Word of Salvation – Vol.12 No.50 – December 1966
A Fresh Start For The World
Sermon by Rev. F. Channing on Daniel 2:44-45
Scripture Reading: Matt. 21: 33 -44, Daniel 2: 36-45
Psalter Hymnal: 349:1,2,3; 174:1,2,3,4; 343:1,4,5; 60:2,3; 345:1,2
Beloved Congregation,
Have you ever considered the fact, that the person responsible for the calendar which we use, made one great mistake? Oh, yes… he did make the mistake of not working out the right year in which our Lord Jesus Christ was born, and he very likely made the mistake of not working out the right day… but he also made another mistake. He made our year to END with the celebration of the birth of our SAVIOUR!
Another week, and we will be celebrating a NEW YEAR… so now at this time of the year, the factories are closing, schools have already closed, businesses are coming to the end of their trading year… in fact you could almost say, that everything seems to be coming to an end. THAT is the biggest mistake we could ever make, to place any celebration of the birth of Christ at the end of the year! If there should be any celebration at all, and it is certainly not commanded in God’s Word… it should be not at the end, but at the beginning, because our text of this morning tells us that the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ was the beginning of a fresh start for the world!
Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, had been upon the throne of his Kingdom for only two years. In those days, to sit upon the throne of a king was a rather precarious thing! You never quite knew when someone else may desire to sit upon that same throne, and when they would make arrangements for your quick disposal! It was quite a common thing for kings to be murdered or kingdoms to be overthrown by rebels within the kingdom. It was quite a common thing for kingdoms to rise, and then fall under the attacks of other kingdoms.
It was very possible that Nebuchadnezzar had been thinking about all these possibilities, and so he had the desire to know the answer as to what did lay in the future for him and his kingdom. And God… the true God of heaven and earth, gave this heathen king an answer.
In his sleep Nebuchadnezzar dreamed a dream. It was a startling dream! It was a dream that just could not be forgotten! Oh, yes, he did forget what he had seen in the dream, but the fact that he had dreamed such a disturbing dream, remained with him, even when he awoke.
The natural thing for this heathen king to do was of course to call for his men of magic. Those were the men of his kingdom, who were supposed to be able to read and interpret the messages of the stars, and to be able to work all sorts of wonderful charms. Ask them! That was the answer to find out what he had dreamed, and what this disturbing dream meant: But they could not tell Nebuchadnezzar what he had dreamed.
What this king was asking was too much for any ordinary man, wasn’t it? He was not only asking for the interpretation of the dream, but he also asked to be told what he had dreamed. And that was an impossibility! That was asking too much of their magic, of their star gazing, and of their charms.
But of course it was not asking too much of the God Who had given the dream to Nebuchadnezzar. He was perfectly able to reveal the dream itself, and the meaning of the dream to His faithful servant Daniel!
Nebuchadnezzar had dreamed, and he had seen a great image. It must have been a gigantic thing: It must have been a terrible thing to look upon! We are not told exactly what it looked like, but we are told what it was made of… Gold and silver… and brass and iron…. and iron mixed with clay! Each one of these sections of the body of that image represented a great world empire. You should note how that these world empires gradually were to become less and less glorious. Each one would be inferior to the former one. But, at first look, you must admit, this image which Nebuchadnezzar had seen in his dream, was an image of power. It was an image of strength. It was an image of wealth.
Now doesn’t that paint a good picture of world empires? Are not all the empires of this world concerned with power, and strength and wealth? If you just give a glance at the newspapers, what do you see? There are headlines about the economic situation in this nation and that nation! There are headlines about the military strength of this nation and that country! There are headlines about how nations are using their political power to stir up strife and overcome their enemies!
Yes, indeed this image which Nebuchadnezzar saw was a perfect image of the world kingdoms.
And why are the world kingdoms always so interested in power, and strength and wealth? Because that is actually what is the main interest of man himself! That is what our natural hearts long after. Just glance over your life, as you would live it without Christ in control, and what do you see?
Don’t you want power? The power to out-manoeuvre your neighbour… this is just the basis of that modern-day “cult” of keeping up, or if possible, passing the “Joneses”. Don’t we naturally grasp after the power of position, whether it be in society, or in our neighbourhood or even the church? Men will sell their souls for power and position! We don’t like to be looked upon as a nobody, do we? We don’t like to be spoken of as weak, and having no power in this world do we?
And also, don’t we want strength? Don’t we by nature use our strength to seek to overcome our neighbour? Even the boys and the girls do this by nature… the first thing that flies to their lips when they are being oppressed or hurt is, “I’ll tell my Mum and Dad on you!” I’ll gather my strength together,… I’ll muster my troops… I’ll overcome you! You had better watch out for my strength! And you hear this type of talk in the church also! “Why those people….?” “They are weak and I am strong! Look at me!”
And then there is wealth! As the Lord Jesus Christ said,.. The love of money is the root of all evil! That is what we see on every side of us today… men and women selling their lives, sacrificing their homes… neglecting their spiritual needs, because they love wealth! Nations and kingdoms are what they are, because of what the people are who made up those nations and kingdoms!
Nebuchadnezzar had seen a vision of the true condition of those nations and kingdoms. People throughout history have been planning and hoping and working for improvement. We have had leagues and treaties, non-aggression pacts… League of Nations,.. United Nations… all working for something better! The cry has been, “We are building a better world to live in!” “We are improving the world!” But Nebuchadnezzar in his dream saw the truth! The world is not improving…it is growing worse. And why is it growing worse? Because the hearts of men are growing further and further from God! Man is rejecting every testimony that God has given concerning Himself. Nebuchadnezzar saw an image of power and strength and wealth, and as he cast his eyes from the head onto the feet of that image, he saw first, gold, then silver, then brass, then iron, and then finally iron mixed with clay. There was a progressive deterioration! Progressively there was decay, instead of a growing more glorious and more powerful, and more strong and more wealthy. Man and his kingdoms was going to progress downwards!
The theory of evolution is that man is rising up out of the animal world. The theory of evolution is that man is improving, and that he is heading for a super-stage… a super-man! But that theory is completely contradicted by the Bible. Man was created good, but he fell, and he is progressively decaying, and all that he touches and all that he plans, his kingdoms, his armies, his wealth… all is falling into decay!
If we truly see this, we will see that man and his Kingdoms are certainly nothing in which to put our trust!
But if this was all that Nebuchadnezzar had seen, then it would be a very dismal picture for us all. But that was not all that Nebuchadnezzar did see! And that is why we can sing this morning of glad tidings of great joy!
And Daniel said, “Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and did break them into pieces… then was iron and clay, and brass and the silver and the gold, broken into pieces together and did become like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them, and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth!
That is the good tidings of great joy! The end of that dream was not just in the decay of the nations… not just the picture of utter helplessness into which man has got himself. The end of this dream was not just with the toes made of iron and clay… that would not mix… the continual wars and rumours of wars, resulting out of the evil heart of man….!
The end of this dream was the picture of a new start for the world! Yes, beloved congregation,.. the stone was cut out of the mountain without human hands. The Christ was born into this world, of the seed of David, of the generations of Abraham, of the tribe of Judah… yet born not of the human strength of Abraham, David or Judah! Not cut out of the flesh of David by the will of human flesh, but born of a Virgin, conceived of the Holy Spirit! Miraculously brought forth by the action of God Himself!
And why was He so miraculously sent of the Father into this world, to assume human flesh? To sweep away forever the foundation upon which the kingdoms of this world are built… the kingdoms of dictators and kings, and the kingdom of little people like you and me!
We have our kingdoms, and we have our domains… we build them… we cherish them! We think the weakness of our bondage in sin is strength… we boast of our strength. We stand before God and cry out, “I thank thee that I am not as that person. We think that the quickness of our tongue is strength, and the force of our lives is power, with which we oppress, and overcome. We think that the little heaps of gold and silver… the temporal possessions… are everlasting wealth: We do not recognise that the world is already conquered by Christ, the meek and mild One, the rejected One!
Nebuchadnezzar saw the power of the world, and the strength of the world, and the temporal riches of this world, dealt one destroying blow by the stone that was cut out of the mountains without hands. God set up His kingdom in this world!
Maybe we look about us today and say, “Where is it?” “What is it?” Of course when we do that, we are looking for a kingdom of great earthly power, and a kingdom of great show of great physical strength… and a kingdom that can count its heaps of gold and silver… and that we just cannot see! Neither did the Jews, when Jesus Christ said of them, “My kingdom is not of this world, else would My servants fight for Me”. Oh, no! This kingdom of God is not a kingdom that overcomes with physical power and strength or earthly riches… but this is a kingdom that comes, and overcomes by heavenly love and the free offer of eternal riches. This kingdom of God is a kingdom that destroys earthly glory and transforms into heavenly glory! Where is this kingdom?
It is within the hearts of those people who have seen that image, so powerful, so strong, so terrible and so costly and wealthy… and these people have also seen that the sinful power, and the sinful strength and the soon-to-pass-away wealth is rotten and decaying. And seeing this, they have cast themselves upon that stone cut without hands from the mountain, and they have cried out…
“Crush down my kingdoms… destroy my domains… shatter forever my power, that in my weakness, Thy strength may be displayed. Break me! Yes, break my trust in the power of position in society… and in my neighbourhood and in the church… let me really see what I am, a nobody who cannot save myself!
Break my strength, that I might learn to trust only in Thy strength! Break my trust in wealth, let me see myself as a destitute beggar,.. receiving from Thy hand all that I have! Break me! that in my brokenness Thy perfect wholeness and health may be seen!
Yes, brothers and sisters,… we… and our lust for power, and for strength and for earthly wealth, have to be destroyed, if we are ever to be transformed to the state where we gladly acknowledge, that it is not by might, nor by power, nor by temporal possessions, but by the grace of God and the spirit of God, that there shall ever be improvement… a fresh start… a start in holiness and trueness and uprightness in our lives! That is the message of Christmas: There is a fresh start for us! On this Christmas morn, listen to what our Saviour says: “The stone which the builders rejected is become the head of the corner… whosoever shall fall upon this stone shall be broken…!” That is what we want isn’t it? Our strength… our power… our trust in temporal wealth… broken! Our bondage to these things… broken! It is either that… or what our Saviour continued to say: “On whomsoever it… the stone… shall fall, it will grind him to powder!”
The message of Christmas is that there is a fresh start for the world! But such a fresh start means brokenness!
It is a fresh start for you and for me… that is what the birth of Jesus Christ means. A new beginning… a new creation… a fresh start… after being broken!
But isn’t that good news? We can be broken… broken by the Rock… and we can, by God’s grace in Christ Jesus, be built again upon the Rock Christ Jesus… the Rock of Ages that from age to age shall endure! Behold I bring you these glad tidings of great joy.
Amen.