I'm sure everyone who frequents this forum knows the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. It's easy to focus in on the part of the story where they get tossed into the furnace, but it all started with the 90-foot-high golden idol the king set up to be worshipped. I only just understood why the king did it - Daniel had explained that he, Nebuchadnezzar, was the head of gold, part of the image he had seen in a dream. Babylon was the head/gold, Persia was the chest & arms/silver, Greece was the belly and thighs/bronze, Rome was the legs/iron, and lastly the ten nations to come from the two legs (western & eastern empires) were the toes/iron + clay. We live in the time of the toes...
What I realized is this: being an idolater and surely a believer in the power of magic, Nebuchadnezzar must have decided that if he could extend the gold from the head down to the toes, he might, no MUST, extend his Babylonian kingdom to the end of time. So, he made just such an image, and if everyone worships it, well there you go...
In the end, God proved him wrong, and Nebuchadnezzar praised the true God. However, he still faced another lesson lasting seven years, but that's another story.
:Chinscratch: hmmm.. I never thought of that! I think you are onto something.. It makes a lot of sense, his building his statue of gold.. to be worshiped by all.. or else.. because Daniel had interpreted his dream and told him how he was the head of gold!
...Kings can be so silly!
Aren't we living in the Babylonian system referred to in revelations?
The Jews were deliberately put under that system and told not to get out, they would be delivered in a set time. Just like we are to live in this world and will be delivered at our set time.
Neb ended up acknowledging God; so will mankind.
Neb also did stuff to make people worship him- the beast will do that.
7 years for Neb as an animal- seven years of the beast- then change.
Amazing really.
All planned explicitly.
Great plan- master who set that up knows the plan well and is more than capable of doing all that right stuff.
At the end of his education, Nebuchadnezzar wrote a letter to the whole nation, expressing his enthusiasm for the God of Daniel, and he simply sounds to me like a Jesus Freak! :Peace2: :Peace2: :Peace2: :Peace2: :Peace2:
:laugh2: :mlaugh: :goodpost:
Off topic but I thought the history with Daniel and king Belshazzar was quite powerful too.
Daniel 5:25-28 (KJV)
25 And this is the writing that was written, Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin.
26 This is the interpretation of the thing: Mene; God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it.
27 Tekel; Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting.
28 Peres; Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.
Wow!!
Highlights the depths of the master plan.
very interesting.... TY Brothers....