Who Are You | Circumstances - Daniel 6 | October 27

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Music.

Hey family, it's good to be back with you today.

Let's get right into it this morning. This is Daniel chapter 6,

Daniel 6 · chapter mention

if you'd like to follow along in your Bibles.

If you don't have a physical Bible, there are some at the front of the end of each row.

And there's a familiarity that comes with thumbing through these pages that

we miss when we just scroll on our phones, when we can just select the books of the Bible in a menu.

There's a familiarity that comes as we turn the pages, as we realize that this

is a series of books that tell one unified story.

So feel free to grab one if you don't have one.

If you don't of a Bible collector, just leave this one behind so it finds its

way into people who need to take it with them.

All right, let's get stuck into it. Daniel chapter 6.

Daniel 6 · chapter mention

Darius the Mede decided to divide the kingdom into 120 provinces,

and he appointed a high officer to rule over each province.

King also chose Daniel and two others as administrators to supervise the high

officers and protect the king's interests.

Daniel soon proved himself more capable than all the other administrators and high officers.

Because of Daniel's great ability, the king made plans to place him over the entire empire.

Then the other administrators and high officers began searching for some fault

in the way Daniel was handling government affairs, but they couldn't find anything

to criticize or condemn.

He was faithful, always responsible, and completely trustworthy.

So they concluded, our only chance of finding grounds for accusing Daniel will

be in connection with the rules of his religion.

So this is the quintessential story of the book of Daniel. This is why we've saved it for today.

And if you know anything about Daniel, it's the lion's den. Sure,

there's a fiery furnace, but the lion's den is the quintessential story in the book of Daniel.

But there's so much more to this story than we can remember or imagine.

And as I've been meditating on these words and discerning what God would have

for us through this chapter, I find that there are sort of two main sticky points for me.

Not sticking points that are challenging, but sticky points that need to worm

their way into our brains and change the way that we live.

As we work our way section by section through these beautiful words,

I pray and I hope that these words, these truths will find a place in your thoughts.

So I pray, Lord, change us.

May the persons we were when we walked into this room not be the same people who leave.

May your living word transform us, our minds, our desires, and our behavior

so completely that what the Bible teaches about us being new creatures,

new creations is true in our living.

Open up new levels of growth and maturity in us.

May your resurrection power change our identities, who we are and to who you say that we are. Amen.

So the first sticky thought I want you to have is actually a reminder from some

Sundays past all the way from 1 Corinthians. and that is that you are called to be a saint.

Some of you may remember the series from 1 Corinthians.

Paul writes in chapter 1 verse 2, I am writing to God's church in Corinth,

to you who have been called by God to be his own holy people.

He made you holy by means of Christ Jesus, just as he did for all people everywhere

who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours.

So other translations will say, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus,

called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord.

As we've spent these series asking the question, who are you?

As we've been answering this question, knowing that if you know who God is,

you will know who you are. You will know what to do. You will know your purpose.

Even as we've spoken these truths to remind us of this identity,

that God has endowed into his beloved creation, that you are a child of God.

That you are a beautiful creation made in the image of the Almighty.

That you are a warrior who stands firm on the truth.

You are a vessel of love, grace, and strength filled with the Holy Spirit.

You are a citizen of heaven who was redeemed, chosen, and set apart for God's purpose.

You are a follower of Christ who walks in victory and refuses to bow to fear.

You are a pillar of truth who doesn't take any lies from the enemy.

You are a servant sent into the world to shine his light.

You are a messenger of hope sent to proclaim the good news and to live out the love of Jesus.

You are an ambassador bringing peace, justice, and mercy wherever you go.

You are a glorious expression of the king sent to make him known.

And even as we remind ourselves of these words, these truths,

this identity, there is a part of you that doesn't believe it.

There is a part of you that does not believe it, perhaps does not want to believe

it, but even more so, especially if you've grown up in the church,

have been programmed not to believe it.

And that seems strange to say, shouldn't this be the place? Shouldn't it be opposite?

Shouldn't this be the place where we stand firm in the truth of our identity

in Christ? You would think so.

And I hope so. And it's not that we are being lied to. It's not that we've been deluded.

It's not that there's this grand conspiracy. it's that we focus much too heavily

on the fact that we are sinners yes sinners saved by grace but sinners nonetheless

this is our intrusive thought.

This is our intrusive thought. And because this is what we experience in this

life and exile outside of Eden is the brokenness of humanity.

We acknowledge the truth of our sainthood, but we deny it to ourselves.

We are constantly reminded of our own failures, our own sins,

and they are ever before us.

So the mantra playing in our head is, I'm a sinner, I'm a sinner, I'm a sinner.

It's the pink elephant problem.

If you try not to think about something, you're going to think about it even more.

For example, let's do that exercise. Do it with me. Don't think about a pink elephant.

Whatever you do, don't think about a pink elephant. Don't picture a pink elephant

in your mind. Just don't do it.

Now, what are you thinking of? I'm willing to bet for quite a few of you,

you're thinking about a pink elephant.

Does this sound familiar that you often think about the things you're trying to avoid?

So when you tell yourself not to do something. Your brain just hears that as an instruction.

This means you spend a lot of time, a lot of time and energy focusing on what

you want to avoid, all the while making it more likely that you're going to

do the very thing you don't want to do.

You can't stop thinking about the pink elephant.

And Paul writes, for I do not understand my own actions, or I do not do what

I want, but I do the very thing that I hate.

Verse 18 says, For I know that nothing good dwells in me that is in my flesh.

For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.

For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.

I'll never be good enough. I'm a sinner. I can't do anything right.

I'm a sinner. We think, don't do this sin. Don't lie.

Don't cheat. Don't steal. Don't look at that.

Don't. and all the while we are

making it all the more likely that that's exactly what we're going to do.

And that becomes the sum of it all. I'm a sinner. Saved by grace or not,

that's all I'll ever be as a sinner.

So we read these passages in Daniel and even though what we know is that these

stories in the Old Testament are not presented, they're not presenting us with

heroes to be emulated and I should say, neither are they presenting us with

villains to compare ourselves with.

But our natural inclination is to see ourselves, to compare ourselves,

to desire to be Daniels, but to realize that we are so much more like Nebuchadnezzar

and Belshazzar and Darius.

We're trying to be these faithful Daniels. We hope to be Daniel, but we fall short.

Daniel seems unattainable. Daniel doesn't have a chink in his armor,

doesn't have an error in his integrity. Daniel doesn't have a flaw to uncover.

And there are sort of these three characters in this story. There's Daniel,

there's Darius, and then there are these other administrators and high officials.

I guess there's also the lions and then God, of course, as well.

But if we interpret these words, looking for someone to be like or to avoid,

we're often left wondering if we're gonna be the ones, are we gonna be the ones

who scheme and trick and defraud to get what we want?

Are we gonna be the high officials conspiring against Daniel?

Or are we going to remain faithful?

Who will we be? Who are you?

The other officers couldn't find anything to criticize or condemn Daniel.

He was faithful, always responsible, and completely trustworthy.

Who feels that this morning? Anybody want to raise their hand?

You always feel faithful, responsible, and trustworthy.

I remember, I'm reminded of those passages in the New Testament that talk about

how we should live our lives so that no one has...

A legitimate cause against us. Yeah? That we would be faithful,

responsible, completely trustworthy.

In public and private, Daniel had integrity. So what if instead of spending

all of our attention focusing on not sinning,

not touching, not tasting, not doing, what if we spent the majority of our thought

life reminding ourselves of the truth of our identity, which has not come from within us,

but has been bestowed upon us from God, our loving Father.

Why don't we listen to who he says that we are?

Daniel was faithful to God regardless of what he faced, because his integrity

and his reputation were not dependent upon his circumstances.

In the face of difficulty, he did what he always did, not something special. He remained faithful.

That's because circumstances don't dictate your integrity or reputation. Your identity does.

Your identity doesn't come from within yourself. You are saints.

The idea of the word saints is a group of people set apart for the Lord and His kingdom.

Christians are called to be saints, to increasingly allow their daily life to

more closely match their position in Christ.

Christians are called to be saints, to increasingly allow their daily life to

more closely match their position in Christ.

So instead of focusing on not sinning, what if you flipped it?

What if you flipped it and focused on who you are, your sainthood?

Yes, your sainthood is a gift that you can't earn, but it's yours and it's who

you are. You are a saint. Focus on that.

Focus and tell yourself to act in a manner that aligns with who you are.

Rather than telling yourself not to do something, tell yourself to act in a

manner that aligns with the reality of who you are. You are a saint.

The beginning of Romans 8 has beautiful words of encouragement for us all.

There is therefore now no condemnation for us who are in Christ Jesus.

For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.

For God has done what the law weakened by the flesh could not do,

by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin,

He condemned sin in the flesh in order that the righteous requirements of the

law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh,

but according to the Spirit.

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the

flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.

For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.

Athanasius, who was an early church figure in church history,

some people call him Saint Athanasius, so there's that reminder of our sainthood as well.

He reflected on the victory of Christ over death.

He reflected on the significance of the resurrection and the power of the cross.

And he talked about how Jesus, how Jesus' Jesus' resurrection is a demonstration

and sign of his victory over death, which is made all the clearer by the observable

effects held in believers' lives.

Jesus is not dead. Jesus is alive.

And only someone who is alive can continue to influence and change the lives of others.

Christ is active, continually persuading people from all nations to embrace him in faith.

This ongoing transformation of human lives where sinners abandon sin and idols

are overthrown serves as further evidence that Christ is not dead,

but alive and working in the world.

Athanasius asks this, how, if Jesus is no longer active, no longer alive,

does he stay from their activity, those who are active and alive,

so that the adulterer no longer commits adultery, and the murderer murders no more,

nor is the inflictor of wrong any longer grasping, and the profane is henceforth religious?

Or how, if he be not risen, but is dead, does he drive away and pursue and cast

down those false gods said by the unbelievers to be alive and the demons they worship.

For where Christ is named in his faith, there all idolatry is deposed and all

imposter of evil spirits is exposed and any spirit is unable to endure even the name,

nay even on barely hearing it, it flies and disappears.

Our transformed lives are demonstrations of the power of the resurrection.

Moving across time and space, God is going out and moving and changing our lives.

And in our encountering Christ and his word, that leads us to real changes in our lives.

And it is such a profound transformation.

This is who you are. You are a saint.

Remember that. Meditate on that. Remind yourself of that truth.

Let that be your intrusive thought. Let's keep reading.

So the administrators and high officers went to the king and said, Long live King Darius.

We are all in agreement, we administrators, officials, high officers,

advisors, and governors, that the king should make a law that will be strictly enforced.

Give orders that for the next thirty days any person who prays to anyone divine

or human, except to you, your majesty, will be thrown into the den of lions.

And now, your majesty, issue and sign this law so it cannot be changed.

An official law of the Medes and Persians that cannot be revoked.

So King Darius signed the law.

Now this may seem like an odd detail. Why couldn't the king change a law that he created?

But we see this dynamic in the book of Esther. I don't know exactly how the

King Esther Marys relates to Darius in the book of Daniel.

Experts, theologians, have not made that connection quite clear enough.

It's debated, but it is the same empire.

It's the same empire that Esther finds herself in just a few years down the road.

Esther shows on multiple occasions how the king cannot overturn a law he has passed.

And at the end of the book, this plays a major role as the king can't repeal

his law to kill the Jews, but he can pass a new law that says the Jews are allowed

to defend themselves, so the Jewish people are preserved in the Persian empire.

Let's keep reading. Verse 10.

But when Daniel learned that the law had been signed, he went home and knelt

down as usual in his upstairs room, with his windows open toward Jerusalem.

He prayed three times a day, just as he had always done, giving thanks to his God.

Then the officials went together to Daniel's house and found him praying and

asking for God's help. So they went straight to the king and reminded him about this law.

Did you not sign a law that for the next 30 days, any person who prays to anyone

divine or human except to you, your majesty, will be thrown into the den of lions?

Yes, the king replied. That decision stands. It is an official law of the Medes

and Persians that cannot be revoked.

Then they told the king that the man Daniel, one of the captives from Judah,

is ignoring you and your law. He still prays to his God three times a day.

There are a lot of lessons to be learned from Daniel in this story,

certainly with regard to identity.

It's not merely what you do in public that determines who you are,

but it must also be confirmed in your private life that your identity doesn't

mean a thing if it doesn't remain true when no one else is looking.

As William Shakespeare said, all the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players.

So is your identity the character you play, who you show yourself to be to the world at large?

Or is it the truth of who you are when no one is looking, when you are no longer playing the part.

As we established earlier, there's a sense where neither of these is true because

your identity does not come from within yourself. It comes from God.

There's also the awareness that Daniel prayed in front of an open window.

He wasn't hid in some closet. He was well aware of the visibility to the world around him.

So does this really speak about our private life even?

Does it not then say that we should live out our faith to be seen?

That we should be visible? Daniel wasn't flaunting it. He wasn't on the corner,

he was in his room, but he was not hid in a closet.

So surely this is a lesson for us to learn as well, a lesson for us in this time, in this place.

There's also the observation that Daniel was simply doing what he always did.

He had built a habit of prayer these some 60 or 80 years that would not be abated under threat of death.

His allegiance was to a king of another kingdom, a different kingdom, all together.

So there too is a lesson for healthy habits that build spiritual resilience in us.

And that may be enough to fill several more weeks in Daniel 6 alone.

At least there will be more to talk about should we ever return to Daniel in the future.

But for our second sticky thought, I am much more concerned with what Daniel should be praying for.

What were the contents of his prayers? What are the things that we should pray for each other?

What are the things that we should be praying for one another?

And I know that we can't know exactly what Daniel prayed for preceding the lion's

den. It wasn't given to us to be known.

We do have some of Daniel's prayers, which we will arrive at in not so many

weeks, but that's a future concern.

We do have a question that can guide the remainder of our time and become a

sticky thought in itself.

Who are you grabbing onto for dear life?

Who are you grabbing onto for dear life? For many of us, we think of prayer as crisis management.

We think of turning to prayer in the midst of crisis. And we could continue

that false belief should we not pay attention in this story.

But Daniel was not merely turning to prayer in his time of need.

Daniel continued in what he was already doing.

The circumstances of the lion's den were not dictating Daniel's integrity.

His identity was already driving his actions from long before Darius.

And when a person's doing great, they need prayer just as much as when their

life is threatened, to pour more fuel on the fire and fan into flame the work of the Spirit more.

Daniel clung to God. Daniel abided in the Lord.

I believe we can pray for the same thing, not to be rescued from our circumstances,

although I would not fault Daniel for such a prayer, not for a way out per se,

but for a new way of life to take us captive.

We can pray this for one another. We can pray for a new way of life,

regardless of the circumstances, to be a community living under the reign of

a different king, for new life.

Paul teaches us to pray this over one another as well in the book of Ephesians.

He writes in chapter 1, For this reason, because I have heard of your faith

in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you,

remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ,

the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and a revelation in the knowledge of him,

having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope

to which he is. he has called you?

What are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints?

And what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe?

According to the working of his great might, that he worked in Christ when he

raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places,

far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name

that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come.

And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to

the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

You know, it's interesting. When we say we'll pray for someone,

when I say I'm going to pray for you, we usually mean I'm going to pray for your circumstances.

I'm going to pray for a new job and I'm coming move. I'm going to pray for the

things going on in your life right now and maybe those things coming up.

But when Paul prays for the saints, he's rarely praying for people's circumstances.

Mostly what he's praying for is God's given wisdom so that in whatever circumstances

they may draw near to Jesus.

Paul is not praying for people's circumstances, but he is praying for God's

wisdom in circumstances, in whatever circumstances that people may draw near to Jesus.

And that's what we should be praying for one another as well,

not for circumstances and for them to change, but for a new quality of experience

in our life so that we might understand God's personal presence in every circumstance,

for new life.

And Paul prayed here that the Ephesians would know three things.

And we can pray these three things for one another as well. The hope of their calling.

Paul wants them to understand the hope that comes from being called by God,

which includes the future promises, internal life in Christ.

He prays for the riches of God's glorious inheritance.

He prays that they would grasp the value and splendor of the inheritance they

share with all the saints, which reflects God's abundant blessing and promises

for his people in the immense grace of God's power.

Paul prays that they would know the vast and incredible power that God exercises

on behalf of his believers, on the behalf of believers, the same power that

raised Christ from the dead and exalted him above all other authorities.

So Paul prays for hope, riches, and power.

Hope that whatever the present state of the world may be, whatever circumstances

you may find yourself in, that your hope would come from and be found in Christ.

That the meaning of your life is not determined by what is happening to you or around you.

That the meaning of your life is not determined by what is happening to you

or around you, but that the meaning of your life would be found in Jesus,

the hope he has called you to.

That the eyes of your heart would be opened to the riches you are walking into.

That you'd wake up to the fact that as God's family, you are uniquely and wholly

different from the world around you.

Be the witness, to be witnesses to his grace and glory. This is your privilege.

This is your calling. This is your election as saints.

Now, where we're going in the book of Daniel is about to get real weird,

but it will continually show us two things. It'll show us that the times are evil.

And as the saying goes, it only gets worse before it gets better.

But it will also show us that the Son of Man will return.

Jesus will come again and the saints will inherit the kingdom.

So wake up to the riches of being a child of God and open your eyes to his power

proven in the resurrection and demonstrate it as his word goes out and changes

lives, as it changes your life.

This is not the power to do whatever you want.

It's not a power to be free and independent as the world sees it.

There was a Caesar, a king, someone I can't recall quite who,

but when he became king, he said, now I can do whatever I want to do,

whenever I want, to whomever I want to do it.

That's not the power to be realized. That's not the power we're after.

This is the power of the one who lived, overcoming the desire and pull of sin

and resurrected Jesus from the death, from death to new life.

This is the power that gives up status and influence for the sin of others to be thrust upon him.

Power to take spiritually dead sinners and turn them into life-giving spirits.

Resurrection power. It's the power that is turning death moments in your life into something new.

It's restoring patterns of death in your life and injecting them with new life.

It's the power that is overcoming what Paul will go on to talk about in the

book of Ephesians, the power to overcome the very real principalities and powers

of this world who have real influence in human behavior and history.

These powers that are not visible to us, but have real influence.

That is the power of our prayer for one another.

It is a subversive prayer that topples empires, seen and unseen.

One of the most influential rabbis of the 20th century, Abraham Joshua Heschel,

said that prayer is meaningless unless it is subversive, unless it seeks to

overthrow and to ruin the pyramids of callousness, hatred,

opportunism, falsehood.

The liturgical movement must become a revolutionary movement seeking to overthrow

the forces that continue to destroy the promise, the hope, and the vision.

This is our challenge. The challenge to see prayer, our prayers for one another

as a force within the world rather than a mere spiritual exercise removed from it.

This is the prayer that I envision that Daniel was praying before his open window,

a subversive prayer that topples empires.

Let's go ahead and finish reading the rest of the chapter. Hearing this,

the king was deeply troubled and he tried to think of a way to save Daniel.

He spent the rest of the day looking for a way to get Daniel out of this predicament.

In the evening, the men went together to the king and said, Your majesty,

you know that according to the law of the Medes and Persians,

no law that the king's signs can be changed.

So at last the king gave orders for Daniel to be arrested and thrown into the den of lions.

The king said to him, May your God whom you serve so faithfully rescue you.

A stone was brought and placed over the mouth of the den. the king sealed the

stone with his own royal seal and the seals of his nobles so that no one could rescue Daniel.

Then the king returned to his palace and spent the night fasting.

He refused his usual entertainment and couldn't sleep at all that night.

Very early the next morning, the king got up and hurried out to the lion's den.

When he got there, he called out in anguish, Daniel, servant to the living God,

was your God whom you serve so faithfully able to rescue you from the Alliance.

As we learn from Paul, there's an influence exploiting my thoughts and feelings and realities.

There are beings and powers who have influence over whole cultures and societies,

exploiting the collective brokenness of humanity.

But as we know from Daniel, Jesus is the victorious king over these spiritual realities.

Jesus is king over everything, exalted over all power and all authority for

the church to be this little pocket of humanity where that is actually seen to be true.

That Jesus is king here, where people experience their true humanity and beloved status by God.

Daniel answered, Long live the king, for God sent his angel to shut the lion's

mouth so that they would not hurt me.

For I have been found innocent in his sight, and I have not wronged you, your majesty.

The king was overjoyed and ordered that Daniel be lifted from the den.

Not a scratch was found on him, for he had trusted in his God.

Then the king gave orders to arrest the men who had maliciously accused Daniel.

He had them thrown into the lion's den along with their wives and children.

The lions leapt on them and tore them apart before they even hit the floor of the den.

Then King Darius sent this message to the people of every race and nation and

language throughout the world.

Peace and prosperity to you. I decree that everyone throughout my kingdom should

tremble All with fear before the God of Daniel.

For he is the living God, and he will endure forever.

His kingdom will never be destroyed, and his rule will never end.

He rescues and saves his people. He performs miraculous signs and wonders in

the heavens and on earth.

He has rescued Daniel from the power of the lions.

So Daniel prospered during the reign of Darius and the reign of Cyrus the Persian.

That's Daniel chapter 6. And so we conclude our time with a question.

Daniel 6 · chapter mention

Where in your life do you profess Jesus, but your life is still controlled by other powers?

What area in your life do you confess, do you profess Jesus,

but it is still being controlled by other powers?

In what small step can you take to have that area come under the influence of King Jesus?

So that no matter who you thought you were when you walked into those doors,

what identity you've been speaking over yourself all of these years,

that you will leave changed, forever changed.

As Athanasius said, you used to harm others. Now you no longer act selfishly.

You were once disrespectful toward Lord God, now you live faithfully.

Whatever it is, may you leave those doors knowing that you were once a sinner,

but that description suits you no longer. You are a saint.

And may we pray over the saints, this new life of hope, riches, and power.

That the same power that brought Jesus back from the dead.

The same power, it's the same power that is changing you today into the glorious

identity that God has given you. Amen.

Music.