Jehovah is Gracious

Minister:
Date: PM
Text: Daniel 1:1-3
Psalters: 375, 379, 122, 354
Sacrament of Baptism
  1. The difficult setting.
    1. It was a time of divine indignation (8:19) expressed on the disobedient church of God.
      1. Despite many warnings, Judah as a whole continued to rebel and doing evil in God s sight.
      2. God warned also by having the Babylonians comes once (when the princes taken, Isa. 39) and again.
    2. Even the faithful wondered if God s promises would fail.
      1. The faithful were stunned by the sinfulness of the nation and what they together deserved.
      2. While they were desperate to know whether God would deliberately forget His promises.
    3. Nebuchadnezzar took princes (sons and nephews of the royal family of David) in the first captivity.
    4. Nebechadnezzar s desire was to give them such a life that they would forget the nation of their birth.
  2. The answer of faith.
    1. Jeremiah assured them that God s relationship with them (covenant) was everlasting (Jer. 32:37-42)!
    2. The parents of these four young princes (likely 14 - 17 years old) had faith in Jehovah.
      1. The names their parents gave their sons indicate the faith of their fathers.
      2. Together their names signify parents who confess their faith in God as the God of their salvation.
    3. These four men kept their names in spite of Nebuchadnezzar changing them.
      1. These names are the gospel of Jesus Christ as the Old Dispensational church had it.
      2. God gathered these four men together in Babylon so their names would proclaim the gospel to the captives.