12.07.2014 Old Testament: Dan 9.16

To read the Bible in a year, read Daniel 9–10 on December 7, In the year of our Lord 2014

By Don Ruhl

I have recommended Daniel’s prayer to you before, found in chapter 9. It exudes a beauty of spirit that helps us to see why the Lord called him a beloved man, and why the Lord worked through Daniel. Notice this part of his prayer,

“O Lord, according to all Your righteousness, I pray, let Your anger and Your fury be turned away from Your city Jerusalem, Your holy mountain; because for our sins, and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and Your people are a reproach to all those around us” (Daniel 9.16). 

Daniel recognized that the turning away of the Lord’s anger and fury came from His righteousness. It certainly would not come from man’s righteousness, for as Daniel noted, Israel had sinned and committed iniquity.

Yet, it was those very sins that brought reproach upon Jerusalem before the nations, and Daniel focused on the fact that the Jews were His people, implying that the reproach fell upon the Lord also. The Lord heard Daniel’s prayer.