Lesson 2, April 7-13
Sabbath Afternoon
Read for This Week’s Study: Luke 16:10; Daniel 1, 2; 3:1-6; Revelation 13:11-15; Daniel 3:13-18; John 3:7; Daniel 4, 6.
Memory Text: “The king answered Daniel, and said, ‘Truly your God is the God of gods, the Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets, since you could reveal this secret” (Daniel 2:47, NKJV).
The Lord had great plans for ancient Israel. “And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation” (Exodus 19:6). This holy nation, this kingdom of priests, was to be His witness to the world that Yahweh was the only God (see Isaiah 43:10, 12).Unfortunately, the nation didn’t live up to the holy calling that God had given it. Eventually, it even went into captivity in Babylon.
Interestingly enough, God was still able to use individual Judeans to be His witnesses, despite the disaster of captivity. In other words, to some degree, God would accomplish through Daniel and his three fellow captives what He did not achieve through Israel and Judah. In one sense, these men were examples of what Israel as a nation was to have been and to have done.
Yes, their stories unfold in a time and place far removed from the last days. But we can still find traits and characteristics in these men that can serve as models for us, a people who not only live in the end time but who are called to be witnesses about God to a world that, like the pagans in the Babylonian court, does not know Him. What can we learn from their stories?
