Daniel's prayer of restoration (Daniel 9:4-19)

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Good morning. Welcome to Adult Sunday School Kootenai Community Church. What a blessed day.

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Wasn't that a lovely wedding yesterday? Wow. You're not supposed to ball at other people's weddings.

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Just that's a part of etiquette, etiquette, etiquette. Yeah, etiquette. That's how you pronounce it in North Idaho that I had forgotten.

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Well, it's a Q. Say the word Q without a kind of a W in it somewhere.

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Yeah. We're going to be in Daniel chapter nine in this incredible prayer of Daniel from verses four through 19.

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I don't know if we'll get through all of those. I'm going to try because it is one prayer. So we will see what happens.

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Let's open in prayer. Father, there is nothing that you have left out of your word that isn't necessary.

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I hope I said that right. Everything that is necessary is in your word. Let me put it that way. You have given us what is necessary to be godly in Christ Jesus.

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We are so grateful for your son, for the Holy spirit, for you and for the word of God. It is new every day.

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It is something special every day. And I thank you that you have given us this privilege of knowing you through your word.

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It is sufficient and it is perfect. This morning as we look into Daniel chapter nine, we pray for illumination, help us to, to sharpen our prayer life, to more carefully enter into prayer with you and for you and through you and for others.

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And Lord to be aware of what you are looking for by your word in the lives of others.

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And in our own life, help us to to change in the changes that is necessary that are necessary.

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This morning as we study Daniel, we look to you for teaching and we'll thank you for it in Jesus name.

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Amen. So there's a couple of disclaimers. When I'm going through this section of the prayer,

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I'm going to act like it's the finest prayer that there ever was. And to me it is, but I'm not saying everybody has the same problem

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I have, which is that I have really reevaluated my prayer life as I've gone through this.

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So please do not take it as any kind of an indictment. When I say things like that, I don't mean it that way.

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But I think we can all learn from this section of Daniel to sharpen our prayer life, to be more faithful in prayer, to be more careful and thoughtful in prayer.

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As I looked at how Daniel presented his supplications to God, it's interesting that he goes,

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I think 14 verses before he finally actually asked for something. It's mostly prayer.

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It's mostly praise and acknowledgement confession. And we will see that as we go through it.

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Secondly, I will often say things like a more cogent translation. That is not implying that we don't have a good translation.

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I'm simply saying for me, it helped me to understand when I, when I re went through it and put the words down on paper and looked at it this way from the original language, it helped me a little better.

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That's all I'm saying. And I think that's all the disclaimers I have this morning. So let's start by reading the first 19 chapters of Daniel chapter nine,

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Daniel chapter nine. And we made it through verse three last year.

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We'll do a little dab of review and then we'll plunge on into the prayer. Daniel's prayer for his people.

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Chapter nine, again, it's page 1154. For those of you who are unsure in the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus of Median descent, who was made

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King over the kingdom of the Chaldeans in the first year of his reign. I, Daniel observed in the books, the number of years, which was revealed as the word of the

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Lord to Jeremiah, the prophet for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years.

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So I gave my attention to the Lord to seek him by prayer and supplications with fasting sackcloth and ashes.

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And I prayed to the Lord, my God, and confessed and said, alas, O Lord, the great and awesome God who keeps his covenant and loving kindness for those who love him and keep his commandments.

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We have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly and rebelled, even turning aside from thy commandments and ordinances.

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Moreover, we have not listened to thy servants, the prophets who spoke in thy name to our Kings, our princes, our fathers, and all the people of the land.

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Righteousness belongs to thee, O Lord, but to us open shame, as it is this day to the men of Judah, the inhabitants of Jerusalem and all

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Israel, those who are nearby and those who are far away in all the countries to which thou hast driven them because of their unfaithful deeds, which they have committed against thee.

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Open shame belongs to us, O Lord, to our Kings, our princes, and our fathers, because we have sinned against thee.

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To the Lord, our God belong compassion and forgiveness for we have rebelled against him. For we have obeyed nor have we obeyed the voice of the

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Lord, our God to walk in his teachings, which he set before us through his servants, the prophets. Indeed, all

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Israel has transgressed thy law and turned aside, not obeying thy voice. So the curse has been poured out on us along with the oath, which is written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, for we have sinned against him.

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Thus he has confirmed his words, which he had spoken against us and against our rulers who ruled us to bring on us great calamity for under the whole heaven, there has not been anything, not been done anything like what was done to Jerusalem as it is written in the law of Moses.

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All this calamity has come on us. Yet we have not sought the favor of the Lord, our God by turning from our iniquity and giving attention to thy truth.

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Therefore the Lord has kept the calamity in store and brought it on us. For the

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Lord, our God is righteous with respect to all his deeds, which he has done, but we have not obeyed his voice.

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And now, oh Lord, our God who has brought thy people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand and has made a name for thyself.

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As it is this day, we have sinned. We have been wicked. Oh Lord. And here's where he first asked for something in accordance with all thy righteous act.

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Let now thine anger and thy wrath turn away from thy city, Jerusalem, thy holy mountain. For because of our sins and the iniquities of our fathers,

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Jerusalem and thy people have become a reproach to all those around us. So now our God listened to the prayer of thy servant and to his supplications.

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And for thy sake, oh Lord, let thy face shine on thy desolate sanctuary. Oh my God, incline thine ear and ear open thine eyes and see our desolations and the city which is called by thy name.

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For we are not presenting our supplications before the on account of any mercy merits of our own, but on account of thy great compassion.

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Oh Lord, here, oh Lord, forgive. Oh Lord, listen and take action for thine own sake.

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Oh my God, do not delay because thy city and thy people are called by thy name. What a marvelous prayer.

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I, um, as I went through this, I came back again and again to the fact that Daniel spent so much time acknowledging and praising the character of God.

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It is his character that causes him to bless us. And it is his character that causes him to discipline us and both should be welcome hard though they may be.

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Daniel recognizes that we live in an age, we live in an age when any kind of discipline is looked upon as a reproach, as nasty, as evil, as wicked.

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I find it hard in my own life to thank God when he disciplines me, but I'm learning. It is his desire for all of us to follow closely in the, in the word of the

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Lord Jesus Christ. And to do that, often he has to discipline us and Daniel acknowledges that the curses that came on Israel were part of a promise.

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They were a promise and every promise of God is perfect when it comes true and they all will come true in history and in time.

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So Daniel starts, he says in verse three, we looked at this last week.

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He said, so I, I gave my attention to the Lord God to seek him by prayer and supplications with fasting sackcloth and ashes.

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I find in my life when I start to pray, if I don't set aside the computer and the phone and all the other distractions that are in life and I hear a ding, it summons me away from prayer.

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What an idiot. And so I'm, I'm, this is my sackcloth and ashes.

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This has become my sackcloth and ashes. If you will. I'm, come on, I'm not trying to, there's not going to be any angel feathers coming from the duckboard or anything.

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It just, this is just me understanding what it meant to me to give my attention to the Lord God.

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When I pray, stuff has to give way in order for us to be fully focused on things. And this is what

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Daniel was doing. He was setting his full attention on the Lord God for his prayer and supplication.

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And then we will see as we go through this prayer, how important that was for him. He says in verse four, I prayed to the

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Lord, my God, and confessed. Now, is there any inkling in scripture of a sin that Daniel committed?

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Do you think he was sinless? Good on you for all.

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And it doesn't say in Romans for all, and even Daniel because it doesn't have to for all have fallen short.

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So Daniel knew his own, his own failings. And he plunges into this and he acknowledges himself and Israel.

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He says, Oh Lord, he says, I confessed and said, alas, Oh Lord, the great and awesome

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God who keeps his covenant and loving kindness for those who love him and keep his commandments. So for me, as I was reframing this and printing out the words and things,

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I, the more cogent wording was this. He said, I prayed to Yahweh, my God. He here uses the personal name for God.

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This is the only chapter in the entire book of Daniel where he uses the sacred name as he, and he uses it seven times in this chapter.

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And it's significant that he uses it in prayer. It's the covenant name. This is for the

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Jews, the special name for the covenant keeping God of Israel who hears a man or a woman when they pray, he hears them.

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This is the very first thing Daniel does. The very first thing he does is he confesses and it starts with a statement of praise about his

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God. That is even a praise, acknowledging that God is his God who is a covenant keeping

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God. Interestingly enough. And I've noted this before. There are a number of people who have exegeted the book of Daniel only to, to ignore the non -prophetic passages.

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Some deal only with the prophecies and leave much of Daniel untouched. This fantastic prayer lasts 16 verses of which

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I believe are just a couple or actual supplication. And it's an interesting pattern to consider when you're praying, not that you have to follow this pattern.

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Um, prayer is a very intensely personal thing, but the scripture does give us good ideas about because it's

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God's word about how to pray. So I was going to intentionally at the beginning do a cursory glance of the whole prayer and then come back and go through it verse by verse.

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And as I got deeper and deeper into it, I realized that's not going to work. There's just too much to say about each verse, too much, too much meat here.

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So we're going to go through it verse by verse. And that may very well leave us not finishing the prayer today, which if I just shut up and plunge into it, we might do.

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But at any rate, be that as it may, we'll get as far as we can. So 900 years before the captivity in Babylon, God told the

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Israelites in Deuteronomy chapter 28, how he would bless them for their obedience. He spent 14 verses dealing with the blessings and 54 dealings versus dealing with the curses.

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Should they not choose to be obedient? One of the, one of the curses included being taken away into captivity.

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Throughout the history of Israel, you can see all of the 54 verses being applied in one way or another to a disobedient and ignorant in the way of ignoring

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God nation at different times. Then in Deuteronomy chapter 30, he reminds the

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Israelites that if they repent, he will relent and restore to them, restore them from captivity. This is some of the things that Daniel would be thinking about as he prayed along with a promise in the book of Jeremiah about the captivity ending very soon.

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When Daniel read the passage in Jeremiah in 25 and 29 that talked about the, the, the length of the captivity, he took that literally is 70 years.

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And so he would have been, I think, please don't, this is not my prediction, but I believe he was 67 years into the captivity approximately when we read this section here.

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So Deuteronomy chapter 30 verses one through five, say this, so it shall be when all of these things have come upon you, speaking of the cursings of the blessings, the blessing and the curse, which

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I have set before you and you call them to mine in all nations where the Lord, your God has banished you.

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We'll see that in his prayer. And you return to the Lord, your God, and obey him with all your heart and soul. According to all that I command you today, you and your sons, then the

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Lord your God will restore you from captivity and have compassion on you. And we'll gather you again from all the peoples where the

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Lord, your God has scattered you. If your outcasts are at the ends of the earth from there, the

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Lord, your God will gather you. And from there, he will bring you back. The Lord, your God will bring you back to the land, which your fathers possessed and you shall possess it.

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And he will prosper you and multiply you more than your fathers. So there's the promise to an, uh, uh, an obedient, repentant

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Israel. He'll bring them back. And Daniel is basically begging God in his prayer, that this is what would be happening, that Israel would be repenting and he would be able to bring them back after the 70 years.

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So he starts with confession and praise. In this verse, he's opens with the statement that he's going to confess.

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And then he immediately praises God's character specifically, that he is a covenant keeping God and that he sheds loving kindness on those who love him and keep his commandments.

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He claims God as his own in his statement, the Lord or Yahweh, my God, using the personal name of God, we would do well to remember as we pray that God is our father as children of, of his, we can come to his throne room, humbly, respectfully, but boldly, as he teaches in Hebrews, a boldness, always tinctured, if you will, with respect and awe,

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Daniel states that God is a covenant keeper and that he maintains loving kindness for those who love him and keep his commandments.

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This will be one of the, this will be one of the hopes that Daniel will have as he acknowledges that Israel must repent.

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God keeps all covenants and he extends his loving kindness to men who are unable to live up to covenants.

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Do we live up to his requirements every day? Are you not grateful for his loving kindness?

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What, what is, I thought about this. I thought, you know, when people don't live up to my expectations, what do

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I do? It's often not pretty. And I'm really grateful that God's not like me.

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So in this Daniel identifies the ones who can hope for his loving kindness for this is what he has established in the

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Mosaic covenant. And that would be the people Israel, should they repent and come back to Christ verse five.

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And then I'll see if there's any questions, but verse five, we have sinned. Daniel says, committed iniquity and act wickedly and rebelled, even turning aside from your commandments and ordinances.

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So this is corporate confession, if you will, but in corporate confession, always acknowledging individual complicity.

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Daniel gives a general statement about the wickedness of the nation, Israel, the four words that he uses to denote sin are missing the mark, distorting righteousness, acting perversely and rebelling.

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I pretty much covers all the nasty things we can do as people. We, we miss the mark all the time.

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We, we distort righteousness and make it our own righteousness. That's a distortion of righteousness.

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When it's not predicated on God's righteousness, we act perversely. We act opposite of what should be done.

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And we rebel. We just upwards up, up, up, no other good word for it.

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We just rebel. He seemed, it seems to be a progression. Now it may or may not be, but it seems to be, he leaves no stone unturned in the wickedness that Israel has committed.

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He doesn't candy coat, anything, sugar coat, anything. He acknowledges the sin that they've committed.

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I think as I was looking at this, that I would do well in my prayer life to recognize that I can hide nothing from God.

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We say that. And I know I say that. And then I try to try to hide stuff.

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That's what, what a foolish thing to do. It is also interesting to note that this is not an overt promise for God may oftentimes use difficulty in the lives of those who love him.

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But concerning the covenant, this is the program that God himself established with Israel as outlined in Deuteronomy, the end of the chapter, end of the book of Deuteronomy and elsewhere as well.

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So it's also interesting that right here at the beginning of Daniel's prayer, that, uh, that the general early sin of Israel was to turn aside from God's word.

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One commentator mentioned that to disregards word God's word is, he said, the beginning of all moral disorders.

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We have pulled, who was a commentator on the book of Daniel. How true that is that the beginning of all this moral disorders is when we begin to dis to ignore

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God's word, not pay attention to it, not spend time in it. That is the beginning and the continuation of all moral disorders, commandments and ordinances here, by the way, are a synonym for God's law.

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As one commentator said, this is first speaking of laws as authoritative demands of God. And second as products of his wise judgment.

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They do not in this instance seem to specify respective aspects of the law as they do in some other contexts.

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So this is a general synonym to God's law. It's all important. Daniel, if his prayer is going to not last four years, he just makes a general statement about the laws of God.

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They've disobeyed them. They've ignored them. Israel has, and that's a statement of truth. And Daniel doesn't shy away from it.

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And then verse six, and then we'll ask if there's any questions. Moreover, we have not listened to your servants, the prophets who spoke in your name to our

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Kings, our princes, our fathers and all the people of the land. So more confession in a general nature, but Daniel acknowledges that the nation of Israel has ignored the prophets that God sent to them.

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What did they do with some of those prophets? They stoned them. They threw them into pits. I don't want to hear this.

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Nah, nah, nah, nah. I'm not listening. I mean something like that, except it was much more dangerous than that.

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Some of them lost their lives. This indeed in the life of any believer is a terrible sin.

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The sin of not believing scripture, not spending time in it, not or minimizing it. Scripture is sufficient and sometimes that word sufficient sounds kind of like a low bar.

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It's not, it's not a low bar. It is the bar. Everything that is necessary has been given to us.

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They had disobeyed the prophets and called them out for the prophets who had called them out for their disobedience and they either ignored or stoned the prophets.

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So the prophets spoke most often, if you will, to people in positions of responsibility. And Daniel lists the recipients here of the prophetic denunciation in descending order.

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Kings, princes, fathers, all are guilty. The leadership and the common people.

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No one is escaping Dan's Daniel's denunciation here of the disobedience of the land. It wasn't just the

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Kings and the princes and the fathers. It was everybody down to the last person.

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All are simply are, all of us are simply responsible for our own sin. You can't blame the government even though it's a piece of junk.

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Yeah, I didn't say that. That felt really good. Pardon me? I get it.

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Yeah. Dad, Brian was calling me out. We support the government. He said, no, he didn't say that. So no one escaped

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Daniel's confession here. And I think that's significant in our own lives. When we, we confess to God, what's going on.

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Any comments or questions about those several verses there? Verse seven, righteousness belongs to you.

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Think about that. It's not as I was trying to apprehend the character of God.

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It's not like he's righteous. Righteousness belongs to him. It's well,

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I don't have enough. I don't have enough perspicacity to give you any clearer definition than that. It just belongs to him.

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He is righteousness defined, but to us, he says, righteousness belongs to you,

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O Lord, but to us, open shame. As it is this day to the men of Judah, the inhabitants of Jerusalem and all

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Israel, he again covers them all. Those who are nearby and those who are far away in the countries to which you have driven them because of their unfaithful deeds to which you have committed, which they have committed against you.

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Do you hear him reciting to God? What he just read in Deuteronomy chapter 30. It's, it's a wonderful thing to use scripture in prayer because it's always true.

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And we can generally, we can, we can, we can kneel at that if you will. So here is praise and comparison.

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Daniel states that one of the character qualities of Yahweh is righteousness, but that the character of the men of Judah is unfaithfulness because of that they have been judged and scattered.

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He uses the frame open shame as the possession of the men of Judah. These two words come from words that strongly indicate that the things that the men of Judah did were right out in the open and their actions were wickedly evident.

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This wasn't hidden sin. This was open wickedness that everybody could apprehend. We should always remember

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God's character and compare it to ours when we're praying, not to other people. Well, I'm sure glad I'm not like those other folks.

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And then what Jesus said about those two men, who do you think left that that the temple justified?

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We should always, we should never compare ourselves to others because that is the path to self deception. Daniel compares

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Israel's actions to the character of the true God of the Lord God. So the idea of open shame comes from the actual translation, which was shame of face, because when a person is ashamed, it generally appears on their face.

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You've probably seen that when you walk into the room that the kid didn't clean, like he told you who's going to, the head goes down, open shame.

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Daniel particularizes the declaration of shame to the men of Judah local in the inhabitants of Jerusalem, a broader group, and then to all

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Israel everywhere, everyone included anyone associated with Yahweh who refused to obey him.

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This includes as he read in a Deuteronomy 30 that Israelites disperse throughout the world says, and those who are far away and all the countries to which you have driven them.

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Some of these were still in Egypt. The word translated unfaithful deed connotes the idea of treacherous sinfulness, stealth, treachery, and unfaithfulness.

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As one commentator specified, unfortunately, none of us escapes these kinds of things in life. And it is best to confess them to God truly.

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So Daniel does that here. Then he reiterates open shame in verse eight, open shame belongs to us.

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Oh Lord, to our Kings, our princes and our fathers, because we have sinned against you.

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So he acknowledges the consequences of the sin. Daniel uses the word open shame. Again, the words, a dual reminder of the wickedness of Israel.

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After his statement in verse seven, that the Lord is the owner of righteousness. He descends through a litany of the proper responses.

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The Lord had to Israel's disobedience. God judged the men of Judah. He judged Jerusalem and he judged all of Israel, even though they were scattered throughout other countries and therefore open shame, blatant, obvious shame belong to all of Israel.

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And it must be accepted by the Kings, the princes, the fathers, and all the people.

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So it's well to remember as I looked at this section of Daniel, that our sin will never remain hidden.

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And that in our lives to continue to sin is to court what Daniel called open shame, open shame belongs to us.

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He's leaving no stone unturned with Israel. Verse nine, to the Lord, our

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God belong compassion and forgiveness for we have rebelled against him. I read that.

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I thought, how's that? So since God is compassionate and forgiving, we've rebelled sometimes.

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I actually remember a year when I was, I was a young, a fairly young Christian. I think, you know, I'd been a

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Christian maybe 10 years and I was pulling chain with a guy who was living with a girl and he claimed to be a

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Christian. And I, I, I was a lot more blunt in those days, which may not be a bad idea.

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Daniel's pretty blunt here, but I said, you can't call yourself a Christian if you're living with a girl, you need to, you need to make it right and either move out or marry her.

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He goes, Oh God will forgive me. And I physically took a step back from him. I remember this, this was 1980.

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And I, I was being really judgmental. I'll have to admit that. But I thought he doesn't really believe that.

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And I saw it in his eyes. He really believed that. So I don't know. I, I, I've read the commentators translation of this verse and exposition of this verse, but I think sometimes

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I'm not saying this is the only exposition of this verse, but I think sometimes we presume upon God's compassion and forgiveness.

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Be very careful. Be very careful. He is compassionate and forgiveness and forgiving, and he loves us, but don't presume upon that.

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Daniel praises Yahweh, almost as if he's reminding himself and his fellow Jews that God is still a good

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God. We're in captivity in Babylon. God is still a good God. We're struggling under the yoke of the

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Babylonians, but God is still a good God. It's good to remind ourselves of that. He is saying in so many words that God is compassionate, forgiving and that the

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Israelites need that compassion and forgiveness because they have rebelled. It is always good and healthy in one's prayer life to study, understand and repeat to ourselves the character of God.

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Daniel is not here just describing compassion and forgiveness to God and reciting one of the sins of the

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Israelites. He is saying that God has great compassion and forgiveness and that the Israelites need this because they have failed.

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They have rebelled. It is most certainly the same in our lives. I need God's great compassion.

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I am so far from perfect. This has been good for me to be reminded, to remind myself of that, not as a beating yourself down, but just an acknowledging that we need

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God's compassion. And then that compassion should bring us back up off of our knees to forge forward and spend time with him and go forward for him.

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Nor Daniel says in verse 10, have we obeyed the voice of the Lord our God to walk in his teachings, which he set before us through his servants, the prophets.

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Do we have his teachings set before us through his servants, the prophets? What do we call that scripture?

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Yeah, I know this is like a fourth grade Sunday school, but it's good to remind ourselves. It's right here.

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Not we don't, we don't worship this, but we worship the one who gave it to us. So more confession,

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Daniel spends so much time in confession in this prayer. It was a, it was a reminder to me. Here is the most common wickedness that men who claim the name of Yahweh or Jesus Christ commit.

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They ignore his word as either unimportant or not enough. I need something else.

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I need something more than his word. The word translating teachings here is a word for instructions.

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God had graciously provided Israel. If you will a manual for their blessing and help.

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Now I'm not talking about something. If you memorize and if you do these three things and print them on your refrigerator and Calibre font, you will prosper.

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That's not what I mean. What I mean is is that for those who will obey him, he will bring his blessings upon them.

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Sometimes that blessing is a difficulty, but it's a blessing. Nevertheless, he provided Israel with a manual and he provided them with prophets who kept bringing them back to that at the base of all human wickedness is the, is disobedience to the word of God in our lives.

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It is well to recognize this. If we have the great blessing of sitting under sound exposition of the word of God, as much as the

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Israelites could have by the hand of the servants, his prophets, his servants, the prophets, as this translation clearly says, we need to heed that exposition and let it drive us to our knees.

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That is done to Daniel here. And we have the blessing of sitting under good exposition of God's word in this body.

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And has it changed your life? Yeah. God's word changes, changes inevitable in the life of a

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Christian. And welcome God's word will change you. It will break you.

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It will put you back together. It's, it's unbelievable what God's word can do. Indeed.

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He says in verse 11, all Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, not obeying your voice.

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So the curse has been poured out on us. He acknowledges that along with the oath, which is written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, for we have sinned against him.

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And I'm going to look at that in a minute here, more corporate confession and an acknowledgement that Israel has consistently ignored and has ignored

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God and thus God being righteous and true to what he has said would have to keep his oath and judge

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Israel for their wickedness. He is a oath, an oath keeping God. And if his oath was that he would judge

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Israel for their wickedness, he kept that oath that should be in, in the life of a, of a Christian.

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That should again be a strengthening in our faith that he keeps every oath remarkably.

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Daniel never whines or argues here. I, I wish I could say that about me.

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I think wine and cheese with an H, both of them have an H in it. Yeah.

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Rather he acknowledges what his people have done as he acknowledges the proper response from God for their wickedness, which was to keep his oath.

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All Israel includes Daniel. So I'm not going to cast any stones at Daniel, but we know because of what scripture says that sometime in his life, he did things that he shouldn't have done, said things he shouldn't have said, went places he shouldn't have gone, but he was a man who allowed

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God's word to change his life. He allowed the prophets to the word of the prophets to change his life.

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And here he is 82 years old, praying this prayer, teaching us how to pray, but also bending his knee at the foot of the throne of God, asking for mercy.

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And he has the right to do that because he's a child of the father. So he's the one man where scripture records, no sin, but all, but scripture has said all of sin and fallen short of the glory of God.

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And we know that he was including himself here, an excellent pattern to follow. This verse again, references the covenant curse in Leviticus 26 and in Deuteronomy 28,

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God promised to expel Israel from the land. If they continued in disobedience, that's in 28 versus 63 through 67, it says this, it shall come about that as the

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Lord delighted over you to prosper you and multiply you. So the Lord will delight over you to make you perish and destroy you.

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And you will be torn from the land where you are, where you are entering to possess it. Moreover, the Lord will scatter you among all people from one end of the earth to the other end of the earth.

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And there you shall serve other gods, wood and stone, which you or your fathers have not known among those nations.

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You will find no rest and there will be no resting place for the soul of your feet. But the

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Lord will give you a trembling heart, failing of eyes and despair of soul. So your life shall hang in doubt before you and you will be in dread night and day.

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And you shall have no assurance of your life. In the morning, you shall say, would that it were evening. And at the evening, you should say, would that it were morning because of the dread of your heart, which you dread for the sight of your eyes, which you will see.

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So he said, if you do not follow me, you will be unsettled all of your lives.

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And indeed they were. It was, it took the prophets. It took this captivity in Babylon for this particular period in Israel's life existence,

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I guess, to bring them back, to bring them to their knees and back. So Daniel acknowledges Israel's culpability based on God's word.

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This is an excellent attitude to have when confessing sin in prayer. Any comments about any of this so far?

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Do you see how, how this not necessary must be the pattern, but could be a pattern for prayer.

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It gets better. Thus, especially when he starts asking for things and guess what, what did

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God do? We've read the end of the book, Daniel, go ahead. It's not like, you know,

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I don't know what's going to happen in the, in the series I'm watching, but I know what happens here. He brings them home in this particular part of their life as a nation.

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He brings them home promise of Jeremiah. He brings them home. Thus he has confirmed his words, which he had spoken against us and against our rulers who ruled us to bring on us great calamity for under the whole heaven, there has not been done anything like what was done to Jerusalem.

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So the promised and predicted consequences of disobedience came to pass.

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And here Dan Daniel acknowledges that again, without railing against it, he acknowledges it as a righteous act of God.

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It is a righteous act of God to bring the calamities. He promised for the reasons he promised he would bring that calamity.

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God is a God of he's perfect. He's perfect. Make no mistake disobedience to God will result in his discipline.

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It is also interesting to note that all, although Israel's leadership had violated God's commands, it was individual violations that resulted in the calamities that the fit befell made

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Israel as a nation. All were complicit. All were guilty. All were responsible for that fall, for that judgment, for that keeping of the curse, the oath

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God made. God would hold the leaders, all the leaders and all the people accountable, the rank and file citizens of Israel couldn't say, but God, the guys you put in charge did all this.

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Yeah, they did. What did you do about that? We often delight in acknowledging that God will do what he says regarding his promises to bless us.

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It is well to remember that he will also do what he promises in his word to correct sin to punish sin.

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And that's a good thing. Sin needs punishment. That's like a proverb.

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Verse 13. Yes. Yes. So did you get that?

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Brian said, God's mercy, God's patience, God's grace, and love is evidence in, in his chastening of his people.

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Do you want to be brought around as a child of God? You do now an unbeliever. No, leave me alone.

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My 401k is doing fine. And green Bay's winning. Actually green Bay isn't winning, but there are better things in life.

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I suppose in green Bay, not many Thomas where's

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Thomas. Okay.

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God's chastening is a good thing. It is a bringing back to him of his people. And I know that it says in Hebrews and I'm going to,

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I'm not going to, I'm only going to be able to paraphrase this, but that chastening doesn't feel good when it's happening. But after he had his rot, the change that it was designed to, to, to ring, to reek, to cause, how's that?

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What's the present brought. Okay. Okay. After he had has changed us and brought us back from the disobedience.

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Are we not grateful? Yeah, we are. So I kind of lost my place now.

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Verse 13, as it is written, Oh, what a, what a blessed phrase to use when you're talking about the word of God, as it is written in the law of Moses, all this calamity has come on us yet.

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We have not sought the favor of the Lord, of the Lord, our God by turning from our iniquity and giving attention to your truth.

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So the most proper thing to do in the face of this calamity would have been for Israel to turn to God and seek his favor.

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Previous to this, Israel had not done that. Daniel acknowledges that this is written in the law of Moses and thus must come to pass because God is always faithful to his word.

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Further, Israel would not give attention prior to this, to the truth of God's word.

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So it seems that common denominator in the downfall of men and nations is that the truth of God's word is ignored, belittled, or disobeyed.

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You can ignore it. You can mock it, or you can disobey it. All of that will have the same result.

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It will be the beginning of moral disorder. It will be the furthering of moral disorder. Our first inclination upon the suffering that God brings into our lives, the discipline of God should be to fall to our knees and seek him to thank him for the discipline, because it has caught our attention.

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It has turned us from what we were doing. Had Israel done this, things may have turned out differently for them.

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And scripture might be a little different. We would have a different section here in Daniel that they had turned sooner.

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God would have attended to that. But as it was, it was up to here where Daniel is on his knees, begging

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God to turn Israel. Daniel reminds his readers that that's what he's doing.

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He's reminding those who are going to read this, that not only did God promise the blessings and the curses in the covenant, but he had them written down so that they could be referred to from time to time when necessity arose.

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That's the written word is so, so important. What he, when he states that the

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Israelites had not given attention to God's truth, he meant that they had not acted in that truth. It's one thing to hear the truth.

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It's one thing to acknowledge the truth. It's a whole, just actually a word, a whole other whole nother thing.

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Well, it is this morning. It's a whole other thing to get up off your knees and walk in that truth to act in that truth.

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So don't just read heed and act upon it. That's what he's saying here. Daniel has said he's not giving attention.

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That attention includes action. Therefore, verse 14, the

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Lord has kept the calamity in store and brought it on us for the Lord. Our God is righteous with respect to all his deeds, which he has done, but we have not obeyed his voice.

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So Daniel acknowledges that God's righteous and correct. He is righteous and correct to bring the calamity that he held at bay.

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He kept the calamity in store. He held it at bay on Israel for the disobedience. So the words kept the calamity in store is an interesting construction coming from the idea of to watch over the calamity was carefully kept ready.

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Should it be necessary? Should it be necessary to impose upon the Israelites? God waited for them to repent and turn.

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But when the time came for the dispensing of the calamity, true to his word, true to his oath, true to his own character, he did so for the betterment of Israel.

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Did Israel believe that Daniel's prayers to, at least to me beginning to imply that they are going to believe that it is important to recognize that whatever

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God brings into our lives for discipline is for good. Romans 8 28 is still in the

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Bible. All all things. He brings all things to our good works, all things to our good.

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I think we're going to have to end pretty quick, but that might be a good thing. We'll end with all the negative stuff.

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And then we'll look next week at the supplication. You almost think

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I planned it that way. I didn't. And now he says, and we'll finish with this beginning of request.

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And now, Oh Lord, our God, who have brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and have made a name for yourself as it is this day, we have sinned.

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We have been wicked. How important is the name of God to you? How important is the name of God to me?

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So do I want blessing in my life so that I won't have to work so hard so that I'll feel better.

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I'll get more sleep. Or do I want blessing in my life? So God will be seen as righteous, that he really does keep his promises, that he really is a covenant keeping

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God who, when he states something in his word, he brings it to pass. This is what

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Daniel's looking for. Not, not mercy for mercy sake, but mercy for elevating the name of God before the nations as a great, mighty covenant, keeping all powerful sovereign.

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That's what Daniel's looking for. Even more corporate acknowledgement happens here that Israel though, treated with great kindness, especially when

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God brought them out of Egypt, they would not obey his voice. I, when we look back at the plagues and when they came out of Egypt and they wanted to go back because of onions, leeks, you know, onions, why do they want to go back to Egypt?

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Cause they had onions. Are we that petty? Yeah, we, we are that petty.

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Okay. It is a good thing to bless God for his goodness, even in the middle of a prayer of confession and contrition.

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So that's what Daniel does here. He's confessing, he's contrite. He's acknowledging sin, but he still spends time praising

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God. So the remind this reminder of the victory in Egypt, which resulted in the name of Yahweh being exalted.

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Remember the people in Jericho and the people around about we've, we've heard about this. God, we've heard of him.

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We've heard of you. That's what the people of Israel should have been about exalting that name.

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This resulted in the name of Yahweh in Egypt being exalted and feared throughout many nations. When people called to mind the things that happened in Egypt with the plagues, et cetera, it is a continuation of Daniel's element of praise throughout this whole prayer is always good to return to praise when we are seeking

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God. Daniel opens this verse with the words and now, and this is what we're going to finish with indicating that he's finally coming to his conclusion.

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Now, actually, it doesn't take very long to read through this. It seems like a long prayer because I've spent so much time on, on looking into it, but it's a fairly, as prayers go, at least in my life, when things are going wrong, it's a fairly short prayer, but it's full of implication, full of meaning.

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He says, and now coming to his conclusion, he has laid a solid basis for the petition supplication he's about to express.

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And he has appealed to God's power in bringing Israel out of Egypt. Do you think God is going to enjoy the supplication now?

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No, he is. I don't want to put words in Jehovah's mouth and Yahweh's mouth, but, but when his people come to him like this,

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I believe it is a delight to him as it talks about in the new Testament and in various places in the old

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Testament to answer his people. We need to be in prayer. We need to pray for this nation, not for this nation's sake, but for the name of God's sake, that this nation, if it can would begin to exalt

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God again, would begin to do things that praise the name of Yahweh. We need to do that in our own families, that our families would be an example of praise to Yahweh of exalting his strength of his character, his incredible sovereignty, all of the things about God and, and a study of the character qualities of God would be appropriate at this time.

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If you wanted to do that, it's those things we want to lift up when we pray, when we seek God, when we supplicate him, we ask him for his sake that he will be exalted.

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Let's pray. Father, even this morning, as we look in this section of Daniel, we pray with him that your name would be exalted, that it would be exalted in the sermon we're going to hear, that would be exalted in the interaction of your people this morning as they love one another, that it would be exalted as we go out into the world tomorrow, today and tomorrow and seek to show the world that you are a great and mighty and righteous

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God, worthy to be served, worthy to be honored, worthy to be exalted. It is a delight and a wonder to be one of your children.

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And I have no idea why you chose me, but I am so grateful. And I know that your body in this building, they are all the same.