Today, I am reading and commenting on  Daniel 9-10.

When Babylon fell, the passage tells us that Daniel understood Jeremiah’s prophecy concerning the devastation of Jerusalem lasting for seventy years was almost up.  This inspired Daniel to pray for the restoration of Jerusalem.  The first part of Daniel’s prayer acknowledged that the people of Israel deserved God’s judgement against them.  He continued by acknowledging that even now the people of Israel did not deserve to be restored.  Finally, Daniel asked God to restore the people of Israel to Jerusalem for His name’s sake and because of His mercy.  We can learn a lot about petitioning God from Daniel’s prayer, especially about things which we understand Scripture to say that God has promised to do.  First, we need to acknowledge our sinfulness.  Then we must acknowledge that we do not deserve God’s mercy.  Only then should we petition God to act on our behalf.  I took the title of today’s blog from Daniel’s prayer.  Our prayers should easily fit into that format: a plea for God to listen as we confess our sins, a plea that he forgive those sins, and finally a plea that He hear our requests and act on them.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.