Daniel 10:1-4 | With Daniel In The School Of Prayer

All right, this morning, let me open in prayer, and then

I want to share what was one of the most important or special months of my life.

Something that was just very dear to my heart with you as an introduction to Daniel chapter 10.

Let's pray. So Father God, thank you so much for the chance to open your word.

Thank you for the example of Daniel, and we pray that you would live according to your word.

Not just be hearers, not just have the intellect right, but to be spiritual as you are spiritual.

Help us to be taught by your Holy Spirit in Jesus' name, amen. So the month was

May of 2003, May 2003. So just now 20 years ago,

I was about to move from St. Petersburg, Florida to Dallas, Texas.

And I had a month where I was finishing up as a youth pastor and preparing myself spiritually to go out into the world eventually to become a minister.

You know, I thought I would be a missionary, and I did become a missionary for a time, but then ultimately became a pastor.

During that month, I consecrated every day as a day of prayer from 6 p .m.

to 6 .45 p .m. And I invited the church, it was a Presbyterian church in Florida, to join with me.

So different people would come on different days, but every day was a prayer meeting. And during that time,

I began to experience God in powerful ways. I wanted to share one of the things I wrote in this book.

During that month, for the entire month, I was reading With Christ in the School of Prayer. Anybody heard of Andrew Murray?

Yeah, Andrew Murray from South Africa. I've got a couple of those books. Yeah. So he had led a revival in South Africa.

While many of the other revivals were going on around the world, some of the Welsh revival and other places,

Andrew Murray in South Africa, God was using him to bring many people to faith.

Well, I was reading this book of his on prayer, and I would take notes on what was happening in my life.

I just wanted to read this one here from May the 4th, may the 4th be with you,

May 4th of 2003, 20 years ago. Today was amazing.

During first service, I was preparing papers for Sunday school. God blessed me to hang out with a young guy named

Chris. The sincerity of his faith amazed me. Chris is about 3 foot 10 and 50 pounds, soaking wet.

He is so small for a fifth grader, but his heart for the Lord is enormous. Those who give testimonies enjoy to play off of sensationalism.

Chris spoke casually without realizing how amazing his words were. He talked about how

Christ is the best thing that has ever happened to him. How I love to hear him tell about his attempts to convince his friends about the truth of the gospel.

Mature Christians, 50 years plus in the church, might rarely speak of Jesus with unbelievers.

Chris knows little about the Bible, although he definitely loves stories like the one about Samson. When I asked him if he knew the story of Jesus and the bread, he hesitated, but then remembered, oh yeah,

Jesus fed all those people with five loaves and two fish. When I asked him what was a miracle about that, he said the miracle was that he was able to chop up the bread and fish into such tiny bits that he could feed that many people.

That's a little bit for each of the 5 ,000 people. That's a miracle that he could chop it up that small.

The end of that said they were satisfied. That wouldn't satisfy them. Yeah, right.

Yeah. No, that wasn't the miracle. That was his. When God is feeding you, you don't complain. God bless me so much to be able to talk with this little fella.

And I had the extreme privilege to tell Chris about the second coming. He loved to hear about seeing

Jesus face to face. They space Sunday school was awesome. I really felt that this half a dozen of adults,

I was teaching adults about the Great Commission that they wanted to learn more and more and they were drawn to do so.

Then right at about 430 this afternoon, I left and went to church, left my house and went to church.

It was for this new prayer time in May, every day at six o 'clock prepared, preparing for it.

So 430 in the afternoon, two kids rode up on bikes. They talked and stuff.

I heard one say, dude, how weird is it that a Jewish kid and a Catholic punk are hanging out at a

Catholic church? They thought our church was Catholic, but it was Presbyterian. I listened into more of their conversation, but I see now that this statement can be analyzed and it was just like a

Macedonian call. After going from the fireside room to the front of the sanctuary,

I read in the huge church Bible at the front, a word from the Proverbs. He who conceals knowledge dot, dot, dot.

And some following verses told me not to go out blazing like I thought maybe I should. Instead, I feared that these kids would never hang out at the church again.

So I decided just to see, just to sow seeds and try to build relationship. I walked outside and said,

Hey, what's up? They made an awkward comment about, Hey, they're just passing through and they weren't right.

They're just resting or something like that. So I said, well, I just want you to know that you guys are always welcome to hang out around you.

Suddenly they thought I was their best friend. I told them about other Riviera middle school kids that attend

Northeast press, and we talked soon. It was time to share the gospel and the power of the

Holy Spirit guided the discussion. I could see the Holy Spirit quickening Corey's eyes, the quickening in Corey's eyes.

I hope I never forget the look of those eyes. Sean didn't get saved as Corey did, but I could almost watch as God melted layers of hurt away from him.

He's Jewish. It helped that I could point across the parking lot when a Messianic Jewish man named

Barry Tormund was standing, coming to the prayer meeting and here

Corey was glorious. Saved that today, his little heart was racing. How beautiful it is to see the site of salvation.

No greater joy. Wow. I remember that day like it was yesterday.

There was something spiritual about it. I remember Corey and they were skateboarding in front of the church and how

I just was praying. I saw the Bible verse. I thought I'm just going to try not to go in guns blazing. And then the

Lord just opened their hearts and Corey especially. And Chris, the little,

I'm still friends with him on Facebook. He actually grew up to become a cop. Believe it or not.

He has the cutest little daughter, probably younger than he was when I knew him. And just an awesome thing to look back 20 years later and remember that it got me thinking that this book was having an influence on me and Andrew Murray was a bit from the higher

Christian life school. Have you heard of the higher Christian life? Okay.

So Hannah Widow Smith and some other teachers had begun to teach in the 1800s that there is a higher

Christian life. And this is really the the seedbed for the Pentecostal movement that you have those who are either baptized in the spirit or not.

Spiritual Christians, carnal Christians. It's a bit of a distortion and Andrew Murray was not fully in that camp.

He was actually a Dutch Reformed guy. So he believed in election and things like that. So he wasn't as Arminian and Wesleyan in his thinking.

But there arose. Yeah, just confused. I'm sorry. Yeah. Were you reading out of that book when you were telling us the story?

So I had written notes in this book. I was reading my own story. Yeah, that I had.

I had taken notes while studying this book. Okay. Okay. Thank you for clarifying the question.

I didn't know if you had it on the plume or something. What's the name of that book again?

This one is called with Christ in the school of prayer. With Christ in the school of prayer.

And it was teaching me to go with Christ alone every day. And then also in corporate prayer times to make prayer central that you needed to be spiritual.

Not just intellectual. Okay. Another book that came out in the 1900s was early 1900s was

Lewis Berry Chafer. He that is spiritual. Great book says

Bob. Well, B .B. Warfield disagrees with you, Bob. B .B.

Warfield is a Princeton theologian. And I want to read his book review.

I want to read his book review of he that is spiritual. Mr. Chafer is in the unfortunate and one would think uncomfortable condition of having two inconsistent systems of religion struggling together in his mind.

Hmm. Hmm. He did here. He was the president of Dallas Theological Seminary where I went to school.

So if you say that Chafer is somewhat divided or two inconsistent systems of thought struggling within himself, that could just as well apply to me.

But I think in a good way, I'll explain what I think is happening here. It says

Warfield. Keep up with this. This is difficult, Bob. I'm all over the place this morning. You got

B .B. Warfield commenting on Lewis Berry Chafer. He was bred in evangelical and as a minister of the

Presbyterian Church stood committed to evangelicalism of the purest water.

But he has been long associated in his work with the coterie of evangelists and Bible teachers in quotes, scare quotes, among whom there flourishes that curious religious system at once curiously pretentious and curiously shallow, which the higher life leaders of the middle and last century brought into vogue.

And he has not been immune to its infection. These two religious systems are quite incompatible.

The higher life teachings and the pure reform doctrine of the

Reformation are quite incompatible in their thinking. In other words, Calvin is incompatible with Arminius or Whitfield is incompatible with Wesley.

Okay, there's something incompatible, but the one is the product of the Protestant Reformation and knows no determining power in the religious life, but the grace of God.

The other comes straight from the laboratory of John Wesley and in all its forms and modifications and mitigations alike remains incurably

Arminian subjecting of all grace workings of God to human determining.

Human will being stronger and more determined there. The two can unite as little as fire and water.

Yes. The one is the product of the

Protestant Reformation. And he has not been immune to its infection.

These two religious systems are quite incompatible in their thinking. In other words,

Calvin is incompatible with Arminius or Whitfield is incompatible with And he has not been immune to its infection.

The one is the product of the Protestant Reformation and knows no determining power in the religious Calvinistic view.

We're not talking about predestination in terms of salvation. This morning. We're talking about spirituality. He that is spiritual.

Have you ever noticed that the Pentecostals tend to have bigger and better prayer meetings than the

Calvinists? What's that?

I haven't taken a survey lately. Yeah. Have you ever noticed that in China, the

Pentecostal churches are growing like fire? Have you ever noticed that in Africa?

Same thing. Although often contaminated by prosperity theology in a number of things. Do you ever notice that when

B .B. Warfield wrote these words in the 1910s by 1925, his Princeton was apostate.

Notice that? Have you ever noticed that in so many of these reformed what they call frozen chosen churches that intellectualism takes over all of Scandinavia and the

Anglican Church and what ends up happening is a dry and dead orthodoxy, which eventually gives way to liberalism, formalism and apostasy.

So what do I do with my book? I keep it. A little dramatic pause here for me.

I believe fire and water in the economy of God are compatible. Yes.

I think for as harsh of a review that B .B. Warfield writes of the higher

Christian life, there is still there is error in the higher

Christian life, but there is something to be learned. Something that this side needs to hear from this side.

And likewise, there's something that this side needs to hear from this side. Yeah. Fire and water produce steam, which is a very, very powerful motivator.

Oh, OK. Let's go, Bob. Steam engines and things like that.

You need the pure water of orthodoxy. The washing of the water of the word.

And you need the fire of the Holy Spirit. And where B .B. Warfield says that these two are as incompatible as fire and water on the human level.

As we look at these things, we say they cannot be brought together. Fire and water do not coexist.

But what I believe is that both are necessary. Like Bob said, it creates a steam that gets things going.

Well, you and Bob are on that analogy and I like it. That's like a volcano. Let me take a few minutes to to describe what

I think. And I saw this in seminary. Very intellectual people. 20 years ago, when

I went off to Dallas in 2003. And so many of them, I thought they know as much as I do.

They know as much as the rest of us. But I just don't see any fire. I don't see any passion.

I don't see any love for the Lord. And they don't want to go to prayer meeting and they don't go evangelize. And there's just not any fire.

What's going on? And now I look back and of those people that I'm thinking of, many of them, one became a

Roman Catholic. Others left the faith altogether. And a vast majority, a vast majority of these seminary classmates of mine took the woke bait and they went woke.

They might still claim their orthodoxy. There are plenty of reformed, orthodox, scholarly, intellectual, woke

Christians. But I don't see that on the Pentecostal side.

I see Jack Hibbs, the Calvary chapels, the Joe Focius. I see Dallas seminary, some kind of divided between.

It's not as cut and dry as B .B. Warfield made it.

There was a lot commendable in he that is spiritual. There's a lot here that's commendable.

Lewis Ferry Chaffer. I do think he took it took a step too far in describing the

Christian life as either your carnal or your spiritual. And by your willful allowing of God, you make it possible for God to make you spiritual.

He's made the provision and Christians are either carnal or spiritual. I think that's creating kind of this two tiered

Christianity in the church that kind of oversteps what's actually at play there. I don't know

Wohlford's view on sanctification. I don't know on this particular question of spirituality.

But I don't think that this is heretical. I think that this book is largely helpful.

Even though it might be described as higher, higher life, what

I experienced in devoting myself to prayer was the powerful working of God.

I saw evidences of him answering prayer. And part of that came from that fire, that passion, which we're going to see in Daniel now.

So turn with me. And what I'm calling this lesson, I told you this one's a little different than most of my my teachings, because this one is very personal, very core to my thinking and my theology.

What's that? My thinking, I'm giving you a glimpse into how

I minister and how I think. I don't see it as yours. I see you.

You preach the Bible. Oh, I see what you mean. I don't see it as yours personally.

So each individual has a theology. Not everybody is a systematic theologian per se, but everybody's a systematic theologian.

Nobody's completely bias free. No, that's the case, too. But I'm saying that everybody has a theology.

Everybody either believes this or that. And the

Bible is the standard. But not when every person is interpreting the

Bible as well. So let me just put you on the spot for a second. Do you believe that speaking in tongues is for today?

No. OK, your theology is that it's not for today. Right. So that's what

I mean by Bob's theology. Now, the question is, what does the Bible say?

And that's the truth. So nobody, B .B. Warfield, as great as he is as a theologian, one of my favorites, look,

I bought his systematic. So I've read it. I love B .B. Warfield, one of my top shelf guys.

But I disagree with the fact that he in his theology, you should baptize babies.

I think that is largely in his Presbyterianism, largely contributing to nominal intellectual

Christianity that falls away from the faith. So B .B. Warfield's theology is good at a lot of places.

But because of that error, there's great damage done in churches. That Presbyterian church that I went to suffers from that problem.

In fact, they invited me to come be their pastor when the other was retiring way back in 2012.

And I said no, because I will never baptize babies. I just can't be a Presbyterian. It's just not my theology.

That's what I mean. Does that make sense? Take me to the task. You said I gave you my answer. Yeah. And what is your thought?

Oh, so I am not a cessationist to say that speaking in tongues is not for today.

That's not my view. When I read 1 Corinthians 13 and it says where there is knowledge, you know, it shall pass away.

It says when the perfect comes. And I believe that is at the second coming of Christ.

So I do. You could call it the open, cautious view or maybe even more than open and cautious because the

Bible also says eagerly pursue the greater gifts. We should desire spiritual gifts.

And so I would desire for everybody, like Paul would say, that you speak in tongues, as Paul says. But it's not something that is manufactured or created by human engineering.

And so what you have in Pentecostal churches, I think, is a lot of conditioning and doing what they're seeing other people do.

And no interpretations. I don't believe that often. It's genuine. But I would also say that if God wants to give a gift of tongues to someone, he can still do that today.

I'm open to that. You know. Yeah. Yeah. So so that kind of thing or like if God wants to use a particular person in healing more than he uses other

Christians and you call that a gift of healing. I'm open to him doing that. I just don't think it's Benny Hinn.

He might be a missionary somewhere in China and God has used him to heal a lot of people. I'm very open to that.

But I'm not. I'm not. That's why I don't teach at an assembly of God Church, because that's not me.

You know, I am not a cessationist. I'm a continuationist. But I'm very.

This is why I'm saying it's the Calvinistic view with this view somehow compatible.

I like the way you teach that. Yeah. Yeah. I agree with that. Yeah. That's how you use the scripture.

The scripture. Yeah. I do not believe and I would debate anybody on this that the

New Testament teaches the cessation of gifts. That's to go beyond what is written.

First Thessalonians 5 says test the prophecy and see if it's from God, right? It doesn't say that it ceased.

Now, I would also debate the Pentecostal over, you know, in Orlando. My good friend that I grew up with in high school is the son -in -law of Benny Hinn, Michael Koulianos.

I would debate him over what their church practices to say that that's error, you know, for a number of reasons.

From female pastors to this ecumenism with Rome to the slaying in the spirit where they're knocking people down.

And they're saying that that is the power of the Holy Spirit to do that. Benny Hinn repented from his prosperity teaching and then proceeded to do it again.

And then this last week he gave this one was funny. I was watching this. I don't mean to mock but less than a month ago, he gave a new

YouTube video that ran up 300 ,000 views. Benny Hinn and the whole point of it was on the cusp of Saudi Arabia and Israel making peace.

Now is the great peace of Israel. Amazing peace is coming to Israel like never before.

Two weeks later, Hamas, October 7th, invaded and it is the worst false prophecy that one could imagine.

He has all these views on these two videos back -to -back that he did. This is going to be the peace of Israel.

It's amazing. Saudi Arabia. So he's just reading the headlines, but he doesn't know the future because he's not a prophet.

And he falsely prophesied the peace of Israel. So, yeah, yeah.

Put a put this. This is two parallel lines intersecting.

Beautiful. That's Charles Spurgeon's language. He says it's like two parallel tracks, human responsibility, divine sovereignty.

It looks from our perspective like fire and water that can't run parallel, can't run together. And they run parallel, but somewhere in eternity, those two parallel lines meet.

So what's possible for God is impossible for us. It's kind of the idea there. In eternity, we'll see it.

Another Dallas professor actually said this, and I think he's right. That when you look at the gate of heaven from an earthly perspective, you're looking up at the gate of heaven.

It says whosoever will. And that human willingness is there.

If you will, you may come. Let him come. Let him drink. Whosoever will.

But as you get on the heavenly side of that gate and you look back at the gate, what does it say on that side?

Chosen from the foundation of the world. Same gate.

So wide open gate. It's a free invitation. Whosoever will. So it kind of puts it on the individual.

Come believe. But when you get there, you're seeing it from God's perspective that it's the chosen that will come.

That will be drunk. So the two perspectives. I'm saying that both are essential. And I think that Christians beat each other up sometimes wrongly.

But there needs to be correction. So you need to have that conversation. Let's go to Daniel. Just one thing.

Daniel 10. Yeah. That'll take you back to Deuteronomy 29, 29. The secret things belong to God, but the revealed things belong to us and to our children.

Similar to that. Right. Very good. Well, fortunately,

I only plan to teach four verses. Yeah. So I will do that.

And I think we can get through that. We're going to go with Daniel into a school of prayer.

And I'll make eight observations quickly. Could I just have somebody, John, would you mind just reading Daniel chapter 10 verses one to four?

In the third year of Cyrus, king of Persia, a message was revealed to Daniel, who was named

Belshazzar. And the message was true, and one of great conflict.

But he understood the message and had an understanding of the vision. In those days,

I, Daniel, had been mourning for three entire weeks. I did not eat any tasty food, nor did meat or wine enter my mouth.

Nor did I use any ointment at all until the entire three weeks were completed. On the twenty -fourth day of the first month, while I was by the bank of the great river, that is, the

Tigris. Do you want me to finish the thought? Yeah, you can finish the thought.

I lifted my eyes and looked, and behold, there was a certain man dressed in linen, whose waist was girded with a belt of pure gold of apaz.

Eight lessons from these four verses. You'll notice that there is activity that Daniel himself is doing.

I, I, I, he says. I did this, I did that, I fasted, I prayed, I humbled myself.

The first lesson comes from the first phrase, and we're just going to follow it along.

In the third year of Cyrus, king of Persia, a word was revealed to Daniel.

The first lesson is that God's sovereign timing is over the human responsibility.

The two are not incompatible. I want you to think about this for a minute. Daniel is going to get a word from God that tells of what will certainly happen.

The answer to his prayer is not the healing of his daughter. It's not something that he had long labored for.

The answer to his prayer will be the revelation of things that will certainly happen.

This will be Daniel chapter 11, when he really reveals what the vision is. The king of Persia, then three after him, and then after Persia will come

Greece, and then the Romans. All of these things will be revealed to Daniel. It's a revelation of God's certain plan.

Notice it says in the third year of Cyrus, king of Persia. It was ordained that Cyrus be the king of Persia.

The timing of what is going to happen to Daniel in this chapter is sovereignly prepared before God by God.

It is not that God was dependently waiting on Daniel to make something possible, which again is where Chafer airs.

And in Warfield's criticism, he'll point out you didn't make God. You didn't make anything possible for God.

And you never do make anything possible for God. Even though this is so key, even prayer, which is a means, is ordained by God.

The means are ordained as well as the end. So if you say,

I am going to, by my willpower, let's say, I am going to consecrate a prayer season every day of the month for 45 minutes, and I'm going to get my church here and do it, and I'm going to pray.

That is not being willful and trying to manipulate God and make something possible for God, because even the fact that you're doing that and have this desire, even all of this was part of God's plan.

Does that make sense? That is how you reconcile the two. So in bringing together what might be a reformed emphasis on grace and the sovereignty of God, and the emphasis upon human agency, if you realize that God ordains the means as well as the ends, he ordains prayer and evangelism just like he ordains who would get saved,

God himself is over it all. So when I read this first phrase, it was ordained that Daniel would pray this way in the third year of Cyrus's reign.

How old is this man? Daniel at this time is in his 70s. He surely had other seasons of prayer, but never quite like what we're about to read here, and never with this final revelation of the things to come, and the amazing story we're told about warring angels for 21 days.

This itself was ordained by God. That's the first lesson. Number two, real identity.

Times of prayer reveal the true nature of the secret heart. Psalm 51 is

David's prayer of confession, and he says, you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.

Now, look at Daniel 10. We're still in the first verse. We're going to look at it. There's five pieces to that first verse.

The second is, who was named Belteshazzar? Daniel. Right. But the text says, who was named

Belteshazzar? You know him as Daniel. What was the name

Belteshazzar? Given to him by the king. Yeah. And that's why some translation says he was called

Belteshazzar. He's named. He's identified that way by the king.

But what is Daniel's true identity? He's Daniel.

We call the book Daniel, not Belteshazzar. We're not reading the book of Belteshazzar. From God's perspective,

God sees your true identity. Here is the point about prayer. When you are alone praying, and you're pouring out your heart to God, that's the true you.

You guys see me when I preach, and that's the visible part of what you hear from me.

But if you really were to know the hidden me, the secret heart, that's who

I am when I pray. That's who you are when you pray. Who you are when you pray is who you really are.

The true identity of Daniel is between him and God. Does that make sense?

We can put on a front for other people. We can do our best to project what we want people to think about us.

But when you're alone with God like Daniel is here, that's why it's also so important because there, even the most hidden motives of your heart, the thoughts and intentions are laid bare.

The dividing like bone from marrow by the word of God. You must spend these seasons like Daniel had.

You go before him. Show God who you really are. He knows anyway. Open it up to the light of his presence that you would be more and more conformed to the image.

So your true identity comes out in seasons like this. I think that's why it's mentioned.

Who is called Belteshazzar. What is that? The N -I -V -E. You're trying to mention the one you use.

This one is ESV. ESV. What is ESV? Named. Named Belteshazzar. Oh, it's named versus called.

Yeah. Number three. And the word was true.

The word was true. For all your experiences and your desires, everything that you would want to see accomplished in prayer, it is meaningless and empty apart from the word.

The word, here, we have the opinions of men, my theology, my theology.

Here is the theology, Bob, to your point. There is only one word. The word is true.

Prayer, then, needs to be conforming your desires to what

God has revealed. That's your Deuteronomy 29 -29. The things that are revealed. This is why

Jesus' high priestly prayer in John 17, and then even in the upper room when he's teaching them the deep things of God.

What does he say in John 15 -7? Abide in me, and my words abide in you.

Then he speaks of prayer. Then you'll ask whatever you wish, and it will be given to you. Why is that?

Because prayer has to be conformed by the revelation of God. When we're in the word, when we're studying like we're doing today, this is preparing you to pray because you'll understand better the deep things of God.

The deep things of God are not esoteric. They don't come from our experiences and our charismania.

They come from the word, and when you're in the word, that's what's teaching you to pray.

Yeah, Bob? Just knowing that fact about the truth being in the Bible is a wonderful piece of knowledge for us with regard to evangelizing.

We know what the truth is, and we always have the option of, or the first step in going to the word.

Point number four. This is a big one. All of these are big.

These are eight big points about prayer. To intercede is to enter into conflict.

And it was a great conflict, says Daniel 10. Daniel 10, verse 1.

And it was a great conflict. It speaks of the conflict that happens spiritually between these angels.

It speaks of the word of God and future conflicts between earthly kingdoms,

Persia and Greece and Rome. But it speaks also of a conflict that Daniel himself is entering into.

It was a great conflict. There is spiritual things. There are spiritual things happening in heavenly places that Daniel doesn't see.

What we are seeing now is Daniel entering into that conflict.

Colossians chapter 2, verse 1. Paul says, for I want you to know how great a struggle

I have for you. He's not talking there about other things he went through in the ministry.

He's talking about his prayer struggle in Colossians 2 .1. The conflict is when he goes to the

Lord and intercedes for them. He enters into a conflict. We're going to find out next week when we spend more time on this particular subject that when

Daniel set himself to pray, God released an angel from heaven to bring the answer.

For 21 days, a demonic spirit resisted the angel.

Some people say that the spirit that appeared to Daniel, because we're going to see, has blazing eyes and just glory all over to the point where it melts

Daniel down into a puddle of mush on the ground. Some people say that's

Christ because it looks like Revelation when Christ is pictured that way. It is not Christ, I'm convinced.

It is an angel, because when Christ comes, he doesn't have to struggle for 21 days being held in check and call for an angel to help him.

An angel and a fallen angel are a good match for each other in a collision of conflict.

But my point is that God is sovereignly over that and over the conflict itself. Within the means of prayer, conflict is unleashed between angels in heaven, and we as instruments are part of this conflict.

Our praying matters as an instrument of what God is going to do. But God himself is over it all.

Does it make sense? So there is a conflict. We're going to move fast. We only have two or three more minutes and we've got three more points.

The next thing in verse one, and he understood the word and had understanding of the vision.

Daniel's understanding here is spiritual, not merely intellectual.

What you will not find in Daniel 10 is a scholar writing a book.

What you will find is a man struggling in prayer. That's interesting.

And it doesn't mean that being intellectual and studied is bad. No, it's good.

Daniel's writing a book. But it does mean here that there is a spiritual element to understanding.

You should pray for understanding. We don't have time now to go to 1

Corinthians 2, but understanding the deep things of God is a work of the

Holy Spirit of God. The Spirit knows the mind of God, and he teaches wisdom to he that is spiritual.

Now, that doesn't mean there's a higher class of spiritual versus carnal Christians. It means that when you are praying, when you're in the

Spirit, when you're being taught by the Spirit, he opens to you the deep things of God from the word.

So there's a spiritual aspect. It's not merely intellectual, which is why some of these intellectual movements, scholasticism of the

Reformed world, often result in just emptiness and apostasy.

Next principle. Some precious things are only procured by deep mining.

Verse 2 says, in those days, I, Daniel, was mourning for three weeks. What does he mean by mourning?

Mining. He was going to God, digging deep. He was praying, consecrating a period of prayer.

Doesn't that sound like he's trying to manipulate God? Trying to get something from God? Trying to make something possible?

No. He wants God himself. He's spiritual. He wants to pray because he's seeking

God. But he's the one who's doing that. For three weeks, it says.

Verse 2. In those days, I was mourning for three weeks. Next principle.

Because this ties into that one. Godly resolve to pray must be proven with discipline over time.

Now, doesn't that sound human? Look at verse 3. I ate no delicacies.

No meat, no wine entered my mouth. Doesn't that sound a little bit...

Fasting. It's fasting. Why is it that the

Pentecostals fast and the Calvinists don't? Very often.

We did fasting and prayer together a lot in the New Testament. Absolutely. So Jesus said this.

Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them and then they will fast.

They will fast. He'll do that work and they will. He's working in believers.

What looks like human effort. Fasting. Praying. Consecrating. What looks like a human endeavor is actually

God's work in that person. And it is good work. It's something that we should not shy away from or be scared of.

Lastly, seeking certain physical spaces to behold glory is not unspiritual.

Look at verse 4. On the 24th day of the first month, as I was standing on the bank of the great river that is the

Tigris. What's he doing there? I thought he was over all the kingdom appointed to be the leader.

Doesn't he have a job to do? Yeah, you know what his job was at that point? Before God?

It was to go get alone with God and he chose to do it on the bank of a great river.

Andrew Murray called his place Patmos. It was in South Africa along the rocky shore.

He would go by himself. He would take his Bible to Patmos which is not the one in the

Mediterranean Sea but the one along the ocean on the shore of Africa. Where is your Patmos?

Wouldn't you draw near to God if you went and took some consecrated time and place?

Maybe it's a park near a lake. Maybe you drive all the way down the shore and sit on the beach for four hours with you and God and your

Bible and you pray and you seek his face. My point in this whole lesson, that's the eighth point.

My entire point here is that what we see modeled in Daniel is seeking

God. Some might call it human effort to fast and to pray and to consecrate time and place but these are actually not a threat to the sovereignty of God and to the grace of God.

This is a means that God uses in your life. God has ordained it and once you've done a season of prayer in your life you'll give

God the glory for it. I look back on that 30 days of prayer that I had in May of 2003.

Corey got saved, I remember that day like it was yesterday, just early on. At the end of the month we took the teens to Kentucky and Caitlin and her boyfriend and all these other teenagers got saved.

It was amazing to see the power of God and it wasn't that I did anything.

It was God who ordained that we pray. It was God that saved them. All the glory goes to God.

There's no threat to the grace of God but we consecrated these times of prayer and fasted. We actually fasted food all together for that time.

We drank milkshakes and things like that. Does that seem like it was human engineering?

No, these things are compatible. So that's the point. You need the water of the word and sound orthodox.

You need the fire of the spirit and these two things do not extinguish but they, what do they do

Bob? They create steam. That's the point. Let's pray. So Father God, we thank you for these deep things.

We thank you for the example of Daniel and that we could go with Daniel into a school of prayer.

Lord, teach us to pray. Teach us to fast.

Teach us to consecrate time and place and effort and energy to prayer.

And Lord, we ask that you would do it again Lord. We pray that we would see many people come to Saving Faith at this church.

That we would consecrate seasons of prayer. Maybe 21 days until we see a breakthrough or longer or shorter.

God, let this be according to your lead by your Holy Spirit but I'm asking Lord that you would reignite the flame, the fire, the passion of prayer at Cornerstone Church.

Do this for your namesake and for your glory to the praise of your glorious grace in Jesus' name.