God and the Nations

God’s Sovereignty Over the Nations

 And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever, just as you saw that a stone was cut from a mountain by no human hand, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold. A great God has made known to the king what shall be after this. The dream is certain, and its interpretation sure.” (Daniel 2:44-45 ESV)

“Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are accounted as the dust on the scales; behold, he takes up the coastlands like fine dust. Lebanon would not suffice for fuel, nor are its beasts enough for a burnt offering. All the nations are as nothing before him, they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness.” (Isaiah 40:15-17 ESV)

Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.” (Revelation 11:15 ESV)

The central teaching of the Old Testament is that there is only one, true God. This God created everything and continues to rule over the world that He made. The sovereignty of God is a theme that comes up over and over again. The Bible wants to emphasize this point: God rules over everything! This fact is one of the central facts of all Scripture.

Sovereignty simply means power. Power is the ability to get your way. But for many Christians the subject of God’s sovereignty poses some intellectual problems. If we have a free will to choose, even to rebel against the will of God, then how can God be completely sovereign? And if God is completely sovereign, then how can we have free will? But God remains sovereign no matter what choices we make! God’s sovereignty will be displayed in His judgement of those who rebel and the blessing of those who obey Him. Others have wondered if we can have a God who is sovereign AND who is also good. The skeptical philosopher David Hume was famous for saying that if God is all-powerful, yet allows evil, then He is not good. And if He is good, yet still there is evil, then He is not all-powerful. But God has committed Himself to defeating all evil and opposition to His rule and yet He still reserves the right to choose how and when to judge men’s actions. If God were not sovereign, then He would not be God and He could not provide for man, save man, or judge the nations of the world.

But sometimes it does not seem like God is ruling the world. The nations of the world are in a constant state of chaos and turmoil. The Bible compares the world to a storm-tossed sea. And we are like mariners who are trying to ride out the storm and survive! The nations are like a restless sea because of their wickedness and rebellion against God. The nations are raging against the authority of God. What will God do about this? Sometimes it seems like He does precious little and the wickedness of the world goes unchecked and unchallenged. Evil sometimes seems to be the stronger Power. It usually looks like everything is going badly in the world. Just listen to the daily news reports, if you can stand it for long! It looks hopeless and this can drive us to depression or even to despair.

A Higher Perspective

We need to get a different perspective on what is happening in the world. There is more to reality than what we can see with our physical eyes. No matter what is happening in the world at any given point in time, we know that above it all God is seated on His throne and is executing His eternal purpose. The only way we get this perspective is through Divine revelation. God gave Nebuchadnezzar a dream and revealed something to him he would never have known any other way. While God is perfectly capable of giving dreams and visions today, we do not need such revelations under normal circumstances since we have the Scriptures.

Human wisdom is severely limited. Philosophy or science can only tell us what is apparent to our own senses or thought process. Unless God were to reveal Himself to us and tell us what He is like and what He wants, we could never discover these things on our own.

Men have often been interested in knowing the future and have even utilized the occult to unlock these mysteries that are hidden from our philosophy and science. But when God tells us the future He is not just reporting what He sees. God does not predict the future, like someone who is prognosticating. God DETERMINES the future! What God revealed to the King and to Daniel is what God had already foreordained would happen in the earth, regardless of what men would plan and do. God is not reacting to what men do but is revealing what He is going to do in the world. And nothing can stop God’s plan from being executed!

When God does have something to reveal to men He has almost always made it known through His chosen messengers. The dream came to the King but he did not understand it and he had to call on Daniel for the interpretation. Ultimately, this revelation was not for Nebuchadnezzar but was for the people of God. This dream was a word of prophecy, which is always given for the benefit of God’s people. The people of Israel, who were under the thumb of these pagan nations, needed to know that God was the true ruler of the nations.

The King of Babylon was a polytheist who did not know the one, true God. But you will notice that he did not doubt that he had received a Divine revelation. It seems to me that this kind of revelation could not come to a modern man. Modern man has rejected the very idea of a spiritual realm and so a revelation like this would immediately be discounted, possibly written off as some kind of mental illness. Modern man has also questioned the veracity of the written Word of God and attempted to discredit it. Yet the revelation of God remains a fixed and certain thing that men reject to their own destruction.

The revelation of God always begins with God as the starting point. That is, God is the central fact of all Biblical revelation. God is on His throne, ruling and reigning over the earth and all the nations. So when the Bible interprets history and events it always starts with a sovereign God who is the unmoved mover of everything else. Without God as our starting point all other reasoning is inherently flawed. The universe does not revolve around man and his needs or desires. The center of all reality is the Throne of God. What God wants is what really matters. Everything else takes on significance, or insignificance, relative to the will of God.

The big lesson for Nebuchadnezzar in the book of Daniel is humility. Unfortunately, like many people today who have great power and wealth, the King was proud and stubborn being unable to learn the lessons God was teaching. If you accept the truth revealed in the dream Nebuchadnezzar received, you should become humbled by the fact that your “kingdom” is insignificant compared to the Kingdom that God will establish. Nebuchadnezzar was the head of gold, Babylon being the first empire depicted, but all of the Kingdoms depicted were inferior to what God was going to do. All men must acknowledge that God is greater and that His Kingdom is superior to all of our little projects. To be proud is to be puffed-up, or to have self-image that is way beyond its proper size. This is one of the fundamental sins of the nations of the world and of men individually. Man’s greatest need is to be humbled. God has a way of humbling nations and men. God exalts the humble and humbles the proud. If we are going to be exalted, we should let God do that to us. It is dangerous to try to exalt yourself.

People often overestimate the value and security of what they have. The fact is that all worldly position and material goods can vanish in an instant, like a puff of smoke! Nothing is certain in this world except uncertainty. Kingdoms can be lost in an instant. Empires fall. Stock markets crash. Wealth is stolen. The things people trust in are really not that stable. Every nation values security and power along with the ability to create its own destiny. When a nation is successful, the people, especially the rulers, tend to think that this success will be sustainable. It is like an army who has never lost a battle coming to think that it is actually invincible! A person who trusts in his wealth comes to believe that this wealth will always be there. But the things that the world values are NOT inherently stable or reliable and trusting in them is a risky business.

The King’s dream shows us something that IS completely reliable: The Kingdom of God! Only the Kingdom of God will last when everything else in this world turns to dust and blows away. The people of this world are always anxious because everyone senses that nothing is really stable. But God’s people do not have to be anxious like this because they have placed their trust in the living God.

A Purposeful Perspective

No one would get on a bus without knowing the destination and feeling somewhat secure in the driver. But here we are “riding” through space on planet earth. Where are we going? And who is driving this thing? Imagine being on an airplane at 30,000 feet when the door to the cockpit opens and there is no one there flying the plane! As terrifying as that would be, there are many people who believe there is no ultimate purpose or plan to the world: no one is in the cockpit of planet earth! The human race and all our history is just a meaningless journey through time and space that just happened to come about by chance and will eventually cease to be through some unknown cataclysm. That is the secular view of the world that many have embraced today. The Bible presents a radically different view. History has meaning because of the purpose of God. God is doing something in the world! This purpose is described in the Bible as the Kingdom of God.

The Kingdom of God is not easily defined. The word “Kingdom” simply means rule, reign, power, or authority. This rule is expressed through an agent, like a king. So a Kingdom is literally “the rule of a king.” Earthly Kingdoms are defined by physical boundaries or the control of geographic areas of the earth: in that place this king rules over everyone who is there. In the world there are multiple kingdoms and they often compete with each other for power and for control over larger areas and more subjects. It should be obvious that God is the ultimate ruler of the world whose Kingship can never be successfully challenged. But God is invisible. Most of the people in the world do not acknowledge God’s rule. In fact, the world goes to great lengths to obscure the reality of God and His authority.

Most Christians would agree that the Kingdom of God is “not of this world.” And most Christians interpret that to mean either that the Kingdom of God is not like earthly Kingdoms or that the Kingdom of God is not located on the earth but is in heaven and something “spiritual.” But these conclusions miss the point. “Not of this world” is saying something about the origin of the Kingdom: it comes from God, not from men. The Kingdom of God is God’s purpose, not the agenda of men. All earthly kingdoms represent what comes from men: their desires, goals and agendas. The Kingdom of God refers to God’s plans, desires, and agenda. In some sense the Kingdom of God has always been a reality and always will be. God is God and that means He reigns and rules everywhere and at all times. But that is not the point here. The point is that God is going to do something or make something known ON THE EARTH. God’s kingdom is always evident in Heaven. It will now be manifested on the earth.

This will not be some display of brute force or power, although God obviously has the kind of power to do what He will. But God’s power is not going to be manifested in the destruction of men. The Kingdom of God will mean the reconciliation or salvation of men and the spread of the knowledge of the true God throughout the earth.

The Kingdom of God will be established ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN. That is the point of Daniel’s dream. God is going to do something on earth that had not previously been seen. The Bible tells us there are two realms: heaven and earth. Heaven is the realm of God while the earth is the realm of men. The Kingdom coming means that the Kingdom of God is going to come to the earth and will be manifested here among men. Heaven is going to invade the earth. During WWII the Allies invaded Europe on the beaches of Normandy. A beachhead was established through which the invasion could then advance all the way to Berlin, Germany. In a similar way, God “landed” on planet earth and has established a beachhead. The Kingdom of God will continue to advance and spread throughout the earth. The vision of Daniel was a prophecy of the establishment of this beachhead and the eventual spread of the Kingdom of God. We are now looking back at the beginning of the fulfillment of this vision. The Kingdom has come and is growing. And there is more to come in the future before the End!

God was revealing to Daniel a little glimpse of His eternal purpose. The world is really a stage upon which God is working out His purpose, even though men often cannot see what is happening. Daniel was basically a prisoner of war in Babylon. He was a stranger in a foreign land. Yet, he is the one who is called upon to declare the Word of God and give the meaning of the dream for the King. The People of God were captive in Babylon yet God had not forgotten His people and He was with them working out His plans for them. The nation of Israel was nothing in the eyes of Babylon. And yet they were the focus of God’s plan. The nations of the world and their prosperity is not the focus of God’s plan. God’s plan has always been to have a People for Himself. This was first depicted in Israel and now includes even those Gentiles who believe. God’s people often seem small or insignificant and are usually overlooked by the world. But they are the focus of the Divine purpose. If God is going to work in the world among the nations, He is going to do it through His people just as He did with Daniel in Babylon. Eventually, the people of God are going to be the ones who will possess the Kingdom of God and reign forever, judging all the nations of the world.

The people of God have to take comfort in the fact that the purpose of God will always be successful and it is always futile to oppose it. No earthly Kingdom can successfully oppose the Kingdom of God. Of course, we know that behind all the opposition to God in the world is the great Enemy, Satan, who has been in opposition to God from the beginning. But Satan’s Kingdom of darkness is also unable to successfully oppose the advance of the Kingdom of God. So we must align ourselves with God’s Kingdom and purpose because it will be successful. Every other Kingdom will fail and fall.

A Stabilizing Perspective

Life in the world is always uncertain and this fills us with anxiety. Most people are either filled with anxiety or trying to find a way to keep fear from ruling their lives by making themselves secure. What can we trust? What security and stability can we find in life? This search for stability and security explains a lot about the world and what makes people do the things they do. Political systems exist largely to try to provide this security and stability. But these systems often fail and the chaos returns like a sudden squall at sea.

God’s people are supposed to be different from pagan people. We are not to have anxiety about the things of life but are to trust in God. This does not mean that we don’t work to provide for our needs. But we do so without the anxiety that characterizes people who have no faith in God. In this world God’s people are living like exiles. Daniel and the rest of the people of Judah were exiles in Babylon. They were not at home. This is the same situation for the people of God today. This world is not our true home. We live in a pagan world that has a completely different value system and worships different gods. The world is hostile to God’s people because we are different. We are never to love the world and anchor our affections to it. And we are not to conform to its values. This makes perfect sense when we consider the fact that the world is hostile to God and is also temporal. We can’t love a world that hates God and we will not put our hopes in a sinking ship.

God is able to make His people prosper even in a state of exile. We use the things of this world and our position in it for God because we are His servants and stewards while we are here. But we never cease to live by faith. We do not by what we see in the world. Faith means living by unseen realities and orienting our lives to those things rather than to what is all around us. We live by faith, not by our physical senses. What we see does not dominate us. Whatever gain and success we might have in this world we hold on to loosely. Any worldly circumstance can change instantly.

God has established earthly authority or government and He raises up rulers and gives them power. God’s people are to respect the God-ordained rulers and kingdoms. But God’s people do not assign ultimate value to the kingdoms of men nor do we worship men as the ultimate authority. We respect men but we fear God. We obey the laws of men unless those laws conflict with God’s law and then we must obey God rather than men. When there is a conflict between God and men we always prefer God to men. This makes perfect sense because men are inherently weak and are always coming and going like the grass of the field. But God remains the same. God can simply blow men away like the wind blows away the withered grass. It is a mistake to put all of our hope in a man who is nothing but grass that withers and blows away in the wind. Trusting in men will always be disappointing. Men will fail us. They will make promises and then break those promises. But God will never fail us and He always keeps His word!

One of the many false gods that the people of this world worship is the idol of government. Men have always worshiped their rulers and looked to earthly power to make their lives secure in this world. God ordained government to keep peace and order, but He never meant for us to trust in other men. We are to trust in the Lord. Christian people may participate in political systems. Daniel himself served the kings of Babylon and Persia. But it was clear that Daniel was really serving God. God’s people do not expect the world to be perfect or provide us with ultimate peace, security, or satisfaction. We are not living for this world or investing our ultimate hope in the kingdoms of men. The world we live in now is an evil Age. The kingdoms of men are in rebellion against God’s rule. We are waiting for another Age to come. Actually, this New Age has already begun to dawn.

A Hopeful Perspective

These prophetic texts were given to oppressed people. The dreams Daniel interpreted for the King defy what seems to be the reality of the world. Those who seem to be on top are really not in charge! What seems to be solid and immovable is not as strong as it appears to be. The problem is that we are limited in our knowledge by time. We cannot see the future or the end. But God can because He is working out the future according to His purpose. With God there is hope! Things will change for the better if we are with God and are actively participating in His purpose. God is not ultimately underwriting any nation’s agenda. God has His own agenda and our hope is in Him, not in any earthly nation’s success.

Every earthly Kingdom is doomed to fail and to fall with the passing of time. It may seem like these Kingdoms will last forever, but they will fall and be replaced by other Kingdoms, all under the rule of God. God raises up nations and rulers and He disposes of them when He is done with them.

There is an inherent flaw in every Kingdom of men: sin. Not only is sin rebellion against God, it is also inherently destructive to human society. The Kingdoms of the world are their own worst enemies! Every Kingdom becomes weak from the inside because human nature always tends toward destruction. The Flesh always degenerates. A Kingdom may have a good and a powerful beginning, but it cannot be sustained. Only what God does will increase and get stronger. Men always fade away.

A nation may become so wicked that it suffers the wrath of God. God eventually has enough of man’s rebellion and the cup of His wrath becomes full and must be emptied. Every nation of the world is “on the clock,” awaiting the judgement of God. God may give a nation time to repent and He might withhold His judgement for a season. But wrath eventually comes, like a dam that finally breaks. God is patient, but not infinitely so. But even when the nations are wicked and in rebellion against God, and all of them are to one degree or another, God still uses them as He pleases and for His own purposes. Even the wicked must eventually serve the purpose of God, leading up to their eventual destruction and judgment. God may raise up a nation, allow it to prosper for a time, use it for His own purposes, and then bring it down to destruction or humiliation.

God’s purpose was always to exalt His Son over the nations. The Kingdom of God is administered by an exalted Christ who has entered into heaven and is reigning over the earth. Jesus ascended into heaven as a glorified man and received the Kingdom from the Father. (This is the theme of the book of Revelation.) Christ’s reign over the earth is from heaven, which is the control-room for the earth. God has exalted His Christ in spite of the world’s hostility and objections (Psalm 2). Christ is reigning NOW, even in the midst of His enemies upon the earth (Psalm 110). Jesus rules the nations and He will eventually destroy all of them like a man smashes a piece of pottery for which he has no more use. The Kingdom of God has come to this earth and the King has been exalted into heaven where He is currently ruling over the world and all the Kingdoms of men. The objective of the reign of Christ is to bring people into His Kingdom, which results in salvation. Rather than being in rebellion against God and His Christ, and being His enemies, we are reconciled. Then we willingly bow the knee to His reign. Eventually every knee will bow.

The reign of Christ is not visible to the eyes of men. So the Kingdom of God is all mixed in with the Kingdoms of men. This situation is explained in one of Jesus’ parables as a field where there are both wheat and tares (weeds). The sons of the Kingdom and the sons of the Wicked One are both together, growing in the same field. But the field belongs to God. The whole point of the world is to “grow” the Sons of God. The world is not for the Kingdoms of men, to do as they will. The tares are actually intruders, having been planted there by an enemy. At this stage in the project it is not wise to try to pull up the tares because the wheat is not ready. But eventually the harvest will be mature and a great separation is coming. At the end of all things everything that does not conform to the Kingdom of Christ will be uprooted and destroyed. All the Kingdoms of men will be destroyed and the Kingdom of Christ will be all that is left, like the wheat that is gathered into the barn at the harvest.

The End will come when the King appears. He is reigning in heaven now and His reign is not visible to men upon the earth. But He will come out of heaven and He will appear to judge the world and consummate His Kingdom, uprooting and destroying all of His enemies in this world. When He appears every knee must bow and every tongue must confess that He is Lord. It is better to do this now and be reconciled to Him!

The people of God are in the world now because they are charged with the task of being witnesses and preaching the Gospel to every nation before the End comes. This Gospel must be preached to all the nations of the world. This is why the Church is in the world. Through the preaching of the Gospel this Kingdom continues to permeate the world. The Kingdom will continue to grow, even though it started out small, and the knowledge of the Lord will cover the earth before the End. The Kingdom is like a mustard seed that begins small and grows large in the end. It is like a small stone that grows into a mountain that fills the earth. And it is like a little yeast that is mixed into dough and then has a powerful effect on the whole batch. The Truth must triumph in the world. The Kingdom of God will continue to grow and have an effect upon the world. It will even overcome all other Kingdoms, proving to be the superior Power. It is absolutely necessary that the Kingdom of God be shown to be superior in the earth before the End comes. The Kingdoms of this World, as well as the Kingdom of Darkness that is behind all worldly powers, will NOT have the last word!