It’s All Part of the Plan, Part 2

Today on Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. Our hope is not in perfect marriages or prosperous businesses or in political power. Our hope is in the resurrection of the dead. Our hope is in the certainty that Satan and sin and death are going to ultimately be defeated and that just as hardship and persecution have been decreed, so is the eternal reign of the anointed one Jesus, who is going to renew and restore all things and let us rule with him forever. Welcome to a new week of solid biblical teaching here on Summit Life with Pastor J.D.

Greer. As always, I'm your host, Molly Vitovich. Today we conclude our teaching series through the book of Daniel called Shining in Babylon, and Pastor J.D. Greer shows us how these final chapters of the book teach that the suffering here on earth is limited, the resurrection is eternal, and the power of God through Christ is available to all who believe in him.

The only question is, are you ready to be a part of this movement and live like this? We know you don't want to miss a single message here on the program, so if you need to catch up, you can hear previous broadcasts from the Daniel teaching series online at jdgreer.com. But first, let's join Pastor J.D. as he concludes our series with part two of a message he titled, It's All Part of the Plan.

Make no mistake. We are sending our kids out into a hostile world, and we have to prepare them for that. Cute little songs and little habits and learning to say the right words… That's not going to cut it in the world that's to come. We have to teach them that there is something worth living for and dying for that is stronger than all the opposition of the world and is better than any of the world's affirmation. They're never going to be applauded by the world if they're going to hold fast to their confession of faith, and it's okay because Jesus is worth it.

That's why we've got to move beyond just this sort of lazy kind of discipleship where we're content with Christian children who don't have sex and know what way to vote, and we've got to teach them to be overcomers who love Jesus enough to give their lives for him. Now, I say all that because I read this. I read this, and you should too. I say, well, no wonder Daniel's grieving. What a dark view of the future.

Right? We should grieve also. Y'all, the world, generally speaking, is a tragic place where God's people suffer and are sometimes tortured and slain again and again.

And justice never comes on earth, and it's only going to get worse, he says. Jesus is like they hated me. They're going to hate you. Be assured, John 16, in this world you're going to have tribulation. Sometimes in church we're in such a hurry to rejoice that we overlook the grief that some people coming in are feeling.

Some of you coming in this weekend, you're facing pressure at your job to conform. You're suffering from the scorn of friends for the sake of godliness. Or maybe you're just suffering. The world can be a dark place, and we want to grieve with you and not get so close to the happy songs that we don't take time just to acknowledge. I know that it's dark, and I know that it's painful, and that's exactly what scripture tells us we should expect.

You say, this is the worst sermon I've ever heard. What is the good news? I thought you'd never ask. I've been waiting to tell you, and you just haven't asked. Here we go. I'm going to give you three elements of hope that Daniel gives you.

They're bright, and they're shiny, and they're awesome. Number one, he says the suffering is limited. The suffering is limited. What stands out to me as I read this is how in control God seems to be of all of this. Daniel drops little hints about that along the way.

Look at 1136, which you read a second ago, and look at it again. He will be successful, the antichrist will be successful, until the time of wrath is completed, because what has been decreed, not by him, but by God, what has been decreed will be accomplished. The time of wrath is completed. What has been decreed is accomplished. In other words, this is all part of the plan.

The persecution is real, and it's painful. It's all been decreed by God. The time has been set, and not an ounce more of it comes than God has intended and determined. It's like that terrible scene where it was Snape and Dumbledore. It looks bad, but it's all according to the plan. One day, the meaning of these tragic events is going to be reversed.

One of my favorite aspects of the book of Daniel is how specific God is about where it's going to come from and how long it's going to last. By the way, if you've never seen what I'm about to show you, it will blow your mind, okay? I want you to go back. Hold your finger in chapter 12. Go back to chapter 9 real quick. I want you to tighten your belt and put on your nerd glasses.

You're going to need them here for a minute. Verse 24, Daniel 9. Watch this. Seventy weeks are decreed, God says to Daniel, or through the angel, 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 an everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy place. A week—follow me here, okay, nerd glasses on—a week in the Jewish language just means a period of seven. That could be seven days, a week of days, or it could mean, like it does here, seven years, a week of years.

So, how many weeks of years are prophesied? Seventy. So, it's seven years times seventy. Seventy weeks.

Seventy sets of seven weeks. That's 490 years, okay? And what happens at the end of those 70 weeks of years, into that 490 years? It says, well, at that point, rebellion is going to be brought to an end, stop will be put to sin, iniquities will be atoned for, everlasting righteousness will be brought in, all biblical prophecy will be fulfilled, and the most holy place will be restored. Okay, when do those 490 weeks start, you ask?

Great question, right? He tells you in verse 25 exactly when they start. No one understand this, from the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem.

That's when you start the stopwatch. From that moment until an anointed one, the ruler will be seven weeks and 62 weeks, yet Jerusalem will be rebuilt with a plaza and a moat, but in very difficult times. So, again, the clock starts ticking at the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem. That decree was given by King Artaxerxes of Persia in around 445 BC. You can read about that event, by the way, in Nehemiah chapter 2.

That's the story of that. From that date, he says there's going to be seven weeks and then 62 weeks. Seven weeks, again, nerd glasses, is 49 years, which is roughly how long it took to rebuild Jerusalem. Then 62 more seven-year periods pass after that.

Now watch this, verse 26. After these 62 weeks, plus the first seven, the anointed one will be cut off. So, seven weeks and 62 weeks means 69 weeks. Then the anointed one is going to be cut off 69 weeks of years. That's 483 years.

I did the math for you, but that's 483 years. Now, using the Jewish custom of a 360-day year, 483 years after 445 BC, when Artaxerxes issued the decree to rebuild Jerusalem, that would land us at AD 32. 32 AD, which is the date that Jesus, scholars tell us, was crucified. That's when the anointed one was cut off. God gave to Daniel the date that Jesus would die, some 480 years before it happened. The point is, a God who can prophesy the details of something like that is in control of all of it.

Wouldn't you agree? It's all part of the plan. Verse 26, watch this. Then the people of the coming ruler will destroy the city and the sanctuary. That happened in 70 AD.

The Romans are going to re-destroy the temple in Jerusalem in 70 AD. Then watch this, verse 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 occur again. After the anointed one, another way of saying, by the way, the Messiah, anointed one, that's what it means in Hebrew, after he is cut off, there is one more week of seven years, the 70th week. Now, there are two ways you could interpret this. One way is that the last week of years are not literal years, that that week represents the final chapter of human history, which we're in now.

It's just stretched out for a long time. The second way you could interpret this, and I believe the correct way, is that after the Messiah was cut off in 32 AD, the timeline was paused. We are now in a parenthetical period, commonly called the church age, where God has shifted the focus of his activity away from the nation of Israel and onto the church, which is comprised mostly of Gentiles, non-Jews, most of us. But at the end of time, when the antichrist officially makes his debut, the focus is going to reshift back to Israel, and we will enter into that last 70th week, a seven-year period that we call the tribulation. The tribulation of the book of Revelation is all about Daniel's 70th week. Now, here is why I strongly prefer that second interpretation and not the one where it's just kind of like this metaphor for what we're in now.

First, here's why. The first 69 weeks were literal. Like I showed you, it was roughly 483 360-day years to when Jesus died, so why would you suddenly switch the last seven and make them an elastic metaphor? Second, like I noted, the book of Revelation is all about this 70th week, and the book of Revelation strongly implies that this is something in the future and not something we're living in now. There are a few commentators that try to argue we're living in the midst of Revelation right now, but I just don't find their reasoning that compelling.

I could be wrong, and it's not a first-issue order of faith. You don't have to leave our church if you disagree with me, but it just doesn't seem to me to be written that way in Revelation. Third, verse 24 says that 70 weeks are decreed about your people and your holy city. For Daniel, your people would be the Jews and your city would be Jerusalem. These 70 weeks focus on Israel and Jerusalem. Well, right now, like I've said, the focus of God's work is in the church, which is mostly made up of Gentiles, non-Jews. In fact, Paul says in Romans 9 through 11 that God has temporarily set aside his focus on Israel to build the church among the Gentiles. But one day, Paul says, one day in the future, God's going to resume his focus on Israel, and when he does, man, more people are going to get saved than any previous chapter in human history.

It's going to be awesome, Paul says. But the point is, Daniel says these 70 weeks are about Israel, and so we live in an ellipsis right now, and there's another really, really terrible week coming. J.D., when do we get to the encouraging part? Listen, the encouragement is in the word decreed. If God decrees all this with this amount of specificity, doesn't that show you he's in charge of all of it? What that means is that what looks to us like bad news is going to one day be reversed to be good news.

Snape drops Dumbledore. It's okay. It's all part of the plan. That means that when something feels dark and chaotic to me right now in my life, I can still rest in it because, say it with me, it's all part of the plan. One day, the terrible meaning of all these things is going to get reversed.

It's not Dumbledore's tragic death but part of his ultimate victory. I'll give you just one quick story. I heard a man named Steve Saint speak at a Desiring God conference in 2005. Steve was the son of Nate Saint, who was one of the five young missionaries who were brutally and tragically speared to death on the beaches of Ecuador in the 1950s. They had been trying to establish contact with this isolated tribe called the Alcas in order to bring food and supplies and, eventually, the gospel to them.

But on January 8, 1956, they were deceived by the tribe and murdered in cold blood. Steve was the son of one of these slain missionaries, Nate Saint, and at this Desiring God conference some 50 years later, he recounted how, as a young boy, he had struggled with why God had allowed that to happen. Why did God let my daddy die? He could have prevented it. They were trying to do the right thing.

Why not stop it? Now, here in his late 60s, he realized that God did not just allow it to happen. He said, God planned it.

Let that sink in. He didn't just allow it. He planned it. Steve said, 50 years later, we can see that God used the incident to pave the way for that tribe of Alcas to be saved. After the murder of those five men, their wives went back into the tribe. The tribe was so moved by their generosity and their forgiveness they'd never seen anything like it.

Peace was established, and eventually, nearly the whole tribe came to faith. Several years later, in fact, Steve, who I was hearing speak, got to baptize the very man, the very man, Menkaie was his name, who had put a spear into his father's heart. That man, Steve said at this conference, became the surrogate grandfather of my children, a beloved member of my family. Then Steve said this to that conference. It was one of the most powerful statements I have ever heard.

He said, Why is it that we demand every chapter to be good when God promises only that in the last chapter he will make all the other chapters make sense? It's all part of the plan. I know it's hard to believe in your life, but it's all part of the plan. I know it's dark, and I'm trying to communicate that to you.

It is dark. I understand that. I need you to understand that it is limited.

It is limited. One day it is coming where that gets reversed. That's your first element of hope.

Here's your second and third, and these are much quicker. Number two, he says the suffering is limited, but number two, the resurrection is eternal. After Daniel tells us about this time of untold suffering, there's going to be a time of distress.

This has never occurred since nations came into being. He says, But at that time all your people who are found written in the book will escape. Many who sleep in the dust of the earth are going to awake, some to eternal life, and some to disgrace and eternal contempt. Just as a time of persecution is decreed, so is a resurrection. As certain and as real as our suffering, so is the certainty and the reality of our resurrection. The Ancient of Days, who sits on his throne of wheels, saying, I have decreed it all, sits above it all, and will restore it all.

He had the first word, Daniel says. He's going to have the last. Our hope, friend, is not in success in this life. If you're coming to this church thinking that Jesus is going to give you your best life now and success in your job and a perfect marriage, you might be disappointed. Our hope is not in perfect marriages or prosperous businesses or in political power. Our hope is in the resurrection of the dead.

Our hope is in the certainty that Satan and sin and death are going to ultimately be defeated and that just as hardship and persecution have been decreed, so is the eternal reign of the Anointed One, Jesus, who is going to renew and restore all things and let us rule with him forever. Note that not everybody participates in this blessing. For not everybody is this coming of the Ancient of Days is the coming of this Messiah.

Not for everybody is it not joyful. Verse 2 says, Many who sleep in the dust will awake. Many means not all. Verse 1 says it's only those who are found written in the book that will escape. The book of life is what Revelation calls it, the most important book in history.

The book of life contains a list of all those and only those who have repented of their sins and trusted Jesus as Savior. It might be the most important question somebody has ever asked you. Is your name in that book? If we looked over the names this weekend we went through alphabetically, would we come to your name in that book? One of the worst feelings in the world to me is when I show up at some hotel late at night to check in after traveling all day, and I give them my name, Greer, expecting them to say, Mr. Greer, your room is ready, only to have the hotel clerk look back at me and say, I'm sorry, sir, your name is not on the reservation list. Let me tell you, I stand there, and I argue like there is no tomorrow. I'm like, well, I know I told my assistant to make this reservation, but inside I'm thinking, did I? Did I drop the ball on this?

By the way, my assistant, Allie, will want me to point out that this has happened only like once, maybe twice, in all the many years she's worked for me. But the point is, how tragic to find out on the most important list ever compiled that your name is not on it. Whose names are written in that book? Is it church members? Is it people who live mostly good lives?

No. It's those who have repented of their sins and surrendered control of their lives to Jesus and trusted in him as their only hope of salvation. Those who have been born again.

Has there been a time that you can point to when you were born again? Because, listen, salvation is a gift that's offered freely to all who will receive it. No matter who you are or what you've done, Jesus' death has paid for your sin. He's atoned for it, covered it.

Atoned just means covered for. Covered it forever, but you've got to receive it. It's not yours until you claim it. I read this week that last year, Americans left over three billion dollars to receive it. Three billion.

Just wasted. Never claimed. This offer is worth far more than three billion dollars. It's the price of your soul.

Do not leave it unclaimed. The suffering is limited. The resurrection is eternal. Finally, the power is available. In this in-between time, y'all, between Daniel's 69th and 70th week, Jesus has inaugurated something new. Daniel alludes to it in our key verse for this series. Verse 3. And those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the sky above, and those who turn many to righteousness are going to shine like the stars forever and ever.

Jesus talked about it this way. All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth, so go and preach the gospel in my power and make disciples of all the nations. The power and the authority of the kingdom is now here upon us to preach the gospel and make disciples.

In other words, like Daniel says, to turn many to righteousness. The full measure of the kingdom may be coming in the future, but the power is here now. Repeatedly throughout the gospels, Jesus kept telling people, y'all, you keep looking for the kingdom of God as if it's something that's only coming in the future, but I'm telling you it's right here in front of you.

I'm here. I'm the power of the kingdom. In the Holy Spirit, that power has taken root in us. So in the midst of a dark world ruled by the spirit of antichrist, we're supposed to set up little outposts of the kingdom like bright stars dotted on an ink-black sky landscape. With the power of the kingdom, we're to preach the gospel that sets people free from sin and then work with our hands to restore justice and demonstrate the kingdom and lift others out of poverty and break chains of oppression and promote peace. Our lives ought to give glimpses of that coming kingdom whose power is at work in us right now in the Holy Spirit. That's what it means to shine in Babylon.

That's why we called this series what we did. Those who are wise, those who have turned their lives over to Jesus are going to shine like the brightness of the sky above, and those who turn many to righteousness are going to shine like the stars forever and ever. That's who we are as a church. That is who God called us to be. So here's the question. Are you ready to be part of this movement?

It's the whole reason we did this series. Are you ready to be a part of this movement as we shine in Babylon? Why don't you bow your heads if you would. I've got two invitations for you.

With heads bowed, two invitations. Some of you need to trust Christ. That's the first one. You need to use an old-fashioned word, get saved. Are you sure your name is written in the book of life?

Are you sure we'd find it there if we looked in? You say, I'm not sure. Let me give you a prayer that you could express to God that would receive Christ, that would be a prayer of repentance. These are not magic words. Simply repeating them after me is not going to do anything, but if they come from your heart, this is a prayer of salvation that God will hear. Lord Jesus, I know that I cannot save myself. And I know that you did everything necessary to save me when you died on the cross. Tell him you believe that his death on the cross was for you.

Tell him that. Say, I'm ready to receive this gift, and I surrender my life to you right now. I'm turning from my sin and turning control of my life over to you. I'm turning from my sin and turning control of my life over to you right now. Now, I can't see everybody at our church, obviously, but with heads bowed and eyes closed, listen, if you prayed that prayer right now, would you just hold up your hand and just say, this weekend, I'm praying that prayer with several of you that I can see and a whole lot more that I can't see. Put your hands down. I pray for every hand that is raised. I know that you're doing something in them, and I know that, God, if they prayed from their heart and repented of their sins and received Christ as you heard them.

Here's my second invitation. For a lot of you, it's time for you to get involved. You're in Babylon. It's a hostile world. There's no neutral ground, and you need to start shining like a star.

The only way that you can do that is by becoming wise, and the only way you become wise is by submitting to Jesus. So we want you to get off the sidelines. We want you to get involved here. But maybe right now, just with heads bowed, just say, God, I'm ready. I'm ready to get off the sidelines, and I'm ready to start shining in Babylon. Are you ready to shine in Babylon? The power to make a difference comes from your commitment to be different. With the power of the Holy Spirit, you can thrive in this dark and hostile world. You're listening to Summit Life, the Bible teaching ministry of pastor, author, and theologian J.D.

Greer. If you happen to join us late, or if you would like to share this message with a friend, go to jdgreer.com. When you give to Summit Life, you're helping us expand our website and radio ministry to reach new listeners, all so that more people can dive deeper into the gospel message with us every day. We're so grateful for your partnership, and we'd love to say thanks by sending you a copy of a new resource created especially for our listeners. This is the last week to reserve your copy. Like our series, it's titled The Book of Daniel, Shining in Babylon, a nine-part inductive Bible study.

As you read and study, you'll dive deeper into this Old Testament book, rich with history and accounts of faithful and courageous Hebrews living in a land that was not their home. Ask for your copy of The Book of Daniel, Shining in Babylon, when you donate today at the suggested level of $35 or more. Give us a call at 866-335-5220. That's 866-335-5220. Or it might be more convenient to give and request the study online at jdgreer.com.

That's jdgreer.com. It's a joy to provide these gospel-centered resources, but it's only possible thanks to listeners like you. While you're on the website, you can learn about becoming a gospel partner. As a growing ministry, we desire more gospel partners to join us in helping others dive deeper into the love of God through the gospel of Jesus Christ. When you sign up for a regular ongoing monthly gift of $35 or more, you become part of our gospel partner family. We would love to have you join this special group of supporters today. I'm Molly Vidovitch inviting you to join us again tomorrow as we begin a short new teaching series called Come to the Table right here on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by J.D. Greer Ministries.