1.a_Daniel_LLU — Transcript

Hi friend, I'm Zdravko Stefanovic and I teach the Bible in the brand new Adventist University of Health Sciences.

And I feel that it is a great privilege for me to teach the book of Daniel on the graduate level here at Loma Linda University.

I am a guest professor.

But I have many good friends who teach here and I'm grateful for this challenge. I would like to congratulate you for signing up for this class and I sincerely trust that this is going to be a rich experience for you that will affect your personal life, your walk with God and also that it will enrich your ministry.

So this is module one and I would like to basically give some orientation what we are studying this week.

And also what the assignments are for you to do during this week.

Basically, this week we will be dealing with the background information to the book of Daniel, the plan of the book and not actually go to the very first chapter yet.

So questions like, what was the world like in which Daniel lived, probably you have heard that there was a shift in empires from Assyria to Neo Babylon.

The world was changing in other words.

The nations, small nation where Daniel lived, was seriously affected by these changes.

What kind of impact did this make on Daniel, on his faith, walk with God?

We are living today in a world where there are many people and and and maybe you too are at least bilingual and bicultural, maybe trilingual and tricultural and so was Daniel.

He grew up in one place, spoke one language, only to go later on and spend the rest of his life in a foreign country that became his home.

And it's interesting when we read the Bible, then we find that Daniel was not the only one who had this type of experience.

Joseph, for example, for example, he left his home, his father's home and the land where he lived.

And he went to Egypt and basically acquired education there and God was able to use him in that place.

You're probably thinking of Moses too, who followed in Joseph's footsteps.

And Moses, although raised in in Pharaoh's place, he was a Hebrew.

And he had that dual background and he allowed God to use this as an asset in service of God.

The Hebrew rabbis or the Jewish rabbis, they liked to say that this was the humanly speaking the secret of Moses's success.

That he was on the one hand an Egyptian and on the other hand he was a Hebrew.

So he was both of these at the same time so that when he talked to the Egyptians, they could understand him and then when he related to the Hebrews, they would consider him as one of them.

Jesus too, he may have been capable of conversing in more than one language and what shall we say about the Apostle Paul, who was a Roman citizen.

And who spoke not only Aramaic, but he could carry on conversation in Hebrew, Greek and possibly Latin.

So we have a series of people in the Bible who were bilingual and bicultural.

And then we meet people in our world who basically have the same heritage.

And I'm sure that as we study lessons from the book of Daniel, we will be able to utilize this and show how these should not be a hindrance to our relationship with God and service to him, but it can be a great asset.

Also what's interesting is that Daniel was not alone in serving at a critical time of Israel's history or the history of the nation of Judah.

When exile was something that the nation was fast going into captivity in other words.

God used not only Daniel, but we have the prophet Jeremiah, who exercised a great influence on Daniel.

Especially in the way in which Jeremiah related to Babylon, Babylon was not only to be an enemy.

But Babylon would become a mission field, a place for witnessing for Daniel's God and to help Daniel in that.

Not only that Jeremiah worked in Jerusalem, Daniel was in the city of Babylon, but in the land of Babylonia in another city, there was the prophet Ezekiel.

So there were Daniel's colleagues, contemporaries, who received important messages for God's people and they related them to the exiles, to the captives at that critical point in the nation's history.

When we look at the plan of the book of Daniel, then we can get an idea what the message of the book is.

A total look at the plan of this book shows us that the book, half of the book approximately, has to do with the faith building stories.

That talk about the experiences of Daniel and his friends in captivity and these were placed in the book to strengthen the faith of the reader of the book.

And then the book has the second part where we have revelations from God, some are visions, others are auditions.

And the purpose of revelations was to tell that in the future, God is someone we can count on.

So from stories, from daily experiences in life, to the future that will be glorious because of God's power and because of God's capability of direct or steer the events of life.

So what was the purpose of Daniel's book, it was to strengthen the faith of the people who lived in Daniel's time and of the future readers of the book.

To tell them that there is a God who holds in his hand the history of this world and the life of every single human being.

And that God is capable of saving all those who call on him when they're in need.

Now this message was to be addressed to two different audiences, since the first part of the book of Daniel is written in the Aramaic language.

Which was the world language, chapters two to seven, this part was particularly appealing to the global or universal audience in Daniel's time.

And at the heart of that part of the book is the message of how we respond to God's intervention in our lives.

We may repent, come back to God and be richly blessed by him or we can go away from him, rebel against him and to go into our own destruction.

The second part of the book of Daniel written in the Hebrew language was written for a particular audience.

And the purpose of this part of the book was to show God's people that the promised Messiah will come and with him the forgiveness of sins.

And that is how God who leads the history of this world to meaningful end, also takes care of the history of his people and will in the end realize his promises, all of them.

Jesus, as he studied the his Bible, I believe that he read the book of Daniel.

And I personally have come to the conclusion that the book of Daniel was high on his priority list.

Because when we read speeches of Jesus, especially those that pertain to the time of the end, we find that Jesus was inspired by what is found in the book of Daniel.

In fact, Christ's favorite way of referring to himself, Son of Man, clearly comes from Daniel chapter seven.

And you will see that as you study the textbook and as we compare the what is found in the book of Daniel with that which is found in the Gospels.

So the messages of the book of Daniel and and and the purpose why it was written and so on are all related to the plan of the book and the background information.

So I invite you to begin with biblical reading that has to do with the background to Daniel's time.

Second Chronicles 34 to 36 will give us an idea of the time when Daniel was born, when he was growing up.

And what the situation was in in in Israel and then in Daniel as you turn to the book of Daniel.

I'm asking you also to read all 12 chapters and see basically how the book was put together and how some of these messages come through.

I then I ask you to study the textbook, the pages are specified in the module.

So please read the introductory chapter from the textbook and take good note of the important elements that are there as specified in the module.

Then each time I am going to give you some questions in the discussion forum and you're expected to submit a posting with the minimum number of words.

A longer posting in which you will react to the questions asked, then after reading the postings by your friends, you will respond to one of them.

And that is called threaded response and both of these need to be submitted by the specified deadline.

I also would like to tell you that you need to prepare for the test and take it this week.

The deadline is specified in the calendar, but I'm going to be somewhat more lenient this week because this is the first week.

So some of the deadlines I may be able to extend into the next week and this exception I can make only this week because we are right at the beginning of the class.

And I understand that there are a number of things to accomplish in the next few days.

So when you feel ready, please prepare and take test one, which is based on the material that we study this week.

And finally, I'm asking you because a part of this class will be writing of an expository paper.

I'm asking you to choose one passage, five, maximum 10 verses and passage maybe that is close to your heart.

That you have always wanted to study, hopefully not too difficult, but one that you can handle, that you send that reference to me.

Because later on you'll be taking like a quiz or answering my questions and writing a short proposal.

Based on which you will be working on a full expository paper which will be due toward the end of this class.

So I believe that we are ready for a very good course, I would like you to be of good courage.

If you have any difficulties, please let me know and the the director of this program is Dr Johnny Ramirez from Loma Linda.

We can ask him for help and if there are technical issues, we have good tech support.

So I'm sure that with God's grace, this experience can be a success.

So let me offer a prayer and I I would like to entrust you into God's hands.

And I know that you and I can go successfully together through this experience.

Father, we turn to you because we learned from the book of Daniel.

And other parts of the Bible and from our own experiences that you are a God for whom nothing is impossible.

So thank you for this privilege to study the book of Daniel together.

And although we may be separated by distances, through this message and through the influence of your Holy Spirit.

May our hearts be united in this task, help me to be able to to minister to my friends.

Who will gain precious knowledge and discoveries on their own and those that have been discovered by others in the book of Daniel.

And that those lessons may warm up their hearts and that they may make their mission and their service to you even more successful.

So please be with us, bless us, that is the prayer that we offer to you in the name of Christ.

Amen.

God bless you.