This sermon, “Trusting God in Difficult Times Part 2“, from the Book of Daniel, is inspired by the experience of the Jews who were exiled in Babylon in 605BC. These Jews demonstrate to you and me that it is possible to operate in your God-given gifting in Babylon. This is what will make you a blessing to others, yourself, and God.
Trusting God in difficult times
God is in control
Remember, we have already established that God is in control of every event in the world and your life. In fact, in chapter 2 of the book of Daniel, God’s control is recorded to span:
- times and seasons,
- earthly kingship,
- the wisdom of the wise and knowledge of those with understanding, and
- knowledge of the deep and hidden things.
That’s why God made Nebuchadnezzar have a dream that made his spirit to be troubled until sleep left him. This happened because he didn’t understand his dream.
Nebuchadnezzar, therefore, commanded those who were in his service, the best of the best, to give him the interpretation of the dream. For historical accounts reveal that the Babylonian astronomers had measured a year to 365 days, 6 hours, 15 minutes, 41 seconds. And surprisingly, this measurement is only 26 minutes and 55 seconds too long!
Despite being that accurate, they couldn’t tell and consequently interpret his dream. Thus, they admitted this to him.
Their failure made him angry. He, therefore, ordered that they all be destroyed (killed).
But as they were being sought to be killed, Daniel acted prudently and discreetly towards the captain of the king’s guard. After the captain had briefed him on the king’s urgent order, he went before the king and requested more time so that he could pray about the matter (Philippians 4:6-7).
A man’s gift makes room for him
and brings him before the great.
– Proverbs 18:16 (ESV)
Remember, Daniel could interpret dreams (1:17). He had the gift of interpreting dreams. But in that case, the king had not told anyone his dream. This is what brought about the difficulty.
Trust God in difficult times
Pray about the difficult challenges
Therefore, you can be gifted by God, but it doesn’t mean you will not need Him when operating in your gift. You will still need Him. That’s why prayer should be your first response to difficult times while you are in Babylon. This is how you demonstrate that you are trusting God in a difficult time.
In addition, Nebuchadnezzar’s move, whether with or without wisdom, was a good one. He didn’t tell his dream and that locked out evil/wicked interpretation.
This implies that if you must tell your dream, then tell it to a mature, godly person. Otherwise, you will subject yourself to demonic (counterfeit) interpretation.
Also, in your times of praying for difficult challenges, you may need to enlist your close companions to join you. These are people you consider to be your prayer partners. They should be people that you can share with tricky challenges.
Unfortunately, some people, no matter how they can pray, don’t qualify to be prayer partners. Especially those who are not able to keep certain matters confidential.
Expect to receive God’s mercy
All in all, difficult times demand God’s mercy. This means that your safety or preservation would be purely in God’s hands.
Therefore, expect to receive God’s mercy. For He is faithful. That’s why the Bible recorded that “Daniel received the revelation of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream in a vision of the night”. And this is why you should be trusting God in the difficult times.
Thereafter, he praised God. Meaning that it is only prudent that you praise God. Give Him thanks when He shows mercy to you.
Dreams
Concerning Nebuchadnezzar’s dream, it would not be right for me to overlook the same. This is because God, according to Job 33:14-18, speaks to men through dreams.
This is one of the most common ways that God speaks (Numbers 12:6). In fact, many of the great biblical events began while someone was sleeping. For example: Genesis 15:8-21, 28:10-22, 37:5-11, Matthew 2:7-23, Acts 10:9-17, etc.
Joel in 2:28, prophesied that “God would pour out His Spirit on all flesh and men and women would prophesy, old men would dream dreams, and young men would see visions”. Therefore, you need to note down your dreams for you to be able to make a follow up on them. This is because you need to remember the details. And for you to remember the details, you need to have noted down the dream. This is the surest way to remember the details of the dream so that you don’t miss out on anything. You could consider having something like a dream journal.
Seek to understand what God is saying to/about you/something
Remember, God is good. He makes the understanding of dreams accessible to us through the gift of His Holy Spirit (Acts 2:16-17). Therefore, you need to be a believer (Christian) for you to understand what God is communicating to you.
Nebuchadnezzar was troubled because he didn’t understand the meaning of the dream he had had. And my prayer is that you too will seek to understand what God is saying to you. You will not sleep (rest) till you understand whether God is directing instructing or warning you.
Therefore, dreams are part and parcel of the times that we’re living in. Personally, I’m no stranger to dreams. I have had dreams until when I started to be attacked in dreams. That’s when I asked God to halt them. But I got back to serious dreaming for the fear of missing a lot.
