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My soul cleaved up onto the dust to quicken down me According to my word, I have to climb my waist and harness me Teach me thy statutes, make me too ununderstand The way of thy precepts that I talk about, I won't disclose My soul melted for heaviness, strengthen now me According to thy word, remove from me the way of life And grant me thy law graciously, I have chosen My way of truth, my judgment's fine, be before me I have spoken truth, my testimony is full of the need not to share I will run away if thy commands, and thou shalt enlarge my heart The Way of Life You see, when it comes to taking a stand for God, it starts with one person There's a purposing in the heart where one man decides, I'm not gonna do it And then when that one person takes a stand, three other people say, we're not gonna do it either There will be people who are beheaded for the cause of Christ We better be like Daniel, we better decide right now not to compromise, not to give in, not to bow down to whatever the devil demands of us even now And if they can't take a stand now, how in the world could they ever take a stand during the tribulation? All that will live Godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution He said, be faithful unto death and I'll give thee a crown of life And we need to pray for boldness today, you say, I can't help it, I'm scared, I'm a coward God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind And we ought to pray for boldness Oh God, give me the boldness to stand for you Where's the Daniel series, Paul? Give us the Daniel series Where's the Daniel series, Paul? Give us the Daniel series Where's the Daniel series, Paul? Give us the Daniel series Where's the Daniel series, Paul? Give us the Daniel series, Paul? Give us the Daniel series Thanks for joining us for the season finale of the Baptist Bias podcast Of course we're going to be continuing though with the Daniel series, one episode every week It's a super highly anticipated series that's going to be released In fact, we've been waiting years for this You can see that there was some pent up anticipation there with Pastor Jimenez It was pretty funny, but thanks so much to Paul Wittenberger and Framing the World for helping us We were able to work with them to get this Daniel series finished to the finish line A lot of people donated, a lot of people were excited about this project And we're finally here We're going to be airing episode one of the Daniel series tonight at 9pm So in less than one hour we're going to be releasing it And you don't have to go anywhere, it's going to be on this stream We were thinking about previously streaming on the Steadfast Channel But we're actually just going to put the show here on the Baptist Bias So this is where you can watch it And also next week at 8pm and every Tuesday at 8pm we'll be releasing each one of those episodes Now, main editor for this film is our co-host Ben the Baptist How's it going? It's going great and I'll reiterate what you said And just give a shout out and a thank you to Framing the World and brother Wittenberger For doing the camera work and some of the other work that he did on this film Great camera work I liked it a lot, high quality For those watching, when you check out the Daniel series when it debuts Just understand the camera work was done by brother Paul And he set up this cool railing camera on a rail and other different angles Action shots So that was really great and made my life a lot easier Yeah he's very professional so it's great to get footage from brother Paul And we actually have the star of the show who's going to be joining us for a quick preview of this series Pastor Steven Anderson from Faith Ward Baptist Church How's it going? It's going great, thanks for having me on I'm really excited about this thing finally coming out At the time I put a lot of thought into the sermons I did a lot of study especially on some of the more difficult chapters toward the end of the book And so I really wanted it to be a high quality series that would last for a long time And that it would be up there with the Revelation series As far as helping people's understanding And that people would enjoy it and love it for many many years to come And so I was a little disappointed when years went by without it really happening And so this is super exciting for me to see this come out And it's really important because it seems like lately there have just been a lot of goofball teachings on end times And even independent fundamental Baptists and even people that we're maybe loosely friends with Having some strange views and things Being influenced by things like preterism or bombillennialism or postmillennialism and things like that And I feel like this series is the cure to that disease Simply because it really addresses one of the biggest misunderstandings in Bible prophecy Which is this tension between futurism and preterism When in reality the answer is dual fulfillment And with the abomination of desolation even triple fulfillment And I go to great pains in this series especially in the sermons on chapter 7, chapter 8 And the sermon on rightly dividing the book of Daniel In just proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that there are multiple fulfillments in view And so it seems like the futurist crowd just totally ignores the fulfillments that have already happened And then the preterist crowd just foolishly acts like oh it's all over, it's all done, nothing more to see here folks So we'll figure out that there's a middle path that's correct One of the great things about this series is even though it was preached in 2018 It's more relevant than the newspaper that's coming out tomorrow And in fact we've been watching it and working on it and editing it And you can tell occasionally that you're referencing things from that time period But generally speaking it feels fresh, it feels fresh off the iron And it's kind of incredible to see how it's just aged so well And it's going to continue to age well I'm excited for people to see it, it goes in tandem really well Fries and ketchup with the Revelation series And elaborating further and kind of showing how those things fit together There's no contradictions and that they tell the same story about the future What's interesting is our first real Baptist Bias podcast We had you on as a guest doing Daniel chapter number 9 We went in detail and we talked about that And so it's kind of fitting that a few years later we're now going to release the Daniel series Very exciting, exciting to hear that chapter expounded again And of course chapter 11 was a great sermon I actually got to be there for all of those sermons Ben do you think you know the book of Daniel a little bit better now? It would be sad if I didn't considering I've watched each sermon like 12 times So there'd be something wrong with me if I didn't get it by then So you're like the 144,000, 12 times 12? Not so sure about that No I mean obviously I appreciate the opportunity Just from a personal standpoint Like when I worked on the preserved Bible It helped me immensely on understanding the topic of you know King James only isn't bibliology Whatever you want to call it And the same thing occurred here with this project So that was really cool But I want to echo what you're saying It is an evergreen production if you want to call it that In the sense that don't get scared by the fact that this was recorded in 2018 It is still very relevant And in fact take away the desert theme inside the building of Faith Forward Baptist Church The auditorium is a little smaller But you take that away and you would think that this was preached I mean recently maybe even you know last year or something like that It really doesn't feel like something from that time And the reason why is because all the things that were going on back then are happening now In this series for those of you who haven't seen it yet which is everyone Unless you've watched the unedited version Pastor Anderson rips face I won't spoil anything but I will say this He rips face on the fags on the homos Well guess what? There were homos in 2018 There were homos before that There's homos today so obviously it's still relevant the things that he was talking about Yeah a lot of current events were able to be used in the broadcast Because what you were saying is a timeless truth And of course with prophecy it's just those things are going to come to pass And so we see them coming to fruition And of course the doctrines here are everlasting doctrines And so it's really important for people to understand the book of Daniel Even today in 2024 America And these are timeless truths And of course the Bible itself is going to be better understood The closer we get to the end But everything that was in that series is great I kind of wanted to ask Of the sermons that you preached Is there one particular episode that you're looking forward to the most Pastor Anderson As far as watching or that you are kind of interested how it came out I would probably point to chapters 7 and 8 Just because I think that those are the most interesting chapters in the book of Daniel You know the cool thing about the book of Daniel And the way that it's laid out Is that it starts out with the first six chapters Which are Bible stories And it's really some of the most bottom shelf Scripture in the whole Bible As far as just for a little child or a new believer To just read some fun stories from the Bible That's the first half, the first six chapters But then the latter six chapters of the book Are some of the most difficult chapters in the Bible Super heavy prophecies It's kind of interesting how Daniel balances That which is really easy on the surface With that which is really difficult toward the end I think that chapter 11 May be the most difficult chapter in the whole Bible And I put a lot of study into that sermon Because it was super hard to just wrap my mind Around everything that's going on in that complicated chapter So obviously coming from my place as being a pastor Who's been preaching for 20 some years and everything The really difficult, heavy, prophetic stuff toward the end of the book Chapter 7, chapter 8, chapter 11 Is what I'm looking forward to the most But I think that for the average viewer They're probably really just going to love the first six chapters Just because it's going to be more just fun, practical Just good stories You know I think about my daughter who just turned eight years old And she just loves the book of Daniel She's got her little Bible and she reads those stories And I remember as a kid just loving the first six chapters of Daniel When it comes to the prophetic aspects of the book I consider it to be a strong meat of the word And I think that obviously the New Testament Should always take precedence In our understanding of end times prophecy Because it's going to be the most clear The stuff in the Old Testament is a little bit more Through a glass darkly if you will And so the New Testament, the book of Revelation Is really the starting point And then this is sort of the graduate studies in Bible prophecy Kind of going to another level with strong meat So for people who are into prophecy And they've digested the Revelation series If you want to think of an Old Testament book That deals with the second coming of Christ And end times prophecy Obviously Daniel is the big one And so I think there's something in this series for everyone Because like I said the first six chapters I think are pretty bottom shelf And then hopefully by the time people get through those first six chapters They're going to be hooked on the series And glean as much as they can From the difficult sections toward the end And they're difficult sections But I hope the sermons aren't difficult Because my whole goal as a preacher Is to take that which is difficult and complicated And make it easy So my hope is that even someone who's newly saved Or doesn't have a huge amount of knowledge Is going to be able to watch all twelve of these episodes And not be scratching their head And walk away feeling like Okay yeah I got something out of this I get it I appreciate as a listener Pastor Shelley And Pastor Aderson you share this attribute as well That you guys get up and you preach on Difficult sections of scripture You talked about the strong meat of the word And you're able to break it down and make it palatable for the listener Rather than getting up and using flowery intense Difficult theological terms That no one in the congregation is understanding Simply to show off Or acting like that brain dead idiot From the flat earth debate Who used a bunch of big words out of context That he himself probably didn't even understand But my point is I appreciate that you guys Are able to break down the information for us And make it easier for those who Aren't as familiar with the scripture Well anti-corpuscular rays and magnetic declination Is really common So if you don't understand that you should probably There's something wrong with me I gotta read some more From your perspective Ben What episode are you kind of looking forward to People watching You've put a lot of these together You've seen them You were able to add a little bit of B-roll Mostly a lot of just the verses and the screen shots But from your perspective What episode do you think people are gonna really Resonate with or what was the episode that you Really enjoyed the most? I'm gonna say chapter nine For me personally I'm fascinated with verses 26 and 27 in particular Just as a I guess you could say prophecy nerd If you want to call it that There's a lot of misinformation about what those Verses are about Many point to them being about Jesus Christ himself when it's not at all And so specifically In reference to the anti-Christ When it's talking about the anti-Christ coming in In the midst of Daniel's 70th week The explanation of what Daniel's 70th week actually is The events that will occur during that time period So I think for me that's probably the chapter That I would be most looking forward to If I was simply just a viewer Well it does seem like Daniel's 70th week Is There's a lot of view points out there There's a lot of differences of opinion out there And it's kind of crazy to me to see how much variation How much splitting seems to be happening On those sections and a lot of people just kind of Don't want to believe in A final seven year period There's all these metaphors or it already happened Or a lot of interesting views But you know when I grew up I grew up believing there was always a seven year period Towards the end so I was probably in an echo chamber A little bit I guess to this viewpoint But I mean when you were growing up Pastor Anderson did you hear a lot of difference of opinions On Daniel's 70th week? Not really I grew up as an independent fundamental Baptist And so I would say that Pretty much all the churches that I grew up in Were probably pretty similar In the millennial They all erroneously held to the pre-tribulation rapture position Obviously they were wrong about that But in general Everything was futurist Everything was Daniel's 70th week Is coming in the future And you talk about it already having happened Well you know what it did already happen And that's one of the things that we cover in the series Is that it both already happened And is going to happen Because dual fulfillment is really just prophecy 101 If somebody doesn't understand dual fulfillment I don't even see how they can even read The Old Testament at all Because it's just so prevalent of a theme From Genesis to Revelation I mean it's huge And not only that but it also kind of even echoes The style of the Hebrew Bible itself Because of the fact that the key feature of Hebrew poetry is parallelism Which is stating the same thing twice Or stating two contrasting things And obviously we think of the poetic books Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon And they're just chock full of doublets, couplets, parallelisms Everything twice But even beyond that The vast majority of the Old Testament books Contained poetic sections I think there were only like three books in the Old Testament That contained no poetry I mean it's just a massive percentage of the Old Testament That is written in poetry rather than prose When you're reading books like Isaiah and Jeremiah They're packed with poetry And again the theme Or excuse me the primary poetic device of Hebrew poetry Is parallelism These little couplets And so on the macro scale You also have double tellings of Bible stories All throughout the Bible And then beyond that You have dual fulfillments of Bible prophecies In the day you eat thereof You shall surely die They die spiritually the day that they eat it But that's only the shadow fulfillment The real fulfillment is when they ultimately physically die Yeah Well I was thinking about like Isaiah Isaiah chapter 7 verse 14 The Bible says The Lord himself shall give you a sign Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son And shall call his name Emmanuel Butter and honey shall eat That he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good For before the child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good The land that thou pourest shall be forsaken Of both her kings So if I read that Isaiah chapter 7 Of course that was fulfilled That there was this child born And that did happen in the past But then that would be Definitely wrong to then not realize That that was a reference to the Lord Jesus Christ Who was coming down the line And how it was going to be fulfilled with him I think what's interesting is Like you said and I've You watched the series again recently But you bring up a lot of times Even how the Book of Daniel itself Has a mirroring Where chapters within the Book of Daniel Mirror other chapters Or have parallels with other chapters And it almost makes me wonder If one aspect of that Would give you a hint That this has more than one application This has more than one Fulfillment of prophecy The fact that it was mirrored The fact that it was doubled Because there was visions that were Specifically mentioned in the Bible Like saying this was doubled unto you As a significance Like there's a significance attached to the idea Of something being doubled in the Bible And so we should recognize That there's going to be a multiple fulfillment here Plus the whole Book of Daniel Which is all of the different stories Of tribulation and persecution That are brought up With Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego And the trials of Daniel And them having to stand strong On their faith I think what's cool to me is As a young child I also love the Book of Daniel And I think for children they like this book Because it's talking about children And how they take stands And how they're willing to take bold Steps in the faith And opportunity But the reality is Coming down the pike there could be These great opportunities for Christians To take stands Just like Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego And how we do need to take Bold stands today Against opposition I know that our persecution is very light In comparison to being thrown into a fiery furnace Literally But do you feel like we've already Or you or your church Or some of our friends have kind of A sense of like going through some Levels of persecution That are indicative Of what the future beholds Well You and I have talked about this many times And I'm always trying to tell you How little persecution I've endured But you never believe me Honestly You know to me when I hear you talk like that I just think like nah not really Because you know I just don't feel like I've really been through Much persecution at all Obviously all that will live godly in Christ Jesus Shall suffer persecution I've gone through some stuff but Yeah but I mean let's just be honest Because with Daniel In chapter one He's refusing to eat the kings meat And there's a lot of tension there But in reality He kind of just asks The captain if he can have a different diet And they're just like sure and then they try it So like on the surface it didn't end up Escalating into something like really extreme But it was a level of testing Of just where is your faith Are you willing to take a bold stand Even if it doesn't end up becoming very extreme You're willing to take that stand And to me seeing you go Like to countries like Botswana Or going to some of these places And going onto the radio And just boldly proclaiming what the Bible says Not necessarily knowing where that's going to take you And literally getting even deported I think that that Is some level of persecution That's at least worth mentioning I get it that Sure you're not thrown in the fiery furnace But not everybody has that specific trial We all have our own trials And our own levels of Moments where we have to take a stand Or we may have to say something uncomfortable And maybe that's even on a micro scale You know standing up to your parents On biblical issues Or standing up to your boss Or standing up to friends Or standing up to people that are protesting your church I think That's a very positive outlook on life And that's great I love that But you know I think for the average person If they went through your life And I talked to the average person They wouldn't say I've had no persecution Or no suffering or anything I mean you're literally like the most banned person in the world So how is that I mean at least from countries perspective Yeah obviously you're right And I think that obviously We all go through things in our life That are like Daniel chapter 1 Where we're forced to Make decisions about How to handle situations That are thrown at us And what's the right thing to do And we have to take the risk Of going through persecution Or facing negative repercussions For our Christian walk You know obviously these Messages in the book of Daniel Are really relevant Because they are the types of things That we go through You've got the Israelites That are in captivity In Babylon And what this represents Is us as Christians We're like foreigners In this world right We're strangers and pilgrims in this world Our citizenship is in heaven And so just like Daniel And the three children They're foreigners In this worldly sinful place Babylon Well that's kind of what all of us are As Christians you know We're not going to be able to Go back and track Meshach and Abednego Because we are foreign to this world And we don't necessarily fit in We want to excel And do the best we can And obviously they did that And they worked hard At their job They worked hard at their studies And they excelled In the world's system But they also took a stand For what was right And just praising the true God As a result of their testimony And so Obviously this book Is super relevant To every Christian Who is interested in taking a stand And yeah obviously we've all gone through What the Bible calls Light affliction You know in the book of What first Peter Second Peter it says you know Our light affliction I guess that's just the way The apostles are kind of looking at it that way In comparison to Christ right And some of us are literally foreigners Living in Babylon like Ben So you know he gets to tell us Exactly what that's like He's so foreign I was born in New Jersey But we'll move forward What I thought you were born like on a camel Or something in the Middle East If you want to think that that's okay I don't want to rain on your parade I thought you grew up being taught that America was the great Satan I'm just kidding What was it like being born you know In the desert As a foreigner Well I mean obviously you don't know what it's like I mean in all seriousness I lived in Lebanon for like five six years so Wasn't you aren't you ESL No not that but Your native language wasn't Lebanese When I was a child I had an accent when I spoke English So you learned English as your first language Yes it was my first language But anyway you really You never granted what it's like to be The first world country I feel like a lot of the time But you guys are having a great conversation One thing I want to point out Because with this series Obviously the goal is let's see if we can Maybe reach someone new You bring up the Revelation series For a lot of people that was Perhaps their introduction to you Pastor Anderson and your church And maybe even end times Bible prophecy As a subject And so the idea is well We're going to do that with The Daniel series given the fact that We're not allowed to be on YouTube And all the rest of it but We are now on Band.video And we thought Hey let's go ahead and put This series on Band.video And reach that Entirely new audience And there's a lot of them on that platform And I'm hoping That in doing so They'll be introduced for the first time To our movement and come aboard Just because so many people are online Nowadays and there's so many channels And there's so much streaming You know it also helps that our audience Shares it, you know Share it, mirror it, like it Tweet it, make shorts out of it Do anything and everything you can Because I know a lot of people I've talked to said the Revelation series Is one of the first things they were Ever introduced to when it comes to New IFB style preaching Or even just hearing an alternative view To the Pre-Trib Rapture Which is false in the Revelation series Specifically And it seems like whenever I was at Faithful Word A lot of people talked about the Revelation series As maybe one of their first introductions That's what caused them to even move out there Or get plugged in or start going soul winning Do you have a lot of people that have Come up to you through the years And kind of brought up the Revelation series? Oh absolutely and even to this day When I ask people Hey how'd you hear about our church How'd you find out about us I mean even though A lot of other films that we've done With framing the world like After the Tribulation New World Order Bible versions Marching to Zion Babylon USA Obviously those got tons of views Some of them got tens of millions of views But still probably the big one Is the Revelation series As far as just the most common answer To how people found out about our church Even to this day I mean Even within the last 12 months I mean hey I just found out about you I just found your Revelation series And so hopefully this Daniel series Will do the same thing Because again I think it's It's probably pretty accessible Even for people That are not super into Bible prophecy Especially the early chapters And hopefully it's simple enough all the way through I think it will be But yeah I really like the fact That this is getting put on a place Like band.video Which is kind of a new platform New audience for us And there are just so many people out there That still haven't been reached That haven't heard about this stuff And also You know even the old IFB That maybe isn't really too pleased With the end times preaching that I've done You know a lot of those people eventually I think are going to come around Because if they're honest If they're reading their Bible everyday In the spirit You know they're only going to be able to kick Against the pricks so long When they just start realizing How Zionism is such a fraud The pre-tribulation rapture is such a fraud And you know I just think that in the future A lot of people are going to come around Because you know if you think about it The dispensationalists had this big story That they've been telling my whole life About how God brought the Israelites Into the promised land in unbelief But then once they're in the promised land He's going to give them a new heart They're going to get saved All these things That's the story that they were telling In the sixties and seventies And in the eighties And even in the nineties They kept telling that story But that story at this point Has become absurd They're twisting scripture And have made up this fiction About how God brings them into the land In unbelief Well the children of Israel You know Didn't get right with God So why would God bring them back into the promised land I mean he scatters them Throughout history For their wickedness And then when they get right with God He brings them back I mean you know There's so much biblical evidence for that But they had this big story Where they're twisting stuff in Ezekiel And no no no he brings them back Well the problem is that the year is 2024 And the people that came to the land In 1947, 1948, that whole era Virtually all of them are dead And very few of them An extremely small number of them got saved Such a small number that it really doesn't even factor in It's so much less than one percent You might as well just round it down to zero I mean praise God for every single individual Who receives Christ as Savior And praise God for every Jew That he even gets saved to this day But let's face it They came into the land in unbelief They lived in unbelief They died in unbelief They are burning in hell right now So when are we going to realize That this bill of goods That the dispensationalists have sold us Just didn't happen It just isn't a thing I mean eventually People are going to say wait a minute This was supposed to happen Hey let me bring you into the land So you can go to hell and your kids can go to hell But you know maybe your grandkids will Magically all get saved Even though they are the most unreceptive demographic on the planet When you got to wonder too You know under the Zionism umbrella You have people like John Hagee Who's not even trying to evangelize that group So this idea of them converting Is even kind of foreign to some of these people Or we had a debate with a couple of people One was an actual Jew And one was just kind of a Judaizer But the Judaizer And a lot of these Judaizing types They don't even believe that These individuals need to be saved They are still under their first covenant or something And so they are on no plan To get them saved And so you got to wonder The people that actually believe the gospel And believe that the gospel needs to go to the Jew And to the Greek If they will kind of wake up I feel like the younger generation though For instance they don't know anything about 1948 They don't really know a lot about dispensationalism They are not necessarily resonating with this message And I feel like a lot of this preaching The Zionism preaching And dispensational preaching Is not bringing in the youth It's not bringing in the next generation And I kind of wonder if these pastors Are going to have to Kind of do what politics does Where when the whole culture changes You kind of just have to be like Well yep I'm going to just accept it Just because if I want to bring people in my church Or the vast majority of my church Already believes this We are kind of trying to win the masses So that the leaders will just finally acquiesce To the truth on these issues Because there are still great men out there That believe the gospel And are saved doing so many But they are just wrong On some of these end times issues And it would be great for them to Even if they didn't even change But at least to just accept like We are going to act like we are these black sheep Of Christianity Like you can't even have fellowship with us For having alternative prophetic views Whereas while we think they are dead wrong too We are not holding that against them In a sense like we can't call them brethren Or hang out with them Or do works with them or something And so it's kind of frustrating How the division on this issue Has caused people and individuals And churches to not even want to fellowship Or associate Or even praise For or be supportive of When they are going through difficulty Because we need more like-minded brethren As the end approaches And as more persecution is ramped up Rather than us all being divided On the timing of the rapture I mean it just seems silly And pedantic To not support a fellow Baptist Because of the preacher rapture Or something like that You've experienced that Ben Have you experienced churches kind of being hostile With that viewpoint Just once and I told the story On the stream already At a wedding of all places Where I was pulled into the pastor's office To talk about pre-trib Pre-trib at weddings or post-trib? No not necessarily I didn't plan on it at that time But pastor Anderson I think Isn't the post-trib rapture or the wrath or whatever That's like after the honeymoon or something like that? No I do believe that Daniel's 70th week though And a woman's labor process Explain that again Analogous Well when a woman begins to go through Her first What are they called? The labor pains? The labor pains thank you Contractions thank you Tim I had a brain freeze Yes now When she first begins the contractions The beginning of sorrows Then when the water breaks That's the abomination of desolation Which kick starts 75 days of Great tribulation And that is also the hardest part of the labor Right I mean typically Is you know When that the labor process begins to become The most difficult And then of course the baby comes out That's the rapture And then after that whole process is over Is God's wrath Which makes perfect sense because then you have postpartum But I'm excited about You know a lot of these episodes Daniel chapter 9 verse 27 being expounded Really I like all of the series I have to admit that I always enjoyed the first half of Daniel a lot more But I think as time goes on And you kind of want something new to study Some of these other chapters become more appealing They're more interesting I also think Daniel chapter 11 is just Never preached Like I don't know that I've ever heard a sermon on it Except for your one sermon Have you even heard other people preaching on this chapter You know I don't think I ever have No You didn't have much to go on right I don't blame preachers for not preaching it Because it's super difficult So you know it took me a long time to figure it out And I put a bunch of work into it So hopefully you know since I did the heavy lifting You know the viewers at home can just sit back And benefit from you know a clear expounding of it But yeah I agree with you a hundred percent Obviously you know we don't break fellowship with people Or look down on people Or make a big deal out of the fact That there are people who are wrong on end times But the other side is really hostile toward us They're really emotional about it Whereas for us these are non-essential doctrines Although we obviously are passionate about them We care about them At the end of the day you know we're not going to just You know tear down or decide that we don't like Another pastor because he's pre-trib You know I'd be glad to be friends with pastors Even if they're wrong on end times And have wrong views in these areas You know when it comes to the preaching That has been done by the Zionist pre-trib crowd It was never biblical to begin with And it was very much tied to current events And it has become extremely outdated It doesn't make any sense anymore So it's kind of funny to hear these guys Still spouting off the same talking points Even though none of it panned out in real life The world has changed And like I said it was never biblical to begin with But it was heavily leaning on Hey look what's happening in the world Well here we are it's 2024 And the story played out Nothing like they said it was going to You know you made the point that Some of these Zionists are so over the top That they're not even trying to evangelize Jews But let's face it Independent fundamentalists, Baptists who are Zionists They all want to evangelize Jews I've never heard an independent fundamental Baptist say That Jews are going to heaven without believing in Jesus That's more of these charismatic weirdos But like when it comes to evangelizing Israel I think that the old IFB has sent a ton of missionaries To Israel Because back when I was in the old IFB Missionaries to Israel would come through All the time And we would watch slideshows of missionaries Who were preaching in Israel I had a friend who I was trying to get To go to a certain mission field Because he was trying to go to Israel And I'm telling him no man, don't go to Israel And thankfully he ended up I don't know if it was because I talked to him But he ultimately ended up following my advice Not necessarily because I said it But just he wised up and realized That yeah that was better than being a missionary to Israel I'm thinking of another guy That was serving God Doing a great work as a missionary in a certain country That was receptive And then after decades of service God's calling him to Israel It's just so many of these guys They're so into that Zionist preaching And Zionist doctrine Which is a bunch of baloney That they just get super fired up About going and evangelizing Israel And obviously I'm for witnessing to anybody But I'd just rather see people Going to places that are more receptive That already haven't been evangelized A bunch of times And the thing is There have been tons of missionaries sent to Israel With the right gospel There have been tons of Baptists Who have made a point To give the gospel to Jews As much as they could And yet we still see Just a ridiculously small amount of results And so why would we just believe That this is going to be magically different in the future Okay I'm not a Calvinist I do not believe that God Just chooses who goes to heaven Goes to hell And that there's irresistible grace I don't believe in irresistible grace And so therefore Why would I believe That these people are all just gonna magically Get saved in the future When it hasn't happened in our generation It didn't happen in the previous generation There's no indication of them softening Toward the gospel at all Wake up people You've been sold a bill of goods And it's over man Just put a fork in it It's done It's time to let it go How many generations How many Jewish generations Have to die and go to hell Before the Zionist crowd Begin to ask some questions here That's the question I have I mean it's one after the other And you know what it is though It's just this clinging To their out of context And twisted interpretation Of Romans 11 and verse 26 That it's like you gotta You gotta pry it away from them With a crowbar or something like that And help them understand that passage it seems Yeah and I understand the point that you're making Because we've done a lot of foreign missions trips And there's a lot of people out there That want to get saved And you know to me I have options I don't have to go to Israel I can go wherever I want I can't even think of a meme I ended up I don't know if we can get this on the screen or not But it's just kind of sad That we're sending all of these resources To someone that's not very interested When it's possible we could be Giving it to other individuals So I made you a meme here Based on what you were describing there Perfect You just made that? Yeah it's just It's sad because you'll see He's doing a bunch of souls He's doing a great work for God And now it's like I'm going to Israel It's like what a waste of talent Right You know it's like God has put us on this earth We've got one lifetime Why would we go beat our heads against the wall In a place where it's already been tried It's already been done Nobody is succeeding You know and whenever you hear about these Oh revival at Israel There'll be like a fake news Of Israel getting saved Every once in a while Now that we have the internet to fact check things We know it's not real Like when I was a kid I'd hear these vague rumblings About these major rules in Israel And all this stuff But then like now that we have the internet You can actually look at the data Look at the statistics, fact check these things And find out that it's a complete fraud It's not going to exist And then even when you do find these So-called messianic Jews Have never met one of them That believed that salvation was by faith alone It was always a workspace salvation But even that is not happening in Israel You know that might be happening Different places throughout the world But you know there's no big revival Happening in Israel There isn't a major conversion to Christianity at all And even when they do quote unquote convert to Christianity It's always this workspace salvation And if anything it just seems like They're just infiltrating Christianity At that point And maybe we're a little off topic Yeah I wanted to make one more comment Because it seems like there's no new thing under the sun Because in the book of Acts You have Israel getting a disproportionate amount of apostles All dedicated to Israel And it's like the world just gets Paul But hey Paul did a lot of work And so you know there's a lot of work to do out there And you know with the book of Daniel series It's a great opportunity for people to share You know share this content with other people It's really palatable I know sometimes people get nervous about sharing new IP content But this is really palatable It's really easy Don't worry about that Don't worry about that By the time they get to chapter four They've already been softened up by chapters one through three So is chapter one pretty safe? Like it's dolphin safe? Yeah of course There's a lot of modern day parallels and challenges And you really relate it for children and us Also to talk about different challenges when we go through So I think that people are going to love episode one And they're going to love all of the episodes Because they're all great and they're all different You know they all have a lot of differences I will say I'm a big fan of when you, Pastor Anderson Go on this like epic rant And you end it with Okay beloved And let us continue our sermon this evening And I'm like that is a great transition I like it Going from a ten to a two real quickly No I mean look All kidding aside there really is a lot of great fiery preaching in this But there's also some practical applications That I think people will find to be not just useful But maybe even life changing I know when you talk about in this series About being a hard worker How to deal with your boss while also maintaining your Christian integrity as well Using Daniel obviously as an example So there's a lot of practical application There's the anti-fag stuff which is great But then there's also that meat of the word That end times Bible prophecy We brought up Daniel chapter 11 Arguably one of the hardest if not the hardest chapters in the entire Bible You're going to get it explained to you line by line Leaving no stone unturned in this series Coupled with B-roll Coupled with seeing the verses on the screen as well to help you absorb it So you're getting a whole lot of different content in the series Well and even though there was some items that might be seemingly time capsuled They still rear their ugly head today How about Trump? Isn't that something that's still relevant today? Yeah Trump gets mentioned And it's like you preached the sermon yesterday when you bring him up Because he's still obviously relevant He's running for president again this year What do you think about Trump? I don't Great answer I don't really follow politics anymore I've kind of been there done that Another thing to say about this series is that it's verse by verse preaching through the Bible It's expository preaching and it's not just a glazing over or a glossing over of anything It's actually dealing with everything It's not like I skipped the hard parts We're going line by line, verse by verse You do a great job explaining the chapter It's teaching in that the series gets pretty cerebral at times and goes deep and doesn't shy away from the difficult issues But at the same time they're full of sugar to make the medicine go down Where I try to keep it entertaining and there's a lot of practicalcation And so it's education but no exhortation It's not one or the other So it's not dry But it's also not vacuous Well one thing I was curious about and this is for both of you When it comes to Bible passages that deal with a dual fulfillment And something that had a historical fulfillment and an end times fulfillment For example Antiochus Epiphanes being a picture of the Antichrist And then you have the end times Antichrist Do you have a go to source that you would appeal to to learn about the historical events that happened That act as pictures of the end times Is there one place that you go to or multiple places that you go to How do you do that kind of research? Because when it comes to history there is so much Misinformation out there, Pastor Shelley is there anything you would point to Libraries, books, I mean where does one get this kind of information To know more about the seven year Roman Jewish war or Antiochus Epiphanes, Titus, whatever these different historical figures I mean I think that this is a skill in and of itself a little bit Just because people need to learn the importance of primary witnesses And first hand accounts and even just secondary witnesses And trying to track down source documents Also biases that may exist There is a lot when it comes to history History is in some ways just a story And so you kind of have to take it for what it is But I think just trying to do your best to check sources Read original documents And sometimes it's hard just because English hasn't always even existed So sometimes you're even reading someone else's translation of something And you know I think when it comes to history You kind of look through a glass darkly a little bit So I'm not to the point where you say we don't know anything about history But at the same time we always have to take it In my opinion with a grain of salt The Bible is really the only history that we can rely upon And know that it's factually correct And so I do think that it's important to take all historical documents With a little bit of scrutiny But at the same time you know I think there is good resources out there Libraries I think archive.org I believe maybe Is actually a pretty good resource I've found a lot of original documents that have been scanned by libraries And then they put them on archive.org We used it for the preserved Bible Yeah and then you can read like you can actually find the exact quotes And then people put quotes in there I like to sometimes find the original and still read all the context And kind of make sure like they're not even twisting things Because boy there's a lot of gaslighting and fake news out there But I don't know if you have any other suggestions there Pastor Anderson Well first of all you know I just agree with everything that you said there I mean when it comes to history Obviously there's the level of historical research Of just buying a book about something That is sort of designed for popular consumption right So you just go to the history section down at Barnes and Noble Or online or whatever and you purchase a book That just tells the story in a nice clean narrative fashion Whether it's about the Roman Jewish wars Whether it's about Alexander the Great Or the generals that took over his empire after him And all that aftermath and the different history Leading up to the Roman Empire The time of Christ and all those things Obviously there are a lot of great books on those subjects That are just easy to read But at the end of the day when you're reading a history book You can't just believe that it's all gospel Because what you have there is a historian Who has looked at the primary sources He's digested them all And he's come to certain conclusions And usually he's just kind of giving you those conclusions Hopefully if you're reading a good history book Things will be backed up with source citations And he'll point to the actual evidence From which he's drawing his conclusions And so if you want to go to the next level of historical research You have to start dealing with the original documents themselves And a lot of people don't understand the difference Between a primary source and a secondary source A primary source is something that is written At the time of the events or very close to the time of the events Whereas secondary sources are people writing many many years later Like a book that was published 20 years ago about the Roman Empire It's a secondary source A book published 500 years ago about the Roman Empire Is still a secondary source Because only things that are from the time when those things took place Are primary sources And then another level of historical research Is when you can actually start reading things in the original languages Greek, Latin, whatever Obviously most people are never going to go that deep on these things And look, I still think you can learn a lot And it's great to just pick up Even just starting at that first level Where you just grab a history book that's just written for popular consumption And read it That's going to get you to first base It's going to help you understand a lot You might not necessarily just take everything as absolute gospel And then obviously other people are going to go deeper They're going to go to the second level They're going to go to the third level But at the end of the day the only thing we can trust 100% is the Bible I have done a lot of historical research about ancient history I have read a lot of stuff in the original Greek and Latin sources and everything Obviously I still have a lot more to learn We all do But at the end of the day What I'm covering in the Daniel series isn't really disputed It isn't really controversial There's nothing that I bring up historically That I think that any historians would really argue with It's pretty much common knowledge Pretty solid ground I'm on Whenever I talk about history in this series Well, folks, you don't have to wait much longer We're only about three minutes away And we're really excited about releasing this Thanks again Pastor Anderson for allowing us to work on this project Thanks again to Paul Wittenberger and Framing the World For shooting this film and giving us the work to continue And thanks again to Ben so much for editing this We're excited to release this We're hoping that we can reach some new people Of course, you know, share it on the Baptist Bias You know, tweet it, like it Put it out there and share it for us Because that really helps And, you know, share it with co-workers Share it with friends We want to make sure that a lot of people get to see this Get to hear this And what I love about these series is Even the onset, it's not over These things last for years And sometimes even decades People keep sharing them So continue to share it And put it out there Do you have any final thoughts you have for us there Pastor Anderson? No, I just want to thank you guys for doing this Because, you know, I've really been looking forward to this thing coming out And, you know, I would say also just, you know, I pray that everybody will be blessed by this And that Christians will be able to live a better life for Christ That people will be saved as a result of finding this series And finding other preaching that we've done about the Gospel And I hope that Christians are just edified And that they'll be able to live a more solid Christian life Understand the Bible more You know, that's why we do what we do Ben, do you have any final words for us? One other thing that the viewer will notice with this series Is that the book of Daniel accurately predicted historical events that came afterward And that will make you fall out of your chair And prove even more that this book is the Word of God Of course, we already believe it But this substantiates that fact even further Truly incredible stuff You don't want to miss out on the Daniel series Tuesday nights 8 p.m. Central Time Watch everyone Yeah, of course, get your King James Bible out Open it up to Daniel Chapter number one Get ready, we're about to release it And of course, next week, Tuesdays at 8 p.m. You want to check it out We're going to take a break for our podcast Happening on Tuesdays at 8 And we're going to replace it with the Daniel series So we believe in replacement theology So we're replacing the Daniel series with our podcast I may still do some special episodes I have some other guests and some other shows that we may do I believe I might pick up the Sword Drill podcast as well On Fridays And so you can check that out at lunchtime At noon, we'll be doing some other streams Make sure to check out The Baptist Bias Because look folks, everyone's got a perspective But you need to get The Baptist Bias The Baptist Bias I'm going to start out by giving you an overview of the book of Daniel in general Now Daniel is the most important book of the Old Testament When it comes to Bible prophecy and the second coming of Jesus Christ It's like the book of Revelation of the Old Testament And it covers a lot of subjects like the tribulation, the anti-Christ The abomination of desolation, the millennial reign, mystery Babylon And a lot of other things that we read about in Revelation And one of the main features of the book of Daniel Is that it's actually split in half right down the middle Chapters 1 through 6 are a lot different than chapters 7 through 12 And the book of Revelation is the same way And the best way to understand the book of Revelation Is to take chapters 1 through 11 and realize that they're in chronological order And then when you get to chapter 12, what happens? We back up to the birth of Christ And then we go through all the same things that we saw in the first half of Revelation We go through them again from another angle We see the tribulation again, the rapture again, the wrath of God being poured out again Well Daniel is like that too, where it's cut in half right down the middle Because if you remember, Daniel chapters 1 through 4 deal with the reign of Nebuchadnezzar And then chapter 5 deals with the reign of his son Belshazzar And the story actually takes place at the very end of his reign When he sees the handwriting on the wall And then in Daniel chapter 6, it's King Darius So it's all in chronological order there up to that point But then if you look at Daniel chapter 7 verse 1 The Bible says in the first year of Belshazzar, king of Babylon Daniel had a dream and visions of his head upon his bed Then he wrote the dream and told the sum of the matter So now we've backed up in time to Belshazzar's reign Look at chapter 8 verse 1 And it says in the third year of the reign of king Belshazzar So in chapter 7 we were in the first year In chapter 8 we were in the third year Go to Daniel chapter 9 verse 1 And the Bible says in the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus Of the seed of the Medes, which was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans So here, this would be parallel with what we saw in Daniel chapter 6 Where Darius is forced to put Daniel into the lion's den and so forth And then if we flip over to chapter 10 verse 1 The Bible says in the third year of Cyrus, king of Persia A thing was revealed unto Daniel And Daniel 10, 11, and 12, they all go together It's one vision that just goes over the course of three chapters So the point is that chapters 1 through 6 are in chronological order And then chapters 7 through 12 are in chronological order Now the two halves of the book of Revelation are also very different from one another Just like the two halves of Daniel are different from one another The second half of Revelation is harder to understand It's more cryptic and figurative The first half of Revelation is pretty easy to understand Well Daniel is similar to that in the sense that chapters 1 through 6 are very easy to understand I remember when I was a child, I loved reading Daniel 1 through 6 That was one of my favorite portions of the Bible Because we loved the stories about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego Going to the fiery furnace We all know the story of Daniel in the lion's den The handwriting on the wall All these great stories from the first half But I remember when I would get to chapter 7 And then especially when I got into chapters 8 and 9 I started to get lost a little bit as a kid Because the second half is a lot harder to understand The second half is all of the deep Bible prophecy stuff So chapters 1 through 6 are the stories Chapters 7 through 12 are the deep Bible prophecy stuff So when it comes to understanding the second coming of Christ And understanding the book of Revelation At an even deeper level The second half is just a gold mine of information on that subject Even though it's a little tougher Hopefully as we go through it verse by verse We're going to be able to make it a lot easier By just breaking it down And comparing scripture with scripture So let me just give you a quick overview of what the various chapters in Daniel are about Daniel chapter 1 is going to cover the story about Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego When they're first taken captive by the Babylonians How they don't eat the king's meat And they will not drink the wine that he drinks And how God blessed them for that And how they excelled That's what we're going to be talking about in tonight's sermon on chapter 1 Okay chapter 2 is where Nebuchadnezzar dreams the dream And it's of a giant image that's in four sections And those four sections represent the four kingdoms Of Babylon, Persia, Greece, and the Roman Empire Then in chapter 3 we have the famous story about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego Chapter 4 is where Nebuchadnezzar loses his mind And is given the heart of a beast And has his fingernails grow like bird claws And his hair becomes like bird feathers Like he gets the dreadlocks going on And he's out eating grass in the field for seven years Then in chapter 5 we get to the story about his grandson, Belshazzar And he sees the fingers of a man's hand writing on the wall And then of course Daniel chapter 6 is about Daniel and the lion's den So those are the familiar chapters Then in chapter 7 we get into something that's pretty similar to chapter 2 Because in chapter 7 we have these four beasts That represent the same four kingdoms from chapter 2 And we have that great vision of the ancient of days And then we have even the Son of Man coming with the clouds of heaven So it's a wonderful prophecy of the second coming of Jesus Christ Very graphic in fact for being an Old Testament passage So it's a really interesting chapter, Daniel chapter 7 Then in chapter 8 we have the vision of the ram and the goat The ram representing the Medo-Persians The goat representing Greece Then in chapter 9 we have the chapter where Daniel prays and confesses the sins of his people And then where we get into the famous 70 weeks of Daniel Anybody who's heard a lot of preaching on Bible prophecy Is of course familiar with the term Daniel's 70th week Well that comes from Daniel chapter 9 Then in Daniel chapter 10 we get into that final trilogy Of chapters 10 through 12 which is a very in depth complicated prophecy Chapter 11 is probably the hardest chapter in the whole book of Daniel by far Chapter 10 sort of just introduces that subject Where the angel comes and talks to Daniel And everything is set up Chapter 11 is the meat of that prophecy And let me emphasize the word meat Because that's a very deep heavy chapter Daniel chapter 11 And then chapter 12 is the wrap up chapter And again chapter 12 is very relevant to end times It gets very explicit about the resurrection of the dead And about the second coming of Christ The tribulation, the millennium, things like that And it even gets into some really specific numbers Of the 1290 days and the 1335 days So that's a great chapter as well So that gives you a basic overview of the book of Daniel And before I get into chapter 1 also I just want to give you an important principle For studying the book of Daniel Go to Daniel chapter 12 And this is a great principle for studying the Old Testament in general But this is specifically said of the book of Daniel itself And this is where a lot of people go wrong When they study Bible prophecy They don't understand this principle that I'm about to show you here And that is that the New Testament is clearer than the Old Testament The New Testament is more explicit The Old Testament is darker and more difficult to understand Therefore we should always take the clear teachings of the New Testament And use them to interpret the Old Testament Now a lot of Bible teachers who teach false doctrine They would do the opposite They'll ignore clear teachings in the New Testament And then they'll try to take things from Daniel And twist them around to try to somehow trump revelation And they'll basically say Oh Daniel's the main book No the main book is Revelation The clear book is Revelation Even its very name, Revelation Should show how it's making things clear It's exposing the truth So anything that we see in Daniel We should look through the lens of Revelation We have the privilege of sitting here thousands of years later With the whole Bible in our hands And we've already read the whole book of Revelation So when we take that knowledge back to the book of Daniel We can understand the book of Daniel very well We don't want to read Daniel pretending like we don't know what Revelation says Why not? Well because Daniel himself didn't even understand the book of Daniel Because he'd never read Revelation Look what the Bible says in Daniel chapter 12 Verse number 8 And I heard And what did he hear? The vision that he received over chapters 10, 11 and 12 And I heard but I understood not Then said I Oh my Lord what shall be the end of these things And he said Go thy way Daniel For the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end So notice he doesn't explain it to him Daniel says I don't understand what I've just heard I mean I'm writing it down in the book of Daniel But I don't understand it And instead of being given an explanation He's told well just seal it up Because it's not going to be for a long time So don't worry about it Some of these things are over your head Because they're way off in the future And they're not for you They're for people that will later get these prophecies People like us They were written for our admonition Upon whom the ends of the world are come As it says in 1 Corinthians 10 The Bible says in verse 10 there in chapter 12 Many shall be purified and made white and tried But the wicked shall do wickedly And none of the wicked shall understand But watch this But the wise shall understand Now Daniel didn't understand But God's saying that in the future The wise will understand That's what we want to be Amen We want to be the wise people In the 21st century We have the Bible We have revelation We have the four gospels We can put it all together And we can understand what Daniel didn't understand Now compare what we just read With Revelation 22 10 Flip over to Revelation chapter 22 verse 10 In Daniel he said I heard but I understood not And he was told Seal up the sayings He said Daniel the words are closed up and sealed Until the time of the end Revelation says the exact opposite Look at chapter 22 verse 10 And he saith unto me Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this book For the time is at hand So Daniel was told Well this is for the time of the end It's sealed up, it's closed Revelation says the opposite Seal it not, the time is at hand So that proves that Revelation is the clear book Daniel is the more difficult, darker, obscure book But with the flashlight of Revelation We can illuminate everything in the book of Daniel And understand it very well So let's dig into Daniel chapter 1 now With all that in mind Let's go to Daniel chapter 1 verse 1 The Bible reads In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim King of Judah came Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon unto Jerusalem And besieged it And the Lord gave Jehoiakim King of Judah into his hand And he brought the vessels of the house of God Which he carried into the land of Shinar To the house of his God And he brought the vessels into the treasure house Of his God And the king spake unto Ashpenaz The master of his eunuchs That he should bring certain of the children of Israel And of the king's seed And of the princes So this is where Nebuchadnezzar And the Babylonian army take over They defeat Jerusalem They take over the kingdom of Judah They rule over them They bring the people into captivity This is one of those waves of captivity Where the people are transported into a far land This is what God had prophesied would happen to them Over and over again in the book of Jeremiah He told them that this was coming That the king of Babylon Was gonna come and wipe them out And that they were gonna be scattered into all nations And carried away captive into Babylon This is the fulfillment of that And in verse 3 The master of the eunuchs Ashpenaz Is certain of the children of Israel And of the king's seed And of the princes So get the picture here The children of Judah Are going into captivity And this specific man Ashpenaz Who is the master of the eunuchs Is supposed to select certain people For a certain task Now what kind of people is he looking for Look at verse 4 Children So not adults Not old men But children Children in whom was no blemish But well favored And skillful in all wisdom And cunning in knowledge And understanding science And such as had ability in them To stand in the king's palace And whom they might teach the learning And the tongue of the Chaldeans So what kind of young people Is he looking for He's looking for the ones that are The children of the princes The ones who understand science The ones who are skillful And knowledgeable Basically they want the best And the brightest So that they can indoctrinate them In the language And the learning of the Chaldeans The heathen They're false gods They're wicked ideology So they're taking God's people And they want to take the children And specifically they want to take The most promising children Of the heathen Now this is the devil's plan Even in 2018 He would love to get our children He would love to get the best And the brightest and the smartest And the most godly And the most righteous And the ones with the best work ethic And the ones with the most character And he would love to use them For his purposes Not to serve the Lord But to serve his agenda And not only that But eunuchs What is a eunuch? A eunuch is a man who is emasculated Who is castrated Who is neutered And so the devil would love nothing more Than to take our Christian young men And not only to make them worldly Not only to brainwash them With his ideology And his wicked mentality But he would love to also feminize them And emasculate them And castrate them And we see that going on today He would love to get us To drop our kids off At the public school system Where Nebuchadnezzar Could educate them And where he could teach them His learning and his tongue Instead of them being reared By God's people And trained in the Bible Now look what the Bible says in verse 5 And the king appointed them A daily provision of the king's meat This is their school lunch program And of the wine which he drank So nourishing them three years That at the end thereof They might stand before the king Now among these Were of the children of Judah Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah So remember All the children of Judah end up Eventually going captive They all end up being removed But this is one wave of that removal And then among those who are removed They take the children And they specifically take The best and the brightest And the most skillful And we don't know how many Were in that group But we know that Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego Are just part of that group They're not the whole group So there are a whole bunch of other Young people from Judah And among this great crowd That Ashpenaz sets aside There are four in particular Whose names are Daniel Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah Daniel 7 says Under whom the prince of the eunuchs Gave names for he gave unto Daniel The name of Belteshazzar And to Hananiah of Shadrach And to Mishael of Meshach And to Azariah of Abednego Now we know Daniel By his Hebrew name of Daniel That's how he's referred to Throughout this book And that's the name that we tend To know him by We don't often talk about him As Belteshazzar Or Babylonian names So that's how we're going to refer to them Tonight and in the future Just because that's the common way Of referring to them We've got Daniel Which is the Hebrew name And then we've got Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego Which are the names that they're given But their real names were Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah Those are the names that were given them By the prince of the eunuchs And then it says in the next verse Verse 8 It says that Daniel Singular purpose in his heart That he would not Defile himself with the king's meat You see when it comes to taking A stand for God It starts with one person It starts with one guy Everybody else is just Going with the flow Everybody else is just Doing what's popular Everybody else is just Doing what's popular Everybody else is just Compromising their beliefs And not following the word of God But one guy Decides in his heart And before anything is ever said Before any action takes place There's a purposing in the heart Where one man decides I'm not going to do it I'm not going to do it And that's Daniel And then when that one person Takes a stand The result of that Is that three other people say Take the ice And then three more will pop up But notice not everybody got on Board with their program Out of all the captives And we can assume that it was A lot more than four people If we read the story But four of them decide That they're going to take a stand Through Daniel's leadership They're not going to defile Themselves with the king's meat And with the wine Which he drank Which is an unclean meat Because of the fact that this is When the children of Israel and Judah Are under the old covenant And they have dietary restrictions And they're not supposed to be eating Things like pork, etc. But probably a more likely explanation Is that it was meat offered And sacrificed unto idols Because if you remember All the way back to when the children of Israel Came out of the land of Egypt And were in the wilderness They were tempted To sacrifice unto idols Through Balaam The false prophet And so that was a problem for them back then And then even in the New Testament We see multiple scriptures Especially in Revelation chapter 2 About the sin of eating meat Sacrificed unto idols So that's probably what this was But either way it was some kind of A sinful meat And then they also were abstaining From the wine which he drank So we can assume that that's Which would be the reason why They wouldn't drink the wine that he drank Because it's alcoholic And so the Bible says In verse number 8 But Daniel purposed in his heart That he would not defile himself With the portion of the king's meat Nor with the wine which he drank Therefore he requested of the prince of the eunuchs That he might not defile himself Now notice the difference there It starts out very strong saying He purposed in his heart That he would not defile himself With the king's meat But then in the second half of the verse It says he requested Of the prince of the eunuchs That he might not defile himself Now this has nothing to do With Daniel's resolve I mean the first verse is clear He'd already made the decision That he was not going to do it And we know from the rest of the book of Daniel That when Daniel says he's going to do something And when Daniel takes a stand for God He's willing to follow it through All the way unto death He's willing to follow through unto death So why did he then request? And why did he say, you know, that he might not? I'll tell you why Because when you go to an authority figure in your life When you go to your boss at work Or when you go to someone else Who's a legitimate authority You don't want to just go in there Guns a-blazin' And rudely demand That they allow you to follow your conscience It's better to be polite, respectful In your heart you know you're not going to do it But you don't have to go in there and say I'm not going to eat this meat I'm not going to drink this There's no way you're just going to have to kill me Instead he just said Hey is there any way That we could not do this Is there some way around this See we're supposed to try to live peaceably With all men if we can When we have a legitimate authority over us Whether it's our parents Whether it's a wife with her husband Whether it's a baby with his boss at work We need to try to obey the authorities In our life that are God-given legitimate authorities And so this is a good lesson in how to be tactful and respectful And to still get what you want Now the Bible says That he requested of the prince of the eunuchs That he might not defile himself And then verse 9 is key Now God had brought Daniel Into favor and tender love With the prince of the eunuchs This will help you When you're trying to take a stand For what's right on the job Or taking a stand for what's right at school Or taking a stand with other authorities in your life Like your parents or whatever Is that you have a good rapport with those people beforehand You see if you're a lazy worker And you're one of the worst workers on the job And now all of a sudden you want to take this big stand for God And you have to have time off for church And you're not going to lie And everything like that You know your boss might not be willing to ban any rules Or make exceptions for you Because of the fact that you're not worth it Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were worth it And so therefore Melzar Ashpenaz he's also called Was willing to ban the rules for them And help them out And you know if you're a great worker on the job If you're giving it 110% That's going to help you get the Sundays off That's going to help you get Wednesday night off That's going to help you Be able to follow your conscience And not have your boss trying to pressure you To do things that are wrong You've got to have a boss that loves you Because you're a great worker You know what bosses love? To make money That's what the owner of the company Started the company for To make money Unless you're working for some kind of a nonprofit organization Then chances are Your boss is in it to make money And so if you work hard and make him money He likes you He doesn't care what color you are He doesn't care what your personality is like If you're making him money That's the way most bosses work So you know what if you work hard And you do your job And you're a diligent worker You'll find that your boss Is willing to work with you On these issues of the conscience The Bible says in verse 10 And the prince of the eunuch said unto Daniel I fear my lord the king Who hath appointed your meat and your drink Then shall you make me endanger my head To the king Now when he talks about his head being Endangered to the king He means like being removed from his body Kind of danger He's not saying I'm worried I'm going to get fired He's talking about I'm worried I'm going to get my head chopped off For doing a bad job Because these kings of the east At this time They were pretty serious In the next chapter he's going to talk about Just killing all kinds of his employees On the long hills And so this is a boss that doesn't just fire you He kills you He cuts off your head and destroys your home So he said I'm just afraid So basically the supervisor at work Wants to help out Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego But he's just afraid that he's going to get in trouble But he wants to help him So Daniel makes a suggestion Verse 11 Daniel to Melzar whom the prince of the eunuchs had said Over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah Prove thy servants That means test us I beseech thee ten days And let them give us pulse to eat And water to drink Pulse is like beans, lentils, legumes Other sources of protein Other than meat Then let our countenances Or our faces is what that means Be looked upon before thee And the countenance of the children That eat of the portion of the king's meat And as thou seest Deal with thy servants So he consented to them in this matter And proved them ten days And at the end of ten days Their countenances appeared fairer And fatter in flesh Than all the children Which did eat the portion of the king's meat Thus Melzar took away the portion of their meat And the wine that they should drink And gave them pulse So they said Give us a ten day trial period So we'll be healthier And we'll look better So that the king won't look at us and say What's wrong with these bunch of soy boys? Give these guys some meat for crying out loud Who's been feeding these guys? Now I personally believe that this is a miracle I think that God stepped in And allowed it to be a miracle Now some people have made the case that That's what we should be eating anyway We should all be vegetarians We should all be eating pulse We should all get rid of meat Well first of all there's a lot in the Bible That that doesn't jibe with And in fact you can even prove From the book of Daniel Later in the book of Daniel That Daniel didn't eat this way For the rest of his life He ends up talking about later in the book of Daniel In chapter 10 A time when he fasted for three weeks And he says during that time I didn't eat any flesh during that time I didn't eat any pleasant bread I wouldn't even be bringing that up If he'd been vegan since chapter one Okay he obviously went back to Eating meat later on And only during a fasting period He went on like a bread and water type fast In Daniel chapter 10 Leading up to that great prophecy That he gets at the end of the book of Daniel But either way If he did just get great nutrition From the lentils and beans Because lentils and beans and pulse are good for you And so maybe he just got the right mix of protein And naturally looked fine Or God stepped in But either way after 10 days He came out looking better I believe it was the blessing of God I believe it was the miracle of God That makes a lot more sense So then in verse 16 Melzar took away the portion of their meat And the wine that they should drink And gave them pulse So again this is a great lesson on How to deal with authorities in your life That are trying to get you to do something that's wrong First of all you can be polite Come up with a solution that makes sense Where everybody comes out okay Hey I want to be off on Wednesday night But here's where I'm willing to work extra over here Here's where I'm willing to give you something A quid pro quo Where I'll do a little extra over here And then you help me out over here And that's what I used to do through the years When I had a secular boss And he would try to get me to work on Wednesday night I would just get it all done before then And tell him hey I already took care of that I don't need to do that on Wednesday night Because I took care of it by working late Tuesday night Or whatever the case may be So Daniel finds a solution Where everybody comes out okay Now there's a little bit of symbolism here With the tribulation as well Because of the fact that they're tested for how long? Ten days And when we get to Revelation chapter 2 verse 10 What does it say? You shall have tribulation ten days Be thou faithful unto death And I'll give thee a crown of life Why? Why does Daniel start out with this story About taking a stand for what's right And refusing to give in to the devil's requirements Or refusing to do things that are wicked When you're being forced to I'll tell you why Because Daniel's a book that's all about Bible prophecy And when we think about the second coming of Christ When we think about the events leading up to it Known as the tribulation It's going to be a time of trials And testing for God's people Because there will be persecution Unlike anything that the world has ever seen So what more fitting to have in chapter 1 of Daniel Than a test of the resolve of God's people To not defile themselves Why? Because in the end times There's going to be pressure To stop preaching the word of God To stop preaching hard on sin To stop preaching the whole Bible Because it'll be called hate speech And it'll become illegal And you could be fined or imprisoned For just preaching what the word of God says There's going to be persecution that intensifies And once we get into the great tribulation itself There will be people who are beheaded For the cause of Christ And so in Daniel chapter 1 We have an example of God's people Refusing to bow down Refusing to give in Refusing to defile themselves And then we're going to see another example of this in chapter 3 Where they refuse to bow down To the great image Which pictures what? The anti-Christ's great image The image to the beast in Revelation 13 Where the whole world is going to be required To bow down and worship that image And God's people are going to have to be like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego And refuse to bow down So this story in the book of Daniel itself Is very relevant to end times But here's my question If you can't take a stand now When things are easy When we're not even in the tribulation When you haven't even been kidnapped And taken to a foreign country How are you going to take a stand When things really get difficult? Now I've preached the word of God for 12 years now Completely uncensored Completely unfiltered And I've suffered persecution very lightly A very light affliction I have not had to endure any serious persecution Or affliction over the last 12 years It's very light relatively To what people went through in the Bible And what other people have gone through Throughout history or even right now In other parts of the world As we speak But yet today there are many many Baptist preachers Baptist preachers who believe exactly like I believe On certain issues But they will not speak up Because they're afraid of the persecution They're scared to take a stand And if they can't take a stand now How in the world could they ever take a stand During the tribulation? Oh but I forgot they made up their fake Pre-tribulation doctrine That gives them a get out of tribulation free card Get out of persecution free card Get out of all the trials free And all that will live godly in Christ Jesus Shall suffer persecution Doesn't say they might suffer persecution They shall suffer persecution But this doctrine of the pre-tribulation rapture Is a convenient doctrine For people who don't take a stand now And certainly won't take a stand then You see the Bible tells us in Jeremiah 12-5 If thou ist run with the footmen And they have wearied thee Then how canst thou contend with horses? And if in the land of peace Wherein thou trustest They wearied thee Then how wilt thou do in the swelling of Jordan? I mean if people can't take a stand for God right now If preachers can't get up In the United States of America Where we have the first amendment Protecting our freedom of speech And our freedom of religion If they won't get up now And preach boldly the word of God And not care what the outcome is Not care what the persecutions are Not gonna do it when it's illegal You say well someday in America It might become illegal To preach against the sodomites Or to preach this or to preach that Well you know what most pastors won't have to change a thing Most pastors won't even have to change a thing It won't even affect them They're not even preaching it now while it's legal You think they're gonna preach it when it's not legal? No way They won't even risk offending people They won't even risk a little dent in their 401k You think they're gonna risk going to prison? You think they're gonna risk having the church shut down And the IRS putting a padlock on the front door Or whatever the case may be I mean now the biggest persecution is what? Oh our YouTube channel is shut down Well you know what I can handle that That's easy right? And I can handle more than that And you know what we as God's people Are supposed to be faithful to what point? What point? Death! He said be faithful unto death and I'll give thee a crown of life Death! These people aren't even to first base When it comes to persecution But they talk big like they're gonna make it all the way to home Oh yeah I'm willing to die for Christ Look if you're not willing to live for Christ You're not willing to die for Christ I mean it's easier to live for him than it is to die for him Oh yeah you know I'm ready to die on that hill I'm ready to be beheaded for Christ But they can't even preach the whole Bible now Because they're a coward It doesn't make any sense folks Now the Bible tells us in the end times That there's gonna be intense persecution And it talks about how people will betray one another And cause people to be put to death even Mark chapter 13 is one of the most famous passages On the second coming of Jesus Christ That covers the rapture It covers the tribulation It covers those events Mark 13 and Luke 21 are the three big ones In the four gospels there And in Mark 13 verse 12 it says Now the brother shall betray the brother to death And the father the son And children shall rise up against their parents And shall cause them to be put to death That's pretty chilling That the Bible tells us that children Would rise up against their parents And cause them to be put to death How could that happen? How could a child cause their own parents I'll tell you how Because someone else must have raised them Because if a child was raised up by his parents And loved his parents And had a right relationship with his parents You think he's gonna betray his parents Even unto death? But when a child is indoctrinated In a government institution For seven, eight hours a day Getting a completely different ideology Than what their parents believe You could see that child Being brainwashed and indoctrinated To the point where they would think That their parents are the enemy Their parents just aren't progressive enough Their parents just don't understand The New World Order And they don't understand the way things are going And so I have to do my civil duty My patriotic duty And turn in my own parents That they might be put to death Think about that And so isn't it fitting that Daniel chapter one A story about persecution About trials About people standing up About things of God Even when their own life is on the line It's also a story about children Being indoctrinated In beliefs Other than what their parents have Now notice what the Bible says In verse number 16 It says Then Melzar took away the portion of their meat And the wine that they should drink And gave them pulse As for these four children God gave them Knowledge and skill And Daniel had understanding In all visions and dreams Now at the end of the days That the king had said He should bring them in Then the prince of the eunuchs brought them in Before Nebuchadnezzar And the king communed with them And among them all was found none Like Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah Among whom all? Among all of the captives from Judah Right? They all came from homes that supposedly Worshiped the Lord At the indoctrination camp here And among them all There were none like these four You know what that tells me? That most children Who are put into the government's indoctrination Are not going to turn out right Four of them will You know, I don't know What the number was That turned out wrong But there were none other that were like them And when it came down to bow down To the great image in chapter three It's only these godly young people That are standing It's not a whole bunch Of the children of Judah No, because most of your public school kids Are going to get indoctrinated To that ideology to some degree You say, well, you know I went to public school And I turned out great Or, you know, I know children Who go there and they turn out fine Well, you know what? That's true! But you know what? That's not what I want to bank on Those kind of odds That kind of a percentage Where a small minority Can turn out right In spite of being in the public fool system And listen If your kids are in public school You better make sure To do everything that you can To build a relationship with those kids And to teach them the Bible And to get them in church As much as you can In the public school system But I strongly believe that your children Should be homeschooled Simply because they need to be raised By God's people Not by an atheistic institution You know, I was listening to an old sermon From back when I used to actually vote And I talked about in that sermon How when I saw the ballot And I saw the part that said Superintendent of schools I never really knew who to vote for And you see the signs up all around town, right? This person for Superintendent of Public Schools And I'm thinking to myself I don't believe in the public school system I'm not going to put my kids in public school And so I don't really have a dog in this fight And I don't really know Who these people are Or what sets them apart So I decided to not vote for any of them But to do a write-in candidate And I decided to write in Satan For the Superintendent of Public Schools And you say, well, what if he gets elected? Well, then nothing's going to change In fact, I was saying we should put up a sign that says Re-elect Satan For Superintendent of Public Schools Experience you can trust He's got the experience Why? Because he's been running it for decades And so we as Christians We don't want to just willingly put our kids In a situation where they're being indoctrinated Into the devil's ways Now, these people in Daniel Chapter 1 They didn't have a choice, they're kidnapped And there are some countries in this world Germany comes to mind Where children will literally be kidnapped And taken to the public school Where homeschoolers have the police come And take the kids to school at gunpoint But thank God we're not there in America We're not there in Arizona California's not there And we have the freedom to homeschool our children Let's take advantage of that And make sure that we can raise up a godly generation You say, oh man, that's hard work Well, I'd hate for you to have to do anything hard But the Bible says that God gave these young people knowledge You know where real knowledge comes from? God The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge You say, well, I just want them to go to the public school To get a great education And then I want them to go to Devil State University So they can further their education Well, you know what? These young people who were brainwashed into what the Chaldeans had to offer They were already understanding science They were already the best and the brightest And they were trained full-time in this boarding school of the Chaldeans They were the top of their class They got all the training that the world had to offer They got all the education But you know who was smarter? Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego Why? Because the Bible says that God gave them knowledge You see, God-given knowledge Will allow you to excel beyond what the world can do mentally You see, the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God God can give you knowledge You say, well, I need knowledge, I need wisdom, I need skills God can give you those things Seek ye first the kingdom of God And his righteousness And all these things shall be added unto you The Bible says in verse 17 As for these four children, God gave them knowledge and skill And all learning and wisdom And Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams Now at the end of the days that the king had said that he should bring them in Then the prince of the eunuchs brought them in before Nebuchadnezzar And the king communed with them And among them all was found none like Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah Therefore, they stood before the king These are the top students These are the top workers And the Bible says in verse 20 And in all matters of wisdom and understanding That the king inquired of them He found them ten times better Than all the magicians and astrologers that were in all his realm So all of the devil's crowd had less wisdom than God's people Why? Because the word of God and training in the things of God is the ultimate in education And it will allow you to even excel in science and English and history and all the other disciplines of learning Why? Because God's word makes wise the simple It takes the simple one and it gives him knowledge and understanding I've noticed that people who I've seen get saved Who weren't very intellectual, weren't that bright As they begin to read the Bible over and over again I've just watched that person get smarter In all areas of life Reading the word of God Listening to Bible preaching Understanding the doctrines of the word of God Actually makes you a smarter person in all areas of life It can actually help you succeed at your job If you're a doer of the word and not a hearer only And the Bible says in verse 21 He continued even under the first year of King Cyrus And we know that he even continued beyond that Because at the beginning of chapter 10 It talks about him receiving a vision in the third year of Cyrus So what the Bible is saying when it says that he continued under the first year of King Cyrus It's saying he continued working for the King of Babylon until what? Until there was no more King of Babylon Because Cyrus the Persian came in He continued all the way Basically he worked for the company until the company got bought out in a hostile takeover And after that hostile takeover He was kept on The new management kept him on Now you know how long that is? Seventy years Seventy years later When Cyrus takes over Daniel is still working the same job And he gets taken on by the new king And he continues in that position So he was an old man at that point We don't know how young he is here But he must have been an 80 some year old man at that point Still serving God Still praying Still preaching Still a prophet unto the Lord And so Daniel is a great example Of what we need to be like If we end up being the generation that goes into the great tribulation itself If we are the generation that's living in the very last days We better be like Daniel We better be like his three friends here We better decide right now Not to compromise Not to give in Not to bow down To whatever the devil demands of us Even now You say well when it comes to the mark of the beast and the anti-Christ That's a no brainer Okay well you know what There are a lot of things that are a no brainer right now But yet we see churches giving in Compromising And not standing up for what's right These people They're cowards And we need to pray for boldness today You say I can't help it I'm scared I'm a coward God has not given us the spirit of fear But of power and of love And of a sound mind The apostle Paul kept praying for boldness And we ought to pray for boldness Oh God give me the boldness To stand for you At all times Give me the boldness to do what's right No matter what happens And so this is a great chapter We need to start out the book of Daniel Yeah we're going to get into the heavier Bible prophecy stuff But before we get in To the heavier Bible prophecy stuff In chapter 7 through 12 You know what we need to get is some character We need to start out in chapter 1 And learn how to be the best worker on the job How to stay with the company How to be brought into tender love with the supervisor Where he wants to help us Serve God and serve the company And we need to get some backbone to stand up To the devil and his minions When they want us to compromise our beliefs That's where it begins It's all fine and dandy to have your doctrine all straight On when the tribulation happens How about actually being ready for the tribulation Instead of just knowing the doctrine How about practicing it And being a doer of the word Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer Father we thank you so much for this great chapter Lord And we thank you for this great example Of Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego Give us knowledge and wisdom And understanding as we go further Into this great book Lord Open our eyes That we may behold wondrous things Out of thy law And in Jesus name we pray Amen Amen. Amen. Amen.