Daniel 7

"In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence." 

Daniel 7:13 (NIV)

LIKE a son of man.

Daniel 7 is an awesome chapter of the Bible, and there are many great lessons and mysteries in this chapter, but I want us to think about one phrase today: “like a son of man”. John used the same phrase to describe what he saw as the Lord Jesus gave him the Revelation (see Rev 1:13 and 14:14). Son of Man is a title that our Lord took on Himself. All four gospels use it. Stephen told his murderers in Acts 7 that he saw heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God. Luke explains to us that he used the term to refer to Jesus. Son of Man seems simple enough to understand, really almost self-explanatory, but when the word like is added, the meaning changes.

We could understand Daniel and John adding the word like, because their visions were of the glorified Person of the Lord of lords and King of kings, and yet Stephen (Acts 7) saw the glorified Lord and he used His title without adding like.

May I suggest that while our Lord was here on earth everyone saw His humanity, and only saw glimpses of His Deity. Now that our Lord is seated at the right hand of God in all His glory, everyone sees His Deity and only see glimpses of His humanity. Hebrews 2:17 teaches us that Jesus was made fully human and yet Hebrews 1:1-3 teaches us that He is fully God. He is like us in every way, but He is not the son of “a” man. He is the Son of God. He is the Son of Man, but not the son of “a” man, for the Eternal God is His Father.

I am the son of “a” man, and all you see when you look at me is fallen humanity. But I have this light within me, a treasure in a jar of clay as Paul describes it in 2 Cor 4, and slowly, very slowly (the slowness is my fault) little glimpses of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ can be seen in me. As we spend time trying to get our heads around this topic, contemplating the greatness of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, which makes us then aware of the sinfulness and sorry state that we are in in this flesh, may we be encouraged by 1 Corinthians 15:51-53: “Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.”