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Realizing the presence, promise, and power of the Kingdom of God.
The DEEP

Grace

is gloriously different from leniency.

Daniel 9:1–6

In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, of the lineage of the Medes, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans—in the first year of his reign I, Daniel, understood by the books the number of the years specified by the word of the LORD through Jeremiah the prophet, that He would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.

Then I set my face toward the Lord God to make request by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes. 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, we have sinned and committed iniquity, we have done wickedly and rebelled, even by departing from Your precepts and Your judgments. Neither have we heeded Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings and our princes, to our fathers and all the people of the land."

When Darius takes over, Daniel gets excited. Israel’s captors are gone and the 70 years of captivity prophesied by Jeremiah are almost up. Daniel responds with a model prayer. If you want to learn how to pray in conformity with God’s will, study this prayer. But why pray for God to keep His promises?

There is plenty of precedent for praying about the fulfillment of existing prophesy. After Nathan rebuked David for his sin with Bathsheba, David prayed for God’s sentence against the child to be revoked.

However, because by this deed you have given great occasion to the enemies of the LORD to blaspheme, the child also who is born to you shall surely die.” Then Nathan departed to his house.

And the LORD struck the child that Uriah’s wife bore to David, and it became ill. David therefore pleaded with God for the child, and David fasted and went in and lay all night on the ground. — 2 Samuel 12:14–16

Prophesies can change. As Isho’dad of Merv notes in his commentary on this passage, “At the same time he thought that the Jews might stay a longer time in captivity because of their sins, according to the fact that God had added thirty years to the Jews in Egypt and had reduced [the time for repentance conceded] to the generation of Noah of twenty years and of fifty in the case of the house of Ephrem.

So, praying about the fulfillment of prophesy is normal and in conformity with His will. Thus, the question becomes, how should we pray for God to keep His promises?

And this passage reduces the answer down to one word—honestly.


Daniel is being brutally honest about the sins of his people. If he were a lawyer trying to convince God to relent, he’d be the worst lawyer ever. He’s making a great case against leniency.

But God doesn’t grant leniency; He grants grace. The difference is glorious beyond measure.

Don’t pray to God like He’s a human judge. He wants repentance, not spin.


These Monday—Friday DEEPs are written by Mike Slay. To subscribe to all the DEEPs click here:

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All the weekly study guides, which include all the Monday–Friday devotionals plus related questions for discussion or meditation, are available for download here:

https://www.ailbe.org/resources/itemlist/category/91-deep-studies

Except as indicated, Scripture taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved. ESV stands for the English Standard Version. © Copyright 2001 by Crossway. Used by permission. All rights reserved. NIV stands for The Holy Bible, New International Version®. © Copyright 1973 by International Bible Society. Used by permission. All rights reserved. KJV stands for the King James Version.

Mike Slay

As a mathematician, inventor, and ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church in America, Mike Slay brings an analytical, conversational, and even whimsical approach to the daily study of God's Word.

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