A Tale of Two Kingdoms (8)

A Secret of the Babylonian Kingdom

If you recall, in Daniel 2 (see also my blog post A Tale of Two Kingdoms (4)) we had a glimpse into Nebuchadnezzar’s dream, in which he saw a great image crumbling into pieces when a stone cut out without hands struck it. According to Daniel’s interpretation, there were to be four kingdoms of men, Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon being the first, before the setting up of God’s Kingdom. But we have to realize also that the image being a whole (gold, silver, bronze and iron-clay made into one structure), we can look at it as one kingdom – the Babylonian Kingdom.

This Babylonian Kingdom is the epitome of everything that’s of man, but all of man apart from and independent of God is satanic in nature. To understand the nature of the Babylonian Kingdom is but to understand the nature of God’s Kingdom. They are opposite. In essence, darkness is but the absence of light and death is but the absence of life. We have already seen that one aspect of God’s Kingdom is that it is full of Grace. And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace (John 1:16, NKJV). There is a strange description given to the stone that struck the image – “cut out without hands”. We couldn’t fail to observe the emphasis, though somewhat odd looking at it. Certainly it means “not cut out with men’s hands”. This is a clear picture of Grace: none of human effort, all of God’s favor. It is the nature of His Kingdom.

The Babylonian Kingdom is smack of human effort, a lot of it. In human economy, everything we need or desire has to come from our hard work. We have to merit it. Fallen man is cursed with this curse: In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread (Gen 3:19, NKJV). We don’t have to go far to see this, just look at the life of one of the great kings of the four human kingdoms – Alexandra the Great. Classical Bible interpretation will tell you that the kingdom designated “bronze” refers to the Grecian Empire and her greatest king was Alexandra the Great. In his time, he conquered as much as he could possibly have done. That’s why Daniel 2:39 says of his kingdom: a third kingdom of bronze, which shall rule over all the earth. It was said of Alexandra the Great that when he had conquered all that he could possibly reach, he sat down and wept. When asked why, he replied that it’s because there was no more land for him to conquer. You see, his meaning and purpose to life was determined by how much he could achieve, and when he could not exert himself anymore he felt miserable. What a pathetic life he had!

Whenever self-effort is esteemed, it’s because Law is being emphasized. Law always requires self-effort. Perfect Law demands greatest exertion of self-effort. What does Law say? When you do well to observe the commandments you will be blessed. When you fail to do so you will be cursed. It all depends on your doing, your self-effort.  It is easy to see that this system of Law governs the kingdom of men.

Let’s see what we can find in Nebuchadnezzar’s image. We have a head of gold, which Daniel said represents Nebuchadnezzar and his kingdom. Gold is the strongest among the four metals. It speaks of purity and strength. There is also something we must notice about this gold: the God of heaven has given you a kingdom, power, strength and glory (Dan 2:37). So this gold represents something given and ordained by God which is very good, full of purity and strength.  But at the same time, we know that Nebuchadnezzar and his kingdom was not good for God’s people Israel and not the will of God for them. Can you think of something whose nature is similar to this gold? It is good and ordained by God, yet not His will for His people. Why, it’s Law! Law fits the bill perfectly.  Law is good and holy, ordained by God, yet not His will for believers. It is easy to prove this about Law. Certainly there is no question that the Law is good: What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not… the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good (Rom 7:7,12, NKJV) But it is just as clear that it’s not God’s will for those who are in Christ to be under Law. Paul said in Galatians that Law is meant to bring us to Christ, but after that we are not supposed to be under Law: the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor (Gal 3:24-25, NKJV). So the gold of the image could represent Law, in fact it is perfect Law.

After gold come silver, bronze and iron. They are basically of the same substance so to say, i.e. they are metal, but each is inferior to its predecessor. If gold is perfect Law, then silver bronze and iron are more and more substandard Law.   Then, there is also a mixture of iron and clay. So, is this clay an even more inferior material? No, not so, not in the sense in our particular interpretation. In fact it is of a different substance. Basically it is of the same substance as the stone. If the stone represent perfect Grace, then the clay, which is inferior in strength, must represent substandard Grace! So, in fact what we have here is a mixture of substandard Law and substandard Grace. Do you get it? There is no mixture of perfect Law and perfect Grace; there cannot be. There can only be a mixture of substandard Law and substandard Grace. A professed believer of Jesus Christ, who believes that salvation only comes by grace but at the same time thinks that he must work hard to please God in order to deserve His blessings, is a good example of someone living under the mixture. Whatever they are, whether pure Law, substandard Law or a mixture of substandard Law and substandard Grace, they belong to the Babylonian Kingdom.

This is a secret of the Babylonian Kingdom, which is so powerful and efficient that it has kept many in darkness, even believers. But fear not, it is no match for the Kingdom of Grace, the stone cut out without hands. Jesus has no desire to let his loved ones live a second longer in the evil kingdom. He has begun a good work in our lives which He will bring to completion. Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end (Isaiah 9:7, NKJV)