Read Daniel 8:15-27
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!As Daniel was seeking God, he suddenly noticed a figure standing before him. The figure had the appearance of being a man. It looked human, but it wasn’t. Angels have the ability to take on the appearance of humans, even though they are spiritual beings.
This wasn’t just any ole angel though, this angel was named Gabriel. (vs. 16) Daniel, standing along the banks of the Ulai, contemplating this very disturbing vision, now sees a figure of a man standing in front of him and he hears another man’s voice coming from between the banks of the canal.
The voice called out to Gabriel and gave Gabriel the command to “make this man understand the vision”. Let’s break this down before we move on. First of all, the voice Daniel heard was the voice of God.
Gabriel is an angel of the Lord. There are several times where the Bible records God sending angels to humans with messages. This is actually the first recorded time in the Bible where Gabriel is mentioned as God’s entrusted messenger, he visits Daniel again in chapter 9. So Gabriel is the one who makes “huge” announcements on God’s behalf. In this case he is the one who reveals the meaning of the vision to Daniel. God can and will reveal his word to us in different ways.
Gabriel’s name literally brings together two hebrew words, the first is geber which means “mighty man” and the other is el which is God in hebrew. Put them together it’s mighty man of God. Pretty cool. In Luke 1:19 Gabriel himself says that he stands in the presence of God.
Verse 16 is beautiful, Daniel got to see and hear first hand, God commanding one of his angels to help Daniel. We have the Holy Spirit who reveals to us the meaning of God’s heart to us. In this case it is the angel who will give understanding. Daniel just experienced the heavy weight and burden of seeing this vision, he was left feeling confused and didn’t understand everything that was going on, so God commanded his angel Gabriel to “make him understand”. God needed Daniel to understand this vision. His understanding of what he saw was a requirement, it was necessary. The people of God need to understand this prophecy.
With the command Gabriel goes over to where Daniel was standing, as he got closer to Daniel, Daniel became terrified. He became so terrified that he fell on his face. This is not an unusual reaction. Everytime an angel comes near a human in the Bible, they become afraid and many fall down onto their faces, he kneels down with his face to the ground. Gabriel comes directly from the presence of God, all that holiness must be overwhelming.
The angel begins to speak to Daniel, telling him that he needs to understand this vision because it contains details of how it will be during the end times. That is when Daniel faints. The description is that he was in a deep sleep. Well, that is sort of what passing out is, right? Going into a state of unconsciousness. But, Gabriel touched him and stood him upright. He touched him and brought him back to consciousness.
Gabriel begins to explain to Daniel the meaning of what he saw. He also mentions that he will make known to him what will happen in the latter time of the indignation; for at the appointed time the end shall be. This is actually a “dual” prophecy. It covers both the time of Antiochus and it extends through the future to the coming antichrist. The angel is revealing the meaning of the Greek empire and the coming end times of which Jesus sets up his kingdom.
KJV uses the word indignation, so let’s look at that word. Indignation means anger or annoyance provoked by what is perceived as unfair treatment. Another definition is anger or extreme anger, mingled with contempt, disgust or abhorrence.
God will become angry and when he does it will lead to judgement. What is it that God will become angry with? The biggest thing people do to cause God’s anger to rise is reject him. When a nation, whether its Israel or America or any other nation, rejects God, God will begin his judgement on that nation. One of the ways he does this is by putting into power bad leaders who will create abominable laws and who will persecute the righteous. The bad leaders are appointed by God for the purpose of chastising his people. Do you see any similarities with what is happening in our nation today?
We can read example after example of Israel experiencing periods of great peace followed by times of great suffering. It seems like people get relaxed, they begin to take God for granted during the peaceful times. It’s so easy to allow your convictions to be compromised because you think everything is going well and you let your guard down and the next thing you know you’ve rejected God.
The Jews began to compromise their faith, they began to join in with the perverted practices of the Greeks. In the beginning of Daniel, Daniel resolved that he would not allow his convictions to be compromised, he stood firm and refused to bend. Unfortunately, not too many people have this same resolve. I have been warning you all for the past few weeks, to be in prayer now over what you will and will not compromise. You need to make your mind up now, don’t wait until it’s too late.
We’ve already covered verses 20-22 in our previous discussions. Verses 23-25 is where Gabriel reveals the dual prophecy. He is talking about Antiochus, and the coming antichrist. We know this because at the end of verse 25 it says, “But he shall be broken without human means”. Jesus is the one who will remove him from power.
Once the vision was understood, Gabriel told Daniel to seal up the vision. He was to write it down, he was required to preserve it because it would be many, many years before it would be fulfilled. Everything with the exception of verse 25, has come true. Every single detail about the Medo-Persian and Greek empires has come to pass down to the smallest detail.
The Bible is truth, the words written in it are truth. We just spent the last several weeks comparing this prophecy to history. Mostly because this happened during “between testament times” so we didn’t have a choice, but it allowed us to learn the truth.
We’ve been given the truth of what our future holds. We are given “heads up” for how to escape the coming judgement. It’s pretty clear, If you accept Jesus you will be given eternal life, to deny Jesus is eternal death.
I want to be very clear, if you’ve been following the news, forget about the source, if you’ve been following any reports of what is happening in our nation, then you should be aware of the changes coming to this nation. If you are one of God’s holy ones, now is the time to search your hearts and make sure that you are in fact “a holy one”, because God is going to separate his true children from the imposters and you need to make sure that every sin has been reconciled.
What are we receiving corrections for? Well, we’ve done a pretty crappy job of influencing this nation toward the kingdom of heaven. We’ve allowed laws to be passed that should have never been. We allowed the government to do what it wants, knowing full well it contradicts the word of God. We’ve spent more time opposing political parties, than we have going to battle for God.
The verse in 2 Chronicles 7:14 has been quoted so much over the past year. You all know it, it’s the one that talks about humbling yourself, praying, seeking God’s face and oh yeah, turning from your wicked ways. I have to say I see very little evidence that anyone has really taken this to heart. It seems to me that emotions would not be so high right now if this verse was taken literally and obeyed.
If you are not one of God’s holy children, then you are going to be judged. This is imminent, this is what I sense is happening right now. Many prophets have said that we are headed into a time of correction. This nation is going to receive correction and it depends on what side of heaven you belong in that dictates what that is going to look like.
