1 00:00:02,640 --> 00:00:05,280 Good morning. How's everyone doing? 2 00:00:06,000 --> 00:00:10,200 Good. All right, if we haven't met, my 3 00:00:10,200 --> 00:00:12,920 name is Mandy. I'm on staff here at the Garden 4 00:00:12,920 --> 00:00:18,080 Church, and I am excited to be kicking off our new sermon 5 00:00:18,080 --> 00:00:20,840 series on the book of Daniel. Oh, give me one second. 6 00:00:20,840 --> 00:00:28,920 All right, so I'm curious how many people have gone through a 7 00:00:28,920 --> 00:00:31,200 sermon series on the book of Daniel before? 8 00:00:31,560 --> 00:00:33,040 Raise of hands, a couple of people. 9 00:00:33,040 --> 00:00:35,400 OK, More people than I thought I was actually thinking to myself. 10 00:00:35,400 --> 00:00:38,440 I don't know if I have like, I feel like it's a lesser chosen 11 00:00:38,440 --> 00:00:41,560 book in my mind, maybe because it's prophetic and apocalyptic 12 00:00:41,560 --> 00:00:43,760 and all of that. But it's a fun challenge for me. 13 00:00:43,760 --> 00:00:45,120 It'll be a fun challenge for all of us. 14 00:00:45,920 --> 00:00:50,600 So Daniel, as some of you may know, is an inspiring book full 15 00:00:50,600 --> 00:00:55,880 of valiant acts of faith, But it is also hard to make sense of, 16 00:00:56,200 --> 00:00:59,120 partly, again, because of, you know, the apocalyptic elements. 17 00:00:59,480 --> 00:01:02,160 There's a lot about it that is metaphorical and interpretive. 18 00:01:02,720 --> 00:01:05,519 But partly part of what's hard about it is the fact that it 19 00:01:05,519 --> 00:01:09,640 takes place at a time in history that most of us know very little 20 00:01:09,640 --> 00:01:13,640 about, which is Israel's journey into exile. 21 00:01:14,200 --> 00:01:19,040 And so exile is a very specific experience of displacement 22 00:01:19,320 --> 00:01:21,480 because it involves being forcibly taken from your 23 00:01:21,480 --> 00:01:24,600 country, separated from everything you've ever known, 24 00:01:24,920 --> 00:01:27,320 and taken to live in the land of your captors. 25 00:01:27,880 --> 00:01:31,560 So a core element of exile is the loss of 1's home. 26 00:01:32,080 --> 00:01:34,640 Like not just the physical space, but everything that it 27 00:01:34,640 --> 00:01:38,720 represents, the safety, the familiarity, belonging, the 28 00:01:38,720 --> 00:01:41,720 sense of identity. And the loss of those things is 29 00:01:41,720 --> 00:01:44,440 really the context of the book of Daniel. 30 00:01:45,080 --> 00:01:48,600 So on the topic of home, you know, a bunch of you in this 31 00:01:48,600 --> 00:01:50,200 room are people that I know personally. 32 00:01:50,200 --> 00:01:54,440 But if we haven't met, I will warn you that I do something 33 00:01:54,440 --> 00:01:57,800 really awkward when people ask me where I'm from, which is that 34 00:01:57,800 --> 00:01:59,880 I give everyone a different answer depending on how I'm 35 00:01:59,880 --> 00:02:03,640 feeling that day. So which is super confusing for 36 00:02:03,640 --> 00:02:06,720 everyone, including me. But the the problem is that I 37 00:02:06,720 --> 00:02:11,000 get fixated on the question behind the question because, you 38 00:02:11,000 --> 00:02:13,200 know, the people asking you aren't usually just like 39 00:02:13,240 --> 00:02:16,160 collecting factoids about you just in case they get quizzed in 40 00:02:16,160 --> 00:02:17,920 the future. You know, they're they're trying 41 00:02:17,920 --> 00:02:20,000 to get to know you, they're trying to make a connection. 42 00:02:20,480 --> 00:02:22,520 And so, you know, if they're familiar with the place that you 43 00:02:22,520 --> 00:02:25,400 grew up, then they might have some understanding of how you 44 00:02:25,400 --> 00:02:28,320 see the world or what experiences you've had or what 45 00:02:28,320 --> 00:02:31,280 you expect from other people. And that's what makes the 46 00:02:31,280 --> 00:02:34,960 question feel complicated to me because if you just ask me, 47 00:02:34,960 --> 00:02:37,640 like, where geographically did you spend most of your years as 48 00:02:37,640 --> 00:02:40,960 a minor? I might say northern New Mexico. 49 00:02:41,600 --> 00:02:45,000 But if you said, tell me about the places that shaped you, 50 00:02:45,920 --> 00:02:47,640 which is a great question, I would love it if someone asked 51 00:02:47,640 --> 00:02:50,760 me that question. I might mention that my family 52 00:02:50,760 --> 00:02:53,760 moved at least once a year from the time I was born to when I 53 00:02:53,760 --> 00:02:56,320 was 7. I might say that I felt like a 54 00:02:56,320 --> 00:02:59,640 misfit in the small town where I spent most of my, like, primary 55 00:02:59,640 --> 00:03:02,080 school years. And I was like actively plotting 56 00:03:02,080 --> 00:03:03,800 to get out by the time I was in high school. 57 00:03:04,920 --> 00:03:07,360 And I might say that I still think of Los Angeles as my home 58 00:03:07,640 --> 00:03:09,000 because that's where I met Jesus. 59 00:03:09,320 --> 00:03:11,960 That's where I experienced my first really rich Christian 60 00:03:11,960 --> 00:03:13,720 community. And that's the first place that 61 00:03:13,720 --> 00:03:17,840 I had a real sense of belonging. So that's what home means to me. 62 00:03:18,200 --> 00:03:20,880 You know, it is a place, but it's also memories. 63 00:03:20,880 --> 00:03:23,800 It's a it's a people. It's a feeling that you're more 64 00:03:23,800 --> 00:03:27,240 yourself when you're with them. So to me, the question beneath 65 00:03:27,240 --> 00:03:30,160 the question is, where do you feel that you belong? 66 00:03:31,120 --> 00:03:32,520 How would you answer that question? 67 00:03:33,320 --> 00:03:35,160 I mean, some of you might be getting like warm fuzzies 68 00:03:35,160 --> 00:03:37,680 thinking about the place that you call home, but some of you 69 00:03:37,680 --> 00:03:42,120 might feel kind of a, a sadness like a a pain because it's 70 00:03:42,120 --> 00:03:45,120 connected to loss or difficult memories. 71 00:03:45,600 --> 00:03:49,760 So as we begin our journey into the book of Daniel, this is a 72 00:03:49,760 --> 00:03:51,400 question that we're going to be confronted with. 73 00:03:51,760 --> 00:03:56,200 How do we respond when our sense of security and belonging is 74 00:03:56,200 --> 00:03:59,200 taken from us? And how might that shape the way 75 00:03:59,200 --> 00:04:03,400 that we view and relate to God? So before we turn back to the 76 00:04:03,400 --> 00:04:06,200 book of Daniel, I'd love to open us in just a quick word of 77 00:04:06,200 --> 00:04:09,240 prayer that God would meet with us and speak to us this morning. 78 00:04:11,000 --> 00:04:16,120 Father God, we are grateful that you are here to teach us, God, 79 00:04:16,519 --> 00:04:18,600 not me, but your Holy Spirit and your word. 80 00:04:19,279 --> 00:04:22,240 So God, we pray that you would be present in this place. 81 00:04:22,240 --> 00:04:24,000 We pray that you would be present among us. 82 00:04:24,480 --> 00:04:27,680 We pray that even though we are talking about a people in a 83 00:04:27,680 --> 00:04:31,800 place that are centuries and miles away from most of our 84 00:04:31,800 --> 00:04:35,560 experience, we pray that the common humanness would speak to 85 00:04:35,560 --> 00:04:37,480 us this morning. God, we believe that you have 86 00:04:37,480 --> 00:04:41,400 things to say, that your word is for us, that it is rich, that it 87 00:04:41,400 --> 00:04:44,400 teaches us things that we need to know about reality, about who 88 00:04:44,400 --> 00:04:46,840 we are, how who you are. And we also believe that you 89 00:04:46,840 --> 00:04:49,800 meet us in it, God. So we just pray that you would 90 00:04:49,800 --> 00:04:52,360 open up our hearts and minds this morning to be able to hear 91 00:04:52,360 --> 00:04:55,160 from you. And yeah, I just thought you, by 92 00:04:55,160 --> 00:04:57,720 your Holy Spirit would continue to shape the way that we view 93 00:04:57,720 --> 00:05:00,320 ourselves, the way that we view the world, and that you would 94 00:05:00,320 --> 00:05:02,560 bring our hearts more and more into alignment with yours and 95 00:05:02,560 --> 00:05:05,360 your desire for us. We pray all those things in 96 00:05:05,400 --> 00:05:08,120 Jesus name, Amen. Amen. 97 00:05:08,800 --> 00:05:12,880 So earlier Amy very kindly read the first few verses of the book 98 00:05:12,880 --> 00:05:17,120 of Daniel, which tell us that in the third year of the reign of 99 00:05:17,120 --> 00:05:21,120 Jehoiakim, king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon 100 00:05:21,240 --> 00:05:23,200 came to Jerusalem and besieged it. 101 00:05:24,120 --> 00:05:26,280 That's first one. Already we might feel lost. 102 00:05:26,520 --> 00:05:27,920 There's so many names we can't pronounce. 103 00:05:27,920 --> 00:05:30,640 You know, we're not really sure why these people are important 104 00:05:30,640 --> 00:05:33,360 maybe. And what does besieging mean? 105 00:05:33,360 --> 00:05:35,680 Like it sounds bad. My first instinct is to be anti 106 00:05:35,680 --> 00:05:37,160 besieging. But I'm also going to need like 107 00:05:37,160 --> 00:05:41,400 a thesaurus. So to Orient us, let's just back 108 00:05:41,400 --> 00:05:45,760 up a minute and kind of get oriented to Daniel's world. 109 00:05:46,200 --> 00:05:50,920 So to do so, I'm going to kick us off with a 2 minute history 110 00:05:50,920 --> 00:05:53,880 lesson. So just 120 seconds. 111 00:05:54,160 --> 00:05:57,040 Nobody time me but 120 seconds. And you'll know everything that 112 00:05:57,040 --> 00:05:58,760 you need to know about the history behind the book of 113 00:05:58,760 --> 00:05:59,960 Daniel. OK, sound good? 114 00:06:00,320 --> 00:06:01,720 You excited? OK, let's do it. 115 00:06:01,720 --> 00:06:05,720 All right, so it all starts with a civil war. 116 00:06:06,280 --> 00:06:08,800 So way back under King Solomon, which might be a familiar name. 117 00:06:08,960 --> 00:06:12,600 Israel enjoyed this brief period of peace, but after Solomon 118 00:06:12,600 --> 00:06:15,080 dies, things basically rapidly fall apart. 119 00:06:15,520 --> 00:06:18,480 Infighting causes the nation of Israel to split into two into 120 00:06:18,480 --> 00:06:19,960 the northern and southern kingdoms. 121 00:06:20,240 --> 00:06:23,320 And both kingdoms experience like a long line of mostly 122 00:06:23,320 --> 00:06:26,840 violent and wicked kings who like claim the the throne 123 00:06:26,840 --> 00:06:29,680 through insurrection and who brings the Israelites deeper and 124 00:06:29,680 --> 00:06:34,040 deeper into idolatry. So these wicked kings leave 125 00:06:34,040 --> 00:06:37,840 Israel in a weakened state, basically totally unprepared for 126 00:06:37,840 --> 00:06:40,880 when bigger stronger nations come knocking at their door. 127 00:06:41,400 --> 00:06:44,640 And the southern Kingdom, which is also known as Judah, is 128 00:06:44,640 --> 00:06:47,880 conquered first by Egypt and then by Babylon. 129 00:06:48,400 --> 00:06:51,560 Now, Babylon's conquest kind of happens in stages, which is part 130 00:06:51,560 --> 00:06:53,280 of why it can be hard to track the timeline. 131 00:06:53,560 --> 00:06:56,240 But first, the first thing that Babylon does is they appoint A 132 00:06:56,240 --> 00:06:59,960 vassal king over Israel. And a vassal king is like a 133 00:06:59,960 --> 00:07:02,960 puppet, essentially. So they do have authority, but 134 00:07:02,960 --> 00:07:05,880 like, Babylon is like pulling the strings behind the scenes. 135 00:07:06,120 --> 00:07:09,520 And, you know, the king has to, like, pay taxes to Babylon and 136 00:07:09,520 --> 00:07:11,120 provide military support to Babylon. 137 00:07:11,120 --> 00:07:12,480 So that's kind of the arrangement. 138 00:07:13,080 --> 00:07:17,520 But secondly, Babylon deports Israel's best and brightest to 139 00:07:17,520 --> 00:07:19,200 come live in the Babylonian empire. 140 00:07:19,200 --> 00:07:22,520 And that's what we saw happening in Daniel 1 verses 3:00 and 141 00:07:22,520 --> 00:07:24,120 4:00. So it says that King 142 00:07:24,120 --> 00:07:26,920 Nebuchadnezzar brings some of the Israelites from the royal 143 00:07:26,920 --> 00:07:30,520 family and the nobility, young men without any physical defect, 144 00:07:30,800 --> 00:07:33,520 handsome, showing aptitude for every kind of learning, well 145 00:07:33,520 --> 00:07:36,560 informed, quick to understand, and qualified to serve in the 146 00:07:36,560 --> 00:07:38,560 King's palace. And they were to learn the 147 00:07:38,560 --> 00:07:41,160 language in the literature of the Babylonians. 148 00:07:41,880 --> 00:07:44,000 Now, that might seem like kind of a strange practice, right? 149 00:07:44,000 --> 00:07:47,240 So Babylon conquers Israel, and then they kind of just 150 00:07:47,240 --> 00:07:50,080 immediately send out a talent scout to be like, OK, who are 151 00:07:50,080 --> 00:07:52,400 the smartest and the best educated and like the best 152 00:07:52,400 --> 00:07:55,880 looking Israelites and throw in any who come from good families 153 00:07:55,880 --> 00:07:57,480 too. And we'll basically bring them 154 00:07:57,480 --> 00:08:00,200 here and give them fancy jobs in the royal palace. 155 00:08:00,200 --> 00:08:03,080 So it's kind of odd, but that's what happens. 156 00:08:03,320 --> 00:08:07,120 And that's how Daniel and his friends, Hananiah, Michelle, 157 00:08:07,680 --> 00:08:10,920 Azariah, that's how they all end up in Babylon. 158 00:08:13,240 --> 00:08:15,440 One of the talents I need to develop is the ability to turn 159 00:08:15,440 --> 00:08:16,760 pages more. I feel like. 160 00:08:16,800 --> 00:08:18,560 Do you think our, like, opposable thumbs become most 161 00:08:18,560 --> 00:08:21,200 less useful because we're interacting with technology all 162 00:08:21,200 --> 00:08:22,600 the time? Anyway, we'll see what happens 163 00:08:23,560 --> 00:08:25,720 as time passes. Well, that's it. 164 00:08:25,720 --> 00:08:27,080 That's your two-minute history lesson. 165 00:08:27,600 --> 00:08:29,560 So how do we do? Everyone still tracking with me. 166 00:08:29,880 --> 00:08:30,960 OK, great. Perfect. 167 00:08:32,080 --> 00:08:36,120 OK, so recap. This is what it means to live in 168 00:08:36,120 --> 00:08:38,440 exile. So your homeland and your people 169 00:08:38,440 --> 00:08:41,640 are conquered by foreign nation. Your places of worship have been 170 00:08:41,640 --> 00:08:45,240 ravaged, and sacred items have been carried off to the temple 171 00:08:45,240 --> 00:08:47,440 of a foreign God. You're taken to live in a 172 00:08:47,440 --> 00:08:49,880 foreign land and to work for your oppressor. 173 00:08:50,320 --> 00:08:52,840 And you're under pressure to adapt to the culture of your 174 00:08:52,840 --> 00:08:55,440 oppressor, to speak their language and embody their way of 175 00:08:55,440 --> 00:08:57,800 life. And even your names are changed 176 00:08:57,800 --> 00:09:00,320 to foreign names. So kind of that last marker of 177 00:09:00,320 --> 00:09:02,480 your former identity is taken from you. 178 00:09:02,480 --> 00:09:07,040 So this is a desperate situation full of a loss and grief and 179 00:09:07,040 --> 00:09:09,720 fear, right? Everything's very tenuous, and 180 00:09:09,720 --> 00:09:12,640 these sentiments are captured really elegantly in Psalm 137. 181 00:09:12,640 --> 00:09:15,960 It's about exile, It says by the rivers of Babylon. 182 00:09:15,960 --> 00:09:18,320 We sat and wept when we remembered Zion. 183 00:09:18,960 --> 00:09:22,520 There on the poplars we hung our harps, for there are captors 184 00:09:22,520 --> 00:09:26,120 asked for our songs. Our tormentors demanded songs of 185 00:09:26,120 --> 00:09:28,640 joy. They said, Sing us one of the 186 00:09:28,640 --> 00:09:31,520 songs of Zion. How can we sing the songs of the 187 00:09:31,520 --> 00:09:35,000 Lord while in a foreign land? If I forget you, Jerusalem, may 188 00:09:35,000 --> 00:09:38,280 my right hand forget its skill, may my tongue cling to the roof 189 00:09:38,280 --> 00:09:41,000 of my mouth, if I do not remember you, if I do not 190 00:09:41,000 --> 00:09:43,360 consider Jerusalem my highest joy. 191 00:09:43,360 --> 00:09:48,480 So there's like a pain, attention, a longing in these 192 00:09:48,480 --> 00:09:50,120 words. How can we sing a song about our 193 00:09:50,120 --> 00:09:52,880 homeland when our hearts cry out that our home has been lost to 194 00:09:52,880 --> 00:09:55,000 us? How can we forget where we are 195 00:09:55,000 --> 00:09:56,680 from? But how can we remember without 196 00:09:56,680 --> 00:10:00,120 being overwhelmed by grief? So this is kind of the emotional 197 00:10:00,120 --> 00:10:02,440 overtone of the book of Daniel as we go in. 198 00:10:02,760 --> 00:10:06,360 And so our big question of today is, how might Israel's 199 00:10:06,360 --> 00:10:10,400 experience of exile speak to us and shape our faith today? 200 00:10:11,080 --> 00:10:14,360 Well, to answer that question, I have kind of three main points 201 00:10:14,360 --> 00:10:18,360 that we're going to focus on. So first, exile invites us to 202 00:10:18,360 --> 00:10:23,240 experience God differently. Second, exile normalizes our 203 00:10:23,240 --> 00:10:27,960 longing for something better. And 3rd, exile frees us to focus 204 00:10:27,960 --> 00:10:31,560 on eternity. So first, exile invites us to 205 00:10:31,560 --> 00:10:35,520 experience God differently. So exile involves like tangible 206 00:10:35,520 --> 00:10:38,280 losses right of home and country, but it also involves 207 00:10:38,280 --> 00:10:41,680 intangible losses of what you thought that your life would be 208 00:10:41,680 --> 00:10:45,280 like, like how you imagined your future or how you thought that 209 00:10:45,280 --> 00:10:47,360 God would show up in your hour of need. 210 00:10:48,200 --> 00:10:51,320 So in Daniel 1-2, we see, for instance, that the Lord gave the 211 00:10:51,320 --> 00:10:52,120 king. This is what it says. 212 00:10:52,120 --> 00:10:55,360 It says the Lord gave the king over to Judah, basically to his 213 00:10:55,360 --> 00:10:58,400 enemies, along with some of the articles from the temple of God, 214 00:10:58,600 --> 00:11:01,560 which are like carried off into the temple of a Babylonian God. 215 00:11:01,720 --> 00:11:04,960 So already the story immediately starts with the sense that God 216 00:11:04,960 --> 00:11:07,640 has given up on Israel, or at least that's what we imagine the 217 00:11:07,640 --> 00:11:10,640 are the the Israelites might think as they're in exile. 218 00:11:11,440 --> 00:11:14,760 So another book of the Bible that was written about exile is 219 00:11:14,760 --> 00:11:17,360 Lamentations. And this is a much more poetic 220 00:11:17,360 --> 00:11:18,520 book. And so again, it gives us kind 221 00:11:18,520 --> 00:11:20,400 of a glimpse into the grief of the people. 222 00:11:20,400 --> 00:11:24,600 In chapter 5 it says, remember, Lord, what has happened to us? 223 00:11:24,840 --> 00:11:28,040 Look and see. Our disgrace, our inheritance 224 00:11:28,040 --> 00:11:30,640 has been turned over to strangers, our homes to 225 00:11:30,640 --> 00:11:33,000 foreigners. We have become fatherless. 226 00:11:33,000 --> 00:11:36,120 Our mothers are widows. We must buy the water we drink, 227 00:11:36,120 --> 00:11:38,000 and our wood can only be had at a price. 228 00:11:38,400 --> 00:11:40,720 Those who pursue us are at our heels. 229 00:11:41,080 --> 00:11:45,120 We are weary and find no rest. And then the chapter ends with 230 00:11:45,120 --> 00:11:48,360 this kind of cry out to God. Why do you always forget us? 231 00:11:48,720 --> 00:11:50,680 Why do you forsake us for so long? 232 00:11:51,040 --> 00:11:55,280 Restore us to yourself, Lord, that we may return, renew our 233 00:11:55,280 --> 00:11:59,000 days as of old. These are like heart wrenching 234 00:11:59,000 --> 00:12:01,440 verses, right? Like God's people have lost 235 00:12:01,440 --> 00:12:03,960 homes and family members. They're weary and they're 236 00:12:03,960 --> 00:12:06,000 hungry. And so they essentially cry out, 237 00:12:06,160 --> 00:12:08,960 God, where are you? Have you forgotten us? 238 00:12:09,040 --> 00:12:10,800 Have you abandoned us completely? 239 00:12:11,720 --> 00:12:14,480 So maybe this is the first place that we might have something in 240 00:12:14,480 --> 00:12:16,600 common with the exiled Israelites. 241 00:12:16,600 --> 00:12:20,200 Like, have we ever felt abandoned by God? 242 00:12:21,360 --> 00:12:23,880 Have we ever felt like we're not sure where he is in the midst of 243 00:12:23,880 --> 00:12:26,280 our struggles? Have we ever wondered if he's 244 00:12:26,280 --> 00:12:30,480 forgotten to answer our prayers? And, you know, maybe you read 245 00:12:30,480 --> 00:12:33,120 the news and every day there's like, you know, a new headline 246 00:12:33,120 --> 00:12:36,320 of some injustice, some atrocities, some senseless 247 00:12:36,320 --> 00:12:38,320 suffering. Maybe you've experienced a 248 00:12:38,320 --> 00:12:40,960 personal loss and your relationship with God has felt 249 00:12:40,960 --> 00:12:44,080 distant ever since. Or maybe you've prayed the same 250 00:12:44,080 --> 00:12:47,080 prayer over and over again for years on end, but it doesn't 251 00:12:47,080 --> 00:12:50,760 feel clear if God has heard you. It's difficult enough to 252 00:12:50,760 --> 00:12:52,560 struggle in your personal relationship with God. 253 00:12:52,560 --> 00:12:55,280 It's another thing to feel that God has abandoned your people, 254 00:12:55,480 --> 00:12:58,760 your nation, your church. And ancient Israel was all 255 00:12:58,760 --> 00:13:00,400 three. Like, they were an ethnic 256 00:13:00,400 --> 00:13:02,560 community. You know, they were a political 257 00:13:02,560 --> 00:13:04,520 entity, and they were a religious body. 258 00:13:04,520 --> 00:13:07,360 And so for generations, their identity was really rooted in 259 00:13:07,360 --> 00:13:10,400 this idea that they were God's people, you know, the standard 260 00:13:10,400 --> 00:13:12,520 bearers of the truth, the chosen ones. 261 00:13:12,760 --> 00:13:14,640 Surely God would spare them from suffering. 262 00:13:14,840 --> 00:13:16,720 Surely God would stand behind their leaders. 263 00:13:16,920 --> 00:13:19,600 Surely God would allow his own people to be overtaken by 264 00:13:19,600 --> 00:13:22,280 enemies. But that's exactly what happens. 265 00:13:23,600 --> 00:13:26,440 And the reason was sin, like exile should not have been a 266 00:13:26,440 --> 00:13:29,640 surprise to the Israelites Centuries, centuries and 267 00:13:29,640 --> 00:13:33,120 centuries before. When God gave Israel the law, he 268 00:13:33,120 --> 00:13:36,040 warned what would happen if they broke it and if they just chose 269 00:13:36,360 --> 00:13:39,400 injustice and violence and idolatry instead. 270 00:13:39,720 --> 00:13:43,480 In Leviticus 26, God says what will happen is your land will be 271 00:13:43,480 --> 00:13:47,240 laid waste, your cities will lie in ruins, and then the land will 272 00:13:47,240 --> 00:13:50,440 enjoy its Sabbath years all the time that it lies desolate and 273 00:13:50,440 --> 00:13:52,400 you were in the country of your enemies. 274 00:13:53,240 --> 00:13:55,840 And that was far from the last time that God rang the warning 275 00:13:55,840 --> 00:13:58,400 bell. So the era of wicked kings that 276 00:13:58,400 --> 00:14:02,520 we kind of talked about earlier, it lasted for over 300 years. 277 00:14:02,560 --> 00:14:05,240 During that time, God sent dozens and dozens and dozens of 278 00:14:05,240 --> 00:14:08,600 prophets urging Israel to repent and to remind them that God 279 00:14:08,600 --> 00:14:11,560 would not stand by them while they refuse to provide justice 280 00:14:11,560 --> 00:14:14,080 to orphans and deny the rights of the poor, which is what the 281 00:14:14,080 --> 00:14:17,160 prophet Jeremiah warns. And they freely just keep giving 282 00:14:17,160 --> 00:14:21,120 themselves to idols generation after generation passes, and the 283 00:14:21,120 --> 00:14:23,280 people just refuse to change their ways. 284 00:14:24,200 --> 00:14:27,280 But what's especially tragic is that we have people like Daniel, 285 00:14:27,280 --> 00:14:31,240 Hananiah, Mishael, Azariah who suffer the consequences. 286 00:14:31,960 --> 00:14:33,840 The book of Daniel doesn't provide like a ton of detail 287 00:14:33,840 --> 00:14:35,080 about their background and their lives. 288 00:14:35,080 --> 00:14:38,080 But through the book, we mostly see them acting with integrity 289 00:14:38,160 --> 00:14:40,440 and what's pretty radical faith in God. 290 00:14:40,800 --> 00:14:42,400 And yet they are sent into exile. 291 00:14:43,120 --> 00:14:46,080 There's this verse in Lamentations 57 that may have 292 00:14:46,080 --> 00:14:49,320 resonated with them. It says our ancestors sinned and 293 00:14:49,320 --> 00:14:51,680 are no more, and we bear their punishment. 294 00:14:52,800 --> 00:14:55,360 So how do we make sense of this, really? 295 00:14:55,360 --> 00:14:59,480 How do we cling to faith in God when our leaders sin and we face 296 00:14:59,480 --> 00:15:03,000 the consequences? When our parents or our bosses 297 00:15:03,000 --> 00:15:06,560 or even our church leaders fail us and we are left to clean up 298 00:15:06,560 --> 00:15:10,520 the mess? In some cases, like the 299 00:15:10,520 --> 00:15:13,680 Israelites, admittedly, we might be part of the problem, right? 300 00:15:13,880 --> 00:15:16,000 Like sometimes we do choose selfishness, or we turned a 301 00:15:16,000 --> 00:15:18,440 blind eye to justice and then we kind of act surprised when it 302 00:15:18,440 --> 00:15:20,920 catches up with us. But there are other times when 303 00:15:20,920 --> 00:15:24,200 it feels like despite our failings, like we didn't create 304 00:15:24,200 --> 00:15:26,480 the broken system or the broken families were in. 305 00:15:26,480 --> 00:15:29,960 So what then? Like, where is God in the midst 306 00:15:29,960 --> 00:15:32,920 of our struggle or in the midst of our exile? 307 00:15:34,120 --> 00:15:36,640 So the themes of exile might hit closer home than we thought. 308 00:15:37,200 --> 00:15:40,800 I was thinking about, you know, the years since the pandemic, 309 00:15:41,040 --> 00:15:43,200 that whole era where the world just shut down, right? 310 00:15:43,200 --> 00:15:47,560 And I was thinking about how we experience more like shared loss 311 00:15:47,600 --> 00:15:50,400 and communal reasons to lament than I think I'd experienced in 312 00:15:50,400 --> 00:15:54,120 my lifetime before that. But as I process my own griefs 313 00:15:54,120 --> 00:15:58,000 from that, I've realized that the pain doesn't just come from 314 00:15:58,000 --> 00:16:01,320 the loss itself. It also comes from the unmet 315 00:16:01,320 --> 00:16:05,200 expectations, like from the way that loss kind of reshapes our 316 00:16:05,200 --> 00:16:07,840 view of reality. You know, we thought life would 317 00:16:07,840 --> 00:16:09,840 look one way, but it didn't turn out like that. 318 00:16:10,320 --> 00:16:12,920 We thought certain things were true in our relationships with 319 00:16:12,920 --> 00:16:16,600 others or even in our society, but it turned out we were wrong. 320 00:16:17,320 --> 00:16:19,240 We thought God would show up in a certain way, but then he 321 00:16:19,240 --> 00:16:21,480 didn't. I think that last one is the 322 00:16:21,480 --> 00:16:24,400 sticking point because whether we're aware of it or not, each 323 00:16:24,400 --> 00:16:28,120 of us has an internal script of how God is supposed to relate to 324 00:16:28,120 --> 00:16:29,920 us. It's usually subconscious, 325 00:16:29,920 --> 00:16:31,320 right? So it makes it easy to assume 326 00:16:31,320 --> 00:16:33,680 that our script is just like reality. 327 00:16:34,360 --> 00:16:37,200 But for instance, I became a Christian when I was living in 328 00:16:37,200 --> 00:16:40,960 Los Angeles, and I feel like the default mindset in LA could be 329 00:16:40,960 --> 00:16:43,360 summarized by the phrase good vibes only. 330 00:16:43,720 --> 00:16:45,880 Like people literally sell T-shirts that say that on the 331 00:16:45,880 --> 00:16:48,320 beach. So there is kind of like this 332 00:16:48,320 --> 00:16:52,920 determined avoidance of pain and struggle and even inconvenience 333 00:16:52,920 --> 00:16:55,560 that really shapes the whole culture and that bleeds into 334 00:16:55,560 --> 00:16:58,160 people's spiritual lives. And often it shows up as this 335 00:16:58,160 --> 00:17:02,680 kind of subconscious script that says I'll know God is real if he 336 00:17:02,680 --> 00:17:06,119 keeps me from suffering. Or it might sound something like 337 00:17:06,560 --> 00:17:09,200 as long as I'm a good person or a good Christian, that will 338 00:17:09,200 --> 00:17:11,480 protect me from pain or even discomfort. 339 00:17:12,200 --> 00:17:13,960 And maybe you grew up with kind of a similar script. 340 00:17:13,960 --> 00:17:16,440 Or, you know, maybe it might say something like, as long as I 341 00:17:16,440 --> 00:17:19,319 work hard and do good deeds for God, he will reward me. 342 00:17:20,000 --> 00:17:22,560 Or God is on the side of the specific community or this 343 00:17:22,560 --> 00:17:24,800 political party. So if I just align myself with 344 00:17:24,800 --> 00:17:26,760 them, God will be pleased with me. 345 00:17:27,319 --> 00:17:29,520 Which are all very American scripts to live by. 346 00:17:30,600 --> 00:17:33,360 But most of us have scripts like this that are really based on 347 00:17:33,360 --> 00:17:37,000 like our culture or kind of influential voices in our lives, 348 00:17:37,000 --> 00:17:40,080 but they're not based on Scripture and they're not based 349 00:17:40,080 --> 00:17:42,760 on truth. And the reason Daniel has 350 00:17:42,760 --> 00:17:46,040 companions are able to endure exile well and maintain 351 00:17:46,040 --> 00:17:49,160 faithfulness to God is because they are following a script 352 00:17:49,520 --> 00:17:53,640 based on a right view of God. Because God does not promise 353 00:17:53,640 --> 00:17:56,680 that we will never feel pain. God has not promised that we 354 00:17:56,680 --> 00:18:00,800 will never experience loss. God has not exchanged good deeds 355 00:18:00,800 --> 00:18:02,640 for like, get out of suffering free cards. 356 00:18:02,640 --> 00:18:05,600 That's not a part of the biblical paradigm. 357 00:18:06,040 --> 00:18:07,720 The greatest leaders of Israel suffered. 358 00:18:08,200 --> 00:18:10,960 The apostles and evangelists of the early church suffered. 359 00:18:11,760 --> 00:18:15,680 Jesus suffered. So God does not promise a life 360 00:18:15,680 --> 00:18:20,240 free of suffering, but he does promise to never leave us or 361 00:18:20,280 --> 00:18:22,840 forsake us. And that is the key, because 362 00:18:22,840 --> 00:18:26,160 when we put our trust in God that promises for us, our 363 00:18:26,160 --> 00:18:28,760 comfort is in the fact that God stands with us. 364 00:18:28,760 --> 00:18:32,520 He identifies with our pain. And we can be sure of that 365 00:18:32,800 --> 00:18:36,640 because of Jesus, who willingly went to the cross for our sake. 366 00:18:37,120 --> 00:18:40,760 A God who is willing to suffer with us is a God that we can 367 00:18:40,760 --> 00:18:43,840 trust. Jesus could have avoided that 368 00:18:43,840 --> 00:18:47,360 ultimate and excruciating pain and humiliation and separation, 369 00:18:47,360 --> 00:18:51,240 but he pursued it out of love for us. 370 00:18:53,320 --> 00:18:55,840 So the God who is willing to go to the cross for our salvation 371 00:18:55,840 --> 00:18:58,720 is the same God who shows up for Daniel and his friends in 372 00:18:58,720 --> 00:19:01,840 unexpected ways. You know God, we'll we'll see 373 00:19:01,840 --> 00:19:03,160 this later as we go through the series. 374 00:19:03,160 --> 00:19:06,680 God gives Daniel the ability to interpret dreams to save him 375 00:19:06,680 --> 00:19:09,680 from the wrath of the king. God walks alongside Daniel's 376 00:19:09,680 --> 00:19:12,000 friends in the fiery furnace and protects them from harm. 377 00:19:12,200 --> 00:19:14,440 God shuts the mouth of lions to protect Daniel when he is 378 00:19:14,440 --> 00:19:17,040 sentenced to death. So he does show exile is 379 00:19:17,040 --> 00:19:21,160 happening and yet God is showing up and providing deliverance and 380 00:19:21,160 --> 00:19:24,160 evidence of his presence and showing his faithfulness in 381 00:19:24,160 --> 00:19:25,960 other ways. Kind of both are happening at 382 00:19:25,960 --> 00:19:28,800 the same time. And this is in response to 383 00:19:29,000 --> 00:19:32,720 Daniel and his friends just continual reliance on the mercy 384 00:19:32,720 --> 00:19:35,280 of God. And imagine if Daniel and the 385 00:19:35,280 --> 00:19:38,200 others had operated by the script, you know, if I find 386 00:19:38,200 --> 00:19:40,640 myself in exile, God must not be with me. 387 00:19:41,440 --> 00:19:43,800 They literally would have missed out on some of the most 388 00:19:43,800 --> 00:19:46,640 extraordinary miracles of the Old Testament. 389 00:19:47,080 --> 00:19:50,520 But by clinging to the God who stands with them, Daniel and his 390 00:19:50,520 --> 00:19:54,040 companions discover the extraordinary ways God can show 391 00:19:54,040 --> 00:19:56,080 up even in our most desperate moments. 392 00:19:57,040 --> 00:20:00,080 Hebrews 13 contains these two kind of like anchoring quotes 393 00:20:00,080 --> 00:20:02,800 from the the Old Testament. The first one is the one that 394 00:20:02,800 --> 00:20:05,560 says. God has said I will never leave 395 00:20:05,560 --> 00:20:10,040 you nor forsake you, and then the Lord is my helper. 396 00:20:10,320 --> 00:20:13,160 I will not fear. What can man do to me? 397 00:20:14,040 --> 00:20:17,400 I feel like that is the script that Daniel and his friends live 398 00:20:17,400 --> 00:20:21,360 by, like a faith that God is beside them and even the darkest 399 00:20:21,360 --> 00:20:25,040 tragedy cannot destroy them. That exile is not the end of the 400 00:20:25,040 --> 00:20:29,240 story. So our second point today is 401 00:20:29,240 --> 00:20:32,840 that exile normalizes our longing for something better. 402 00:20:34,080 --> 00:20:37,440 So despite these dire circumstances, Daniel and his 403 00:20:37,440 --> 00:20:39,640 friends are shown a certain amount of favor in the Royal 404 00:20:39,640 --> 00:20:42,680 Court. And Daniel, 15, says the king 405 00:20:42,680 --> 00:20:45,040 assigned them a daily amount of food and wine from the King's 406 00:20:45,040 --> 00:20:47,120 table. They were to be trained for 407 00:20:47,120 --> 00:20:49,920 three years, and after that they were to enter the King's 408 00:20:49,920 --> 00:20:52,840 service. So if the first temptation in 409 00:20:52,840 --> 00:20:57,080 exile is to believe that God has abandoned you, the second 410 00:20:57,080 --> 00:21:00,560 temptation would be to adapt to exile, like to try to make 411 00:21:00,560 --> 00:21:04,080 Babylon your home. So this temptation, I think, 412 00:21:04,080 --> 00:21:06,920 appeals to something that all humans have in common, which is 413 00:21:06,920 --> 00:21:09,360 this desire to belong. As we talked about before, we 414 00:21:09,360 --> 00:21:13,680 want to be connected to a place and a people, to find a home. 415 00:21:14,280 --> 00:21:16,440 And so this is another way that we might relate to the 416 00:21:16,800 --> 00:21:20,560 Israelites in exile, this feeling of existential 417 00:21:20,640 --> 00:21:24,120 homesickness. And I say existential because 418 00:21:24,320 --> 00:21:27,080 you could argue that homesickness is actually part of 419 00:21:27,080 --> 00:21:29,600 the human condition. Like, we can trace it all the 420 00:21:29,600 --> 00:21:33,080 way back to the fall in Genesis 3, where Adam and Eve rebel 421 00:21:33,080 --> 00:21:35,280 against God and must leave the Garden of Eden. 422 00:21:35,280 --> 00:21:39,000 And leaving Eden meant so much more than, like, leaving behind 423 00:21:39,000 --> 00:21:43,320 a place, you know, it meant a loss of stability and comfort 424 00:21:43,320 --> 00:21:46,560 and intimacy with God. And since then, humanity has 425 00:21:46,560 --> 00:21:50,200 just found itself striving to return to that place of 426 00:21:50,200 --> 00:21:53,680 stability and comfort and intimacy, but always coming up 427 00:21:53,680 --> 00:21:56,920 short. So whether or not we realize it, 428 00:21:57,320 --> 00:21:59,400 our hearts are longing to go back to Eden. 429 00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:03,320 There's something in us that resists the brokenness of this 430 00:22:03,320 --> 00:22:05,240 world, right? Like the world is full of 431 00:22:05,240 --> 00:22:07,440 suffering, but we long for comfort and pleasure. 432 00:22:07,440 --> 00:22:10,200 This world is full of violence and strife, but we long for 433 00:22:10,200 --> 00:22:11,920 peace. It's full of judgment and 434 00:22:11,920 --> 00:22:14,280 prejudice, but we long for acceptance and belonging. 435 00:22:14,440 --> 00:22:17,600 The world is full of loss and disappointment, but we long for 436 00:22:17,600 --> 00:22:21,400 permanence and fulfillment. So despite the fact that we are 437 00:22:21,400 --> 00:22:24,600 surrounded by darkness, something in US resists it, like 438 00:22:24,600 --> 00:22:28,280 something in US knows that we were made to live in the light. 439 00:22:29,360 --> 00:22:32,360 It's difficult to live with unmet longings, isn't it? 440 00:22:33,000 --> 00:22:35,920 Like it creates this tension inside of us. 441 00:22:36,280 --> 00:22:38,480 So we're like, tempted to try to resolve it. 442 00:22:38,480 --> 00:22:41,440 So we like, you know, maybe we try to numb out or, you know, 443 00:22:41,440 --> 00:22:44,200 dull our desires by kind of detaching from them, you know, 444 00:22:44,240 --> 00:22:46,560 doom scrolling, like doing whatever we can to forget. 445 00:22:47,000 --> 00:22:50,600 Or we might go to the opposite extreme and chase highs, you 446 00:22:50,600 --> 00:22:53,000 know, look for like the next adventure, excitement or the 447 00:22:53,000 --> 00:22:56,280 next accomplishment or status symbol to kind of strive after. 448 00:22:57,080 --> 00:22:59,800 But the problem with these coping mechanisms is that we're 449 00:22:59,800 --> 00:23:03,280 resisting this very real thing that we can feel in our hearts, 450 00:23:03,280 --> 00:23:06,760 which is the reality that we're not supposed to be satisfied 451 00:23:06,880 --> 00:23:11,680 with this world as it is. God is not satisfied with the 452 00:23:11,680 --> 00:23:16,840 world as it is, which means that the more that our hearts align 453 00:23:16,840 --> 00:23:20,280 with his and the more that we kind of catch his vision for the 454 00:23:20,280 --> 00:23:22,880 Kingdom of heaven to come to earth, the more dissatisfied 455 00:23:23,200 --> 00:23:27,800 we'll be with this broken world. And that is the second lesson of 456 00:23:27,880 --> 00:23:32,080 exile, To resist becoming comfortable in Babylon, we kind 457 00:23:32,080 --> 00:23:35,840 of have to let ourselves stay dissatisfied or to lean into 458 00:23:35,960 --> 00:23:39,360 that deeper longing. And just like Daniel and his 459 00:23:39,360 --> 00:23:41,560 friends, we live in a world that we don't really belong in. 460 00:23:42,160 --> 00:23:45,040 Like first Peter 211 literally refers to Christians as 461 00:23:45,040 --> 00:23:47,760 foreigners and exiles in this world. 462 00:23:47,760 --> 00:23:51,440 So one of the gifts of realizing that we are exiles is that it 463 00:23:51,440 --> 00:23:54,000 normalizes this longing that stirs within us. 464 00:23:54,120 --> 00:23:57,960 We are supposed to want more. We are supposed to feel like 465 00:23:57,960 --> 00:24:00,560 even the best experiences this world has to offer are not 466 00:24:00,560 --> 00:24:03,560 enough, that they're too fleeting or too shallow or too 467 00:24:03,560 --> 00:24:06,160 unsatisfying. It's like that famous quote by 468 00:24:06,160 --> 00:24:09,120 CS Lewis. If I find in myself desires 469 00:24:09,120 --> 00:24:12,800 which nothing this in this world can satisfy, the only logical 470 00:24:12,800 --> 00:24:15,560 explanation is that I was made for another world. 471 00:24:16,680 --> 00:24:20,680 So here's the plot twist. What if the longing we feel is 472 00:24:20,680 --> 00:24:24,080 not something to be fixed? Like what if the solution is not 473 00:24:24,080 --> 00:24:27,320 to just kind of grasp for any destruction or pleasure or 474 00:24:27,320 --> 00:24:29,240 affirmation that the world can offer? 475 00:24:29,520 --> 00:24:33,160 What if this dissatisfaction is meant to draw us closer to God? 476 00:24:34,160 --> 00:24:37,600 When we feel in our hearts an ache that nothing in this world 477 00:24:37,600 --> 00:24:42,360 can ease, we become vibrantly aware of our need for Jesus. 478 00:24:42,960 --> 00:24:46,240 Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in him. 479 00:24:47,480 --> 00:24:51,320 So that longing for more is kind of like a fuel that we need to 480 00:24:51,320 --> 00:24:54,680 propel us forward, like toward God and toward the things of 481 00:24:54,680 --> 00:24:57,360 God. It motivates us to right wrongs, 482 00:24:57,360 --> 00:24:59,800 to heal wounds, to counteract the coldness of this world with 483 00:24:59,800 --> 00:25:01,800 love. It moves us to preach the gospel 484 00:25:01,800 --> 00:25:04,720 and to tell people that in Jesus there is healing and hope. 485 00:25:05,120 --> 00:25:08,800 There is a return to Eden. There is eternal life in God's 486 00:25:08,800 --> 00:25:11,640 presence. And maybe you felt that longing, 487 00:25:11,640 --> 00:25:13,520 but you've tried to, like, dampen it. 488 00:25:13,520 --> 00:25:16,960 You know, maybe you've even grown complacent or apathetic or 489 00:25:16,960 --> 00:25:20,160 given in to defeat. But if you have, I would invite 490 00:25:20,160 --> 00:25:23,360 you to get in touch without longing. 491 00:25:23,360 --> 00:25:26,080 It's still there, buried beneath everything. 492 00:25:26,240 --> 00:25:28,720 We are not supposed to be satisfied with this life. 493 00:25:28,720 --> 00:25:31,240 We are not supposed to make this life satisfying. 494 00:25:31,920 --> 00:25:35,280 Our time in exile is meant to turn our eyes to Jesus because 495 00:25:35,280 --> 00:25:38,920 he is the answer to our longing for something better than this 496 00:25:38,920 --> 00:25:41,760 world can give us. Which brings us to our last 497 00:25:41,760 --> 00:25:46,600 point today, which is that exile frees us to focus on eternity. 498 00:25:47,520 --> 00:25:50,440 And this is maybe the most counterintuitive of them all. 499 00:25:50,960 --> 00:25:53,520 So in our sermon series, we're not going to spend much time on 500 00:25:53,520 --> 00:25:56,200 like the prophecies at the end of Daniel, but I'm going to 501 00:25:56,200 --> 00:25:59,280 summarize them for you now. So basically Daniel, you know, 502 00:25:59,600 --> 00:26:02,960 prays on behalf of his people for God to forgive their sin and 503 00:26:02,960 --> 00:26:05,600 show them mercy and bring them out of exile. 504 00:26:06,240 --> 00:26:08,160 And God essentially tells him two things. 505 00:26:08,360 --> 00:26:12,680 So first, this time of exile will come to an end in his 506 00:26:12,680 --> 00:26:17,080 lifetime. And 2nd, the exile, the cycle of 507 00:26:17,080 --> 00:26:21,800 exile will repeat itself again, meaning the people will turn 508 00:26:21,800 --> 00:26:24,840 away from God again and come under the control of a foreign 509 00:26:24,840 --> 00:26:28,200 presser and cry out for help. And God will answer. 510 00:26:28,720 --> 00:26:30,960 Rinse, repeat. I think I've seen that tree 511 00:26:30,960 --> 00:26:33,840 before. It goes around and around, and 512 00:26:33,840 --> 00:26:36,240 this is a sobering realization because it reminds us that as 513 00:26:36,240 --> 00:26:40,560 humans, we need much more than like temporary relief from our 514 00:26:40,560 --> 00:26:43,520 current bad circumstances. We need something fundamental 515 00:26:43,640 --> 00:26:46,840 about this world to change. We need our own hearts to 516 00:26:46,840 --> 00:26:50,240 change. Unfortunately, the last thing 517 00:26:50,240 --> 00:26:53,200 that we have in common with the Exiles is that we believe in a 518 00:26:53,200 --> 00:26:57,960 redemptive God. God is able to bring light out 519 00:26:57,960 --> 00:27:01,800 of complete darkness. He is able to embed blessing 520 00:27:02,040 --> 00:27:04,960 into the most desperate circumstances. 521 00:27:05,520 --> 00:27:09,480 And the redemptive story arc of the Bible, which we need to keep 522 00:27:09,480 --> 00:27:13,360 at the front of our minds, is that God is renewing the world. 523 00:27:13,720 --> 00:27:17,560 His plan is to transform every creature, every experience, 524 00:27:17,800 --> 00:27:21,360 every aspect of our current world so that it returns to its 525 00:27:21,360 --> 00:27:25,560 original state, purely good, radiant with the light of His 526 00:27:25,560 --> 00:27:28,240 glory. So basically, we are all 527 00:27:28,240 --> 00:27:31,840 awaiting like a cosmic glow up that will last for all of 528 00:27:31,840 --> 00:27:33,720 eternity. You can quote me on that. 529 00:27:34,160 --> 00:27:39,880 So anticipating this renewal is absolutely essential if we were 530 00:27:39,880 --> 00:27:42,280 going to hold on to hope in this fallen world. 531 00:27:42,920 --> 00:27:45,680 And that is how Daniel and his friends survive exile with their 532 00:27:45,680 --> 00:27:48,200 faith intact. If they focused only on their 533 00:27:48,200 --> 00:27:51,760 circumstances, only on their limited kind of vision of what 534 00:27:51,760 --> 00:27:54,960 they could see ahead or on the pain that they had just left 535 00:27:54,960 --> 00:27:57,440 behind, they would simply despair. 536 00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:01,360 Like they need a bigger vision to remain faithful and 537 00:28:01,360 --> 00:28:04,880 courageous and stable. Like they needed a vision of 538 00:28:04,880 --> 00:28:07,360 God, a God who renews all things. 539 00:28:08,600 --> 00:28:11,800 So when I began writing the sermon, I was kind of struggling 540 00:28:11,800 --> 00:28:14,760 to make the connection between the Israelites experience of 541 00:28:14,760 --> 00:28:17,840 exile in our lives today because the circumstances are very 542 00:28:17,840 --> 00:28:19,760 different than a lot of us have experienced. 543 00:28:19,760 --> 00:28:23,280 But if we look beyond kind of the details of the circumstances 544 00:28:23,440 --> 00:28:28,760 again, we see that exile is fundamentally this experience of 545 00:28:28,760 --> 00:28:32,600 your reality being disrupted, of suddenly losing access to 546 00:28:32,600 --> 00:28:35,480 everything familiar, everything that helps you feel grounded. 547 00:28:35,480 --> 00:28:38,320 It's feeling like the rules of the game were rewritten 548 00:28:38,320 --> 00:28:40,400 overnight, and now you don't even know how to relate to the 549 00:28:40,400 --> 00:28:43,000 world around you. It's a disorientation. 550 00:28:43,000 --> 00:28:45,120 Your life suddenly feels fragile. 551 00:28:46,000 --> 00:28:47,480 And that made me think about the pandemic. 552 00:28:48,560 --> 00:28:52,120 So recently, I have personally been reprocessing some of the 553 00:28:52,120 --> 00:28:55,600 like sources of grief from that season, from the again, the time 554 00:28:55,600 --> 00:28:58,440 when the world shut down and everything became unfamiliar to 555 00:28:58,480 --> 00:28:59,640 us. Everything changed. 556 00:29:00,360 --> 00:29:03,920 And part of the reason I've been revisiting that era is I 557 00:29:03,920 --> 00:29:08,280 realized that even if I don't currently feel like a heaviness 558 00:29:08,280 --> 00:29:11,840 or a sadness about some of the hard things that happened or the 559 00:29:11,840 --> 00:29:15,520 things that I lost, I realized that they had still kind of 560 00:29:15,520 --> 00:29:18,320 quietly shaped the way that I see my future. 561 00:29:19,440 --> 00:29:22,120 So for instance, you know, I lost a job like many of us did, 562 00:29:22,480 --> 00:29:25,360 but I also lost like relationships there and a work 563 00:29:25,360 --> 00:29:28,600 community and even a vocation that I just never returned to. 564 00:29:28,600 --> 00:29:30,880 All of these things that I invested in deeply that just 565 00:29:30,880 --> 00:29:32,920 kind of disappeared seemingly overnight. 566 00:29:33,640 --> 00:29:35,120 And the same thing happened within church. 567 00:29:35,120 --> 00:29:38,280 Like countless people moved away or moved on. 568 00:29:38,280 --> 00:29:41,600 And with many of them, there wasn't even like an in person 569 00:29:41,720 --> 00:29:43,760 meaningful goodbye. It just kind of felt like 570 00:29:43,800 --> 00:29:46,920 suddenly all of our familiar rhythms and people in spaces 571 00:29:46,920 --> 00:29:50,000 just vanished. And even in the season where we 572 00:29:50,000 --> 00:29:53,360 started to rebuild, right, we were still faced with more loss, 573 00:29:53,560 --> 00:29:57,520 more movement, more change, more people burning out from just 574 00:29:57,520 --> 00:29:59,800 trying to get so hard to keep everything together. 575 00:30:00,240 --> 00:30:02,480 Some relationships even imploding because of like, 576 00:30:02,680 --> 00:30:05,240 political disagreements and other pressures from the world. 577 00:30:05,520 --> 00:30:07,560 And in the midst of all of it, we're still just trying to, 578 00:30:07,560 --> 00:30:10,720 like, take the next step forward and chart a new path forward 579 00:30:10,720 --> 00:30:14,480 towards a new life. So when I think about it that 580 00:30:14,480 --> 00:30:18,240 way, it turns out I might understand exile a little bit 581 00:30:18,240 --> 00:30:20,080 better than I thought that I did. 582 00:30:21,320 --> 00:30:23,640 And even though I thought I had processed these griefs, I 583 00:30:23,640 --> 00:30:25,680 realized again that they had changed something in me. 584 00:30:25,680 --> 00:30:28,880 Because now there was this quiet script that, you know, I 585 00:30:28,880 --> 00:30:31,400 shouldn't get attached, too attached to anything, because it 586 00:30:31,400 --> 00:30:32,800 could just fall apart at any moment. 587 00:30:34,560 --> 00:30:37,360 And Daniel and the Exiles could have bought into that same 588 00:30:37,360 --> 00:30:40,480 script. That is not a sustainable way to 589 00:30:40,480 --> 00:30:43,080 live. So what's the solution? 590 00:30:43,600 --> 00:30:47,640 Like, how do you move forward and rebuild and invest in what's 591 00:30:47,640 --> 00:30:51,080 good when you know that life is fragile and when you know that 592 00:30:51,080 --> 00:30:52,880 the world will likely disappoint you again? 593 00:30:54,240 --> 00:30:57,840 Well, the Bible's answer is maybe surprising, but it's also 594 00:30:57,840 --> 00:31:01,960 really beautiful, which is that we keep our eyes on eternity. 595 00:31:02,960 --> 00:31:06,320 We move forward knowing that this present brokenness is not 596 00:31:06,400 --> 00:31:07,960 all there is. It's not even the thing that's 597 00:31:07,960 --> 00:31:11,880 most real. We rebuild, believing that we 598 00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:15,160 are a part of God's renewed world already. 599 00:31:16,240 --> 00:31:19,320 We invest in good, knowing that what we do out of love for 600 00:31:19,320 --> 00:31:22,520 others and for God's glory are the only things that will last 601 00:31:22,600 --> 00:31:26,720 forever. There is this kind of unexpected 602 00:31:26,720 --> 00:31:30,320 gift in exile because when our lives are comfortable, it's 603 00:31:30,320 --> 00:31:32,600 tempting to want this life to fulfill us. 604 00:31:32,720 --> 00:31:35,880 As if the joy or the satisfaction or even that sense 605 00:31:35,880 --> 00:31:39,800 of home that we long for has to happen here and now or it'll 606 00:31:39,800 --> 00:31:42,880 just be lost. Forever, my friend said, is far 607 00:31:42,880 --> 00:31:47,960 from the truth. The truth that will free you is 608 00:31:47,960 --> 00:31:50,320 that home is waiting for you in eternity. 609 00:31:51,040 --> 00:31:53,720 And that truth is how Daniel and his companions were able to 610 00:31:53,720 --> 00:31:56,560 stand behind their convictions with such courage. 611 00:31:56,800 --> 00:31:58,600 That truth is how the early church lived with such a 612 00:31:58,600 --> 00:32:01,480 beautiful, reckless faith. They served and preached and 613 00:32:01,480 --> 00:32:03,920 healed and embodied the love of Jesus without fear, because they 614 00:32:03,920 --> 00:32:07,480 knew that nothing lasting could be taken from them. 615 00:32:08,280 --> 00:32:11,040 They knew that the treasures we store up in heaven are the only 616 00:32:11,040 --> 00:32:14,280 ones that last. That this light, momentary 617 00:32:14,280 --> 00:32:18,880 affliction, as the apostle Paul says, cannot compare to the 618 00:32:18,880 --> 00:32:21,760 eternal weight of glory that awaits us. 619 00:32:22,880 --> 00:32:25,680 That paradise is in the presence of God himself, and we are 620 00:32:25,680 --> 00:32:30,240 invited to live there for all eternity, and that the joy we'll 621 00:32:30,240 --> 00:32:34,760 have there will far eclipse the years of pain that we faced on 622 00:32:34,760 --> 00:32:39,200 this earth. So as I was doing kind of the 623 00:32:39,200 --> 00:32:44,160 research around exile, there was another era in human history 624 00:32:44,160 --> 00:32:47,640 that came up for me as I was reading and putting things 625 00:32:47,640 --> 00:32:51,480 together, and that is the African slave trade here in the 626 00:32:51,480 --> 00:32:54,480 US. So the African slave trade was 627 00:32:54,480 --> 00:32:59,920 also a time of exile. And amid all the atrocities, 628 00:33:00,280 --> 00:33:04,920 something extraordinary happened that makes me emotional. 629 00:33:06,160 --> 00:33:11,440 Countless enslaved people put their trust in Jesus, and they 630 00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:14,400 made their faith of their own. They designed their own church 631 00:33:14,400 --> 00:33:16,360 services. They wrote their own worship 632 00:33:16,360 --> 00:33:18,960 songs, which we know as spirituals. 633 00:33:19,560 --> 00:33:22,760 And so there's this one spiritual that I found called 634 00:33:22,760 --> 00:33:24,480 the City of Heaven. It's called the City called 635 00:33:24,480 --> 00:33:25,560 Heaven. And it just moved me. 636 00:33:25,560 --> 00:33:27,440 And so I'm going to read part of it for you now. 637 00:33:27,440 --> 00:33:31,080 It says I am a poor Pilgrim of sorrow. 638 00:33:32,720 --> 00:33:34,920 I am tossed in this wide world alone. 639 00:33:36,240 --> 00:33:40,880 No hope have I for tomorrow. I've started to make heaven my 640 00:33:40,880 --> 00:33:45,800 home. Sometimes I am tossed and 641 00:33:45,800 --> 00:33:51,120 driven, Lord. Sometimes I don't know where to 642 00:33:51,120 --> 00:33:55,400 roam. I've heard of a city called 643 00:33:55,400 --> 00:33:59,040 heaven. I've started to make it my home. 644 00:34:01,600 --> 00:34:03,480 It's about me to tears the first time I read it. 645 00:34:03,800 --> 00:34:07,680 Something about it really like hits me because there's this 646 00:34:07,680 --> 00:34:13,360 time, right, of such darkness and oppression and injustice. 647 00:34:14,320 --> 00:34:18,000 But despite the fact that their lives had been stolen from them, 648 00:34:18,719 --> 00:34:24,080 these Christians found a new source of hope that no one could 649 00:34:24,080 --> 00:34:26,960 take away from them. They called it heaven. 650 00:34:27,639 --> 00:34:30,239 We might call it the renewed earth that God creates in 651 00:34:30,239 --> 00:34:34,199 Revelation. Same idea, but their hope was 652 00:34:34,199 --> 00:34:36,639 not that this current world would right all the wrongs that 653 00:34:36,639 --> 00:34:40,199 had been done. Their hope was in a future that 654 00:34:40,199 --> 00:34:41,960 completely. It was just completely 655 00:34:41,960 --> 00:34:43,840 different. It was set apart. 656 00:34:44,400 --> 00:34:47,000 It was a future where they found their rest and joy and the 657 00:34:47,000 --> 00:34:48,719 presence of God for all eternity. 658 00:34:48,719 --> 00:34:53,080 And I think the thing that makes me emotional is realizing that 659 00:34:54,320 --> 00:34:59,120 there are sources of injustice that we will never see resolved 660 00:34:59,120 --> 00:35:04,320 in this world. But the people who are the 661 00:35:04,320 --> 00:35:08,680 victims of this injustice, who put their faith in God, now have 662 00:35:08,680 --> 00:35:11,080 peace and rest and joy for the rest of eternity. 663 00:35:11,400 --> 00:35:13,840 And man, does that make that worth it? 664 00:35:14,080 --> 00:35:18,480 Like, isn't that beautiful? Because the world's not kind to 665 00:35:18,480 --> 00:35:22,240 so many people in so many places, but God is. 666 00:35:23,160 --> 00:35:26,800 His ways are mysterious to us. He's so much more patient than 667 00:35:26,800 --> 00:35:30,680 any of us are, but he's also so much more just than any of us 668 00:35:30,680 --> 00:35:33,560 are. And he calls us to wait upon him 669 00:35:35,080 --> 00:35:38,360 so much. Like a pandemic or maybe a 670 00:35:38,360 --> 00:35:40,720 tragedy that you've experienced in your own life. 671 00:35:41,440 --> 00:35:44,440 You know, we don't choose to go into exile, but we can choose 672 00:35:44,440 --> 00:35:48,920 what we do once we're there. We can, you know, there's the 673 00:35:48,920 --> 00:35:51,520 option that I suggest nobody chooses, which is to turn to 674 00:35:51,520 --> 00:35:55,000 broken coping mechanisms to try to resist reality, you know, 675 00:35:55,280 --> 00:35:57,920 maybe try to adapt to a broken world and lose a bit of our 676 00:35:57,920 --> 00:36:01,120 souls in the process. But there is another option. 677 00:36:02,040 --> 00:36:03,880 We can refuse to let our faith be shaken. 678 00:36:05,120 --> 00:36:08,320 We can sing anyway. We can worship anyway. 679 00:36:09,160 --> 00:36:11,720 We can set our sights on the better life that is to come. 680 00:36:12,600 --> 00:36:16,280 We can live in a way that brings a little taste of heaven to 681 00:36:16,280 --> 00:36:18,880 earth today. So I'm going to end with this 682 00:36:18,880 --> 00:36:22,600 quote from Frederick Beechner. I wanted it to be like, I could 683 00:36:22,600 --> 00:36:24,440 have read you an entire 2 pages from his book. 684 00:36:24,440 --> 00:36:26,920 So I had to choose a very short, short quote. 685 00:36:27,400 --> 00:36:30,280 But I feel like it captures kind of that calling to stay 686 00:36:30,280 --> 00:36:34,840 connected to the true home we find with God and why it 687 00:36:34,840 --> 00:36:39,000 matters. So he says the fragmentary 688 00:36:39,000 --> 00:36:42,800 nature of our experience shatters us into fragments 689 00:36:43,960 --> 00:36:47,040 instead of being whole. Most of the time we are in 690 00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:51,720 pieces and we see the world in pieces, full of darkness at 1 691 00:36:51,720 --> 00:36:54,360 moment and full of light the next. 692 00:36:55,600 --> 00:36:59,400 It is in Jesus, and in the people whose lives have been 693 00:36:59,400 --> 00:37:04,200 deeply touched by Jesus, including ourselves, that we see 694 00:37:04,200 --> 00:37:08,440 another way of being human in this world, which is the way of 695 00:37:08,440 --> 00:37:11,120 wholeness. And when we glimpse that 696 00:37:11,120 --> 00:37:13,840 wholeness in others, we recognize it immediately for 697 00:37:13,840 --> 00:37:16,920 what it is. And the reason we recognize it 698 00:37:17,280 --> 00:37:21,000 is that no matter how much the world shatters us to pieces, we 699 00:37:21,000 --> 00:37:24,960 carry inside us a vision of wholeness that we sense is our 700 00:37:24,960 --> 00:37:27,560 true home and that beckons to us. 701 00:37:28,880 --> 00:37:31,880 It is part of what the book of Genesis means by saying that we 702 00:37:31,880 --> 00:37:35,640 are made in the image of God. That is the vision I want us to 703 00:37:35,640 --> 00:37:37,280 carry with us. So let me pray for us as we 704 00:37:37,280 --> 00:37:40,760 close. Lord God, we recognize that we 705 00:37:40,760 --> 00:37:42,880 live in a broken world that we cannot fix. 706 00:37:44,800 --> 00:37:47,680 God. It causes us grief to know that 707 00:37:47,680 --> 00:37:50,560 we live in a broken world that we cannot fix because we would 708 00:37:50,560 --> 00:37:53,840 like the pain to end now. We would like exile to not 709 00:37:53,840 --> 00:37:56,160 happen. We would like injustice to come 710 00:37:56,160 --> 00:38:00,200 to an end. God, our greatest hope is that 711 00:38:00,200 --> 00:38:03,880 you want all of these things so much more than we do. 712 00:38:05,160 --> 00:38:08,360 The price you were willing to pay to achieve that was great. 713 00:38:08,800 --> 00:38:12,120 You held nothing back. Jesus, you went to the cross. 714 00:38:12,400 --> 00:38:16,840 You paid for our sin. You put an end to basically the 715 00:38:16,840 --> 00:38:20,640 disease that afflicts us as humanity so that we would get to 716 00:38:20,640 --> 00:38:23,800 enjoy a renewed world. You did it all on our behalf, 717 00:38:23,800 --> 00:38:28,320 God, and we thank you for that. And we pray, Jesus, that you 718 00:38:28,320 --> 00:38:32,640 would help us to not be a people who are complacent, who are numb 719 00:38:32,640 --> 00:38:37,680 to this world, who strive for things that can never satisfy or 720 00:38:37,680 --> 00:38:40,200 who give up hope. We pray that you would guard 721 00:38:40,200 --> 00:38:44,160 these, guard us from these things by your Holy Spirit, and 722 00:38:44,160 --> 00:38:47,960 we pray that instead that you would help us to connect deeply 723 00:38:47,960 --> 00:38:51,960 to our longing for heaven, that we would connect deeply for our 724 00:38:51,960 --> 00:38:54,760 desire to see this world completely renewed. 725 00:38:55,920 --> 00:38:59,600 God, that that hope would be alive in US and that it would 726 00:38:59,600 --> 00:39:01,080 change the way that we Live Today. 727 00:39:01,200 --> 00:39:04,680 God, because when that hope is alive, we don't live as if 728 00:39:04,680 --> 00:39:06,680 nothing matters. We live as if everything 729 00:39:06,680 --> 00:39:08,200 matters. Because you can use it towards 730 00:39:08,200 --> 00:39:10,760 your great purposes. God, it's not on us. 731 00:39:10,760 --> 00:39:14,840 The pressure isn't on us, but we get to invest in and kind of 732 00:39:15,040 --> 00:39:17,520 foreshadow the world that is to come. 733 00:39:17,600 --> 00:39:19,960 God. And what a joy it is to be able 734 00:39:19,960 --> 00:39:22,240 to do that. What a joy it is to remember the 735 00:39:22,240 --> 00:39:26,280 testimony of many people who died without seeing that perfect 736 00:39:26,280 --> 00:39:30,440 world realized, but who everyday walked out their faith with such 737 00:39:30,440 --> 00:39:32,800 courage and such beauty and such hope. 738 00:39:33,080 --> 00:39:35,320 God maybe be like that in this world. 739 00:39:35,320 --> 00:39:38,120 So God, we asked that if there is anything in our way this 740 00:39:38,120 --> 00:39:42,160 morning that you would remove it and that we would cling more 741 00:39:42,160 --> 00:39:45,040 closely to you and the hope that we have in you. 742 00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:48,000 Jesus, we pray all of that in your name, Amen.