“But the holy ones of the Most High shall receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever—forever and ever.”
Daniel 7:18
Daniel 7 is a strange prophetic vision, a very strange vision.
I struggle to understand what this passage truly means. I have attended churches that devoted significant effort to understanding passages like these. There are innumerable sermons, conferences, and books trying to parse Daniel’s apocalyptic language and reconcile it with other biblical passages.
I will not go so far as to claim that those efforts are a waste of time. Studying God’s word is enormously beneficial. Still, I am not convinced that we will ever truly know the precise meaning of this passage, and I am concerned that such efforts devote so much time to studying the truth associated with the trees that they never see the goodness and beauty of the forest.
The four beasts that Daniel saw are scary, especially the last one. Daniel is explicitly told in his vision that the beasts represent kingdoms. It is tempting to devote tremendous effort to parsing what kingdoms are represented by the beasts, which kings are represented by the horns, and who the vile king represented by the final horn is, was, or will be.
But that is all speculation.
The heart of this message is that “the holy ones of the Most High shall receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever.”
The breasts and the horns are all subplots. The main story is that, in the end, it is those who are set apart to God who will receive the kingdom. The Eschaton, the culmination of history, the eternal state of humanity existing in shalom with God, is for the people of God.
Despite the events of visions that turn prophets like Daniel pale, the end is not the terror of a beast with ten horns. It is the people of God living in the presence of God.
A Quote to Consider
“Few things have contributed so powerfully to the unbelief of the modern and postmodern world as the pretension of Christians to know more than we do… If Christians exhibited more intellectual patience, modesty, curiosity, and sense of adventure, there would be fewer atheists in the world, both of the rationalist and the postmodern varieties.”
-Richard Neuhaus
A little intellectual humility would serve us all well.
We like to be right. We like to know. But because we know He who is True, we sometimes think we know all that is true. I’ve seen so many people branded as heretics because they believe one thing or don’t believe another.
I’m not saying that heresy isn’t real or that doctrine and truth do not matter. But often these people who are branded as outside the body are not rejecting or affirming anything that conflicts with the historic creeds. Often they are questioning things that have been questioned openly for millennia or are questioning newly ascendant doctrines that have ridden cultural tides to theological prominence.
But it isn’t just those who were once in the body who are chased from faith by our pretensions to know more than we do.
Sometimes we claim theological certainty about things that are not certain and then build cultural battlefields to wage war over those issues. Sometimes we claim “the Bible clearly says” about things the Bible ambiguously addresses or about which it is silent.
We build academic centers and political think tanks to advance these ideas. And we do it all without love. Love… remember that word? Remember that most central of Christian tenets?
We as followers of Christ are not called to theological, political, or ontological certainty. We are called to love God and love our fellow humans. We are called to be known by our love. “Intellectual patience, modesty, curiosity, and [a] sense of adventure,” as called for by Neuhaus, is consistent with love, maybe even mandated by love.
I recently was speaking with someone who does not believe in God. This person has strong feelings against the public persona of the Church. But I was struck when they said, “I don’t believe in God, but I love how you speak about faith.”
Maybe we become so concerned with truth that we claim to know it even when we don’t, and the goodness and beauty of God and our faith are obscured by our arrogant pretense that claims we know more than we do.
A Prayer
Lord,
The One God who loved us before the universe sparked. Give us humility when we do not understand and wisdom to recognize what matters most. Keep our pursuit of truth from becoming arrogance, and let our faith be marked by truth, goodness, beauty, and love.
Amen.
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