Good morning and welcome to our
concluding message in the study of the book of Daniel. We're
in the last chapter, chapter 12. Chapter 10, 11, and 12 are actually one one document and it's broken
up just for our convenience into chapters and verses but it's
really the same narrative and I just like us to remember who's
speaking and what's going on and Daniel's been given a boatload
of future information about what's going to happen and he's already
been given the message of Messiah the Prince coming and being cut
off, but not for Himself, and the Gospel message that the church
just rejoices in. But in Daniel chapter Let's go back to Daniel chapter
10 and remember who's speaking and what's going on. And Daniel, during this reign of Cyrus King
of Persia, In verse 1 there, he said, a
thing was revealed to Daniel through this vision. And he says,
but the time appointed was long. It was like a long time in the
future that this was going to happen. And Daniel lived in 500 B.C., and so it was quite a lengthy
time before Messiah the Prince would come on the scene, and
another period before he would be cut off, and then all the
subsequent events that happened all during this time. But he
said the time appointed was long, and he understood the thing,
and he had an understanding of the vision that was given to
him. And then he lays it out for us,
and he says, I started out by fasting and praying for three
full weeks. He says, I was concerned about this. And then
in verse 5, he says, then I lifted up my eyes and looked. And behold,
a certain man, clothed in linen, whose loins were girded with
fine gold of Uphaz, or Ophir, as it's referred to in the Hebrew
in the Old Testament. And his body was like the barrel,
and his face as the appearance of lightning, and his eyes as
lamps of fire, and his arms and feet like in color to polished
brass, and the voice of his words like the voice of a multitude. And he said, I alone saw the
vision. And then in verse 9 it says,
And I heard the voice of his words. And when I heard the voice
of his words, then was I in a deep sleep on my face, my face toward
the ground. And then he's told, oh Daniel,
you're greatly beloved. Fear not. What wonderful words. And so this vision goes on through
chapter 12. And so that, as Beth said, the
segue into chapter 12. In our last lesson, remember
we had all the kings from the north, the king from the south,
and this one's gonna come against that one, and this one's gonna
scheme with that one, and all the skullduggery that went on,
and all the kingdoms that came and went, and the Greeks, and
the Persians, and then finally the Romans, and everything. So we come finally to chapter
12, and remember that it's this one who's, was girded in white
linen. They had his golden girdle and
his eyes like lamps of fire. He's describing Christ. He's describing the Lord that's
speaking to him. And he says, at that time shall
Michael stand up, that great prince, which standeth for the
children of thy people, and there shall be a time of trouble such
as never was since there was a nation, even to that same time.
And at that time, thy people shall be delivered, every one
that shall be found written in the book. What a remarkable opening
statement. What a wonderful words of comfort.
And it talks a lot about times and times and times. We know all these things transpired
or are in the process of transpiring. In the book of Daniel, we have
a kind of a time from the beginning to the end of the age with the
church. And it says in verse 2, And many
of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awaken, some
to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.
And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament,
and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever.
And that's just what we do when we declare the gospel. We declare,
as Beth mentioned, I had a chance to read that Doer, Done pamphlet.
And that's all we can do. And it says, they that turn many
to righteousness, all we can do is present the gospel, present
the gospel righteousness narrative, and then it's out of our hands. But thou, O Daniel, shut up the
words and seal the book even to the time of the end many shall
run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased then i daniel
looked and behold there stood two other the one on this side
of the bank of the river and the other on that side of the
bank of the river. Remember in the previous chapter
he said, I was by this river, the Tigris River, and I had this
vision. And one of them said to the man
clothed in linen, which was upon the waters of the river, how
long shall it be till the end of these wonders? So you have
one that's on the water, one on this bank, and one on that
bank. So there's this triad of ones that are being spoken of
here. And I heard the man clothed in linen, which was upon the
waters of the river when he held up his right hand and his left
hand unto heaven, and swear by him that liveth forever, that
it shall be for a time, times, and a half. And when he shall
have accomplished to scatter the power of the holy people,
all these things shall be finished. And I heard, but I understood
not. And then I said, O my Lord, what shall be the end of these
things? And he said, go thy way, Daniel, for the words are closed
up and sealed till the time of the end. Many shall be purified,
made white, and tried, but the wicked shall do wickedly, and
none of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall understand.
And from the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away
and the abomination that maketh desolate set up, there shall
be 1,290 days. Blessed is he that waiteth and
cometh to the 1,335 days, but go thy way until the end be,
for thou shalt rest and stand in thy lot at the end of the
days. So that, and that concludes the the vision that he had. So we always have to remember
the purpose of it and who's speaking. And we went back to Daniel chapter
10 and recognized that it was the Lord speaking to Daniel.
And he had these angels with him that were one on the one
bank of the river and one on the other bank of the river. But it's the gospel narrative. I'd like you to turn with me
just real quickly over to 1 Peter, because I think this is what
1 Peter was referencing there. Remember when Norms always said,
well, all they had was the Old Testament. They had the law and
the prophets and the Psalms. That was the gospel that they
had. And so Peter's writing this epistle
in 1 Peter chapter 1. And remember, all these Jews
had been scattered. The diaspora, they called it,
where all the Jews were scattered because the Romans hated them
and they drove them all over. And under the purpose of God,
the gospel was spread all over the world. And so Peter says,
to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, and Galatia, and Cappadocia,
and Asia, and Bithynia, who are the elect according to the foreknowledge
of God the Father. Interesting, in your bulletin,
there's a little segment from Arthur Pink that said that many
people say that election is based on, or foreknowledge is based
on election, and vice versa, and they always have it backwards.
God elected them. And so it says, elect according
to whom God foreknew, God the Father, through sanctification
of the Spirit unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of
Jesus Christ, grace unto you and peace be multiplied. And
then he's writing these words of comfort to them. And remember
the key words that we found in Daniel was, you're greatly beloved,
fear not, peace be unto you. And so he's talking to them about
this gospel message that's been going on from the beginning of
time, and he's telling them, you know, You're having a period
of a trial here. You've been run out of town,
and you're living in a land that's not your own, and you're being
persecuted. And verse 70 says that the trial
of your faith being much more precious than gold that perishes,
though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and
honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ. Remember what
we just read in Daniel. whom having not seen ye love,
in whom though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice
with joy unspeakable and full of glory, receiving the end of
your faith, even the salvation of your souls. Verse 10, of which
salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently, who
prophesied of the grace that should come unto you. Daniel
chapter 9, Daniel chapter 10, all the whole book of Daniel.
searching what or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ
which was in them did signify when it testified beforehand
the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow.
Isaiah 53, unto whom it was revealed that not unto themselves but
unto us they did minister the things which are now reported
unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the
Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, which thing the angels desired
to look into." I like the NIV translation of
that. It says, concerning this salvation,
the prophets who spoke of the grace that was come to you searched
intently and with the greatest care, trying to find out the
time and the circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in
them was pointing. when he predicted the sufferings
of the Messiah and the glories that would follow. And it was
revealed to them that they were not serving themselves, but you,
when they spoke of the things that have now been told you by
those who have preached the gospel to you by the Spirit sent from
heaven, even angels long to look into these things. So I like
that descriptive terminology there in the NIV. And as we go
back to Daniel, chapter 12, he's getting the word from this
one, the Lord. And there were two, one on this
side of the riverbank and the other on that side of the riverbank.
And they're saying, how long shall it be till the end of these
wonders? That's just what it said in 1
Peter. They inquired, they wanted to look into this whole matter
of grace and when the accomplishment of all these things would be.
And then the man clothed in linen, which was upon the waters, when
he held up his right hand and his left hand, Heaven swear by
Him that liveth forever that it shall be for a time, times,
and a half, and when ye shall have accomplished to scatter
the power of the holy people, all these things shall be finished."
And, you know, as we, as we look at some of these words. People are always trying to take
the very things that Daniel proclaims to us and make them into something
they're not. It says, fear not, and so they're always trying
to make it into fear. And they're always trying to predict the
times, and he says, the times are sealed up. And even the angels
inquire about it. They want to know, but they don't
know. This word times that's used here,
it shall be for a time, times and a half. And that word means an appointment. It doesn't mean like, well, it's
not code word for like, 892 years or something. That word properly
means appointment, a fixed time or season and specifically a
festival and by implication an assembly that's convened for
an appointed time or festival. So it's not just a word that
says we should be looking, trying to figure out a calendar date
of this or that. So as we go through this, when
we started out in chapter 9, we learned of the coming of the
Messiah, the Prince, the Christ, the Anointed One who would be
cut off but not for Himself. And chapters 10 and 11 take us
through this series of kings and kingdoms that were scheming
and warring one against another. And then we come to the part
about the desecration of the temple that we talked about last
time in Antiochus Epiphanes, who was a Syrian king that got control there in 167 BC. The historian Josephus records
in his War of the Jews that Antiochus, king of Syria, surprised Jerusalem
by force and held it three and a half years. and during which he created all
his mayhem. And at that time he was cast
out of the country by the Maccabees or the Hasmoneans as it refers
to them in other Hebrew and the other apocryphas. The Hasmoneans
were a class of They were of the Levitical tribe. And they were kind of the wealthier
Jews. And they put together an army
and drove out Antiochus and took over Jerusalem. And they set
up a series of kings. And they ruled from 167 B.C.
to about 37 B.C. in Daniel chapter 8. In Daniel chapter 8, in verse 13, And I heard one saint speaking,
and another saint said to that certain saint, which spake, how
long shall be the vision concerning the daily sacrifice and the transgression
of desolation to give both the sanctuary and the host to be
trodden underfoot? And he said, unto 2,300 days,
then shall the sanctuary be cleansed. Well, Antiochus Epiphanes, he
set up an image of Jupiter in the temple and sacrificed a pig
on the altar and desecrated the whole thing. And when the Maccabees,
the Hasboneans drove out him, they cleansed the temple and
they redid everything. And when they got it all done,
they rededicated the temple to God, and when they had the dedication
ceremony, they lit an oil lamp. And according to their tradition,
the lamp only had enough oil to burn one day, but it burned
by miracle. It burned eight days. And so
that became the beginnings of the Hanukkah. Festival of Lights
and the lighting of the menorah and all that stuff that they
do nowadays. They still celebrate that. they'd
still be sacrificing stuff if they could, if they had a place
to do it. And I think I read to Norman here some while ago
that they're preparing all the stuff to redo all that whenever
they get control of the temple mound and build another temple,
which isn't probably going to happen. But anyway, Ultimately, the Romans came in,
took over that whole region, and during his reign, according
to the purposes of God, Messiah the Prince would come during
the Roman era. Messiah the Prince would come,
born of a woman, born under the law. in the fullness of time. Not by a calendar date, although
it was, but it was according to the time that God had appointed
for Messiah the Prince to come that was written about in the
Old Testament. Out of Bethlehem shall he come. And Messiah the Prince, the true
Passover lamb would come and be slain to redeem his people and to redeem
them that were under the law that we might receive the adoption
of sons, Galatians 4, verse 5. And that's what they wrote about
in Acts chapter 4, and Peter's preaching again. He just wrote
about the angels and the prophets trying to figure out this time
element. And in Acts 4, verse 25 through
28, it says, Who by the mouth of thy servant David hath said,
Why did the heathen rage? And the people imagined vain
things. The people imagined useless, That word vain means useless,
worthless. And that's basically what they
did with all of their religious shenanigans. The kings of the
earth stood up and the rulers were gathered together against
the Lord and against His Christ, Antichrist. For of a truth against
thy holy child Jesus, whom thou has anointed, Both Herod and
Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were
gathered together for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined
before to be done." The sovereignty of God in a kind of your basic
nutshell there, working his purposes out for the redemption of the
church. In due time, when we were without strength, Christ
died for the ungodly, it tells us in Romans chapter 5, verse
6. And in the purposes of God, many
of His children were yet to be born. And still, there are still
some that are yet to be born. Otherwise, He would be back. And God declared that they too
would be saved by the preaching of the Gospel. Remember in Daniel
it says, they shall turn many to righteousness. We don't have
the power to tap anybody and say, okay, now you're righteous,
now you're saved. All we can do is give them the
Gospel. And the Spirit takes care of
the rest. But they knew that they would
Everyone that would be saved would ultimately be saved by
the preaching of the gospel of Christ and his ultimate sacrifice
on their behalf. And for the Jews during this
period of the Romans, they rejected him. They rejected him as Messiah. They rejected him as king. They
said, we have no king but Caesar. They said that. Crucify him. And they rejected him, really.
Norman's been going through the Old Testament, and it's just
a story of redemption and remnant according to the election of
grace. All the way from Adam on up. Noah. Eight people out of the entire
world. So, as a nation, they rejected
him. But some, from every kindred,
tongue, and nation are going to hear the gospel as norm It went through in Acts chapter
2. We do hear in our own languages the wonderful works of God in
saving His people from their sins. And while the Jewish nation
of Jesus' time rejected Him as King and swore allegiance to
Caesar, they in truth hated Him. They didn't even like the one
that they swore allegiance to. We have no King but Caesar. They
hated Caesar. They didn't want to be paying
those taxes to support the Romans. They didn't want those Roman
troops in their town. They didn't want nothing to do
with them. But they chose that over the true king. And they
were in continual revolt against those Romans. And they continued their They wanted
to hurry up and get Jesus down off the cross because they needed
to get back to the temple and celebrate the Passover. There you have it. They continued to celebrate that
Passover feast in their corrupt way long after Jesus was crucified,
buried, and rose again the third day. And they revolted again
and again, and then that's what led to the Vespasian and the
Romans coming in in 70 A.D. in besieging Jerusalem. And remember we mentioned that
there were three million Jews in Jerusalem at the time of the
Passover when the Romans besieged it? And millions died. They were
just, they were, after a time when they were cut off from going
in or coming out and their starvation was rampant and murder and mayhem
and, They were cut off. They couldn't come or go. They
ran out of food. People were just ganging up and
running around town, killing everybody. And Josephus said
the Romans couldn't have, they couldn't have conceived anything
so evil to do to the Jews as they did to themselves while
they were in this condition. And so eventually, They stormed
the city and got in and burnt it to the ground and wrecked
the temple. Jesus said, you know, there's
not going to be one stone left upon another. It's all going
to be torn down. That'll be the end. He says,
but you know why? Because you knew not the time
of thy visitation. They shall not be left one stone
upon another. They shall be thrown out. Remember
the disciple there, the Jews, were saying, hey, look at this
temple. Isn't this wonderful? Isn't this great? Never mind
all the crooked, corrupt stuff that's going on inside. that you're sacrificing the halt
and the lame and the maimed and the stuff you couldn't sell in
the marketplace. You got your money changers set
up in the thing because you said, hey, no, we'd only accept Jewish
shekels in the sanctuary. So you can bring your denarius from somewhere else
and for a fee, we'll change that into shekels that can be And
then when you have your shekels, then we'll sell you a dove or
a lamb. It was a money process. And he
says, it'll be laid even with the ground, because thou knewest
not the time of thy visitation. And as for these things, these
wonderful things that you're bragging about, The days will
come when there will not be left one stone upon another that shall
not be thrown down. Remember that Herod had kind
of decorated that he wanted the temple to kind of reflect his
gloriousness. And so he put a lot of gold stuff
in there, gold plating and whatnot. And when they set fire to it
all, it melted. The gold ran down between the
rocks and the Roman soldiers pried the stones apart with their
swords to try and get at the gold. The whole thing was just
torn down. In 1880, a photographer took
a picture in Rome of the Arch of Titus. It was an arch that was to celebrate
their victory over the revolt in Jerusalem. And so they built
that to magnify him. And inside was one of those,
well, on the inside, there's a relief carving here that shows
them hauling back the treasures of the temple back to Rome. So if you want to pass those
around, people could look at those. So that all took place. That's history. There's history
right in your hands there that shows that all that took place
just as it was foretold in the scriptures in Daniel here. And
now we're even taken to a further time. You remember when Daniel
says, I'd like to, you know, I think it's the 70 years are
up. And the messenger said, let's not worry about the 70 years
of captivity. I'll tell you about the deliverance
from the true captivity in 70 weeks until Messiah the Prince
comes. And He'll make an end of sin.
So now we're taken to a further time in chapter 12, a time when
the last sheep has been saved, brought to Christ by the Spirit
through the preaching of the Gospel. And verse 1 says, at
that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth
for the people, the children of thy people, and there shall
be a time of trouble such as never was since there was a nation,
even to that same time. And at that time, thy people
shall be delivered, everyone that shall be found written in
the book. So if we take that literally, that's the end. They shall be delivered. Everyone found written in the
book. Some of them who's written in
the book haven't been born yet. And many of them that sleep in
the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life and
some to shame and everlasting contempt. And they that be wise
shall shine as the brightness of the firmament. And they that
turn many to righteousness as the stars forever and ever. I'd
like to just call your attention to that description of how those
people will be And we're going to kind of delve into this a
little further in our next lesson, what we shall be, because there's
quite a bit written about it in the New Testament. But it
says, they shall shine as the brightness of the firmament.
And whenever we have these descriptions of the Lord, the heavenly messengers,
and Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration, and they shine, They have this
appearance of light and shining. It says, many shall be purified
and made white and tried, but the wicked shall do wickedly
and none of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall
understand. That's just a picture of when
Christ is revealed to His people, they have an understanding of
grace that the unregenerate will never have. And even if Christ
comes back and appears to them and they're subject to Him and
they have to bow the knee to them, they will never understand. They may have to bow the knee
and say, yeah, apparently you are the
king, but we don't get it. Well, I don't know why I'm here.
I thought I did OK. I did this, this, this, and this. I thank God I'm not like those
guys over there. They will never understand. For the church, it'll be a glorious
time when the Lord returns. And as again, some of that will
go into our next lesson here, which is not exactly from Daniel,
but part of it. And Daniel chapter 7 and verse
13, I saw in the night visions, behold, one like the Son of Man
came with the clouds of heaven and came to the ancient of days
and they brought him near before him. You know, in Isaiah 8, 18,
it says, behold, I and the children whom thou has given me. That's just a picture of Christ
coming to the Father with all His redeemed that He was given
in the covenant of grace. And there was given Him dominion
and glory and a kingdom that all people, nations, and language
should serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting
dominion which shall not pass away, and His kingdom that which
shall not be destroyed. Well, that's not talking about,
well, when he comes back, then there'll be a period of this
many times, and there'll be the rapture, and then there'll be
this other stuff, and all the stuff they've made up to frighten
people into making a confession. Matthew 24 says, when he comes,
he shall send his angels with the great sound of a trumpet,
and they shall gather all his elect from the four winds from
one end of heaven to the other. They'll all begin, not some now
and some later, they'll all begin. In 1 Thessalonians chapter four,
if you turn over to 1 Thessalonians 4, 13, we'll read a few verses
there. But I would not have you to be
ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep. Because
we have that concern about our families and friends that have
passed on. You know, next week we're going
to celebrate Rose and have a service for her. He said, Sorrow not, even as others
which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus
died and rose again, even so them which also sleep in Jesus
will God bring with him. For this we say unto you by the
word of the Lord, so that's where his source of information is
coming from. He didn't make this up. It wasn't
conjecture or theory. For this we say unto you by the
word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the
coming of the Lord, shall not prevent them which are asleep
or come be ahead of them. For the Lord himself shall descend
from heaven with a shout and with the voice of the archangel
and with the trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise
first. Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up
together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.
And so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one
another with these words. Now I call your attention back
to Daniel chapter 12 again, and I'm going to read you the end
verses here, and I like the translation from the NIV. As for you, Daniel, verse 13,
go your way till the end. You will rest. You're going to
die. You will rest, and then at the
end of the days, you will rise to receive your allotted inheritance. In the KJV version it says, Go
thy way till the end be, for thou shalt rest and stand in
thy lot at the end of the days. You know what? That's what the
Lord said. to give you an expected end.
That's what the scripture says. So, we have this glorious time coming.
The dead in Christ shall rise, and we'll go to meet them in
the air, and we shall ever be with the Lord. Next time we're
going to look at some of the things Flesh and blood cannot inherit
the kingdom of God. We shall be changed, and the
twinkling of an eye will be changed. To what? And what will that probably
be like? But you know, he says, the eye
has not heard, or seen, or ear heard the things, we can't imagine
it. We can't imagine a world uncontaminated
by sin. Because everything that we deal
with, From the minute we're born, we're born in sin, we're born
into a world that's under the effect of sin. Everything is,
there's not one atom that's not been impacted by the fall. And
so we can't really visualize or imagine how things would be without that. We can't imagine
that time. And God says, you know, the old
stuff is done away with. I'm going to create a new heaven
and a new earth. Everything will be new. If any
man be in Christ, he's a new creation. We just can't envision
all those wonderful things that God has in store for us that
are unimpacted by sin. And so the message here was clear.
The time is sealed until the end. But Daniel, be comforted,
be strong. Go thy way till the end. You will rise and then you'll
get your inheritance. Come, ye blessed of the Lord.
Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of
the world. So with that, we'll stop. We
used up our time. Thank you for your attention
throughout this Book of Daniel study, and next time we'll look
at what we shall be, and after that, something else. Be free.