DanM8 — Transcript

Often in the beginning of these presentations, we have a word of prayer, and I would like to do that again, so let us have a word of prayer.

Heavenly Father, we bow our heads because once again we recognize that we are not alone, even in this class, as we are doing different assignments, gaining different insights, we feel that the Holy Spirit is working in our hearts, and we pray that you would help us be able to cope with all that we have to accomplish in this class, and that you your power will be made even more manifest in our lives, in our ministries.

Amen.

Talking about prayer, and we are studying here prophecies in the book of Daniel, I'm wondering if you have ever tried to relate the two.

I like to ask or quiz my students very often and ask them, when is for the first time the term prophet mentioned in the Bible, and to the surprise of many, it's that reference in regard to Abraham.

And Abraham is the first person called prophet in the Bible or Navi in Hebrew, and it comes, this the use of that term prophet comes in the context of prayer, God tells a foreign king, I cannot say foreign, but the king of the foreign land in which Abraham lived, that's what I meant, he he comes to him and he says, well, you are having a problem, and this is how the problem can be resolved, and part of it will be that Abraham is a prophet, and he will pray for you and you will be healed, so prayer, prophecy, healing, an interesting combination, so when we go into the prophetic books of the Bible, we see for example, the prophet Amos receiving a vision of terror from God, and he prays for the people and say, oh Lord God, please relent, because Judah is small and they will be completely destroyed, and God listens to the prayer of the prophet, so the prophets were people of prayer.

And Daniel chapter 9 presents the prophet Daniel as a praying person, so as we read this chapter, let's remember that there is a lengthy prayer, consisting first of all of confessions to God, confessions of sins that Daniel confessed in behalf of himself and in behalf of his people, asking that God would somehow be merciful to his very rebellious people.

That's what Daniel puts nicely in words by and couching it in the phrases that are that can be found scattered all over the Bible, including the book of Psalms and and and other places, and in the second half of his prayer, Daniel, he petitions God, and he asks God for an intervention in the life of his people, that with the coming of Babylon to an end, that now God will remember the promises made to the patriarchs long ago, and that he would be merciful to his people again, and that he would allow them to realize the plans that God had had for the nation a long time ago, so immediately after Daniel's prayer, we have the divine answer that comes from Gabriel, and that answer turns into a special revelation that Daniel receives from Gabriel, which provides a further light on the visions found in the previous two chapters, chapter 7 and 8, and especially chapter 8.

But because prophecies sometimes can be a challenge to people, I like to look for ways to portray those prophetic revelations in the form of stories, and for this reason, I entitle this module, the story of two exiles, and you will read about it more in the textbook for this week, but I would like to tell you that I feel very excited about the story of two exiles, because that's very often how God speaks to us and reveals himself to us, so that when we focus on a specific problem in life, like Daniel was in Babylon, and there were challenges that he faced and that his people faced, and Daniel knew that the 70 years of exile came to an end, and that something was to happen now at that point in the history of the nation, it it was the revelation that Gabriel brought to Daniel, it was a wider revelation, so God wanted Daniel not to focus only on the exile in Babylon, but to look at the whole world as being in exile, being a prisoner to sin, that's what the world is.

And to lead the people out of that type of exile, someone much greater than King Cyrus, than an earthly king was needed, although Cyrus in biblical prophecy is called an anointed one by the Lord, the anointed one, the Messiah was needed to lead God's people out of an oppression of sin, so we have two exiles, shorter, a limited exile in the time of Daniel, and a much bigger one, we can also say that there are two returns, the return from Babylon to Palestine, and a much bigger return with the coming of God's appointed agent, the Messiah, who was to open wide the door to God's kingdom, so that the captives, those oppressed by sins, they can come to him and find rest, as Jesus promised in the gospels, one of the very important topics in Daniel 9 is God's willingness to to forgive sins of his people.

So verse 24 that becomes the key to the revelation brought by Gabriel, is here very important, because when the Messiah comes, the most important work for him to accomplish is to save his people from their sins, so definitely that is one of the very important messages found in this chapter, in this module.

Would like to say one more thing in regard to the contents of this module, let us keep in mind that Daniel chapter 9 was one of the most important texts to the early Christians, who went to it again and again to find comfort in the thought that Jesus of Nazareth was the promised Messiah, the savior of the world, who appeared as Josephus hinted or suggested in his in his quotation, when he said that Daniel not only prophesied about the future events, but also about the times when those events would come to pass, and now I I'm taking that idea and applying it to Daniel 9, what what is outstanding about Daniel 9 is that we do not find only the promise, but also some time ramifications in regard to the coming of the Messiah, so at the end of the 77s or the 70 weeks, the Christians saw how Jesus Christ came on God's appointed time to bring about God's kingdom down to earth and also work on the forgiveness of our sins.

So Daniel chapter 9, I'm asking you to read in one sitting, and then after that you will go as usual into the textbook to find more information about it and background information, then there is as usual a discussion forum with a number of questions, I'm asking you to do an original posting, please remember again the minimum number of words, and then you will react to what others have written with a threaded response, then please remember to prepare for the coming test, and to do it within the time that is allotted, and finally, I hope that you are now nearing at the end of the writing of the expository paper, because very often very soon that paper will be due, and I will be asking you to turn it in, so there are several things that need to be accomplished during this week, but I would like you to cheer up and to be ready to face up those challenges, because we can almost see the finish line from here, and I know that strengthened by God, with God's help, we will be able to accomplish that, so may the Lord bless you in what you do, in your ministry, and in the work in this class, so that you can accomplish success, that's my prayer and earnest desire.

Thank you.