The Coronation of the King Text: Daniel 7:13-14
Introduction: Getting Your Bearings
There are certain passages in Scripture that function like a continental divide. How you interpret them will determine the direction of all the theological rivers that flow downstream from that point. Daniel 7:13-14 is one such passage. For many modern evangelicals, buffeted by pessimistic headlines and newspaper eschatology, the phrase "coming with the clouds of heaven" immediately conjures up images of a future, end-of-the-world return of Christ. They read it as a promise of escape, a divine airlift out of a world spiraling into chaos.
But this is a profound misreading, a case of letting our traditions and our anxieties read the Bible for us, instead of letting the Bible read and correct us. Daniel is not describing the Second Coming. He is describing the Ascension. This is not Christ coming down to earth from Heaven; this is the Son of Man going up to Heaven, into the very throne room of God, to receive His crown. This is not a rescue mission; it is a coronation. And understanding this simple directional fact changes everything. It changes how we view history, how we understand the Great Commission, and how we live our lives in the here and now.
Daniel has just witnessed a terrifying vision of four monstrous beasts rising from the sea, representing a succession of brutal, pagan empires: Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. They are savage, destructive, and arrogant. They represent man's rebellion against God, embodied in the state. But just as the final beast with its arrogant little horn is boasting, the scene shifts dramatically. The court of heaven is seated. The Ancient of Days, God the Father, takes His throne. Judgment is rendered against the beasts. Their dominion is taken away. It is into this context of judgment upon earthly empires that a new figure arrives, not from the chaotic sea of nations, but from the glorious clouds of heaven.
This vision is the lynchpin of a robust, optimistic, and victorious faith. It is the foundation of a postmillennial eschatology, not because we are optimists about man, but because we are steadfastly confident in what Christ accomplished and what He received when He ascended to the Father.
The Text
"I kept looking in the night visions, And behold, with the clouds of heaven One like a Son of Man was coming, And He came up to the Ancient of Days And came near before Him. And to Him was given dominion, Glory, and a kingdom, That all the peoples, nations, and men of every tongue Might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion Which will not be taken away; And His kingdom is one Which will not be destroyed."
(Daniel 7:13-14 LSB)
The Heavenly Investiture (v. 13)
We begin with the arrival of the central figure of all history.
"I kept looking in the night visions, And behold, with the clouds of heaven One like a Son of Man was coming, And He came up to the Ancient of Days And came near before Him." (Daniel 7:13)
First, notice the title: "One like a Son of Man." This is a Semitic way of saying "a human being." After a parade of grotesque, inhuman beasts, Daniel sees a figure who is truly human. This is a deliberate contrast. The kingdoms of men, in their rebellion, become beastly. But the kingdom of God is administered by a Man, the perfect Man. This is, of course, the Lord Jesus Christ's favorite self-designation. By using it, He was not simply being humble; He was laying claim to this very prophecy. When the high priest demanded to know if He was the Christ, Jesus answered by quoting this verse directly: "you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power, and coming on the clouds of heaven" (Matt. 26:64). The high priest understood perfectly; he tore his robes and cried "Blasphemy!" Why? Because he knew Daniel 7.
Second, notice the mode of transportation: "with the clouds of heaven." Throughout the Old Testament, riding on the clouds is a sign of divinity. It is something Yahweh does (Ps. 104:3, Is. 19:1). So this figure is truly human, yet He travels in a way reserved for God alone. Here is the mystery of the incarnation in prophetic miniature: the God-man.
Third, and this is the crucial point, notice the direction of travel. Where is He coming? He is coming "up to the Ancient of Days." He is not coming from heaven to earth. He is on earth, and is ascending to the heavenly throne room to be presented before the Father. This is a vision of the Ascension, the event described in Acts 1 where a cloud received Jesus out of the disciples' sight. He was not just floating away; He was traveling to His coronation. He was going to the Ancient of Days to receive the kingdom He had just purchased with His blood.
This completely inverts the popular but mistaken reading of the Olivet Discourse. When Jesus speaks of the Son of Man coming on the clouds (Matt. 24:30), He is referring to His coming in judgment against Jerusalem in A.D. 70, a judgment He would execute from His newly acquired throne at the right hand of the Father. His ascension was His enthronement, and from that throne, He judged the nation that had rejected Him.
The Universal Mandate (v. 14)
What happens when the Son of Man is presented to the Father? The result is the greatest transfer of power in the history of the cosmos.
"And to Him was given dominion, Glory, and a kingdom, That all the peoples, nations, and men of every tongue Might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion Which will not be taken away; And His kingdom is one Which will not be destroyed." (Daniel 7:14)
This is the charter of the Great Commission. This is the "all authority in heaven and on earth" that Jesus claimed before He sent His disciples out to make disciples of all nations (Matt. 28:18). This authority was not something He was waiting to receive at the end of time. It was given to Him at His ascension. He has it now. Jesus is not president-elect; He is the reigning King.
Look at the scope of this authority. It is absolute. He is given "dominion, glory, and a kingdom." And it is universal: "That all the peoples, nations, and men of every tongue might serve Him." This is not a spiritual, ethereal, "in-your-heart" kind of kingdom. It is a real kingdom over real peoples, real nations, and real languages. The prophecy does not say that some individuals from every nation might serve Him, but that the "peoples, nations, and...tongue[s]" themselves would serve Him. This is a vision of global conversion. It is the promise that the heathen will be His inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth His possession (Ps. 2:8). The stone cut without hands will become a great mountain and fill the whole earth (Dan. 2:35).
The nature of this dominion is then described. It is "an everlasting dominion which will not be taken away." Unlike the beastly empires that rise and fall, this one is permanent. And His kingdom "will not be destroyed." It is indestructible. This means that history is not a random series of meaningless cycles. History is the story of the establishment and expansion of this indestructible kingdom.
This is the engine of our gospel confidence. We do not go out to the nations hoping to carve out a little enclave for Jesus in a world owned by the devil. We go out as ambassadors of the enthroned King, announcing the terms of surrender to a world that already belongs to Him by right of creation and by right of redemption. We are not fighting for victory; we are fighting from victory.
Living in the Kingdom
So what does this mean for us? If Christ has already been crowned, if He is already reigning, and if His kingdom is an ever-advancing, indestructible force in history, how should we then live?
First, it means we must reject all forms of eschatological pessimism. The idea that the world must get worse and worse until Jesus comes back to rescue a defeated church is a direct contradiction of this text. That is a theology of retreat. Daniel gives us a theology of dominion. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation, and it is mighty to the pulling down of strongholds. We should expect the gospel to succeed. We should pray, work, preach, and build with the confident expectation that "the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea" (Hab. 2:14).
Second, it means our work in this world matters. We are not just polishing brass on a sinking ship. We are building a civilization, the civilization of Christendom, under the authority of the ascended King. Every lawful vocation, every subject taught in a Christian school, every act of mercy, every piece of legislation that restrains evil and promotes good, is an act of kingdom-building. We are called to take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ, and that includes thoughts about politics, art, science, and education.
Finally, it means our worship is warfare. When we gather on the Lord's Day, we are not just huddling for comfort. We are ascending in the Spirit into the heavenly places with Christ (Eph. 2:6). We are appearing before the throne of the Ancient of Days alongside our King, the Son of Man. In our prayers, we are petitioning the command center of the universe. In our singing, we are proclaiming the victory of our King to the principalities and powers. In the Supper, we are renewing our covenant allegiance to Him and being fortified for the task of discipling the nations.
The vision Daniel saw has come to pass. The Son of Man came to the Ancient of Days. The dominion was given to Him. The kingdom is His, and it will not be destroyed. The story of the rest of human history is simply the outworking of that enthronement, the mopping-up operation. Our task is to live like we believe it, to declare His crown rights over every square inch of His creation, and to joyfully participate in the glorious, unstoppable, and victorious advance of His kingdom.