Sons of Man
The Book of the Prophet Daniel, brothers and sisters, may be
the single most important book of the Bible about which we never speak. It almost
single-handedly set the Jewish world of Jesus’ day ablaze with messianic
expectation, and confirmed for the early Church the destiny she would claim.
As we heard this morning, the Book of Daniel is set during
the time of the Babylonian Exile. This was when God’s people in disobedience
turned from God and thus fell prey to the might of the Babylonian Empire. The
Judean people, especially the movers and shakers of society, were forcibly
removed from their homeland of Israel and scattered throughout the lands of
Babylon. Yet even as they lost everything that they knew, a faithful remnant
returned to God. Daniel was a famous prophet during this Exile, and God gave to
Him a mighty vision.
Babylon would not be the end of Israel, God promised. Rather,
it would be but the first of four great pagan empires to arise in the Middle
East. The vision of Daniel portrayed these empires as four great ravening
beasts, then as four parts of a mighty statue. Each would rise and each would
fall, yet Israel would remain. Daniel then saw what almost appeared to be an
older God crowning a younger God—like a Father crowning His Son. And this Son
would descend to earth as God’s Messiah, the Anointed King, Who would
reestablish the royal line of Israel and found the Kingdom of God on earth.
He would appear, in Daniel’s cryptic words, as the “Son of
Man,” which many took to mean God in the form of Man, or perhaps a new
generation of humanity. And in fact, as Daniel’s visions progressed, the
singular Son of Man seems to become the plural saints, to whom God promises a curious and glorious destiny. The
fourth and final pagan empire prophesied by God, according to Daniel, would be toppled
by a Rock from Heaven, and the empire given over to the saints. And all this
would happen, the vision proclaimed, in 70 weeks. We can see why Daniel’s
prophecy proved rather a big deal for the Judeans in Exile, can’t we?
Other prophets had spoken of a coming Messiah. Isaiah, for
example, proclaimed that the Messiah would come as a Suffering Servant, crushed
for the sins of others and rewarded in glory after His death. But it was Daniel
who most explicitly claimed that this Messiah would not be just another earthly
king, but rather God Himself on earth: a divine
Messiah, a cosmic Messiah—a “Son of
Man” Who was so much more than just a Man. And on top of all this, mind you, it
was Daniel who started the clock. You see, from the very beginning of Daniel’s
proclamations, faithful interpreters understood each “week” of his prophecy to
represent seven full years. And 70 times seven years, beginning from the time
of Daniel, put the Messiah’s arrival at right around A.D. 30 by modern reckoning.
The Messiah now had a deadline.
As time passed, history seemed to play out the predictions
of the prophet Daniel almost to the letter. Babylon did fall, conquered by the Persian
Empire, and against all odds the people of Judea returned to the land of Israel
and rebuilt God’s Temple in Jerusalem. Persia was the second empire, the second
beast, and it fell to the third right on schedule when Alexander the Great
conquered the known world. This Greek Empire was particularly brutal to the
Israelites, and Greeks desecrated God’s Temple just as Daniel predicted they
would. But with love for God and trust in His promises, a faithful remnant
defeated the Greeks and drove them from the Promised Land. The anniversary of
this victory is still celebrated as Hanukkah.
At this point, Daniel’s predictions seem so spot-on that
many modern scholars hypothesized that the prophet could not possibly have
lived in Babylon way back under that first empire. No fortune-teller was this
good. Surely, they imagined, the Book of the Prophet Daniel must have been invented
by someone living much later, under the Greeks, under the third empire. The
only way they could’ve known the progression of history was to have written
about it in hindsight, right? But we know now that’s not the way it happened.
We have references to Daniel’s prophecies well before the
coming of the Greeks. And more recent scholarship has admitted that while our
modern version of the Book of Daniel may have been compiled in the Second
Century, the prophecies stitched together therein date back much farther than
they’d care to admit. (And this makes sense, right? If you have an ancient
prophecy that seems to reference the very events through which you and your people
are suffering, wouldn’t you reprint it?) Well, like I said, the Greeks rose and
the Greeks fell. And so came the final empire predicted by Daniel so very long
ago: the Empire of Rome.
By now centuries had passed. 490 years were up. And everyone
who knew the writings of the prophet Daniel knew that it was time for the
Messiah, for the Son of Man, to appear. Most of us have heard that Jesus was
one of many possible Messiahs. What we’re rarely told is why so many people in the time of Jesus expected the Messiah to
arrive: it’s because the conditions laid down by Daniel were being fulfilled.
The fourth empire, Rome, had conquered Israel. The 70 weeks were over. There
was almost what you might call a “Cult of Daniel” running around, crying “This
is it! The Son of Man is coming! He’ll be here any minute! We’ve waited 500
years for this!” And this all made their Roman overlords very nervous—for Rome
also expected a Messiah to arise in Judea. They had a pagan prophecy of their
own.
Then right on time, in A.D. 30, a prophet arose—born at the prophesied
time, in the prophesied city, from the prophesied family—calling Himself the
Son of Man. And the crowds welcomed Him. They proclaimed Him Son of David, Son
of Man, Son of God. They would’ve ridden with Him to war, as they did with so
many other would-be Messiahs both before and after Jesus, all now forgotten
save Him. But He refused to resort to violence, just as Daniel had said that He
would. He suffered and died, just as Isaiah prophesied. And He rose to life,
just as Ezekiel wrote…
And then things got even weirder,
because Jesus had taken a fisherman named Simon as His chief Apostle, renaming
Simon as Peter. Peter means “Rock” in Latin, and though Jesus warned that Peter’s
faith would first be fragile, like seed thrown on rocky soil, he would become “the
rock” on which Christ would build His Church. Remember that fourth empire from
Daniel’s prophecy—the one that would be conquered by a Rock from Heaven and
given over to the saints? Well, as it ends up, after Jesus rose into Heaven,
Peter was led to Rome. There he established the beating heart of Jesus’ Church.
And so the Christian faith—faith in the very Messiah Whom Rome had crucified—soon
conquered the entirety of the Roman Empire. It was just as God had promised to Daniel
centuries before Christ. Rome and all its lands were given over to the saints.
That would be us, by the way. We are the saints. We are the fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecy. You
see, in Baptism Jesus gives to us His Holy Spirit, and in the Eucharist we are
all made one in His Body and Blood. We
are one in Jesus Christ. That’s how the single Son of Man in Daniel’s
prophecy becomes the many saints who conquer pagan empires—not through fire,
blood, or steel but through faith and hope and love, through our willingness to
live for Him Who died for us.
And just as death was not the end of Jesus’ story but rather
His crowning in glory, so now for us has death become our door to everlasting
life—for if we have been united in a death like His, we shall surely be united
in a Resurrection like His! Think to your parents and grandparents and
great-grandparents. Think to your forebears from distant lands and times. Think
back to Peter, to Moses, to Abraham and Sarah. These people are not dead! They
live on in Jesus Christ, not as some shadow of their life here on earth but as
beings more fully alive, more fully human,
than you or I could yet imagine.
Heaven is not some distant fantasy. It is our destiny, our
home, the Kingdom promised unto the saints from days of old and ages past.
There do our loved ones live on, not separated from us, but praying and
interceding and guiding us in ways far beyond anything they were able to do for
us here on earth. Heaven is alive
with action, with prayer, with rejoicing and song. Heaven is brimming over with
activity to aid the Church on earth. And Heaven is preparing for the End of the
Age, when God shall again descend to earth to dwell amongst mankind. Then there
will be a new Heaven and a new earth—for they shall both be one. God will live on earth with Man and
all the dead shall rise to life.
But even this, dear Christians, is not some far-off future.
When we gather today in Communion, we share a foretaste of the feast to come—a piece
of Heaven, the Body of Christ, here and now on earth. At this Table, at this
railing, we join with all the saints of God before us, loved ones who share in
this one eternal Meal. Our story is
ancient. Our present is blessed. And our future is more glorious than we can
possibly express. Christ has come. Christ is here. And Christ has made us saints.
Thanks be to God, Who brings Heaven down to us on earth. In
Jesus’ Name. AMEN.
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