The King Who Learned to Praise

The anchor stands at the end of the chapter, and it must be heard before the story that earned it, because the end interprets the beginning: "Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven; for all his works are truth, and his ways justice; and those who walk in pride he is able to abase" (Dan 4:37). A king speaks this sentence. The same mouth spoke another sentence twelve months earlier, and the distance between the two sentences is the whole sermon: "Is not this great Babylon, which I have built for the royal dwelling place by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?" (Dan 4:30). Between "I have built" and "I praise" lie a dream, a decree, seven times, grass, dew, and eyes lifted to heaven. The herald announces a king who learned to praise by being brought low until the praise was no longer about himself.

Mark first who tells the story, because the narrator is the king himself. The chapter opens as a royal proclamation to every people, nation, and language on earth: "It has seemed good to me to show the signs and wonders that the Most High God has worked toward me. How great are his signs! How mighty are his wonders! His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom. His dominion is from generation to generation" (Dan 4:2-3). The man who was abased publishes his abasement. He does not hide the madness and keep the restoration, because the praise he learned is not private gratitude but public witness. The exposure shown in an earlier post in this queue stands behind this proclamation: no creature is hidden before the God to whom account is given (Heb 4:13). Nebuchadnezzar does not wait to be exposed. He exposes himself, and the exposure is the praise.

The dream comes first, and the dream is a tree: grown strong, height to the sky, sight to the end of the earth, fruit plentiful, food for all, shade and shelter for beast and bird (Dan 4:10-12). Mark that the greatness is real before it is judged. The king's dominion reached to the end of the earth and fed multitudes. The sin is not an imagined empire. The sin is standing on the palace roof and claiming a real empire as his own building, by his own power, for his own majesty. Pride does not need a lie to stand on. It stands on a true gift and calls it its own work. The tree is cut down not because it was small, but because it was great and forgot who planted it.

The watcher speaks the sentence, and the sentence carries its purpose inside itself: "The sentence is by the decree of the watchers and the demand by the word of the holy ones, to the intent that the living may know that the Most High rules in the kingdom of men, and gives it to whomever he will, and sets up over it the lowest of men" (Dan 4:17). Mark the intent: the decree is not given to punish in secret, but "to the intent that the living may know." Knowledge is the goal, and the knowledge is a single fact: the Most High rules, and He gives kingdoms to whomever He will. The king's fall is a lesson written for the living, and the living include every reader who has ever surveyed something he built and felt the sentence forming on his own lips: I built this, by my power, for my glory. The decree names no exception and no appeal. It says He rules, and gives it to whomever He will. No autonomy stands anywhere in this chapter, no free hand choosing its own portion apart from the hand that gives (Rom 6; Jer 17:9).

Then comes the mercy hidden inside the judgment, and it must not be missed, because it is the difference between destruction and discipline. The tree is cut down, but the stump is left: "leave the stump of its roots in the earth, even with a band of iron and bronze, in the tender grass of the field" (Dan 4:15). And Daniel reads the stump plainly: "your kingdom will be restored to you after you learn that Heaven rules" (Dan 4:26). The sentence has an end built in: the kingdom will be restored, not because the king earns its return, but after he learns the one lesson the decree teaches: Heaven rules. The stump is the promise that judgment is not annihilation. The band of iron and bronze holds the root through the seven times, so that what is cut down is not uprooted. Set this beside the previous post in this queue, where men who thrust away faith were delivered to Satan to be taught (1 Tim 1:20). The same pattern holds here: a man is handed over, not to be destroyed, but to learn. The classroom differs. The Teacher does not.

The fall arrives with a speed that leaves no room for negotiation. At the end of twelve months the king walks the palace and speaks the sentence, and "while the word was in the king's mouth, a voice came from the sky, saying, 'O King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is spoken: The kingdom has departed from you'" (Dan 4:31). Mark the timing: while the word was still in his mouth, the answer came from heaven. The boaster was, in the same hour, driven from men, eating grass like oxen, wet with the dew of the sky, until his hair grew like eagles' feathers and his nails like birds' claws (Dan 4:33). The kingdom departed the moment the claim was spoken, because the claim itself was the rebellion: a creature taking the Creator's authorship for himself. The swiftness is the mercy of the sentence. This fall let him only fall.

Then the turning, and the turning must be read in its exact order, because the order is the doctrine. "At the end of the days I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up my eyes to heaven, and my understanding returned to me; and I blessed the Most High, and I praised and honored him who lives forever" (Dan 4:34). Eyes lifted first, understanding returned second, praise followed third. The king did not reason his way back to sanity and then look up as a reward. He looked up, and understanding returned as a gift from outside. The lifting is his act, and his act is real. But nothing in this chapter lets the lifting become a boast, because the return of understanding belongs to the same giving hand that gives kingdoms. The man who once said "I have built" now confesses understanding was returned to him. The active verb of pride gave way to the passive verb of grace. This is the same movement the whole queue has traced: the conscience is washed, not scrubbed (Heb 9:14); faith is held as a gift, not steered as a skill (1 Tim 1:19); and here, understanding returns, it is not recovered by effort. God gives the increase at every step, and the king's praise names the Giver rather than the climber.

What the returned understanding sees is the creed the king learned in the field: "for his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing; and he does according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth; and no one can stop his hand, or ask him, 'What are you doing?'" (Dan 4:34-35). Mark the sweep of it. The king who once asked the world to admire his hand now confesses a hand no one can stop and no one can question. "What are you doing?" is the question pride always wants to ask God, and the king who learned to praise has stopped asking it. He neither explains God's will nor justifies it. He praises the God whose will needs no justification, because all His works are truth and all His ways justice (Dan 4:37). The evidence of the Scriptures corroborates this sovereignty passage upon passage, but evidence is never the foundation of the trust that praises Him (1 John 5:9-10). The foundation is the word that came from heaven while the boast was still in the king's mouth, and the word is Christ, in whom all rule is gathered.

Read the three movements together. First, a real greatness, truly grown, is claimed by the creature as his own building. Second, the kingdom departs in the same hour, the man eats grass, and the stump is held by iron and bronze until he learns that Heaven rules. Third, eyes are lifted, understanding returns, and the king who boasted now blesses, praises, and honors the King of heaven, publishing his own abasement to all the earth as witness. The pride warns. The fall teaches. The praise publishes.

So the post ends where the king's proclamation ends, but deepened. The king who learned to praise did not learn a technique for better boasting. He learned that the Most High rules, gives to whomever He will, abases those who walk in pride, and restores the stump He never uprooted. His praise is present possession, spoken now and not postponed: "Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise" (Dan 4:37). The past held a boast. The present holds a praise, belonging to the King of heaven, whose works are truth, whose ways are justice, and whose hand no one can stop. God gives the increase.