Well, this morning, if you've got your Bibles with you, I thought I was going to say go to Luke, but we're going to take just a break this Sunday from Luke and go to Daniel chapter 9. So we're going to go back to the Old Testament. Daniel chapter 9. And this morning we're going to be looking at verses 1 through 19 in the book of Daniel. It's a great reminder of the power of prayer when God's people pray and seek His face, what God can do and how He answers our prayers and how He can restore and revive us. So let's begin reading in Daniel chapter 9 and we'll read all the way to verse 19. It says, In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus, a descent of Mede, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans. In the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that according to the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years. Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to the Lord my God and made confession, saying, O Lord, the great and awesome God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments. We have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from Your commandments and rules. We have not listened to Your servants, the prophets, who spoke in Your name, to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. To You, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us open shame, as at this day. To the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, and all the lands to which You have driven them, because of the treachery that you have committed against you. To us, O Lord, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him and have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God by walking in his laws, which he set before us by his servant, the prophets. All Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice. And the curse and oath that are written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, has been poured out upon us because we have sinned against him. He has confirmed His word which He spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us by bringing upon us a great calamity. For under the whole heaven there has not been done anything like what has been done against Jerusalem. As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us. Yet we have not entreated the favor of the Lord our God, turning from our iniquities and gaining insight by your truth. Therefore the Lord has kept ready the calamity and brought it upon us. For the Lord our God is righteous in all the works that He has done, and we have not obeyed His voice. And now, O Lord God, who brought Your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and have made a name for yourself, as at this day we have sinned, we have done wickedly. O Lord, according to all your righteous acts, let your anger and your wrath turn away from your city Jerusalem, your holy hill, because our sins and for the iniquities of our fathers. Jerusalem and your people have become a byword among all who are around us. Now therefore, O God, listen to the prayer of your servant and to his pleas for mercy. And for your own sake, Lord, make your face shine upon your sanctuary which is desolate. O my God, incline your ear and hear. Open your eyes and see our desolations and the city that is called by Your name. For we do not present our pleas before You because of our righteousness, but because of Your great mercy. O Lord, hear. O Lord, forgive. O Lord, pay attention and act. Delay not for Your own sake. O my God, because Your city and Your people are called by Your name. Let's pray. Father, as we come to You this morning, And as we come to this passage where Daniel cries out, please, for mercy for your people, Lord, to come and restore them and to come and revive them. Lord, we pray the same thing for us this morning. We pray that You would show Your power in our life, that You would come and You would forgive us of all of our sin and our iniquity. I pray that, Lord, You would give us a contrite heart, that You would break us, Lord, that You would show us, Lord, our sin and our need of Jesus. And I pray that, Father, that You would just revive us here today, revive this church, revive the churches around us. And we just pray, Lord, that You would come in a mighty and powerful way. Lord, we ask these things in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen. You may be seated. Well, this morning we're looking at the book of Daniel here in Daniel chapter 9. And this is a powerful passage. And it reminds us of how it is sometimes with God's people. They find themselves far from the blessings of God. Sometimes they find themselves far from the presence of God because they have strayed and wandered from Him. We find this when we go to some of the churches in Revelation. We find that even though they're churches, even though they're made up of God's people, they have drifted from the Lord. For example, the book of Revelation in chapter 2 describes the church at Ephesus, how it had forgotten its first love, which was the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, think about that. A church that has gotten away from its first love. I think about the day and age in which we live in, and I look around And I will tell you that it is, I believe, nothing like what I grew up in. I remember growing up, even though there were problems in that day, the same as there are today in the church, it was a different time. And if I go back even farther and I look back to the days of my grandparents and so forth, I hear of other things that God used to do. and would show up and work and move in the lives of churches. But it seems like over the last probably 20-25 years, it seems like there's been a coldness that has come over the church, and it seems like it has gotten worse. and worse. And it's not because of God, because the Bible tells us, as we read in James, that if we draw near to Him, He will draw near to us. And so, why do we find God not manifesting His presence among the churches today, the way He has in times past? Well, it's not because God has moved, but I believe it is because God's people have moved. And so we look around us and we find that basically we find churches that are empty, we find churches that are dying, and even the ones that are packed. It doesn't mean that the Spirit of God is at work there. As we talked about last week, quoting Spurgeon, When he saw big crowds, he was also reminded that there are theaters that have large crowds. So that doesn't necessarily mean that there is a move of God. God's people have become a byword among the nation in which we live in. The church at one time, for example, in our day, growing up, The church wouldn't, or the society, let's say, would not even infringe upon the church's right to Wednesday night or Sunday. Now you look out and schools have basketball games and soccer games and all kinds of other things going on during those times when God's people worship and when they come together. But now it's not that way. The church is just kind of an afterthought. They are no real influence on society. And why is that? It is because God's people have allowed sin in their lives, they have drifted from God, and they have not sought the face of God like they should. And that's the case that we see here in the book of Daniel. Now, we'll get into this in just a moment, but I want to tell you a story from a book that I read many years ago, and maybe you're familiar with that book, but it's called Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire, by a man by the name of Jim Cimbala. We may not agree with everything that he's ever said, but who are you going to agree with on everything that they've ever said? But I believe it's him to be a godly man. And in his book, he tells a story about in 1971, he was called to this little church called the Brooklyn Tabernacle in New York. And this church was on the verge of closing its doors. And in his book, Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire, he describes the situation this way, and I quote, The ceiling was low, the walls needed paint, the windows were dingy, and the wood floor hadn't been sealed in years. And the air conditioning did not work, there was no money for the improvements on the church facility, and only a handful of people filled the sanctuary that could seat 200 people. and to top it off, during one of the sermons, the church pew collapsed that dumped five people onto the floor. Everything in that church seemed to be going wrong. Every single thing. But because Simbala had been called there, and because he had a heart for God's people, and to serve the Lord, he continued to stay there for better or worse. And despite having been called to this church, and despite all that was going on there, And he finally, in the midst of his ministry there, he had a breakdown. And it was in the pulpit. He got there one night, and he began to preach, and he was so depressed by what he saw all around him, that in the midst of his sermon, in that situation, he started choking up. Tears came to his eyes, and he told the congregation, he said, I cannot do this anymore. And so, gloom engulfed him, and he began to cry, and all he could say to the people was, quote, I'm sorry. I can't preach in this atmosphere. Something is terribly wrong. I don't know what to say. I can't go on. And so, he goes on to say how his wife would play something on the piano, and he just cried out to the people. He said he could not go on, and while she played, people began to cry out. people begin to confess sins. And so that's what happened. In the midst of all of this, as he finally just broke and could not go on in his own strength, and he mentioned that to the people, all of a sudden God's Spirit fell upon that place. There was one man in the back who came forward and he began to confess and cry out aloud. He was one of the ushers. And he began to confess that he had been taking money from the offering plate. And so what happened was, from that point on, people began to erupt in confession of sin. And they started confessing their sin and forsaking it right there in the meeting. And when they began to do that, everything changed. It was like God's presence came down upon that place. And ever since that time, that small group of people started crying out to God, that church has grown, it has been blessed by God, and many and countless people have been saved in that church. If you know anything about that church, many drug addicts, many prostitutes and homeless people, and have come to that church and come to know the Lord. If you read about some of the stories how God has used that place to reach a lost and dying world, it is amazing. But they have planted many churches, they have produced much music in that congregation, and now that church runs many, many people, well over a thousand people. And one of the things that they still are focused on in that church is prayer. is prayer. They have regular prayer meetings that go on for an hour, two hours, and they pray and they seek the face of God. And I believe that when God's people pray, when they truly seek after God, and they pray, and not just pray, but they begin doing as James talks about, drawing near to God, resisting the devil, confessing their sins, God will draw near to His people. And that's what we're going to look at this morning in this passage. We're going to see the same pattern here in what happens when Daniel begins to pray in Daniel 9. Let's look at this passage together, and let's think about the situation at hand. First of all, when we think about this passage, we have to think about the context in which we find it in, where God's people are, and what is going on here. And so, we have to go back to the Old Testament, all the way back to the Law of Moses, to the days of Moses in Deuteronomy. God had warned His people, He had called them out of Egypt, He had made them His own, and He said that basically promised His presence among them, promised them many blessings and so forth, if they would follow after Him. But there was a condition. In Deuteronomy chapter 4, He talked about, to the people, of how if they went away from Him, then nothing but bad would happen. Listen to Deuteronomy chapter 4 and verses 25 through 27. And I'm setting all this up to get to Daniel 9, so follow with me closely. God said to His people, If you then become corrupt, this is after they have come into the Promised Land, He said, If then you become corrupt and make any kind of idol, doing evil in the eyes of the Lord your God, and provoking Him to anger, I call heaven and earth as witnessed against you this day, that you will quickly perish from the land. that you are crossing the Jordan to possess. You will not live long there, but will certainly be destroyed. The Lord will scatter you among the peoples, and only a few of you will survive among the nations to which the Lord will drive you." Instead of heeding the voice of the Lord, instead of continuing to seek the Lord and following Him, God's people begin to rebel. You go to the book of Judges, now they rebelled before that in some ways, but especially in the book of Judges onward, you find this continual movement away from God towards idolatry, towards sin, and all kinds of filth and wickedness. And that's what God's people did. They went away from Him. And so God was true to His promise. He sent prophet after prophet to them, warning them about what was going to happen, calling upon them to repent, calling upon them to return, calling upon them to return to the Lord their God, but they would not listen. And so, God warned the people through the prophet Jeremiah about the coming judgment. And if you want to follow along with me, go to Jeremiah 25. We'll read verses 1-11. And we'll hear what Jeremiah said to God's people in that day. Jeremiah 25, verses 1-11. I'll give you just a second there to turn to that passage. God has warned them in Deuteronomy, and now this is many years later, in Jeremiah 25, verses 1-11, it says, The word came to Jeremiah concerning all the people of Judah in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, which was the first year of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon. So Jeremiah the prophet said to all the people of Judah, and to all those living in Jerusalem, For twenty-three years, from the thirtieth year of Josiah, son of Ammon, king of Judah, until this very day, the word of the Lord has come to me, and I have spoken to you, notice this, again and again, but you have not listened or paid any attention. They said, Turn now, each of you, each of you, from your evil ways and your evil practices. And you can stay in the land that the Lord gave to you and your fathers forever and ever. Do not follow other gods to serve and worship them. Do not provoke me to anger with what your hands have made. Then I will not harm you, but you did not listen to me, declares the Lord. And you have provoked me with what your hands have made, and you have brought harm to yourselves. Therefore, the Lord Almighty says this, Because you have not listened to my words, I will summon all the peoples of the north, and my servant Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, declares the Lord, and I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants And against all the surrounding nations I will completely destroy them and make them an object of horror and scorn and everlasting ruin. I will banish them from the sounds of joy and gladness, the voices of bride and bridegroom, the sound of millstones and the light of the lamp. This whole country will become a desolate wasteland. And these nations will serve the king of Babylon, listen to this, 70 years. Well, God always fulfills His promise, and that's exactly what He did. God did not lie about His promise, because, in fact, we know that in 605 BC, God brought to power the Babylonian Empire. They came into existence, And in 605 BC, the Babylonians defeated the Assyrians and the Egyptians, which gave them superiority over the ancient Near East. After this defeat, Nebuchadnezzar became king following his father's death, and in that same year, Nebuchadnezzar and his Babylonian army began to reign, and they began to deport God's people out of Judah into Babylon. They deported them out along with the vessels used in Solomon's temple to worship the Lord God, and this was the first of three deportations that they would undergo. And finally, the big The big one came in 586 BC. They came in and they sacked Jerusalem, and they carried off God's people. The troops came in, they destroyed the city walls, they knocked down everything, and they took away the people leaving the poorest there in Babylon. And it was a very dark time for God's people. The Babylonians came in and carried them away. No longer were they in the land of promise. No longer were they in the land of milk and honey with God's blessings flowing down upon them and the presence of God manifesting Himself there amongst them. No longer was there joy for God's people. It was a dark day. It was a hard time. And Psalm 137 describes at best what it was like after they had been delivered off into exile out of Jerusalem. Listen to Psalm 137, 1-4. This is what they said as they were there in Babylon. It says, By the rivers of Babylon we sat and we wept when we remembered Zion. Remembering Jerusalem. There on the poplars we hung our harps. Now, you've got to think about it. This was a singing people. They were rejoicing. They had many singers in their midst. They had David and so forth, and others, the sons of Asap. They hung their harps there in Babylon on the trees. It says, For there our captors asked us for songs, our tormentors demanded songs of joy. They said, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land? The joy was out. It was gone from them. There was no joy. There was no singing. They were in despair and despondency. They were far from home. They were in the presence of God. God was not manifesting Himself amongst them. And so there they were in a foreign country, surrounded by unbelieving pagan Gentiles, and all of this had happened because they had drifted from the Lord. All of this happened because of their sin, because of their rebellion, because they were far from God, because of their compromises. Now, if you go to Isaiah, and you read Isaiah 1, it wasn't that they quit worshipping. In fact, they were still observing all the feasts and the festivals. They were doing sacrifices and all of this. But do you remember what God said to the prophet Isaiah? Who is required of you, this trampling of My courts? who is required of you to lift your hands, and he goes, you lift your hands, but I'm not going to listen. Why? Because they had religion, but they had also sin, and ways in which they had compromised in their lives. So because of their disobedience, because of their desire for worldliness, and their love for other gods, God had withdrew Himself from His people. And anyway, because of that, the judgment of God had fallen upon them. And in the midst of this dark, desolate place, having been there for several years, having experienced the desperation and desolation of being there in Babylon, we find the prophet Daniel here in Daniel chapter 9, crying out to God. There he is in Babylon, and he comes to a fresh realization that God is not finished with His people, that there is still hope while there is air in their lungs. There are still promises that God has made for those who have strayed from God, that if they will seek His face, that God will hear from heaven, and He will come, and He will heal their land. The applications here are many, I believe, for the church today. Now, we're not ancient Israel. We're not being deported from some land or anything like that. But I do believe that there are many parallels. I think that this is a pattern that you find not just with Israel, but you find even with the church in the New Testament. And the reason I say that is, if you were to go over to the book of Revelation, and you look at all of those churches, the seven churches, what you find with most of them is that there are compromises, there is sin, and because of that, God has disciplined them in some way. There is a danger for them in some way. In fact, as I mentioned in the book of Revelation chapter 2, Ephesus had left its first love. Then there was the church at Pergam, where some were engaged there in idolatry, in sexual immorality. There was a church at Sardis. Jesus said of that church, you have a reputation of being alive, but you're dead. You have a reputation of being alive, but you're dead. And then there was a church at Laodicea. The church at Laodicea, He describes it as being wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked. and it needed to return to Christ. Christ was on the outside of the door knocking that they might open up to Him, that He might come in and might dine with them. And so what you see with the church is many of those things you see with the nation of Israel. Nothing has changed. There are times when God's people drift. And those times when you don't see the power of God, those times when you see it look like everything's on the downhill, on the downgrade, The reason for that is because God's people have strayed. Because there are things in people's lives within the congregation that they have allowed in that have grieved the Spirit of God. It is because God's people are not praying and seeking God's face. And so I'm not here this morning to preach law or to condemn anyone, but I want you to look around, not just to this church, but all around us and say, what has changed? What has changed over the last 40, 50 years in the church in America? Because at one time you would have great moves of God in this country, going back to the 1800s and even the 1700s. And we read about those stories, the great revivals and the great ways in which God would come and just masses would be swept into the kingdom. God's people would be revived and they would have a new affervency to go out and preach the gospel and they would have a great love and focus on Christ. What has happened? And you look at today and you're like, well, none of that is happening. We don't really see that. In fact, many of the leaders that we would say that are out there in the spotlight, many of them have fallen. It seems like every day you hear of someone else who has fallen. And they have fallen into sin and disrepute. And you see churches that are closing their doors in record numbers. And you say, what has happened? Is God not powerful? Has God changed? Well, no, the Bible says He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And so I think that what we need to say is, we need to stop living off of the past acts of God And we need to rejoice in those, but instead of just talking about the Great Awakening, instead of talking about the Welsh Revival, instead of talking about the days when God revived His people in the days of Pentecost, and the ways that God revived His people in the Old Testament, instead of living off of those days, we need to say, why is God not acting in some way like that in our day? Where is the power? I mean, we've got all kinds of things at our disposal, probably more than any other generation of Christians. I mean, think about it. Conferences. Over the last 20 years, there's been more conferences probably in the last 20 years than there probably has been in the last 100 years. Over the last 10 years, 15 years, books have been churned out left and right. All these Christian books just churned out left and right. We have Christian music, songs being written all the time and so forth. Some of them good, some of them bad. We have all kinds of things like that going on. We have all of this Bible software and we can just study the Bible and we can come to a passage and have all the cross-references at our fingertips. where guys used to have to search and go through book after book and bring it all together. And we have all of this, but yet we are at the weakest point probably that the church has been in probably a hundred years, two hundred years. And so what has happened? What has happened in our nation? What has happened in our churches? Well, the thing that we find is the churches have gotten away from seeking God in prayer. We have been comfortable, I heard an old preacher say years ago, that the problem is that we have built playhouses rather than prayer houses. and how true that is. You had these churches, you had the movement back around the 2000s, everybody's building a family life center and basketball gyms and all that. Well, I'm not against any of that. If you want to have that and have fellowship and hang out and things like that, there's nothing wrong with that. But if that's what you're doing as though that's the hand of God and the work of God, and you're settled with that, and you're fine with that, then you've got it all wrong. As the late Leonard Ravenhill said in his book, A Revival Praying, he said, surely we need some new injection to the church of the living God immediately. And the path of this power is that, first, we must renounce all known sin. Second, there must be sorrowful confession that we have failed so much and have been satisfied so long with the status quo. And third, we must seek God's face in earnest prayer. And finally, we must study God's Word in order to uncover the promises of God directed to this desperate age and our needy churches. And so that's the situation we're in. That is the situation that Israel was in, and Daniel knows it well. And what does Daniel do? Well, let's look here in verses 1-3. In Daniel 9, 1-3, we find that Daniel is in a situation of desperation, despondency, and despair. And what Daniel does is somehow or another, he gains a copy of Jeremiah, the book of Jeremiah, Jeremiah 29, 10-14. Notice there, that Daniel, he says in verses one through three, in the first year of King Darius, the son of Ahasuerus, by descent Amid, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans, in the first year of his reign, notice this, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that according to the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet must pass before the end of desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years. What is he talking about? Go with me to Jeremiah 29, 10-14. Daniel had God's Word before him. Somehow or another, he had Jeremiah 29. Now, they didn't have chapters and verses in those days, but he had this section of Jeremiah. And in despair, in this dreadful situation that they had found themselves in, in captivity in Babylon, because of their sin and because of all of their forsaking of God, Daniel comes to Jeremiah 29, 10-14, and this is what he reads. This is what the Lord says. When 70 years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place, that is, Jerusalem. For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future. Then you will call upon Me, and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you, and you will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares the Lord, and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and the places where I banished you, declares the Lord, and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile. Daniel read that, and here he's in Babylon. They've been there 70 years, and what Daniel realizes from God's Word was a promise. Number one, captivity will last 70 years, and God would bring His people back home. Number two, he sees the means by which God is going to do this, bring them back from their desolation, from their exile. It would happen when they would seek God in prayer with all of their heart. So what does Daniel do in verse two? I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that according to the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely seventy years. Then I turned my face to the Lord God seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. He reads the promise, captivity is going to last 70 years, but you must pray and you must seek my face and you'll find me when you seek me with all your heart. And so what does he do? He says, I turn my face to the Lord seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth with ashes." Now, this wasn't just, Lord, thank you for this day, please deliver us from captivity type of prayer, and that was it. No, he turned his face to the Lord and he sought him. He didn't just toss up a prayer He didn't just pray for a couple minutes, but this was earnest prayer. This was a pleading prayer. This was urgent prayer. This was a prayer where Daniel got on his knees in his face and cried out to God. This is a prayer where he pleaded with God. He pounded on heaven's door. He sought God with all of his heart, and his mind, and his soul, and his strength. He prayed to God. Now, there are some in our day who would say, Well, God said it would only last 70 years, so the Word of God says that, and we'll just rest in that. And we don't have to pray, because we know it's just going to be 70 years. But they ignore the other part. That yes, it is true that God will do that for Israel here. It's true and all of that, but there's some who will act as though we just need to be passive and do nothing. As though God has not prescribed the means to be brought back to God. God prescribed the means to be brought back to God, and that is when God's people would pray. The promise was there. They would come back from captivity, but they had to pray. And I believe it is this way in our day as well. There are people who think, well, God will bring revival when He wants to. I believe that. I believe that God is sovereign and that God, it is only in His timing. But you know what God has also put in His Word? He talks about all throughout that if God's people will seek Him. Now I know some might say, well that promise back there in Chronicles, that's to Israel. No, it is to Israel. But those things were written down for our instruction on whom the end of the ages come. And there are principles by which we can live by based upon those promises of the Old Testament given to Israel. And throughout the Bible, we find even in James, that if we will draw near to Him, if we confess our sins and forsake them, if we do all of that, what is going to happen? God is going to hear and He is going to answer our prayers. And so that's what we must do. We must not be passive and just sit back. God has called us to seek Him and to pursue Him with all of our hearts. And sure, Daniel knew that God was going to fulfill this promise, but only when God's people sought Him. And so that is what he did. He called upon the Lord. He knew what Jeremiah said, but he also knew that Jeremiah said, you will call upon Me and come to pray to Me and I will listen to you and you will seek Me and find Me. when you seek Me with all of your heart." And so that's what he did. Prayer is what God used to revive His people. God heard and He answered Daniel's prayer. And that's the way it has been all throughout history. Every time you see a mighty move of God, every time you see the church really on fire for the Lord and God doing mighty things, you will find, guarantee it, every single time that someone has prayed. someone or more than one people that they have been pleading with God in prayer. There's a book that I have, it's called Sketches of a Pastor's Life by Ichabod Spencer. And this guy from the 1800s writes down all of these different stories about what he experienced in pastoral ministry. And on one occasion he went to a woman's house and to visit her and to check up on her. And she told him, revival's coming. Revival's coming. God is going to pour out His Spirit. And he was like, how do you know that? How do you know that that's going to happen? Well, Mr. So-and-so, I've been watching him for some time now, and every day he'll go into that barn or whatever it was, and he'll go up there and he'll spend hours in prayer. And he said, sure enough, it came. God came in power. and came upon His people. And that is what you find every time God's people get serious about their sin, about their need for God, they get desperate and they cry out to God in prayer. Isn't that what God promised the church at Laodicea? If they would recognize their condition, that they're nothing without Him, that they're blind and naked and all of this, and they will open the door, what does Jesus promise? He'll come in and he'll dine with them. He'll fellowship with them. Jim Cimbala says it this way. He said of American Christianity, we are like the church at Laodicea. In fact, we have so institutionalized Laodiceanism that we think lukewarm is normal. In any church, winning more than a few people to Christ is considered outstanding. The trouble, though, is that it is The trouble, though, is that Jesus is not impressed. You see, that is the problem today. We think that this is normal. We think what we've experienced over the last ten years is normal. It's not. What we need to see is a mighty move of God in our midst. And so, what we need to do is seek the Lord in prayer. You see, the church today doesn't need more conferences. The church today doesn't need more books. The church today doesn't even need more preaching. We have more sermons than... I go to my podcasts that I have, or the different apps, and I don't even know where to start. There are so many sermons. We need those things, but we don't need more of them. What we need is for God's people to get serious about prayer. They need to pray and to seek the Lord's face. But before we do this, we have to get out of this mindset that we are just to be passive and somehow we'll see a mighty move of God. No, God's people are to be active, seeking after the Lord. Listen to some of the scriptures that give us promises of what happens when God's people believe and they come to Him in prayer. Matthew 7, 7-11 says, Ask, and it will be given to you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks, it will be opened. Or which of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him? John 14, 12 through 14, Jesus said, Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in Me will also do the works that I do. And greater works than these will he do, because I am going to My Father. Whatever you ask in My name, this will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. And if you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it. John 15, 7, If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you." 1 John 5, 14-15. And this is the confidence that we have towards Him that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the request that we have asked of Him. And James 4, 2 says, you do not have because you do not ask. This means The means by which God restores His people is through prayer. And again, Daniel understood this. He knew that the time of captivity was coming to an end, but he must seek the face of God as God commanded. So let's look at Daniel's prayer here real quick. We'll run through this. What did Daniel pray in order for God to hear and restore His people? Well, look in verse... We'll start in verse 3. It says, Then I turned my face to the Lord, seeking Him by prayer and pleas for mercy, with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. That was a way of expressing humility. That was a way of expressing the desires of the heart. It was an outward manifestation of the heart's disposition towards God. He was fasting and he was there sitting with sackcloth and ashes. Sackcloth was a very rough material. He didn't want any comforts. He wanted to remind him of the place in which he was in, and ashes. That was basically to express the anguish that he was in. He was anguishing in prayer, pleading making pleas to God for mercy, and he was also giving up things. He wanted a singular focus. His focus didn't want to be food and things that would comfort him, but he wanted to fast and he wanted to seek the Lord. And so he seeks the Lord, and in verse 4 we see, He begins by reminding himself of who God is. Verse 4, he says, I prayed to the Lord, my God, and made confession, saying, O Lord, the great and awesome God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love Him and keep His commandments. What was the covenant? That covenant that he's referring to is that covenant that he had made with Abraham. Well, sorry, Moses. The covenant He had made with Moses. And what was that covenant? Well, if they went away from Him, the curses would fall upon them. But if they would draw near to God, God would hear and God promised that He would answer and He would bring them back. And so he remembered those covenant promises. He remembered that God was great and awesome in his prayer. And so he cries out to God, who's the Lord. And he says, He's my God. And so he's reminding himself of who God is. And that's what we need to begin with. We need to remind ourselves that God is able to forgive. that God is mighty and that He is awesome and He is a great God. He is Lord and He is the sovereign Lord. And nothing is too hard for Him. We look around and it looks like, man, how are we ever going to get out of this mess? How are we ever going to survive the situation in which we find ourselves in today as a church? Weak, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. How are we going to do this? Well, God is Lord. He is the sovereign Lord. He is the awesome God. He is great. He is powerful. He is mighty. And we need to pray those things. And as we go on here, we see that He begins the confession of sin. That's where we need to begin as well. He says, we have sinned. He confesses and He agrees with God about this. And He includes Himself in this, though He is a prophet. We have sinned. and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules. And we have not listened to your servants, the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. And so he begins to confess sin. And that is what God always calls His people to do. In James 4, when He says, that if you'll draw near to Me, I'll draw near to you, that's followed by telling the people to confess their sins, and forsake their sins, and repent of their sins. And so we need to acknowledge sin in our lives. If there's any sin in your life, if there's any sin that would be grieving the Spirit of God and quenching the Spirit of God, then you need to forsake that sin and go to God and cry out for forgiveness. Then we find the acknowledgement of their condition. He says, to you, O Lord, belongs righteousness. But to us, open shame, as at this day, to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all of Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, and all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you." So he's acknowledging their condition. And he acknowledges why God's people are in the condition that they're in, in verses 9-12. He says in verse 9, To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against Him and have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God by walking in His laws, which He set before us by His servants, the prophets. And so, all Israel has transgressed, your law has been turned aside, refusing to obey your voice, and the curse and the oath that are written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, has been poured out upon us because we sinned against him. It's because of us that we're in this situation, not because God has chosen and said, well, this is what I'm going to do. I'm just going to withdraw my presence. and bring disaster upon this city and all of that. Yes, God does those things. He withdraws, He brings disaster, judgments, discipline, all of those things, but it's always in response to those who have rejected God. He goes on in verse 12, and He says, He has confirmed His words which He spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us by bringing upon us a great calamity. For under the whole heaven there has not been done anything like what has been done against Jerusalem. Verse 13, the acknowledgment of their failure to obey. He says, As it is written in the law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us yet we have not entreated the favor of the Lord our God." Why are we still in this situation? Because we have not entreated the favor of the Lord our God. Why is the church in the situation it is today? Because people have not entreated the favor of the Lord our God, turning from our iniquities and gaining insight by your truth. Verse 14, Therefore the Lord has kept ready the calamity and brought it upon us. For the Lord our God is righteous, in all the works that he has done, and we have not obeyed his voice." And so there is appeal for mercy and forgiveness. He says in verse 15, in light of the way we've acted, in light of our condition, in light of our failure to obey, he says in verse 15, now, O Lord God, who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, He is appealing again to the character of God. And if you have made a name for yourself, as it is this day, we have sinned and we have done wickedly. O Lord, according to all your righteous acts, let your anger and your wrath turn away from your city Jerusalem. Your holy hill, because of our sins and for the iniquity of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a byword among all of those who are around us. Now, therefore, will God listen to the prayer of your servant and to his pleas for mercy, for your own sake, O Lord, and make your face shine upon your sanctuary which is desolate." What was the sanctuary? Well, it was there, the temple, the temple that had been destroyed. It was desolate. It was in rubble. But He's saying, make your face shine upon it. They will come back and they will build the temple, as we see in the Old Testament, they did that, the second temple. But He says, Make your face shine upon your sanctuary which is desolate. There may be churches today that are not in rubble, but there are churches that are in rubble in a spiritual way. And what we need is God to come and to shine His face upon His people once again. He cries out in verse 18, Oh my God, incline your ear and hear. Open your eyes and see our desolations in the city that is called by your name. For we do not present our pleas before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy. O Lord, hear. O Lord, forgive. O Lord, pay attention and act. Delay not for your own sake, O my God, because your city and your people are called by your name. He cries out to God with pleas and mercy. He cries out for God. to act on behalf of His great name, for His glory. Don't do these things because we're not worthy. We're not asking you to do this because of our righteousness, because we're not righteous. But we're asking you to do these things because of who you are. You're a merciful God. You're a forgiving God. You're a God who hears and sees. And not only that, but you're a God who is concerned about your own name. So come and do these things for your glory. And so while he was speaking and praying and confessing the sin and the sin of his people Israel, what happens? Well, we see as we read on, Gabriel comes and gives him an answer. God had heard from heaven the pleas and the cries for forgiveness and mercy and all of those things. And here we see one man praying for an entire nation. And God hears, and He answers, and if we read on in the book of the Old Testament, we find that God's people return. We know this from Ezra 1 and 2, that the people returned to Jerusalem, each to his own town, and what we need today is the same thing. We need restoration. We need revival. We need God to come and to do a mighty work and for His face to shine upon His people once again. You say, well, God's everywhere. He doesn't leave us. He'll never leave us nor forsake us. I agree. God is everywhere. He will never leave nor forsake His people. But you know what I do believe? And I think we see it in Scripture. There are times when God withdraws His manifest presence. And there are times when God's people cry out to Him, and God comes down in power and does amazing things amongst us, revives hearts, convicts hearts of sin and so forth, and people get right with God. And many people come to know the Lord Jesus Christ. And so what we need to take away from this this morning, as we look around and we see our condition, First, we go to the Bible. We remind ourselves in the Bible of who God is. That's what he did. Daniel went and he perceived in the books how many years they would be in captivity and what God required. of them in praying and seeking His face. And so we need to start with the Bible. We go to the Bible and we take hold of those promises of what God has said will happen if His people will seek Him. And we go and we claim those promises. And we rely upon them. We hold fast to them. And when we do that, it bolsters our prayers. And then we need to go on and we need to confess our sins. If there's any sins in our life, we need to confess. That's what Daniel did in 4-15. He was becoming truthful about the condition of himself and the people around him. He recognized sin. He called sin for what it was. He didn't give it names that softened the sin. He called it for what it was. Wickedness and rebellion, treachery in verse 7, disobedience in verse 10. And he recognized God as righteous and holy, and that He was to be feared, and He was great, and He was merciful and forgiving. And what he did is he went and confessed his sin to God, who was able to forgive. And then, he remembered past mercies. He goes back in verse 15 to what God did with His people in Egypt. And now, O Lord our God, who didst bring Thy people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand. God, You did this before. We've seen what You've done in great revivals in times past. We saw what You did on the day of Pentecost. We saw what You did even here with Daniel. Lord, do it again. Please come and hear our prayers. And if there is any sin, confess them and, Lord, forgive us of our sins. And what has God promised to do? God will come for His own namesake. We ought to be praying for God's name to be glorified. Not for our sakes do this, but for Your great name. That others might come to know You. That we might have a fresh vision of You, Lord. That we would not be focused on the things of this world. And so, here in Daniel 9, we have a great example of God's people praying, a specific person, Daniel, praying for God to come and to revive His people, and we see that God hears and He answers this prayer. I believe God can do that same thing today, and I think that sometimes we get complacent. and we get complacent and we don't really look for God to do much, but we go on about our day and maybe we don't forsake sins the way we should. We don't seek the face of God the way that we should. But I want to challenge each and every one of us to seek the face of God and to forsake any sin in your life and go to God and ask Him to search your heart. And if there's anything that is between you and God that is keeping you from seeing the manifest presence of God in your life, from seeing God do great things in your life, and coming and fellowshipping with you and dining with you, then confess that sin. Ask God to show you those things that would be a hindrance. And may we seek the face of God and ask Him to come and to bless and show His power again in our churches. Not just this church, but even the churches around us. So let's begin this morning. Let's bow our heads together and pray. And maybe it is that you don't know Christ as Lord and Savior, and you are in sin, and you know nothing about the power of God that we speak of. And maybe it is that you just need to be saved. You need Christ in your life, and so I would encourage you to repent. Turn away from your sins, confess your sins, and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation. Let's bow our heads together, and if there's any sin in your life, confess it. and ask God to forgive, and ask God to come and revive our hearts again, those around you, your own heart, and those in other churches as well. But let's pray. Father, as we come to you this morning, Lord, we know that we are nothing without you. And Lord, we know that so many times we have allowed worldliness and the things of this world to take away our attention from you. We have focused on things of this world that do not profit, that hold no water, that do not satisfy, that bring no good. And Lord, we have taken our eyes off of you. Lord, we have not sought you the way that we should. Lord, we know, and I believe everybody in here, I'm not saying anything, but no one doesn't already know that when we look around us, we look in this church, we look perhaps even into our lives, we look into churches around us, that Lord, something's missing. There's a lot of activity. There's a lot of things that go on, but we see little power. We see little joy in people's hearts. We see very little desire for you, even among churchgoers. Lord, there is an indifference towards the things of God in our day. And Lord, we know that it is because even though there are prayers that are offered, even though there are sermons preached, even though there are conferences and books and all of these things at our disposal apps and Bible softwares and all of that. Even though we have multiple Bibles at our house, Lord, we know that there's something missing. And even though we have all of that, Lord, and even though we may have salvation and have trusted in You as Savior and Lord and have the hope of heaven and all of those things, many of us, Lord, are living off of crumbs. We're not living to the fullest. We're not living in perfect communion with You and fellowship. And so, Lord, we ask that You would come that You would truly revive us. We pray that You would come and You would convict us of sin. Lord, if there's any sin in people's life today, in my life or anybody here this morning, Lord, bring about conviction. And may there be confession and repentance and a turning away from sin and turning to You, our great Savior, who with You there is plentiful redemption, there is mercy. And Lord, I pray that we would be reminded of that. Lord, we pray that You would come And You would revive us, Lord, lest we perish, lest we just fade away into oblivion, where we just fade away and we're not living for You and we're making no difference in this world whatsoever. Lord, I pray that You would come and You would show Your power for Your namesake, for Your glory, and that, Lord, the world around us would see that, Lord, our God is real. Lord, be with our lost loved ones. We pray that You would come and You would save them. that you would do a mighty work in their heart. And Lord, for all who are going through struggles and trials and difficulties that have tested their faith over the last few years, Lord, I pray that you would help us to hang on to your strength and that, Lord, we would come to you and look away from our trials and troubles, and we would look to you, the one who is mighty, who is awesome, who does not change, who is able to pick up all the broken pieces in our lives. And Lord, restore us. And Father, we just pray that you would just bring revival to our hearts. Revive us again, O Lord, the way you've done in times past amongst your believers. And Father, we pray you'll do it again. Lord, save the lost around us and our families and our spouses, perhaps, or our children or family members. Lord, save them. Lord, we ask these things in Jesus's name. Amen.