The Testimony and Its Vessel unto the Time of the End

We shall have to take what this book ('Daniel') brings into view along a two-fold line, in the main. Firstly the historical and prophetical; and then secondly, the typical and spiritual. But I would like here immediately to say that it is not in one's thought or intention to deal with the book of Daniel in any way exhaustively along prophetical lines, that is, it is not just prophecy as contained in this book which will occupy us, although that will be latent and sometimes patent all the way through.

We are aware that prophecy by itself need not be spiritually helpful or enriching or building up. It may be very interesting, very fascinating, very educational, but it does not always have a spiritual effect, and I do not think the Lord ever intended His people just to study prophecy as a subject, but to recognise that everything in His thought is intended to reach down into the life and to make very radical changes there, and in order for prophecy to do that, you have to do a great deal more than study dates, times, seasons and signs. There has to be a spiritual interpretation and application, and it is that which we have especially in mind here.