Taken from today’s reading in The NKJV Daily Bible:

I was looking, and behold, a tree in the midst of the earth, and its height was great.  The tree grew and became strong; its height reached to the heavens, and it could be seen to the ends of all the earth.  Its leaves were lovely, its fruit abundant, and in it was food for all.  The beasts of the field found shade under it, the birds of the heavens dwelt in its branches, and all flesh was fed from it (Daniel 4:10-12).

This tree represents King Nebuchadnezzar in his full, prideful majesty.  But read on.  The tree got chopped.  The leaves stripped.  The fruit scattered.

God turned the king into a beast.  It reminded me of a recent play that my family watched– “The Beauty and the Beast” in Idaho Falls at the Civic Auditorium.

But the beast in Daniel 4 came to fully acknowledge the sovereignty of the one, true God:

For His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and His kingdom is from generation to generation.  All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing; He does according to His will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth.  No one can restrain his hand or say to Him, “What have You done?”