Light on the Hill

Guest (Male): God's prediction in Daniel chapter 11 was perfect, and that should serve to bolster our confidence in God's word. That's next on Light on the Hill.

Guest (Male): I have found. The peace only comes from you. I have found. The joy only comes from you. Cuz all I need is you.

Guest (Male): Welcome to Light on the Hill, a ministry of Calvary Chapel Signal Hill. Today we're going to pick up where we left off in Daniel chapter 11. Have you ever had a friend or family member question the accuracy of God's word? Maybe you have some doubts yourself. Well, when you carefully study a passage like this and see how prophecy has been fulfilled with such remarkable accuracy, it leaves no doubt that the Bible really is true. Here's Pastor James Kaddis.

James Kaddis: So what I decided to do, I I've been very for lack of a better term, shall we just say schizophrenic with um if I might if I might be risky enough to use that term with Daniel chapter 11, I've had a lot of debate in my mind as in to how to treat it. Because with Daniel 11, it is, in my opinion, perhaps historically one of the most accurate prophetic documents in existence. Um it it is uh pretty remarkable. There's so much that it actually deals with. And as a matter of fact, Daniel 11 is one of those passages where it's probably a good idea that I have something in front of me because it keeps me from getting ultra distracted and going down a whole bunch of rabbit trails.

But my initial thought was that I was going to try to teach Daniel 11 all in one day. Um and quickly I realized that's just a terrible idea. And then so I thought that I was going to break it up in maybe two studies, and actually I was going to teach through the first 20 verses today, and I thought that um that was a great idea until a little bit later or earlier today where I realized that's a terrible idea because there's just so much that's there. So I may do it in probably three or four uh different studies.

Here's the reason why. Let me just give you a quick little summary and then we'll pray, and then we'll go over it. Daniel is Daniel 11 is really unique in that um Daniel speaks about several Persian kings um at the very beginning of chapter 11. And then as he deals with the several Persian kings, the last of the Persian kings, by the way, he mentions is um is Artaxerxes or Xerxes the Ahasuerus, which for those of you that might remember that name, that is the name of the king of Persia that we read about in the book of Esther.

Okay? So if you think about it, Esther is clearly post-exilic period. Esther is um easily easily easy a lot of years away from the time of uh Daniel. And Daniel is touching up on some of this stuff hundreds of years before it's actually happening. As a matter of fact, there's one date that I'm going to have you guys remember, and that's going to be 536 BC. And the reason why I want you to remember that date is because that's when presumably these predictions are being made. And if you understand when these predictions are being made, you're going to have a deeper and better understanding or appreciation for the accuracy of um of the word here as Daniel brings it forth.

So um the last of the Persian kings, and we'll actually talk about that in the first four verses that we go over today. I I Yes, that's right. I'm sticking only four verses because I wanted to stop and to talk about Alexander the Great. And of course, if you remember the story of the Ahasuerus, he did something that was uh an error, and that was he tried to defeat um Alexander the Great. That was a huge problem. He probably shouldn't have done that. Um and of course, in doing so, uh we know that Alexander the Great's um empire basically grew and grew and grew as a result because he pretty much ate up the Persian empire.

Now um it's interesting because the life of Alexander is really unique. And um we're going to get into the four generals that Alexander the Great gave his uh uh gave his empire to. Now I will probably I was going to talk about this later on in the study, but I might as well talk about it now so that you have a picture of this. As many of you may know already, Alexander the Great actually had two children that were murdered at a very young age, and then he had an uncle likewise that was also murdered.

So when he died, the empire that he was going to leave to, he had no family members to leave it to, and he left it specifically to four generals that were the most prominent during the time that he was ruling. And the two specific generals that we're going to focus on over virtually all of Daniel chapter 11 will be Ptolemy um and uh I I always say Ptolemy just there's a whole reason why and I'll explain that later. Um uh some people say Ptolemy. But um is that general and of course Seleucid. And it's interesting because when you talk about the Ptolemies and the Seleucids, uh Daniel chapter 11 literally through the next 25 verses will speak about the wars and the battles that existed between those two empires.

And the reason why that's really specific and the reason why that's really important to know and to understand and to make a connection with is because those two specific empires were the empires that had control over um all of this area that's in Israel and around Israel. One of the generals controlled uh the more southern section, which of course um we're talking about Egypt. We're talking about all of that area in the Sinai. We're talking about the southern portion of what would be Israel today. Uh this is where we're leaning towards Gaza and a certain area that would be further east.

And then the Seleucids uh were the ones that ruled the area that was all around north of that including Syria, Turkey, and parts of Asia Minor. And so the conflict between those two kings was very well documented in Daniel chapter 11. So I haven't even opened up in prayer yet and look at how uh involved I'm already getting here in trying to lay down what's going on. Now my my philosophy in going over this somewhat exhaustively with you guys is to be able to get you to appreciate the dead-on accuracy of Daniel 11. Like that's the thing that I really need you to capture here because the accuracy of this is so remarkable.

It's so powerful that if anybody is willing to just simply listen and follow the facts as they are laid out here, there's no way you can argue that God's word is inaccurate or God's word is not true. As a matter of fact, it's interesting Daniel chapter 11 is the sole reason why there were a lot of people that actually believed that this wasn't the Daniel of the 530 period. That this was a Daniel that had to have existed during the time of Christ who wrote this because of just how insanely accurate it was. And by the way, there were even lots of scholars who were beginning to believe that lie until of course the time of the Dead Sea Scrolls where fragments of this was actually found and proven to have existed.

The dating of those scrolls happened to be prior to the uh prophecies that we read about uh specifically as it relates to uh the Grecian empire. And as it relates to the later part of the Persian empire. So this is such um interesting stuff as as we look at it. And all of this can be established uh very very significantly, right? It's it's really important. So that brings us to an issue that I promised we would talk about when we got into verse one of chapter 11. There is one technicality that I want to discuss with you, and that is the technicality of verse one here of chapter 11.

Now on purpose I did not do this last week because um clearly we did not have the time. And even on last week I I I ran out of time and I didn't want to go too much over because I knew how much more complicated things would get as a result. So I just thought that I would dedicate that to the beginning here. You will notice that when we read verse one of chapter 11, it says, also I in the first year of Darius the Mede, even I stood to confirm and to strengthen him. Now um a lot of people uh will look at this, I being very much included in that category, and I'm very puzzled as in to why the translators when they translated this put verse one of chapter 11 into chapter 11.

I think that verse one should have been put at the end of chapter 10. And let me tell you why. Because number one, not only does it create confusion, and when I say confusion, I mean immense confusion, right? But number two, it causes people to start questioning the dating of the document when the document is actually written. And I tell you why this becomes a real problem. The way generally the mindset as in to how the chapters were broken up in Daniel is something that I knew we were going to have to get to, but I decided very conveniently to wait until we got to chapter 11 in order to do this.

And by the way, you can thank Andy Woods for being a pain uh in my behind uh because if I hadn't listened to something that he said, then it wouldn't have triggered me to second guess one other line of thinking which made me reconsider um literally how much time I was going to spend on this. And I've decided to kind of go whole hog on it because of the nature of how confusing it is. Uh Andy, if you're listening to me, which you're probably not, but if you are, you know what? I got some words for you later.

Anyway, God bless him. The the problem is he shouldn't be so I wish he wasn't so brilliant. If he wasn't, then maybe life would be easier for me. Uh he challenges me a lot of times on a lot of levels, and it's good. So we have to go back to how all of these chapters started. Now when these chapters were translated, when Daniel was translator, remember, Daniel in the Bible is um uh is is put together with two different languages. Okay? Daniel is written partially in Aramaic, and Daniel is also written in Hebrew. And one of the things that we have to understand is the significance of the language that's being communicated doesn't really write or play much into how each of the chapters are started, but it is consequential in being able to understand the timing and the dating of all of the chapters.

Now there's a couple of things that I had already pointed out that I should reiterate to you regarding each of these chapters. The first point that I bring up is when you go through all through Daniel's chapter one through six, it's kind of a different section of the book than what you would read in Daniel chapter seven on because when you get into Daniel one through six, Daniel one through six is a summary of all of the life of Daniel and all of the things that Daniel went throughout his life. When you get into Daniel chapter seven and you carry it all the way through to the end, that is a summary of all of the prophecies of Daniel.

So some of the things that you'll see all throughout the chapters from chapter seven all the way out through chapter 12 will be reflected in the time period that existed somewhere in between chapters one through six if that makes any kind of sense. So Daniel's lifespan is rehearsed to us in chapters one through six as it's also rehearsed to us in chapter seven through 12. Now that's important to note because when you understand that thing, you recognize one section of it are prophecies, the other section of it is um uh in essence uh stories that relate to significant moments or key moments in Daniel's life.

Now don't get me wrong. When you go over some of these prophecy passages, you'll also find very key moments in Daniel's life. Like for example, one of the key moments in Daniel life that we talked about yesterday or last week was the fact that Daniel was very very disturbed. He was very very bothered. And it's very likely the reason why Daniel was bothered at the very beginning and was fasting because he was going through um uh uh just a real uh hard time was because Daniel, of course, was in his uh late 80s, probably early 90s at this point.

There's no way he would have been able to be a part of the repatriation of his homeland at that age. And so as a result, he made the decision, at least these are the assumptions that we're making, he made the decision to retire uh in the place that he knew he would be the most effective. And that is as a official in the Persian empire. And of course, understanding the effect that he would have upon the Persian people and upon the governments uh that existed throughout the 10 years of all of their administrations would have been a very significant one.

And so um around the time, remember I keep telling you to focus in on 536, you got to keep in mind around 538 or 537, which is two years prior up to two years prior, you've got this young man by the name of Ezra who's actually coming in and is uh getting in the process of rebuilding the temple for the purpose of dedicating the rebuilding of the temple so that the people uh of Jerusalem would find uh focus in order to continue to repatriate their nation and to in essence rebuild the walls and so on and so forth.

Of course, as we see happening in the story of Nehemiah. As a matter of fact, it's interesting uh we keep talking about all of these uh Xerxes rulers. Uh we learn about Artaxerxes Longimanus a little bit more at length who is a very very important ruler uh that Daniel does actually make reference to in chapter nine of Daniel who is the one who makes a declaration to restore and rebuild Jerusalem which will which actually happens almost 100 years after Daniel speaks here in in chapter 11 and uh uh right at 100 years after he speaks in chapter nine.

So these are all very important things to be able to understand. Now with that said, the way that Daniel started every single chapter is he started it providing for us something to allow us to have a dating. Okay? Of the time that he's actually talking. I'll give you an example of this. Go back to Daniel chapter one. Let's go there really really quickly, and then we'll we'll do this with the next several chapters so that you can see this because it happens um everywhere. And I think it's um I think it 's pretty important he does it pretty much everywhere.

Okay? If you look at Daniel chapter one, he says, in the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim. Look what he does in chapter two. He says, and in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. And then as you go on to the many other chapters that he starts off, he um will start those chapters off uh declaring what year it actually was that he was talking about. So when you get into uh chapter four uh for example, he talks about um uh three and four. He talks about Nebuchadnezzar ruling. And uh the understanding is the year of his ruling, and the time of his ruling is being specified here.

But then when you get into the next chapter, chapter five, he begins to name other kings. And he tells us uh in essence by naming the kings a better understanding of the dating and how it actually worked. When you get into the next chapter, notice he's mentioning kings. Every single chapter is starting off by the mentioning of a king. Sometimes he'll talk about what year the king reigned in. In other times he won't. And often more times than not he will talk about the year that the king reigned in that he mentions in the beginning of his uh prophecy.

Look at the beginning of chapter seven. He says in the first year of Belshazzar, king of Babylon. Uh and and in chapter eight, the third year of the reign of king Belshazzar. Uh look at chapter nine. He talks about the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus. Okay? So all of these are all uh uh very interesting references. And then of course we talked about chapter 10 last week where he says the third in the third year uh of Cyrus, king of Persia. So this is all very interesting as Daniel brings this up because when you get into Daniel chapter 11, he says also, in the first year of Darius the Mede, even I stood to confirm and to strengthen him.

So this this is very confusing because you have the mention of Cyrus at the beginning of chapter 10, but then at the beginning of chapter 11 you have what is presumably the same mention of the same king, just taking on a different name. Cyrus and Darius were believed to be the same people, right? But he mentions this king, and he talks about him in a very specific year. So if you were to read this, then this would be very confusing because what you would in essence do is you would place the dating of what you're actually reading to be somewhere in the neighborhood of probably 534 BC.

Well, the problem with that is we know that this is actually 536 BC because the phenomenon that's happening in verse one of chapter 11 is the angel is basically talking here, and it's not Daniel who's talking. And I think that that's very important to understand. Okay? So the point behind what I'm trying to say is as the angel gives Daniel this picture of everything that's happening, he ends his statement not by verse 21 that we read here in chapter 10. He ends it by verse one of chapter 11. And what is he saying? Well, let's read the last verse of chapter 10 which says, verse 21, but I will show thee that which is uh that which is noted in the scripture of truth.

And there is none that holdeth with me in these things but Michael, your prince. Also I in the first year Darius the Mede, even I stood to confirm and to strengthen him. In other words, he mentions Michael, the Archangel, and says, by the way, Michael was also the one during that time that was with me throughout the time of uh Darius in order to fight the prince of Persia. Okay? So he's he's not making it about the king per se. He's saying, hey um this is not my first time at the rodeo. Is what he's telling Daniel.

He's telling Daniel, we've had many of these fights in the in the world that you cannot see. And by the way, Michael was also with me when we were doing some fighting over this same king that Daniel mentions in the beginning of chapter 10. So what you have to understand is this is uh a note that that is being made by the angel basically identifying um uh Michael, the Archangel, as being his partner in the battle as they were fighting the fallen angel that we read about who was the one who was uh in essence the the one who was assigned to the area of Persia.

So this is kind of an interesting note because then the natural question that anybody might ask is, well then how do you get to the starting of uh chapter 11 then? There's no mention of a king. And my response is exactly because chapter 11 is literally a continuation of chapter 10. He's not going to mention that because he's still talking about the same king and the same vision that's been given to him. Chapter 11 shows us how the message was actually delivered and the setting that the message was delivered in. Chapter 11 tells us exactly what the message is.

Makes sense?

Guest (Male): You've been listening to Pastor James Kaddis on Light on the Hill and part of our new study in the book of Daniel. Pastor James will be right back with more. There are a few ways you can listen to today's message again or catch up on what you may have missed in the series. We post all of our programs to lightonthehillradio.com as well as oneplace.com. You'll also find Light on the Hill on most of the major podcast platforms like Apple, Spotify, and Google. We also have an app that makes listening to messages easy to do on any of your mobile devices.

Just search for Calvary Chapel Signal Hill in the App Store or Google Play. We're thankful to the Lord for the listeners that come alongside us with their prayers or financial support. It helps us do what we do every day. If you'd like to make a donation to the ministry today, visit lightonthehillradio.com. You can also give through the Light on the Hill app. Start following James Kaddis on X, Instagram, and YouTube throughout the week. He shares biblical encouragement and videos that deal with current events and Bible prophecy. You can also explore the Countdown to Eternity program for even more biblical encouragement in this area.

You'll find that at countdown the number two eternity.com and at oneplace.com. We left off at verse two in Daniel chapter 11. Let's return there now. Let's get into chapter uh 11 uh verse two. It says this, and now will I show thee the truth? Behold, there shall stand up yet three kings in Persia, and the fourth shall be far richer than they all. And by his strength, through his riches, he shall stir up against the realm of Grecia. Now of course, I talked about these kings already to you guys. I thought that it was um very important to kind of discuss them.

And um uh the last of the kings or the one that was most significant is of course going to be the Xerxes that we read about in the book of Esther. Of course, this being Ahasuerus. Now this is really interesting to understand because um by the way, if you're if you're curious to know uh what kings uh these are, uh this would of course be related to we see the line of everybody, right? Darius the First. There are a few other kings that that were along that line that he's actually talking about, all very significant.

But the one most significant to us here is the one that tried to railroad the Grecian empire which of course uh would have been Ahasuerus. This is the same king, by the way, that uh you read about in the book of Esther. And that's kind of a really important thing. Okay? And so there's a lot to say about uh who uh Xerxes was and what he did. But just remember, this king was looking for vengeance. Okay? He was looking to destroy uh the Grecian empire uh because of a previous battle that was lost by one of his predecessors who actually was his father in essence and um and and wanted to find vengeance for that very thing actually happening.

Of course, that uh backfired tremendously. It did not work well for him, and it was a very very uh it created for him a very very difficult uh situation. Okay? And so um uh by the way, uh that would be Cambyses uh Smerdis. Oh, I always I always mess that name up. Uh Smerdis. Uh I can I can say it in the in the in the Persian way. Uh Smerdis. Uh and then uh of course uh Bardiya. So these some of these kings were uh again, you you probably wouldn't know them. They wouldn't even be of any consequence to you.

One of those kings actually ruled for less than a year. Um but they they were all the ones that were predicted here in chapter 11. So something to just note here. Okay? So verse three, it says this. It says, and a mighty king shall stand up uh that shall rule with great dominion and do according to his will. By the way, this is interesting because the one thing that we should probably talk about when it comes to uh uh this whole situation is that um he was brutal. Okay? Uh Alexander the Great was one of these guys that did a lot.

He was a guy that was just I mean he was a force to be reckoned with. And the king, of course, that's being referred to here is none other than Alexander the Great. By the way, we know this because Alexander the Great is mentioned all over Daniel. He's mentioned indirectly in Daniel chapter two uh right at verse 32. That's when the statue is actually described by Daniel in the dream that uh Nebuchadnezzar has. Then you see it specifically mentioned in chapter two verse 39. You see it later on mentioned in Daniel chapter seven uh right around either verse five or six.

And then of course uh Alexander the Great is also mentioned and his four generals, believe it or not, in Daniel chapter eight. So um uh of course it it goes without saying he was Greek. He was the one that pretty much put an end to the uh Medo-Persian empire. We often times refer to it as the Persian empire because of all of this. And so it is interesting to look at the story of how the Persian empire was actually overthrown. It was destroyed in Nineveh uh right around 331. And so um when you think about all of these kings and who they were and where things went, it begins to make a lot of sense.

There's much more to come in our study of Daniel, so join us each day for Light on the Hill. Remember, you are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. This program is brought to you by Calvary Chapel Signal Hill.

Guest (Male): I have found. The peace only comes from you. I have found. The joy only comes from you. Cuz all I need is you.