Daniel 4 starts with these words from a previous pagan king, “I want you all to know about the miraculous signs and wonders the Most High God has performed for me. How great are his signs, how powerful his wonders! His kingdom will last forever, his rule through all generations”.
This is probably one of the most amazing transformations and
a process that God used that He still uses today. A Pastor once said that
sometimes God needs to break us down so that He can rebuild us. He needs to
remove all the pride and religious ideas we form so that He can use us. In Martial
arts we learned that you cannot teach someone whose cup is full and they need
to empty their cup before they can become teachable. In other words, they need
to put aside what they think they know and receive the new ways that will make
them better.
Daniel 4 tells the story of King Nebuchadnezzar’s
pride, his subsequent madness, and his ultimate restoration. Through a dream of
a great tree that is chopped down, God warns the king that he will lose his
sanity and kingdom for seven years (times) until he acknowledges that the Most
High God is the ultimate ruler over all human kingdoms.
Nebuchadnezzar's immense success led to excessive pride and arrogance.
In the dream, he is represented by a towering, fruit-bearing tree. The command
to chop it down is a direct consequence of his self-reliance and arrogance,
serving as a warning that pride precedes a fall.
The purpose of the king's humbling and living in the
wilderness like an animal for seven "times" was not just punishment,
but a transformative process. When Nebuchadnezzar finally looks to heaven and
humbles himself, his sanity and royal status are immediately restored.
Uniquely, the entire chapter is written as a public decree
by Nebuchadnezzar himself. It ends with him praising and exalting the God of
Israel - “Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and glorify and honour the King of
heaven. All his acts are just and true, and he is able to humble the proud.”
My dear friend, pride can destroy us and pride can lead us to
more problems. It is in our humility before the God of all creation that we find
true peace and true freedom from the burdens of this world. Everything we do
and say remains a choice. We can choose to do the right thing, or we can choose
to do the wrong thing. We can choose to be depressed and say the wrong thing,
or we can choose to speak life and speak positively over our situation. We can choose
to go to church, or we can choose not to.
As God says
in Deuteronomy 30:19, “Today I have given you the choice between life
and death, between blessings and curses. Now I call on heaven and earth to
witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, so that you and
your descendants might live!”.
My dear friend, Nebuchadnezzar’s rise and fall is a classical
example of choices. In the end we see a very familiar pattern to salvation that
we all have to follow at some point. It is not a McDonalds happy meal or a
quick seven steps to a happier life. It is a process and in Nebuchadnezzar’s
case it was a seven-year process. In the end His whole life and His way of life
changed entirely. Now I am not saying it takes years for us to change our way
of life, but it takes an encounter with God. These encounters are only
available when we seek God above all else and we desire more of Him. Your encounter
can be today or maybe you have already had it, whichever it is, live by it. For
the God we worship is able to do increasingly and abundantly above all we can
think or imagine.
As God says in Jeremiah 32:27, “I am the LORD, the God of
all the peoples of the world. Is anything too hard for me?”.
I pray that you have an amazing encounter with God in this
week and that your life will be completely transformed as Nebuchadnezzar’s life
was transformed. In the mighty name of Jesus.
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