I don’t think we understand how important we are in making the Plan of Salvation work to everyone’s advantage. When we read scriptural prophecies we tend to think that God will miraculously make things happen or that someone else will suddenly appear to fulfil the promises God has made when in fact it is the ordinary people like us who are ‘the doers of the word’ that are instrumental in God’s hands of making marvellous things come to pass.
Daniel of the
Old Testament is a good example of making things happen. Daniel lived in
Babylonian captivity in service to heathen kings for most of his life. He was
very much devoted to the God of Israel and had Israel's welfare at heart. He
eagerly hung onto the Lord's promise that Israel's captivity would last only 70
years (Jeremiah 29:10).
I mentioned in my previous post on Cyrus that historians attribute Daniel with the fulfilment of Isaiah’s prophecy (Isaiah 44:28-45:1-5). Imagine this man who loved God, being so familiar with the scriptures and knowing of a man called Cyrus who would free the Jewish nation, see him walk through Babylon’s gates! How could he not use his position in government to tell him of the prophecy that contained his name?
When Cyrus
sent the first wave of the Jews to Jerusalem and they began rebuilding the
temple, they encountered bitter opposition from the Samaritans who reasoned
that they should be involved in the project. Samaritans were Assyrians who
intermarried with left-over Israelites in Samaria, following the conquest of
the Ten Tribes. Because they were not pure Israelites and had practiced a
variant religion of Jehovah worship heavily intermingled with pagan and other
unauthorized religious practices, the Jews refused.
In
retaliation the Samaritans influenced the Persian kings who succeeded Cyrus to
halt the rebuilding project for 17 years. In steps Daniel again. In the first
year of King Darius, Daniel again petitioned the Lord about Jeremiah's
prophecy. Daniel 9:17-19 shows Daniel's prayerful concern for the unfinished
temple and the city of Jerusalem. The Lord answered Daniel and raised two
prophets in Jerusalem: Haggai and Zechariah.
You might
wonder how prophets could finish construction of anything. You might wonder why
God didn't send someone with political clout, negotiation expertise or even
military power....but instead he sent two of his servants to finish the
job....and finish they did....Haggai alone showed the Jews exactly why they
were not able to finish the project. He taught them that all temporal problems
arise out of spiritual weakness and that if they would put God first, they
would extricate themselves from abject poverty they were in which was their
main problem. It makes for compelling reading.
These two
prophets instructed the governor Zerubbabel, the high priest Jeshua and the
Jewish people how to complete the temple in spite of persecution, poverty and
governmental red tape (Haggai 1:1-5, 12-14; Zechariah 4:9, Ezra 6:14). Even
though these two prophets got the job done, in reality, this began with Daniel,
the doer of the word.
“By small
and simple things are great things brought to pass……[and] by very small means
the Lord doth confound the wise and bringeth about the salvation of many souls.” (Alma 37:6,7)
We might be
the small and simple things but He is the mighty one who fulfils……
- CATHRYNE ALLEN
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