Daniel 6:1-28, 2 Peter 3:1-18, Psalm 119:129-152, Proverbs 28:21-22
Today is the 29th day of November, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It is a joy to be here with you today as we spend together the last couple of days of this month. We started this month strong, day by day step-by-step, we’ll finish this month strong. And so, let’s dive in, we’re reading from the New Living Translation this week. Today, Daniel chapter 6.
Commentary:
Okay so, we just concluded second Peter in our New Testament reading today. And as the letter concludes we see pretty clearly the apocalyptic worldview of the first century, a general feeling that continues to exist until today and a problem that was introduced because of this worldview and how this, how this was addressed. So, a basic Christian apocalyptic worldview would be that the world is going somewhere and it’s going to get worse before it gets better, but it will get better, but it will get worse, way worse before that happens. A new era is coming, the world is changing, but in the end, there will be rescue and essentially a new heaven and a new earth. This idea, this sort of sense of the overarching themes here were involved in Jesus’ ministry. He spoke on these kinds of things as well, and He spoke of the immediacy of the kingdom of God like it's…it’s within you, it’s among you, it’s happening now. This was part of…of the attraction to the faith originally because it was taught that Jesus’ arrival, His return wasn’t going to be spaced out over thousands of years, it was imminent. He went away to prepare a place, He’s coming back. So, whatever you’re facing or whatever you are enduring right now is momentary, it will pass away. But the idea is it will pass away quickly, very, very soon eminently. And this was so much throughout the early churches that even in other letters we see people who are quitting their jobs to wait for Jesus’ arrival. They don’t need to work anymore and so they were told if you’re not gonna work then you’re not going to eat. So, and we’ve seen this stuff even until today. So, this apocalyptic worldview still exists with us today. This is underneath it all, how we feel, generally. This is going somewhere and it’s probably going to get worse before it gets better. So, this view arises in second Peter, it’s not the only place, but in second Peter in what we read today and presents a problem: people have believed and they have waited, and they are enduring and it is getting worse and Jesus isn’t coming, at least in the timeframe that they had assumed and so people were beginning to fade into the woodwork, to disappear, or to return back into regular Orthodox Judaism because what it was starting to feel like is it’s only getting worse but there is no rescue, He’s not showing up when He was supposed to, maybe we’re not believing the right thing. If we just think about what I just said, we realize that we end up at these crossroads ourselves maybe for different reasons. Maybe now 2000 years into the future, we understand that the arrival of Jesus will come when God wills it, but our assumptions about it aren’t going to change anything. But we do have expectations of God. We are believing for something or to be rescued from something and we’re waiting and we’re enduring and if He doesn’t show up when we expected him to than we are faced with the same kind of confusion that leads us to…to fade. The people that Peter’s writing to, they were not looking for a distant future arrival of Jesus. They were looking for an eminent arrival of Jesus. And that wasn’t happening. And so, Peter addresses this and so I quote “I want to remind you that in the last days scoffers will come mocking the truth and following their own desires, they will say what happened to the promise that Jesus is coming again. From before the times of our ancestors, everything has remained the same since the world was first created” and so that’s the setup of the problem and here’s how Peter responds to the problem “but you must not forget this one thing, dear friends, a day is like a thousand years to the Lord and a thousand years is like a day, the Lord isn’t really being slow about His promise, as some people think, no, He is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed but wants everyone to repent.” So essentially what Peter is saying to these people who are discouraged that what they thought was gonna happen has not yet happened and doesn’t look like it’s going to happen. Peter essentially says this isn’t about God’s tardiness. This is about God’s patience and then he explains a thousand years is like one day to the Lord. So, if we, in the modern era right now, take that metaphor then it’s only been a couple of days for the Lord, since this was said. So, Peter’s trying to say hey, you have to, you have to look with a God’s eye view here of time. That’s one thing that he’s saying but he’s also saying look, this isn’t really about you. You are redeemed, you are saved, what you are longing for is the reward of that. But what’s happening is you are being a witness and enduring what you are facing, which makes you a light, so that many more may also have an experience of the redemption that you are feeling and will be included in the end of all things, and rewarded with eternal life. So, you being patient is collaborating with God in his own patience with the people of the world. Certainly, God could come today, separate the sheep from the goats, destroy all of the evil and fix everything around us that could happen, but His patience is such that He loves the people who are destroying themselves and hopes, hopes for their redemption, their choice to turn and repent and follow Him and they won’t know how to even move in that direction if you don’t stay here as a city on a hill, as the salt of the earth, as the light in the darkness, if you don’t stay here as a testimony, if you don’t stay here and endure and rise above it and model that there is a better way to be a human being then they won’t know. So, your impatience is actually flying in the face of God’s patience. And so, he’s essentially inviting us to get on board with what’s really happening here. Our endurance is part of God’s work. It’s part of our collaboration in God’s work. Our endurance and our testimony are how these people that He loves will find a path to Him and that should change the dynamic of a lot of things that should, at bare minimum, force us to look at our discomforts and our impatience and our expectations and at least reframe them to the point that we begin to see that maybe we are actually collaborating with God. And maybe the word of our testimony and the light of our life, maybe it actually matters. Maybe it actually matters a lot. Maybe we should pay attention to our impatience. Maybe we should pay attention to the way that we behave toward one another because this is the word of our testimony, the weightiness of our lives, the way that we live. This is our testimony. Is it saying anything good about Jesus? Is it compelling in any way to somebody that’s within our sphere of influence that doesn’t know Jesus? But that Jesus loves deeply because we may be the one in proximity and it may not be the we have to go hand them a tract or walk them down the Romans Road, maybe we just have to live true, revealing that we have found a different way to be in this world, one that is permeated with love, one that is openhanded and patient. So, some things for us to think about as we approach the end of another month and as we certainly reached the conclusion of second Peter.
Prayer:
And so, Holy Spirit, we invite You into that, we think that if we keep our mouths shut, we’re not really saying anything which isn’t true, we’re still saying volumes with the way that we live out the convictions that we have. The way that we live into this faith and walk with You and there isn’t a day we couldn’t repent of something, we understand that we fail. The important thing is that You are patient and we know that You have been so patient with us, but we haven’t in turn been patient with the people of this earth that You love. We just want You to come and fix it and eradicate evil and get us out of here and make things right. And we do long for those things but help us to have a sense and an awareness that we are collaborating with You. We are the witness, we are the light, You are using us to tell the people of the earth that there is a better way and this is going somewhere and rescue is available before it’s too late. Come, Holy Spirit, and help us to realize the importance of our lives. We pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen.
Announcements:
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And that’s it for today. I’m Brian. I love you and I’ll be waiting for you here tomorrow.
Prayer and Encouragements:
Good morning, Daily Audio Bible community, this is Diane Olive Brown calling from and I’m from Newberg, Indiana but I’m at Beaver Island right now. And it’s the day before, it’s Thanksgiving Day but I’m listening to the reading from the day before Thanksgiving. Community, please pray for me. Because I had a dream where my uncle Don, he moved to heaven recently, he gave me a hug and he said “go to see your Aunt Denel and thank her for this hug. But my husband and my step-mom, my family don’t want me to go. I feel like God has called me to go and give her a hug from my uncle Don. There saying that you can do it on zoom. My sister is saying you can’t see my son Andrew who has, it hurts. I can’t do what I want to do. It’s been such a nice trip with mom but I shared things with her about my birth mom that I don’t think I ever shared. Family, please pray for me. Cause I want to be a light to the people here.
Hi Nita, I’m, this is Ashley from California. And I want to come on here and I just want to first and foremost say I am so sorry. If no one has told you but my heart broke for you and I want to let you know that first, I am praying for you. I am praying for strength; I am praying for wisdom and I am praying that our God who counts our tears comes and comforts you and blesses you. And, that is first and foremost what I’m praying for. But then I also want to respond to your request to pray for Robert. And I am praying for Robert that God would humble him. I ask that God would convict him and bring him to a place of confession and repentance that he would come to a place where he wants to be done with this addiction. And I am praying and I ask that, praying and asking God that he would reveal the lies and hurts that Robert has in his heart. And Nita, I want you know that there are people out there that are also going through this and they are, you’re not alone. And there is, there are ministries that can help you and that can walk with you through this season. So, I love you and I’m gonna be praying for you and praying for your husband and asking for God to just sweep through and that He would be glorified in what work is done in your house. And I just wanted you to know that and I’m grateful that you called in and I’m grateful that you called in on Thanksgiving, so I am praying for you Nita. Love, Ashley from California.
Happy Thanksgiving Family. This is Danny from Southern Oregon. Today I want to give thanks for all of the faithful husbands out there who wash their wives with the word of God. The husbands who pray with their wives, who lead their families according to Scripture, who teach their children about the love of God, who read Scripture with their wives. They just, they just take their wings, like God does with us and cover their wives and protect their wives and it’s so unusual for me to see anymore, and I can’t help but think that this world would be such a better place if more men stood up and surrendered their lives to Jesus Christ and led their families according to the way God’s set up the family. And anyway, so those of you wives who have husbands like this, O man, you have such a treasure. I hope that you honor and respect that husband of yours and just let him know how wonderful he is because he is submissive to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And so, anyway have a great Thanksgiving everybody. I love you, bye.
Hi, Daily Audio Bible family, this is Renzo in Florida. I just wanna ask for prayer today, just like, prayers for my family. My family is going through a lot of stuff right now. My mom has an ulcer that just, the doctor said that basically, it just needs to get better, hopefully. And it could turn into cancer so I just pray that it doesn’t. And if you guys could pray for that and if you could just pray for my dad as he’s just trying to find a job cause he was, he lost his job in early, in later October and he’s trying to find one right now and just let him be able to find one and if you could pray about that. If you could pray for my family there’s been a lot of struggles with our house and stuff breaking and stuff. So, if you guys could pray for that. And if you could pray for me as I’m growing my relationship with God. And I’ve been trying to find time to get caught back up on Daily Audio Bible cause I’m behind. I’ve been behind for a couple weeks now and it’s kind of getting me upset but I just have to realize that, you know, gotta keep going and gotta keep spending time with the Lord cause it’s very important. And if you guys could just pray about that. And just pray for me and my walk. And pray for my street of evangelism ministry. It’s starting up, I’ve been getting people together. If you guys could just pray that the harvest is plentiful. And thank you guys, bye. Have a blessed day, Jesus loves you, I love you too. Bye.
Hi guys, my name is Crystal and I’m calling and asking for prayer for prayer warriors out there. My heart is just breaking, my family is broken. My husband is living with another, I’m still standing for my marriage, my family, my kids, standing in the gap and loving them and doing my best. Thanksgiving was so hard, especially at night time when I hear my kids crying. I just ask for endurance and strength in Christ this Christmas season to make it through and to shine right, shine with God’s love to my kids. Just to teach them morals, integrity, faith in Christ and to persevere and to live a happy life regardless of my circumstances because God’s in control and God has this. I’m just asking for restoration: my husband’s soul, our marriage, and our family. If my prayer warriors out there can help me, I would greatly appreciate it. Again, my name is Crystal, my husband is Chris and we have our children. I thank you so much and enjoy this time with Brian in listening to everybody out there. I love it and I lift all ya’ll up in prayer. Thank you so much, bye bye.