Hope in the Midst of Chaos - Daniel 8

The other day I saw a meme that said we should start using 2020 as a verb. So, whenever anything goes terribly wrong we should say, “I really 2020’d that.” 

In all seriousness, this might be one of the wildest years of my life. We started out with the crippling fear and uncertainty of the covid-19 pandemic. We went through several weeks of lockdowns where we were all forced into varying degrees of isolation.

Then we had months of rioting, which caused deep division in our nation. And now we’re living through what is probably one of the craziest elections in American history.

And then to add to the craziness my wife and I had a baby this year. I know there are a few other folks here who have had 2020 babies. I’m sort of looking forward to being able to tell Claire about the year she was born. No doubt this has been an unforgettable year. 

It’s just been so chaotic. Doesn’t our world feel completely out of control? Everyone hopes that on January 1 all of the turmoil will go away, but I don’t know if that’s realistic. The depressing thing is that there’s really no end in sight to any of this. 

But none of this has been a surprise to the Lord. God says in Isaiah 45:7, “I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things.” 

God is in complete control. 

Daniel 8 reiterates this point. God sovereignly ordains every event of human history and nothing takes place outside of his sovereign control. 

Bad Things Will Happen

After we finished reading Daniel 8, you may have been wondering… what did I just read? What is going on?

I got some mileage out of the fact that at the end of Daniel’s vision, he actually says, “I was appalled by the vision and did not understand it.” The man who interpreted king Nebuchadnezzar's dreams doesn’t understand his own vision.

I’ve thought multiple times, if Daniel didn’t understand it, how will I? 

There’s a ram and a goat, apparently some stars fell and then we have something going on with the kings of Media, Persia, and Greece.

Despite all of this we can understand this passage.

Thankfully, we’re able to look back through history and see exactly how his vision was fulfilled - something that Daniel wasn’t able to do since he was prophesying of future events - events that would take place after his death. 

Daniel’s vision here prophesied of well documented historical events hundreds of years prior to them taking place. The specificity of this particular vision is amazing. 

This vision predicted the conquest of the Greek empire under Alexander the Great; his defeat of the Media and Persian empires, his death, and the kingdoms that arose from his death - and one Hellenistic king named Antiochus Epiphanes who persecuted the people of God. 

I want you to have a general sense of what’s going on before we dive into the details of the passage. 

So let’s look at it together. 

Verses 1-14 describe the vision and verses 15-27 give an explanation of it. 

There are two animals in this vision: a ram and a goat. And the vision focuses on specific features on the ram and the goat. It focuses on the two horns of the ram and the singular horn of the goat. The goat is described as having a unicorn style horn.

And from Daniel’s description, initially it appears that the ram is unstoppable. Look at what he says concerning the ram in verse 4. “I saw the ram charging westward and northward and southward. No beast could stand before him, and there was no one who could rescue from his power. He did as he pleased and became great.”

The angel tells Daniel in verse 20 that the two horns of the ram refer to Media and Persia. The Median and Persian empires were superpowers in the ancient near east, what is now the modern day Middle East.

But just as it appears the ram was increasing in power, along comes this powerful goat. 

Look at what happens in verse 7: “I saw him [the goat] come close to the ram, and he was enraged against him and struck the ram and broke his two horns. And the ram had no power to stand before him, but he cast him down to the ground and trampled on him. And there was no one who could rescue the ram from his power.”

So the goat defeats the ram. Again the goat’s horn refers to the great Greek leader Alexander the Great who conquered Media and Persia 200 years after this prophecy.

But then we learn that the goat’s unicorn horn breaks off and four separate horns emerge. Look at Gabriel’s explanation of the goat’s broken horn in verse 22. “As for the horn that was broken, in place of which four others arose, four kingdoms shall arise from his nation, but not with his power.”

The goat’s horn - Alexander the Great - died childless and rather suddenly at the age of 33. And after his death, four other kingdoms arose.

One of those kings who ruled one of those four empires was Antiochus Epiphanes. Antiochus Epiphanes is the little horn that Daniel describes. Historically, Antiochus Ephinanes was a great persecutor of the people of God. 

He was a Hellenistic king who wanted to force Greek culture, particularly Greek polytheistic worship, onto all people in his kingdom. Naturally, this was a problem for the Jewish people. 

He was a very arrogant man and he gave himself the name Epiphanes which means “God manifest.”

Daniel tells us in verse 9 that the little horn had grown “exceedingly great.” Daniel goes on to say that the little horn took, “...some of the stars [and] threw them down to the ground and trampled on them.” 

Here the heaven and stars are symbolic for the people of God. In other words, this “little horn” has thrown down the people of God.

He’s using symbolic language to describe grave persecution for God’s people. But it’s not just physical persecution. It’s religious persecution.

Daniel says that Antiochus Epiphanes challenged the “Prince of the host” - a reference to God himself. 

He says that the “sanctuary was overthrown” and “truth” will be overthrown in verses 11 and 12. In other words, the Jewish temple would be desecrated along with the truth of the Scriptures. 

Again, history records these events. Pigs were ceremonially unclean for the Jewish people but Antiochus Epiphanes sacrificed a pig in the Jewish temple - making a mockery of the worship of God. He abolished Jewish sacrificial system in the temple.  

Antiochus Epiphanes was an oppressive king to the Jewish people. 

There’s a lot of historical detail in Daniel 8 about events that have taken place thousands of years ago. 

Just as a quick recap: Daniel’s vision foretold Alexander the Great’s conquest of Media and Persia, that he would die abruptly, and that four kingdoms would rise from Alexander’s kingdom. One of those kings was Antiochus Epiphanes who persecuted the Jewish people and mocked God. 

It’s all interesting historical detail, but how do we understand this? How does it relate to us living in the year 2020? 

In many ways it challenges what the Apostle Paul says in 2 Timothy 3:16 which says, All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching. There are a few lessons we can learn from Daniel 8.

First is that God’s word never fails. 

Many people would love nothing more than to cast doubt on the reliability of the Bible. People want you to believe that the Scriptures cannot be trusted. 

This actually happened to me when I was in college. I had a professor that told the class that there are other flood accounts similar to the story of Noah’s ark. And his conclusion was that the Israelites stole the story of the flood and that it never happened.

All he was trying to do was cast doubt on the trustworthiness of the Bible. And it is true that there are other flood stories but if multiple sources attest to the same thing then a great flood actually happened! 

Passages like Daniel 8 should increase your confidence that the Word of God is true. Here we have a prophetic vision foretelling well documented historical events hundreds of years before they came to pass. 

If God makes sure he fulfills small historical details like this, why would he lie to you about the big things? Things like miracles. Things like heaven and hell. Things like salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. 

God speaks to us through this book. 

But I think there’s another lesson we can learn from this passage that addresses the nature of Daniel’s vision: sometimes evil flourishes. Sometimes people do bad things and get away with it. 

Daniel’s vision revealed that the people of God were going to suffer greatly. It was terrible news! It was probably something he didn’t want to see. 

It’s like, for me, I don’t want to know everything that happens in the ER. I don’t want to know what a police officer sees on a daily basis. I like being ignorant. I like my bubble. 

If you were Daniel, wouldn’t ignorance be better? Wouldn’t just not knowing what was going to happen to the people of God be preferable? 

Especially when the vision is that bad people are going to do horrible things and get away with it for a period of time. It just doesn’t seem right.

But the reality is that bad people get away with wrongdoing and sometimes evil prevails. We’ve all seen it. 

Why doesn’t good always prevail? Why do people like Antiochus Epiphanes rise to power? Fundamentally, we know that these things take place because of sin. Because Adam and Eve sinned in the garden of Eden, we are all born into sin. We know that sin is the root cause of all that is wrong with this world.

Just because things aren’t going the way we want them to doesn’t mean that God has abdicated his throne.  But doesn’t sin make us long for something better? We all know that this cannot be as good as it gets!

Isn’t it true that bad helps us see good more clearly? Doesn’t injustice make your desire for justice stronger? Doesn’t evil make you long for righteousness? 

If anything good has come out of 2020 it’s this. That we can see clearly that this world isn’t as it should be.

This world is broken by sin and so are you.  Seeing sin, particularly your own sin, helps you see your need for a Savior.

How Should We Respond?

In verses 15-26, the archangel Gabriel is sent to explain the vision to Daniel. He tells Daniel that Antiochus Epiphanes will increase in power through wickedness. 

Verse 24, he’ll grow in power by destroying mighty men and the saints. Verse 25, his cunning and deceit will make him great. But eventually he will be broken by the Prince of Princes or God himself. No kingdom or ruler will last forever. Eventually his time will be up. 

But it raises a question: How do Christians live in and through less than ideal circumstances? How should we respond?

Do we run away? Do we totally capitulate to the culture? No!

We resolve to be totally committed and faithful to God right where we are. It’s really that simple. The world may change, leaders may rise and fall, but Christians are to be faithful to the Lord. 

That’s what Daniel says in verse 27. “And I, Daniel, was overcome and lay sick for some days. Then I rose and went about the king's business” 

Daniel had just received this horrific vision that there would be wars and eventually the Jews would be persecuted. 

What he saw was so bad that it made him sick for some days. But then he rose and went about the king’s business. He had to fulfill his calling and duties. He didn’t wallow. He didn’t complain. Why? Because his relationship with God never changed. His calling never changed. 

And the same is true for you and me. Perhaps you're disappointed with what you see around you. Maybe you're disappointed over the election. Perhaps you're disappointed with the direction of your life.

For the believer, there’s always a mission, there’s always purpose, there’s always a reason to get out of bed in the morning. Fulfill your role or duty and remain committed to Christ. That should never change despite what happens in the world around you.

You see, God has ordained everything that has come to pass. God was never surprised by 2020.

He is controlling human history, but human history isn’t really human history at all. It’s redemptive history. All of history, every event, is a piece of God’s story about drawing people to himself through the saving work of Jesus Christ.   

Redemptive history is human history. Too often we look at the events of this world through the wrong lens.  Sometimes God uses bad things to put you in a position to acknowledge your need for Jesus Christ.

Much of Israel’s history was God’s attempt to bring them to repentance. Despite the events of the world, God never leaves us hopeless.

Daniel’s prophecy was horrible news. But the prophet Isaiah prophesied wonderful news.

Isaiah prophesied that Jesus, “was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and by his wounds we are healed.”

You see, despite our sin and rejection of God Jesus came to earth and died on the cross to reconcile us to God.

Contentment, peace, and happiness are possible even in the midst of chaos if your faith is in Jesus Christ. 

Faithfulness to Jesus Christ should dictate the direction of your life, not the current circumstances you find yourself in or the events of this world.

Jesus can turn your sadness into gladness. He can turn your mourning into dancing. Christ has the power to make ugly things beautiful.

Let’s pray together.