for God's sake

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, make your face to shine upon your sanctuary, which is desolate.

Daniel 9:17

Rather than focus on the intense prophetic answer given to Daniel in this chapter, I'd like to instead take encouragement from the way that the old prophet prays as we observe it here. It is convicting to me. Daniel is involved in a national intercession in this passage. He is praying for God's holy reputation to be restored in Jerusalem, even as the exiles are still held in Babylon. He lives in Babylon but the prophet's heart is obsessed with Zion. And so he intercedes, confessing the sins of a generation and begging God to restore the people and the glory of worship at the temple once again.

How Daniel makes this request is humbling. He pleas for God to be merciful to him and to the Jews in exile. He personally takes responsibility for the sin of the nation through intercessory confession, knowing that only God's mercy can cover their transgressions. But his prayer is not at all self-focused. He also appeals to God's own name, to God's glory and power, asking God to act solely for the benefit of His divine choice to bring glory to Himself. He wants God to act in the way that brings praise to God. Daniel is concerned most with God's reputation as he intercedes for Israel.

I'm afraid I've got a lot to learn in praying effectively in this way. I mostly ask and intercede for my own reputation. I make requests of God because I want something for me. Like James pointedly accuses, I "ask amiss" to spend the answer "on my own pleasures". But when my heart is consumed with desiring God's reputation above my own, only then could I begin to intercede and pray a holy prayer like Daniel does. I hope I can learn to pray not for selfish ends, but for God's sake.

not so fast,,,

If one gives an answer before he hears,

it is his folly and shame.

Proverbs 18:13

Hasty advice is no help at all, but in the age of Facebook and Twitter, where a friend can tell us about an experience half a world away seconds after it happens, I'm afraid hasty words rule my world. It is one of the real dangers of social media, and the scriptures call us to consider whether it is healthy to quickly jump into that comment thread!

It is not unusual to have someone send a post or tweet out about a ministry activity or a sermon DURING the event. Particularly with the teaching of God's Word, my hope is that it would cause us to think and make deliberate commitments to God's truth. I would rather enter into a series of discussions over months as someone processes the truth of scripture and responds to the work of the Holy Spirit than have ten thousand likes on that clever post in Facebook. It takes times to carefully listen to what God hast o say to us!

Lord,

Make me a listener. Help me to care by listen SLOWLY and CAREFULLY to You and with true attention to my brothers and sisters in Christ. I don't want to be a shameful speed counselor who answers fast and thinks little! I want to give careful attention to Your Word and Your people, becuase Your Word is the only truth, and Your people are precious enough to You that You died for them.

Amen

future perfect

Say among the nations, “The Lord reigns!

Yes, the world is established; it shall never be moved;

he will judge the peoples with equity.”

Psalm 96:10

Christians can never be satisfied with the justice or moral opinions of the society of humanity. People are fallen. Our endemic twisted natures pervert justice and subvert God's design. It doesn't matter at all... not one bit really... whether a political climate is conservative or liberal because all sinners are incapable of carrying out God's justice and will break God's Law. From the sense of God's rule, all people fail. All politicians disappoint us because sin frustrates holiness and people are sinners at their core. Our only hope for a perfect world is found in the hope and confidence this psalm generates: God has to direct His justice toward us.

This psalm calls for Israel to sing about God's justice to the nations. It looks to God's sovereign rule. It is a prayer and a song of faith and hope. When Israel sang this song in the temple, they were surrounded by Gentile powers that did not know God. How could it possibly be true for them that the world was established when so many Gentiles hated God and hated His people? These nations did not worship Yahweh. Yet the truth of God's rule of the entire universe was to be displayed in all the world. God establishes the world... even the world of the nations that do not know Him.

Believing this fact creates confidence for the future. God will judge the peoples (all the nations, Jew and Gentile) with His equity. I love the way that word "equity" is defined. It is described as God's perfect, sweet evenness. God's holiness is upright and fair. No sinner gets special treatment... yet all are offered His grace. This is what "establishes" the world under God's rule and care. He judges us. But He does so as a God of mercy and grace.

Ultimately Christians know this in the mercy and grace of Christ Who died for sinners and rose again for new life. And now as King of Kings and Lord of Lords He will judge the world in sweet, perfect justice. The hope of the world is the gospel of Jesus Christ and we must preach it among the peoples of this earth so that His Church may be established. Other societal structures are under God's rulership through the scrutiny of His justice and equity. We individual Christians, no organized church, (and thank God most of all...) nor any politicians will establish this world. God does it for His purposes, for His glory, and we worship as we look to the perfect future that Jesus brings!

a gatekeeper

The gatekeepers were on the four sides, east, west, north, and south. And their kinsmen who were in their villages were obligated to come in every seven days, in turn, to be with these, for the four chief gatekeepers, who were Levites, were entrusted to be over the chambers and the treasures of the house of God. And they lodged around the house of God, for on them lay the duty of watching, and they had charge of opening it every morning.

1 Chronicles 9:24-27

When David brought the ark of God and the tabernacle to Jerusalem, one of the main tasks became organizing the public expressions of worship in God's house. Jerusalem was big, cosmopolitan, and central to the nation's life. The ark had been in an out of the way countryside setting in Shiloh for generations. Now it was front and center in national life. That meant that more people would worship at the tabernacle now that it was located in the capital city.

Under David's leadership, the Levites appointed singers and musicians, as well as gatekeepers and guards. The worship complex in Jerusalm grew as it housed treasuries where offerings were stored and living quarters for various worship personnel. And this necessitated more staffing in order to distribute gifts and to guard them. A new class of administrative duties was created and organized around the worship of Yahweh and the offering of sacrifices in Jerusalem.

What was it like to be a gatekeeper? They rose early in the morning to open the house of God for worship. First with the tabernacle and then later in the temple, four gates (one in each cardinal direction) were to be opened. Guards were posted 24/7 and as the gatekeepers arrived, the guards would report and prepare for the day's worship activities and incoming worshipers and pilgrims. This happened every day, including the Sabbath, for priestly duties were always needed. God was always worshiped in His house and the gatekeepers kept that worship always available to God's people. 

On of these worship workers, Korah, captured the anticipation of worship each morning at the gates:

Psalm 84:10

For a day in your courts is better

than a thousand elsewhere.

I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God

than dwell in the tents of wickedness.

And since one day with God in worship is better than a thousand days without Him, a gatekeeper at God's house opened the doors to a thousand great joys!

camping in His presence

Thus did the people of Israel. According to all that the Lord commanded Moses, so they camped by their standards, and so they set out, each one in his clan, according to his fathers' house.

Numbers 2:34

God organized the camp of Israel in the wilderness. How else could such a large nomadic nation stay together? At the center of the camp was the tabernacle, where God was worshiped and His presence was visible with a pillar of smoke and fire. Around the tabernacle each tribe had its unique position and in each tribal campground, each clan encamped in a specific location. Everything was ordered by family and deliberately focused on the importance of the worship of Yahweh.

Out of worship, Israel's life was ordered. God provided the manna, they collected it and ate. Every aspect of their lives was one of dependence upon the Lord, even as each Israelite awakened to each new wilderness sunrise to find their tent door opening to a view of God's presence over the tabernacle.

In one sense for me, that same idea of ordering life around God is necessary. My house however does not face my church building! But my life must be ordered with a Christ focus. I believe strongly that scripture is that focus. I open its pages first thing each morning to see the presence of God and to hear His voice. I keep the bible and its message close in front of me at various points of my day. It is in my pockets, in my hands, before my eyes consistently because God knows that I need it and I believe that I must encamp around His presence!

Jesus is life.

For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will.

John 5:21

Jesis is a life-giving Savior. And Oh how glad I am that this is the case! Jesus came that we might have life, and have it to the fullest. Jesus fills the soul of the one who will come to Him. He will give life to one dead in trespasses and sins. He will fill with joy the broken and wounded heart. Jesus is a life-giver because Jesus IS life.

I was resurrected at the age of seven. Before that time, I was living as a dead person. I was born dead because I was born in my sins. But in 1971, God gave me life. It started with my parents, who both came to Christ after the preaching of the gospel one late spring evening. And I saw an immediate life come to them that wasn't there before. They quite fighting. The quit trying to find life in things. They loved Jesus and we worshiped Him as a family. And a few months after their conversions, I came to clearly understand the gospel and the meaning of Jesus' death and resurrection. Over several days I slowly began to realize that I needed the life that He offered. And so, I prayed the first prayer that I can remember praying and trusted Christ as my Savior. He made me alive at that moment.

I have never regretted that life! And no truly converted soul ever does. My life in Him has not been without difficulty, and Jesus promised it would mean walking a narrow way, but it has been rewarding. My new life in Christ has been dynamic, joyous, and beautiful. The Son has made me free and I am free indeed. I am so blessed to have my life in Jesus.

worthy of his calling

To this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power, so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Thessalonians 2:11-12

If any Christian life results in the glory of God, God must empower that believer to live to that end. That's what this prayer of Paul's for the church in Thessalonica instructs us to understand and practice. It calls us to trust God so that He may do in us and with us all that is good, that our work of faith would lift the name of Jesus high.

Good intentions are not enough. I believe most Christians would say that they "intend" to live godly lives. But the issue is that our flesh is incapable on its own. We will fail if we don't get at this task under the Spirit's leading and with God's power enabling us. We must follow what God does in us so that our intentions become His purposes.

Lord,

I want to live a life worthy of Your calling upon me. But sin in me weakens me. I was born a spiritually dead person and only Your Spirit can give me life. That is true in my salvation and also in my sanctification. Make me worthy as Your new creation in Christ. May my resolve to do good be because Christ's righeousness is good. May the ministry You entrust to me be done by the faith that You provide. May Your power be the strength others see in me.

And I pray for these things not so that I mak look impressive but so that the name of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ may be glorified in You, O God. May Your grace overflow in me.

Amen