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SEGMENT
6 DANIEL 9
page 1 of 9Segment
6 - Daniel 9
Gods Timing Is So Perfect
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Who foretold this long ago, who declared it from
the
the distant past? Was it not I, the Lord? And
there is no God
apart from me, a righteous God and Savior; there
is none but me.
Isaiah 45:21
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Introduction
Some of the chapters in
this book of Daniel are not in chronological
order. For example, Daniel 7 occurred
chronologically before Daniel 6. This point is
mentioned because the prayer recorded in Daniel 9
occurred during the year that Daniel was sent to
the lions den (Daniel 6). Even though the
prayer recorded in Daniel 9 was left unfinished
because of Gabriels unexpected visit, it
was included in the book of Daniel for at least
two reasons: First, the Bible tells us that
God sent an answer to Daniel while he was
praying. This information assures us that God
hears the prayers of His children and He responds
according to His infinite wisdom. Second, this
special prayer has been preserved in the Bible
because of its amazing content. Daniel states
many profound truths in his prayer that everyone
should thoughtfully consider.
Part
I
The story in Daniel 9
occurred in 538 B.C. and Daniel knew the seventy
years of captivity were drawing to a close. He
was deeply concerned about Israels release
from captivity and was anxious to fulfill
whatever role the Lord might want him to play.
Therefore, Daniel turned to the Lord with
humility, fasting and prayer. In the
first year of Darius the [grand] son to
Ahasuerus, of the seed of the Medes, which was
made king over the realm of the Chaldeans; In the
first year of his reign I Daniel understood by
the books the number of years, whereof the word
of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he
would accomplish seventy years in the desolations
of Jerusalem. And I set my face unto the Lord
God, to seek by prayer and supplications, with
fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes. (Daniel
9:1-3, KJV, insertion mine)
Commentary
on Part I
Consider some of the
concerns and concepts that must have been in
Daniels mind before he began to pray:
- Daniel
knew that god had set the descendants of
Abraham apart from the other nations for
a glorious purpose. (Exodus 19:4-6;
Isaiah 42:6)
- Daniel
knew why his people were captives in
Babylon.
- Daniel
knew that Israels deliverance would
have to be an act of God.
- Daniel
knew that God kept vigil, and He
would not forget His promise to free His
people from captivity. (Exodus 12:42)
- Daniel
knew that God had set a date for
the release of His people and the
Friday year of 536/5 B.C. was the
seventieth year of captivity.
- Daniel
believed he had been placed in a high
administrative position to somehow
facilitate the release of his people, but
he did not know what to do.
Now that some of
Daniels concerns have been identified,
carefully examine Daniels confession and
prayer:
Part
II
And I prayed
unto the Lord my God, and made my confession, and
said, O Lord, the great and dreadful God, keeping
the covenant and mercy to them that love him, and
to them that keep his commandments; We have
sinned, and have committed iniquity, and have
done wickedly, and have rebelled, even by
departing from thy precepts and from thy
judgments: Neither have we hearkened unto thy
servants the prophets, which spake in thy name to
our kings, our princes and our fathers, and to
all the people of the land.
O Lord,
righteousness belongeth unto thee, but unto us
confusion of faces [shame and embarrassment],
as at this day; to the men of Judah, and to
the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and unto all
Israel, that are near, and that are far off,
through all the countries whither thou hast
driven them, because of their trespass that they
have trespassed against thee. O Lord, to us
belongeth confusion of face, to our kings, to our
princes, and to our fathers, because we have
sinned against thee. To the Lord our God belong
mercies and forgivenesss, though we have
rebelled against him; Neither have we obeyed the
voice of the Lord our God, to walk in his laws,
which he set before us by his servants the
prophets.
Yea, all Israel
have transgressed thy law, even by departing,
that they might not obey thy voice; therefore the
curse is poured upon us, and the oath that is
written in the Law of Moses the servant of God,
because we have sinned against him. And he hath
confirmed his words, which he spake against us,
and against our judges that judged us, by
bringing upon us a great evil: for under the
whole heaven hath not been done as hath been done
upon Jerusalem. As it is written in the law of
Moses, all this evil is come upon us: yet made we
not our prayer before the Lord our God, that we
might turn from our iniquities, and understand
thy truth. (Daniel 9:4-13, KJV,
insertion mine)
Commentary
on Part II
Daniels fasting and
prayer must have been motivated by three factors.
First, fasting is something we can do when we
want God to consider the intensity of our
hearts desire. Second, Daniel humiliated
(embarrassed) himself with sackcloth and ashes to
show God that he was willing to do anything God
wanted him to do to facilitate the release of his
people. Third, Daniel knew about Solomons
prayer, which the Lord confirmed by sending fire
from Heaven when Solomon dedicated the temple in
Jerusalem. Solomon prayed: When they [Israel]
sin against you for there is no one who
does not sin and you become angry with
them and give them over to the enemy, who takes
them captive to a land far away or near; and if
they have a change of heart in the land where
they are held captive, and repent and plead with
you in the land of their captivity and say,
We have sinned, we have done wrong and
acted wickedly; and if they turn back to you with
all their heart and soul in the land of their
captivity where they were taken, and pray toward
the land you gave their fathers, toward the city
you have chosen and toward the temple I have
built for your Name; then from heaven, your
dwelling place, hear their prayer and their
pleas, and uphold their cause. And forgive your
people, who have sinned against you. (2
Chronicles 6:36-39, insertion mine)
Given the content and
eloquent language in Daniels prayer, it is
possible that Daniel prepared this prayer for a
specific worship service. It is also possible
that he prepared this prayer to meet one of the
conditions required for deliverance! Notice what
the Lord had said when He gave the covenant to
Israel at Sinai: [If you rebel
against me] You will perish among the nations;
the land of your enemies will devour you. Those
of you that are left will waste away in the land
of their enemies because of their sins; also
because of their fathers sins they will
waste away. But, if they will confess
their sins and the sins of
their fathers their treachery
against me and their hostility toward me, which
made me hostile toward them so that I sent them
into the land of their enemies then when
their uncircumcised hearts are humbled and they
pay for their sin, I will remember my covenant
with Jacob and my covenant with Isaac and my
covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham,
and I will remember the land. (Leviticus
26:38-42, italics and insertion mine)
Daniels prayer
indicates that he well understood the terms and
conditions of the covenant between Israel and
God. Daniel acknowledged that God had afflicted
Israel with a curse as the covenant stipulated.
Daniel knew that Israel deserved captivity
because of rebellion. Daniel justified Gods
righteous actions and he openly confessed that
Israel has insulted God. He prayed,
therefore
the curse is poured upon us, and the oath that is
written in the Law of Moses the servant of God,
because we have sinned against him [the Lord
our God]. (Daniel 9:11)
Bilateral Covenant
The curse that God placed
on Israel is difficult for some people to
understand, so some background information may
prove helpful. God made a unilateral covenant (a
one-sided unconditional covenant) with Abraham.
God promised Abraham that a) all nations would be
blessed through him, b) his descendants would be
as numerous as the stars, and c) they would
inherit a specific parcel of land. At the Exodus,
God made a bilateral (a two-sided or mutually
agreed upon) conditional covenant with Israel,
and it may be summarized with these words:
If you will be my people, I will be your
God. (Leviticus 26:12) However, if
you chose to love other gods and rebel against my
laws, I will destroy you. (Leviticus
26:14-39) The Bible indicates that God began
destroying Israel with the first generation that
came out of Egypt. The first generation was put
to death in the wilderness because of rebellion!
The nation of Israel could uphold their end of
the bilateral covenant only if a majority in
Israel loved and obeyed the Lord. Moses knew this
was a crucial point. In his farewell address to
the second generation of Israel the
generation that entered the Promised Land
he said, Love the Lord your God with all
your heart and with all your soul and with all
your strength. (Deuteronomy 6:5) He
also wrote, Do not seek revenge or bear
a grudge against one of your people, but love
your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord. (Leviticus
19:18) According to Jesus, these two commandments
were the greatest commandments spoken by Moses.
(Matthew 22:36-40)
It has been said in the
book that Gods treatment of Israel is a
mirror reflecting how He deals with all nations.
The inverse of this statement is also true.
Israels treatment of God is a mirror
reflecting how the human race treats God. The
carnal nature of individual Jews made
Israels corporate behavior rebellious and
ungrateful. A grateful company of slaves was
willing and eager to enter into a covenant with
God at the base of Mt. Sinai. However, forty days
later, they were dancing around a golden calf.
After two years, this same group of people became
so rebellious that God refused to allow them to
enter the Promised Land. (Numbers 14) God
confined that generation to the wilderness for
forty years so that all of the adults (except
Caleb and Joshua) would die without receiving
what had been promised to them. (Hebrews 3:10,11)
This is a crucial point. Many people have
wondered, Why did God deal so harshly with
Israel? Would it have been easier for Him to
abandon Israel and start over with another
nation? This almost happened. God almost
destroyed Israel when they bowed down and
worshiped the golden calf in the shadow of Mt.
Sinai, but Moses interceded. (Exodus 32:10)
Consider Gods love. From the beginning, God
foreknew the offspring of Abraham would fail, so
why did He enter into a covenant with them? This
is a profound point: God does not treat us on
the basis of what He knows the outcome will be.
Instead, God deals with His subjects on the basis
of love. God loved Abraham and He did
everything a heart of love could do to accomplish
His plans through Abrahams children. God
wisely put a destruction clause into
His bilateral (two-sided) conditional covenant
with the offspring of Abraham because God had
made a unilateral covenant (one-sided
non-conditional) with Abraham. In other words,
God unconditionally promised the patriarch
Abraham that his descendants would inherit
a specific parcel of land. God foreknew that
Abrahams offspring would rebel against Him
time after time, and the only way He could
fulfill everything He promised to Abraham was
through a provision in the covenant that would
provide for rebels to be destroyed! Every time
God destroyed Israel, He started over with a
remnant. When Israel rejected Messiah, God
did not abandon Israel and turn to the Gentiles.
God redefined Israel by making Gentile believers
in Christ the heirs of Abraham! (Galatians
3:28,29; Ephesians 2) By doing this, God will be
able to fulfill the unconditional covenant He
gave to Abraham!
Blessing and Curses
Gods bilateral
covenant with Israel was conditional. The
covenant began with If you will be my
people, I will be your God. To motivate
Israel to be faithful to the covenant between
them, God put an important balance between
blessings and curses in the covenant. This
balance mirrors the two options from which
mankind can choose. Our first option is to love
God, submit to His laws and enjoy His presence,
favor and blessings. Our second option is to
rebel against God, experience the pleasures of
sin for a short season, and suffer the
consequences of sin and destruction. (Leviticus
25; Deuteronomy 28; Ezekiel 18; Romans 8) These
are the only options available to mankind,
because everything in the universe belongs to
God. People who wish to live forever in
Gods kingdom cannot live in rebellion
against God because God will not tolerate
rebellion in His house. God cast Lucifer and a
third of the angels out of Heaven because of
rebellion, and God cast Israel out of His favor
for the same reason. (Ezekiel 28:17; Revelation
12:7-9; Matthew 23:38) Consider Gods words
to Israel: Follow my decrees and be
careful to obey my laws, and you will live safely
in the land. (Leviticus 25:18) If
in spite of this [a series of punitive
judgments] you still do not listen to me but
continue to be hostile toward me, then in my
anger I will be hostile toward you, and I myself
will punish you for your sins seven times
over. (Leviticus 26:27,28)
God
has demonstrated through Israels long
history that perfect laws cannot change a
rebellious heart. (Romans 8:7) God blessed Israel
with His magnificent laws and promised them every
material benefit if they would follow Him, but
unfortunately, Gods generosity did not cure
their rebellion. Instead of becoming a conduit
through which Gods blessings could flow to
all the nations around them, Israel selfishly
appropriated Gods blessings to themselves.
However, we should not condemn Israel too harshly
because every nation has followed the same path!
Remember, Israels treatment of God is a
mirror reflecting how mankind treats God. A
carnal heart can change. The carnal heart can
even do a good deed every now and
then, but good deeds do not transform the carnal
heart into the type of heart that God wants. The
root problem with the carnal heart is that it
cannot love God and others as much as it loves
itself. Believe it or not, selfishness and
rebellion against God are genetic! Human beings
are born with the carnal nature. This is why
everyone who wants to be part of Gods
kingdom must be born again. All
sinners can receive a new heart if they
surrender to Gods will. The carnal heart is
self-seeking; therefore, we cannot joyfully
submit to Gods will until we surrender to
His will. If we surrender daily to go, to be and
to do all that God directs, He will do something
within us that we cannot do for ourselves. God
will transform our selfish hearts into selfless
hearts through the power of His Spirit. A loving
heart does not think less of itself; it thinks
more of others than itself. The born-again
experience does not occur in groups of people; it
occurs within the heart of one individual at a
time. Because most people in Israel did not
experience the new birth, the nation of Israel
corporately failed to reach the glorious
potential that God offered. Israels
history indicates that most people in Israel were
constantly rebellious toward God at any given
time. Israel destroyed the prophets God sent, and
ultimately, God destroyed His temple and His city
along with two-thirds of His people. Then He put
the survivors in Babylonian exile for seventy
years. (Ezekiel 5:11,12)
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