Daniel chapter 9 and verse 24
will be our text. Daniel chapter 9 and verse 24. The title of the message tonight
is, Determined Grace. Determined Grace. Daniel chapter
9 and verse 24, it says, 70 weeks are determined upon Thy people. and upon thy holy city to finish
the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation
for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and
to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy."
Now here in this chapter we have the prophet Daniel. He has been
reading the Scriptures, and the Lord had opened to his understanding
that there was 70 years determined for the captivity of the people
of Israel. He read in the book of Jeremiah,
I suppose, that it was 70 years the Lord had determined to accomplish
the time of captivity in the land of Babylon. He calculated
it and 70 years was over. 70 years was done. And so Daniel here is beseeching
the Lord to forgive his sins and the sins of his people. And that he would deliver them
for his own namesake. Look at that in verse 19. He
says, O Lord, hear! O Lord, forgive! O Lord, hearken
and do! Defer not! for thine own sake,
O my God, for thy city and thy people that are called by thy
name." God had determined to send them into captivity. We learn this in Jeremiah, that
God, even before they had completed their sin and filled their sins,
God determined for them to be captive. He determined for them
to be captive 70 years, and He also determined the time that
they would be released. And so now he sends his angel
to Daniel, his messenger. And the angel gives him a message
of utmost importance. This is the message not only
of the deliverance of the captive nation of Israel. He gives him
something far greater than that. He gives them the determination
of God to deliver His people by the Messiah. He gives him
a prophecy of the Messiah. And that's the verse we're looking
at tonight. This verse 24 is a prophecy of the coming of Jesus
Christ. And there are two things I want
us to see tonight from this chapter. I want us to see, first of all,
a determined captivity. A determined captivity. And then
we're going to see a determined grace. A determined grace. Now, first of all, to determine
captivity. As I said before, God had determined
to put Israel into captivity for 70 years. If you will, flip
over to Zechariah. Zechariah chapter 7. Zephaniah, Haggai, and Zechariah. Zechariah chapter 7, and look
at verse 4. The Scripture says, Then came
the word of the Lord of hosts unto me, saying, Speak unto all
the people of the land. And the priests saying, When
ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh month, even
those seventy years, there it is, seventy years of captivity,
ye did eat all You did at all fast for Me, even to Me. And when you did eat, and when
you did drink, you did not eat for yourselves and drink for
yourselves." Now, this was because of the iniquity of the people
of Israel, that they were held captive. They were held captive
because of their worshiping of other gods, and they would not
repent of their sins. When the Jews fasted and mourned,
they didn't fast and mourn to God. God says, when you fasted,
you didn't do it unto Me, you did it for yourselves. And when
you ate and when you drank, you didn't eat and drink unto Me,
you did it for yourselves. I'll tell you, even so it is
with God's elect people that there is a determined time of
captivity. There is a set time for every
one of God's people that they are born into this world, and
from that time to the time that God delivers them, it is a set
time of captivity. A time in which all the elect,
the Scripture says, walk according to the course of this world.
We all had our conversation in time past, the Scripture said.
walking according to the lust of our flesh, even as others,
even as the children of wrath. There was no difference between
us or anybody else. There was an appointed time of
our darkness, of our blindness and spiritual death. And during
this time we were by nature, even as others, and we ate and
we drank, not for God, but for ourselves. We did that which
was right in our own eyes. We had no care for God, and even
if we were brought up under the Word of God, even if we did commit
fasts or religious things, we did them not for God, but for
ourselves. In the captivity of our souls,
we did that which profited our own self. And we went about in the exercise
of religion, offering what God did not require. Isn't that what
religion does? Religion offers something God
doesn't want. God never asked for it. I heard this before that
in Vietnam, most people in that country still trade in livestock.
You know, if a man has a daughter and he's paying a dowry for his
daughter, he pays in hogs. Five hogs I think it costs for
a dowry. If you were to go down to the
Lexus dealership and you were to want to buy a car, and you
had, and you say, look, I'll pay you a hundred hogs. He doesn't
want your hogs. He wants currency. He wants money.
That's not what he requires. And so it is, we bring the filth
of our religion, the filth of our sin, and we bring it to God
as though He wanted it. And God says, I don't want that.
I don't want that. God doesn't require our rites
and ceremonies and rituals. What He does demand is not our
best works. He demands absolute perfection
from men, His creatures. And yet the natural man still
brings his religion, the works of his flesh, works of his hands. But God will not accept men's
best efforts. He will only accept perfection.
He will only accept a man who has clean hands and a pure heart.
And just as these Israelites were in captivity, friends, make
no mistake about it, everyone who is outside of Christ tonight
is in captivity. They are in bondage to their
sins. They are blind and running madly away from God. And I can understand that because
that's exactly how I was at a determined time in my life. I too, in my
time of captivity, ran from God and ran toward my sins. And so
Daniel, in his study here, he found out that there was a determined
captivity. It was only by the Word of God
that he saw that there were 70 years determined. And it's only
by the Word of God can a sinner see that there is a determined
time of captivity. That we are in that time if you're
without Christ. It's only by the Word of God
we can see our condition. You can't see your condition
by looking at nature or anybody else. You can't compare yourself
to someone else and expect to see your nature. The only way
you can see your nature is if God reveals His Word to your
heart. That's the only way. The only
way we ever could be waken up to see our need of Christ is
by the Word of God. And I'll tell you, when Daniel
read the Word of God and found out he was in captivity and the
time was approaching of grace, what did he do? Did he just sit
back and say, well, God will do it. God said it, He'll do
it. No, he prayed. He sought God
to do what God said He would do. He sought in prayer and he
begged for forgiveness of sins. And I'll tell you, that's exactly
what a sinner does when he sees who he is and who God is. He
begs for mercy. He says, O Lord, hear. O Lord,
forgive and hearken and do. Don't wait. He said, don't defer. Don't hesitate. Please come now
and deliver now. Friends, salvation is of the
Lord, forgiveness is of the Lord, and He does it for His own glory
and the good of His and those who are called by His name. All men by nature are captives. I was a captive, but God opened
His Word to me one day and I saw that there was not only captivity,
but there was a determined time of captivity. There's hope. There's hope of grace. And that's
the second thing we want to see, is an appointed time of grace.
An appointed time of grace. O sinner, hear the goodness and
grace of God towards men, that just as sure as men were born
in sin and captivity, even so God has determined to show grace
to some. God is determined to show grace
to some. And here in this chapter, He
reveals His appointed time of grace. His appointed time of
grace. And how the release of His elect
was to be accomplished. Seventy weeks are determined. Grace is determined in seventy
weeks. If there is anyone captive in
sins and sees their need of grace and forgiveness, this message
is for them. Are there any here who are in
need of Christ, to turn to Christ and to have forgiveness and let
this message of deliverance both save the lost and comfort the
saved? Why? Because God has determined
to have grace. Now God, when He determined to
have captivity, what stopped Him? Nothing. What will stop
God when He determines to have grace? Nothing. Nothing. And there are six things there
in this text, six things that God has appointed for our salvation
by grace. Now, just as there is a day of
captivity appointed of God, even so the day of grace is appointed. And He reveals here that it is
decreed 70 weeks are determined, and then He would manifest His
grace. He would manifest His grace to
all His people. Now, 70 weeks are not 70 weeks
of days here mentioned, but 70 weeks of years. 70 weeks of years. Which means it's 490 years. 490 years from the time that the
decree went forth to rebuild Jerusalem. 490 years, God says, I have determined
to manifest all my grace at that time. At that time. Let's read
on in our text, if you'll look in your text. He says, "...know
therefore and understand that the going forth from the commandment
to restore and rebuild Jerusalem unto the Messiah, the Prince,
shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks." That's a total
of 69 weeks. "...And the streets shall be
built again, and the wall, even in troubleless times." And after
threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off and not for
Himself, and the people of the prince shall come and destroy
the city and the sanctuary, and the end thereof shall be with
the flood, and unto the end of the war desolation are determined. And He shall confirm the covenant
with many for one week." And there it is, a total of how many
weeks? Seventy weeks. Seven weeks to rebuild Jerusalem
in the 20th year of Artaxerxes, which was 445 B.C. Now, keep with me on the math,
because I had to recheck myself several times on this, but it's
true, it's right. Artaxerxes in the 20th year was
445 B.C., and we know that the death of Christ was in 33 A.D. which is a total of 478 years. Now understand that 478 Chaldean
years is equivalent to 483 Julian years, which we are in. We don't
count by Chaldean years. We count by Julian years. But
the equivalent of that span of time is 483 years. And if we add one week, which
is seven years, how many years? 490 years total. From the time that the decree
went forth until the time that Messiah was cut off, 483 years
and then one more week to confirm it, which was seven years. And
then the vision was sealed up. I'll tell you what. God is precise
and accurate in every detail. 490 years were determined, and guess
how long it took? 490 years for this prophecy to
be fulfilled. And guess how many people stood
in God's way? Nobody. Everybody did exactly
what God determined for them to do. Kings were risen up. Kings
were put down. War had come. Peace had come. Everything went according to
God's plan. You don't have time, but in Daniel
chapter 11 and chapter 12, we see God telling us which kings
will rise up and which kings will fall right up until the
time of Messiah would come. He determined everything. He is seated on the throne of
heaven, our God reigneth and does whatsoever He hath pleased. We should never be discontent
with what God does. God does everything. And there
is nothing that is outside of His decree or purpose. Nothing
happens to God's people but what is for their good and God's glory. This day of grace, friends, was
appointed not in time, it was appointed before time. It was
appointed by God from all eternity. And friends, at this time of
Daniel, I know that Daniel, he didn't understand fully everything
that was here. But I'll tell you this, we can
look and see that God's day of grace has already come. Daniel,
he didn't get to see God's grace in its full measure. That day was appointed from all
eternity and it was revealed to Daniel. What time we would
bring the Messiah, but we can look and see that God has already
sent this day of grace. God the Father in sovereign grace
chose of Adam's race a people for Himself from all eternity. And gave them to His Son to be
their surety and representative. And He promised to save them
before the world began. God's redemption of His people
was not an afterthought or a second thought. It was His first. It
was his first thought of salvation. You see, God didn't in time see
Adam fall and say, oh, I need to make up something now. My
first plan failed. No, his first plan was salvation
by grace and not by works. This is the eternal purpose of
God, that Messiah would come. And from this text, from the
decree sent forth by a heathen king, God had determined 490
years. But when the fullness of the
time was come, the Scripture says, God sent forth His Son
made of a woman. When? At the appointed time.
At the time God said it would come. Christ came at the appointed
time and not before. I believe we see in chapter 10,
Daniel begins to weep, and I can understand why he's weeping.
He figured out that, hey, Messiah is not coming in my lifetime.
You know that every Jew looked forward to the Messiah coming
in his time? And now then, Daniel knew that
Messiah would come at a later date, 490 years. But God says, don't worry about
that. You'll die, but you'll have your
lot with those in the last days. In Daniel 12, last verse, it
says, But go thou thy way to the end, the Lord speaking to
Daniel, for thou shalt rest and stand in thy lot in the end days. Friends, behold what manner of
grace God has shed on us that He had not given to the saints
of the Old Testament. Have you thought about how much
God has given us as opposed to what He gave them as far as the
light of the gospel? Hebrews 11.40 says God provided
some better thing for us. And now that grace has come,
Christ has appeared in our time, and we have a better view of
God's salvation than Daniel. Daniel had visions. Daniel spoke
to God himself. But we have a better view of
God's grace. You see, they were saved by seeing
the promise to come, but we are saved by seeing the promise has
come. They have seen Christ in types and shadows, but we've
seen Christ who fulfilled all the types and shadows of Scripture. They were under the tutor of
the Law, and they worshiped Christ by seeing Him in the types. But now we believe that we are
free from the bondage of that Law. They were under a priesthood
of men that never ceased. But now we are under the great
high priest who has offered himself once in the end of the world
for sins for us and sat down satisfying God's justice. At
that time, the gospel was hidden in a mystery. Can you imagine
having to see so darkly through those types and shadows, not
being able to see that Christ and the deity of His person,
the greatness of His person that is manifest to us today. God provided some better thing
for us. Believer, He who promised to
come, He who was determined to come, God's only Savior has come. He has come. And in verse 24,
there are six things here that we need to see. Verse 24, look
at this, about this determined grace. The Messiah was sent by
determined grace of God. He was sent first to finish the
transgression. Look at that in verse 24. And
it says, "...upon thy holy city to finish the transgression."
When I saw this word, I thought, first of all, my mind went right
to that scripture where it says, it is finished. That's the first
thought I had. But I had to rethink myself because
I had to look up the definition of this word. It doesn't mean
to complete. What it means is to shut up.
It means to shut up. It's like one who is shut up
in prison or one who is shut up to a disease. The Scripture says in Philippians
chapter 2, it says, and who being in the form of God thought it
not robbery to be equal with God, but made of himself no reputation. That phrase means he emptied
himself. He emptied himself. He did not empty himself of deity,
we know that. He did not empty Himself of the
attributes of God. We understand that by His miracles
and by His forgiveness of sins. But rather, He emptied Himself
by exchanging one state for another. In other words, when Jesus Christ
came down, He shut up His glory in human flesh. He shut himself
up in humility and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled
himself under the transgression of men. Friends, he who could call twelve
legions of angels was betrayed and arrested by a band of thugs. He who could speak, and the Scripture
says when His voice, the earth could melt at His voice. And
yet, there He stood before Pilate and Herod and the Jews and He
kept silent. He was shut up. He being oppressed and He was
afflicted and yet He opened not His mouth. He was brought as
a lamb to the slaughter, and as sheep before shears is done,
so He opened not His mouth. He was taken from prison and
from judgment, and who shall declare His generation? He who could have spared Himself
from the cross humbled Himself unto death. And He did it not for Himself,
but He shut Himself up to our sins. God took our sins. He imputed them unto His Son
and He shut them up on Himself. And thus, He poured out His soul
unto death, making it an offering for sin. He shut Himself up by
taking the disease of our sins in His own body on the tree.
Thus, all the transgression of His people were imputed to Him
of the Father, and the Father shut Him up, and He bore all
our sins willingly. Number two, he says he would
make an end of sin. When all the sins of God's elect
were imputed to Christ on that cross, God poured out all His
vengeance on Christ. He poured out all of His wrath
that was due our sins. on His Son. I'll tell you this, Jesus Christ
in His physical suffering was marred more than any man. But
I'll tell you this, His physical suffering was only a small fraction
of what His soul endured for our sins. When our sins were shut up in
Christ, God's justice poured out all hail on Christ. Believer, our Savior was offered
up. He offered up Himself, and He
took our sins that the Father shut Him up to, and He paid the
ultimate sentence for our sin, which was death. And by His offering, friends,
He has made an end of sin. He has made an end of all the
penalty of sin. He has made an end of all the
power of sin. And one day, He will make an
end of all the presence of sin. He completed it. He was a victorious
Savior and He made an end of sin and thus He said, it is finished. God's Holy Son bore our sins
in His own body on the tree. And thus He made an end of all
our sins. I know that our experience of
sin is still real, isn't it? I know the old nature still haunts
us, and I know when we sin, we are cast down, and sometimes
we cry in our souls, Lord, forgive us of our sins. And the sweet
voice of the Savior comes in and says, what you can't forget,
I can't remember. What you can't forget, I can't
remember. He says, I will remember their sins and iniquities no
more. Why? Christ made an end of them.
They're finished. They're done. Number three, He
made reconciliation. Look at that in our text. And
He says, He made an end of sin and to make reconciliation for
iniquity. In 2 Corinthians 5.19 it says,
To wit, God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself. This word reconcile means atonement. It means atonement. It's to take
two opposing parties who are in opposition to one another
and to remove that which is between them and reconcile them together,
to bring them together. And yes, God is the one that
has done the reconciling. God has done all the reconciling
necessary to bring His people to Himself. We by nature love
sin and we're not subject to God. We love darkness rather
than light. Yet God in His love, God in His
mercy, would send His Son to reconcile us to Himself. Jesus being shut up to our transgression
and making an end of our sin by His death, God has by Him
reconciled us to Himself. Now friends, this is an amazing
thing because reconciliation doesn't just speak of forgiveness
of sins, it speaks of being brought into the presence of God Himself. It's being brought into the family
of God. It's being made sons of God who
are aliens. That's one thing if you have
an alien rebel, somebody who hates you, and he has a debt
to you, and you pay that debt. It's one thing for you to just
pay his debt. It's another thing for you to
bring him into your home, isn't it? To make him one of your own. Friends, God has not only reconciled
us by the blood of His Son, but He's also brought us in to the
family of God so that we would be sons of God. Number four,
He determined to bring in everlasting righteousness. Friends, the law
of God is perfect and good. There's nothing wrong with it.
The only problem with the law is us. We can't obey it. And because we can't, it brings
in only everlasting curses to us. Only everlasting curses. Scripture says, "...curses everyone
that continueth not in all things written in the book of the law
to do them." And friends, because we have
broken that law, there is no hope of us bringing in any righteousness. The law and the priesthood, they
could never make a man perfect. Why do you think they did it
every day? They did it every day. They sacrificed a minimum
of two sacrifices every day. Then that priest never sat down
because the work was never finished. It was never finished. And I'll tell you, if a man could
obey the law in perfect, absolute righteousness, It would fail
in the comparison of what Christ has brought in. It wouldn't even
measure up because it would still be the righteousness of a man. Whereas Jesus, who is the God-man,
has brought in not just any righteousness, but the righteousness of God
itself. And He's given it to every one
of us who believe on His name. He imputed that righteousness.
so that nothing is lacking in our salvation. For Christ's righteousness
is all our righteousness. And it was the Messiah that had
brought that in. He brought in righteousness that will endure for all times.
Number five, Christ was determined to seal up the prophecy. Look
at verse 27 of our text. It says, "...and he shall confirm
the covenant with many for one week. And in the midst of that
week, he shall cause the sacrifice of oblation to cease." Now that
last week, the last seven years, is speaking after the death of
the Messiah. After the death, after He had
shut up the transgression, after He had done away with sin, after
He had brought in everlasting righteousness. The Scripture
tells us now that in that final week, He's going to confirm it. He's going to confirm it. God never left Himself without
a witness. Do you know that? God has never
left Himself without a witness. And guess who the witness was?
The same One who accomplished all of those things. It was Jesus
Christ. He rose from the dead. And the Prince, the Scripture
says, it says in verse 26, the Prince of the people, He shall
come. And He is the One that's going
to confirm the covenant with them for one week. He confirmed it by His resurrection. He confirmed it by the Spirit
of God descending on the day of Pentecost. He confirmed it
to His eleven apostles. He confirmed it in the midst
of that week to another apostle as one that was born out of due
season, the Apostle Paul. And it was by their testimony,
by the Word that He had given to them, that the oblations were
caused to cease. Do you not understand what they
did when these twelve men went out into the world preaching
the gospel? They turned the world upside
down. That Jewish religion that had
lasted for decades, for centuries, all of a sudden they said, Christ
is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believe it.
And people believed, and guess what it caused? It caused those
oblations, those sacrifices to cease. It caused them to cease. He confirmed that within that
week. I know He confirmed it when He
rent the veil. I mean, that was a big enough
testimony, don't you suppose? When the veil was written to,
there was no way that that system could last with a sewn-up veil. It couldn't have done it. But yet God, willing more abundantly
to show unto us these things, He constantly gave us witness
after witness after witness. He confirmed His covenant by
His blood, by His Spirit, and by His apostles. And so we can
be confident then of this, that if any man preach any other gospel
than that which we have preached, let him be accursed. We can be
confident to say that. Why? Because Christ has confirmed
His Word, His covenant of grace to His people. This is His only
covenant. This is the only manifestation
of God's Word to men is this Bible. There is no other source
of truth or faith or practice to be given. Number six, He is
determined to anoint the Most Holy. That's the last thing.
Believer, God has raised up Jesus Christ from the dead, and I know
this by His Word, He has anointed Him King over all creation, over
all providence, over all grace. The Lord Jesus Christ, the Most
Holy, has been anointed and He's seated on the throne of God to
do His own will. And what is His will? To call
His people to Himself. Hear this, the blessed gospel
of God's appointed grace. Just as there is a time of captivity
appointed, Even so, God has appointed a time of grace when Christ would
come and accomplish salvation, but there's another appointed
time of grace, and that's the time that the sinner is given
life and faith in Christ. When the sinner sees this Scripture
and he sees Christ as his only salvation, friends, that is a
time of great grace that God has appointed. A time of great
blessing to the heart of every sinner. And friends, I don't
know when the Spirit of God is going to approach any sinner.
I don't know. I preach at every opportunity
the gospel of Jesus Christ to men. I say, believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Believe now on Christ. The Scripture says that today
is the day of salvation. Believe on Him whom God has appointed
heir of all things. Believe on Him for the forgiveness
of all sin. And friends, we can be sure of
this, that all who believe, all of these things I've mentioned,
shut up to transgression, end of sin, reconciliation, righteousness,
all of these things, have been done for that person who believes. I know that. I know that with
all my heart. Why? Because I believed and He
gave it to me. He gave it to me. This is all
my joy, all my peace and all my comfort that Jesus Christ
is God's determined Savior. He is all my hope, all my salvation,
as well as He is the hope and salvation of all God's elect
who believe on Him. I pray that God blesses to our
hearts. Let's stand and be dismissed in prayer.