Welcome to I Dare You a series through the book of Daniel with Skip Heitzig.

Father, we celebrate your good hand upon us. As we are here on the first day of the week, a day that we have typically ascribed as the Lord's day to give you honor and praise, to give you our due. We realize, Lord, that your gifts to us have been abundant, some of them subtle, and some of them overt. One of the gifts we're so grateful for is the gift of fellowship and friendship, people and associates that we know in this church in this body that encourage us; that in and of itself is a great gift. I personally am thankful for your people who have inspired me to keep going and to move on and to trust you.

Father, with every new study that we have received, every week a challenge, a dare, we believe comes the strength, as Paul tells us, "I can do all things through Christ who gives me the strength." Father, give us grace as we look upon Daniel one final time together, and consider not just what he has predicted, but who he was himself, the man; in Jesus' name, amen.

Losing your balance can motivate a person to change. True story about a twenty-five-year-old German woman named Inge Brunner from Tuebingen, Germany, was visiting her friend in the hospital. This twenty-five-year-old German lady went up to her friend's room and she had the audacity to ask a doctor, "Hey, is it okay if I smoke in here?" What do you think the doctor told her? He said, "Absolutely not! This is a hospital; besides that, it's highly unhealthy for you to smoke. You are forbidden to smoke."

Doctor left the room. She lit up a cigarette, opened the patient's window, and got really, really close, leaned really, really far into the window outside to get the smoke outside. She leaned a little too far. She lost her balance. She fell out of the window sixty-five feet to the ground. Now, her fall was broken by a tree, and wait to you listen to the kind of tree that broke her fall---it was an ash tree. [laughter]

Come on, how perfect is that? She's smoking a cigarette; she falls into an ash tree. It breaks her fall. She hits the ground. She's treated for minor injuries. But she said after that, "I learned my lesson. I quit smoking," all because she lost her balance. That's why I say losing your balance can be a great motivation for change.

I want to speak to you a little bit about balance today. Whenever you hear the word---it's a common word---we often feel guilty about it. Because here we are in this world we live in trying to balance so much in our lives. We're trying to balance our time: the time we spend working, the time we spend exercising, the time we spend sleeping. We try to balance our responsibilities in our marriage, our career, relationships with kids, volunteering at church activities.

We try to balance our diets, make sure we have enough fruits and vegetables as well as protein, ice cream, you know, all the basic necessities. Gotta keep in balance. Then we have to go home and balance our checkbook. We go out to the garage and take the car in because we gotta balance the tires. And at the end of our balancing act we feel exhausted and we feel guilty that we're not quite balanced enough.

It's rare to find a man or a woman that believes his or her life is in perfect balance. I've had seasons of imbalance where I've worked too much and rested too little, or rested too much and worked too little. I want suggest to you, by looking at the book of Daniel, four areas in which the man Daniel lived a balanced life. And we're going to look at just a few passages, but mostly an overview today looking backward on Daniel, having considered it now for twenty-four weeks.

Number one, here's where Daniel lived a balanced life: He worshiped God supremely, but he was involved socially. That's quite a balancing act. He worshiped God supremely and at the same time he was involved socially. Now, I want you to look once again at chapter 1, verse 8. It's the key verse to the book. It's where it says, "Daniel purposed in his heart not to defile himself with a portion of the king's delicacies, nor the wine which he gave." That is the key to Daniel's life. That's the key to Daniel's effectiveness.

In fact, that might even be a definition of true worship, where you have this teenaged kid displaced in Babylon and at an early age he makes a value statement, a purpose statement. He says, "I'm all in for God. He's number one in my life, and I'm not going to let anything mess with that. I purposed in my heart that I'm not going to defile myself."

Not only that, but he lived that commitment throughout his life, so that by the time we get to chapter 6, and the guy's, like, in his eighties, and he's persecuted because of that worship of God, and he's told not to worship God---remember when he does? Opens his windows so everybody can see him, three times a day, facing Jerusalem, gets on his knees, prays to God. Daniel was an amazing man, not intimidated by powerful people, not afraid of difficult circumstances.

The Babylonians could change his address, change his name, change his education; but they could not change his heart, they could not change his belief system, they could not change his theology---he purposed in his heart. At the same time, though he worshiped God supremely, here was a man who was involved on a horizontal level, on a level with people socially, and so that his commitment with God spilled out to make an impact on people around him.

For example, in chapter 1 it says that "in matters of wisdom and understanding" Daniel and his buddies were "ten times better" than any of the rest who were in the court. In chapter 2, "The king promoted Daniel . . . and made him ruler over the province of Babylon." So now he has a key political position in his culture. Chapter 6, "Daniel prospered in the reign of King Darius and King Cyrus." This guy is involved. Now, I'm using that because I'm impressed by that in Daniel---a man who worshiped God supremely, yet was involved in his culture.

And I believe that we could use a few more dedicated believers in places of social responsibility, political responsibility, while maintaining spiritual integrity. Daniel struck a balance between worship and work, or what we might want to say is upreach and outreach, like Jesus Christ himself who came to this earth principally for salvation. He came, he said, "to seek and to save those who are lost." Nobody will dispute that. He didn't come to just be a nice guy and give a good example; he came to save people from their sin.

But, at the same time, Peter one of his apostles in Acts, chapter 10, noted when he said, "He was anointed by the Holy Spirit and he went about doing good and healing those who were oppressed of the devil." Yeah, he was saving souls, but he was helping people around him, and thus, attracting them to the salvation of their souls. I think that there have been other notable people throughout church history that have done exactly like Daniel.

One that comes to mind is John Wesley. Now, if you know church history, you know John Wesley. Immediately what comes to mind is, "Yeah, he was an evangelist. He was an itinerant evangelist." He rode on horseback, get this, 250,000 miles on a horse in his lifetime as a street preacher, as an evangelist. But did you know that John Wesley also took up certain social causes during his time? The abolition of slavery was one of them, human trafficking, also the mistreatment of animals, public drunkenness; but most notably, the elimination of the African slave trade.

And he interfaced with another man who was a political man named William Wilberforce, also a committed believer. And three days before Wesley died in 1791, he wrote a letter to William Wilberforce who was then in the Parliament. And he said, "I believe God has raised you up for this glorious enterprise," to end the slave trade, and urged him not to become weary in well-doing. Worshiped God supremely, also involved socially.

I believe that we evangelicals have a tendency, and the tendency is to be escapists, to sort of use the church to hide from the world. Oh, we have our occasional raids into enemy territory where the drawbridge goes down, we cross over the moat, we have our Christian event, and then quickly run back into the castle and foom! Drawbridge goes right back up. This may not be a tendency for most of us here, because we live and work in a secular world, but I will tell you one thing: this is a danger for those who work on a church staff, who are around church people, and talking about all the events that go on in the castle all week long. This can become a danger to us.

Mission is the human responsibly to the divine commission. And Daniel, I believe, was both salt and light. He was salt, and salt in those days was used as a preservative to stop the decay that would happen. It was rubbed into meat. And I believe that believers, like Daniel, can be in their society and stop, retard the corruption that has a tendency to go on. At the same time Daniel was also light, shining the light of the glory of God in Babylon and the court where he was with Nebuchadnezzar, and leading people out of spiritual darkness, letting them see the true God.

One thing we must never become like is that country preacher, when a homeless lady came to him for help and he sort of patted her on the head, and said, "Well, I'll say a little prayer for you," and sent her away. And she wrote this letter from her shelter where she was staying: "I was hungry and you formed a humanities group to discuss my hunger. I was imprisoned and you crept off quietly to your chapel and prayed for my release. I was naked and in your mind you debated the morality of my appearance."

"I was sick and you knelt and thanked God for your health. I was homeless and you preached to me of the spiritual shelter of the love of God. I was lonely and you left me alone to pray for me. You seem so holy, so close to God, but I am still very hungry and lonely and cold." Daniel struck a balance---worshiping God supremely, but involved socially.

Second area of balance: Daniel stood alone, but he walked with others. Now, let me flesh that out for you, because this, to me, is impressive. I am continually impressed as I go through the book of Daniel that this guy was never afraid to stand alone if he felt like God wanted him to, to act alone, to stand up for his convictions.

For example, in chapter 1 Daniel acted alone in protesting the king's diet that he was trying to impose upon everybody. He said, "I don't want to do that. We don't want to do that," and he was the spokesmen. "We don't want to eat that. We don't want to drink that. We'll go on this special fast." That was Daniel. He did it single-handedly. In chapter 2 it was Daniel alone who approached Arioch the captain of the guard, and eventually the king, and said, "I'll give you my guarantee; I will interpret that dream for you."

In chapter 5 Daniel alone stood against Belshazzar. In chapter 6 he also stood alone against the ban not to pray, and he alone faced the lions' den. So here's a guy who over and over and over and over again made a stand, sometimes all alone, but---but he was never an island. He was never an isolationist. He shared companionship and fellowship with his brothers while he had them, other Jews in the kingdom.

Example: chapter 1, Daniel is noted as one among four other Jewish young men: Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, Azariah. They're all four named as a group. In chapter 2 when the edict came to kill all the wise men of Babylon, including Daniel, we are told, "Daniel went to his house, made the decision known to Hananiah, Mishael, Azariah, his companions," the word means those he was in constant fellowship with, "that they might seek mercies from the God of heaven." So as soon as he finds out the problem, he goes, "Boys, we need to pray, and we need to pray together."

He was able to stand alone because he walked with others. You and I will be able to stand alone for God in the workplace only when we walk with others in fellowship. That's where we get the strength, the platform to do that, which is why we need fellowship. Koinónia is the Greek, New Testament word. Most of us have heard that term before. Most everyone here has heard the word koinónia. In fact, you've been a Christian, like, a month, you go, "I know that. I know Greek." Koinónia: fellowship, partnership, communion. It actually means to share something with someone else.

But let me tell you, if I may, what fellowship is not. Fellowship is not just hanging out in Jesus' name. We have an interesting habit, we church people, we are able to sanctify just about any activity we do, or hobby. All we have to do is add "fellowship" on the end of it. We have our weight lifters' fellowship. We have left-handed basket weaving fellowship. Just add fellowship to it and it's cool. But it means much more than just a social activity---we're getting together, we're with each other, and we're hanging out, so we're "fellowshipping."

Fellowship always has a spiritual component. Fellowship means that I'm adding something your life, you're adding something to my life, that we're mutually encouraging one another in spiritual matters, stimulating spiritual growth. One author wrote this: "Our churches are filled with people who outwardly look contented and at peace, but inwardly they are crying out for someone to love them just as they are." They're crying out for fellowship. If they had true, authentic fellowship, they wouldn't be crying out.

There's an old Jewish proverb that says, "A friendless man is like a left hand bereft of the right hand." I would add to that and say "an isolated Christian." First of all, it's an oxymoron. You can't have an isolated Christian; a Christian is part of the body of Christ. But an isolated Christian is like the right hand bereft of the left hand. In Proverbs 18 we are told, "A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire. He rages against all wise judgment." We have a need to interact. We have a need for a family.

Years ago I was impressed by a little known fact; at least I didn't know it till that time, a little book that described Adolf Hitler and kind of what made him tick. I guess his closest associate was a guy named Albert Speer. And Albert Speer, "Though," he said, "I'm his closest associate, I was never his friend, because Adolf Hitler," he said, "had no friends at all."

He said, "One of the things I noticed about Hitler is that he repelled, he always repelled friendship." He wouldn't let anybody get too close to him. He always had his guard up. "And I can say with authority," said Speer, "that Adolf Hitler died without any friends." Daniel was able to stand alone, but walk with others, be connected with others. His life was in balance.

There's a third area of his life that brought balance, and that is: He saw into the future, but he lived in the present. One of the big features of the book of Daniel we notice from chapter 6, actually, 7, all the way to chapter 12, the second half of the book, is it's mostly all future; it's all prophetic. From Daniel's standpoint it's all yet to come.

Daniel is sort of like the equivalent in the Old Testament of the apostle John in the New Testament. Both were given apocalyptic visions. Both were able see the coming kingdom, the coming Messiah, the tribulation, the Antichrist, etcetera. Daniel, from his vantage point, saw what was going on around him and what would come after him in terms of the Babylonian Kingdom, Medo-Persian Empire, the Grecian Empire, the Roman Empire.

What's really fascinating to me is that he wasn't the first one to see it, but King Nebuchadnezzar was; Daniel merely interpreted what the king saw. And if you remember back to chapter 2, King Nebuchadnezzar saw in a dream a large image, a polymetallic image: gold, silver, bronze, iron, iron and clay. A few chapters later, Daniel gets the same information, same revelation about four successive kingdoms, but he doesn't see a statue. Do you remember what he saw? He saw four beasts, four rapacious beasts destroying each other, eating one another.

And I submit to you that what Nebuchadnezzar saw is history from the human viewpoint; what Daniel saw is history from God's viewpoint. Human viewpoint is always impressive, shiny, awesome: "Look at the gold, silver, woo!" That's how we write our history. God sees the same thing, but he gives you the heart of it. They're a bunch of animals trying to destroy each other.

Remember the Scripture when Samuel was looking for the next king of Israel after Saul? And he went to the house of Jesse and he looked at Eliab the oldest guy. He was so handsome and so---well, he looked like a king. And God said, "I have rejected him. For man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart." Nebuchadnezzar saw the outward appearance; God was showing Daniel the heart of the matter into the future.

And so here is Daniel able to see from his shoreline, his vantage point, all of history, all the way to the coming of the Messiah and the setting up of that kingdom. But though he saw into the future, he lived responsibly in his present world. That's a balancing act.

Now, let me share with you something that I believe is very important. I have taught the book of Revelation. I've taught you the book of Daniel most recently. Some believe that it's unhealthy to teach prophecy. "It's a bad thing," they would say. They say, "If you teach prophecy it's distracting, it's unprofitable, you're getting people's minds off of what is real and important now."

There was a pastor that actually boasted, saying, "I never teach my people prophecy. I believe it's too distracting." A friend of his heard that and said, "Well, then you gotta admit, God has put a lot of distractions in the Bible." Right? Because, like, a fourth of the Bible is prophetic. So, it's like God wrote it for you to be distracted a little bit about what's coming in the future. And here's why: It's not distracting; it's motivating.

When you study prophecy, it will do something for you. Number one, it'll make you confident in God. Because you realize as you read what God writes is coming in the future, God takes nothing---or nothing takes God by surprise. He sees it all. He knows the future.

He knew all about Alexander the Great, all about Seleucus, all about Antiochus Epiphanes, because he wrote in detail about it and gave it to Daniel; which must mean he knows all about you. And Jesus said, "The very hairs of your head are numbered," which is a daily task for God, I would imagine. Because for some people it's growing on more, and some are losing it.

A second thing studying prophecy will do, it'll clean up your life. There's always a close relationship between prophecy and godliness. Do you know that? When Peter predicts the end of the world and the coming of the end of the age in Second Peter, this is what he said, "Since all of these things around you will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness?" When you see what is coming and that this world is going to be burnt up, it changes the way you live. It makes you less a materialistic person and more a spiritual person. It'll clean up your life.

Number three, it'll comfort you in your sorrow. All of us have had loved ones, relatives, friends who have died. They're no longer with us. We study prophecy and we're told about not only the coming tribulation, but the coming King, the coming kingdom, coming rewards, and a coming reunion with those who have died in Christ before us. That gives us comfort.

Number four, it'll call you to service. It'll motivate you to serve the Lord. Because you read as the Bible speaks about the future that in future you're going to stand before the judgment seat of Christ. And he's going to say to you who are faithful, "Well done, good and faithful servant; you've been faithful in a little, I'll bless you with much. Enter into the joy of your Lord." And you go, "Hot diggity dog!" I want to serve the Lord with that motivation in mind. There's nothing wrong with that.

In other words, studying the future gives you a solid foundation in an unstable world. That's why Daniel was so balanced. He was able to see into the future, but with that information, use it to live responsibly in the present.

There's a fourth area of balance I want to consider as we close our time together in Daniel: Daniel aged gracefully, but he influenced mightily. And do you remember---I'm going to have to jog your memory a little bit, like a long time---when he first opened up the book of Daniel, how old Daniel was when he first came to Babylon? He was about fifteen or sixteen years of age. He was a young teenager.

So, he essentially grew up in Babylon, grew old in Babylon, died in Babylon, was buried in Babylon. And as he aged, he aged so gracefully. His commitment that he started with was maintained faithfully throughout his whole life. But as he aged he influenced. Every person who came in contact with Daniel was influenced by his integrity and his stand for God and his work ethic; whether it was Arioch, the chief of the eunuchs in chapter 1; or Nebuchadnezzar in chapter 2 and chapter 4; or Belshazzar the next king in chapter 5.

His mom came to him in chapter 5, if you remember, during that party, and said, "There's a man in your kingdom in whom is the Spirit of the holy God," and she was referring to Daniel. Daniel influenced. I also believe that he influenced Cyrus the next king, the Medo-Persian king to let the Jews go back home after the seventy-year captivity. He knew what the prophecy said. He read it. But I believe he used his governmental influence to persuade Cyrus, "Sign that edict. Let the Jews go back home and rebuild."

Now, let me throw something else at you. I want to sort of leave it with you. I alluded to it during our study in Daniel. But I suggest that Daniel's influence reached far into the future beyond even his lifetime, all the way into the New Testament, all the way to an incident that happens in Matthew, chapter 2. Do you remember what happened in Matthew, chapter 2?

It says a group of wise men from the East came to Bethlehem, but first Jerusalem. And they said, "Where is he who has been born King of the Jews? For we have seen his star and we have come to worship him." These are the magi. What on earth are they doing in Bethlehem? They come from the Medo-Persian coalition. They go all the way back to Babylon. The magi were the magicians in the court of Nebuchadnezzar. Magi, magicians---from the same root. These were the wise men of Babylon. Daniel was placed in chapter 2 above all of the magi in Babylon.

So, what are they doing so many years later following a star, ending up in Bethlehem? It's my belief that since Daniel saw so far into the future, he saw the coming Jewish Ruler, the Messiah, wrote about him, and he left all of that deposited work there in Babylon along with the Scripture scrolls that he had brought with him from Jerusalem. We know he brought the book of Jeremiah, for instance.

That through what he saw he also influenced those around him, so that years later they had been following the prophecies and looking for a certain astronomical wonder that would lead them to see a Jewish Messiah who would one day rule the world. That's essentially what they asked Herod the Great for. Now that, folks, is influence and that's balance. Daniel's life was in superb balance.

I want to tie in something else because it involves us. I believe that as a church, as individual Christians, but as a Christian community, we like Daniel, should live in balance. We should know who we are and what we're about, and our lives should be lived in balance. So, when I was going through Daniel and looking at all these areas of balance, something struck out to me, and that was our own vision statement as a church. I just want to refresh your minds with it.

We also, like Daniel, in chapter 1, verse 8; we have a purpose statement as a group of believers called Calvary. And I would love it if everybody who attends this fellowship would be able to just when somebody asks them, "Well, what's Calvary about?" You'd be able to say, "I'll tell you exactly what it's about: 'We pursue the God who is passionately pursuing a lost world.' "That's our statement. We pursue the God who is passionately pursuing the lost world, and we do it through three ways: upreach, inreach, and outreach.

It's been on our literature for years. We've told you about it before. Maybe it'll lock in today, because I believe that these same areas were the areas of balance in Daniel's life. Upreach---we express our adoration to God---that's worship. We express our adoration to God through dynamic worship and uncompromised obedience. When we gather, we love to worship. We think our worship should be reverential, but we also think it should be happy, joyful.

You know, one of the things I've always noticed about bars is they have this crazy thing and they call it "happy hour." Have you ever been outside of a bar after happy hour? How many people look happy? [laughter] Not too many, and if they do, they're really loopy. But then I was thinking---how many people genuinely look happy after they leave church? [laughter] Why can't this be happy hour? Why can't we get happy about our God and express in songs of reverential but dynamic worship that we love God? Upreach.

Second is inreach. Inreach---we explain the relevance of Scriptures to our daily lives, and we seek to build people up and fit them for service in God's kingdom---that's inreach. That's why whenever we gather together; it's the study of the Bible, the study of the Scriptures. We make that paramount.

Every now and then somebody might say, "Well, can't you guys, like, break from the pattern of Bible study? Couldn't you have, like, a raffle one day, [laughter] or a puppet show, or I don't know, interpretive dance?" Short answer---no, we can't. We believe the word of God does the work of God in the lives of the people of God. Inreach also means we get involved personally. Inreach means that you discover a place of your volunteer activity in some area of church life---that's inreach.

The third is outreach---we extended the love of God to a hurting world through evangelism as well as social concern. And we believe that is like Daniel's life. He was all about upreach---he worshiped God supremely. He was all about inreach---he was tethered to a group of people that he prayed with, his brothers in Babylon. He was all about outreach---influencing people, influencing people who didn't know who God was.

So, "Dare to be a Daniel, dare to stand alone! Dare to make his purpose firm, and dare to make it known!" So, we end like we began, taking a challenge to live a balanced life through the grace provided to us by God himself. Let's pray.

Father, I have been so impressed with this young man who became an old man who died in Babylon, Daniel the prophet. I've been impressed when I've seen how he was so bold, so purposeful, so intentional about his life, that he made a stand as a young man, an early age to follow you, to not defile himself. At the same time, he wasn't cloistered away. He was very busy in a governmental position, superintending the provinces of Babylon, involved socially.

He was able to stand alone in certain cases, but never apart from others, walking with others in fellowship. What a beautiful balance. Able to see into the future, but that meant something to him as he walked day in and day out in his present world. And then to see him age from chapter to chapter, and as he aged so gracefully, he was able to make an impact and an influence so mightily.

He's really a wonderful example, Lord, a man in whom there really is no guile. One of the few people in the Bible that nothing bad is ever mentioned about, and so he provides us a good example. Help us, Lord, as we seek to live out these principles and to be balanced a little more so. I pray you'd rescue us from the guilt that says, well, we're not balanced enough; that in and of itself is an imbalanced position. That, Lord, we would just day by day take your grace as it comes, and seek by your Spirit to implement what we can for your glory, in Jesus' name, amen.

For more teachings from Calvary Albuquerque and Skip Heitzig visit calvaryabq.org.