Intro to Daniel: Don't Compromise
September 7, 2025Pastor Patrick presented today's message, "Intro to Daniel: Don't Compromise." A video of today's message is here on YouTube. The discussion that follows assumes you are familiar with the message content.
This message was the first of a series on the Book of Daniel. I don't know much about Daniel at this point, so I thought I'd simply pull together some references I've made to Daniel before and maybe some basic reference materials that might be helpful.
Let's start with previous snippets...
Back in August, Pastor Travis gave a message entitled "Community Isn't Enough." In response, I offered these examples of closeness from the Book of Daniel:
- Friends who will walk through fire with you (Daniel 3:16-18)
- Being on the same diet together (Daniel 1)
- Standing in defiance of an ungodly governmental decree (Daniel 3)
- Standing together in court together as one (Daniel 3:16)
- Being thrown in the furnace together (Daniel 3:24-26)
There are seven Hebrew words that mean gold. One of them occurs in Daniel (and Ezra): dehab (דְּהַב).
In a 2023 message, Pastor Travis made the distinction between easy and good. And his references included the Shadrach, Meeshach, and Abendigo story in Daniel 3:16-18. Those three certainly did not choose the easy way (of bowing to the king) but rather the good and right way of accepting the king's punishment/wrath for believing and having faith in God.
Another course I developed back when was "Out of the Ashes" (stories of resurrections). Part of it included metaphorical resurrections from the Old Testament. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob all had barren wives. Miraculously, they all conceived. This resurrected the line of the patriarchs. Speaking of Isaac, he was figuratively resurrected when God stopped the sacrifice. Noah and his family represent a resurrection of mankind. Joseph is resurrected from the pit and, to the point here, Daniel is "resurrected" from the lion's den (Daniel 6). The list actually goes on...
We've spoken often of the metaphor of light, as in "Light of the World." One of those references was to Daniel 12:3, "And those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above; and those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever."
It was only in the latter books of the Old Testament, like Daniel (9:25-26), does the word messiah take on the meaning of savior. For more on OT messianic expectations, click here for a Vatican News article.
We learned back in our series on the Book of James that God is often named relating to Old Testament ideas. One of those is in James 1:17, God is referred to as "the Father of light" (in Greek: tou patros ton photon). This reflects many references from the Old Testament, from Genesis on including Exodus, the Psalms, Daniel, and Isaiah.
I'll close by referencing this article for those interested: An Introduction to Daniel – Detailed outline and introduction to the book of Daniel. It includes some discussion about the who, what, when, and where of its writing as well as an outline of the contents.
Off we go!
Bonus
Notes from Nana
When Nana noticed that the grandkids had devices on them all the time, it dawned on her that she had a way of communicating with them all the time. Leave it to a teacher to figure out a way...
So, she created herself a text group containing all the kids' phone numbers, which she labeled "Notes from Nana," and started sending motivational/wisdom snippets now and then. Here are a few current examples:
Go Nana!
Bonus2
50th Anniversary
We celebrated Nana and Papa's 50th Wedding Anniversary at our Family Dinner this past weekend.
Above: "Seats for TWO?!" as we walked to the car which was to take us to the reception. The car was Jeff's "Bee-ou-Hickey," a rather beat up old Buick to which we were invited to nail the balloons.
At this Family Dinner, we focused on rituals, particularly rituals that remind us of things we should be grateful for. It was fun to see the kids come up with so many rituals, holidays, etc. from the Bible. And of course, family celebrations for things like anniversaries and birthdays are also important rituals. One of the kids asked if anniversaries and birthdays were prescribed in the Bible. While neither celebration is dealt with in detail, it's clear the Bible calls for remembering people and honoring them assuming it's appropriate. "Honor your mother and father" comes to mind. Birthdays are only mentioned a couple times (once the Pharoah's birthday, Genesis 40:20; and Herod's birthday, Matthew 14:10-12). These would cast something of a negative view on birthdays, but clearly peoples' ages were known and therefore their birthdays must have been noted. As long as the focus of the celebration is appropriate ("gratefulness for having you in the family" versus "I want this for my birthday"), I think God would approve.
To close, we watched a 5-minute PragerU video called "Clay Pots" which talked about the importance of keeping history accurately written and how to make sure your personal history is written as well. See Clay Pots (posted last May). And yes, they each got their two-dollar bill.
Bonus3
The Road to Liberty
PragerU, in conjunction with the White House, has created a series of short videos spotlighting the men and women who risked everything for liberty.
The Road to Liberty
Each video lets each of the 56 signers (and some significant others) of the Declaration of Independence share their stories. There are about 43 weeks left until July 4, 2026, when we celebrate our 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration. Just do about 7 videos per month and you'll arrive at our 250th Birthday with room to spare and a much greater understanding of the folks who started it all.