I want you to turn in your Bibles
to Daniel 9. If you don't have your Bible,
you can follow me in your pastor's commentary. The outline is in
there as well. Daniel 9. As our elders said,
this is a profound piece of Scripture, profound portion of Scripture. How do you go from being second
in command over the greatest nation of your
day. How do you go from living in
the lap of prominence and luxury and power and ease? I know some of you know what
that's like. To become the burden bearer of a people who themselves
are destitute of wisdom. They are ignorant of their circumstances. They don't know the calamity
that is forthcoming, nor are they grieved about their present
situation. And yet you, who by all intents
and circumstances, are living the best life you could live.
You are one of the leading rulers in the nation, You enjoy the
best food. You wear the finest clothes. Every day you can say the Lord
has been good to you. And yet somehow you are driven
to be concerned about a people who aren't even concerned about
themselves. How do you do that? What compels
you to a serious pursuit of the true and the living God. What
compels you to that? All by yourself. This is just
you and God. I love the way he said that in
verse three. I set my face to seek my God. All by yourself. There's no one
with you. You didn't call your partners
in. You didn't call your buddies in. This wasn't one of those
40 days of national prayer that's all on the TV and the internet
and in the media as a spectacle. Look, we're praying. This is just you, a regal saint,
given over to the concern for others who don't have any concern
for themselves and you're driven, you're compelled You're prompted
to seek the true and the living God all by yourself. You haven't let your left hand
know what your right hand is doing. You haven't spoken publicly
about it to your colleagues or to your brethren. You are praying
in secret so that no men see you because you trust that God
will reward you openly like Jesus said. This is precisely the scenario
with Daniel. This for me is what makes Daniel
remarkable. I mean, this prayer in Daniel
chapter nine has always been remarkable to me, not only because
of the content of which we'll get into shortly, but the selflessness
of the man. The selflessness of, you know,
you and I, everything we do by nature, we do to get something
out of it. See, nobody responded. Can I
get a witness? It's just true. The reason you don't pray as
much as you ought to pray is because God don't hurry up and
answer your prayers. That's because you're pagan.
You do know that, right? It's just true. Prayer is one
of the rawest forms of faith. It doesn't seek immediate gratification. You pray because you're driven
or compelled. But more than that, in our context,
Daniel is driven to prayer. I want you to know he's driven
to prayer. Hear this Prince. He's not only
praying, he's fasting. And he's fasting in sackcloth
and ashes. That's serious business, folks.
Isn't that right? Listen now, it's one thing for
him to wear his fine 360 count threads in his own house and
pray to God. He could have done that, but
he emptied himself of all of his natural luxurious resources
and clothed himself in what we would call symbolically utter
humility, utter destitution. He made himself as appropriate
to this urgent need as possible. Do you think he was trying to
get at God? Do you think Daniel was trying to get God's ear?
See, this is serious, isn't it? here he is the prince and now
he's in sackcloth and ashes and he's crying out to his God he's
not eating he's not drinking he's seeking God's face and I'll
tell you when I think about that kind of prayer the question that
I ask is what compels a man what drives it see do you know to
pray like this God's got to help you do you know that to pray
like this In disregard for the moment, the externalities of
it, don't get caught up in what did it look like? What did he
sound like? Was he screaming and hollering? Was he snotting
and sneezing? Don't get in all of that. That's not the concept. It's the motive of the heart.
It's the energy behind his prayer. It's the drive to say the least. And then it's the content, which
Daniel uttered, which we'll get into. I wanna share with you
two things that's in our outline that constituted what's going
on in Daniel's life. First of all, let me say this
in point number one, it says the response of heaven to a God-inspired
prayer. Do you see that? Daniel was heard,
wasn't he? Was Daniel heard? Look over in
verse 20 through 24. Notice what it says. I love this, this is quite interesting,
very graphic. And while I was speaking and
praying, confessing my sin at the same time correspondingly
simultaneously while I was speaking and praying and confessing my
sin and the sin of my people Israel see and presenting my
supplications before the Lord my God for the holy mountain
of my God yes while I was speaking in prayer even the man Gabriel
whom I had met in the vision at the beginning being calls
to fly swiftly touched me about the time of the evening oblation.
Do you see that? You know what this is? This is
the consequence of two things. First of all, It's the consequence
of the Spirit of God operating in Daniel's life. See, to pray
fervently, to pray passionately, to pray accurately, God has to
help you. Do you know that? You gotta have the spirit of
prayer. You gotta have the spirit of adoption whereby you cry,
Abba Father. So, what we see first and foremost is something
that requires the assistance of God Almighty. Don't you try
this without asking God to help you, you'll fall flat on your
face. It won't work. God has to help you. Let me give
you a couple of examples. The kind of prayer that Daniel
is praying is the kind of prayer that Abraham prayed for Lot when
he was in Sodom. The kind of prayer that Daniel
is praying, the energy, the passion, the drive, the zeal, the fervor,
the thought, the tenacity, is the kind of prayer that Moses
prayed when he was in the wilderness and God was about to kill those
rebel Jews at that time. And he jumped in the way and
said, God, kill me, not them. This kind of prayer is a prayer
that resembles the prayer of a mediator, a go-between, a person
who is willing to stand in the gap. This is the Spirit of Christ
operating in the prophets of the Old Testament. Only the spirit
of Christ can take a selfish sinner like you and me and give
us a drive and passion to act as selfish as he did with Abraham
and Moses. And here now, Daniel. Daniel
is driven by that spirit of Christ bearing down upon the prophet,
urging him to this one business for which he has set aside everything
political and personal. The second thing that's driving
Daniel is that principle that's given to us in James chapter
five, verse 16. You know it, right? The effectual
fervent prayers of a righteous man does what? Avail much. You
guys believe that? That's what's going on right
here. The effectual and fervent prayer of the righteous man availeth
much. I'm not talking about Abraham,
Moses, or Daniel. I'm talking about Christ. Got
it? Got it? He is the righteous man
whose prayers are heard all the time. The title of our message
is Daniel the Mediator. The thought that I want you to
gather here is significant because in order for us to understand
what is probably one of the most complex and controversial portions
of the book of Daniel, the 70 weeks of Daniel 9. They are precipitated
by a man who stands in the gap because he knows some things
that are critical to the fulfillment of Daniel chapter 9 verses 24
through 27. That's our meditation today.
You see, there's always something that happens before something
happens. Do you know that? When God created
the heavens and the earth, that wasn't when God started to think
about the heavens and the earth. When man fell into sin and rebellion
against God, it didn't catch God by surprise. When He created
the first Adam, He created the first Adam as a prototype of
the real Adam. And when men fail, it was all
part of God's ultimate linear redemption plan in Jesus Christ
for his own glory. So there's always something going
before something happens. And so with all of this language
about the 70 weeks of Daniel, which you've heard written about,
and books have been written about, and many things have been declared
in terms of preaching and prophecy, what have you, what prompts or
brings into focus or initiates What's going to take place in
verses 24 through 27 is what takes place in chapter nine,
verses one through 23. And that is the mediatorial work
of a man who loves his people so much that he knows that nothing
will happen until God hears their prayers. Nothing will happen
until God hears their prayers. I'm hoping that this will sink
home into your heart Today, many of you have heard me press this
home to you time and again. God's called his people to prayer. He's called you and I to the
privilege and responsibility of prayer. And God works through
prayer to see that things get done. And there are gonna be
in your life and mine, listen to me, things that you would
hope and desire, earnestly desire to be accomplished, which won't
get accomplished until you hit your knees. So now Daniel is
driven and the Bible says over in verses 20 through 23, while
he was praying, the angel Gabriel came to him in the beginning,
being caused to fly swiftly, touched Daniel about the time
of the evening oblation, that's verse 21. And notice what he
says, and he informed me And he talked with me and said, Oh,
Daniel, I am now come forth to give you skill and understanding
for at the beginning of your supplication, the commandment
came forth and I am come to show you for thou art greatly beloved. Therefore, now listen to what
he says. Understand the matter and consider the vision. This is a response of heaven
to a God inspired prayer. It was a quick response. It was
an intimate response. He touched me. He made his presence
known. He instructed me. He gave me
understanding. You see, Gabriel here is a representative
of the Holy Ghost who gives interpretation to the dream and to the vision.
He's the one that helps us understand God's Word. He's the one that
helps us understand God's providence and the circumstances that go
on in our life. You know this as well as I. There
are times when things are going on in your life that you can't
understand. And as you seek God's face, he
begins to make them plain to you, doesn't he? He makes them
very plain to you. And this is what's going on with
Daniel. Daniel is about to be comforted by a grand word from
the Lord. My desire is to help you understand
the context of this event in order for us to appreciate what
we'll deal with next week in terms of of the word that Daniel's
going to receive. So the second point in our outline
is this, the motive behind his prayer. What's the motive behind
Daniel's prayer? Do you know that your motive
for prayer is just as germane as the content of your prayer?
Why you pray is critical, isn't that right? Jesus said in Matthew
chapter six, where I quoted earlier, don't let your left hand know
what your right hand is doing. Jesus said, when you pray, Do
not pray to be seen of men. He said, now, when you pray,
do not pray like the Pharisees. Don't pray like the pagan. That's Matthew chapter six. And
I try to talk to the saints about this all the time. There is a
radical difference between biblical, God-centered, Christian-oriented
prayer and pagan prayer. The reason why some of us don't
get our prayers answered is because we're praying like pagans. Do
you guys believe that? You know what pagan prayers are?
The prayers that are centered around you all the time. the
prayers that consist of your needs and your wants and your
desires, which may not at all correspond with God's will. God
has said in his word very plainly that he is not obligated to answer
your prayers if they don't correspond with his will. In fact, prayer
is not designed for you to simply give God a Christmas wish list.
Do you know that? Man, I'm tearing down some trees
today. I didn't know that, but that's just the way it has to
go this way. Because you know, I know that you won't pray once
you get frustrated about the fact that God doesn't seem to
be answering your prayer. You'll stop praying and you'll
think, well, you know, prayer don't work. I'll just go ahead
on and be a pragmatist and do what I gotta do. And I'll give
God his 10% or what have you and going down the line. At that
point, you're a pagan. Because prayer is not designed
for you to reciprocate with God in order for you to get something.
Prayer is designed for you to commune with God. Because you
have access into his presence by the Spirit of God through
Jesus. Prayer is designed for you to gain a portal into the
glories of God. Prayer is designed for you to
see better. Prayer is designed for you to hear better. Prayer
is designed for you to understand more accurately. Am I making
some sense? That's what prayer is about. Prayer is designed
for God to move in a way more effectually in your life so that
you can line up more with his revealed will. That is his written
will. That's what prayer is for. So
then the purpose for which prayer is given to the child of God
is so that he can line himself up more with the one whose will
is most important. Not my will, but thine be done. You guys got that? And so the
motive behind Daniel's prayer is critical. And the motive behind
your prayer and mine is critical. Always ask yourself, why are
you about to bend your knees? Why are you about to go to the
throne of God? I want you to see two motives
behind Daniel's prayer. Two motives. These are very clear.
One, Daniel is urged for two reasons. The first is that he
knows that it's time for his people to return to their inheritance. Look at verse one and two. Daniel
knows that the time has come. See, do you know what the Bible
says? The Bible says everything is good in its time. There is
a time And there is a season for everything under the sun.
The Bible also says in that same wonderful saged book called the
Ecclesiastes, that a wise man discerneth both time and judgment. In other words, we learn when
to respond and when to pray what we pray because the timing is
just as critical as the content of our prayer. Are you hearing
what I'm saying? Daniel had learned in verse one and two that there
was a critical change that had just occurred. Look at verse
one and two. In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus,
the seed of the Medes, which was made king over the realm
of the Chaldeans. See, now we have shifted from
Babylon to Medo-Persia, right? We are in the Medo-Persian kingdom.
Daniel is now ruling with the Medo-Persian kings. And it says,
in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, understood by revelation
the number of the years is that what your bible said no what
does it say y'all scared of that word books you know what that
means you have to read See, this is another element of paganism
in our churches today. We think we can have a vital,
powerful, potent relationship with God by osmosis or some type
of existential experience and not read his word. Daniel didn't
understand anything until he read the prophet Isaiah. And as he read, the Holy Ghost
helped him to understand that there was a critical point of
fulfillment that had occurred right at the time that Daniel
was living. He became aware that there was
a time for transition for his people to leave bondage out of
Babylon and return to their liberty into Jerusalem. He understood
that by the books. When his soul came to an awareness
of this reality, Daniel was prompted. He was prompted to say a couple
of things. All right, God's about to move
because he said he would. The 70 years is up. God's about
to move. This is not a matter of question
or doubt. The 70 years is up. And the question
now is, what is that gonna look like? God says, my people will
be let go. They will hear a Jubilee sound.
There will be a declaration from Cyrus that you can return to
the land. And what would that look like
in terms of the response of the people? Personally, I don't know
but Daniel is compelled by virtue of his knowledge that the time
is right for Israel to go back and So he is prompted to pray. I want you to see this keep your
hand here go to 2nd Chronicles 36 2nd Chronicles 36 verses 22
and 23. We are at the end of the Chronicles and And at the end of the Chronicles
is that history and period of Israel when they are brought
into captivity to Babylon. And the author of the Chronicles
is going to explain to us while he describes they're going into
captivity, what will take place and transpire when they come
out of captivity. This is a very comforting word
that he gives us in second Chronicles chapter 36. I'm going to start
at verse 22. Are you there? Now in the first
year of Cyrus, King of Persia, here's the same phraseology,
that the word of the Lord spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah might
be accomplished. The Lord stirred up the spirit
of Cyrus, King of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout
all his kingdom and put it also in writing saying, thus said
Cyrus, King of Persia, all the kingdoms of the earth All the
kingdoms of the earth hath the Lord God of heaven given me,
and he hath charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which
is in Judah. Who is there among you of all
of his people? The Lord his God be with him,
watch this, and let him go up. Now ladies and gentlemen, this
was in the first year of Cyrus. The prophecy that we're dealing
with in Daniel 9 is in the first year of Cyrus, isn't that right?
What is driving Daniel to pray? A proclamation by a pagan king
inspired by the true and the living God to let God's people
go. If you were there at that time
observing this pronounced message that's given throughout the whole
of the kingdom, wouldn't you be excited? Here your people
have been in captivity for 70 years. They are slaves. They are worshiping other gods.
They are bent over backwards. They are the tail and not the
head. And even though you're in authority, you too still are
a slave. You know that this captivity
is not designed to last forever. And there's a day that comes
that is almost unimaginable. The president says to Israel,
every one of you who wants to go back, Not only you can go
back, watch this now, but your God has told me to tell everybody
in the world, you must go back and rebuild your temple. That's
an amazing prophecy. He's saying the Spirit of God
is stirring him up. He's saying the God of heaven
has driven him and compelled him to say this. See, this is
not merely on the authority of the pagan king. This is on the
authority of God himself. Now, saints, think about this
for a moment. What if you heard that from the president? The
true and the living God has told me to tell you to go do this.
Why are you hesitating? Why aren't you moving? Why aren't
you swiftly departing from the land of Babylon into your own
inheritance? After all, for the last 70 years,
you've been complaining about being in Babylon, right? Look with me over in Ezra chapter
1, because Ezra is the subsequent book that follows that. According
to the the Masoretic they put the book Ezra after the book
of Chronicles because they want us to be able to Understand the
things that took place in terms of the deliverance back into
Palestine by the children of Israel I want you to read verses
1 through 4 with me now in the first year of Cyrus King of Persia
the word of the Lord by the mouth of Prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled
and The Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, King of Persia, that
he made a proclamation throughout all the land of the kingdom.
And he put it in writing. This is going to be important
when we get to Nehemiah and Ezra. He put it in writing. He didn't
just say it. He put it in writing. Thus said King Cyrus of Persia,
the Lord God of heaven has given me all the kingdoms of the earth.
And he had charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which
is in Judah. Who is there among you of all
his people? His God be with him. and let
him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and build the house
of the Lord God of Israel. He is the God which is in Jerusalem. Before I get to verse 4, I want
you to think with me now. Right now, while this proclamation
is taking place, Daniel is still alive. Got it? Daniel hears the proclamation.
This is the context that we have in Daniel chapter 9. So while
Ezra is writing about this from hindsight, the fact of the matter
is Daniel is the one who has the privilege of hearing the
jubilee sound going out. Now look at verse 4. And whosoever
remaineth in any place where he sojourns, let the men of his
place help him with silver and with gold and with goods and
with beasts, besides the freewill offerings for the house of God
that is in Jerusalem. Verses one through four describe
the command. We're gonna see this when we
develop chapter nine, verses 24 through 27, the commandment
to go forth and rebuild. There was a command given. Now
look with me at verse five and six briefly before we go back.
Then in response to the command, apparently, rose up the chief
of the fathers of Judah and Benjamin and the priest and the Levites
with all them whose spirit God had what raised to go up to build
the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem and all day that
were round about them strengthened their hands with vessels of silver
and of gold and of goods with beasts and precious things besides
all that was willingly offered And also Cyrus brought forth
vessels out of the house of the Lord, which Nebuchadnezzar had
brought from Jerusalem. And he put them in the house,
who had put them in the house of his God. And it goes on to
talk about how the king of Persia helped and assisted. Do you notice
in verses five and six, it says they rose up and they were stirred
up and they moved forward. We have a radically different
picture here than we have in chapter nine. Go with me back
to chapter nine now. I said that there were two reasons
for which Daniel prayed and I want you to understand that between
verses 1 and 4 of Ezra chapter 1 and verses 5 and 6 is where
we are in the book of Daniel chapter 9. In Daniel chapter
9, we have verses 1 and 4 of Ezra fulfill the command. But
there is something else that takes place, children of God,
before they rise up. Before they're stirred up to
go to the work, there's something else that takes place. And that
is the mediatorial work of a praying man that God might respond to
his own command to help his people go. Why do I say that? Because
Daniel in his own prayer says this, he says, Lord, I'm coming
to you because my people still don't get it. Look with me at
verse 13. I want you to see this. Are we
there? Listen to what he says, as it
is written in the law of Moses, I'm gonna break down the content
of the prayer here in a moment. He says, father, as it is, as
it's written in the law of Moses, all this evil is come upon us. Now saints watch this, yet made
we not our prayer before the Lord, our God, that we might
turn from our iniquities and understand thy truth. This is
the key to Daniel's prayer. Watch this saints. The key to
Daniel's prayer is that he's aware that it's time to go, but
ain't nobody in the kingdom moving. Do you hear me? Nobody's moving. Why aren't they moving? This
is the issue. They got a problem. They're not
ready to go. What do you mean, Pastor? The
vast majority of the Jews at this time, in Daniel's time,
have become Babylonians. Are you hearing me? They have
been there 70 years and they have proliferated and raised
up children and you know after a while you just sort of assimilate
into society. Now Daniel sees a few synagogues
here and a few synagogues there and he knows that there is a
sort of external worship going on, you know, certain Sabbath
days and what have you because God allowed for that under the
Babylonian system. He saw the perfunctory Religious
observances going on week after week. But when the call to come
out of Babylon and go back to Jerusalem was uttered, nobody
moved. Do you know why? Not only because
they were Babylonians, but they were dead. They were dead. They were dead
spiritually. Will you hear me? They were dead. They didn't want to go back.
They weren't desirous to return. Daniel said in verse 13, we have
not confessed our sin to you God. We have not acknowledged
our error. We have not sought your face. We have not turned, watch it,
for my what? You know what those iniquities
were? Idolatry. The very same thing that drove
them into Babylon is what's keeping them in Babylon. Are you guys
hearing me? So here's what's going on. The prophet Daniel,
the servant Daniel, the statesman Daniel hears the call. He can't
wait to see his people begin to file out of there, make a
beeline back to Jerusalem. But to his astonishment, all
he sees is perfunctory worship in the synagogues in Babylon.
And by this time, I'm here to tell you the Babylonian religion
had so permeated the Jewish religion that Jesus said in Matthew 13
that their system had become leavened. He had called the doctrine
of the Sadducees leavened, the doctrine of the Pharisees leavened.
It was called covetousness. It was called idolatry. They
had been so usurped and turned over and transformed by the Babylonian
system. It wasn't even the true worship
of Jehovah by the time Jesus got there. This is the reason
why when Jesus walked through Palestine and preached the gospel,
the rulers couldn't hear him when he rightly divided the word.
They had so lost a proper interpretation of the scriptures because they
had become Babylonians. Are you guys hearing me? Daniel,
therefore, is dealing with a problem. And it's a problem that we all
deal with. You know what that is? Sinners will never respond
to the gospel of the call of grace into the liberty that's
in Jesus Christ until God does something for them spiritually.
You can tell them all day long, come, believe, follow, look to
Christ, flee from the wrath of God. But until the spirit of
God starts to work in that soul, they won't move. Am I making
some sense? See, now we're in Ezekiel chapter
37. Turn with me in your Bible to Ezekiel 37. Now, as I lay
this foundation, I want to remind you that we are still dealing
with the historicity of Scripture. It's so very important to understand
the historicity of Scripture. We are at present in the year
587, I'm sorry, 539 BC. 70 years have transpired since the
beginning of the captivity of Israel consummated by the captivity
of Jerusalem in 587 BC. Babylon began to come into Israel
in 609 BC. 70 years later is 539 BC. We are in that very year where
the 70 years is up. The 70 years is up. And Ezekiel
is what we call an exile prophet. In exile prophet, that means
he was in the captivity right along with Daniel. And Ezekiel
had a lot of revelations, didn't he? Concerning the character
of God, the glory of God, the bondage of Israel, the destruction
of the nations, and what have you. And in Ezekiel chapter 37,
we have some very unique but commonly addressed language concerning
the state and condition of Israel spiritually. In Ezekiel chapter
37 verses 1 through 10, Ezekiel is shown a valley. He's taken
up by the Spirit of God, by the hand of God, and carried and
placed into the midst of a valley. Isn't that what the text says?
Look at it, verse one. The hand of the Lord was heavy
upon me, carried me out in the Spirit of the Lord, and set me
down in the midst of the valley, which was what? Full, a valley
full of dry bones. Now folks, don't look for this
valley. You can't find it. This is not an earthly valley.
This is not an earthly vision. It has no geographical location.
This is a dimension that is only comprehended in the spirit, because
Daniel is receiving revelation concerning the spiritual condition
of his people Israel. In other words, if we were to
look on things seen, what Daniel would have seen and what Ezekiel
would have saw were a people who were engaged in commerce,
a people who were engaged in work, they were going to and
fro, they were very lively in the flesh. But if they saw things
the way God saw things, they were nothing but a valley full
of dry bones, dead to God. Am I making some sense? Dead
to God. And saints, do you know that's
the condition of the whole human race outside of Christ? Can I
help you? That's the reason why people
don't respond to this wonderful, glorious, incomprehensible message
called the grace of God in Christ. because a dead man can't do a
thing. Are you hearing me? Now the preacher,
Ezekiel, is going to seminary right now. This is called God's
seminary. See, when God teaches a preacher, he learns the gospel.
And one of the first thing God teaches a preacher is the condition
of mankind. See, you can't preach the gospel
to sinners unless you know what the condition of sinners is.
And Ezekiel's being taught by God that the condition of his
people is that they are dead. In fact, they've been dead a
long time. Not only that, not only have they been dead a long
time, they're all dead. And it points to the larger condition
of the human race. All have sinned, come short of
the glory of God. By one man did sin enter into
the world, and death has passed upon all, for all have sinned.
You know what that means? Until you and I are born again,
we're dead in trespasses. Am I making some sense? And you
need to know that when it goes, when you go to witnessing and
preaching to people that you can't cajole or bargain or manipulate
a dead man into salvation. You can't do it. So what God
does, he brings this man into the reality of the spiritual
condition of his people, Israel. And he says to Ezekiel in the
subsequent verses, after making Ezekiel to seriously examine
the state of his people. And he saw with a critical eye,
having been taken by the spirit of God and passed all the way
through those bones. See, he had a bus. I'm gonna
talk about that in a moment. God gave him a spiritual bus and
he rode this spiritual bus all through this graveyard. And he
looked carefully and he saw every person dead. There wasn't an
ounce of life in them. There was no marrow in the bone. There was no moisture anywhere. They didn't even have a hope
of life. They were dead. That's the condition
of you and me, apart from the grace of God. Dead. God says
to Ezekiel, can these bones live? Isn't that what he said? Can these bones live? Verse three.
And Ezekiel said, yeah, Lord, all I gotta do is get them to
follow me down to Romans road. Look at it. Oh, you dry bones. Ezekiel says, Lord, only, you
know, only, you know, if they can live, got that when we preach
the gospel, the rest is up to God. When we preach the gospel,
the rest is up to God. It's God's sovereign prerogative
to raise the dead. We want him to. Every time I
open my mouth, I'm begging God. I'm begging the Holy Ghost to
do something. Raise somebody from the dead
today. But only God can do it. And the prophet who himself is
impotent to save anybody must acknowledge, God, only you know
whether you're going to save somebody today. And this is what
he said, Thus saith the Lord God. prophesy unto these bones,
saying to them, all ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus
said the Lord God unto these bones, behold, I will cause breath
to enter into you and you shall live. Do you see that? I will
cause breath to enter into you and you shall live. I will lay
sin upon you and will bring flesh upon you and cover you with skin
and put breath in you and you shall live and you shall know
that I did it. That's the other thing about
this thing called salvation. Do you know when God actually
saves you? You know it. I'm here to tell you, when God
saves a sinner, He knows God saved him. You don't know perfectly,
you don't know all the facets of it, but I'm here to tell you,
you know once you were dead and now you're alive. How do I know
that I'm alive? Because now you feel your sin.
Now you feel your sin. Now you realize that you're in
trouble with God. Now you realize that you need
to get right with God. Nothing's going to stop you from
hunting God down. That's how you know you've been
born again. And the first work of the Spirit is to convince
the world of what? Sin. When he raises you from
the dead, you start hurting. You start hurting and that's
what's going on here. He's raising them. He's he's quickening them
the verse tells us in chapter 37 verse 6 after that he put
sin upon them and God says, you know He said so I prophesied
as I was commanded and as I prophesied there was a noise and behold
is shaking and the bones came together Bone to his bone and
when I beheld low Sinu and flesh came upon them and the skin covered
them above but there was no breath in them see it. I What God is
engaging Ezekiel in is the restoration of the nation of Israel. Now,
I want to say this because it corresponds to our study in the
historical context and it has application to the larger prophetic
and apocalyptic language of verses 24 through 27. Most people, particularly
in our country and in this generation, in this century, will compel
you to look at verses 24 through 27 of Daniel chapter 9 and completely
consider this as some end time prophecy relevant to the future
of Israel being brought back into the land of Palestine. They
suggest and imply that somehow 1948 was a day in which God began
to fulfill this prophecy. Nothing could be further from
the truth. They completely dismissed all the language of the book
of Ezra, of the book of Nehemiah, of the book of Esther, of the
book of Chronicles, of the book of Daniel, of the book of Haggai,
Zechariah, and Habakkuk. These were all prophets correspondent
to that time. I just read to you in 2 Chronicles
36 in Ezra chapter 1, where the command was to go back, right?
And if you were careful, you would have seen the language
that denoted the movement of the Spirit of God. The Spirit
of God stirred up the king. The Spirit of God raised up the
leaders of Israel. The Spirit of God stirred up
the people to bring them back. That's what Ezekiel is dealing
with. It was that initial return from Babylon back into Jewry,
into Israel. God had to do that. Now, it is
a great, great picture of the redemption of sinners through
Jesus Christ, through the preaching of the gospel. Jesus said in
John chapter 6, the hour is coming, and now is when the dead shall
hear the voice of the Son of God. And they that what? Hear
shall live. And he's making a parallelism
between the quickening of Israel and bringing them back into their
land and the redemption of sinners in Christ. Because as you know,
I've been telling you that we are the new Israel. We are the
total Israel, the people of God in this dispensation. The combination
between the Jews who are elect and the Gentiles who are elect
are constituted the Israel of God. So what happened to Israel
in the Old Testament was a foreshadow and prediction of what happens
to sinners under the gospel in this present generation. And
we make up the sum total of the experience of that redemption.
I'll show you what I'm talking about in our text before we go
back. I'm in chapter 37 and I want you to look with me down in verse
21. I want you to see verses 21 through
23 and we'll go back. And saying to them, thus said
the Lord God, behold, I will take the children of Israel from
among the heathen. Do you see that? Whether they have been
gone and I will gather them on every side and bring them into
their own land and I will make them one nation. Do you see that?
No more a divided kingdom between the 10 northern tribes and two
southern tribes. upon the mountains of Israel,
and one king shall be king to them all." Who is that? Jesus. Not Herod or King Agrippa. Jesus. Now listen to the language.
and they shall be no more two nations neither shall they be
divided into two kingdoms anymore at all neither shall they defile
themselves anymore with their idols nor with their detestable
things nor with any of their transgressions but I will save
them out of their dwelling places wherein they have sinned and
I will cleanse them so shall they be my people and I will
be their God listen saints when God says I'll do it that's the
gospel Verse 24, and David, my servant shall be king over them. What David is he talking about?
The greater David. Listen, David's not getting resurrected
from the dead. Do you guys hear me? Do you know
how to see the prophetic language of names in the Old Testament
having their fulfillment in Jesus? This is the thing that blows
me away with our pre-millennial dispensationalists. They want
to raise Elijah and Moses from the dead. Revelation 11, Moses
and Elijah, the two witnesses rising from the dead. Why on
earth would Moses and Elijah want to come back here? Isn't
that crazy? Watch this now. And after they
witnessed for three and a half years, I'll deal with that next
week. Then they get killed again. Come on now. They come back from
glory after almost 2,000 years, preach for three and a half years,
and then they get killed. What kind of resurrection is
that? That I should not only go to glory, be clothed in Christ's
righteousness, receive my robe of righteousness, then be resurrected
from the dead to have some pagan heathen be able to kill me. That's
no resurrection. And then comes the scripture
that says it is pointed unto men. How many times to die? And
after that, what the judgment? No, no, no, no, no. Listen to
me. You got to understand the prophetic language. You got to
understand the prophetic language. This is symbolism concerning
the greater David, God's beloved Jesus Christ. Now listen to this
language. And David, my servant shall be king over them. And
they all shall have what one shepherd. Isn't that what Jesus
said in John chapter 10? I'm the good shepherd. My sheep
hear my voice. They follow me. Other sheep have
I that are not of this foal. They too must be brought in and
there shall be one foal and one shepherd. Can you see that? Good. Now go back to Daniel chapter
9. And we'll deal with this as we get into the apocalyptic language
later. But what I despise about this
present-day eschatology is they totally disregard two things
the fulfillment of biblical scripture as it points to Jesus and here's
the second thing that I despise their theology and their hermeneutic
is a Christless hermeneutic and I just can't stand it. I just
can't stand it. All right, we're back in Daniel
chapter 9 a couple two or three more points and we'll wrap this
up notice what it says the content of his prayer Daniel understood
that it was time to go. But Daniel also saw that his
people was dead. What does a man who is alive
pray to God for people that are dead? This is quite interesting. Notice what it says over in verses
four through seven. And I prayed unto the Lord, my
God, and I made what my confession. Isn't that interesting? And I
said, oh Lord, great and dreadful God, keeping covenant and mercy
to them that love him and to them that keep his commandment.
Verse five, we have sinned. We've committed iniquity. We've
done wickedly. We've rebelled. We've departed
from your precept. Not only that, we have not listened
unto your prophets who spoke in your name unto our kings and
princes and our fathers. Here's verse seven. This is interesting.
Oh Lord, righteousness belongs to you alone. You know what Daniel
has just said? Father, I'm not coming to you
on the grounds of any righteousness in me. In fact, I'm acknowledging
that you are righteous, both in terms of your gracious character
to your people, but also in terms of your judicious character to
punish us. What Daniel is saying, the condition
that we're in is a condition we deserve. He's about to say
that but I just want you to understand when he says God to you alone
belongs righteousness He's simply saying what the writer says in
Romans chapter 3 verse 9. There's none what? That's right. I told you that's your name none
none Righteous no, not one and that's what Daniel is saying.
Listen, Oh Lord righteousness belongs unto you but unto us
shame of faces and as it is to this day, the men of Judah and
the inhabitants of Jerusalem and unto all Israel that are
near and that are far off throughout all the countries, whether you
have driven them because of their trespasses, they have trespassed
against you. You know what Daniel is doing?
He's confessing his sin and that's what we do. He's acknowledging
that they have violated the law and the prophets, that's verses
five and six. He acknowledges that God alone is holy in verse
seven. In verse eight, he says, we deserve
your judgment And in verse 11 and 12, notice what he says,
this is interesting. Yea, all Israel have transgressed your
law, even by departing that they might not obey your 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've sinned against
him. First thing I want you to know, Daniel is acknowledging
that there is a curse that's going forth against his people. Do you know it is politically
incorrect today to say that God curses his people? Or God brings
his judgments upon his people? Or that God brings wrath upon
his people when the Bible is clear that God judges his people? Isn't that true? Some of us are
about to partake of the Lord's table today, and if you read
1 Corinthians 11 very carefully, what Paul said was, judge yourself
so that you won't be judged with the world. That's what Paul said.
Now, what he said, and then he said, now, some of you, you're
sick and you're dead because you have approached the table
the wrong way. You have been arrogantly proud in your dealings
with the gospel and you have been negligent to deal with your
brothers and sisters in the right way that is not discerning the
Lord's body. And you think that somehow you can come to God's
table. And Paul was implicating that sickness and death occurred
because the people of God weren't earnest with the true and the
living God. You know what that means? God was judging his people.
And I told you this last week, Revelation chapter one through
three is all about God judging his own people. He comes to the
church first. That's the inaugural vision that
we have in Revelation one through three. And I being turned, says
John, saw a golden candlestick and him who stood in the midst
of it was like the son of man, the great high priest of his
church. And he was dealing with the churches. He tells every
one of them, I know your words. Repent. I want to bless you.
But if you don't, you can be sure that I'm going to judge
you. Isn't that what the book says? And so this is what Daniel
is acknowledging that the Old Testament had a curse in its
covenant stipulation. That's Deuteronomy 28, Leviticus
chapter 26. And so what Daniel is saying
is this. These judgments are not arbitrary, nor are they natural.
They've come upon us because God was faithful to his covenant. See, a covenant God laid out
before this people, Israel, a conditional covenant. If you obey, I'll bless
you. If you disobey, I'm going to punish you and I'll punish
you in such a way no other nation in the world will have been punished
like I punish you. That's what he just acknowledged.
Now notice what he goes on to say. Notice what he goes on. The verse 12 is quite interesting.
Not only did he say it's written in the law, so nobody's without
excuse. No one's without excuse. Verse 12. 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, listen to it, for under the whole heaven hath not been
done as it hath been done upon Jerusalem. Hath not been done
as it hath been done upon Jerusalem. Verse 15 says, And now, O Lord,
our God that brought us up from Egypt, out of the land of Egypt
with a mighty hand, and hath gotten thee renowned, as at this
day we have sinned and we have done wickedly." Daniel is praying
the appropriate prayer for a sinner to be heard from God. He's acknowledging
his transgression. He's acknowledging his wickedness.
He's acknowledging his disobedience. Saints, listen to me as we go
to the next point, the we factor. Please hear me. When you pray
to God, acknowledge your sin. Confess your sin. The Bible says
very plain, if we confess our sins, he's faithful and just
to forgive us of our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Isn't that what he said? That's 1st John chapter 1 verse 8. It
follows the motto of the Old Testament. You don't come to
God without blood. And if you come to God with blood, you're
coming to God acknowledging your sin. Not only are you coming
to God acknowledging your sin, you're coming to God acknowledging
your sin nature. What that means is I may not
know if I've sinned today, but I'm sure I did. Because sin is
not merely conscious sin. Sin is what I am and what you
are. Am I making some sense? What
I love about this next stage of our prayer is absolutely phenomenal
to me. We call this the we factor what
on earth is Daniel doing saying we Do you see it? Let me show you several things
about this is quite interesting. What is he doing saying we this
is called the we factors an amazing thing look at verse 5 again After
that, he prayed to God. He says, I'm praying to my God,
verse four. And I made confession. I made
my confession to God. And then he acknowledged God's
covenant mercy. Then he says in verse five, we have sinned.
Do you see that? Look over in verse six, notice
what it says. Neither have we hearken unto your servants, the
prophets. Do you see that? Look over at verse 8. O Lord,
to us belong confusion this day. Do you see that? Look at verse
10. Neither have we obeyed your word. And then he concludes.
Yea, all Israel have transgressed. Saints, what's going on here?
Can I tell you, Daniel, when he came into Babylon, was a little
boy. When he came into Babylon, he
came into Babylon as a little boy, him and his three partners.
He came into Babylon because of the sin of his fathers. But
here he's acknowledging his sin and their sin. Why? Because Daniel understood. He understood that God looked
at Israel as one man. And that when he looked at Israel
as one man, he saw that the sin of one was the sin of the whole. So that when Daniel prayed, he
couldn't pray to God says, father, I'm praying for them because
they're sinners. They have rebelled against you.
They've broken your law. They've transgressed your commandment.
They didn't listen to your prophets. I did listen to me. If you pray
like that, God's not hearing you. Do you hear me? God's not
hearing you. There's a great truth that's
here and it's called the truth of representation. And what that
means is Daniel, under inspiration of the Holy Ghost, is serving
as a model and representative of Jesus Christ, who stands as
the sinner's substitute. And what that means, when Christ
prays to God in our behalf, he takes on our sin as if it was
his sin. And in so far as we have sinned,
as far as Christ is concerned, he sinned too. He plainly says
it in his Word. I have sinned. The multitude
of my transgressions have encompassed me about. These are in the Messianic
Psalms. How can Jesus say that he sinned? The Bible tells us
that God hath laid upon him the iniquity of us all. And what
Daniel is doing, therefore, is moving into that mediatorial
role. That's the title of our message.
Daniel, the mediator. The Spirit of God is pressing
upon Daniel to serve as a type of Christ to stand in the gap
for guilty sinners like you. Listen to me. You need somebody
to pray for you. Whom God will hear. All right. Give me a few more
minutes of your time. I was talking with somebody last
Tuesday in the prayer meeting. about an individual who's lost,
and people always talk about praying to God. Well, I pray
to God. Do you believe the gospel? No,
but I pray to God. You believe on the Lord Jesus Christ? No,
but I pray to God. And see, you won't tell him, but you could.
God's not hearing you. God doesn't hear sinners. That's
John chapter nine. The psalmist says, if I regard
iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me. Job says, The
hypocrite will not stand before God. Will you hear me? If you
have heard the message of redemption and God has plainly told you
that Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life, and
you have rejected that revelation, and you think you can talk to
God, you got another thing coming. Now God hears everything. Will
you hear me? Because he's omniscient. And God is ever present and he's
omnipotent, but he doesn't hear you to be obligated to respond
to your prayers until you bow the knee to Jesus Christ as Lord
and acknowledge the revelation of God. Am I making some sense?
It's so critical for us to understand that more than that. Can I say
this is going to hurt a little bit, but it's important. God
doesn't hear you just because you're a Christian because you're
a sinner. Don't you know that there are
a couple of mediators between you and the true and the living
God? One is called the Holy Ghost. That's Romans chapter eight.
He mediates in our behalf. He takes our twisted, selfish,
contorted prayers and straightens them out. Then he sends them
up to the Lord Jesus. That's Romans chapter eight.
The Lord Jesus stands as a mediator for it. And when he passes them
on to the Lord Jesus, you know what the Lord Jesus had to do
with those friends? Wash them in his blood and then send them
to the father. And then the Father says, I'll
hear them for Jesus. Am I making some sense? For Jesus sake, will
I hear those prayers? See, so we always talk to people
about the necessity of being conscious of the mediatorial
work of Christ. Don't you think you have access
to the throne of God apart from the Son through the Holy Ghost?
So this is what Daniel is doing as he serves as a representative
of what is necessary for the accomplishment of this jubilee
call to the people of God. What's necessary for the accomplishment
of this jubilee call is for God to hear somebody who can stand
in the gap in order for him to move in God's people's lives.
You and I have the right and call to be mediators. We can
pray for people, we supplicate for people, we stand in the gap
for people. If we didn't have that, it would be no reason to
pray. But God has called us to that, so we do. But as we pray
for lost sinners and needy saints and the troubles of the world
and the leaders of our government and peace in the world and the
prosperity of the gospel and many other things, we pray those
things very conscious that they must be prayers that are prayers
in the spirit and prayers that go through Jesus name. Did you
guys get that? Very conscious of that. Cause
this is how God has taught us. So the we factor is so relevant
here. Daniel says, we, we, we. Point number five. The we factor
is because Christ the sin bearer is represented in Daniel. This
is what I've been developing. Keep your hand here. I want you
to see a couple of verses in relationship to this. Isaiah
chapter 63 verse nine. Isaiah 63 verse 9 This is one
of the most comforting verses in the book of Isaiah many verses
in the book of Isaiah are comforting But this is a comforting verse
because it speaks to you and me I'm in Isaiah 63. Are we there? Listen to verses
7 through 9 and particularly verse 9. I love these verses
I will mention the loving kindness of the Lord and the praises of
the Lord, according to all that the Lord had bestowed on us and
the great goodness toward the house of Israel, which he had
bestowed on them, according to his mercies, according to the
multitude of his loving kindness. Verse eight, for he said, surely
they are a people, children that will not what? Stop it right
there. Are you a liar? Or do you tell
the truth? Now let me help you. Because
if you look at that passage from the legal perspective, all of
us are liars. Am I telling the truth? All men
are liars. Only God is true. Do you believe
that? Oh, I don't, I don't lie pastor. You just lie. You just
lie. You are a liar. What he's saying
is very clear. We don't lie about Christ. We don't lie about who he is. We don't lie about our sin. We don't lie about our need for
a Savior. We don't lie about our need to
be washed in the blood of the Lamb. We don't lie about our
need to have a mediator to stand between us and God. We don't
lie about our need for the assistance of the Holy Ghost to help us
at all times. We don't lie in that Christ is all my salvation. We don't lie when we say that
salvation is by faith alone, by grace alone, through Christ
alone. That's what I'm getting at. We
don't lie when we tell the world that the only way you're gonna
make it to glory is through the mediatorial work of Christ alone. We don't lie when we say, by
himself hath he purged our sin and sat down at the right hand
of God the Father. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
We don't lie by the grace of God when we say the truth about
who God is and what Christ did for his people, children who
will not lie. What do you mean, pastor? When
you brought the sacrifice to the front of the tabernacle,
you told the truth. When the high priest offered
it up in your behalf, you told the truth. When you came back
the next week because you realized that God's revelation is the
only way for you to be saved, you told the truth. The rest
of it, you're lying. Am I making some sense? We only
tell the truth by the Spirit of God in one sense, the truth
about Christ. And so He was their Savior. Do you see that? See, if you're
righteous, Christ didn't come for you. Do you see it? This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation that Christ came into the world to
save sinners of whom I am chief. He didn't come to save the righteous,
but sinners. That's my point. Tell the truth
about who you are and what you do so that you might find a savior
in the true and the living God. Verse nine. And in all there
was Many are the afflictions of the righteous. Do you know
that? But the Lord shall deliver them from them all. Isn't that
what the Bible says? In all their afflictions, he was afflicted
and the angel of his presence did what? Save them. In his love
and in his pity, he redeemed them and he bare them and carried
them all their days. Isn't that good? That's God's
part, isn't it? What's your part? But they rebelled.
All right, go back to Daniel now, that's the truth. I'm just
telling the truth. I'm telling the truth. Go back
to Daniel now, let's wrap this up. Our sixth point is very clear. We already elucidated on it,
and that was that God heard Daniel, didn't he? Verses 20 through
23 is remarkable. The angel said, Daniel, way at
the beginning of your prayer, God gave me the command to come.
Way at the beginning of your prayer. For two reasons, because
your prayer was prompted by God. Secondly, you are beloved of
God, Daniel. And so I'm here, Daniel, to comfort
you concerning your prayer. Your prayers are a consequence
of what you understand is the right time for your people to
go. Your prayers are a consequence of your understanding that your
people are listless, they are in bondage, they are in captivity,
they are spiritually dead. I'm gonna answer that prayer.
And we're gonna stir up the people of God, says Gabriel, and they're
gonna start moving out of Babylon back into Jerusalem. And what I wanna do is just read
verse 24 now in closing because this encapsulate all of the language
of verse 27 and I'll make a comment and we'll come back here next
week and address the 70 weeks of Daniel. Here's the word that
Daniel received from the angel. Here's the word. Daniel, 70 weeks
are determined upon your people. Do you see that? 70 weeks. are
determined upon your people and upon thy holy city to finish
the transgression and to make an end of sin and to make reconciliation
for iniquity and to bring in an everlasting righteousness
and to seal up the vision and the prophecy and to anoint the
most holy. Verse 24, saints, an exclusively crystal centric
prophecy. Verse 24 has everything to do
with the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ alone. Verse 24 is all about the coming
of Christ into the world. The assumption of a human nature. Him walking and living and serving
the true and the living God for 30 some odd years in perfect
Perfect spotless obedience and then offering himself on Calvary's
tree to do exactly what the text says Are you ready for it to
make an end of sin? To make an end of sin To make
an end of sin What did Jesus say on John in John chapter 19
around verse 30 as he hung on Calvary's tree to tell us that
it's finished It's finished. I just quoted it Hebrews chapter
1 verse 2. He by himself all by himself
without you and without me all by himself purged our sin and
sat down at the right hand of God. He made an end of sin on
Calvary Street. The Bible tells us in Romans
10 verse 4 Christ is the end of the law for what? Righteousness
to everyone that believes. The Bible says here not only
did he make an end of sin, not only did he finish this issue
of transgression. And what that means is that the
transgressions of God's people that were under the first covenant
were held there until the testator came and died and put away our
sins. Once he put away our sins under
that old covenant system, the new covenant was enacted. Y'all
know anything about that new covenant? In the new covenant,
the promise is this, I will be merciful unto their unrighteousness.
and I will remember their sins no more. I will cast their sins
behind my back into the sea of forgetfulness and I will take
out that stony heart and put in a heart of flesh and I will
write my laws upon their hearts and their minds so that they
might do them. I will put my spirit in them
and I will, listen now, remember their sins no more. That's a
radical different covenant than the old covenant. The old covenant
says, look, I'm going to bring your sins up every year. Are
you hearing me? Man, that's not comforting. That's
not gospel to me. I need somebody to take him away.
And Jesus did. And the Bible says he brought
in reconciliation. He made reconciliation for iniquity. Isn't that what Jesus did? Paul
said in 2 Corinthians 5, verse 18, he made it plain to which
God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself. We beseech
you, therefore, be reconciled to God. He's given us the word
of reconciliation as a ministry to sinners. Not a word by which
reconciliation will take place, but a word that says reconciliation
has taken place. All you need to do is recognize
it. God's fixed his own problem with
you in terms of your sin and his justice. If the Holy Ghost
will help you to see it, Christ is your righteousness. If he'll
help you to see it, God is satisfied with his son, Jesus Christ. If
he'll help you to see it, you're all right with God by the grace
of God. Am I making some sense? That's what's going on here.
And then he told Daniel, I'm going to seal up the prophecy. And that's what he did when Jesus
hung on the cross. I'll talk about that next week.
And anoint the most holy. Who is the most holy? Yeah, you'll
get interpreters to say, well, the most holy is the temple.
We'll deal with that next week. The only thing God's anointing
is his son. We see three anointings in the
gospels. The anointing of Jesus at his
baptism, the anointing of Jesus at his burial. Remember that
sister Harlett sold all her, gave up all her money and anointed
our Savior. He said, this is for my burial. And the anointing
of Christ's crown rights when God raised him from the dead
and set him at his own right hand And Peter says, let Israel
know assuredly that this same Jesus whom you crucify, God hath
made both Lord and Christ. God anointed him. How do we know
that? Because he sent his Holy Ghost
and anointed us. Am I making some sense? Am I
making some sense? All right, see, this is what
we're gonna deal with next week now. As I close, I just wanna
say these words. What should be of comfort to
Daniel, and it was, should be of comfort to all of God's people
who look to Jesus. His appearing and his coming
is our hope. Is it so for you? His appearing
and his coming saints has been the hope of the saints since
the days of old and it is today. We're about to partake of the
Lord's table. And the apostle says these words, this do ye
as often as you remember him You do show the Lord's death
until he comes. As we partake of the table, what
we are doing by faith is looking back to Calvary Street. Isn't
that right? And by faith, we're looking forward
to Christ's coming. That's the comfort of God's people.
Amen.