I beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him: thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him: the judgment was set, and the books were opened.
Daniel 7:9-10
The visions given to the prophet Daniel were so specific and detailed that some unbelieving skeptics refuse to accept that they were written hundreds of years before the events unfolded. They claim that instead the book of Daniel was written by unknown scribes who lived centuries after Daniel died. But God perfectly knows the end from the beginning, and it was no challenge for Him to speak through dreams and visions in a complete foretelling of the great empires of that age. The progression from the Babylonians to the Persians to the Greeks to the Romans were written down long before they happened. The descriptions of those kingdoms matched exactly how they developed and grew.
The most important part of Daniel’s prophecies is not about the human kingdoms at all, but of the Divine kingdom that will come in the end. The return of Jesus and His rule over the world is not a metaphor or a fantasy, but a settled reality. The main thing we are to take away from Daniel and the other prophecies is not the timing of the events or the identity of all the nations and leaders, but that God has already determined the final outcome and promised and dedicated His power to see that it happens. “Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform this” (Isaiah 9:7).
