Daniel 23: Daniel's Third Vision

Good morning, church and those of you who are guests of the church family this morning, whether you’re here in the room or online. I’m Bill Connors, senior pastor, and I just want to say thanks for being here today.

To that end, I’d appreciate it if you’re a guest today and you’re here in the room, if you’d take just a minute during the service today and fill out a welcome card. You’ll find it in the back of the pew in front of you. We’d just like to send you a note of thanks for being here today, and to see if there’s prayer or ministry that we can serve you with. You can get those back to us by putting them in the boxes by the doors as you leave after service, or better yet, you can bring them down to me when service is over. I have a thank you gift to give to you, and would love the chance to meet you personally for just a moment following our service time today.

I’d also like to take a moment to thank our praise band, Worship 4:24, for their dedication and heart for the Lord as they lead in musical praise and worship each week. It’s a privilege and a joy to get to fill in and play and sing along with them every now and then. They heart of this group is truly to come before the Lord in worship, and to lead us as we join them in that. Thanks for your faithfulness!

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Opening

I really appreciate the message that Trevor brought last Sunday focusing on verses 1-19 of Daniel 9. Thought it was a really practical look at prayer using Daniel’s prayer as a springboard for discipleship. Trevor used Daniel’s prayer as a model to encourage us to lead ourselves to prayer, to let the Bible shape our prayers, and to learn to lament over our sin when we pray. If you weren’t here last week, I recommend going to the website or YouTube or Facebook to check it out.

But for this morning, we will finish our look at Daniel 9 by considering the last eight verses of the chapter. This passage contains both the fact of God’s answer to Daniel’s prayer, and the content of that answer, which makes up a third prophetic vision for Daniel. After this passage, you could say that we are entering the home stretch of the book of Daniel.

So let’s open our Bibles or Bible apps to Daniel 9:20 and stand as you are able to in honor of the reading of God’s Word as we consider our focal passage this morning:

Daniel 9:20–27 CSB

20 While I was speaking, praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my petition before the Lord my God concerning the holy mountain of my God—21 while I was praying, Gabriel, the man I had seen in the first vision, reached me in my extreme weariness, about the time of the evening offering. 22 He gave me this explanation: “Daniel, I’ve come now to give you understanding. 23 At the beginning of your petitions an answer went out, and I have come to give it, for you are treasured by God. So consider the message and understand the vision: 24 Seventy weeks are decreed about your people and your holy city— to bring the rebellion to an end, to put a stop to sin, to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy place. 25 Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until an Anointed One, the ruler, will be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks. It will be rebuilt with a plaza and a moat, but in difficult times. 26 After those sixty-two weeks the Anointed One will be cut off and will have nothing. The people of the coming ruler will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come with a flood, and until the end there will be war; desolations are decreed. 27 He will make a firm covenant with many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put a stop to sacrifice and offering. And the abomination of desolation will be on a wing of the temple until the decreed destruction is poured out on the desolator.”

PRAYER for the work of God’s Spirit in the lives and hearts of our elected representatives throughout this election season.

For many, our focal passage today (or at least the last four verses of it) is a kind of litmus test of biblical orthodoxy. What I mean by that is that some will decide whether a fellow believer, a preacher, or even a church is either biblical or unbiblical on the basis of verses 24-27 alone. But I’ll be frank with you: I read five commentaries on this passage in my preparation, and none of them agreed in every detail. Due to its mysterious nature, this passage can be exceedingly difficult for us to nail down, because like I believe we can be with the identities of the nations reflected in the beasts of chapter 7 and the animals of chapter 8, we want to be extremely specific here as well, and therefore, dogmatic in our approach.

Sinclair Ferguson, in his commentary on Daniel, calls this a “cavalier approach to Scripture,” and offers several reasons for doing so:

(1) The section itself is relatively brief, almost obscure. No interpretation of the Book of Daniel should either begin or end with this section. (2) The New Testament nowhere clearly refers to the contents of this prophecy. Even the reference to “the abomination of desolation” in Mark 13:14 is from Daniel 11:31 and 12:11 and not strictly from 9:27. If the seventy weeks of this prophecy were fundamental to a biblical theology (as, for example, Isaiah 53 obviously is), there would undoubtedly be clearer exposition of the passage in the apostolic writings. (3) To look immediately for an explanation of the seventy weeks of verse 24 is to ignore the significance of the rest of this chapter.

—Sinclair B. Ferguson, The Preacher’s Commentary Series: Daniel

I’m not saying that this passage isn’t important. It certainly is. However, I’m going to preach this passage from what I believe it is saying given other Scripture and history to look back on. If you differ in your opinion, and have biblical and historical reasons for doing so, groovy. I’m still your brother in Christ. We can still fellowship together. We can even still study the Bible together. The meaning of the seventy weeks prophecy in Daniel 9 is NOT a salvation question. If you see it as such, then I’ll just say this as clearly as I can: you are out of balance and need to repent of putting more on this passage than it can reasonably bear. If this were a salvation-level passage, don’t you think they would have additional attestation in the New Testament? Jesus didn’t even refer to it in all we have in the Gospels.

Now that I’ve got you all thinking about what were to talk about in those last four versus, first we have to address verses 20 through 23, between the prayer which makes up the beginning of this chapter and the prophetic vision that follows. In this, we see the faithfulness of Daniel’s prayer and the surprising swiftness with which it was answered.

1: The faithful pray-er

There was a reason that Trevor could use Daniel’s prayer life as a model for our own. The Scripture shows us that Daniel prayed, and he did so diligently. In fact, it seems that Daniel was interrupted almost mid-sentence by of Gabriel:

Daniel 9:20–21 CSB

Here Daniel was, still pouring out his prayers, confession, lament, and requests, when Gabriel appeared. The truth is, it may be a misnomer for me to refer to this is Daniel’s third vision. The Scripture says that Gabriel “reached” Daniel. It is entirely possible that Gabriel manifested personally and physically to Daniel, which would then make this not a vision, but a teaching.

Daniel had apparently been praying with much fervor, because it says that Gabriel reached him in his “extreme weariness.” Daniel was worn out by prayer because of his passion and focus. You can see it in verses 4-19. And what was the object of Daniel’s prayer? It was the restoration of Jerusalem and the Temple:

Daniel 9:2–3 CSB

2 in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, understood from the books according to the word of the Lord to the prophet Jeremiah that the number of years for the desolation of Jerusalem would be seventy. 3 So I turned my attention to the Lord God to seek him by prayer and petitions, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes.

So because of the state of his people, the temple, their capital, and their nation, Daniel brought himself before the Lord until he was worn out.

But there’s one additional thing in verse 21 that gives us an insight into Daniel’s dedication to prayer. Look at that verse again:

Daniel 9:21 CSB

21 while I was praying, Gabriel, the man I had seen in the first vision, reached me in my extreme weariness, about the time of the evening offering.

Notice when it says that Gabriel reached Daniel. It was “about at the time of the evening offering.” Obviously, the Jewish sacrificial system of morning and evening offerings had been suspended when the temple was destroyed in 586 BC, and regardless, morning and evening sacrifices to Yahweh would not have been scheduled as they had been in Jerusalem. But Daniel was so faithful to God that even though he couldn’t sacrifice, he still used the Jewish hours of sacrifice as his times of prayer. And while that doesn’t seem that impressive, the thing that makes it incredible is that at this time, about 539 or 538 BC, Daniel was still praying between about three and four in the afternoon as if he were in Jerusalem, a place he hadn’t seen in over 65 years. There was no call to prayer at the time of the evening sacrifice in Babylon. There was simply Daniel’s faithfulness to spending time in prayer and communion with his God.

There is definitely something to be said for setting aside intentional time to speak with God. There is certainly nothing wrong with coming to God in prayer moment by moment throughout every day as the need arises, but making sure that we have time set aside for doing business with the Lord builds our consistency and focus. This is something that I have been convicted of in writing this sermon.

So in the midst of Daniel’s prayer, Gabriel arrives to provide an explanation. This was a fast answer.

2: The fast answer

It would be nice if we could say that God answered us when we pray in the same style that he answered Daniel in this case. However, this is the only time it’s recorded that Daniel’s prayer was answered this quickly and in this fashion. Gabriel arrives and brings his explanation, which included both an expanded understanding of Israel’s future and a beautiful statement about Daniel himself:

Daniel 9:22–23 CSB

22 He gave me this explanation: “Daniel, I’ve come now to give you understanding. 23 At the beginning of your petitions an answer went out, and I have come to give it, for you are treasured by God. So consider the message and understand the vision:

Even as Daniel began his prayer, Gabriel was sent immediately to respond so that Daniel would understand. And why was that?

It’s because, according to Gabriel, Daniel was treasured by God. Not that Daniel was perfect, but throughout the book we’ve seen that what was important to God was important to Daniel. He wanted what God wanted. He never forgot who he was, and he never forgot Whose he was. He lived out the answer to the question posed by the Hebrew exiles in Psalm 137:4: “How can we sing the Lord’s song on foreign soil?”:

Psalm 137:5–6 CSB

5 If I forget you, Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill. 6 May my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you, if I do not exalt Jerusalem as my greatest joy!

The psalmist’s longing for Jerusalem is a reflection of his longing to worship God as his people were called to do— a longing to be able to fully obey the Lord along with his people.

We don’t serve God in order to be saved. But what kind of relationship can we reasonably claim to have with God if we never want what God wants? If we never do what God says? Daniel was treasured by God because he walked in obedience. Consider what Jesus said in John chapter 14:

John 14:23 CSB

23 Jesus answered, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.

Doing good works doesn’t save a person, but a person who has been truly saved will do good works out of a loving relationship with the Lord and gratitude for what He’s done.

Daniel had that kind of relationship with God. And as a result, he had the special privilege of being the one who received the vision of the 70 weeks. And in that mission, we see the foretold future… Some of which has not even come to pass yet.

3: The foretold future

Before we get too deep into verses 24 through 27, there are a few things to consider. First of all, remember what we saw earlier from at the beginning of the chapter: Daniel had considered the Scriptures, had trusted the promises he found there, and had prayed regarding their fulfillment. He could see that the fulfillment was close, and so in preparation, he confessed his sins and the sins of his people before calling upon the Lord to fulfill the word spoken through Jeremiah:

Jeremiah 29:10–14 CSB

10 For this is what the Lord says: “When seventy years for Babylon are complete, I will attend to you and will confirm my promise concerning you to restore you to this place. 11 For I know the plans I have for you”—this is the Lord’s declaration—“plans for your well-being, not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. 12 You will call to me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you search for me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you”—this is the Lord’s declaration—“and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and places where I banished you”—this is the Lord’s declaration. “I will restore you to the place from which I deported you.”

And while this prophecy was certainly true, it only told a part of the story. The seventy years were coming to an end, but God’s ultimate plan for Israel—His plan for the world, in fact—was really just beginning.

Second: just to set us in the right place, verse 24 begins with, “Seventy weeks are decreed...” Literally, the Hebrew text says, “seventy sevens,” with the word for seven being the same as the word for a set of seven days, or a week. Basically no one takes this as meaning 490 days, because that would be entirely too short of a time frame for all that is said in it to take place. Given what is promised in this passage, as well as the context of Daniel’s prayer resulting from Jeremiah’s use of seventy years, the best way to approach this passage is to say that Israel had just finished one set of seventy years, and now Gabriel was saying that there would be seventy more sets of seven years before God’s ultimate redemption of His people, which is what is in view in verse 24. There is something bigger coming than just getting Israel back home.

Third, as I said in my introduction, there are several different approaches that people take to these four verses, and without going into too much detail on those, they are:

The short-term literal. The seventy weeks of years points to something that would happen 490 years in the future, and claim that it points from the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BC to the death of Antiochus IV Epiphanes, which occurred in 163 BC. But that’s not 490 years. It’s only 423 years. And after that, those who hold this view have to do some interesting interpretive maneuvers to make the other imagery in the passage fit. This is not a convincing interpretation.

The short-term symbolic. The seventy weeks of years aren’t literal periods of seven years, but just kind of represent blocks of years that culminate in Christ’s first advent—His coming as a baby and through His earthly ministry. In this view, the seventy weeks end before the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70. But the different periods given in the passage (the seven weeks, the sixty-two weeks, and the one week) have to each have their own ending points, which mean that the weeks each symbolically must have different lengths themselves. I’m also not convinced by this interpretation.

The last two are the views that most modern scholars take: The long-term symbolic. The seventy weeks of years are still symbolic, but stretch out from the decree of Cyrus to rebuild Jerusalem all the way out across church history to Christ’s second coming, so we would be living in the last of the “sevens” right now, with the occurrences of verses 26 and 27 being during that last week. Again, I’m not convinced by this view either, because the weeks would have to be very strange lengths, with the last week now having lasted for nearly 2000 years. I believe that there is a better way than this view as well.

The long-term literal. This is the view that I hold. The seventy weeks are literally years, broken up as the passage indicates: seven weeks, then sixty-two weeks, then one week. The seven weeks points to a definite historical event, and the sixty-two weeks points to Christ’s first advent in the first century AD. However, the text suggests that there is an interlude between the sixty-two weeks and the one week, which I’ll explain in a minute. We find ourselves today sitting in that interlude, and there is still to come the time of the last week, the tribulation and the Great Tribulation of Revelation.

Again, if you hold a different view, that’s fine. I’m bringing the view that makes the most sense to me given the Scriptures. I’ll show you why I believe what I believe, and hopefully it will make sense to you as well. But remember—the interpretation of Daniel 9:24-27 is not a first-order issue. The thing that we can say with absolute certainly and all agree on is that what God promises, He does. And so in that, we can agree that however we might vary in our interpretations of this passage, they point to God’s victory, and for the sake of our fellowship, that should be enough.

Now, let’s tackle this passage verse-by-verse:

Daniel 9:24 CSB

24 Seventy weeks are decreed about your people and your holy city— to bring the rebellion to an end, to put a stop to sin, to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy place.

The vision of the seventy weeks starts at the end, not at the beginning. The restoration of Jerusalem is still in view, but it is not the ultimate goal of the plan of God. Instead, we see a much broader and comprehensive view of God’s ultimate purposes for the nation of Israel, and a message of incredible and enduring hope that will also impact the rest of the world in its completion.

There are six things that God has decreed will be accomplished by the end of the 70 weeks:

To bring the rebellion to an end;

To put a stop to sin;

To atone for iniquity;

To bring in everlasting righteousness;

To seal up vision and prophecy;

To anoint the most holy place.

First, the rebellion of the people of Israel, and in fact all of humanity, will be brought to an end. Certainly, neither Israel and in the specific or humanity in the general has stopped their rebellion against God since the time of Antiochus IV Epiphanes’ death or the crucifixion of Christ. But there is a promised time in the future when rebellion against God will cease.

Second, sin will be stopped. The day is coming when sin will be no more, when creation is restored to its perfect state, and Christ will reign perfectly in the hearts of all who reside on the earth.

Third, iniquity will be atoned for, covered over. This is the vehicle through which the first two things are accomplished. Mankind’s sin was paid for by Jesus Christ on the cross, and that atonement is available to all who would trust in him. The full realization of that atonement will come at the end of days.

Fourth, at the end of the 70 weeks will come a time of righteousness that will last forever. Humanity will have a restored relationship with God that will never end.

Fifth, the sealing up of vision and prophecy could refer to the fact that all vision and prophecy will be fulfilled, and thus marked with God’s seal of authenticity; or it could refer to the fact that in God’s eternal kingdom, such things as vision and prophecy will no longer be necessary.

Finally, the anointing of the most holy place in my view refers to either the heavenly temple of Hebrews 9:23-24, or to the city of Jerusalem itself (which needs no temple) in Revelation 21:22-23:

Revelation 21:22–23 CSB

22 I did not see a temple in it, because the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. 23 The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, because the glory of God illuminates it, and its lamp is the Lamb.

So we can see that the 70 weeks vision has the end in view. These things, with the possible exception of the atonement of iniquity, have not been completed. We still wait for their full realization. But what a promise we have in Scripture! The eternal kingdom of God is going to be more glorious than we can imagine, because while we can conceive of a world without sin, we have never seen that in reality.

But how will this be accomplished? According to the vision given to Daniel, it will happen in stages:

Daniel 9:25 CSB

25 Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until an Anointed One, the ruler, will be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks. It will be rebuilt with a plaza and a moat, but in difficult times.

As I said earlier, Gabriel’s breakdown of the first sixty-nine weeks—the seven weeks and the sixty-two weeks—points to definite historical events, finishing with the coming of the Messiah, or “anointed one.”

The marking of the weeks must begin with a decree for the rebuilding of Jerusalem. While the decree of Cyrus in 538 BC allowed the Jews to their homeland and begin rebuilding the temple, but not the city. You could argue that Cyrus’s decree may have given them permission, but it did not give them the means. The work of restoring the temple under Zerubbabel began either that same year or in 537, and was completed in about 518, but it was not until the decree of Artaxerxes I to Ezra in 458 BC that an officially government-sanctioned and funded work for the rebuilding of the city of Jerusalem was authorized. It is clear from Nehemiah that the city of Jerusalem was still in a sad state in 445 BC, so the work was obviously slow, and faced much opposition from surrounding governors (“in difficult times”). However, we see in the book of Nehemiah that the work was completed, temple worship was restored, and further reforms were carried out under Nehemiah’s leadership.

One interesting translation note should be made on verse 25. It reads, “It will be rebuilt with a plaza and a moat.” The plaza is actually referenced in Nehemiah 8:1:

Nehemiah 8:1 CSB

1 all the people gathered together at the square in front of the Water Gate. They asked the scribe Ezra to bring the book of the law of Moses that the Lord had given Israel.

But what about the moat? Did ancient Jerusalem have a moat? No. This is, honestly, an unfortunate translation because of our idea of what a moat is. When we hear the word “moat,” we think of castles and drawbridges and crocodiles. The Hebrew word translated “moat” here literally means “trench.” It was common for ancient cities to dig a trench around their defensive walls in order to increase their height, both physically and visually. This is almost certainly what is in view here.

It is believed that Nehemiah died in 409 BC, 49 years after the decree to Ezra in 458 BC. The first seven sevens was completed.

Sixty-two sets of seven years thereafter would be 434 years from 409 BC, or the year 26 AD (yes, 434 minus 409 would give us 25, however, when talking about the break between BC and AD, there is no year “zero”, so 26 AD). So this would mark the end of the sixty-two “sevens,” and would designate the time of the “Anointed One, the ruler.”

The prophecy doesn’t specify the actual occurrence surrounding the anointed one at the end of the 62 weeks, just that it would be that long before his rise to prominence. The term “anointed one” is used in the Old Testament to refer to both kings and priests. So, the anointed one must be one, or the other, or both. This anointed one is also referred to as “the ruler,” a term for a leader or king. Jesus is the only person who fulfills this designation. He was anointed by the Holy Spirit in his ministry. Even in his crucifixion, he was called the King of the Jews, but more than that, he is the King of kings and Lord of lords.

Matthew 27:11 CSB

11 Now Jesus stood before the governor. “Are you the king of the Jews?” the governor asked him. Jesus answered, “You say so.”

He is a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek, who was also a king:

Hebrews 5:6 CSB

6 also says in another place, You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

So where does the year 26 A.D. come into view? If Jesus was crucified in the spring of 30 following an approximately three year ministry, then his baptism would have likely occurred sometime in the year 26. It was then that his public ministry was inaugurated. The 62 sevens, and thus the 69 sevens are completed.

Now comes the time when I must explain the idea of the interlude between the first 69 sevens and the last one. A break between them is clearly shown in the text of verse 26:

Daniel 9:26 CSB

26 After those sixty-two weeks the Anointed One will be cut off and will have nothing. The people of the coming ruler will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come with a flood, and until the end there will be war; desolations are decreed.

The occurrences of verse 26: the cutting off of the anointed one, the people of the coming ruler destroying Jerusalem and the Temple, and the war that brings that about are all referred to as happening “after those sixty-two weeks.” The last, or seventieth week is referred to in verse 27. There must be some kind of break between the coming of the Anointed One and the last “week.”

In that break, the anointed one will be cut off, and will have nothing. Jesus was “cut off,” put to death on a cross for our sake, to pay the penalty that we owe for sin, to purchase the atonement that we so desperately need. He is the perfect Son of God, and never sinned, and yet died the death of a criminal, one with nothing, so that we could have everything.

Isaiah 53:6–9 CSB

6 We all went astray like sheep; we all have turned to our own way; and the Lord has punished him for the iniquity of us all. 7 He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth. Like a lamb led to the slaughter and like a sheep silent before her shearers, he did not open his mouth. 8 He was taken away because of oppression and judgment, and who considered his fate? For he was cut off from the land of the living; he was struck because of my people’s rebellion. 9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked, but he was with a rich man at his death, because he had done no violence and had not spoken deceitfully.

He died the death that we deserve, so that we can have the eternal life that belongs to Him.

2 Corinthians 5:21 CSB

21 He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

We are made right with God through faith in Christ, and no other way. Through surrendering to Him as our Savior and Lord, as our priest and king, believing in His atonement on our behalf and giving up going our own way in order to follow Him, we are made right with God, cleansed from our sins, and promised eternal life with Him. If you have never believed the message of Jesus Christ, the Gospel, I call on you by the Spirit to surrender today, even right now, to this One who died to save you.

The destruction of the city of Jerusalem and the burning of the Temple occurred in 70 AD under General Titus Flavius Vespasianus, who would later become Emperor Titus. The invasion of Jerusalem was like a flood, as legions of Roman soldiers swept away a reported 1.1 million Jews, as well as all of the valuables of the Temple.

But notice that the destruction of Jerusalem would come by “the people of the coming ruler.” This ruler is the same one who is referenced in verse 27: the Antichrist.

Daniel 9:27 CSB

27 He will make a firm covenant with many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put a stop to sacrifice and offering. And the abomination of desolation will be on a wing of the temple until the decreed destruction is poured out on the desolator.”

Titus himself was not the Antichrist. No, the spirit of Antichrist is already in the world (1 John 4:3), but the Antichrist, the “little horn” of Daniel 7. Very quickly, because we will look at this further in the coming weeks, I just want to make one thing clear. There will come a time when the Antichrist will rise to power on a global scale, and at the beginning, that might not seem like a bad thing to most of the world, even the Jews. This is the time of the tribulation. And many will enter into an agreement, or covenant, with him (the language actually suggests that he may FORCE people into these agreements).

But halfway through that covenant, three and a half years, forty-two months, he will betray that Jews and stop all religious practice. This will be the start of the Great Tribulation, as it says in Daniel 7:25, Revelation 11:2, and Revelation 13:5:

Daniel 7:25 CSB

25 He will speak words against the Most High and oppress the holy ones of the Most High. He will intend to change religious festivals and laws, and the holy ones will be handed over to him for a time, times, and half a time.

Revelation 11:2 CSB

2 But exclude the courtyard outside the temple. Don’t measure it, because it is given to the nations, and they will trample the holy city for forty-two months.

Revelation 13:5 CSB

5 The beast was given a mouth to utter boasts and blasphemies. It was allowed to exercise authority for forty-two months.

So the Antichrist will have is day in the proverbial sun, where he will be allowed to exercise his power and authority over the Jews, blaspheming the Lord and attempting to force them to worship him instead. But the Scriptures tell us that his time will come to a close, just as we saw in Daniel 7, at the coming of the Son of Man, and He—Jesus—will reign forever and ever:

Daniel 7:11 CSB

11 “I watched, then, because of the sound of the arrogant words the horn was speaking. As I continued watching, the beast was killed and its body destroyed and given over to the burning fire.

Daniel 7:13–14 CSB

13 I continued watching in the night visions, and suddenly one like a son of man was coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was escorted before him. 14 He was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, so that those of every people, nation, and language should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will not be destroyed.

Closing

Ultimately, what I want us to take away from the vision of the Seventy Weeks is that God has a plan, which included the death of Jesus for the covering of our sin, and that plan hasn’t been completed yet. But it will come to pass. He will receive the glory, the honor, and the victory!

To the lost: If you do not belong to God, you will not experience this victory with Him. Trust Christ and be saved.

To the unbaptized: make a declaration of your faith in Christ through the waters of baptism.

To those looking for a church: Come and be a part of this family.

To those needing prayer: Trevor, Joe, Rich, and Kerry will be at the front. You can pray where you are, or at the steps if you’d like.

Giving

PRAYER

Closing Remarks

Bible reading (finishing 1 Kings with chapter 22, and Psalms 16 today.. next couple of days are catch up days on the narrative part)

No Pastor’s Study for business meeting. PLEASE plan to be here.

Prayer Meeting

Instructions for guests

Benediction

Revelation 5:11–13 CSB

11 Then I looked and heard the voice of many angels around the throne, and also of the living creatures and of the elders. Their number was countless thousands, plus thousands of thousands. 12 They said with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb who was slaughtered to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and blessing! 13 I heard every creature in heaven, on earth, under the earth, on the sea, and everything in them say, Blessing and honor and glory and power be to the one seated on the throne, and to the Lamb, forever and ever!

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