Today we continue our series entitled “Pursuing Grace-Based Success!”
Here are our foundational scriptures:
(Ephesians 2:8-10 ERV)
8 I mean that you have been saved by grace because you believed. You did not save yourselves; it was a gift from God.
9 You are not saved by the things you have done, so there is nothing to boast about.
10 God has made us what we are. In Christ Jesus, God made us new people so that we would spend our lives doing the good things he had already planned for us to do.
(1 Corinthians 1:30,31 NLT)
30 God has united you with Christ Jesus. For our benefit God made him to be wisdom itself. Christ made us right with God; he made us pure and holy, and he freed us from sin.
31 Therefore, as the Scriptures say, “If you want to boast, boast only about the Lord.”
(2 Timothy 1:9 NKJV)
Who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began.
(Read Daniel 2:20-23)
In yesterday’s message, we saw how Daniel and his friends were facing death for someone else’s failure. Since the only way to avoid death was to provide king Nebuchadnezzar the information about his dream and the interpretation of it — something that was humanly impossible — Daniel and his friends did the only thing they could do. They PRAYED!
God heard and answered their prayers. God gave Daniel a vision of the dream, and he gave him an interpretation of it. Needless to say, Daniel was very happy! This was Daniel’s song of praise and thanksgiving:
“Praise God’s name forever and ever! Power and wisdom belong to him. He changes the times and seasons. He gives power to kings, and he takes their power away. He gives wisdom to people, so they become wise. He lets people learn things and become wise. He knows hidden secrets that are hard to understand. Light lives with him, so he knows what is in the dark and secret places. God of my ancestors, I thank you and praise you. You gave me wisdom and power. You told us what we asked for. You told us about the king’s dream.”
(moving on to Daniel 2:24-28)
Then Daniel went to Arioch, the man who King Nebuchadnezzar had chosen to kill the wise men of Babylon. Daniel said to Arioch, “Don’t kill the wise men of Babylon. Take me to the king. I will tell him what his dream means.” So very quickly, Arioch took Daniel to the king. Arioch said to the king, “I have found a man among the captives from Judah who can tell the king what his dream means.” The king asked Daniel (Belteshazzar) a question. He said, “Are you able to tell me about my dream, and what it means?” Daniel answered, “King Nebuchadnezzar, no wise man, no man who does magic, and no Chaldean could tell the king the secret things he has asked about. But there is a God in heaven who tells secret things.
So what does this mean to you today? We will seek to glean some golden nuggets from the story of Daniel. Unlike the epistles, which are more like a textbook, plainly telling us what to do, there are books of the Bible that just capture what happened. In these books, like the one we are reading today, we must seek to learn from what happened back then and apply those lessons to our lives today. So let’s do it!
1. God’s name is to be praised forever and ever.
— Two key things I have learned over the years are: there is a God, and I am not Him!
— Part of acknowledging the grace of God is an acknowledgment of your dependency on Him. You believe in a God you cannot see, and you believe He will show up in your life in ways you can see.
— When you realize how much God has blessed you in ways you don’t deserve, you cannot help but praise Him!
— From the rising of the sun to the going down of the same, God is worthy of praise, so you should live your life with an attitude of praise!
— This series is about success. Part of what will make you successful is acknowledging God’s grace and praising Him daily!
2. Only God can shift times and seasons.
— Daniel said, “He changes the times and seasons.”
— We live our lives out in periods of time. Looking back over the “times” of our lives, we realize each period has a cycle of seasons. We live our lives out in times and seasons, levels and stages.
— We serve a God who can shift the times and seasons of our lives in such a way that He expedites our breakthrough and puts “a rush order” on our blessing.
— Daniel was in a time crunch. He needed an answer quickly, and God gave him the answer the same night he prayed. God is a good God!
— If God did not want to give Daniel the answer that night, He could have shifted things around with the king, changing the timeline. The point is that God is God, and He can shift times and seasons when He needs to!
— Solomon said, “There is a right time for everything, and everything on earth will happen at the right time” (Ecc 3:1 ERV).
— Understanding this helps you to relax. God can help you meet your timeline, or He can shift the timeline altogether. Just keep walking with God and trusting in His timing.
3. True power and wisdom belong to God.
— Daniel said, “He knows hidden secrets that are hard to understand. Light lives with him, so he knows what is in the dark and secret places.”
— God has all power. He sits on the circle of the earth, and all things are under His feet.
— God has all wisdom and knowledge. He has been to our future and remembers our past perfectly. There is nothing God does not know.
— Further, one of the foundational scriptures we have been looking at in this series tells us that God made Jesus to become wisdom itself. The text says that God did this for OUR BENEFIT (1 Corinthians 1:30). This is yet another reminder that we have access to wisdom from above. God has all wisdom, and He freely makes it available to us!
— If you want to maximize your purpose and potential in life, you must live with a heart that is OPEN to wisdom from above. Daniel was OPEN to God’s wisdom.
4. God imparts divine power and wisdom to humans by His grace.
— It’s one thing to acknowledge the fact that God has wisdom. But Daniel said, “You gave me wisdom and power. You told us what we asked for. You told us about the king’s dream.” God had the answer, but Daniel did not. So Daniel prayed. He asked God to reveal the answer. God did. God gave Daniel revelation as an act of His grace. Daniel provided faith, and his faith tapped into God’s grace.
— Moses said, “The LORD our God has secrets known to no one. We are not accountable for them, but we and our children are accountable forever for all that he has revealed to us” (Deut 29:29). God has secrets He has not revealed to us. But then again, there are certain divine secrets He chooses to reveal to man. These are things that cannot be learned; they must be discerned.
— God opened Daniel’s spiritual eyes and allowed him to see king Nebuchadnezzar’s dream in an open vision. Daniel did not receive the vision by education; it came to him by revelation.
— God can give you insight, in a moment of time, by divine revelation, that will far exceed anything you could have learned through education.
— Just like favor can do more in a minute than labor can do in a lifetime, more revelation can be imparted in a minute than education can gather in a lifetime.
— One “download” from heaven can change your life forever!
5. King Nebuchadnezzar was asking for the humanly impossible.
— The king made it clear that he wanted to know both his dream and what it meant.
— The king wanted another human to spiritually/supernaturally find out what was going on in his imagination during his dream. Furthermore, the king wanted someone to spiritually/supernaturally interpret the meaning of it all.
— If Daniel could not do it, he and his friends would be killed.
This teaches me a few things:
a) The powers of darkness (witches, warlocks, sorcerers, magicians, etc.) are limited.
b) Sometimes bad things happen to good people (the Hebrew boys were in a bind due to nothing they did).
c) There is no limit to God’s power, and He is willing to impart His limitless nature into us!
6. The grace of God will make you shine above your peers.
— Daniel said, “King Nebuchadnezzar, no wise man, no man who does magic, and no Chaldean could tell the king the secret things he has asked about.”
— Before giving the king the answer he was looking for, Daniel took the opportunity to emphasize the failure of the so-called “wise men” the king had been relying on.
— It sometimes takes a difficult task to expose the inadequacies of some and to open a door for the children of God.
7. When the world fails, by God’s grace, you can prevail.
— God can grace you to do what others have failed to accomplish.
— God can take difficult situations that have exposed the inability of others to expose the greatness He placed inside of you – greatness deposited by His grace.
— I have a long track record of successfully performing tasks others failed at. Not because I am so good but because of God’s grace. God has graced me to succeed where others have failed so that I could get acknowledged. Do you know why? Because I am quick to deflect the glory right back to God! God will glorify you if you are quick to glorify Him!
8. There is a God in Heaven!
— Daniel said, “King Nebuchadnezzar, no wise man, no man who does magic, and no Chaldean could tell the king the secret things he has asked about. But there is a God in heaven who tells secret things.”
— The world could not produce the answer to king Nebuchadnezzar’s question, but there is a God in heaven who could!
— The world may not be able to deal with the medical challenge you are facing, but there is a God in heaven who can!
— The world may not have an answer for the trouble your marriage is in this morning, but there is a God in heaven who does!
— The world may tell you that you just need to accept the path your children are on, even if you know it will lead to destruction, but there is a God in heaven who can save them and lead them down the path to their destiny!
— When the world does not have the answers, there is a God in heaven who has all the answers!
— There is a God in heaven who still saves, still delivers, still sets free, still changes lives, and still loves you despite all you have done.
— There is a God in heaven who is ready to change your life around for His glory. His hands are not too short that He can’t reach you. His power is not too weak that He can deliver you. His love is not conditional, so He won’t turn His back on you.
— There is a God in heaven, and He is ready to change your life forever, by His grace, for His glory!
Declaration of Faith:
Father, I thank You for teaching me about grace-based success.
I see what You did for Daniel and it gives me hope. Daniel needed a supernatural answer. What he asked you for was beyond human ability. He needed a breakthrough, and time was of the essence.
Daniel came to you in faith, and his faith tapped into Your grace for the answer. Like Daniel, I use my faith to access Your grace for the supernatural.
There is nothing You do not know and nothing You can’t do! You have all power and wisdom. You can shift the times and seasons of my life. You can expedite my breakthrough. You can accelerate my blessing. You can rearrange my life in a moment of time.
There is nothing You can’t do, and You live in me. Therefore, there is nothing I can’t do by Your grace!
I come to You daily and throughout the day. I seek Your face. I yield to Your leading. I listen for Your voice.
When my body is under attack, one touch from You can cause my body to function in the perfection in which You created it to function.
When my relationships are strained, and worldly counselors are struggling to come up with what to do, I know there is a God in heaven who can heal broken hearts, wash away past pain, mend broken relationships, and restore the love that was lost.
When I am expected to succeed where others have failed, I know there is a God in heaven who knows the answer to every problem, and He gives me the answers by His grace.
Father, You are my God. You are in heaven. You have placed me on the earth. I am a human conduit of the divine. My life proves to this world that there is a God in heaven! I know GREATER IS COMING FOR ME! I declare this by faith. In Jesus’ name, Amen!
This is Today’s Word! Apply it and Prosper.
