How do you face difficult tasks? You know, there are some people who thrive under pressure. They love facing what may seem insurmountable to other people because that forces them to access parts of their brain for problem solving, for creativity. And as they are utilizing all of that, they get to formulate plans and devise methods to achieve goals. So, some love those kinds of tasks, but others, as you may know, can be paralyzed by difficulty as they get to as they are confronted, I should say, by all of the what ifs of the scenario or the endless decisions that may be involved in achieving some difficult goal, they can shut down and mentally check out of the task. And so there are different ways in which people respond. Perhaps those are two extremes. Maybe you're on one end or the other or somewhere in the middle. But let's change the word difficult now to the word impossible. How do you respond when you're faced with the impossible? Whether you're facing a small, large, or an insurmountable obstacle, I hope that you are beginning the same way. And that is with seeking the Lord. for wisdom, for knowledge, for strength, and for grace. Because it is with the prayer of the saints unto the Lord that we overcome whatever it is that we face. And that is one of the great themes of this book, of the book of Daniel, and that's what we will see, not only central in this book, but central in this very chapter. How does he face the impossible? We will see an impossible task before him because that is what King Nebuchadnezzar sets before the people, the wise men, specifically of Babylon. He will provide them with what is, in fact, an impossible test. One where failure will, in fact, result in their deaths. Yet this test is the backdrop for God's name to be exalted. And we will see that in Daniel himself. We will see God work through Daniel to glorify himself. Why? Because God is glorified in the impossible. God is glorified in the impossible. And as we go through this text, When we have a lot of verses before us, verses 1 through 23, we will note four aspects in which this text glorifies God. First, we will see that God can trouble kings. God can trouble kings, even mighty kings, even kings like King Nebuchadnezzar. God can trouble them. God can shake them. We'll see that. We will also see second, that God can shame the wise. He can shame the wise, he can make the wise look foolish before even unbelievers. And we will see that in verses four through 12. Third, we will see that God can preserve his people. Verses 13 through 16. Because Daniel is going to be in danger. due to the inability of the other wise men. God can still preserve his people. Fourth, we will see that God can answer prayer. That's such a simple idea, but it's true, and that's what we see in the text, that God can answer prayer. And so let's look at each of these four points, starting with the first one this evening. First, God can trouble kings. And we'll just look at those first three verses again real fast. Now, in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebuchadnezzar had dreams, or dreamed dreams. And his spirit was troubled, and his sleep left him. Then the king gave orders to call in the magicians, the conjurers, the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans to tell the king his dreams. So they came in and stood before the king. The king said to them, I had a dream and my spirit is anxious to understand the dream. God can trouble kings. You know, as we start to look at this, some have wondered about the timing, and it's worth addressing that because it says here in verse one of chapter two, that this is the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. And that may trouble you, actually, because you might recall in chapter one, we noted that Daniel completed a training program of how many years? three years, and so that has troubled some commentators here. As they've looked at this, they've wondered, well, maybe the text here goes back in time a little bit, like this is maybe the second year of the reign, the second year of their training, and that's why Daniel and his friends weren't there with the wise men. And that's a plausible explanation, but I don't think that that is actually representative of what we're reading here. In this case what we have here is a problem with how the ancients counted time The problem really is on our end because we count time differently than how they did We look at it differently. How did the Babylonians do it? Well the Babylonians when they counted time in regards to the reign of their Kings they began with what's known as the ascension year and Then they moved on to what we would consider the second year, but they called that the first year because you have the Ascension year and then you have the first year. And then after that you had the second year. And so we're already starting to see how this can come together. The Hebrews as well reckon time a little bit differently. they could count parts of a unit, say a year, as a whole. And so if Daniel and his friends were occupied for the better part of three years, then they would consider that a three-year training course. And even today, we might still have an equivalent. For instance, you know, if you Well, there's the four year college program, of course. Thankfully, by God's grace, I was able to get through it with a lot of coffee and a lot of grace in 18 months. And so technically that's a four year degree, but. I was able to do it in 18 months. And so there is a sense in which, okay, we do still trim things down, but still call it the four-year program. And that could be part of what's at play here. That's also, incidentally, what you see with the New Testament when we see that Jesus is dead for three days or in the grave for three days but actually he rose from the dead on the third day well they count the part of the day as the day and that's what you see here as such nebuchadnezzar's reign can begin at 605 or on 605 bc and i have this chart up here for you That's his Ascension year. The Hebrew youths would have been captured that year. They would have been put into the training and their three-year program would actually come to an end. in king nebuchadnezzar's second year based on babylonian reckoning that's how that works but we do have the years we can figure that out okay so we're talking about from the year 605 to 604 and then 604 to 603 and then 603 602 remember we're counting down because we're saying how many years we are before christ that's the bc part of it so That's how these numbers can come together. And that's if someone troubles you with a supposed Bible contradiction there, you now know how to answer them. There's no contradiction between Nebuchadnezzar reigning for two years, supposedly in the text, and Daniel's three-year program. But this is the second year of his reign. This would have been right after Daniel and his friends graduated from their training program. Nebuchadnezzar had dreams, we read, or he dreamed dreams. And it is plural in the Hebrew. That is despite the fact that it looks like he only had one dream. And so why do we call it dreams? Or why does the text call it dreams? Because he may have had these, the same dream in succession. This may have been something that he had continued to dream about, and he is troubled by it. We read that his spirit is troubled, or one translation suggests that this could be struck. His spirit is struck, so much so that it causes his sleep to leave him. His sleep leaves him, and you can understand, okay, it's a disturbing dream. Sometimes it wakes you up, and you can't get back to sleep. That is especially true if this is a supernatural dream. and you suspect it to be that. Obviously, Nebuchadnezzar's not going back to sleep. And Nebuchadnezzar did suspect that he could receive supernatural dreams, because it was expected in the ancient Near East that people, oops, that people would receive divine revelation through dreams, that God would speak through dreams. And in this case, they're right. As Matthew Henry notes, God has troubled the troubler of Israel, leaving Nebuchadnezzar unsettled because what he has dreamed seems ominous to him. Of course, in reality, God is using this dream to draw Nebuchadnezzar toward himself, revealing his sovereignty over human rulers. But Nebuchadnezzar doesn't know that yet. All he knows is he's received this dream and he is troubled. And so agitated, agitated, Nebuchadnezzar here summons his court's wise men. Now this includes, and just to give a very brief overview of who we're talking about here, this includes magicians. Again, not the fun kind that might come to kids' birthday parties. These were priests or soothsayer priests who were skilled in the sacred writings of Babylon. This would have also included conjurers. which would have been astrologers. They really watched the night sky. It is amazing. I came across one thing that said that a Babylonian astrologer in the year 500 BC calculated the year within 20 some odd minutes of what it actually is. That's how carefully they watched the stars and watched the planets. They were able to calculate the year within 20 some odd minutes of what it actually is. And so that is pretty stunning, how detailed they were. But these conjurers not only were astrologers, they also were enchanters, perhaps calling on the magics that the priests would bring forth. The sorcerers, of course, would be people who practiced divination, maybe even witchcraft. They received power from demons or evil spirits. And then we had the Chaldeans. Now Chaldeans could refer to a class or to an ethnic group, but it looks like here they also refer to a class of astrologers or wise men. And so these are all people who are especially skilled, who are knowledgeable of the pagan ways of understanding the world, and they are brought before the king. They know the lore, they claim to have access to divine knowledge, and they understand in verse three that the king is anxious to have a dream interpreted. Well, that's one of the things that they do. This is one of the things that they are trained in. They have lots of books dedicated to the interpretation of dreams. All Nebuchadnezzar has to do is to tell them their dream, and they can begin the process of research, and they can determine what that dream means. This account kind of reflects the distress that Pharaoh experienced. If you remember Pharaoh, he was also distressed because he had received dreams and he called his counselors, but none but Joseph, he finds out later, could interpret the dreams. Both the Pharaoh and King Nebuchadnezzar show that worldly power cannot bring ultimate peace. Only God can bring that peace. And God can, if he so wills, bring trouble to rulers so that their sleep flees from them if he's wanting to get a message across to them. He also can do that to us as well. And so when we face troubling situations, we need to seek the Lord to see, is this something where I need to pay attention to your word? Or is this something where I need comfort from you? Because the truth is, I do need comfort from you. And if you are following the Lord and his ways, he can then provide you with that comfort. Do not trust in human wisdom. for the answers that you seek, because worldly thinking will only let you down. And that brings us to the next point here. And that is this, that God can shame the wise. God can shame the wise. Verses four through 12. Then the Chaldeans spoke to the king in Aramaic. O king, live forever. Tell the dream to your servants, and we will declare the interpretation. The king replied to the Chaldeans, the command from me is firm. If you do not make known to me the dream and its interpretation, you will be torn limb from limb and your houses will be made a rubbish heap. But if you declare the dream and its interpretation, you will receive from me gifts and a reward and great honor. therefore declare to me the dream and its interpretation. They answered a second time and said, let the king tell the dream to his servants and we will declare the interpretation. The king replied, I know for certain that you are bargaining for time in so much as you have seen that the command for me is firm. that if you do not make the dream known to me, there is only one decree for you. For you have agreed together to speak lying and corrupt words before me until the situation is changed. Therefore, tell me the dream that I may know that you can declare to me its interpretation. The Chaldeans answered the king and said, there is not a man on earth who could declare the matter for the king. Inasmuch as no great king or ruler has ever asked anything like this of any magician, conjurer, or Chaldean. Moreover, the thing which the king demands is difficult. And there is none, there is no one else who can declare it to the king except gods, whose dwelling place is not with mortal flesh. Because of this, the king became indignant and very furious and gave orders to destroy all the wise men of Babylon. That's a big section there. Let's start with this in verse four. There's something unique to the book of Daniel that is cited here briefly in English. We think of the Old Testament as being written in Hebrew, but from verse four all the way through chapter seven, verse 28, this book is actually written in Aramaic. What is that? Well, that's the language of Babylon's diplomacy, the lingua franca. It's interesting because this book, like many of the prophets, deal with issues of living life for God in a pagan land. And this is actually written, from this point on, this is written in Aramaic, in a Gentile tongue. Now that is a testimony both to God's people and how they should understand how God is operating as well as to the Gentiles who need to know the truth of God. And so Gentiles could pick this up at this point and read it and understand it. And they may even have remembered hearing this story of Nebuchadnezzar with his impossible task The Chaldeans greet the king, and they ask for the dream. As one commentary explains here, the advisors expect that Nebuchadnezzar will follow the standard procedure. He will describe to them his dream, and then they will confer together to arrive at an interpretation. Their confidence reflects a reliance on human wisdom and human knowledge, but it's soon exposed for what it is. Nebuchadnezzar, in verse five, demands the extraordinary. He wants them to tell him the dream's content as well as the meaning of the dream. Now, some who have looked at this have said, oh, maybe he's forgotten the dream. But I don't think that's the proper interpretation here. Because if he had forgotten the dream, they could just simply make up a dream, and he could say, okay, that sounds like that was the dream. And he wouldn't be any of the wiser. Rather, he knows the dream. And He wants them to prove themselves. He wants them to prove their mettle. He wants them to show Him that they, in fact, have the ear of the gods. Reveal to me the dream and its interpretation, because anyone can make up an interpretation. But not anyone, not just anyone, can reveal the secrets of a dream that someone had a night earlier. They claim supernatural insight. He wants them to prove it. And so he tells them to recount his dream. And if they can't, he threatens that he will tear them limb from limb. and that he will make their houses a rubbish heap, or a dunghill, as the King James has here. That is what the ancient kings did. And given what we see in verse 12, and what we see later, like in other places, like 2 Kings 25, seven, this is not an idle threat. King Nebuchadnezzar will make good on this threat. They would know that he is, in fact, a man who will do this, and he will make a show of it, as they are dragged out into the middle of the square, and they are, I don't know if they quartered people, but they would have been torn limb from limb in some way. So, conversely, He doesn't just leave them with a promise of curse, he leaves them with a promise of blessing. And so he says that he will give them lavish rewards. Actually, the text says that it's a reward, and that could have been even marriage to one of his daughters. You know, something spectacular there. They would have had riches, they would have had honor. if they could, if one of them could, in fact, tell him his dream. Nebuchadnezzar's insistence here, I think, shows his intelligence from a human perspective. He has thought this through, and so he's saying, yeah, no, I know they could just make something up. It also shows, I think, his suspicion of the court intrigue. because he is suspecting a possible coup based on the content of his dream. But what we see here is that human wisdom, no matter how polished, fails under divine scrutiny. they have had the rug pulled out from under them. In other words, they are desperate. And they ask again, they repeat their request. They answered a second time, verse seven, let the king tell the dream to his servants. I don't know how much desperation was in their voices, but I suspect there was a great deal of it in their hearts as they said this. Let the king tell the dream to his service, and we will declare the interpretation. This is revealing, unwittingly, their inability to meet the king's demands. So Nebuchadnezzar accuses them now of stalling or bargaining for time. And he accuses them also of likely conspiring to offer up lying and corrupt words. Now, there's a couple of ways we could look at that. We could consider the fact that, yeah, they're just kind of making things up as they go along, even though they have books, even though they have studies dedicated to this. At the end of the day, it is just guesswork. They don't know for sure, because they don't have divine revelation. And so he could see that perhaps in them, and he could be calling their words lying and corrupt just based on that basis. But there may also be something here a little bit more, because as he reflects upon the dream in his own mind, it could be very much, and the dream, of course, as we read later in this chapter, is a dream concerning a giant statue with a gold head. He, for whatever reason, may be associating that with either himself or his kingdom. And that statue gets smashed. And so the fact that he keeps having this dream may be a possible omen that there is a threat against him or his empire. And he wants to know what that is. And if these wise men are bargaining for time, they may be in on the plot. If there's already a conspiracy afoot, they may be a part of it. And so he reasons that whatever the case is, if they can't recount to him the dream, they are untrustworthy and worthy, in fact, of death. Of course, what he's doing is exposing the limits of their occult practices. This is, of course, what the Old Testament condemns. We should not be involved in any of this. We should not be consulting soothsayers. We should not be going to crystal ball readers. We should not be having our palms read. We should not be consulting tarot or the astrology section in the newspaper, I don't even know if people get newspapers anymore, but I guess you can get your astrology update on your phone or something like that. You should not be doing those kinds of things. These are things that are forbidden for the people of God. And for good reason, it's fake, first of all. Second of all, it calls your attention away from God. And third of all, if you do come across something that's true, it's likely empowered by an evil spirit, and you don't wanna be messing with that. And so no, we stay away from that. And the king, even as an unbeliever, is seeing, okay, this is not as trustworthy as what they are professing. And so in verses 10 and 11 here, the wise men admit to their powerlessness, and this is a stunning confession on their part. They begin by saying in verse 10 that no human can do what the king asks. That's why no king has ever asked that. There's almost a subtle insult here. No king has ever asked this. What you ask is ridiculous. Of course, they wouldn't say that. They are trying to couch this in as diplomatic terms as possible, but they say no one can meet this demand. And there's some truth to that. And they go on to say this, and there is no one else who can declare it to the king except gods whose dwelling place is not with mortal flesh. You know, it's interesting because this confession here ironically stumbles upon biblical truth. Right? Because only God can reveal these things. Of course, they say God, it's plural, but only the true God can reveal such mysteries, and only the true God can make himself dwell with human flesh. Of course, we just had a VBS on God's dwelling place, right? Where is God's dwelling place? He can make himself dwell with people, through the tabernacle, through the temple, and of course, through Jesus Christ. But they have unwittingly let the cat out of the bag here. They have just admitted that their claims are fraudulent, they're a sham. And they have exposed the futility of astrology and sorcery and all the rest, showing that they have no access to divine insight. And Nebuchadnezzar, for his intelligence, understands what they have just said. And so it is understandable that we read what we read next in verse 12 of Nebuchadnezzar becoming indignant, becoming furious. His rage is understandable because he has just been told his court is filled with charlatans. And this leads him to make good on his promise, to kill all the wise men, probably just those within the city of Babylon itself, but he issues this decree, this edict out, because he is seen through the facade of human wisdom. What he doesn't know is that this is preparing him to receive God's wisdom next. Human wisdom fails. but not God's wisdom. God shames the wise. He shames the wisdom of this world to display his glory. Take a look over at 1 Corinthians for a moment. Lord willing, we're actually gonna be in 1 Corinthians in a few weeks here. 1 Corinthians 1. Verse 18 says that the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the cleverness of the clever I will set aside. Where is the wise man, where is the scribe, where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For since in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well pleased through the foolishness, of course, Paul writes ironically there, the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For Jews ask for signs, and Greeks search for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block, and to Greeks, to Gentiles, foolishness. But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God, if we could call it that, is wiser than men, and the weakness of God, if we could call it that, is stronger than And we could continue on from there, but we can see that God does in fact shame the wise. And he shames the wise through his message and through his ways. And so when human solutions fail, because God will make them fail, men naturally, people naturally will turn to God. And I hope that is true for you. I hope that is true for you, that you will turn to God who alone holds true wisdom. He alone can preserve his people in an age of violence and deception. And that brings us actually to our next point here, and that's this third, God can preserve his people. God can preserve his people. Let's look at verses 13 through 16. Verses 13 through 16. So the decree went forth that the wise men should be slain. And they looked for Daniel and his friends to kill them. That would be the Babylonians, the Babylonian officials. Then Daniel replied with discretion and discernment to Ariok, the captain of the king's bodyguard or the executioner, who had gone forth to slay the wise men of Babylon. He said to Ariok, the king's commander, for what reason is the decree from the king so urgent or so harsh? Then Ariok informed Daniel about the matter. So Daniel went in and requested of the king that he should give him time in order that he might declare the interpretation to the king. The king's decree threatens not just the wise men who are unbelievers, but also Daniel and his friends, the people of God. They weren't present at the meeting, but that doesn't matter. They are under the same decree of death. Perhaps because they are recent graduates of the training program, they weren't invited to the meeting. They just wanted the best and the brightest there, the ones who were experienced. Well, they weren't there. But because they were graduates, they were counted among the wise men who were to be studied. There's a commentary that pointed out that Satan may be pleased to murder his false teachers. if it means also destroying God's people. And that's exactly what we see here with this plan, this devilish plan. But God has other plans. He demonstrates here an ability to preserve his people amidst danger. So we have Ariok here, the chief executioner, as it appears he is, who's going out to arrest and execute Daniel and his friends. Now, we might imagine if we were ourselves in such a situation, such a surprising situation, that we would be afraid to get this knock on the door and to hear we are actually under a decree of death from the king. and that it is to be carried out immediately. But what we read here is that by God's grace, Daniel responds with discretion and discernment. You know, isn't that great that God can do that, that God can calm our hearts in such situations. Unlike the panicked wise men, he remains calm, which reflects upon the wisdom that God gave him. Remember back in chapter one, verse 17, we read that God had granted him wisdom as well as his friends. God gave them knowledge and intelligence in every branch of literature and wisdom. And Daniel even understood all kinds of visions and dreams, which we will see here as we move through the rest of the chapter. Now it might also be a further display of God's grace that Ariok didn't just simply kill Daniel on the spot. He pauses and accepts Daniel's question, why? Why is the king's decree so urgent or so harsh? And Ariok explains. In crises, God's people can still count on God's grace. And we must take that moment to, as the world might say, take a breath, but what we are actually doing is we're taking a moment to reflect. Okay, God's in control of this moment. Let's not allow our fears to rule us in this moment. Remember, our emotions are controlled by our thoughts. We are not controlled by our emotions. Well, children might be controlled by their emotions, but adults understand that we don't have to be controlled by our emotions. In fact, we can direct our emotions to obey the truth. In this case, Daniel's calm trust in God causes him to respond in the way that he does, and it's a model to us. Now we should approach difficult and even impossible situations. How does Daniel do it? He does it with wisdom and prayer. That's how we should do it as well, with wisdom and with prayer. And we see that faith-filled boldness. that we talked about in Daniel last time. We see it here again in verse 16. Look at this. Daniel approaches Nebuchadnezzar. Daniel goes to the king. And it's amazing that he again has the grace of God that he can say, hey, let me go talk to the king. And Ariok says, okay. And as he goes back there to talk to the king, the king says, yes, I will give him an audience. Perhaps Nebuchadnezzar has calmed down a little bit, that might be part of this. Perhaps Nebuchadnezzar remembered how exceptional Daniel was. Remember in verses 19 and 20, the king had talked to them, and out of them, out of the wise men, not one was found like Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, Nazariah. So they entered the king's personal service. As for every matter of wisdom and understanding about which the king consulted them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and conjurers who were in his realm. He could have saved himself some grief if he had just avoided calling all the rest of them and just called up Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah to interpret his dream. But this really sets the contrast between how the people of God can respond and how the worldly pagans, the wise men among the world, would respond to this kind of situation. And so whatever the cause is, Nebuchadnezzar says, yes, I will talk to Daniel. And Daniel requests time. What is the difference there? What is the difference between what he did and what the wise men did? The wise men just said, yeah, this isn't possible. And he says, yeah, you're just bargaining for time. But Daniel says, no, give me a moment to seek from the Lord. to see if I can't get you the interpretation. Daniel isn't saying it's impossible. Daniel sees that yes, with man it might be impossible, but with God, all things are possible. And so he understands that. And perhaps it is something in that faith and in that confidence that causes Nebuchadnezzar to stay his execution. at least for the moment, to give Daniel some time to see if he can get the dream and the interpretation. Now you might say, yeah, but that's just a moment, that's just a stay of execution. God's protected them, but only for a moment, they could still be killed. Yes, they could still be killed. But God could also continue to protect them. especially as they seek him. And that brings us here to the final point. The final point. So I'm going way too fast at my notes. And that's this. Fourth, God can answer prayer. God can answer prayer. Look at verses 17 through 23. Then Daniel went to his house and informed his friends Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah about the matter, so that they might request compassion from the God of heaven concerning this mystery, so that Daniel and his friends would not be destroyed with the rest of the wise men in Babylon. Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a night vision. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven. Daniel said, let the name of God be blessed forever and ever, for wisdom and power belong to him. It is he who changes the times and epochs. He removes kings and establishes kings. He gives wisdom to wise men and knowledge to men of understanding. It is he who reveals the profound and hidden things. He knows. what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with him. To you, O God of my fathers, I give thanks and praise, for you have given me wisdom and power. Even now you have made known to me what we have requested of you, for you have made known to us the king's matter. So you see Daniel returning home here. where he and his three friends probably lived together. Perhaps it's a house that they have been assigned as wise men. And he informs them of the crisis. And what do they do? They unite in prayer. How do you approach crises in your life? Hopefully it is through prayer. It is through seeking God. And we see that they seek compassion specifically. They seek compassion from the God of heaven. So they are not asking just that they get out of the situation. Note that they call it compassion. And it is from the God of heaven. This is a term that emphasizes God's universal dominion. He is over all. Bless you. He is over all. And so he can then reveal the mystery that they want revealed. The mystery, of course, meaning the dream as well as its interpretation. And so they engage in prayer. and that reflects their dependence upon God. We have to remember that, that we are dependent upon God. Even when things are going well, we're still dependent upon God. We should not neglect to pray to him even when things are going well, but when things go poorly and things look bleak, yes, of course, in those times, seek the Lord's, pray unto the Lord, the God of heaven. This recalls his promise in Jeremiah 33.3. He says, call to me and I will answer you and I will tell you great and mighty things which you do not know. And so in verse 19, we see that God does indeed answer this prayer and he does so in what's called a night vision. We typically have defined a vision as something that happens during the day. You know, something that happens when you're awake. How is this a night vision? Isn't that a dream? Well, no, Nebuchadnezzar had a dream. This is probably a situation where they have spent all night praying. And so, in the midst of the night, when they are not sleeping, because who could sleep when you have a death sentence hanging over your head? They are then interrupted in their prayer time. And Daniel receives a vision, and he sees in the midst of that what the king's dream was, and God then explains to him what the dream's meaning is. And we will discuss the dream and its meaning next time, Lord willing. But you can see that they have received what they asked the Lord to give them. And so how does Daniel respond? We might think that they say, okay, yeah, okay, we got our answer. Let's go, let's go right before the king. Let's get Ariok again. Let's get an audience before the king. That way we can get this death sentence off of our heads. You might think that that's the immediate response. Maybe that would be your immediate response. But guess what? That is not Daniel's immediate response. His immediate response is to pause and thank the Lord. He thanks the Lord for receiving the answer and he blesses in his time of worship, the God of heaven, the same God who has answered their cry, and his praise exalts God's eternal nature and his attributes. He notes wisdom and power belong to God alone, but that God has granted them to him, to his servants. God can give wisdom and power to us when we seek him. And so he notes this, and he notes God's sovereignty, His reign over, over all, over times, and epics, or epochs, and kings. Now this, of course, demonstrates God's control over the world. rulers, which is a central theme here in Daniel, but also alludes to the dream's content itself. God's plan for the future of the nations. That is what Nebuchadnezzar's dream is ultimately about. It is about the future of the nations, starting with Babylon and moving forward. And so Daniel understands that, and he is praising God according to what God has revealed to him. Daniel has the whole picture in front of him now. This is what God has revealed to Nebuchadnezzar. This is the meaning of the dream. And so he prays accordingly. God indeed gives wisdom and knowledge, making wise men wiser and men of understanding more knowledgeable. You say, I'm not a wise man though, how can I be wiser if I'm not already a wise man? Remember, we don't judge things according to how the world judges things. There's that old bumper sticker, wise men still seek him, right? That's where wisdom is, we seek the Lord, and he makes those who seek him wiser. Where's true knowledge found? Is it found in the universities that deny the God of creation? No. is found in God's holy word. And as you seek more knowledge from him, as you're studying his word, he will make you more knowledgeable of his word. And that's the kind of knowledge we want. That's the kind of wisdom that we want. Daniel understands this, and he goes on to verse 22 by saying that God reveals the profound and hidden things. Of course, we know what profound and hidden things he's talking about here, like the dream, the kinds of things that the wise men of the world had to admit were not within their ability. They could not reveal these kinds of things, but God can. God knows what's in the darkness, like in the darkness of the bedchamber and the recesses of the king's mind, he knows what's there. And God is the source of light. He can show the light onto whatever he needs to show. This distinguishes Yahweh from the pagan gods because he is the one who reveals divine truth. The others are pretenders. Even when they are animated by a real demonic power, their power pales in comparison to what God has provided. Even Satan has to ask God permission. God is the one who is over all. And so Daniel acknowledges this. And in verse 23, he says that God is not just God, he's the God of my fathers. He says, I'm not talking about Bel, I'm not talking about all the other gods of Babylon, the false gods of the pagans. He is praying to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He is praying to the God who has made a covenant with his people. And he thanks him for the wisdom and power that he has granted them through their prayer. And note, again, the collective language here that we have prayed. You've given me wisdom and power. You have made known to me what we requested of you. For you have made known to us the king's matter. They have been together in prayer. This is why it's so important for us to be together in prayer. It is good to, when you have something come up, to get the brothers and sisters together and to pray about it. This is a good thing. It is a great, great mission to be together on. God does answer prayer. And God's, or Daniel's gratitude here models how we should respond to answered prayer. Oh, it is such a shame. And I have to admit, sometimes I am guilty of this. So, so if you're guilty of it, understand it is, it is something that happens to all of us. Sometimes we pray for something and God answers it and we forget. Let's not grow forgetful. Let's take that moment to praise and worship God, to thank Him for what He has done. And let's remember it so that next time when we face the impossible, when we face the insurmountable, we can also thank Him. We can also praise Him there for how He has answered in the past and know that He will answer again. Never grow weary in prayer, y'all. Never grow weary in prayer. For God hears and he responds according to his perfect will. Now that brings us to the conclusion here. God is glorified in the impossible. God is glorified in the impossible. He troubles kings to show his power over them. He shames human wisdom to display his truth. He preserves his people in their faith and through their faith, through whatever that they are facing. And he also answers prayer with divine intervention. When we face impossible demands, whether at work or in our relationships or in our spiritual lives, we must turn to God in prayer, trusting his sovereignty and wisdom. Are you facing an impossible situation, a difficult situation? I hope that you see Daniel's example here and that you do not lean on human wisdom. That you don't lean even on your own understanding. Instead, remain calm in the Lord and seek God's wisdom. Pray. Pray with others. And trust him that he will act. And when he answers, because he can't answer prairie, make sure that you give him the glory. Let's commit to praying fervently, trusting in our sovereign God to work in ways that exceed our understanding.