Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
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This is the program
bringing you news, views,
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discussion, up
to date information,
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analysis, all of
religious liberty.
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My name is Lincoln Steed,
editor of Liberty magazine,
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and my guest on the
program is Dr. Ganoune Diop.
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Welcome, Ganoune.
Thank you, Thank you.
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You're Director of Public
Affairs and Religious Liberty
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for the Seventh
Day Adventist Church?
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Correct.
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And also a, a
close workmate of mine
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because we're just
across the hall from each other
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at our world headquarters.
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I want to talk a little
bit about Seventh-day Adventism
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and religious liberty.
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The two things
are joined at the hip.
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For me when I think of
religious liberty in my church,
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I think of prophecy,
or prophetic awareness.
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That's true, our
religious liberty concern
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has a sociological
historic connection as well.
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But what we read, as a people
from Revelation and Daniel,
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I think gives compulsion
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to the religious
liberty proclamation.
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I know Daniel is
every important here.
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How would you link Daniel
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to what we say on
religious liberty?
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Well, before may be the name
itself, Seventh-day Adventist--
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I was, as I was speaking
I thought of the comment--
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You thought about that--
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That their name is a
sermon in itself, isn't it?
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Yes, well, yes.
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Actually, every name of--
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even of every
denomination is meaningful,
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is connected to something,
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but I think exploring the
name Seventh-day Adventist,
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we have two components here,
the first one, seventh day,
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of course,
referring to the seventh,
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I mean, the seventh
day Sabbath of creation.
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Which the Pope
Francis acknowledged this
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in his encyclical
on the environment.
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He tries to confine it
just to the Jews, remember,
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but it's a very
Biblical concept.
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But, yeah, so the
name Seventh-day Adventist,
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the first part is
connected to creation,
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and when I think about creation,
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and this is one aspect
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that people usually
don't think about but,
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the reason why
Adventists value creation
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is because it affirms
several key principles
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about human being, human nature.
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You know, first of all,
creation in God's image,
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that human beings are not
just the result of a chance,
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that we are willed
by God who loves us--
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Created for a
purpose. Absolutely.
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And I think that
is important to--
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Intentional.
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So, Adventists
value life precisely,
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and the sanctity of
life and of conscience,
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in that sense,
as we were talking
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because our very name
says something about that.
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Okay, so creation,
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and also the names Seventh-Day
referring to creation,
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it's also a
commemoration of other things.
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It is interesting to
mention this right away,
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Adventists take the
seventh day as important
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because it was not just
the commemoration of creation,
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when you read Exodus
20, The Ten Commandments,
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the God says that--
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Deliverance, the
Celebration of deliverance.
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Exactly, that He gave Israel,
in Deuteronomy 5, for example,
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He gave Israel the Sabbath
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because it was
commemoration of liberation.
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So, these two
components of the first aspect
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of the
Seventh-day Adventist name
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I think is very important--
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But it's worth remembering,
that in Genesis when it says
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God sanctified the
day and made it holy.
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That predated any
Jewish or-- Jewish nation.
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Yeah, but in the
context of the teaching
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of the whole Bible though,
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very clearly it is connected
to creation and to liberation.
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So, that is the
first part of the name.
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And the second part
of the name Adventist is,
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is a word of hope
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because Adventists
are actively waiting
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for the coming of Jesus Christ.
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The Second Advent
because He came once before.
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Yes.
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But, this coming is decisive
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because He's coming to
bring justice, harmony,
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peace, and complete freedom,
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and including freedom from death
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which is part of our hope.
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So the name itself actually
is a statement creation,
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redemption, and completion
of the history of Salvation.
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It does pretty much,
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it's been said
by ourselves before.
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It sums up pretty much
everything that we hold.
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It is good news, it is good news
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that, Lincoln, you
are important to God.
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It is good news that God has
set up a plan to liberate you.
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It is good news that God
is going to come to liberate
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not only you but
the whole universe.
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This is why creation,
the nature is awaiting
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for this second coming
of Jesus Christ, to come,
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to bring finally what
the world is looking for.
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Remember earlier, I mentioned,
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I mean, in another program
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I mentioned
what the world wants.
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The UN, you know, they
want peace and security,
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while Jesus is going to
bring peace and security.
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Yeah, and what it
says in Revelation,
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when they say
peace and security,
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sudden destruction,
so if it's on man's own,
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if it's alone,
it's destined to fail.
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Yeah, but God wants not
the destruction of people,
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He wants their salvation.
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Well, it says "He's not
willing that any should perish."
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"Perish, but that all should
have access to salvation."
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You know because,
sometimes some people
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may tend to think about
God as a sadistic person,
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just waiting to
punish everybody,
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whereas He died
himself on the Cross
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in order to tell people that
He would rather have them leave
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you know, this is, I
mean, absolute love also,
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and that is
part of God's nature.
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Now when we come, so
this is about the name,
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you know,
talking about creation,
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liberation, and consummation,
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redemption, complete atonement,
complete reconciliation.
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Bring Daniel in. It's beautiful.
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When you come to Book of Daniel,
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like, actually
any Biblical book,
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we could take here any,
especially the prophetic books.
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They are gospels in
prophecy, meaning, okay,
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the Book of Daniel has about,
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well, has actually
specifically 12 chapters.
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But every, what is
called prophetic chapters,
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is actually
aspect of the good news.
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Now imagine, imagine this,
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we are talking about 605 B.C.
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the prophet Daniel
was exiled Babylon,
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and while he was there,
586, the temple destroyed.
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Israel has lost several things.
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Really was the end of the
true integrated Jewish State
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or beyond then.
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Well, it was a
follow on story really.
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It's the dispersion.
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True, but you had a
first dispersion earlier,
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there are two tragic
dates in the history of Israel,
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722 B.C. and then 586 B.C.
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And in a way there's a third
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when Titus destroyed
Jerusalem irrevocably for--
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Absolutely.
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But, I am talking about
now, the kingship dynasty.
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The Samaria was taken
by the Assyrians in 722.
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That was the end of
the northern kingdom,
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the ten tribes,
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and then you have the
southern kingdom, 586,
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the temple destroyed.
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But here is my point though,
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the Book of Daniel
is a magnificent display
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of the good news, how so?
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Israel has lost several things.
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One, they have
lost their kingdom.
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They have lost their
king actually, you know,
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and if you read the
second book of Chronicles,
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it, you know, Chapter
36, the last verses explains
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that God sent several
prophets time and again,
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but Israel did not listen.
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So they lost their
kingdom, they lost their king,
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they lost their
temple, destroyed
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and if the temple is destroyed
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that means that the
priests cannot function,
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the priest cannot
function, sacrifice has to stop.
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Really
religious life had seized.
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Absolutely. Or an entity.
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So what is the Book
of Daniel simply stated?
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The Book of
Daniel is God's response.
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In fact, that Psalm, isn't it?
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"By the rivers of Babylon,
there we sat down and we wept."
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Correct. But--
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There was a desolation
that had come up on them.
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Yes, absolutely, and this is,
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as I mentioned a
multi faceted desolation.
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However, what
could be interesting
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for our viewers
here is to realize
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that they had local problems,
they had temporal problems.
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One, the temple, I
mentioned the kingdom lost,
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the king exiled,
the temple destroyed,
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sacrifice, no longer,
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the priest cannot
function therefore.
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Okay, the Book of Daniel.
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So imagine Shadrach,
Meshach, Abednego asking God,
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God, restore our kingdom.
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And this is where the prophecies
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of the Book of Daniel
come into the picture.
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God, so to speak,
telling these Hebrew young men,
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I am not interested in a
local, in a temporal kingdom.
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Daniel 2, there's
an everlasting kingdom.
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Yeah, it's true.
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Universal and
everlasting that is coming,
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that is God's answer,
good news of the kingdom.
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By the way in the New Testament,
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Jesus preached
the kingdom of God,
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that kingdom
prophesied in Daniel.
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Second, the next
prophetic chapter,
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beside Chapter 2
then is Chapter 7.
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What is in Daniel 7?
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Daniel 7, you have the son
of man coming, being enthroned,
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and we are told all
people will worship Him.
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So that is the everlasting--
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On a cosmic level, it's
not a nation or regional--
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Absolutely, not
just national problems.
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Now God's responses are
on a cosmic and eternal.
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Okay, then the temple destroyed.
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So what about the temple?
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God said, "I have
a temple in heaven."
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Okay. And then
how about the priest?
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Again, a priest in
heaven this is where?
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And that is
Chapter 8, interestingly.
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Okay, so imagine,
Shadrach, Meshach,
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Abednego again asking God,
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but what about, what
about the sacrifices?
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Daniel 9, come and say that
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He will cause
sacrifices to seize,
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one sacrifice,
once ends for all.
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So we have-
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It's interesting
way of looking at it,
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and in an accurate way, yeah.
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And simple way,
you know. And then--
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And of course, this is all
against the historic background
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of events
through several kingdoms.
00:11:39.53\00:11:41.80
But this is the core Gospel.
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Actually I would even
say a comprehensive gospel,
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in a sense that we
are told that the Messiah,
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this is the 70 weeks' prophecy.
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The Messiah, you know,
at the end of the last week
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will cause the
sacrifice to seize,
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and He will bring
everlasting righteousness again.
00:11:58.25\00:12:01.72
But then, Chapter 10 to 12,
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the Archangel is
sent to tell Daniel
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about is going to
happen to his people.
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It's when Daniel was struck.
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And that's wonderful
because Chapter 12 begins
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with the Michael standing.
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Why standing?
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The priest standing for
God's people to defend them
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the priest
protection, and then finally,
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God told Daniel,
Daniel, you will sleep.
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Notice, there is no
immortality of the soul here.
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You will sleep, there
will be a resurrection.
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The book begins with a,
I mean, tragedy, you know,
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as you were mentioning
earlier, desolation, exile,
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and it ends with
life, and resurrection.
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It's a
wonderful, wonderful book,
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and of course,
Daniel on Revelation
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are essential to an
Adventist understanding.
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We'll be back
after a short break.
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Stay with us.
00:13:00.38\00:13:01.71
Interesting discussion
from the Book of Daniel
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and I think
Revelation too, right?
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