Dan. 2
The king of Babylon had strange dreams, but when he awoke, he could not remember what he had dreamed, and he was very troubled. There were men in his court called wise men, who claimed to understand dreams, and to be able to tell the future by the stars or by other ways, so he sent for those men to tell his dream. They came and said they would tell him what his dream meant, if he would only tell them his dream. But the king could not do that, and became very angry because the men claimed to be wise, yet could not tell his dream, and he gave orders to the captain of his guard to have all the wise men killed.
The captain went to get Daniel and the young men with him, who were counted with the wise men. When Daniel learned that the king wanted a dream told, he asked to speak to the king, that he should be given time to consider the matter. The king granted him time, and he went to the other young men, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, to tell them, and said they should all ask God to show the dream.
God did show Daniel, in a vision at night, what the king had dreamed. Daniel was thankful to God, and said,
“Blessed be the name of God forever and ever: for wisdom and might are His.”
Daniel went to the captain and asked to be taken to the king, and told him he could now tell the dream, but not by his own wisdom, but that God had shown it to him. He told the king what he had seen in his dream was a great image, very bright, and fearful to see: the head was of gold; the upper part of the body and the arms, of silver; the lower part of the body, of brass; the legs, of iron; and the feet, of part iron and part day. Then Daniel told him,
“Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet, that were of iron and day, and break them to pieces ... that no place was found for them; and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.”
Daniel told the king that God had also told him what the dream meant, and that it was to show things that were to be in the future. He said to the king, “Thou art this head of gold.”
That meant that this king and nation would have riches and power more than all other nations; but he said the next great kingdom would be like silver, not so rich; the next kingdom would be like brass; the next, strong like iron to conquer, but not as rich; the last kingdom would be like the feet of iron and day, partly strong and partly crumbling, and the rule divided. The stone cut without hands, which fell on the feet of the image and broke the whole image in pieces, and became a great mountain and filled the earth, was the kingdom God would set up on the earth, which would stand forever.
So the dream was like a picture to show the kinds of government there were to be on the earth, from the rule of Babylon until the perfect rule of the Lord Jesus here on earth, but the time has not yet come, but it will in His own time.
ML 06/28/1942