Hebrews 12:1 (NIV)

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us."

Main Idea: The race isn't won on race day—it's won in training.

Daniel's Story: Racing in Babylon

• Daniel's habit protected his identity as a child of God.
• Three times a day, he got on his knees and remembered whose he was.

Key Texts

Daniel 6:3 (NIV): "Now Daniel so distinguished himself among the administrators and the satraps by his exceptional qualities that the king planned to set him over the whole kingdom."

Daniel 6:4-5 (NIV): "At this, the administrators and the satraps tried to find grounds for charges against Daniel in his conduct of government affairs, but they were unable to do so. They could find no corruption in him, because he was trustworthy and neither corrupt nor negligent. Finally these men said, 'We will never find any basis for charges against this man Daniel unless it has something to do with the law of his God.'"

Daniel 6:10 (NIV): "Now when Daniel learned that the decree had been published, he went home to his upstairs room where the windows opened toward Jerusalem. Three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to his God, just as he had done before."

Three Things About Daniel's Habit

1. It was intentional – windows toward Jerusalem connected him to God's promises (cf. Solomon's temple dedication).
2. It was ancient – Daniel practiced a rhythm from the Psalms.
   Psalm 55:17 (NIV): "Evening, morning and noon I cry out in distress, and he hears my voice."
3. It was consistent – "just as he had done before." Seventy years of the same rhythm.

Big Idea: Private habits produce public character.

Daniel Points to Jesus

Romans 5:8 (NIV): "But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

Your Identity & Your Habit

• Your identity is already settled in Christ. You don't start the habit to become God's child. You start the habit because you already are one.
• Declaration: "I am a child of God."
• Invitation: One habit. One person. This week.

Notes on Daniel 3 & 6 (Joyce G. Baldwin)

• Similarities between Daniel 3 and 6 include:
  • General theme of God's deliverance from certain death.
  • Similar structure, style, and vocabulary.
  • Repetition: the thrice-repeated refrain "the law of the Medes and the Persians, which cannot be revoked" anticipates the irony of 6:26, where the new decree effectively negates the object of the original decree (6:7).
  • Overlap in vocabulary:
    • "Satrap"
    • dāt ("decree" in 3:29; "law" in 6:5)
    • The idiom "make a decree" (3:10, 29; 6:26)
• Differences:
  • Daniel, hitherto prosperous, is now in his old age subjected to trial as his friends had been.
  • "It is not a question of a positive sin which he will not commit, but of a positive duty which he will not omit." (Driver)
  • By merely continuing a lifelong habit of worship, he is contravening the law of the land.
  • His miraculous deliverance, like that of the three friends in chapter 3, is not the experience of all who are loyal to God in persecution (cf. Acts 12:2, 11).
  • Examples of God's deliverance still occur in times of severe trial, especially in churches newly born in a pagan environment.
• Source: Joyce G. Baldwin

Will God Save Daniel from the Lions? (Sidney Greidanus)

The central question in this narrative: Will God save Daniel from the lions?

• Even though Daniel knew that disobedience to the king's law would result in the death penalty, he still chose to obey "the law of his God":
  • "He continued to go to his house . . . to pray to his God and praise him."
• When the king had no choice but to throw Daniel to the lions, he prayed, "May your God, whom you faithfully serve, deliver you!"
• At daybreak, the king rushed to the lions' den and cried, "O Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God whom you faithfully serve been able to deliver you from the lions?"
• Daniel replied, "O king, live forever! My God sent his angel and shut the lions' mouths so that they would not hurt me, because I was found blameless before him; and also before you, O king, I have done no wrong."
• They lifted Daniel out of the den, and no harm was found on him, "because he had trusted in his God."
• The king issued a decree that in all his dominion "people should tremble and fear before the God of Daniel," followed by this confession:
  • "For he is the living God, enduring forever. His kingdom shall never be destroyed, and his dominion has no end. He delivers and rescues, he works signs and wonders in heaven and on earth; for he has saved Daniel from the power of the lions."
• Conclusion: God "prospered" Daniel (divine passive) "during the reign of Darius."
• Source: Sidney Greidanus

Application / Discussion Questions

These questions are designed to help you move from hearing to doing. Take time this week to sit with one or two of them. Be honest. Let the Spirit search your heart.

1. What voices are trying to rename you right now? What do they say you are—and what do you find yourself believing?
2. Be honest: when life gets hard, what do you reach for first—and what does that reveal about where you're looking for comfort or control?
3. Is there a gap between who you are when no one's watching and who you are in public? What would it take for those two versions to become the same person?
4. What's one habit you've been "meaning to start" for a while? What's actually kept you from starting—and what does that resistance reveal?
5. What would change if you truly believed your identity was already settled before you started the habit?

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