Well, in Daniel 9, 24, Daniel's
prophecy of Christ. And I can't emphasize too much
in this passage because it is so abused in much of false Christianity
today that this prophecy is a prophecy of the coming of Jesus Christ
into the world to accomplish for his people who were given
to him before the foundation of the world all that God requires. for the salvation of sinners. We need to grow in appreciation
of that. We need to grow in understanding
of that. Value of it. I mean this this
is the treasure that we have and so I want to go over this
verse 24 again I went it went into detail last week on this
and and you can see why I look at verse 24 70 weeks now, that's
that's a term that means 70 sevens which means 70 weeks of years
This this is what the scholarship tells us and I believe it's true
the number seven is so symbolic in the word of God because seven
represents a finished work. As you know, we work in the old
covenant, they'd work six days and on the seventh day Sabbath,
they would rest. And so the work was done in six
days and the Sabbath rest. Well, what is our Sabbath? Our
Sabbath today is not a day. Our Sabbath today is a person.
And that's what this prophecy shows us in this multiples of
seven. And that's the symbolism that
we're gonna find here in these numbers. But Christ is our Sabbath. And you can read about that in
Hebrews chapter four. He finished the work that God
requires to save us. And he did it for us. as our
representative, as our surety, as our substitute, as our redeemer,
as our life giver, as our keeper, preserver, the one who would
bring us to glory as our intercessor. And so he says in verse 24, 70
weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city.
Now, this equals 490 years, 70 weeks of years, And as I said last week, there's
a limited application to the people of Judah who were in captivity
at that time, of them going back into the promised land, but that
was temporal and temporary, and it was limited. I think that's
the best way to say it. It was not eternal. The eternal
application refers to spiritual Israel. And I'm gonna talk about
that in the message this morning in Ephesians chapter two, but
we can talk about it right here. God has a people out of every
tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation, Jew and Gentile. And that they,
and he calls them out, he chose them, he justified them, he redeems
them, he redeemed them on the cross, and he sends the spirit
to call them out of the world into the family of God. They
are believers and they make up the nation of spiritual Israel. And there's so much scripture
that proves that. And so the fulfillment of this
is not ultimately in one nation in a piece of real estate called
Palestine. The ultimate is in the heavenly
city, the heavenly kingdom. And so he says, Here's what he
says in verse 24, to finish the transgression, that's what Christ
did. He finished it by his death on
the cross. Make an end of sins, the same
thing. All that he did was to put away
our sins, to remove our transgressions, to make reconciliation for iniquity. You see, there has to be a ground
of reconciliation. That's why I was gonna announce
this before I got started, but I just got it here. This little
booklet's just out that I wrote called Essentials of Justification,
right here. And you can get a copy, they're
free, and get a copy, or you can read it on our website, download
a PDF, or you can order copies, but we have copies of this now.
Essentials of Justification. And I don't know about you, sometimes
I get tired of reading things on a computer screen. I got to
have a little paper in my hand just to keep my sanity. So get
you some of these books and pass them out. That's what we want.
We want people to see them. And people who are listening
by the internet, they may want to get a copy or read it on our
website. But he made reconciliation for
iniquity, for our iniquity. Because our sins, our transgressions,
our iniquities were imputed to him. And that word imputed, you'll
see that in this booklet. That's the means, the way that
God justifies his people by imputing or charging or accounting our
sins to Christ and imputing, charging, accounting his righteousness
to us. And that's the ground of salvation.
And it's applied to us by imputation. And then we receive it by God-given
faith as he brings us into the enjoyment of it, the knowledge
of it. So understand that. And I often
tell people, I say, if you've never heard of that word imputation,
just think about your credit cards. When you go into a store
and you get something and you pay for it with a credit card,
that money, that debt, that store charge is imputed to you. And
you have to pay it. And so our sin debt, you know,
oftentimes in the Bible, sin is represented as a debt, a debt
to God's law. We see that in our justice system
today. You know, when somebody commits
a crime, we'll say something like, well, they owe a debt to
society. Well, by nature, we owe a debt
to God's law, but that debt for God's people, spiritual Israel,
has been imputed to Christ. And he received it willingly.
Think about that. He did this willingly. He wasn't
forced to do it, but he did it willingly. It's like that little
book of Philemon. I love that. It's just such a
great illustration of it, where Paul, speaking to a man named
Philemon, whose servant had robbed him and ran away, and he ended
up with Paul, and the Lord saved him. Paul wrote to Philemon,
and he said, if Onesimus, that was the name of the servant,
he said, if he owes you anything, put it on my account, I'll repay
it. That's what Christ did in the
everlasting covenant of grace. And he repaid it on the cross.
That's the redeeming work, his blood. And that's what this is
talking about here. The time of Christ coming into
the world and on the cross, paying for our sins, he made reconciliation
for iniquity, and then to bring in everlasting righteousness. That's what he did. That's the
righteousness of God that's revealed in the gospel. the merit of his
obedience unto death in the stead of his people. He came to seal
up the vision and prophecy. The vision means the word of
God, the prophecy means the prophets, and Christ sealed it up. In other
words, he is the fulfillment of it. This is what it's about,
Christ. in the glory of his person and
the power of his finished work, and then to anoint the most holy,
or I believe it means the most holy place, which is the holiest,
it's a reference to the holy of holies in the tabernacle,
or the temple, where the veil separated the holy place from
the holiest of all. Remember where the Ark of the
Covenant stood for a while? When only the high priest could
go in behind the veil with the blood of a lamb, that was a picture.
That was a prophecy in time of Christ, our great high priest,
going into the presence of the Father with his own blood. And when Christ, when he was
on that cross, and he cried out, it's finished, and then he gave
up the ghost, which means in his humanity he died, the veil
in the temple was torn in two from top to bottom, indicating
that the way into the holiest of all, the presence of the Father,
was made by Christ. And so every believer has a full
right and title to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus. Hebrews chapter 10 speaks of
that, among other verses. Now, look at verse 25 now. He
says, know therefore and understand that from the going forth of
the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah
the Prince shall be seven weeks And he says, and three score
and two weeks, the street shall be built again and the wall even
in troublous times. Now remember, this is Gabriel
the angel, a messenger from God giving Daniel all this information. And of course, you remember the
whole passage here started out with Daniel's prayer on behalf
of the people. to forgive them of their sins.
And what God is doing here, he's showing them that God is gonna
deliver them back to the land, but their hope of salvation is
in Messiah, the Prince. Now, who is that? That's Christ.
The Bible calls Christ the Prince of Peace. He brought peace between
God and sinners and between those people. I'm gonna talk about
that in the sermon in 11. He broke down the middle wall
of partition, that which separates Jew and Gentile, brought us together.
And that's Messiah the Prince. So there's no doubt that this
is talking about Christ. And what he's talking about is
when the Medes and the Persians conquered the Babylonians, Cyrus,
the king of Persia, issued a command for the people of Judah to go
back to the promised land and rebuild the city, rebuild the
temple. And you can find that over in the book of Ezra. It's
at the end of the book of 2 Chronicles, and at the beginning of the book
of Ezra, this is stated. If you look at Ezra chapter one,
I can read it to you. Verse one, it says, now in the
first year of Cyrus, the king of Persia, this is Ezra chapter
one, And Ezra, you remember, he was a scribe who went back
with the people and he preached the word of God to them. And
he says that Cyrus, the king of Persia, that the word of the
Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled. Now what
that's referring to is Jeremiah prophesied that Judah would be
in captivity in Babylon for 70 years. And here it is, it's the
70th year. Now again, that number seven
keeps coming up, doesn't it? finished work. What that's talking
about for the people of Judah is the complete finished work
of God's judgment at that time. Now it's over. And it had reference
to other things, like the seventh year Sabbaths and all of that.
But I'm not going to get, I don't want to confuse you with all
these numbers, but I think it's interesting if you'll look at
it. But he says, that might be fulfilled, the Lord stirred up
the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia. Now Cyrus was not a believer. He was a heathen, idolatrous
king. But God works in providence,
in power, even in the heathen. He turns the king's heart whichever
way he wants it to go. So Cyrus unwittingly made a proclamation
here in verse one throughout all his kingdom and put it also
in writing, saying, thus saith Cyrus king of Persia, the Lord
God of heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth and
he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is
in Judah. So Cyrus, issued forth the decree
that they would go back and build the God of Israel a house in
Jerusalem. Now Cyrus, he gave credit to
God, to the true God, but he didn't know the true God. He
also gave credit to other gods. Kind of like old Nebuchadnezzar
in Babylon, you know, he said, well, Daniel's God is God, but
he had other gods. And of course, that's not a believer.
But back here in Daniel 9.25, when that command was issued.
And he's saying, from that time forward shall be seven weeks
and three score and two weeks, the street shall be built again
and the wall even in trebulous times. And again, like I said,
I don't want to go into all these, I don't want to confuse you with
all these numbers, but there are divisions of time here that
are important. Now not all biblical interpreters
agree on how to view these times. Some claim that the numbers here
are totally symbolic and cannot be traced historically in any
way in calendar time. Others disagree on this and claim
that these numbers can be traced historically somewhat. And whatever
view you take on that, The important issue, and I'm reading from the
lesson here, though, because I don't want to confuse myself
either, all right? Whatever view you take on that,
the important issue here is to know that all of these numbers,
whatever they are, this is still a prophecy of the coming of Christ
into the world and events surrounding his coming, historically. I want you to understand this,
though. This is not, as some people say, a prophecy of some
future time when Christ would secretly rapture his church out
of the world and begin a seven year period of tribulation. That's
not what this is. The whole time, you know, the
whole time of the new covenant, and that continues from the time
of Christ's coming until his second coming. That whole time
is a time of tribulation. Did you know that? We're living
in the tribulation. Read your Bible. Tribulous times. Christ told his disciples, in
the world you'll have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I've overcome
the world. So now, it may be that these
numbers can't really be pinpointed specifically with calendar time,
but I really believe they come pretty close. And I also recognize
that there is symbolism here, because all these numbers are
multiples of seven. And again, they represent a completed
work. Now this first seven weeks, he
said, shall be seven weeks, that equals 49 years. Well, do you
know that was about the number of years that it took Judah when
they got back in the promised land? That's about the number
of years that it took them to rebuild the temple and rebuild
the city. About 49 years. You say, well, why not 50? 49
is a multiple of seven. And that's where the symbolism
comes in. All these numbers are multiples
of seven. And from the time of them getting
that command and rebuilding the temple to the time of Christ
was about 483 years or something like that. Again, multiples of seven, and
you add seven weeks to that, that's 490, and that's when Christ
comes. And what it's talking about here,
look at verse 26. After threescore and two weeks
shall Messiah be cut off. Now that's three and a half years
from the time of his earthly ministry. When he was baptized
and went out to preach, what happened to him in three and
a half years? He was about 30 years old, wasn't he, when he was baptized
and went out to preach. And that's what we have recorded
in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and John. Three and a half years,
and then he was crucified. This is that last 70th week of
Daniel that everybody talks about, and it's divided up in half,
three and a half, Well, the first three and a half refers to the
earthly ministry of Christ and the fact that he's going to be
cut off, but look at verse 26 now. Here's what we need to focus
on. After three score and two weeks,
three and a half years, shall Messiah be cut off, but not for
himself. You see that? In other words,
he was cut off, meaning he was killed, he died, He was alienated. Isaiah 53,
eight says that he was cut off, but not for himself. In other
words, he didn't die for himself. He died for his sheep. That's why he was cut off. He
was fulfilling all of these things that were stated back in verse
24. And that happened in the midst of the 70th week of Daniel's
prophecy. The myths, look at verse 27.
We'll come back up here. He shall confirm the covenant
with many for one week. That's talking about Christ.
A lot of people say that verse 27 when he says he shall confirm
the covenant is talking about antichrist. That's not talking
about antichrist. The confirming of the covenant
is the establishment of the covenant in time by the death of the Messiah
who was cut off. He fulfilled it. He established
it. And the new covenant was initiated.
And remember the new covenant is the fulfilling in time of
the everlasting covenant of grace. This covenant that he confirmed,
it was already in existence. It was in existence in the eternal
mind of God before the foundation of the world. The confirmation
of that covenant happened in time at the cross. And that's
when Christ fulfilled all that God predetermined before the
foundation of the world in the everlasting covenant of grace.
What God predestinated, predetermined, what God determined before time
has its completion, has its fulfillment in time. So the eternality of
God in his covenants, in his ways of viewing his people, his
love, his mercy, his grace, That doesn't deny the accomplishment
in time of God's purpose. It demands it. God's view of his people before
the world began, as Ephesians 1 tells us, they are accepted
into be loved. Now what it says, that demanded
that Christ would come in time and die for their sins. Because
everything that God does must be accomplished and established
on a just ground. So Christ died for the sins of
his people imputed to them. Look back up at verse 26. So
after threescore and two weeks, three and a half years, shall
Messiah be cut off, but not for himself, and the people of the
prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary,
and the end thereof shall be with a flood, And unto the end
of the war, desolations are determined. Now that's referring to the desolation
of abomination that took place in AD 70. The people of the prince
that shall come, that's talking about the Roman emperor, Titus,
and the Roman armies who swept through and destroyed Jerusalem
and the temple completely in AD 70. So Messiah's gonna be cut off,
but not for himself. Verse 27, he shall confirm the
covenant with many for one week. Who are the many? His sheep,
his elect, all who come to God-given faith in Christ Jesus. And in
the midst of the week, he shall cause the sacrifice and oblation
to cease. This is verse 27. Now what is
that referring to? The veil ran in two. The sacrifice
is finished. No more need for animal sacrifices. No more need for a Jewish priesthood,
because every believer is a priest unto God. Christ is the high
priest. He offers his own blood on behalf of the people. That's
our righteousness, you see, the death of Christ. And he said,
in the midst of the week, three and a half years of his death,
he shall cause the sacrifice and oblation, which is an offering,
to cease. and for the overspreading of
abominations he shall make it desolate, that's again referring
to AD 70, even until the consummation and that determined shall be
poured upon the desolate. So what's going on here? In this 70th week of Daniel,
and I know this gets confusing to people, but here's what happened. Think about the 70th week, that's
seven years. beginning at Christ's earthly
ministry at his baptism. Three and a half years in the
midst of the wake, he was cut off. He died. Well, what happened
in the next three and a half years? Now, somebody says, well,
If this desolation by the Roman army, if that's AD 70, that's
way beyond three and a half years. Yes, it is. But what happened
in AD 70 when God leveled that place by the Roman empire, the
Roman army, happened because of what happened in the next
three and a half years after the death of Christ. And what
happened? Well, that indicates, if you
read the book of Acts, that indicates the final, you might say, the
final rejection of Christ and the gospel, the persecution of
his apostles. And you remember what happened
later on? Probably about three and a half years afterward, Stephen
was killed, Saul, persecuted the church to the point that
they had to be scattered throughout the Gentile world. And that's
what happened in that last three and a half years. The gospel
left Jerusalem, left Judea, and was spread out into the Gentile
world, indicating that God has a people not just of the Jews,
a remnant, but he has a people out of every tribe, kindred,
tongue, and nation. And I believe that fulfills the
70th week of Daniel. death of Christ in the middle
of it, and the three and a half years of their rejection, and
believers. You can read about that in Acts
chapter eight, that three and a half years. And let me give
you this, just in closing. I've got this in your lesson
here. And you read the whole thing, and you'll see some of
these numbers, how they come together. But you know what the
important thing is. That's the important thing that
we get out of this. that our Lord and our Savior has fulfilled
all righteousness on our behalf. And our salvation is secure even
in trubulous times, even through a tribulation, which I believe
lasts from His coming to His second coming. And it may get
worse as we get near His coming. That's fine to think that. But
the book of Revelation shows us also that the three and a
half years after the death of the Messiah, the Prince. Symbolically
speaks of the whole period of time in which the church would
be exiled and persecuted by the earth and the unbelieving world.
And it indicates, like for example, Revelation 11, two through three,
John speaks of 42 months, and then he speaks of 1260 days,
and that equals the three and a half years. He does the same
in Revelation 12, six, and Revelation 13, five, when he speaks of this
term. And you remember this in Revelation?
He speaks of times, a time, and half a time. That's the three
and a half years. And he does that symbolically.
indicating that after the death of Christ, the true church would
be sorely persecuted throughout the time in different ways and
to different degrees because of our testimony of the gospel
up until the time that Christ returns. Remember what Christ
told the disciples, marvel not if the world hates you. It hated
me before it hated you. Disciple or the servant is not
greater than his master. If they hated our Lord and Savior,
they'll hate us for following him and for speaking his word,
which shows the one and only way of salvation. And all other
ways are unto damnation. Only one way by the grace of
God, through the blood, the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ, Messiah
the Prince, okay.