Thoughts
for the prayer warrior
20. The prayer of Daniel; prophecy of the Seventy
Weeks. Part Three.
Daniel 9:8-14.
“O Lord, to us belongs shame of
face, to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, because we have sinned
against You.
9 To the Lord our God belong mercy
and forgiveness, though we have rebelled against Him.
10 We have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God, to walk in His laws, which
He set before us by His servants the prophets.
11 Yes, all Israel has transgressed
Your law, and has departed so as not to obey Your voice; therefore, the curse
and the oath written in the Law of Moses the servant of God have been
poured out on us, because we have sinned against Him.
12 And He has confirmed His words,
which He spoke against us and against our judges who judged us, by bringing
upon us a great disaster; for under the whole heaven such has never been
done as what has been done to Jerusalem.
13 “As it is written in the
Law of Moses, all this disaster has come upon us; yet we have not made our
prayer before the Lord our God, that we might turn from
our iniquities and understand Your truth.
14 Therefore the Lord has kept the disaster in mind
and brought it upon us; for the Lord our God is righteous
in all the works which He does, though we have not obeyed His voice.”
Up to this point have you noticed how Daniel contrasted God’s goodness
with Israel’s sin? He compared His righteousness with their “confusion of face” which was their
shame. They were scattered because of their trespass against God. They deserved
the punishment they had received. God was righteous in sending them into
captivity. God was right; they were wrong.
If you go to God and make excuses for your sin, if you say to Him, “Lord, you know that I am weak and I was in
this and that circumstance,” you are blaming your sin upon God. You are
saying that God made a mistake, He should have taken those things into
consideration. He has been too hard on you!
You and I are getting exactly what we deserve. And we need to go to God
in confession of our sin. In our day I hear folk implying that God may be wrong
in what He is doing. God is not wrong; we are the ones who are wrong.
Daniel’s attitude is the proper attitude that each of us should take as
we approach our God in prayer. God will not utterly forsake us, but He
certainly is not going to move on our behalf until you and I get to the place
where we can claim the mercy of God and stop making excuses for ourselves.
Daniel 9:15-18.
“And
now, O Lord our God, who brought Your people out of the land of Egypt with
a mighty hand, and made Yourself a name, as it is this
day—we have sinned, we have done wickedly!
16 “O Lord, according to all Your
righteousness, I pray, let Your anger and Your fury be turned away from Your
city Jerusalem, Your holy mountain; because for our sins, and
for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and Your people are a
reproach to all those around us.
17 Now therefore, our God, hear the prayer
of Your servant, and his supplications, and for the Lord’s
sake cause Your face to shine on Your sanctuary, which is
desolate.
18 O my God, incline Your ear and hear; open
Your eyes and see our desolations, and the city which is called by
Your name; for we do not present our supplications before You because of our
righteous deeds, but because of Your great mercies.”
This is Daniel’s petition and plea. He recalls how God
led Israel out of Egypt. God did it because of His righteousness, not because
of theirs. He found the explanation for their deliverance in Himself, not in
the people. “And God heard their
groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with
Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God had respect unto
them” Exodus 2:24–25.
The only thing that made an appeal to God from the people was their
groaning. In other words, God saw their misery, and He remembered His mercy. Now Daniel asks God to repeat Himself by delivering
them again because of His righteousness. God is righteous when He extends His
mercy to us, because Jesus Christ has fully paid all the penalty for our sin.
“To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness:
that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus”
Romans 3:26.
Now notice Daniel’s emotional plea:
Daniel 9:19.
“O
Lord, hear! O Lord, forgive! O Lord listen and act! Do not delay for Your own
sake, my God, for Your city and Your people are called by Your name.”
This is the climactic plea of Daniel. He asks God to hear and answer
because of who He is and what He has promised. No good thing rests upon Israel.
Daniel does not plead because he is Daniel. Rather, he associates himself with
his people and says, “We have sinned,” including
himself, you see. God’s name is at stake, and Daniel is deeply concerned about
the name of God and the glory of God. This is the basis for his plea.
Now we shall see that while Daniel was praying, an answer was on its
way.
End of
part three, part four will follow.
