Scripture Daily

Context No. 1609 of 4322 · Daniel (Greek)

Context · Reflection

Daniel (Greek) 8:19-27: in context

19He said, “Behold, I will make you know what will be in the latter time of the indignation; for it belongs to the appointed time of the end. 20The ram which you saw, that had the two horns, they are the kings of Media and Persia. 21The rough male goat is the king of Greece. The great horn that is between his eyes is the first king. 22As for that which was broken, in the place where four stood up, four kingdoms will stand up out of the nation, but not with his power. 23“In the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors have come to the full, a king of fierce face, and understanding dark sentences, will stand up. 24His power will be mighty, but not by his own power. He will destroy awesomely, and will prosper in what he does. He will destroy the mighty ones and the holy people. 25Through his policy he will cause deceit to prosper in his hand. He will magnify himself in his heart, and he will destroy many in their security. He will also stand up against the prince of princes; but he will be broken without human power. 26“The vision of the evenings and mornings which has been told is true; but seal up the vision, for it belongs to many days to come.” 27I, Daniel, fainted, and was sick for some days. Then I rose up, and did the king’s business. I wondered at the vision, but no one understood it.

Daniel is given a vision of coming empires and rulers, symbolized by a ram and a goat, and of a fierce king who would arise, grow strong, destroy many, exalt himself, and even set himself against the Prince of princes, only to be broken, the text says, by no human hand. The angel tells Daniel the vision is true but concerns days far off, and bids him seal it up. And Daniel records his own response: I, Daniel, was overcome and lay sick for some days; then I rose up and went about the king's business. I was appalled by the vision, and there was no one to explain it.

What is worth noticing is Daniel's response to a vision that troubled and mystified him. It overwhelmed him; he was sickened by it, lay ill for days, appalled by what he had seen, and, he says plainly, he did not understand it, and there was no one to explain it. He was left with something disturbing and unresolved, a burden he could neither shake off nor make sense of. And then this: I rose up and went about the king's business. Carrying a mystery he could not solve and a vision that had shaken him, Daniel got up and returned to his ordinary duties, doing his daily work while the unexplained thing weighed on him. There is a quiet wisdom in that for our own lives. We are sometimes given things we cannot understand, troubling providences, hard mysteries, questions we cannot resolve; and the temptation is to feel we cannot go on with ordinary life until we have made sense of them. Daniel shows another way. He did not resolve the mystery; it remained unexplained. But he did not let it paralyze him either; he rose and went back to his work, carrying the unresolved thing while remaining faithful in the duties before him. We do not have to understand everything before we can go on serving God faithfully in the ordinary. Some things stay mysteries, some burdens stay unresolved, and still we rise and do the work in front of us, trusting God with what we cannot understand. Daniel was appalled and mystified, and he went about the king's business; faithfulness in the ordinary does not wait on the resolution of every mystery.

When I am troubled by something I cannot understand or resolve, do I let it paralyze me, feeling I cannot go on until I make sense of it, or can I, like Daniel, rise and go about my ordinary duties, carrying the unresolved thing while remaining faithful in the work before me?

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