In this sermon, the preacher focuses on the prayer of Daniel in the book of Daniel. He emphasizes the importance of seeking after God's ear, hand, face, and eyes through prayer. The preacher encourages the listeners to humble themselves, confess their sins, and cry out to God. He highlights Daniel's diligence in studying the word of God and his understanding of the prophetic timeline. The sermon concludes with a reminder to shut out distractions and focus on God during prayer.

285, please. 285. Jesus, thou joy of loving hearts, thou sound of life, thou light of men, from the best bliss that earth imparts, we turn on till to thee again. 285, please. Jesus, thou joy of loving hearts, thou sound of life, we praise thee, O God, living Word, that thou art the Spirit and Body, that thou art made good, God, living Word, God, living Word, holy, God, living Word, that thou art made, that thou art holy, thou art holy, that thou art holy, holy, God, holy, that thou art holy. You know, and we're at Daniel chapter 9 this evening. Book of Daniel, chapter 9, and we're looking very carefully at the first 19 verses. And this paragraph lets us see Daniel at prayer. He was a great prayer warrior, this man. We remember that he was cast into the den of lions. Because he prayed. This is one of the great praying warriors of the Old Testament. And I've called this whole paragraph the prayer of a prevailing prophet. And I want to bring this before you so that you can see the man of prayer. We're going to look in a moment at Daniel's determination before the Lord, just how he set his face to seek the Lord. I want you to see the man of prayer. And then more than that, I want you to see the matter of prayer. Because as this man got down to pray, he began, first of all, by exalting the Lord. He got his eyes fixed upon the Lord. I think this is how you come to pray. You shut the door, and in secret you pray to God. It's the Pharisee who stands up and pretends to pray to God when all the time he wants to be seen of men. That's just Pharisee, for that is not prayer in my estimation. But you'll find that Daniel exalts the Lord. Daniel's exaltation of the Lord. And then we shall be spiritized, I think, when we come to Daniel's confession to the Lord. And if you never knew how to confess your sins, you should certainly learn tonight. But the witty part of the whole paragraph is not Daniel's exaltation of the Lord or even Daniel's confession to the Lord. It's Daniel's supplication unto the Lord. My, this man could really pray. But before we get to see the man of prayer, I want you to notice the first two verses because this brings us Daniel's appreciation of the Word. And we're at chapter 9 and we're at verse 1. In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus, of the seed of the Medes, which was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans. And I think all the young people should take note that it is the first year of Darius the Median. And if you take note, you should know this, shouldn't you? That Daniel was brought to Babylon as a very young man. Some of the scholars think he was fourteen, some think he was fifteen, some think he was sixteen. Doesn't really matter, he was in his teens all right. We'll say he was sixteen. And Meduchadnezzar was reigning. And he lived right through the whole reign of Meduchadnezzar. And then you remember that Belshazzar became king. You remember it was Daniel that stood in the banqueting hall and integrated the writing on the wall. And it was that night that Belshazzar the king of the Chaldeans was slain and Darius the Median took the kingdom. So that he lived right through the reign of Meduchadnezzar and he lived right through the reign of Belshazzar. And here he is in the very first year of Darius the Median. So he's getting along now. He's not a lad anymore in the moment or two I'll get to his age all right. He's quite an old man now. You see he's still at Babylon. You can see the period and you can see the place. I want you to see another picture of the prophet. Verse 2. In the first year of his reign I Daniel understood by books the number of the years. Now there's a great statement for you. I Daniel understood by books. He had some books with him at Babylon that he seems to be pondering. And from these books he hath gleaned the number of the years whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet. Because these books were part of the book of Jeremiah the prophet. Because Jeremiah had prophesied that Daniel was quite a boy. And some of these writings he must have brought with him. And he's been pondering them. And he understood through his study of Jeremiah the prophet that the Lord that he would accomplish 70 years in the desolations of Jerusalem. You see he found out as he studied the book of Jeremiah the prophet that God who had allowed the Babylonians to take captive the people of Judah and Daniel was one of them that they would be gone in Babylon for 70 years. And he's beginning to come back now. In fact the 70 years are almost up at this point. Now as he came when he was 16 he must be 86 now. Have you got that? Because that's very important for you. Because this trained warrior that we are thinking about tonight he wasn't a boy you know. He was an old man. He's either 84, 85 or 86 years of age. But he didn't go moaning you know around because God had left him to be an old man. He seems to occupy the most of his time in praying. And I'm perfectly sure that all the old ones could do a lot more at this than they do. Oh you're not able to sing we know that. But surely you're able to pray. And that's exactly what Daniel did. You know if you go back to the book of Jeremiah Jeremiah 25 You'll find the very portion of the book where he was reading. Jeremiah 25 Verse 1 Jeremiah 25 verse 1 The word doth came to Jeremiah concerning all the people of Judah in the fourth year of Jehiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah that was the first year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon the witch Jeremiah the prophet spake unto all the people of Judah and to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem saying from the thirteenth year of Josiah the son of Ammon king of Judah even unto this day this is the three and twentieth year the word of the Lord hath come unto me and I have spoken unto you rising early and speaking but ye have not hearkened for 23 years the people of God have been spoken to morning by morning by the prophet of the Lord Verse 4 And the Lord hath sent unto you all his servants the prophets rising early and sending them but ye have not hearkened nor inclined your ear to hear they said turn ye again now everyone from his evil way and from the evil of your doings and dwell in the land that the Lord hath given unto you and to your fathers forever and ever and go not out after other gods to serve them and to worship them and provoke me not to anger with the works of your hands and I will do you no harm yet ye have not hearkened unto me saith the Lord that ye might provoke me to anger with the works of your hands to your own hurt therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts because ye have not heard my words behold I will send and take all the families of the north country said the Lord and let you kidnap the king of Babylon my servants and will bring them against this land and against the inhabitants thereof and against all these nations round about and will utterly destroy them and make them in astonishment and the hissing and the perpetual desolations moreover I will take from them the voice of mirth the voice of gladness the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride the sound of the millstones and the light of the candle and this whole land shall be a desolation and an astonishment and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years that's the bit that Daniel kept his finger on you know for you amillennialists I would say this to you see verse eleven this whole land shall be a desolation you know when I start to talk to you about the land of Palestine and I begin to give you the geographical location of the land and I say that it stretches from the Nile to the Euphrates and from the going down of the sun into the Syrian desert you try to back out of this you try to say God gave Abraham the world and you try to spiritualize it to mean the world tell me this now when God left this land a total desolation was it the world that was left desolate when God took Judah and Israel out of the land tell me now be honest did he take them out of the world because you don't bother fixing it now your baloney doesn't work did he take them out of their own land did he take them out of the world I'll tell you he took them down to Babylon and I'll tell you he bring them back into their own land but on this occasion he was taking them out for 70 years and old Daniel he was reading Jeremiah he looted 70 years he began to count he knew the time was up he knew the time has almost come when we're going back into the land again and so that's why he put down to pray I think that you young ones should get the hold of this you know this book of Daniel it's a wonderful historical book of course and it's a wonderful prophetical book and yet there are wonderful spiritual lessons in it and one of them is the picture of Daniel himself you know if you go right away back and you remember the first chapter when he was just a boy it said there that Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the king's meat and you can see him as the young steadfast unmovable servant of the Lord shall I just say steadfast servant of course we have seen him in recent weeks as the powerful prophet he's one of the greatest prophets in the book he interpreted the dream of Nebuchadnezzar he read the writing on the wall for Belshazzar and we've already seen two of the visions that God gave to Daniel he was a steadfast servant he was the powerful prophet and then you remember when he was president of that great world empire you remember this that the other president sought to find fault against Daniel and there was no fault or no flaw within him faultless in Babylon you see he wasn't only a steadfast servant he wasn't only a powerful prophet he was a godly man you're beginning to see the picture because if you're talking about daring to be a Daniel you'll need to learn just what the boy was like he was a steadfast servant he was a powerful prophet he was a godly man and we're going to find tonight that he was a sincere suppliant he was somebody who could really pray it's easy to say hallelujah and sing choruses you know not so easy to be shut in for hours on your face before God what do you know about it yeah you've got to learn this you know and unless you begin with prayer when Paul was talking to Timothy he was just a young fellow I've got a lot of young ones around he said listen Timothy I beseech you that first of all get down to praying that's not so easy you know a lot of young ones don't want that they say we need this if I tell you this that he was a steadfast servant and a powerful prophet and a godly man and a sincere suppliant but let me say this he was also a diligent student of the word it may not be this fellow looked into the book he was reading Jeremiah way down in Babylon and he was studying it too that's the picture that's there now we need to see this great man of God down at prayer you know I should point this out before we begin at all that God wasn't revealing to Daniel something that he could dig out of the scriptures for himself he just didn't lie with his heels up and his eyes closed and God told him everything he had to dig into Jeremiah the prophet and you'll learn a lot of things if you keep your nose in the book now we're thinking about the praying and the prayer of this prevailing prophet we're beginning now at verse 3 he says and I set my face unto the Lord God and I want you to hold on to that little phrase I set my face because this is honest prayer you know this man was honestly seeking the Lord's face this is not taking up time in the prayer meeting this is not just repeating old prayers this is not this pharisaical thing to be king of men this is honestly seeking the Lord's face when you do this I hope you don't go to the prayer meeting to be seen and heard you're only a hypocrite if you do he says I set my face unto the Lord God I want you to get this bit to seek by prayer and supplications you know if I set my face is honesty then prayer and supplications is sincerity this fellow was really grasping the thorn you know and holding on and praying it through and supplicating with his whole heart and soul and you can see the honesty and the sincerity that was in this man of prayer but it goes a wee bit closer it says I set my face unto the Lord God to seek by prayer and supplications with fasting you know this man was prepared to do without his breakfast and his dinner and his supper not only that day but for many days you can see the intensity and we don't know a thing about it we just bluff our way through friends this is what you call real prayer this is honesty and sincerity and intensity and it goes further than that you know it says and I set my face unto the Lord God to seek by prayer and supplications with fasting and sackcloth and ashes you know that's humility you know he wasn't coming before God with babylonish garments on you can see sometimes these vestments with their beautiful colours and their scarlet and their gold and it's all so let me tell you it's poppish nonsense that's what it is oh I'm telling you God's not looking for dramatic stuff this man had sackcloth and ashes this man wasn't swanking before God with royal vestments this man was meaning business there was an honesty here there was a sincerity here there was an intensity here there was a humility here that we would need to have if we're going to be men and women of prayer take the starch out of you that no show off here this is the determination before the Lord and then I want you to see this verse 4 and I prayed unto the Lord my God and made my confession and said oh Lord the great and dreadful God you know I'm inspired at times as I hear these men of all the prayer we have been blessed in the prayer meeting looking at the phrases that David used as he went in before God and you can see all the time that these men right at the commencement of the prayer meeting for them they got their eyes on God and if you're going to pray at all you have to shut the door of your life to everything else Jesus said and thou when thou prayest enter into thy room and shut the door and pray to thy father which is in secret you know Daniel could see the greatness of God sometimes we sing a beautiful hymn how great thou art and I could spend quite a lot of time talking about the greatness of God the greatness of his power the greatness of his love the greatness of his grace the greatness of his mercy and you could go on easily you know when we come before God we should always see the greatness we should always know that the one we're coming to he is able to do exceeding abundantly above what we could either ask or think and you know Daniel got the greatness of God before and he also got the dreadfulness of God he said oh Lord the great un-dreadful God and the other evening I was preaching from Daniel chapter 7 here in the Bible class would you turn back for a moment Daniel chapter 7 and I read from verse 9 just then Daniel 7 verse 9 I beheld till the thrones were cast down and the ancient of days did sit this is God whose garment was quite as snow and the head of his head like the pure wool his throne was like the fiery flame and his wheels of burning fire a fiery stream eschewed and came forth from before him thousand thousands ministered unto him and ten thousand times ten thousands stood before him and as I read that evening one of our elders sitting over in the annex over there he said you know for the first time I saw the greatness and the dreadfulness of God he said it scared me I could see the fiery flame all around his throne the wheels of burning fire the fiery stream eschewing from before him and then he said when I thought about a thousand thousands ministering unto him and he began to multiply the mathematicians a thousand thousands equal a million you know they ministered unto him and these must be the cherubims and seraphim these great created angelic like beings that stand around the throne and minister unto God let me say there is one million of them and then when we were talking it over the next phrase came up ten thousand times ten thousands and our elder who is down there now he said that's a billion ten thousand times ten thousands and there is one million cherubims and seraphims and there is one billion angels oh if we could only see the Lord of hosts in all his glory how dreadful people talk about God and blaspheme his name they don't know how big he is if I think we should get this into our mind when we come before him there are coming to a change large petitions which you bring and Daniel saw the greatness and the dreadfulness and then he said this he said oh Lord the great and dreadful God keeping the covenant and mercy to them that love him you know he saw the faithfulness is the covenant keeping God and let me say to every believer here tonight when we meet around the Lord's table on Lord's day morning and we take the cup to drink the wine very often I say the Lord Jesus said this is the new covenant in my blood it's symbolic of the blood of the covenant and you know God has made the covenant with every believer and here is the wording of the covenant he said your sins and your iniquities I will remember no more and he'll keep it no fear of a saved man being lost again God has entered into a covenant with him do you think he's going to break it? the blood of the covenant is there and your sins believer and your iniquities God has made a covenant with you he'll remember no more if Daniel could see the greatness and Daniel could see the dreadfulness and Daniel could see the faithfulness see verse 7 it says oh Lord righteousness belongeth unto thee he could see the righteousness of God I think that this is a phrase that we should frame and hang up somewhere that righteousness belongeth unto God let me say this to all you young ones if you cannot understand election and you can't understand the sovereign choice of God and you can't understand predestination you can understand this that God is always doing what is right he's never doing anything wrong righteousness belongeth unto God don't make any mistakes about it don't ever try to make God as unrighteous that is wrong God is always right how could you have a God who goes wrong? righteousness belongeth unto God and Daniel could see this even if he judged the nation even if he let them go down to bubble Daniel knew that God was right and Israel was wrong he says righteousness belongeth unto me and you can see verse 9 he says to the Lord our God belong mercies and forgivenesses you can see if he came into God's presence that he saw the greatness and the dreadfulness and the faithfulness and the righteousness and the mercifulness and the forgiveness of God oh what a God we have I think we should keep this in mind and when you go to pray take a second or two just to get your mind fixed on the one you're coming to try and see his greatness try and remember his dreadfulness try and remember his faithfulness try and remember his righteousness try and remember his mercifulness try and remember his forgiveness he was a great man wasn't he? so that you can see him exalting the Lord as he comes to pray and then we notice the confession that he makes we're going back to verse 5 he's speaking to God and he has God in focus all right he says we have sinned mind you he didn't say Israel have sinned and he didn't separate himself out from the people although he was a godly man he says we have sinned yes and he's underlining the sinfulness he says we have sinned and have committed iniquity and have done wickedly and have rebelled and then he puts the root cause down to it like this even by departing from my precepts from my judgments you see it was disobedience to the word of the Lord that made them so sinful I wonder has God spoken to some of you young ones about being baptized I don't know how you would read through the New Testament without coming up against it and I hope you're not wiping your feet on us because it happens to be God's word and I wonder has he spoken to you about remembering the Lord's death because I can tell you that on the first day of the week the early church broke bread I don't know what you do but don't stick handling that book and then wiping your feet on these things because that's disobedience and that's disobeying the word of the Lord and that's sin you're not getting off of that you know and there's a lot more commandments that we'd all need to attend to but he didn't only underline the disobedience that brought the sinfulness he went on in verse 6 he says neither have we hearkened unto thy servants the prophets which speak in my name to our kings our princes our fathers and to all the people of the land you know friends he's not only underlining sinfulness but he's underlining stubbornness oh they heard all right but they never hearkened wonder how long God's been speaking to you about some things but you're just stubborn I will lunch with Daniel's confession this sinfulness came from this disobedience and this stubbornness it came from this disbelieving the prophets they didn't treat these men as if they were teaching them the word of God they didn't come to the class and you take the bits you want ah well you're not allowed to do that you have to accept the whole word of God you're not allowed to pick and choose through this book you'll listen to what God says to you and you can then be disobedient if you like or disbelieving if you like but you'll be a sinner in God's sight you know I want you to notice this see verse 7 oh Lord righteousness belongeth unto thee but unto us confusion of faces but at this day to the men of Judah to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and unto all Israel that are near and that are far off through all the countries where the God has driven them because their trespass that they have trespassed against thee I want you to see that he brings the whole nation completely in in this confession to the men of Judah to the men of Israel to the inhabitants to all that are near and all that are far off doesn't make a matter he goes further than that see verse 8 he says oh Lord to us belongeth confusion of face to our kings to our princes to our fathers brings them all in wonder where we would start to confess tonight as we think of the plight of this province wonder has our leader sailed somewhere away back there and I'm pretty sure that the unionist government is not guiltless I'm pretty sure they're not I think that they gerrymandered wards and everything else to keep the Roman Catholics from getting hooked in certain causes and that is not right oh I may upset you I don't mind that happens to be the truth and a lot of people know it and there was never any cause for it they had 5 to 1 all the time I don't know what the federal debate fought because the Roman Catholic has a suction that's not guiltless either they stood at the corners they didn't want to work they wanted to rob the government where would we lay the blame? we haven't been playing our part either living this summer you have never been at a prayer meeting in your whole life ah you're no use to God at all wonder where we would begin lovely we would have to say we and us and our kings and our princes and every one of us that's how Daniel prayed wish we could put this province on its knees before God if I can tell you that he knew something about prayer see verse 13 have a look at it as it is written in the law of Moses all this evil has come upon us yet made we not our prayer before the Lord our God you know he should see the sinfulness and the stubbornness and the completeness of the iniquity of the nation ah but he could see the prayerlessness oh we groan and we're terrified and we're saddened and we're sick about people being shot and killed and murdered and butchered every day but it doesn't put us on our knees I got better it's the same old number at the prayer meeting and you're still missing yes it's time we got down before our God isn't it this man could really pray you know he could confess the sins the sinfulness and the stubbornness and the completeness of the iniquity in the nation and the prayerlessness of prayer yes I can tell you that we knew a thing or two about this but you know it's when we come to Daniel's supplication unto the Lord let's have a look at this it begins at verse 16 O Lord according to all thy righteousness I beseech thee let thine anger and thy fury be turned away from thy city Jerusalem won't you just see him beseeching God he's really supplicating now he's wanting God's hand to move in mercy I beseech thee let thine anger and thy fury be turned away he's pleading for the hand of God to move in mercy I think we need to start like that we need to ask God to be merciful unto us before we're totally concerned and then he went on in the next verse verse 17 now therefore O Lord God hear the prayer of thy serpent and his supplications and cause thy face to shine upon thy sanctuary that is Bethlehem you see he's praying for the hand of mercy and he's praying for the face of God in fellowship again shine on us speak to us warm our hearts it's this fellowship with God that he's after he's after God's hand in mercy he's after God's face in fellowship watch again in verse 18 O my God incline thine ear and hear you know he's after the ear of God can you follow him now he's after the hand of God he's after the face of God he's after the ear of God he's after the eyes of God open thine eyes see verse 19 he says O Lord hear O Lord forgive O Lord hearken and do you know he's after the heart of God to help him I wonder can we do it all that we could humble ourselves all that we could get away from all the old farceical actings that go on in fair meetings all that we could confess our sins all that we could cry the way we should you know when Daniel was finishing this I want you to watch this he closed the book too early verse 19 O Lord hear O Lord forgive O Lord hearken and do despair not for thine own sake O my God for thy city and thy people are called by thy name that was the last thing he said you know he was basing everything on this great fact that this people was called by God's name and that's a very wonderful thing you know there's a young woman in the assembly just now and don't you worry dear about what I'm going to say because nobody knows anything about it and you know she's a very hard working young woman she has done pretty well and she's a pound or two in the bank and she's got a brother who's not much use and he's always getting into trouble one way or another and down through the years you know when he gets in deep and he's going to be in real trouble he comes round mooching of her to get him out and time and time again you see she has come to me and she has said look it's my brother look he needs that to get him out of that and you know I know as well as where I'm standing that there's no use of me talking to her in any shape or form because he bears her name and she's going to help him and it's just like that and I would think no matter what my son is this or how big a mess they ever made of life I would help them when the day comes just because they bear my name then I wouldn't mind being poverised to do it and I would think that God is just as big as her and me I would think that and just because you bear my people which are called by my name you know he's prepared to help you tonight if you're prepared to humble yourself do you remember what he said to Solomon let's go back there that second chronicle take your time to find it now second chronicles and it's chapter 7 and it's verse 14 second book of chronicles now we're waiting on the young ones finding the place because it's important that you do just fuddle through the book till you get it second chronicles chapter 7 verse 14 and it is God that's speaking and he's saying to Solomon if my people which are called by my name I think this is the bit that Daniel knew you know he must have pondered a lot of these books if my people which are called by my name watch it now shall humble themselves it begins with humility it might begin for some of you like this oh God it's true that this country is in a mess but I don't go to the fair meeting and you'll need to humble yourself and come along on Thursday and if you're not living near here maybe you don't go to the fair meeting at all and you'll need to humble yourself and start maybe you don't want blessing you see it begins with humility watch this bit much he says if my people which are called by my name shall humble themselves and pray and that's back to the honesty again isn't it coming to honestly pray and seek my faith and that's back to the sincerity again isn't it yes it is you can see the the honesty and you can see the sincerity and you can see the intensity of the fear and turn from their wicked ways oh listen I wonder if we were prepared if all the church in Ulster was prepared to just humble itself and really pray and really seek God's faith and really at the same moment turn from our wicked ways I'll tell you this God would heal the land and we wouldn't be depending on Craig or Cessna or Paisley or anybody else but it's going to take a lot of preaching and it's going to take the Lord to fall upon us before we're going to get coming on because you're not prepared for that and I'll tell you this just because you're called by God's name if you make a move at all to get right with God you'll have the blessing God's putting up against the wall tonight will we see some of you on Thursday will you start for good this time or will it just be another six weeks and then you're off again you all used to talk about the lemonade Christians and I was so stupid I couldn't understand what the lemonade Christians were and I said to him what's this about these lemonade Christians he said well did you ever see a half bottle of lemonade if you shake it you know it all fizzes it'll break up to the top it will spurt out but shut it down for ten minutes till you see it's not there at all these lemonade Christians they go off with a burst you know they're not going to contain them you can hardly keep a stopper in and two weeks they're not at the prayer meeting at all it's all lemonade stuff wonder do we mean business for God may God help us we're going to sing just what's the number Nora and thirty please three hundred and thirty and we're just singing the first and the last verses but the tune that I have chosen needs us to take the second verse each time of the chorus so we're singing the first verse and then the second one of the chorus and we're singing the last verse and the second one again of the chorus you'll get the tune when you hear it 3-3-0 please holy water I have you now Pastor McWilliams is with us sitting down there I wanted him to come but he wanted to stay with Mrs. McWilliams look there he is he'll ask the Lord's blessing and we'll celebrate a bond of men and women with hearts of fire and flesh the very heart of God we're going to meet with Freddy and good or not we pray once again and say and these last days pains of recession from the house of the Lord in the name of the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit