Chapter 8 presents the second of Daniel’s prophetic dreams, sharpening the focus and details upon the two kingdoms in the near future, along with one king who will arise out of the aftermath – someone so awful that he points the way to the future Antichrist. God could show Daniel these things, because God knows these things. Our God knows everything about the future, and He has a plan for it all!

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Although some of the pictures (signs) in Revelation 12 are strange, the main idea is clear: God wins; the devil loses. Every attack made by the devil on the people God has chosen to protect, fails. The devil is a loser. How comforting it is to know that the God we worship is the God who holds us fact and protects us from the enemy!

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In the latter chapters of Daniel, the Bible provides several versions of prophetic ‘roadmaps’ helping us see the big picture of what God has in store for this world. Different kingdoms would rise and fall, and it would look worse before it got better. But when God’s kingdom came, it would be good…and it would never go away.

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At the end of Chapter 11, the seventh trumpet announces the worst judgments this physical world has ever seen. Even in this, God is to be praised, as John sees in heaven. Is our God a God of wrath? Yes, and righteously so. But praise God we are saved from His wrath through Jesus Christ!

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Daniel needed deliverance. Although King Darius tried to provide it, he couldn’t. Although he was the most powerful man in the world at the time, Darius could do nothing to deliver his friend from certain death. The Lord God has no such limitations. He is the God who delivers!

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Revelation 11 introduces the reader to two supernaturally-empowered witnesses of God, sent to preach His word to a hostile world during the Great Tribulation. Like these two men, we also have a holy calling from God to be witnesses of Jesus Christ. And as we walk in that calling, we can also have the confidence that our Lord sees us, knows us, and cares for us the entire time.

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The last king on the throne in Babylon openly blasphemed the Lord, and the judgment that came to him was swift. He was weighed and found wanting, and his only hope was real faith in the real God. (As is ours!)

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In Revelation 10 the apostle John encounters an angel who presents seven thunders (which are to remain sealed and silent), as well as a little book which John was supposed to consume and speak. Is it a contrast? Certainly, but it is also a lesson. John was obedient to say the things he was supposed to say, but also to remain quiet about the rest.

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The 5th and 6th trumpets will bring untold misery and destruction to the world…and they will come by the will of God. Is God good? Absolutely. God is good all the time, and all the time God is good. But God can use even the worst things to bring about His good plan for this world.

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It took seven years of madness with awful public humiliation, but the king of Babylon finally learned the lesson God had been trying to teach him since Daniel 1: God is King. It might be said in Nebuchadnezzar’s case, humiliation was a good thing. It was the tool used to bring him to faith.

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