“We do not present our supplications before You because of our righteous deeds, but because of Your great mercies.” Daniel 9:18.
In this study we have sought to explore many of the issues involved with seeking the Lord Jesus – as Christians especially, but with many truths that can easily be adapted for anyone who has not yet found Christ.
I have deliberately tried to keep this exploration as practical as it is theological, but there are of course some dangers involved, one of which I’ve felt is worth being especially noted as we close. That is: There is no set formula that guarantees our finding Jesus Christ – except for the irresistibly gracious work of the Holy Spirit.
This has not attempted to be a “Do step 1… step 2… and step 3… and then… Ta da! Jesus has appeared!” type formula. God does not work like that at our will and command. Instead, we have just simply explored some of the key commands, instructions and principles that are involved in the seeking of the Lord Jesus as we find them in the Bible.
What we are to do instead is take the promises and revelations of God’s glorious nature and His plan of salvation that we find in His Word, and bring them before the Lord in prayer.
Daniel understood this as he read of God’s goodness as it is revealed in the writings of Jeremiah. He found that the time of exile and captivity for God’s people was almost up – and this led him into the most incredible of prayers (as found in Daniel 9).
First, Daniel poured out praises to God for what he saw written in front of him, before then suddenly falling into confession of his and his fellow people’s sin – then Daniel returned to adoration over God’s goodness before falling again into a further heart-broken confession of sin – then Daniel gushed praises to God for His mercy, before falling once more into bitter repentance over how the people had been so unfaithful to God in return.
There was a real wrestling going on in Daniel’s prayer – that we can see visibly as we read – between Daniel’s desiring to hold on to God’s glorious and merciful nature and his falling into feeling the bitterness and wretchedness of his own sin.
We are reminded in this of the words found in the wonderful hymn, ‘Beneath The Cross Of Jesus, I Fain Would Take My Stand’, where it says:
“And from my smitten heart, with tears,
Two wonders I confess,
The wonders of His glorious love,
And my own worthlessness.”
Its amazing how we can see this very battle – between being lost in the wonder of God’s glorious love and being lost in the wonder of his own worthlessness – play out so vividly within Daniel’s prayer.
What we can learn from this wonderful prayer of Daniel is that it is right to take hold of the promises of God found in Scripture and bring them before Him in prayer – but we must do so with a spirit that says, “I do not deserve to receive this promise, but because of Your great mercies I pray…”
What this means in effect, is that we take a promise of God, such as the promise found in Jeremiah 29:13 that says, “You will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with all your heart”, but we take it with a spirit that says:
“You have made this promise in Your Word, O Lord. I do not deserve to receive such a blessing as this. I have not and do not seek after you as I ought, or even as I could – yet I bring this promise before You and pray that You would let me find You because of Your great mercies... I look to Jesus and see that You are a merciful God, merciful beyond our comprehension, and so I make this plea upon His Name and nothing else.”
It is quite a curious thing, to expect and yet not presume; to say, “Lord, You have promised! I do not deserve to, I know only too well, but by Your great mercies, O Lord, I claim this promise for myself – by Your grace, by Your mercy in Jesus Christ, I pray.”
To feel the battle between God’s great and glorious mercy and our own sinfulness and worthlessness is the beginning of what it means to truly pray.
My prayer is that this study may have been some help to someone. It is my sincere belief that our greatest need in this life is intimacy with Jesus; a life lived closely by Jesus’ side, in His presence, together with Him – all of which simply serves as a preparation for that even greater day that is promised to us in Jesus:
“O Christ, He is the fountain,
The deep, sweet well of love;
The streams on earth I’ve tasted,
More deep I’ll drink above;
There, to an ocean fullness,
His mercy doth expand,
And glory, glory dwelleth,
In Immanuel’s land.”
“O Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.”
“And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall serve Him. They shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads. There shall be no night there: They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord their God gives them light. And they shall reign forever and ever.” Revelation 22:1-5.