A Kingdom That Will Last Forever

One night, King Nebuchadnezzar had a strange dream. It bothered him so much that he could not sleep. He called his magicians in and said to them: ‘Explain my dream to me.’ They said: ‘Tell us what you dreamed, O king.’ But Nebuchadnezzar told them: ‘No! You tell me what I dreamed, or I will kill you.’ Again they said to him: ‘Tell us what you dreamed, and then we will explain it.’ He said: ‘All of you are trying to trick me. Tell me what I dreamed!’ They told the king: ‘There is no man alive who can do that. What you ask is impossible.’

Nebuchadnezzar was so angry that he ordered that all the wise men in the land be killed. That included Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Daniel asked the king for some time. Then he and his friends prayed to Jehovah and asked him to help them. What did Jehovah do?

In a vision, Jehovah showed Nebuchadnezzar’s dream to Daniel and gave him its meaning. The next day, Daniel went to the king’s servant and said: ‘Don’t kill any of the wise men. I can explain the king’s dream.’ The servant took Daniel to Nebuchadnezzar. Daniel told the king: ‘God has revealed the future to you. This is your dream: You saw a huge statue with a head of gold, chest and arms of silver, stomach and thighs of copper, legs of iron, and feet of iron mixed with clay. Then a stone was cut from a mountain, and it struck the feet of the statue. The statue was crushed into powder and blew away in the wind. The stone became a large mountain, and it filled the earth.’

Daniel then said: ‘This is what your dream means: Your kingdom is the head of gold. The silver is a kingdom that will come after you. Then there will be one like copper, which will rule over the whole earth. The next kingdom will be strong like iron. Finally, there will be a divided kingdom with some parts strong like iron and some parts weak like clay. The stone that becomes a mountain is God’s Kingdom. It will crush all these kingdoms and will last forever.’

Nebuchadnezzar fell down in front of Daniel with his face to the ground. He said: ‘Your God revealed this dream to you. There is no God like him.’ Instead of killing Daniel, Nebuchadnezzar made him head of all the wise men and ruler over the province of Babylon. Can you see how Jehovah answered Daniel’s prayer?