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Redeemer Community Church is located in the historic Avondale neighborhood of Birmingham, AL. Our church family exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
For more information on who we are, what we believe, or how to join us, please visit our website at rccbirmingham.org.
If you have a bible, I invite you to turn to Daniel chapter two. And it'd probably be a good idea for you guys, if do have a bible to start, make sure you bring them on Sundays because the narratives that we have in front of us in Daniel will be more than we can print in our worship guide. We have begun a ten week series on the book of Daniel, and a number of you asked me last week after we introduced it, said, be honest, Joel, is is the reason we are studying Daniel because you just had a grandbaby born named Daniel? And and I said, no, absolutely not. Although, I wouldn't mind if our next grandson is named first Corinthians or Habakkuk, but I I picked Daniel because we had just finished looking at first and second Peter, and Peter calls the church the elect exiles.
Joel Brooks:That we are exiles living in a pagan foreign land. And Daniel is a great example of one of those exiles in how we can not only keep our faith while living in Babylon, but how we can also seek the welfare of the city to which we have been exiled. Like last week, in order to frame the text in front of us, I wanna read one verse from the New Testament. First Corinthians one verse 20. Where is the one who is wise?
Joel Brooks:Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? Daniel chapter two verse one. In the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebuchadnezzar had dreams.
Joel Brooks:His spirit was troubled, and his sleep left him. Then the king commanded that the magicians, enchanters, the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans be summoned to tell the king his dreams. So they came in and stood before the king. And the king said to them, I had a dream, and my spirit is troubled to know the dream. Then the Chaldeans said to the king in Aramaic, O king, live forever.
Joel Brooks:Tell your servants the dream, and we will show the interpretation. The king answered and said to the Chaldeans, the word for me is firm. If you do not make known to me the dream and its interpretation, you shall be torn limb from limb, and your houses shall be laid in ruins. But if you show the dream and its interpretation, you shall receive from me gifts and rewards and great honor. Therefore, show me the dreams and its interpretation.
Joel Brooks:They answered a second time and said, let the king tell his servants the dream and we will show its interpretation. The king answered and said, I know a certainty that you were just trying to gain time because you see that the word from me is firm. If you do not make the dream known to me, there is but one sentence for you. You have agreed to speak lying and corrupt words before me till the times change. Therefore, tell me the dream, and I shall know that you can tell show me its interpretation.
Joel Brooks:The Chaldeans answered the king and said, there is not a man on earth who can meet the king's demand. For no great and powerful king has asked such a thing of any magician or enchanter or Chaldean. The thing that the king asked is difficult, and no one can show it to the king except the gods whose dwelling is not with flesh. Because of this, the king was very was angry and very furious and commanded that all the wise men of Babylon be destroyed. So the decree went out, and the wise men were about to be killed, and they sought Daniel and his companions to kill them.
Joel Brooks:Then Daniel replied with prudence and discretion to Arioch, the captain of the king's guard, who had gone out to kill the wise men of Babylon. He declared to Arioch, the king's captain. Why is the decree of the king so urgent? Then, Arian made the matter known to Daniel, and Daniel went in and requested the king to appoint him a time that he might show the interpretation to the king. Then Daniel went to his house and made the matter known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions, and told them to seek mercy from the god of heaven concerning this mystery, so that Daniel and his companions might not be destroyed with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
Joel Brooks:Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision of the night. Then Daniel blessed the god of heaven. Let's move down to verse 31. This is now Daniel standing before the king. You saw, o king, and behold, a great image.
Joel Brooks:This image, mighty and of exceeding brightness, stood before you, and its appearance was frightening. The head of this image was of fine gold, its chest and arms of silver, its middle and thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of clay. As you looked, a stone was cut out by no human hand, and it struck the image on its feet of iron and clay and broke them in pieces. Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold, all together were broken in pieces and became like chaff of the summer threshing floors. And the wind carried them away so that not a trace of them could be found.
Joel Brooks:But the stone that struck the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth. This is the word of the Lord. Praise to God. Pray with me. Father, thank you for the word that we have before us.
Joel Brooks:We believe it's your word, and we believe that now through your spirit, you are speaking your word to us. And so, my words are are death, but your words are life, and so we really need to hear from you because we want life. So I pray that my words would fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore. But Lord, may your words remain, and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus.
Joel Brooks:Amen. So I've I've had a couple of reoccurring dreams in my life. One dream that I I have is that I could jump really, really high. I love this dream. I've had many times, and I just go around jumping.
Joel Brooks:And and you just feel light, and and and I love it. Anytime I wake up, I try to go back into that dream because right now, you could barely slide a dollar bill under me when I shoot when I when I try to jump up. Another dream I have is that somebody is breaking into our home, probably because that's happened several times. And I also try to go back and enter into that dream because in my mind, I think that person should fear me. But the dream that I have had the most, and I have had this for thirty years now, is that I didn't graduate from college.
Joel Brooks:That the the specifics of this dream changed. Sometimes, in my dream, I'm still in school. I I I'm at the University of Georgia and graduation is approaching, and yet, I know I I oh my gosh, I have forgotten a class. And, it's usually some kind of math class and I can never find a class. I'm spending all this time searching the halls, everything, and I realized I just never took that class.
Joel Brooks:And that's not beyond the realm of possibility. And then other versions of this dream, it's me present now. And it dawns on me, I never really did graduate. No. I I There was a there was a class that I didn't take.
Joel Brooks:Now, I don't like that dream. I don't try to get back into that dream. My heart's always racing, my stomach's in a knot when I have that, and it obviously speaks to some deep anxiety that I have where I feel like an impostor. That there's something that I'm insufficient or there's something I've forgotten to do that was really really important, and that my whole life could come crumbling down in a moment? If you have any other interpretations to that dream, good ones, please tell me.
Joel Brooks:The king here, he has a dream, and it rocks him to his core. It's a reoccurring dream, and it's it's become this ever increasing source of anxiety in his life. He tosses and he turns all night, he wakes up in a cold sweat, terrified, even more exhausted than before he went to bed. The dream is now haunting him. I'm sure he dreads going to sleep each night.
Joel Brooks:And although he doesn't know exactly what the dream is about, he does get it at its at its at its basic core. I mean, he understands it at its core. Otherwise, it wouldn't have troubled him. If it was just some some random dream, some weird dream, said, doesn't bother him. But he he understands instinctively at its root level what this dream is about.
Joel Brooks:It's that his time on earth will come to an end. That no matter what he does, no matter how great he is, he could actually lose it all in the blink of an eye. He didn't know when that would happen, how that would happen, who might bring about that. Those were questions he would have to seek out later, but he knew enough already about this dream to give him deep anxiety. And just think about that.
Joel Brooks:He is the most powerful man on earth. He has just vanquished all of his enemies. He's the wealthiest man on earth, living in a palace in the largest city on earth. And yet, he can't even get a good night's sleep because he knows he can lose it all in a moment. And what he's really wrestling over is he's coming to grips with the fact he 's not in control of anything.
Joel Brooks:Any of you ever have thoughts like that? Any of you ever have a hard time sleeping? You know, there's just thoughts spinning around in your head of all the things you you need to do or the things that you need to try and and regain control over. Perhaps late at night, those thoughts come in, maybe maybe some really deep thoughts, thoughts where you ponder what is the meaning of life. Is there any purpose to to what I'm doing?
Joel Brooks:What's going to happen when I die? And and you have those thoughts and and they begin to become the source of anxiety and they scare you. Probably what you do, because I've done this many times, is you just try to pivot, and you try to think about things you think you can control. You begin thinking about, I wonder what my schedule is tomorrow. What else do I have to do tomorrow?
Joel Brooks:What color do I want to paint the bathroom? Do I want a bone white, ash white, you know, whatever whites there are? Like, you begin thinking of that. That's a problem you can handle. That's a problem you think you have control over.
Joel Brooks:I have found that a lot of times when there's all of these things that think are just spinning out to control my life, I just start cleaning the kitchen. I can bring order to this. But the truth is we'll never have control. Nebuchadnezzar, he realizes doesn't have control. If he doesn't have control, I'll never have control.
Joel Brooks:I mean, Nebuchadnezzar knows it, even though he's he's the most powerful man, even though like you look at his his Instagram page and it's it's the golden head, He knows he has feet of clay. After who knows how many sleepless nights, he can't take it anymore, he's got to do something about it and so he thinks, if I could just figure out exactly what the dream meant, then maybe I can control. So he brings in anyone and everyone who could possibly help. He gathers the think tank of Babylon. He gets the magicians, the enchanters, the sorcerers, the Chaldeans, who were people known for their wisdom.
Joel Brooks:It's the a team. This is the equivalent of of sending, you know, for the best doctors, the best counselors, psychiatrists, sleep specialists, in addition to the best scientists, mathematicians, economists, historians, religious professors. These guys were the experts on all of those fields. And so, collectively, they represented the best wisdom of Babylon. And as they gather around, Nebuchadnezzar, he tells them he's had this deeply disturbing dream and he needs them to tell them tell him the dream and what it means.
Joel Brooks:And they say, no problem. I mean, not I mean, just tell us us the dream, we'll tell you what it means. And, these guys are thinking, this is gonna be super easy, one of the easiest dollars I have ever earned because interpreting dreams was kind of a Babylonian wise man's specialty. It's what they did. It it would be like if we asked Jeff here, you know, to use a Danish philosopher in a sermon.
Joel Brooks:It's easy. Or asking my girls to quote from Twilight or Mean Girls. Like, she doesn't even go here. That that's that's the soundtrack, you know, in my household. They they could do it without thinking.
Joel Brooks:How many of wise men live for stuff like this? All they needed was Nebuchadnezzar, just tell us the dream. We'll give you the interpretation. But Nebuchadnezzar wouldn't. He he wanted them to tell him what he had dreamed about.
Joel Brooks:Now, this is either because he couldn't remember the entirety of the dream, perhaps he just saw flashes, could could get bits and pieces as all he could remember, or possibly it's because he didn't trust the wise wise men, more than likely, it's a combination of both. I think Nebuchadnezzar, he could remember bits and pieces and flashes of his dream, and he also knew that if he were to tell those images to the wise men, they would just tell him whatever he wanted to hear. They could come up with any old interpretation. They could come up with something that sounded reasonable. I mean, if you guys told me that you had a dream where you you lived on the moon or or you had a 100 cats or just something crazy like that, I could give you an interpretation.
Joel Brooks:So Nebuchadnezzar, he he knows the only way to be sure these guys actually have any real insight as to what's going on in here is if they tell me what I dreamed. This is remarkable. I mean, I I find this remarkable because it shows that Nebuchadnezzar, he didn't trust the very system that he was a part of. I mean, he had the same education as these guys. I mean, even more than that, he helped build the schools, he paid for their tuition, he was as an insider as you can get and he doesn't trust the system he helped build.
Joel Brooks:That's why he knows like, I mean, I I know who how you guys think, I know how you guys operate. I had that same education, you know it, and I know it's all a load of crap. It's not gonna actually tell me what's real. So, he gets that. He wants truth.
Joel Brooks:He needs real wisdom, and he doesn't trust the system around him him to give it to him. Does any part of that story resonate with you? Is it hard for you to find a news source that you can trust? Any of you ever, you know, just maybe a little suspicious that the news that maybe comes across your feeds is really nothing more than an algorithm taking the bits and pieces it could put together about your life and combining it with bits and pieces of some story and fusing these two things together to create a narrative that you want to hear. You ever wondered that?
Joel Brooks:I do. Astrology is actually a more reliable source than anything you will read on social media. You can't believe any image you see, you read, or you hear. I mean, just a couple of weeks ago, at our staff meeting, our communications director, he said, before we start, I thought we could listen to the announcement that Joel made this past Sunday, and I'm thinking, what announcement did I make? And so he he he plays this audio and it's me, and he says, hey, before we open up God's word together, I do have one very important announcement.
Joel Brooks:It's about our capital campaign. You guys have been so generous in the way you've given, and I just want you to know that there's been a change of plans, and actually, we're no longer gonna build a new building, I'm gonna use it myself because I could do whatever the heck I want, I'm the pastor of this church. And, it just goes on and on and on. And, every all the other staff are chuckling and I'm just thinking, my life is over. It wasn't funny to me at all.
Joel Brooks:It was my voice. I couldn't distinguish. How can you believe anything? Where do you go for truth? Remember when The US went and kidnapped the president from Venezuela?
Joel Brooks:After that happened, you know, social media is a buzz. I mean, everybody, they're just posting all this stuff, and so I I went to as many people as I could find that week, and I asked them one simple question. When's the last time you've thought about Venezuela? And, Several actually admitted, I had to look it up on a map, but it didn't stop them from being very opinionated and posting about it. I thought, you guys are pawns.
Joel Brooks:Somebody fed you what they wanted you to hear, to move you in a certain direction. Where do you go for truth? Really look for wisdom and for insight as to to what's actually happening in the world, not just out there in the world, what's actually happening in the deep recesses of your heart? Where do you go to get the answers to those questions? Does life have any meaning?
Joel Brooks:What does it mean to be a human? Is there life after death? I mean, Nebuchadnezzar, he he needed information and truth that he knew couldn't come from this world. He tells these wise men, if they don't have the ability to tell him the dream, then they don't have the ability to interpret it. And if they can't do that, well, they're of no use to him, and so he will execute them all.
Joel Brooks:Of course, they protested, they asked for more time, that just infuriated him to where he went ahead and he issued the kill order. So now, all the wise men are being gathered up, and they're about to be executed, and Daniel was one of these wise men. He's still a teenager at this point, just finished his schooling. He's probably 18, 19 years old. When the captain of the guard shows up at his door and says, I gotta take you away to be executed.
Joel Brooks:And, Daniel, he didn't panic, he didn't fly off the handle here. We read that actually responded with prudence discretion, and simply said, what's the rush in this? Slow down a moment. Explain to me what's happening. And after he hears what is happening, Daniel then goes to the palace and sets up a time with the king, where he says, I will give you the dream and the interpretation.
Joel Brooks:So Daniel has just bought himself a little bit of time. What would you do with that time? I mean, really, what would you do with it? What would you do if your boss suddenly told you, if you don't close this deal, you no longer have a job? What's your first impulse in that moment?
Joel Brooks:What's what's your first impulse if you all of sudden, you get a bill that you know you cannot pay, and this means you're likely either gonna lose your car or possibly lose your house. What do you do in that moment? Daniel's first response is, I gotta go get with my friends and pray. He immediately went to see Hananiah and Mishael and Azariah, where we read, they sought the Lord's mercy. Prayer was Daniel's first response.
Joel Brooks:And I'll be honest, there's a large part of me that just thinks that wasn't a very practical or very productive thing to do. I mean, you Daniel, you just bought yourself a little bit of time. Maybe you should have used his time to pack his bags, think of a way he could sneak out of this situation, go online, maybe try to get some answers, chat gbt, Google whatever it is, like, what are some good arguments I could give the king that maybe he'll believe? I mean, those things seem practical. Those are actionable items, real steps, but prayer but once again, Daniel operated as if God was the main character in the story.
Joel Brooks:Not Nebuchadnezzar, not the wise men, not the king's hatchet men, God's the main character. So of course, he would go to God. A number of years ago, I was on staff, I was doing college ministry, I was on staff at a church, and my boss called me up and said, hey, I'd like for us to get coffee. I said, okay. That was unusual already, but then he said, and you you might wanna bring one of your closest friends with you.
Joel Brooks:That's not a good sign for like what's about to come. And so I go and I meet him for coffee. I brought a friend with me, and there was the chairman of the elders, executive pastor, and then my boss. And I just thought, I am about to get fired. And actually, it wasn't that bad.
Joel Brooks:What my boss said was, hey, you know how we said we're gonna build a new student center and new offices and things like that for you and all this, but I I we gotta tell you the cost for those things is just it's too much. And so, you can raise $400,000 in less than three weeks, it's over. I mean, that was that was a punch in the gut, but I I went back. Some of you were there when I went back to the office after that. And you remember, like, what we did, for those of you who are there?
Joel Brooks:I mean, my first impulse is this, okay, what can we do? We could get every parent to buy their kids a seat, we could do, you know, like, I'm just I'm I'm spinning in all these things, but then, this this this voice in the back of my head kept saying, pray. Just pray. Pray. And so what we did is we just gathered together those who were back in office and just said, let's just pray, and we prayed and prayed.
Joel Brooks:Now, I remember walking across the parking lot, and I ran into somebody from the church who was older than me, much older, and said, hey, how are you doing? I said, I've had better days. He goes, do you need anything from me? I said, not unless you could give me $400,000. He goes, well, I can't do that, but I could give you 40 and I'll find the others who can.
Joel Brooks:Guys, did you know God actually answers prayer? Like, actually answers prayer. He's actually the main character in the story. Why do we forget that? Daniel prayed.
Joel Brooks:God revealed to him the mystery of the dream. Yet, what we find is right after that happened, Daniel didn't rush off to see the king. First, he took time and worshiped the Lord. And the second thing he did was he went to go and see the captain of the guard to make sure he hadn't killed the wise men. He wanted to protect the wise men.
Joel Brooks:I was actually reading about this this week, and John Calvin in his commentary had a huge problem with this. He's He did not like Daniel saving these people because he thought these evil charlatans deserved to die. But actually, I think in this moment, Daniel was pointing us forward to the much greater Daniel, the one who said to love your enemies, bless those who persecute you. And I believe that if Daniel had not done this, we would have we would have been robbed of one of the most beautiful stories around Christmas. Have you ever wondered when you read the Christmas story how it was that wise men from the East, why it is they traveled hundreds of miles to follow a star all the way to the little town of Bethlehem in order to worship Jesus?
Joel Brooks:I mean, how in the world did that happen? Did a pagan wise men living out in what was formerly known as Babylon, how how did they have any knowledge of scripture, messianic prophecies, let alone cared about them? This is just a guess, but it's a really good guess. Okay? It's a really good one.
Joel Brooks:I think those wise men, well, they were the long lasting fruit, the 600 year old fruit of a nineteen year old exile who showed love to his enemies. And he committed himself to trust the Lord in nearly impossible circumstances. And that when he became the chief wise man, which is what happens after this, he had such an influence that it would endure for six hundred years. He told those astrologers just what star to be looking for. After he made sure these wise men were safe, Daniel then went to the king, told him the dream, the interpretation.
Joel Brooks:Uh-oh. We didn't get to read that part in the text, but Daniel tells about the statue, and he says how each one of these layers, they represent a different kingdom replacing the previous layer. Nebuchadnezzar was the golden head, but his kingdom would come to an end by an inferior kingdom, actually. He'd be replaced by Persia, and then they would be replaced by two unnamed kingdoms, most likely Greece and then Rome. But none of these kingdoms in the end would stand because of the rock.
Joel Brooks:It would be that rock made without human hands, and it would come rolling down, and it would hit that statue at its feet of clay, and the whole statue would come down, and it would just turn to dust. And, Daniel says that rock coming down that gets bigger and bigger and bigger as it's falling down, kinda like a snowball getting larger and larger, that rock that's gonna hit, that's the kingdom of God. He says that God's going the God of heaven was going to someday come down into this world and would establish his kingdom and would replace all of the other kingdoms. And we know that this rock is Christ. Jesus, he actually taught his disciples in Matthew 13.
Joel Brooks:He's teaching them about the kingdom of God. And he says, guys, I know that, you know, it's just just a few of us here, but let me tell you about the kingdom. The kingdom is like a it's like a little mustard seed. And you know what? Over time, it's gonna grow and grow and grow.
Joel Brooks:It's gonna become the largest trees in the field here. Or it's it's or the my kingdom is like a little seed of leaven, like a little bit of leaven you put in. Over time, it's gonna work itself into the entire dough and fill it. Sure enough, that small small little band of people there, they eventually grew within a few centuries to overtake the Roman Empire itself, and it's still growing. There's only going to be one kingdom that lasts forever, and it's not The United States.
Joel Brooks:I mean, I love my country, but it's not my hope. You don't have to look far to see we have feet of clay. I wanna be part of a kingdom that's built on the solid rock of Christ, that's unshakable. I wanna build my life on the solid rock of Christ. As as we close our time together, I wanna just simply ask you guys this.
Joel Brooks:Where do you go to get answers for those deep questions that are festering inside, that are just churning around in your heart? Where do you turn for real wisdom? In first Corinthians one, Paul calls Jesus the wisdom of God. God reveals his wisdom to us through the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus said of himself, I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life.
Joel Brooks:I am the only path you should be walking on. I am the only truth with a capital t, and I am the life that death can't ever touch. So you don't have to keep on going on in life with feet of clay. If you have Christ, if you build your life on him, you're part of a kingdom that will never ever ever fade. Pray with me.
Joel Brooks:Lord Jesus, I ask that we would build our lives upon you. All other ground is sinking sinking sand. Sand. It's It's clay. Clay, and we all know it.
Joel Brooks:So we we go to the only person who lasts and will remain. Thank you, Jesus, that you call us to yourself. You call us from death to life. I pray we would heed that call, and we pray this in the sweet name of Jesus, our Lord and our savior. Amen.
Joel Brooks:We wanna take time to take communion together, which we actually remember a couple of things. One, we remember that Daniel, his very best, just simply pointed us to Christ who went in the ultimate exile. Daniel might have left Jerusalem to go to Babylon, but Jesus left heaven to come and live on earth. Daniel sought about the the welfare of the city of Babylon. Jesus is the one who has brought out the welfare of the entire world.
Joel Brooks:And he did it through his broken body and his blood. Paul would say, when the world looks at the crucifixion of Christ, they call it foolishness, madness. And he said that when we look at this, we see the power and wisdom of God. The power to save the only truth we can ever know in this world. Jesus, he on the night he was betrayed, gathered his disciples together and had a meal.
Joel Brooks:He took the bread and he broke it and he said, this is my body given to you. The same way he took the cup and he said, this wine is my blood poured out for the forgiveness of many. I love what the apostle Paul said later. He goes, as often as we eat of this bread and we drink of this cup, we proclaim the Lord's death until he comes again. The Lord will come again.
Joel Brooks:This is how we're gonna take communion this morning like we typically do. There'll be four stations up here. If you would come down these center aisles, we'll start with those in the balcony, work our way into the overflow rooms, and then work our way from the back forward. As you come forward, if you break off some bread and you'll hear the words, this is the body of Christ given to you, you would dip it in the wine, and then you will hear this is his blood shed for you. After you partake of that, you're welcome to stay up here and pray, or you can return to your seat using these outer aisles.
Joel Brooks:This table is for all baptized believers. It's for those who know that Jesus is the rock on which, if you do not build your life, you will perish. He is your only hope in life and death. If that's you, you're welcome to come. If if that's not you, but you want to come anyway, you're you're welcome to come and just ask as you come forward.
Joel Brooks:All you have to do is just just raise your hand, and the servers will just pray a blessing over you, and then you can return to your seat. But right now, let me ask that God bless our time and then if our servers would come. Lord Jesus, in this time, as we partake in communion, may we indeed commune with you. May we firmly place our hope once again on you. As we eat of this bread and drink of this wine, may our spirits feast on you, Jesus, the bread of life.
Joel Brooks:And we pray this in your name. Amen.