Walking the Way: A daily devotional

  Daniel 9:4 And I prayed to the Lord my God, and made confession, and said, “O Lord, great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and mercy with those who love Him, and with those who keep His commandments   Thought for the day – Our lament Daniel’s prayer today is a lament. It’s cry of shame for what has gone before and a shout for God to intervene and restore Jerusalem. And it reminds me of a song I love called Lament by a South African group called Friends First, which was written during the apartheid years of South Africa. So rather than wax lyrical, here are the lyrics. Make it your prayer today.   O Lord our God who keeps his covenant of love, we have sinned and done wrong. We have turned away from your righteousness, our ears have been closed to your command. The land is divided and the people are apart,  The nation is covered in shame. We have resisted your power and your grace, We have not acknowledged your name. Our leaders and...

  Daniel 8:14 And he said to me, “For two thousand three hundred days; then the sanctuary shall be cleansed. Thought for the day – Time and all that One of the joys of doing Walking the Way is the research I do. I have encountered some truly weird and wonderful stuff in the 9 years WTW has been produced. Today was one of those days. The verse that came to the fore as I was thinking about the chapter was the time that it would take to cleanse the Temple after it’s desecration. The modern Gregorian calendar would put that at just under 6 years, while the Hebrew calendar would make it 8 years 9 months. I was slightly disappointed that it wasn’t a more ‘biblical’ number, like 7 or time, times and a half a time. And then I got wondering why we think time is so important in Scripture. So, I went and did some research. Oh my… I found a website called ‘The World Now’ . It basically a website that tracks events in the light of end times prophecy. Okay I can get with that. But some of the ot...

  Daniel 7:9 I watched till thrones were put in place, And the Ancient of Days was seated; His garment was white as snow, And the hair of His head was like pure wool. His throne was a fiery flame, Its wheels a burning fire;   Thought for the day – Ancient of days In our chapter today, Daniel has this amazing vision of four beasts, they are the kingdoms of the world that are to follow. It's an image that we see again in the book of Revelation, and a reminder to us that when John wrote the book of Revelation, he was relying on texts from the Old Testament. But our focus today, and the verse that caught my mind, is verse 9. That sense that we are back in the throne room of God, where thrones are set in place, and the Ancient One or the Ancient of Days, as our verse says today, has taken his place and is ready to bring judgment on the world. That description of God is awe-inspiring. His clothing was white as snow. The hair on his head was like pure wool. These are amazing images o...

  Daniel 6:14 And the king, when he heard these words, was greatly displeased with himself, and set his heart on Daniel to deliver him; and he laboured till the going down of the sun to deliver him.  Thought for the day – Powerless to act Have you ever signed something and immediately regretted it? I have. Last year I sent a letter to someone that landed me in a whole lot of trouble. How about you? Maybe it was a contract, a hasty email, or a promise made in a moment of pride. Darius knew that feeling better than most of us ever will. And it must have been a very strange feeling for him. A trap had been set for Daniel and in verse 13 that trap has snapped shut. Flattered into signing a decree that made him sound divine, Darius now watches his own words close in around the one man in his kingdom he actually trusted. And here's the detail that makes this so challenging: under Persian law, not even the king could reverse his own edict. The "law of the Medes and Persians" w...

  Daniel 5:25 And this is the writing that was inscribed: Mene, Mene, Tekel, and Parsin.   Thought for the day – Mene, Mene, Tekel and Parsin Nebuchadnezzar has died. According to historical records he was replaced by Nabonidus. Nabonidus had possibly married Nebuchadnezzar’s daughter. His eldest son was Belshazzar, the king in our chapter today. Nabonidus went into exile and entrusted Belshazzar with the throne and it was during this time that the Babylonian Empire fell to Media as we read in our chapter today.   Belshazzar's story stands as a striking reminder that God remains sovereign over every nation and every human life. His fall shows us, in vivid terms, what happens when pride sets itself against God: judgment inevitably follows. But there's more here than a warning. The story also testifies to God's faithfulness to His own word; We shouldn’t be surprised that Babylon has fallen. Isaiah and Jeremiah had spoken of it generations ear...

Daniel 4:1   Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honour the King of heaven, for all his works are right and his ways are just; and those who walk in pride he is able to humble.   Thought for the day – Examining yourself Today's story is possibly one of my favourite stories in the Old Testament, it's the story of Nebuchadnezzar and how he was driven mad as a result of his arrogance, then restored to his place, and in the process wrote this amazing letter explaining what happened to him and giving praise to God. It's a story how the most powerful man in the world came to understand that actually he wasn't the most powerful being in the world, that he was under the authority of Yahweh, the King of heaven. And one of the things that strikes me about this story is that Nebuchadnezzar was warned, he'd had a dream that he would be cast out, the dream was a tree being cut down, a magnificent tree being cut down to size, we are not kings, I think that's blatantly...