February 6, 1997 Jonis Mkt.

Daniel 1:8-21

But Daniel made up his mind that he would not defile himself with the king's choice food or with the wine which he drank; so he sought permission from the commander of the officials that he might not defile himself. [9] Now God granted Daniel favor and compassion in the sight of the commander of the officials, [10] and the commander of the officials said to Daniel, "I am afraid of my lord the king, who has appointed your food and your drink; for why should he see your faces looking more haggard than the youths who are your own age? Then you would make me forfeit my head to the king." [11] But Daniel said to the overseer whom the commander of the officials had appointed over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, [12] "Please test your servants for ten days, and let us be given some vegetables to eat and water to drink. [13] "Then let our appearance be observed in your presence, and the appearance of the youths who are eating the king's choice food; and deal with your servants according to what you see."

[14] So he listened to them in this matter and tested them for ten days. [15] And at the end of ten days their appearance seemed better and they were fatter than all the youths who had been eating the king's choice food. [16] So the overseer continued to withhold their choice food and the wine they were to drink, and kept giving them vegetables.

[17] And as for these four youths, God gave them knowledge and intelligence in every branch of literature and wisdom; Daniel even understood all kinds of visions and dreams. [18] Then at the end of the days which the king had specified for presenting them, the commander of the officials presented them before Nebuchadnezzar. [19] And the king talked with them, and out of them all not one was found like Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah; so they entered the king's personal service. [20] And as for every matter of wisdom and understanding about which the king consulted them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and conjurers who were in all his realm. [21] And Daniel continued until the first year of Cyrus the king. Okay!, let’s read chapter 2, let’s read from. 1-13, Now in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebuchadnezzar had dreams; and his spirit was troubled and his sleep left him. [2] Then the king gave orders to call in the magicians, the conjurers, the sorcerers and the Chaldeans, to tell the king his dreams. So they came in and stood before the king. [3] And the king said to them, "I had a dream, and my spirit is anxious to understand the dream."

[4] Then the Chaldeans spoke to the king in Aramaic: "O king, live forever! Tell the dream to your servants, and we will declare the interpretation." [5] The king answered and said to the Chaldeans, "The command from me is firm: if you do not make known to me the dream and its interpretation, you will be torn limb from limb, and your houses will be made a rubbish heap. [6] "But if you declare the dream and its interpretation, you will receive from me gifts and a reward and great honor; therefore declare to me the dream and its interpretation." [7] They answered a second time and said, "Let the king tell the dream to his servants, and we will declare the interpretation." [8] The king answered and said, "I know for certain that you are bargaining for time, inasmuch as you have seen that the command from me is firm, [9] that if you do not make the dream known to me, there is only one decree for you. For you have agreed together to speak lying and corrupt words before me until the situation is changed; therefore tell me the dream, that I may know that you can declare to me its interpretation." [10] The Chaldeans answered the king and said, "There is not a man on earth who could declare the matter for the king, inasmuch as no great king or ruler has ever asked anything like this of any magician, conjurer or Chaldean. [11] "Moreover, the thing which the king demands is difficult, and there is no one else who could declare it to the king except gods, whose dwelling place is not with mortal flesh." [12] Because of this the king became indignant and very furious, and gave orders to destroy all the wise men of Babylon. [13] So the decree went forth that the wise men should be slain; and they looked for Daniel and his friends to kill them. To briefly recap, si Daniel, anong basic story nito? They were capture by the Babylonians and the king was trying to brainwash them to put them into the kings service and since some of you were absent, we’d like to share with you the truth that the king Nebu was doing is happening even today, people are being brainwash by the devil and the devil has succeeded. In the United States, they did research with basis… and we shared this with you the last time. Look at some of the brain washing that has occurred where Satan has been successful in taking a bible believing country which started in God we trust, they broke away from England, they set up the United States it became one of the greatest nation nations on earth because it began to follow God’s word. Look at it many years later, 87% of people in America claimed they do not believe all the ten commandments are relevant and binding. Most of them do not even honor their father and their mother, 91% of them lie regularly, is that true of us here too in the Philippines? We lie regularly, businessmen, 75% of employees do not exert best effort, majority in the work force admitted goofing of an average of seven hours per week, obviously they were not playing golf, 50% of the work force admitted regularly calling in seek even though they were perfectly well. Satan has been very successful and we showed a principle for the past three weeks and when we read the bible get facts but don’t remain at the facts level, if you do that it becomes meaningless to all of us. What you get is how does it applied to my life and last week we talked about being… why were they being brainwashed? What was the purpose? In v. 5, why were they being trained and talked about the Chaldeans? To enter the kings service. When you see something like that immediately you gain some applications if you ask a question. Do you want to be in the king service? You know the criteria for service, the world’s criteria and God’s, they are very different and the words, anong criteria nila? 3 A’s, very good!, they go with Age, Appearance and Aptitude and when we select people to go into our company, to enter in our companies we like them young, with some experience, the appearance disente and most important aptitude, when we get married ganon din. So, when you are hiring people ito ang ating nakikita and this is really a formula we said for failure because 99.44% people will never become successful if this is the criteria because many are old, many don’t have good appearance and a lot of people don’t have. God want’s us all succeed and we share with you what is God’s criteria? Just by way of review, you God is only one. If you want to serve God, what does God look for in basic essence? Without which it will be impossible for you to serve God. Many said, you have to be available, you have to do this and do that, many don’t serve God because… but do you know God looks only for one thing. What’s that? Faith. If you have faith in Him then you will be in God’s service, whether you’re old, whether you’re smart or not whether you went to college or not, and this is what you see in Daniel, Faith, and we want to show you what real faith really is. When you read a book like Genesis or Exodus or any books of the bible, what you do is look for a summary statement most of the time there’s a statement, 11:32, it says there, basically the anti-Christ we will studying him. He will lead people to Godlessness with his words he will persuade people to become godless but it says, ‘The people who know their God will display strength and take action and we related this to many verses in the bible, this is really faith. Faith has two aspects one, is if you really have faith, if you know God, it will come out in two ways:

1. You will display strength
2. You will take action

• and we saw last week with Daniel, we will not review but we will just summarize for you for those who were not here. What did Daniel do? we showed you that he displayed strength and we call it inner strength, some people call it conviction, he purpose in his mind sabi niya, I will not defile myself, the strength. They said, when strength displayed? When there is pressure, when there is resistance then you will see how strong a man is. Strength start from the inside, start from you making a decision, I will not defile myself and so he resisted the worlds pressure. The king was trying to conform him, to move him to godlessness but he resolve in his mind instead of coming to that pressure I will give God pleasure, I will live for God not for myself and then once you make that an inner conviction, an inner strength it will come out in action and so he did not eat the king’s choice food, we show you why and then proposed a test to the commander and they relied on God and God delivered. The ultimate test of faith is when you respect authority, what you are saying is all authority come from God. God said it!. Do you believe that God can work through a pagan commander or a pagan king? Then if he gives you a command which is not against God, faith means I will follow. Many cannot understand that God works through an authority system, that’s why you see this? Matthew 28:19, Go and make disciples, this is preceded by a verse on authority, v. 18 says, Jesus answer, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given on to him therefor, since I have the authority I now command you, "Go and make disciples!. But some people they cannot get into their head, they revel against authority. Who’s the authority, who are your authority in the home? parents, husband, how about in the office? The boss, your immediate superior, how about in the government? The police man, whoever has authority. Why many times have problem with this? Because they don’t think, they think they are smarter than the husband, it might be so and most women are smarter than the men, and yet the godly woman though she think she’s smart, her real smartness begins when she despite being smart still submits to a husband. Today, what we would like to do is to explore to you in such a way that you will be man of faith because I believe theoretically we all like. If I ask you, Do you believe in God? See everybody say yes but you know I challenge you, do you really believe in God? I will try to demonstrate to you today that most of us our faith is there during good times but when the chips are down, when there is pressure, when the stakes are high our faith goes away very quickly. We want to teach you some principles tonight and if apply in your life, I guarantee you, you will be a change man, you will be like Daniel as Stuart in the king’s service. Many Christians, they say I believe is a very frustrating statement to Jesus Christ, did you know that? One of the greatest frustration of Jesus is men make the profession Lord I believe and yet when the counting is there, how many will be there? Few, when Jesus returns this is what He will look for. Tonight, in chapter 1, second half, chapter 2, first half, we want to show you why we believers don’t have very much faith during bad times, why we conform to the world, why we for example would lie regularly, why we would do all of those things that they are now doing in America? We are 20 years behind on technology in America, if you would talk to the bankers or the businessman, we are 20 years behind but you know we’re not very far behind as far as morality is concerned, we are almost up to date, we know the latest dances, we know the latest funs, we are not very far of, virginity is going out of the window in the Philippines, we used to have Maria Claras, now what do we have? We have Ma Donna’s, hinde na Maria Clara and you need to open your ears tonight, more important you need to open your heart and start to say, "Am I really a man of faith?" question that we would like to ask, why do people conform? … but when there is pressure do we praise God, are we willing to stand up when the stakes are high? Supposing you’re gonna loose your job because your boss commands you, ‘Doctor the books!’ will you stand up and say, "No, I can’t," sorry! you gonna loose your job. Will we? and why won’t we? What is it that allows the world, the world leaders, how can he control me, did you ever wonder why people go to war? How can the leaders make you shoot the others? How can people rally other people to do awful things to other human being, but how can they do it? They do it if wars all the time. What’s the secret of the Devil? See if we understand it and we can combat it, if we don’t understand we won’t. Let’s read, how was the world operate? Here in v. 10, we can see what is operational in the world, why the people conform? How can a leader make me conform to ways that I even like, what did he do? In v. 10, the commander of the officials said to Daniel, what did he say when Daniel proposed the idea to him? ‘I am afraid of my lord the king’ was appointed your food and your drink, for why should this see your face is looking more haggard than the youth who were your own age, then you make me four feet my head to the king. Why was the commander doing what he was doing, why would he not allowed Daniel to eat just vegetable, why? Fear. Fear of the king and basically king represents authority. Fear of other men, that’s what keeping him from following or approving the request of Daniel. What does fear do? Basically it under minds our conviction. You know it said that in v. 9, God granted Daniel favor and compassion in the sight of the commander of the officials. Most of the time depending on the fear, level of fear that you have it will under mind your belief. Se we believe things, all of us believe we should be honest, all of us we should be holy, why do we sin? Why do we do things against God? Why do we lie? We suggest to you very strongly from the book of Genesis to Revelation, the key problem of man is he fears other men. Why do we fear? Look at v. 10, Can you give me the principle from there, why is he scared, why is he afraid? King could kill him, see that is a specific make it now a principle, make it now general, why are people afraid? What is the equivalent of the king will kill him? He is destroyed or hurt, see that’s now general killing specific, you make it principle, you make it general. Basically fear, the focus on fear is on the potential of someone of that person to harm us. Those who have potential to harm us we are afraid, that is the concept of the bully. How many of you have ever met the school bully? An office bully, how about in PAL are there bullies in PAL? The potential to harm us and this fear is intensified when the potential harm is present. How many of you are afraid of rats? Why? Does the rat have the potential to harm you? see fear is in your mind, in your head. We think there’s potential harm in that rat but if I can convince you… understand what’s going on, there’s fear in your heart and that is what the devil uses. The fear of other men it will prevent you from putting your trust, your faith in God, fear of other men will prevent you from putting your faith in God. Do all of us have fears? Why do people sit at the back for example? And you know that’s gets in your way of faith. I ask people, do you like to give a testimony for Jesus, they have ten quick excuses why they cannot, ten immediately but really there’s only one, what’s that? they’re afraid, they don’t stand up for Jesus because they’re afraid. Why don’t people sing with joy? They look first who’s beside them, see in the banyo when there’s nobody there you sing. When you get married is there fear? Fear destroys relationships, fear destroys many things in life and fear will destroy you, fear will prevent you not only from serving God but from going to heaven, did you know that? hinde compatible ang faith in God and fear of man and to go to heaven you must have faith in God. Let me demonstrate to you what are some of the mechanics of this. What was going on in the face of the commander? Put your finger here, we want to have a clear demonstration of two thousand years ago which is still very applicable to today. Turn your bible please to John. John 12:42-43, Nevertheless many even of the rulers believed in Him, if you were there in Palestine in Israel and you saw Jesus perform miracle after miracle without need of cover, the lame would be healed, the blind would see, five thousand people would be fed, water would be turned to wine, so many other miracles. Lazarus coming to life. If you were there is it any wonder the many people were following Jesus? wherever Jesus went there were multitudes of people because they were seeing miracles happen and many would believe in Jesus Christ and yet look at this, but because of the Pharisees they were not what? They were not confessing Him, why not? They were afraid. Afraid of what? They would be put out of the synagogue; what’s the modern day word for that? Ex-communicated. We don’t know the fear that is in people, you share the gospel of Jesus Christ with them but they been with this church for such long time, their grand father has been in this church for such a long time. Why do they not confess Jesus when everything makes absolute logic? They can believe Jesus in their heart but they can never do it publicly. Why? They’re afraid, the fear pressure, I will now leave the church of my parents, of my parents, I will be ex-communicated. You know in India, if you say I become a believer, what’s the national religion in India? Hinduism, they steal, you are not only ex-communicated from the church, you are ex-communicated from your family, if you say I believe in Jesus Christ!. And yet do they really believe or do they just flock together in a church not really having true faith in Jesus, they say they do but look at this, they believe in Jesus right? But they don’t confess Him as Lord because if you confess Jesus as Lord what would you do? you would obey Him just like Daniel, you would not defile yourself, you would not sin, you would not go and be conform to the world, you will resist or we say we believe in Jesus and cheat. A man came to my office and said, I belong to this organization, and he was trying to sell me our first copying machine and basically… I looked at him straight on the eye, I said you know your calling card carries the name of Jesus, our organization carries the name of Jesus, If I carry the name of Jesus and there’s somebody sees it or not I will not cheat, it doesn’t matter to me if you go hungry don’t either stop carrying that name or follow, you can’t have it bought waste. Are you convinced that Jesus is right, that He’s Lord or there’s something else compelling you? Fear, that shows a major lack of faith in God that God cannot provide without him cheating. Do you understand what the bible is trying to say? Over and over we see that again and again. Why do people commit adultery? Fear of what? Fear of loneliness, so alone, they’ve nobody to talk with. So this nice young lady comes, she’s also married to somebody else and the kind of get along well and they go and they commit adultery even if God says "Don’t commit adultery!" why? They are afraid, fear controls them. I’ll be an old maid so this single lady sleep with another man, fear of growing old alone, nobody to provide for her. You can trace all sin down to that because it’s a lack of faith in our God. Were the apostles of Jesus afraid? Yeah! When Jesus is teaching them… until Jesus resurrected they were all afraid. Let me give you a little story. To illustrate… even the apostles they were afraid. Let’s turn our bibles and see what happens. Matthew 8:24-27
• And behold, there arose a great storm in the sea, so that the boat was covered with the waves; but He Himself was asleep. [25] And they came to Him, and awoke Him, saying, "Save us, Lord; we are perishing!" [26] And He said to them, "Why are you timid, you men of little faith?" Then He arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and it became perfectly calm. [27] And the men marveled, saying, "What kind of a man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?" See, they did not know who Jesus really was at that point in time, they did not understand that this Jesus was God that if He said to the wind stop! The storm would stop immediately, Jesus was with them, is Jesus with us? This same Jesus and even better Jesus resurrected is with us. What problem in your life can Jesus not solved? Nothing and why you’re afraid? You know why? You don’t believe. I challenge you, you don’t believe either that He is with you or that He can do it. I did some research and you know that word timid? You have seen a verse many times it never struck you, you never thought, you never pictured yourself in there, you know where this word is used? It is used in revelation and I like to show you a verse about people who are afraid, who are timid. You turned to my favorite verse in Revelation. Rev. 21:8, we look at that lists and somehow it escapes us. What do you see there?
• "But for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death." Many of us have seen that verse, many of us identifies with liars. Do you know what is the first sin there? That’s the exact same word that was used by Jesus to his disciples translated timid, and you know it’s not surprising that it is the first one on the list who will go to this lake? Those who are timid, the translator understood it better cowards, when the time of pressure comes they succumb to the pressure. Member we shared the Parable of the Sower, they accepted the word but when the tribulation came, when the persecution came they fell away, many will fall away. Why are there so few in the kings service? The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. May I strongly suggest to you it is fear, keeping people away from the service of God, there’s something in you that the devil uses, we can have many, many examples of this. What do we do with it? How does Satan use it? You see in chapter 2 of Daniel, let’s go there, what does king Nebuchadnezzar… did you notice what’s his reactions were? He had a dream, how did he react to his own dream, he was troubled, he was worried, in those days when you are king you are so powerful, anything you wanted to do you can do, no check in balance, absolute power and yet in the heart of the one holding the absolute power there’s fear. And you know what happens when you have a man in authority and he is a fearful man, what does he do? He uses fear to then control you. How does he do it? … Okay! I had a dream, tell me what my dream was and interpret it for me. What did the magician say, you know they said, in chapter 2:10, the Chaldeans answered the king and said, "There is not a man on earth who could declare the matter for the king. [11] the thing which the king demands is difficult, there is no one else who could declare it to the king except God. What did the king do? how do people in authority motivate them, how? They threatened, he threatened them with what?… That’s how the world uses fear, it will tell you, I can harm you! and if you don’t do what I say I will harm you, if you don’t finish that marketing plan if it’s not good I fire you. That’s why many in the marketing field are on edge. The potential harm to you, you will be fired, it does not matter if it’s your boss fault or yours, most of the time it’s his fault right? Who will be fired, since your lower? You, the chances are, potential harm. Do you see how this is operating and do you know we use this? Think of your maids, how do you use it with your maid? Think of your children, how do you use it with them? We drive fear into our children, then you turn to your wife… she drives fear into you. that’s how the devil uses fear. What will the devil tell you? You know, if you don’t do this, harm will come to you or your family. On the other hand if you do this, I will bless you with material things and he works on your fear and mind and it’s built it. Sin, when you sin there is fear, your captivated by it, you don’t even know it and it’s all here in your head because none of it is real. Can the devil harm you if Jesus is with you? can other people really harm you? they can’t, even if they gossip about you, they can’t harm you, you think they can, so what! If they gossip about you, I’m not go be alarm with that, that cannot harm me, but if God says, "Ricky Samson your a fool! That can harm me, we are afraid of the wrong object. Who can harm us? God and then the devil will then lie to you God will not harm you, that’s why you’re not afraid of God, God will not send you to hell you’re only a liar, that’s nothing, you will harm anybody, you lied for a good reason, you cheated for a good reason and what has happened? He’s brain wash to you. The bible is telling you, God can harm you not only your body but He can send you to hell and you know He will, He will send all of the cowards to this place. Sabi ni Jesus, "If you are ashamed of me and my words pagdating mo sa langit I will be ashamed of you." Don’t be afraid of what men can do. Luke chpter12. This criminal he was about to die, this criminal he was making signs because he was studying the bible and he was about to die and he gave me this words in match boxes form, it’s still with me today. Look at Luke 12:4-5. Everything that is covered up will be reveal. V. 4 "And I say to you, My friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. [5] "But I will warn you whom to fear: fear the One who after He has killed has authority to cast into hell; yes, I tell you, fear Him! We suggest tonight that you change the fear object in your life, fear God, that’s the beginning of wisdom. Fear God, your boss can only fire you, he cannot even kill you he can only fire you. Be afraid of what God will do to you. I’ll show you another verse as I showed you in revelation. And I want those who are sharing the gospel to understand this verse. People cannot believe in God, it is impossible to believe in God if they have this fear. Turn to gospel please of John. John the lovely disciple of Jesus Christ. John 5:39-44
• "You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is these that bear witness of Me; [40] and you are unwilling to come to Me, that you may have life. [41] "I do not receive glory from men; [42] but I know you, that you do not have the love of God in yourselves. [43] "I have come in My Father's name, and you do not receive Me; if another shall come in his own name, you will receive him. [44] "How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another, and you do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God? What is Jesus saying? Do you know the root cause of fear why we don’t believe in God? The root of it is because we seek glory from men and not from God. We want be applause of men, we want be applause of our boss. We want be applause of the people around us rather than the applause of God. That’s the root, you will also find in the verse that we read in John 12. Let me just read it to you. John 12:4, for they loved the approval of men rather than the approval of God. I am glad that some people are here in this bible study tonight because I know there’s a party going on, lot’s of men are there, you rather be there, they love you if you’re there, they may not love you if you’re not there but if you come here into the bible study, who will applaud you? God, I would like all of us to play for God’s pleasure and applause. Let God applaud you rather than seek the approval of men. If you wash the words of Jesus, how can you believe? You cannot really believe in God if your looking for glory for men, if your seeking men’s approval you will never believe in God, you will say you believe but you never really believe, in other word you cannot really be saved. Think of it, how can I believe? In John 5:44
• "How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another, and you do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God? If I para-phrase that… if you traced it from Genesis to Revelation. Who’s approval am I seeking? Men or God, why am I basically afraid of man? Because they might not approve of me or my performance or my behavior or something like that and I like them to approved that’s why I’m scared of them. Ask you self the question, does God approved of what I am doing, if God sees me which He does, may He approved of what I’m doing or not and if the answer is not and I suggest you don’t conform to the world. Don’t follow the barkada, if they are doing wrong, if they are doing away from God do not allow them to take you with them, stand your ground. How can you stand your ground, how can you remove fear? Would you like to know the answer to that? Next week you come back and I’ll share with you four fantastic truth from the word of God from Daniel. You read chapter 2 this whole week and try to discover, how can I overcome this fear so I will be a man of faith, I will be control by my faith in God rather than my fear of anything else, would you like that? then you will be liberated, you will be free, free to serve God and God will work wonders in your life miracles that you’ve never seen before. God worked a miracle in my life. Next week we will share with you of great miracles of God does in our life if we are men of faith.