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Daniel 9
9:1 In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, by descent a Mede, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans—2 in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that, according to the word of the LORD to Jeremiah the prophet, must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years.
3 Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. 4 I prayed to the LORD my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, 5 we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules. 6 We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. 7 To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us open shame, as at this day, to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, in all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you. 8 To us, O LORD, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. 9 To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him 10 and have not obeyed the voice of the LORD our God by walking in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets. 11 All Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice. And the curse and oath that are written in the Law of Moses the servant of God have been poured out upon us, because we have sinned against him. 12 He has confirmed his words, which he spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us,1 by bringing upon us a great calamity. For under the whole heaven there has not been done anything like what has been done against Jerusalem. 13 As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us; yet we have not entreated the favor of the LORD our God, turning from our iniquities and gaining insight by your truth. 14 Therefore the LORD has kept ready the calamity and has brought it upon us, for the LORD our God is righteous in all the works that he has done, and we have not obeyed his voice. 15 And now, O Lord our God, who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and have made a name for yourself, as at this day, we have sinned, we have done wickedly.
16 “O Lord, according to all your righteous acts, let your anger and your wrath turn away from your city Jerusalem, your holy hill, because for our sins, and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a byword among all who are around us. 17 Now therefore, O our God, listen to the prayer of your servant and to his pleas for mercy, and for your own sake, O Lord,2 make your face to shine upon your sanctuary, which is desolate. 18 O my God, incline your ear and hear. Open your eyes and see our desolations, and the city that is called by your name. For we do not present our pleas before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy. 19 O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive. O Lord, pay attention and act. Delay not, for your own sake, O my God, because your city and your people are called by your name.”
20 While I was speaking and praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my plea before the LORD my God for the holy hill of my God, 21 while I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the first, came to me in swift flight at the time of the evening sacrifice. 22 He made me understand, speaking with me and saying, “O Daniel, I have now come out to give you insight and understanding. 23 At the beginning of your pleas for mercy a word went out, and I have come to tell it to you, for you are greatly loved. Therefore consider the word and understand the vision.
24 “Seventy weeks3 are decreed about your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and prophet, and to anoint a most holy place.4 25 Know therefore and understand that from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, a prince, there shall be seven weeks. Then for sixty-two weeks it shall be built again5 with squares and moat, but in a troubled time. 26 And after the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have nothing. And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its6 end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed. 27 And he shall make a strong covenant with many for one week,7 and for half of the week he shall put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out on the desolator.”
[1] 9:12
[2] 9:17
[3] 9:24
[4] 9:24
[5] 9:25
[6] 9:26
[7] 9:27
(ESV)
Redeemer exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
If you would open your Bibles to Daniel chapter 9. Daniel chapter 9. We'll read the whole chapter. In the 1st year of Darius, by the way, I'm gonna mispronounce some of these names. It happens.
Jeffrey Heine:I I I I'm a Moses without an Aaron. I I get tongue tied. So I I pronounce this next guy's name Ahasuerus. I don't know if that's right or not, but that's what I'm sticking with. Okay?
Jeffrey Heine:So in the 1st year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus, by descent a mead, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans in the 1st year of his reign. I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that according to the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet must pass before the end of desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years. Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and please for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to the Lord my God and made confession saying, oh, Lord, the great and awesome God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments. We have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules.
Jeffrey Heine:We have not listened to your servants, the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. To you, oh, Lord, belong belongs righteousness, but to us open shame. As at this day to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel who are near and those who are far away and in the lands to which you have driven them because of the treachery that they have committed against you. To us, oh lord, belongs open shame to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers because we have sinned against you. To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against Him and have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God by walking in His laws, which he set before us by his servants, the prophets.
Jeffrey Heine:All Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice. And the curse and oath that are written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, have been poured out upon us because we have sinned against him. He has confirmed his words, which he spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us by bringing upon us a great calamity. For under the whole heaven, there has not been done anything like that has been done against Jerusalem. As it is written in the law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us.
Jeffrey Heine:Yet we have not entreated the favor of the Lord our God, turning from our iniquities and gaining insight by your truth. Therefore, the Lord has kept ready the calamity and has brought it upon us. For the Lord, our God is righteous in all the works that he has done, and we have not obeyed his voice. And now, oh, Lord, our God, who who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand and have made a name for yourself as at this day, we have sinned. We have done wickedly.
Jeffrey Heine:Oh, Lord, according to your righteousness, righteous acts, let your anger and your wrath turn away from your city, Jerusalem, your holy hill. Because for our sins and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a byword among all who are around us. Now therefore, oh Lord God, listen to the prayer of your servant and to his pleas for mercy. And for your own sake, oh Lord, make your face to shine upon your sanctuary, which is desolate. Oh my God, incline your ear and hear.
Jeffrey Heine:Open your eyes and see our desolations in the city that is called by your name. For we do not present our please before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy. Oh, Lord hear. Oh, Lord, forgive. Oh, Lord, pay attention and act.
Jeffrey Heine:Delay not for your own sake, oh my God, because your city and your people are called by your name. While I was speaking and praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my plea before the Lord, my God, for the whole for the holy hill of my God. While I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the first, came to me in swift flight at the time of the evening sacrifice. He made me understand, speaking with me and saying, oh, Daniel, I have now come out to give you insight and understanding. At the beginning of your pleas for mercy, a word went out, and I have come to tell it to you, for you are greatly loved.
Jeffrey Heine:Therefore, consider the the word and understand the vision. 70 weeks are decreed about your people and your holy city to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to atone for inequity, to bring an everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and profit, and to anoint a most holy place. Know therefore and understand that from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, a prince, There shall be 7 weeks. Then for 62 weeks, it shall be built again with squares and a moat, but in a troubled time. And after the 62 weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have nothing.
Jeffrey Heine:And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed, and he shall make a strong covenant with many for 1 week, and for a half of the week he shall put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, and so the decreed end is poured out on the desolator. Pray with me.
Jeffrey Heine:Lord, what a joy it is that we get to come here and open up your word. We get to unpack it and we get to hear from you and we get to have our lives transformed through your word by your spirit, and I pray that that would happen in this place. Take every heart and mind captive now for your glory. May my words fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore. But, Lord, may your words remain, and may they change us.
Jeffrey Heine:We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. As I was preparing to wrap up the book of Daniel, I thought a lot about what Daniel went through in that 65 years or so up to this point as he was, in exile in Babylon, and we just talked about some of that. He got to see kings come, he got seeing kings go. He got to see waves of exiles come in.
Jeffrey Heine:He got to see the armies of Babylon unleashed against his homeland. He dealt with a whole lot of pain. And so I think it's fair to ask the question at this point, because we've raised in previous sermons. I I think we can ask the question, was it worth it? We we've been talking about Daniel being salt and light, Daniel acting as a preservative, but really as is coming towards the end of his life, what exactly did he preserve?
Jeffrey Heine:When you really look at how the city is going, what exactly did he preserve? A matter of fact, last week, we looked at Daniel being thrown into the lion's den, and it certainly seems from scripture that he was the only one. Where are the rest of the Israelites? Where are the rest of the people who refuse to bow or to refuse to pray to the king? You know, where where were the petitions being passed around?
Jeffrey Heine:Where were the protests out in the street, save Daniel? There's there's none of that. It seems like Daniel is completely alone in this. So what exactly did Daniel preserve? I think that's a fair question.
Jeffrey Heine:You know, he did, as we've just mentioned, he did hopefully preserve the life of a couple of kings. King Nebuchadnezzar, King Darius. I think he preserved some, the, the wise men and the enchanters. We see the fruit of that almost 6 100 years later when the wise men come to to worship a Jewish Messiah. I think you see the influence of Daniel with these men.
Jeffrey Heine:But I I think more than any of those things, really what we see Daniel was preserving was actually his own life. He was preserving his own life, and I want you to hear me on this. The outworking of believing the gospel is sharing the gospel. Alright? The outworking of believing the gospel is sharing the gospel.
Jeffrey Heine:If Daniel had refused to do this, and he had isolated himself, and refused to be a city on a hill, refused to be salt and light, Daniel himself would have been in danger of losing the gospel. Because sharing our faith actually anchors our faith in a way that no book, no church service can. So we simply have to share the good news in which we have been saved. It's good news. It's news.
Jeffrey Heine:It's meant to be told. And so if you're not sharing the gospel, I would say that you are in danger of losing that gospel, or at least you don't understand what the gospel is. Romans 10 says, but what does it say? The word is near you. It's in your mouth and in your heart.
Jeffrey Heine:That is the word of faith that we proclaim. Because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and you believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you'll be saved. For with the heart, one believes and is justified, and with the mouth, one confesses and is saved. What we believe is what we confess. If you're not confessing, it's likely you don't believe.
Jeffrey Heine:And I would think the more and more Daniel just profess these things, confess these things, more and more he is writing the gospel on his own heart. Not just preserving others, but preserving himself. And we've seen throughout this book of Daniel, his actions and his words and how they've acted as preservatives. And tonight, we're gonna look at how how he actually prays. How does this prayer act as a preservative for him and for his people?
Jeffrey Heine:So I want us to look some somewhat in detail at this prayer, but I'm gonna leave us time to pray at the end. The first thing I want us to look at is what drives this prayer. Go back to verse 2. Says in the 1st year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that according to the word of the lord to Jeremiah, the prophet, must pass before the end of desolations of Jerusalem, namely, 70 years. Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and please for mercy.
Jeffrey Heine:So the first thing you see here is Daniel. He was actually in the word. He was in scripture, and scripture led him to prayer. In particular, he's reading the book of Jeremiah. And you remember, Jeremiah is just a contemporary of Daniel at this point.
Jeffrey Heine:And yet, Daniel's hearing Jeremiah, and even at that time, he says, what Jeremiah says is the word of the Lord. It is scripture. He's taking that and he's receiving it. And and so Daniel is going through the scripture, and he as he's reading Daniel or Jeremiah's words, he comes across this this writing about 70 years. Jeremiah said, you'll be in exile for 70 years, and and and Daniel's there, he's, you know, he's doing the math, and he's like, I've been here at least 65 to maybe 68 years at this point.
Jeffrey Heine:He's gotta be thinking, that's that's just a couple years away. I I could actually be going home, that that the 70 year exile can be ending. I could be going back to Jerusalem. And and so, I'm sure his heart starts beating faster as he's reading those things, and so he begins to pray. But he doesn't just launch up and just start praying.
Jeffrey Heine:His prayers are shaped by scripture, because he knows in Leviticus, Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 30, that God says, well, it's only if you confess your sin, will the land be restored to you. So Daniel, I guess, I'm gonna pray, and I'm gonna confess. That's the first thing he does. This is just a prayer of confession. Exile was the punishment for their sins, and restoration would only come if they confessed and repented.
Jeffrey Heine:And so we hear, see here that scripture is what is shaping. It's what is driving Daniel to pray. The prayer is absolutely saturated with scripture. You're gonna find references in just this 2 minute prayer. You're gonna find that Daniel alludes to Leviticus 26, Deuteronomy 28, Exodus 34, Psalm 44, Jeremiah 25, and Jeremiah 29.
Jeffrey Heine:The guy knows his Bible, and it is just pouring out in prayer. And and when your your heart is just brimming with scripture, it's gonna overflow in prayer. That's what Jesus said. In John 15, he says, if you abide in me and my words, and you ask whatever you will. Pray, and it will be done.
Jeffrey Heine:And what he's saying is, if my words are dwelling in you, you're gonna burst and pray, and you're gonna pray the right things, because you're gonna pray what I want you to pray. And I'm gonna say, yes. Yes. And that's what we see Daniel doing here. This is how this is how prayer being shaped by scripture works.
Jeffrey Heine:I'll use the example of a married if if you're married. Okay? Many of you are married. Let's say you're going through tremendous difficulties in your marriage, and I know several of you in here are. How does scripture fuel and shape your prayer?
Jeffrey Heine:Well, you, you can think, well, Ephesians 5 says that I'm their husband. I'm to love my wife as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. I'm commanded to love this person. And then you could go to Matthew 22. I want you Jesus says, you know, love your neighbor as yourself.
Jeffrey Heine:So even if you're not feeling very connected with your wife, you know that, well, God still says, even if I don't feel that close to my wife. Even if I kind of relate to her right now like I would a acquaintance or a neighbor, I'm still supposed to love her. You could go to Matthew chapter 5, Matthew 6, in which Jesus says, love your enemies. Pray for those who persecute you. So even if you're in a relationship where you're feeling hostile to your wife, or hostile to your husband, you're supposed to love them, because you love your enemies.
Jeffrey Heine:So you love your spouse, you love your neighbor, you love your enemies. And you come to 1st Timothy 17, which says, God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and self control. And so you you're thinking these things are all brimming in you and you're like, even if my spouse is hard to love, even if I'm feeling like a stranger to her, even if I'm feeling hostile to him, You command me to love, and you give me a spirit of love, and you give me a spirit of self control, and you don't command me to do anything that you will not give me the power to do. And so in confidence, you begin praying, God, let me love my spouse. That's that's how scripture begins shaping prayer, and God saying, yes.
Jeffrey Heine:Yes. Because that's what He wants you to do. So scripture gives us focus to our prayers. It gives fuel to our prayers. I I love in the morning, I always get a cup of coffee.
Jeffrey Heine:I go outside the front porch, wrap myself up in a quilt, and, and pray, read. And I found over the years that if I just jump right into prayer, my mind wanders like crazy. I'm I'm thinking about the game last night, I'm thinking about what I have to do today, it's just it's just rambling prayer. But if I open up the word first, and I allow God through his word to give direction and focus, really, it becomes a spirit led prayer. So always just spend at least the first few minutes just in the word.
Jeffrey Heine:Don't think of the word and prayer as separate. Pray with an open Bible. Alright. It's what Daniel did. One of the things that opening up to Jeremiah and opening up to scripture does for us, In addition to fueling prayer, it also allows us to understand the age in which we live.
Jeffrey Heine:It allows us to make sense of where we are in history. Alright. Daniel's opening up the word, and he's he's trying to find how does this apply? Oh my goodness. I'm 2 years away from this.
Jeffrey Heine:And now he understands where he is in history, and now he can act accordingly. Well, I need to pray. I need to pray. I need to confess our sins so that this will happen. And so we could turn to scripture, and we could see where we are in history, in which the Messiah has come, the son of God has come.
Jeffrey Heine:He lived the perfect life we should have lived. He died to death we should have died. He rose again. He is now ascended. He is now seated at the right hand of the father.
Jeffrey Heine:All power and authority has been given to him, and then he says to the church, go make disciples. That's the age in which we live. If you wanna make sense or give meaning to your life, how do I fit in the grand plan of God? That's where you are. Jesus is risen.
Jeffrey Heine:Jesus has ascended. He has given his church a mission. Now, I already think, how do I pray towards that end? How do I fulfill that calling? Otherwise, you're just gonna be wasting time.
Jeffrey Heine:Alright. Let's look at the content of this prayer. This prayer, you're gonna see confession of sin, and to see appeal to an appeal to God's mercy. You're gonna see a passion for his glory. I wanna go through these quickly.
Jeffrey Heine:1st, you see a confession of sin. I actually see that throughout. But one of the things I hope you noticed is over and over again, Daniel says, we. We. Now a lot of commentators, you're you're reading through this and they're saying, no, Daniel probably prayed this.
Jeffrey Heine:This was the prayer he probably prayed through the window that everybody saw that got him in trouble, that got him thrown to the lion's den, and the timeline fits. If I'm Daniel, I wouldn't be using the we have sinned. I'd be like, everybody else here has sinned, but I am holding fast. For 65 years, I've been holding fast. But Daniel doesn't do that.
Jeffrey Heine:Over and over again, he says, we. And what he's doing is he is so identifying himself with the covenant people of God, that he is taking on their shame. He is taking on their sin, and he is confessing on their behalf. He's interceding for them. Really, and you get a picture of he's he's just pointing forward to Jesus.
Jeffrey Heine:He'll do that with us. You know, Jesus, he gets in line at the baptism. John's baptizing people, and Jesus gets in line. Why do you get in line? Why do you get baptized?
Jeffrey Heine:Even John's trying to say, no, don't do this. I need to be baptized by you, but Jesus gets in line with sinners. He comes and he lives among us, and he identifies with us. We see that for Daniel. So it points to Jesus, but it's also a model for us as a church.
Jeffrey Heine:God's called us to be His people, and to be so united in Him that when one of us sins, we all take on the shame. When one of us falls, we all confess that because we are so united. And And so we need to be praying things like, Lord, we have sinned. Our church has fallen short of her calling. We haven't loved you with all of our heart, soul, and strength.
Jeffrey Heine:We haven't been a city on a hill like you've called us to be a city on a hill. Lord, we have sinned. And so we need to pray for one another. We need to confess, passionately confess our heartlessness at times. I was thinking this, the earlier times in my life I care more about my backyard, or I care more about my lawn, than my neighbors who are perishing and going to hell.
Jeffrey Heine:If that doesn't need confessing, if that doesn't need us saying, God, please forgive us. We have dropped the ball on your calling on our lives. I don't know what needs confessing. And so we do that corporately, and then we see an appeal to God's mercy. Look at verse 9 Says, to the Lord, our God, belong mercy, belong forgiveness.
Jeffrey Heine:God, we realize that when it comes to our salvation, the only thing that we have contributed to it is our sin that needs forgiving. Alright? We we don't contribute any righteousness. We don't contribute any good works, Just the sin that we need to be judged for, but we appeal to your mercy, not our righteousness. And then finally, we see an appeal for God's glory.
Jeffrey Heine:Look at verse 19. Oh Lord, hear. Oh, lord, forgive. Oh, lord, pay attention and act. Do not delay for your own sake, oh my god, because your city and your people are called by your name.
Jeffrey Heine:We have all of our kids at one time or another has gone through Mount Brook, Baptist Mother's Day out. I know a number of you have kids there as well. And so you're aware that there's biters in those classrooms. You know, your your child's gonna come home at some point with just another child's teeth on them. It it happens.
Jeffrey Heine:Alright? And you're gonna be like, tell me who did this? You know, tell me. And and they will never tell you. I mean, you you can go there, you can call, and you're like, just can you tell me who did this?
Jeffrey Heine:But they're not gonna tell you the name of that child because they know you're immediately gonna think of their parents in a completely different light. You're gonna think of them as biters. I mean, you're gonna be like, you know, it's the same same way. And so they don't give that, and and we've gotten a little notice before. 1 of our children has been a biter.
Jeffrey Heine:They will let you know if your child is a biter. It's really awkward if you happen to come across somebody or saying, yes, somebody bit my child. And you're like, yeah. That's that's horrible. But they're not gonna tell you because the child bears the name of their father, and and and you're gonna project that on them.
Jeffrey Heine:Well, we bear the name of Christ. We are Christians. We are those who follow Christ. And so our actions reflect on him, and we bring shame to him. When when Christians have the same divorce rate as the rest of the world, that shames Christ.
Jeffrey Heine:When Christians care just as much about entertaining themselves like crazy, just like the rest of the world, then we shame Christ. When we neglect the poor like the rest of the world, we shame Christ, because we bear His name. And so Daniel is saying, for for your own sake, Lord, we're we're we're embarrassing you, we're shaming you, change us. We confess, we're sinning, change us. So we're different.
Jeffrey Heine:So he's pleading for God's own sake, for his own glory, Change our hearts. And this is how the Lord responds to Daniel's prayer. He responds by giving Daniel a really confusing vision about 70 weeks. Alright. These last four verses of scripture are the black hole of the Old Testament.
Jeffrey Heine:Okay? I'm just you know, you go to comment there's endless commentaries written on this, and you will just spiral down. These four verses actually almost kept me from becoming a pastor. And that's not an exaggeration, because during my, ordination examination, in which I was in a room with, just different professors, different, theologians, different pastors gathered all around. And for hours, I'm being grilled on the Bible.
Jeffrey Heine:Apparently, some of them were very passionate about these 4 verses. Very. Maybe they did a doctoral dissertation on it. I don't know. But they kept going over and over to these 70 weeks in Daniel.
Jeffrey Heine:And And Joel, what do you think about, you know, the 70 weeks? What's your distinction between the 62nd week and the 1st 7 weeks? How does that fit with your eschatology and your relationship between Israel and the church? Alright. And they're just they're asking me these over and over, and I lost it at my ordination exam to see if I should be a pastor.
Jeffrey Heine:I I I blew up. I'm confessing this. I became very sarcastic. I said, you know, it's an excellent question. After this has been going on for probably 45 minutes at this point, so that's a great question.
Jeffrey Heine:You know, when I was already doing ministry at this time. I said, when a girl who is anorexic, and she hates herself, and she's cutting her body, and she comes into my office, I look at her and say, you know, if you could just understand the sick 67th week of Daniel. It's like, if if you could just understand that, God is gonna bring such healing into your life. And when I have the addict come in, and they're addicted to porn, or they're addicted to drugs, I just say, you know, if you could just identify the distinction between the 7th 8th week, it's all be it'll all be good. And so I just kept going.
Jeffrey Heine:Alright. So, thankfully, the one of the people just said, I think we need a break. And I said, great. And so I just left. I called up Lauren at that time, I said, well, I'm not being ordained.
Jeffrey Heine:There's no way. There's no way. And she's like, you did what? Well, it gets a little worse. I I I come back after a 15 minute break to let everybody cool down or me cool down.
Jeffrey Heine:And one of my friends happened to be on the board, and he spoke up first. He goes, Joel, could you explain to us the gospel? And I said, thank you. First good question I've gotten in 3 hours. Yeah.
Jeffrey Heine:I know. Yet I'm here. You know? Yet I'm here. And actually the gospel has everything to do with this 70 weeks.
Jeffrey Heine:It really does. If you just look at the if you just look at the big picture here, don't try to, you know, figure out the different stages of times and the whatever of the apocalypse, you know, just look at the big picture here of what the 70 weeks is about. It's the gospel. Verse 24, God says He's gonna put it into sin. He's gonna atone for their iniquities.
Jeffrey Heine:He's gonna bring them to an everlasting righteousness. Alright? Verse 25, he says that he's gonna bring an anointed one. He's gonna bring a prince. Anointed one is the word Messiah.
Jeffrey Heine:Verse 26, this Messiah is gonna be cut off. This messiah is gonna be killed, or as Isaiah would say, cut off from the land of the living. Verse 27 says that he will establish a new strong covenant, and he's gonna put an end to any more need for sacrifices and offerings. And so if you don't get caught up in the the black hole here, what you're going to see is that God says, hey, you know what? Daniel, I am going to respond to And when he is cut off, there's gonna no longer be any more need for sacrifices.
Jeffrey Heine:And the result's gonna be a strong covenant, A new covenant for his people. It's the gospel. It's pointing us to Jesus. Because when we confess our sins, and we plead for mercy, that's that's God already, through His spirit, working in our hearts saying, Come on. Confess more.
Jeffrey Heine:Confess more. Yes. Now you're getting at it, and he writes that gospel in on our hearts. It's a model prayer for us as a church, which is scripture leads us to prayer. Scripture leads us to confession on our behalf.
Jeffrey Heine:Scripture leads us to understand where we are in the history of the church, to understand our calling, to plead for mercy, and to understand the gospel. I don't want us to take time as a church to do that. I know we we broke up in groups last week. We're gonna do it again.