The God of Daniel - The Revealer of Secrets - Chapter 10

 

The God of Daniel – Revealer of Secrets

In the book of Daniel in the Old Testament we find Daniel and his friends living in captivity in Babylon during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. Since they were sons of noblemen they had been chosen to be trained in the sciences of the Babylonians. However, when they go to the Babylonian school for training, they are presented with foods which they are not used to eating, foods that were forbidden in the laws of Moses.

They decide to keep to their convictions and refuse to eat the Babylonian foods, preferring the basically vegetarian diet of their culture. As a result, God blesses them. In the end, they pass their exams in the Babylonian sciences so well that the Bible says,

And in all manner of wisdom and understanding, that the king inquired of them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and astrologers that were in all his kingdom.[1]

In the Psalms we read these promises: 

Thou through thy commandments hast made me wiser than mine enemies: for they are ever with me. I have more understanding than all my teachers: for thy testimonies are my meditation. I understand more than the ancients, because I keep thy precepts.[2]

Those that meditate on God’s Word and follow His precepts are accorded wisdom from on High.

In the process of time, Nebuchadnezzar, the King of Babylon, has a troublesome dream which he cannot remember. He calls for all the wise men in Babylon to divine the dream for him and its interpretation. The wise men protest saying the king could not ask such a thing as it was impossible for them to know the king’s dream, if he himself could not remember it. But the king insists and says, “Tell me the dream and the interpretation of it or you will all be slain.”[3]

It is at this point that Daniel asks the captain of the guard to give him time and he will find out the dream and its meaning. Daniel and his friends get down in desperate prayer and pray that God in His mercies will reveal the dream unto them. Daniel in a vision in the night sees the King’s dream and learns the interpretation of it. And Daniel gives thanks unto God:

Blessed be the name of God forever and ever: for wisdom and might are his: And he changes the times and the seasons: he removes kings, and sets up kings: he gives wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge to them that know understanding: He reveals the deep and secret things: he knows what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with him. I thank you, and praise you, O thou God of my fathers, who has given me wisdom and might, and has made known unto me now what we desired of you: for thou has now made known unto us the king’s matter.[4]

Afterwards when Daniel is before the King, the King asks him if he is able to make known to him his dream and the interpretation thereof. Daniel responds:

The secret which the king has demanded cannot the wise men, the astrologers, the magicians, the soothsayers, show unto the king; But there is a God in heaven that reveals secrets, and makes known to the king Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the latter days.[5] But as for me, this secret is not revealed to me for any wisdom that I have more than any living.[6]

Daniel goes on to explain the dream and its interpretation. The king bows down before him and worships him and says,

Of a truth it is, that your God is a God of gods, and Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets, seeing you could reveal this secret.[7]

Daniel is made ruler over the whole province of Babylon and chief governor over all the wise men of Babylon. His friends are also given positions of authority in the province of Babylon, but Daniel served as the king’s counselor. It was Daniel’s relationship with God; it was his desperation and ability to hear from God, which enabled him to be able to interpret the king’s dream, a prophecy about the future of the world. He might have even taken courage from the story of Joseph which he knew from the book of Genesis which he had studied and memorized as a child and youth. Joseph’s story may have encouraged Daniel that God could do the same with him.

I put this section about Daniel in to reiterate the point that God is a revealer of the future. In fact, the book of Daniel is one of the most important prophecy books in the Bible. A little book with only twelve chapters, it has nearly eight whole chapters given to prophecy and two other chapters given to prayer. One prophecy that Daniel received predicted the year of the Messiah’s death and much of the other prophecy is specifically for the “latter days.”

Notes:

[1] Daniel 1:20

[2] Psalm 119:98-100

[3] Daniel 2:12-13 For this cause the king was angry and very furious, and commanded to destroy all the wise men of Babylon. And the decree went forth that the wise men should be slain; and they sought Daniel and his fellows to be slain.

[4] Daniel 2:20-23

[5] Daniel 2:27-28

[6] Daniel 2:30

[7] Daniel 2:47

To go to the previous chapter click HERE

To go to the next chapter click HERE