Y'all have never studied so hard as I've been going through this book of Daniel, I'm not gonna lie. I'm gonna be excited when it's done, but I'm really enjoying going through, but I'm not I'm not lying. It's it's difficult because as I'll share stuff today, I know there'll be this objective, this objective, this objective this and then I can't address everything. And I'm just trying to listen to the Lord and share. So what I feel like the Lord says, you know, highlighting and trying to do it in a way where everyone can understand it, I don't get off into all the super crazy stuff that most people don't understand and so forth and so on. So last week, we saw the vision of the ram of the NGO we talked about Alexander the Great, all that interesting stuff. And now this week, we actually shift to once again now Daniel is going to be in prayer, but this isn't during the reign of Belshazzar. We saw the first year of Belshazzar, second year Belshazzar, now when Daniel gets into this prayer, this is actually in the reign of who Nago darious which is no longer a Babylon. So this is the we're gonna see this prayer and then he Gabriel comes to him and stuff is going to happen after Babylon has been disposed. So if we think back towards the golden statue, the head with the goat they had this statue that had the head of gold if I could talk, and we think at the lion that had the eagle's wings, and we talked about that being Babylon Well, that's passed now in the middle Persian Empire is coming in, okay. All right. In the first year, chapter one, I mean, chapter nine verse one, in the first year of darious, this son of a hacer es, a mead by birth, who was made over king over the Kaldi and kingdom which I just talked about, that this was darious the meat I put my drink down. In the first year of his reign, I Daniel understood from the books according to the word of the Lord, to the prophet Jeremiah, that the number of years for the desolation of Jerusalem would be 70. So I turned my attention to the Lord, excuse me, turn my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and petitions with fasting, sackcloth and ashes. Alright, I love Daniel, this is this in chapter seven are my favorite chapters of this book. I love getting to see into Daniel's life, his prayer life. We know that Daniel is a very prophetic, right how God has given him dreams, God has given him visions, God has given him what's going to happen with the Medes and the Persians and the Greeks and all this amazing stuff, right. And so I love to see the way that Daniel operates. And here what Daniel is trying to do, Babylon is gone. The next Empire has risen up. Daniel is trying to discern the times that he lives in. That's what he's trying to do, which I love that right. This prophetic guy's trying to say, Okay, let me figure out what's going on now that the Babylonians are done is going to be over soon. What's happening, and this is what I really love about Daniel, when Daniel is seeking to hear the heart of God. He does multiple things. He doesn't just go into his prayer closet, he doesn't just go to the scriptures. He does go to Jeremiah and by the way, they were contemporaries, okay, so Daniel would have no so Jeremiah and Daniel lived during the same time, Jeremiah was a little before, but I mean, they cross. And so Daniel goes, Okay, Jeremiah was speaking prophetically, we know Jeremiah was from the Lord, I'm going to start going and reading what Jeremiah wrote, to try to seek my understanding. That's huge, first of all, because if you think about the, like, prophetic movement that we have today, sometimes not always, it can be devoid of the scriptures in the story of God. Daniel doesn't do that. Daniel goes, Okay, I want to seek understanding. So I'm going to seek God through Jeremiah and seek to understand, but not only does he do that, it says that he turned to God, to seek Him by what prayer, and petitions with fasting with sackcloth and ashes. So another thing that we could do is swing to the side of we want to understand the prophetic in the prophetic scriptures, and we just read it to read and we get every commentary in the world, we put it all on our table, and hey, I do all that. But we don't seek it. prayerfully we don't seek it with fasting, sackcloth and ashes mean that Daniel was seeking to understand and humility. What was going on in his times? It's the combination of the two that I believe that I love to see in Daniel's life. It's the combination of seeking God and prayer and fasting and sackcloth, seeking Him with the scriptures seeking to understand God, what is going on and what was Jeremiah's what was he telling. There's a lot in Jeremiah, but basically he was prophesying this, Jeremiah was prophesying before, Daniel and all his, all the other folks got carried off to exile.
And Jeremiah was basically prophesying and saying, Listen, you should have seen when the Northern 10 tribes, they went off and they were exiled by a Syria. Do you all remember that? Okay. He said, Listen, you should have looked at your brother Israel and repented, you should have seen the way that they weren't obeying God, and God gave them over to discipline. And you should have turned and you should have repented Israel and repent Israel, but you won't repent is basically what Jeremiah is saying, right? Jeremiah says, you put your trust in the nations like Egypt, but you won't put your trust in God, why won't you repent and turn to God? Which are some probably really practical application we can make for our own lives in that do we trust in man and the nations are we putting our trust in God because God did not like that Israel constantly went and well, I'm gonna seek what's easier for me to trust in a Syria and make alliances or it's easier for me to trust in Egypt than it is for me to actually trust that God's going to get us out of this situation, right. But not only that, in Jeremiah, Jeremiah had something that he was really, really tough for him to be a prophet. Because as he's prophesied, Jeremiah is prophesizing, you're going to captivity. That's what he's saying. You're going to Babylon. Get comfortable when you go to Babylon, because you're gonna be there for a while. While he's prophesying this, a bunch of false prophets are saying, No, no, no, no, no, it's all good. You're gonna be cool. And everyone's listening to the false prophets pretty much. Did you guys know that? Jeremiah? I mean, think about what it was like, we all look back. We love Jeremiah. He's so cool, man. Maybe it was in the all of these prophets were prophesied. No, Babylon is good, good, good times are ahead for Israel were are good. And you have this, you know, one voice rising up and going, it's not really what God's saying. Who would we believe? Right? It's easy to go after the one that tickles our ears that we'd like to hear. Oh, wow, man, those prophets are saying the good stuff. I'm going with the good times, but the good times row, baby, come on.
I don't know.
But Jeremiah is actually speaking the Word of God, in the Word of God is you're going into discipline get comfortable? Could you imagine God saying that? Like, hey, listen, there's some discipline, I'm doing this for your good, ultimately, but get comfortable. And because it's going to be there for a while. It's in the midst of all that, that Daniel, reading through Jeremiah goes, Okay, Jeremiah prophesied that this is going to happen for seven years. And he took him literally. And so Daniel recognizes as he's reading, Jeremiah, oh, we're almost at the end of this thing. Like, this is 60 something years in like, Hey, I'm, Daniel's a pretty old guy at this point in time, okay. And what does that realization caused him to do? seek God for understanding, pray, fast, put on sackcloth and ashes. And I read this, I was like, you know, so many. I'm so guilty of this. That's a lot of hard work. Studying the scriptures and digging in and praying and fasting. And that's a lot of hard work. I don't got time for that. So any of us could say that, right? You think Daniel had time for it? Daniel was third in the kingdom. And actually he was risen above, like, remember that? Remember, darious actually said he was excelling. If we, if we have an excuse that says, well, we're too busy to really get into that and try to discern our times, if anyone had an excuse. Daniel had an excuse. I don't know if any of us are first, second, third, and in our city, much less over an empire. But in Daniel's leisure time, he was seeking the Lord. He was seeking God, he wanted to understand God. And what I love about this is this, to me shows me that Daniel had a love for people and God in His ways, right? That he that you're going to see that it this exhausts him, he has so much love. And he wants to see this turned around, and I just have that burden in my heart. And God, I just been praying this week, God, I want to have that heart for your people. I want to have your heart for you and for your people, to where Lord, I will lay down everything for them. And so what does he pray? Now we get to look into Daniel's prayer life. And you know, I actually taught this like six months ago. So if you remember it, some of you remember some of you don't probably no one does. So let's just go again. Alright. I'm just being honest. So with all this in the backdrop, it says I prayed to the Lord my God and confessed, all Lord, the great and asked, all inspiring God who keeps his gracious covenant with those who love Him and keep his commands. So first of all, he says, this, God, you are a gracious God. And this is about your covenant. Right? This is about the covenant that God made with people of Israel. Remember, we can go back to Mount Gerizim and mount a ball and God gave the law and they're shouting back the blessings and cursings and all these things are going to happen if you don't obey me and all in what will happen. When you do. It's like a good father telling you, Hey, don't go do this or this will happen. But he says listen, he keeps gracious covenant with who? Those who do what, love him and keep us commands. What did Jesus say? If you let me keep my
hands?
Sometimes we see this great man, the God of the Old Testament so different I don't think so. We get to see just exactly God's saying the same thing, Jesus saying the same thing. But what is what is Daniel say here? All right, your gracious God, you keep your covenants. But then he says in verse five, we have sinned, done wrong, acted wickedly, and rebelled and turned away from your commandments and ordinance. We have not listened to your servants, the prophets who spoke in your name to our kings, leaders, fathers, and all the people of the land. I've shared this before. But Daniel going into exile, if we really look at it. This isn't really Daniel's fault or an exile. It's his father's fault, his generations, his grandfather's generations, his grandfather's generation. And it's so easy, so easy for Daniel to point the finger at them. And we can apply this to a lot of things. Well, it was my daddy's generation or what mine I didn't do anything. Well, that was my granddad his generation wouldn't I wouldn't part of it is Daniel to ever do that in this whole thing he never does. Daniel chooses to identify with God's people and cry out we have sinned, we have sinned. We have sinned. I love that. God you are righteous God, you have covenant. You didn't break covenant. We broke covenant God. We haven't listened to your profits, right? They listen to the false prophets, so many of them in Jeremiah. They didn't listen to the true prophet Jeremiah, who was speaking words, we haven't been listening. We haven't we haven't given ears. And then verse 70, says, Lord, righteousness belongs you. You're in the right God, righteousness, Justice belongs to you. But this day, public shame belongs to us, the men of Judah, the residents of Jerusalem and all Israel, those who are near and those who are far in all countries where you have banished them because of their disloyalty. So they've been banished because of their disloyalty. All right, that had been shown towards you, Lord, public shame belongs to us, our kings, our leaders, our fathers, because we have sinned against you. There is public shame what their whole country a bunch of them got exiled, like publicly, all the nation sought. They're not following God, the nations realized either you're God's weak or you're not obedient to your God, public shame is on them. And he just cut to the chase. I love Daniel, he doesn't flirt around it. He doesn't say well, maybe this or maybe he's like, No, we've said it's our fault. It's no way your fault God. This is that that's the constantly the theme of this prayer. God, we broke covenant God, it's our faults. I love that. That's true repentance. That's repentance. When you turn when you're like, you know what, boom, I'm not gonna make excuses anymore. I'm not going to justify what we've done. We're going to turn and we're going to change and he's again doing on behalf of the people. Come verse nine compassion and forgiveness belong to the Lord our God, though we have rebelled against him and have not obeyed the Lord our God by following his instructions that he set before us through His service Prophet, though we have rebelled against him. God, you still remain compassionate. Oh, isn't that amazing? I love it. We have rebelled against you, God, but you're a God of forgiveness and your God of compassion, man, that's powerful. That is so powerful. All Israel, verse 11, has broken your law. So he includes himself again, all Israel, we've all done it, God, we've all broken your law. And we've turned away just like Justin said, with the, with the serpent, we've all been bitten, we've all done wrong. Refusing to obey you, the promise cursed written in the law of Moses. That's what I was saying blessings and cursing, shouting back and forth. They understood that they were cursings. The promise curse written about in the law of Moses, servant of God has been poured out on us because we've sinned against him. Again, it's our fault. We've said, he has carried out his words, and he has spoke against us and against our rulers. By bringing on us disaster that is so great that nothing like what has been done in Jerusalem has ever been done and all of heaven. Justice is written in the law of Moses, all this disaster came on us yet, we have not sought the favor of our Lord by turning from our iniquities and paying attention to your truth. So in the even in the midst of all these things, all these warnings, all this stuff that we've done, we still haven't turned back in that interesting. And it's easy to point our fingers at them and go, Hmm, but where do we do that in our lives, like where they've been places where God has been like, come on. Come on, john. Look, and I'm just like, completely continue to ignore what he's saying. Or the people of God more accurately continue to ignore, right? What God the direction the Lord is pointing us in. And we continue to just do the same things, the same old way, the same things the same old way, because we're just so used to the same things the same old way. But what is God calling what is God calling his church? What is he calling the people to do? Daniel saying, I recognize that God is calling us to turn away from these things, and to pursue a new path and he's repenting for it. Verse 14 says, so the Lord kept the disaster in mind and brought it on us. For Laura. God is righteous in all that he has done, but we have not obeyed him once again, back to obedience and God is righteous. God has done it because he's righteous. He's a righteous judge. Right? He judges injustice, he justice unrighteousness why so that righteousness can reign. That's the whole point.
Two more paragraphs here, now well, and then then we get into the 70 weeks, which is interesting. Okay, now Lord, our God who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a strong hand and made your name renowned as it is to this day, we have sand and we have acted wiggly so it goes back, reminding them of the Exodus that God called brought them out of saying, again, it was us that sin and acted wickedly Lord, in keeping with all your righteous acts again, God is always right, acting righteously, may your anger and wrath turn away. And now this will be important, I think for what we'll read here in the 70 weeks. Dale's praying that his wrath would turn away from your city, Jerusalem, from your holy mountain, for because our sins in our iniquities of our father's Jerusalem and your people have become an object of ridicule for those around us. Alright, last little section here. Therefore, Lord here our prayer and the petitions of your servant, make your face shine on the debt, your desolate sanctuary, the sanctuary, the temple is destroyed. Okay. Alright, so there's no sacrifice happening. So he's crying out asking God, to have your wrath turned away from Jerusalem. And also God lets your favorite shine on the sanctuary. For the Lord's sake, for your sake, God for Your glory, let it be restored. Listen closely, my God in here, open your ears and see the desolations that the city bears your name. So after the city is is desolate, we are not we for we are not presenting. I love this verse. This part's really awesome, y'all. For we are not presenting our petitions before you based on our own righteous acts, but based on your abundant compassion, I just That's powerful. Daniel saying, God, I'm not here praying to you trying to say we've done this right. We've done that right. Look at what we've done, God, we've done so these things, Lord, please, please fix the situation. Please turn your wrath away from Jerusalem, please restore the saints where he says, Listen, it's not about what we've done. It's all relying on your compassion God. like God, we cry out to you based on how compassionate you are, Lord, I just love that based on your abundant compassion God.
Man,
it's a sight man. It just Daniel just really just paints God is this God that keeps covenant that is compassionate, that's merciful. In the midst of exile. He's saying these things. In the midst of this, he's recognizing that it was their fault. It's not God's fault. God is compassionate. He cares for them. He wants to good, but they have sinned against God. In verse 19. He says, Lord here, Lord, forgive Lord, listen and act. My God for your sake, do not delay because of why because of your city, in the name, the people that bear your name. So he's praying about the city of Jerusalem, and the people of Israel. Now listen to what happens. Okay, this is cool. In verse 20, while I was speaking, praying, confessing my sin, I love that he specifically says my sin, my son and the son of the people. So he's not again just going Oh, Lord, please forgive those people their sin. Do we do that? in the church do we do that? Do we point our fingers do we do we see mentioned prophecy? Some we we know that recently, there's a lot of false prophecy that went out. Do we point our fingers ago all those guys are stupid? I don't know little, please forgive them, or they need they need to repent? Or do we say God, we need your true prophetic word to restore to your church God, Lord, how can we restore brothers? How can we restore sisters, we've sinned against you God, we as a corporate body of Christ, instead of us as individuals, if we could see ourselves as that we could pray like Daniel, praise God, restore us, help us to seek your face God, we can become broken before God is Daniel is broken. When was the last time we cried and cried out for the people of God and ask God and repentance slower to bring restoration to us? Yo. All right, as he was making, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel and presenting my petition before the Lord concerning the holy mountain of my God, concerning the holy mountain, the holy mountain Zion, this is where the temple is. While I was praying, Gabriel, here we go again. The man I had seen in the first vision reached me in my extreme weariness about the time of the evening offering or the evening sacrifice. Daniel, once again, as he's praying, and he's Can you imagine this happening? Oh, man, maybe because we don't do this. We don't see this. But he's praying, and he's just crying out it says that he's extremely weary. This is again, I don't believe that Daniel is just going to his prayer closet, gritting his teeth going, Oh, I guess I got to do this. Guess I need to cry out for the people in Israel. I believe that Daniel is so connected to God and the people of Israel, that his heart is aching. That when he goes and cries out for these things, it's because he is so passionate about the people of God is so passionate about God. And in so doing this passion has poured out, it's exhausted him. He's exhausted. He's God, forgive us, Lord, he's just straight. You ever have those moments where you just pray, or God has just come over you and, and you just begin to weep or something that you just exhausted yourself. Daniel is totally exhausted as he's exhausted himself. Gabriel shows up. Again, Gabriel showed up to him during the reign of Belshazzar, Gabriel is the one who shows up to marry. So Gabriel is all through this. In about the time of the evening sacrifice, even though sacrifice hasn't gone, it shows you Daniel's love for the temple for the sacrifice that he's keeping, still keeping time based on that. Alright, verse 22, he gave me this explanation, Daniel, I have come now to give you understanding. So that's why Gabriel has come to give Daniel understanding at the beginning of your petitions and answer went out, and I have come to give it for you are treasured by God or you are deeply loved by God isn't that a man, that verse is so powerful, that Daniel cry and our caring for God's people caring for God, Gabriel is going to remind them Dale just want you to know that your deeply treasured your deeply treasured. So consider the message and understand the vision. So he's going to give him understanding to all these things he's been praying about and seeing. Now we're going to go back to what I've said multiple times and the understanding and interpretations. Sometimes it's just really clear, sometimes it's not the 17th week of Daniel, the 70 weeks of Daniel, this is probably the most written about whatever part of Daniel, I have, I'm telling you, and within the different views that I've shared over the past, whatever weeks it is, there's so many discrepancies within those views I have there's no way that I can talk about every single part of every single view of what this looks like. let's not let's not they'll miss out on some beautiful things that God's telling us as we try to we should seek understanding is one thing that the Lord really emphasized to me, if we've sought understanding of Daniel, without prayer and fasting and sackcloth and ashes, why not?
You know, why have we not come to the come to Daniel and say, God, I'm gonna, I'm gonna spend time fasting and praying, I want to seek I want to make sure that I understand this, you know, if we've always just kind of followed what we've been taught our whole lives on Daniel are these things, I would challenge you to seek it with prayer and try to seek it objectively, right? I've had every view of Daniel possible I'll just be real with you. When I was a young child, I read those left behind books and stuff, and I thought it was all future. You know, I didn't know anything else. Then I went off to college. And in my early years, I thought it was all passed. And I've talked about that. Now I have an element dual fulfillment guy, but hey, who knows if I if I seek if someone shows me and I find the truth, I will switch again. I don't mean to be wishy washy. All I care about is truth. All I care about is truth. All right. 70 weeks are decreed. I could spend a week on every single verse here, I'm just gonna be real, but I'm gonna do as high level overview but at least touch on some stuff for us to all kind of grab some understanding, hopefully, and again, I hope I just make you hungry. 70 weeks are decreed about your people in your holy city, or 70 sevens. Okay? member with Jacob and Leah and Rachel and he fulfilled their week. What was that? I was seven years. Okay. So in Hebrew, this just says 70 sevens. Okay? So there have been 70 sevens. In the Lord, I just thank you for making that just as clear 70 sevens that? What are they decreed about though this is I think important about your people and about your holy city. So Daniel's crying out about Jerusalem, the temple, all these things. And now he's saying there's been 70 weeks to Crete, about the people of Israel, I believe is what he's saying, and your holy time and your holy city, Jerusalem. What are these decrees about now, the 70 weeks, let me say this first, the 70 sevens. It's either completely figurative, which I don't I don't believe, which it may just be like, a perfection number, or 70 times seven would be 490 years, 70 weeks of years. Some people could say 400. They've looked looked at differently. I would say most people say it's 490 years or that it's totally figurative. I don't like going figurative here because he's been very literal. The whole time, right? We've been studying literal history the whole time. We literally just talked about seven years of Babylonian exile. And then now to shift not to say that it couldn't be that. But to shift all of a sudden, I personally don't like that. I want to try to be as consistent as I can. So what are these 70 sevens decreed about? What are they supposed to do? Daniel? 490 years or 70 sevens? What is it supposed to do? This is really important. It's supposed to bring the rebellion to an end. It's to put a stop to sin, or seal up sin, like to stop is to end is actually better, but to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy Place. Let's try this one more time, to bring the rebellion to an end, to put a stop to sin, to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the Most Holy Place. Okay? There are two primary views about this. Okay? One is that this is talking about Jesus's death, resurrection, and the destruction of Jerusalem and 8070. And when that takes place, then this these were basically spiritually most of them fulfilled right that Jesus brought in everlasting righteousness as an option for those who would, who would choose to do that, that there is an atonement that was made for sin? Absolutely, there was an atonement that was made for sin. I won't argue with that. The rebellion to an end, it would stop Israel's rebellion, though Israel continue to rebel, after at 70. But there was that. So that's one view. The other view is that, well, there's there's several views, honestly. But the other view is that this is actually talking more about that end of times. Alright, so that's why it would say things like everlasting righteousness, seal up vision and prophecy, or it actually says seal of vision and the Prophet. Alright. So anyways, so there's two different views of that, I'll talk about that as we as we go on. Know this, know and understand this. So we'll just dive into this one doing this Holy Spirit, give us understanding, know and understand this from the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until an anointed one, the ruler will be seven weeks in 62 weeks. Alright, let's not drown in this show. But this is important, right? This is important for us to understand whether this is the destruction of Jerusalem or this has
in time things, especially as in time things, we should really seek to understand this what he's trying to say. So the first clue that we have here is that he says that there's going to be an issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem, which has to be super comforting to Daniel, right? Because Jerusalem is in ruins. Not good. no bueno. All right, the sanctuary is not going good. And so there is going to be an issue, a decree that goes forth. Now I could spend the next 30 minutes talking about every decree that every scholar or someone says could possibly be it. I think it's one of two this is me personally, I could Some people say it could be Cyrus Cyrus didn't Cyrus decreed the temple to be rebuilt, not the city of Jerusalem, but maybe I'm wrong on their artists, Xerxes made a decree in Ezra seven that is similar. I actually leaned towards the Nehemiah decree because there was a decree two, he actually says Nehemiah go build the city rebuild the city. However, it wasn't like an official royal decree, he sent out letters. So some people are like, I'm not sure. But kind of wherever you choose, you're kind of floating in the 440 to 450 something range of this decree going out? The reason I'm saying that is because we're going to if we count 490 years, we can start seeing some things. Okay. So, from the issuing of this decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until an anointed one. So this Anointed One, most people agree that this is Jesus, this is the Messiah. All right. There's some people that will say that it's not but for the most part, everyone agrees that this is talking about which is so powerful, right? Like, we're actually going to see in the book of Daniel, a prophecy about Messiah, not only prophecy about Messiah, about Messiah being cut off, which is even more incredible that he's going to talk about, okay, so he says, seven weeks and 62 weeks, all right, which is 69 weeks, if you add those two together, why does he separate the seven and the 62, I can give you several thoughts about it, it could have to do with the rebuilding of Jerusalem 49 years or something like that. Some people like to say that that's a Jubilee, you know, seven times, you know, 70 years or whatever, it's like, seven times seven, excuse me, is like the year of jubilee, I kind of tend to lean towards that has to do with the rebuilding of Jerusalem, and the construction of the city and the temple and different things like that. But then at the end of seven weeks, and 62 weeks, which again, when you add when you go seven, seven weeks, and then you go another 62, that's 483 years. At the end of all those times, it says the anointed one will be cut off. Okay? So this Anointed One is going to rise at the end of the 62 weeks, and the anointed one will be cut off. So here's the fun thing about the math. You can make this math work however you want it and I'm just going to be honest with you. I've seen so many scholars write up well this decree and that decree, and you can do the 360 prophetic years. To 365 years, but we do that you take away the leap years and you add this or whatever, like you can, I'm just gonna be honest, you can make it. But the cool thing is, is no matter what, it lands right around Jesus's time, which is so beautiful. Okay, so beautiful. All right, so beautiful that for the people that said, well, there's no, there's no place in the scripture that talks about your Messiah like dying. Yes, there has the Messiah will be cut off. And it's right here in Daniel very, very, very, very clear. And he will have nothing, right, this Anointed One is going to have nothing. And so I believe that with the calculations, though, I might be wrong that it has to do with Jesus, his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, the triumphal entry, where they said, Here comes the king. And then Jesus took a different turn and didn't do exactly what they expected him to do, and, and they went to crucifying him instead of writing him as King. Okay. So after those six, two, he will be cut off. Okay, then it gets even more interesting. So what I've said mostly everyone agrees on for the most part, like there's some little nuances and stuff, but yes, Messiah is going to come Yes, Messiah is going to be cut off all this stuff. Now, here's where it gets more interesting. The people of becoming ruler or prince will destroy the city and the sanctuary. Okay, so there's going to be a destruction of the city in the sanctuary, which means the city in the sanctuary have to be again rebuilt at this point, okay, when this happens, the Second Temple was rebuilt, right? This actually did get rebuilt, okay. But they say that it's the people of the coming ruler that would destroy the city, the sanctuary. Now we get a little bit nuanced. Some people say that this has to do with we're continuing to talk about Messiah, but there's nowhere where the people of Messiah destroy this destroy the city and destroy the sanctuary that's just not in history or anything, right? So I don't that he's talking about another person. Unless I'm, again, who knows, I might be wrong. I believe he's talking about obviously another person for that reason, there's just nowhere where followers of Jesus or the Jews or anyone destroy the sanctuary, they never would do that. Okay, so there will be a coming Prince who's going to destroy the sanctuary in the city,
then the end will come with a flood. And until the end, there'll be war desolations are decreed. So the ends going to come after this ruler destroys the city and destroys the sanctuary. In the meantime, get ready for wars and all kinds of stuff. Okay. Then it says he will make a firm covenant. This is really this is where people get the debate about who is he talking about? would have been a lot nicer if he would have said, the prints that we just talked about, or the Messiah or the anointed one. All right. Some people believe that he's talking about Jesus making a firm covenant with one for a week. I don't know if I have time to go into that. I believe that he flowing better with the passage just talking about this prince of the ruler to come, who will destroy the city will make a firm covenant. So he's gonna make a covenant with many for one week. So this is the seventh week of Daniel, this is where it gets everyone just like everyone doesn't disagree. Sometimes act like it's, but this is where the controversy comes in, is a seventh week of Daniel. So most people will agree the first 69 weeks. All right, most people will say this is about Jerusalem being rebuilt, the temple being rebuilt Messiah coming Messiah, dying and being cut off. But when it comes to the seventh week of Daniel, you have several schools of thought, but the predominant ones are the seventh week has to do with Jesus's death, Jesus's resurrection and the destruction of the temple. Alright, which again, if you if we say that then we say that that means an end of rebellion came, sin was stopped atoning for iniquity, bringing everlasting righteousness, vision and prophecy were stopped. And that's where I have some challenges because vision and prophecy weren't like john was written after first, second third, john was all written after it at 70. So that's hard for me to say this, that's why for me, I have this like, the cyclical thing that Justin was talking about. Yes, in a sense, I believe that it was that it was talking about Jerusalem and destruction of Jerusalem but everything doesn't fit neatly infer me. So to me personally, I believe this has to do with something that's going to happen in the future. And people may call me crazy for that. That's okay. You can call me crazy, john. It's not crazy. I used to blow my view off. Honestly, the view I have now used to go because the people in the scholars I read blew it off. And I never really looked at it seriously. I didn't pull it off because they did anyways. So either so this can this can have to do with He will make a covenant with many for a week. So some people say this is Jesus. Jesus makes a covenant with us the new covenant with many for one week, but in the middle of the week, he will put a stop to the sacrifice and offering and the abomination of desolation will be on the link of a temple meaning that it's Jesus who actually put To stop to the sacrifice and the offering, the challenge I have with that is everywhere in the book of Daniel that talks about an end to the sacrifice comes from not a good thing from an outside. That's it's not good. It's like, it's a good thing that God put a stop to the sacrifice has always looked viewed as negatively. Okay? So this either has to do with the Romans. And then we're have to say, Who was this person who made the covenant for a week? And in the middle of that week, about three and a half years in? What happened? And then what's going on after the three and a half years? Could it be Nero, some people say Nero, Nero was he did die before the destruction of Jerusalem? He died in 68. Right, then he died in 68. Was it Titus whenever the whenever Jerusalem was destroyed, but Titus, I don't know. He don't know about him making any kind of a covenant or whatever he and Titus actually didn't even want the, the he didn't want the temple to be destroyed, but ended up getting destroyed. He actually told him Stop, don't do it. That's what Josephus says, at least. Anyways, so who was it and what happens? Or you believe that there's, this has future implications, all right. And I'm and or of both and guy that I think that it has to do with that. But if this does have future implications, this means that someone is going to come this also means that I believe the temple will be rebuilt a third time. And this is going to happen again. So I think it will actually they're talking about it. And when that be world war three, if the temple gets rebuilt, that's gonna be some serious stuff. So that's why I'm looking forward to I'm not putting all like, I'm not going putting all my eggs into one basket and saying, you know, this, but I'm looking, I'm doing this interesting, because if it does, it's will say someone would come and make a covenant. It will look good at the beginning. Oh, wow. Okay, everything's looking good. But halfway through, it goes to let's just say that and if this is a few if it does, then we have a really good timeline for we know when Christ may return, because if this does happen, then we know hey, if the temple gets rebuilt, and then three and a half years in something goes, then we're looking at whatever and the abomination of desolation. If we believe that it was back in at 70
it's usually people will say that the destruction of Jerusalem was a destruction. I like to look back at Antioch his epiphany is and he was like in your face God, I didn't say this last week, I saved it for this week. You know, Antioch is like set up as a shrine to Zeus in the middle of the temple and he sacrificed a pig a pig in a Jewish temple. And I that he was just like, boom in your face. That's That's why another thing like I didn't see that around at 70, like in your face, now destroy, destroy the temple. But I'm looking for that person that's like in your face, and does something like that. Then on the way your temple until the decree destruction is poured out on the desolator? Who was that a lot, y'all. Lord, we ask for your understanding God, I pray even right now, Lord, that we would as a people, that we would study that we would father fast and pray that Lord in healthy dialogue, we would challenge one another and sharpen one another, Lord, to we want to understand, Lord, I believe everyone in this room, or most of us, I say that truly seek to understand your word and to know, Lord, understand the times and the seasons in which we're living, the times and the seasons. And if it's not us, Lord, that we would be willing to discern it and pass it down to our children. let them pass it down to that so we wouldn't be selfish about trying to understand the seasons. And, Lord, what you're accomplishing now and what you're going to accomplish in the future. Father, I also pray right now that we would cry out with hearts as Daniel Lord, that we would have our hearts knitted with you in with the people of God. In Lord I Lord I even right now I cry out for repentance father, and I asked Lord, that Lord that you, Lord would forgive us those who are following you, Lord, forgive us. There's so much I don't want to feel like a Debbie Downer God, Lord, I just pray that you would return us once again to you God, Lord, I pray that you would ask that you would forgive us for putting trust in man or for doing with the Israelites did Lord for putting trust in in idols, Lord, for having so many distractions in our life, God, that we wouldn't dream or it would be so hard for us to even think about studying and and trying to understand you and seek your word God I pray, Lord, that You would return us as a people of God before you with whole hearts. Lord, holy given over to you we saying Lord refine us. I pray that you would refine us God and I know that that's a that is easier said it's an easy song to sing if we just kind of sing it. But Lord, that You would bring your refiners fire, Lord, to your church, to your body to the body of Messiah, and that Lord that you would bring restoration. Lord, I pray that we wouldn't point fingers at our parents generation or their generation We wouldn't point fingers at one another and and blame people for the the challenges that we have in the body of Jesus of Messiah. But instead father that we would that we would come together in unity that we would repent and turn from our ways and that we would put you first. you first got in everything that we do. In Jesus name, amen
