Holy Scriptures and Israel

Guest (Female): Shalom. Holy Scriptures and Israel is a ministry designed to share with the Jewish people the good news of the Lord Jesus, Yeshua the Messiah, and to instruct Christians on the Jewish roots of their faith. And now, teaching God's word from a Hebrew Messianic perspective, here is Gideon Levytam.

Gideon Levytam: I would like everyone please this evening to turn to the second chapter of Daniel. We are going to deal this evening with the second half of this chapter. We have covered so far Daniel chapter two and really verse one to verse 30. I want today to begin to read from chapter two and verse 31 in the reading.

Guest (Male): Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image. This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible. This image's head was of fine gold, his breasts and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay.

Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces. Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.

This is the dream; and we will tell the interpretation thereof before the king. Thou, O king, art a king of kings: for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory. And wheresoever the children of men dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath he given into thine hand, and hath made thee ruler over them all. Thou art this head of gold.

And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee, and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth. And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise.

And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potters' clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay. And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken.

And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay. And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.

Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure. Then the king Nebuchadnezzar fell upon his face, and worshipped Daniel, and commanded that they should offer an oblation and sweet odours unto him.

The king answered unto Daniel, and said, "Of a truth it is, that your God is a God of gods, and a Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets, seeing thou couldest reveal this secret." Then the king made Daniel a great man, and gave him many great gifts, and made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon, and chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon. Then Daniel requested of the king, and he set Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, over the affairs of the province of Babylon: but Daniel sat in the gate of the king.

Gideon Levytam: I often think as I'm reading some of these passages in a public way that when Paul wrote to Timothy, he told him, "Give attendance to the public reading of the word of God." This is something that is very customary in the synagogues even today. If you go to the synagogue today, you will find out that a lot of the times there is a public reading of the word of God.

It is such an important thing to do the public reading. So if someone is not able to read perhaps or somebody is not able to follow up for one reason or another, the word of God has gone forth and that is sufficient. Even if we do not speak at all or expound the word of God, there is blessing in listening to the word of God. That's why often time it is encouraged to all of us not only to read the word of God individually, but also to read the word of God in our families with our wives, with our husbands, and even with our children, to give attendance to the public reading of the word of God. It's a blessing to read the word of God even if we do not say anything anymore; it is sufficient to read the scriptures.

Now, tonight we'll say a little bit more. We'll spend some time talking on Daniel chapter two. Let me just give you some reminders from our last meeting together. You remember we said last week that the title of chapter two really is Nebuchadnezzar's dream. Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, had this great dream. In the ordinary way for him, he would dream in the past, he would dream a dream and he would call the wise men of Babylon and ask them to come to give them the interpretation of the dream. He would tell them what he was dreaming, and they would come up with some kind of an idea, go to the king, and say to him, "Here is the interpretation of the dream."

But at this particular point, King Nebuchadnezzar did not want to reveal to these wise men of Babylon the dream which he dreamed. This time he did not want only to hear the interpretation of the dream; he wanted also that the wise men of Babylon would show him the dream itself. He gathered them around and asked them, "Tell me now my dream and the interpretation." And they said to him, "King Nebuchadnezzar, tell us the dream and we're going to tell you the interpretation."

Nebuchadnezzar says, "No, I want you this time to show me the dream as well as the interpretation." They were not able to give him an answer. And so they came to him and said there was no such a thing, that no king would ever ask such a thing of his people. That got him mad. It got him so mad that he was ready to destroy the whole company of the wise men of Babylon. Some of these leaders among the Babylonians happened to be also those four Jewish boys which came from Judea.

And so they were running to gather all the wise men of Babylon to destroy them. We discovered in our last session together that Daniel as well was one of them. Daniel immediately went to Arioch and told him that he is able. "Take me to the king. I am able to show the king the interpretation." He brought him in, if you remember, the testimony of Daniel from verse 24 to verse 30. Notice what the king said to him in verse 26. The king answered and said unto Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar, "Art thou able to make known unto me the dream which I have seen, and the interpretation thereof?"

Daniel noticed immediately before he began to tell him that he is able, notice what he says. Daniel answered in the presence of the king and he said, "The secret which the king has demanded cannot the wise men, the astrologers, the magicians, the soothsayers, show unto the king." He put things on the level. He says, "King Nebuchadnezzar, no one is able to show you this dream. You have been expecting from the wise men, the astrologers, the magicians, and the soothsayers to show you the dream. I want to tell you, nobody is able to tell you this."

But he says in verse 28, "There is a God. There is a God in heaven." Daniel is now directing the attention of Nebuchadnezzar to the God of heaven. Why the God of heaven? For two reasons. Number one, because at that time after the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, the Shekinah glory had departed and had been ascended and taken away from Jerusalem and from the temple. God's immediate presence in that city, in that particular time, did not exist and God returned to heaven.

But also, the Babylonians believed that all their gods were gods that had been out of this earth. Daniel said, "Listen, there is no one here in this earth that can show you this dream, but there is a God in heaven. There is a God in heaven that revealeth secrets and maketh known to King Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the latter days." Now, I want you to underline this word that it says in verse 28: "what shall be in the latter days."

This is very important to understand this dream. Why? Because he was revealing now to Nebuchadnezzar concerning future days. These things will take the human race all the way up to the second coming of the Messiah, all the way up to the Messianic kingdom, all the way up to the destruction of this world and the coming of the Messiah to judge this world in righteousness. That is as far as it was going.

What he is saying in this chapter is that this God which is in heaven is going to reveal to you things that will happen in the latter days. Now notice what he says in verse 28 at the end: "Thy dream, and the visions of thy head upon thy bed, are these." And verse 29 he said, "As for thee, O king, thy thoughts came into thy mind upon thy bed," listen to this expression, "what should come to pass hereafter." Nebuchadnezzar was laying in bed and he wanted to know what is going to be the future. He wanted to know what shall be hereafter.

And He that revealeth secrets maketh known to thee what shall come to pass. Again he is speaking about the future, not what had come to pass but what shall come to pass, taking us to the future days. And verse 30, if you remember, that is where we ended: "But as for me, this secret is not revealed to me for any wisdom that I have more than any living, but for their sakes that shall make known the interpretation to the king, and that thou mightest know the thoughts of thine heart." Nebuchadnezzar's heart and the thoughts on his mind was: what's going to be in the latter days? What is next? What is going to be in the future?

And so now this evening we are going to continue from verse 31 on and we are going to go into the dream and the interpretation itself. Now, let's pause here for a minute and I just want to show you this. No, that's in Hebrew. Yeah, that's English. Now, I want you to look at this with me, please. You notice that this is a chart that has to do with the whole prophetic book of Daniel, chapter by chapter.

We of course today, after finishing chapter one, have seen the introductory and the moral condition that existed in the time where God allowed Nebuchadnezzar to take the people of Israel to Babylon. That was chapter one. It was the introduction to the whole book of Daniel, how they have been taken down to Babylon, what happened in Babylon, and how they had been committed to the God of their fathers, the God of Israel. We are interested right now in this second chapter.

The second chapter is really, notice this, the verse that is found in Luke chapter 21, this expression: "the times of the Gentiles." This is an expression that the Lord Jesus the Messiah had given to us, the times of the Gentiles. This is dealing with the whole history of Gentile control since God handed over the control of the kingdoms in this world to the Gentile nations. It had been from 586 BC, some say 605, from the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem where all the Jewish people have been taken captive by the Babylonians, up till the second coming of the Messiah.

This is important to understand. Up till the second coming of the Messiah to rule over this world, to become the King of the Jews, the King of Israel, and the Jewish people restored back to the land and to the Messiah. If you notice, chapter two begins with the head of this great image and it is going all the way down to the feet, which we are going to read in a minute, and the stone that had fallen upon those ten toes upon the feet and destroyed the whole image. Really, that takes us from the time where the Jewish people have been taken captive all the way down to the second coming. This is the time of the end.

If you also notice that there is a break. You don't see it in the image that I gave you, but there is a break in between the thighs and the feet. That break is including the present age or the church period from the cross until the rapture of the church, and even until the end of the tribulation period which is seven years, as we studied in the book of Revelation. Keep the light off. One more picture I want to show you, which you actually have in your hands already. I am just going to show you this before we go through it.

This is the image itself. Notice that I linked it together; in other words, you don't have that break in that image. In this picture, I put it together so it can look exactly as Nebuchadnezzar has seen that image. One image complete from head to toe. One image. But the break is somewhere here, and that break already has about 2,000 years of what we know as the assembly, the church age, the church of the living God beginning from Acts chapter two up till the time where the Lord Jesus the Messiah will catch up or will call all believers to meet Him in the air.

After this, He will come with His own as the judge of this world at the end of the seven-year tribulation to restore Israel and to judge the nations of this world. Okay, you can turn the light back on. Every one of you has in your hand the image that Nebuchadnezzar has seen. Now, if you notice that you yourself do not have the four colors that I have here on this picture. You have written down next to the head and the breast and the belly and the legs the four colors, so you can paint it in your own time so you can see it more clearly, but you have it with you so you can look at this as we go through these points.

Now, let's begin. Chapter two, verse 31 to verse 35 is Daniel telling the dream. First of all, verse 31. In verse 31, Daniel shows the king what he saw. Listen, verse 31: "Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image. This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible." Let's pause here for a second. The first thing that Daniel tells King Nebuchadnezzar is this: "King Nebuchadnezzar, you have seen a huge image." That is what you have seen.

Notice there is a progress here. This image was a unique image. It says in verse 31 it was great, it was bright, it stood, and then it said that it was terrible. Notice the progress. He says, "Nebuchadnezzar, you saw a great image which was bright, which was standing, it was not sitting, and it was a terrible sight to behold." When he was dreaming at night, God revealed to him that great image which was so bright, which was so large, and it was so terrible. The expression here for the word "terrible," it was an awesome sight to see. That is what you have seen, Nebuchadnezzar, in verse 31.

Then in verse 32 and verse 33, he gives him the composition of the image. What was it made out of? Notice in verse 32 and 33: "This image's head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay." You notice how interesting? Now, he gives him the composition of the image which he had seen: gold, silver, brass, and iron, and partly iron and partly clay. Notice this composition. It was made out of these various types of material.

Now, as you notice that when you look at that image, it is very interesting that it has some increases and some decreases. There are certain things that we want to point out. First of all, you notice there is a decrease in the value of the metal: gold, silver, brass, iron, and clay. In my other one it is easier to see: gold, silver, brass, iron, and clay. It's very interesting. There is a decrease in the value of the metal. Gold is worth much more.

Secondly, you notice there is another decrease. It does not start from the feet to the head in the order in which he presents it. He presents it from the head. It's a downward course. There is a decrease from the head, the breast, the thighs, the legs, and the feet. This is the decrease. There is a decrease in value and there is a decrease in position from the head all the way down to the feet. Somebody also said, and I marked that for myself, there's also a decrease in the gravity. The gold gravity is 19. Silver is 11. Brass is 8.5. And iron is 7.8. Don't ask me anything about it. This is exactly what I have listened to in a message about the second chapter of Daniel.

Guest (Female): You have been listening to the Holy Scriptures and Israel with Gideon Levytam. Gideon teaches God's word from a Hebrew Messianic perspective. For more information about this ministry, write to Holy Scriptures and Israel, Box 1411, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, L0S 1J0, or visit our website at holyscripturesandisrael.com.

You are also invited to Gideon's weekly Bible teaching on Fridays at 11:00 AM and 7:00 PM, and Saturdays at 1:00 PM at Willowdale Christian Assembly Hall, 28 Martin Ross Avenue in Toronto. Holy Scriptures and Israel is made possible by your prayers and financial support. If you would like to support the program, visit holyscripturesandisrael.com. God bless you. Shalom, shalom.