Lesson 2

                “My Clocks Do Tell Time!”

                                             Daniel 9:1-2

Introduction

One of the great themes of the Bible is time.

     •   From cover to cover God sets everything on a schedule.

     •   The basic period is “seven.”

Creation week – 7 evenings and mornings – serves as the “master period” for other Biblical parallels.

     •   Using the sun and moon cycles – creation brought three clocks:

          •    Day – light/darkness

          •    Month – lunar

          •    Year – solar

     •   A divine declaration brought the week of 7 evenings and mornings, giving a 4th clock.

          •    The last day of the week is always the seventh and called a blessed or sanctified day.

          •    Lest Israel lose track of this cycle of seven, manna came in a double portion on Friday and none on Sabbath (Exodus 16).

When does a year begin?

     •   There are no “proof texts.”

     •   But – it appears to be at the time of the Spring Equinox.

          •   Time when the sun comes up due east and sets due west

          •   Duration of that journey is 12 hours (there’s a similar path for the Fall Equinox, as the sun “moves” south.

God gives a clue to His year cycle through Passover instruction.

“This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you. Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for an house: ... And ye shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month: and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening.” Exodus 12:2-3, 6.

That year began with the Passover month! (Important to end-time prophecy.)

     •   It would be Passover to Passover.

     •   What month was that?

     •   “This day came ye out in the month Abib” (Exodus 13:4, 23:15, 34:18; Deuteronomy 16:1).

     •   Thus, the year was from Spring to Spring.

Within that year the sun determines the seasons.

     •   Spring begins the Vernal Equinox – 12-hour day. “Vernal” means spring.”

     •   Summer begins at the Summer Solstice” – longest day of the year.

     •   Fall begins at the Fall Equinox – 12-hour day.

     •   Winter begins at the Winter Solstice – shortest day of the year.

God Creates More Time Periods

Three new clocks are added at the Exodus.

     •   Abraham used only four clocks (Genesis 29:14, 20, 27-28).

     •   At the Exodus God introduced:

1.  A “week” of seven months

2.  A “week” of seven years

3.  “Seven weeks” of seven years

1.  The “Week of Seven Months Clock”

     •   The “week” is borrowed from the syntax of the creation week.

     •   From its description, one can see a week = seven months.

     •   The time span is seven months.

          Day:            1st      2nd    3rd    4th    5th    6th     7th

          Month:           1         2        3       4      5       6        7

What time period did this “clock” cover?

     •   “First month” [Abib – Passover month (deliverance) –Leviticus 23:4-5] through seventh month [Tishri – Tabernacle month (restoration) – Leviticus 23:24]

     •   Feasts that were kept during those seven months:   

•    Passover (14th) – wave sheaf (16th)

•    Unleavened Bread (15th)

•    Spring Harvest – called Feast of Harvest (Exodus 23:16) – even later, the time of Pentecost

•    Trumpets

•    Atonement

•    Tabernacles – called Feast of Ingathering (Exodus 23:16)

•    “Eighth” of Tabernacles

Was this seven-month period, Abib to Tishri, special?

     •   It was a “ceremonial year,” perhaps best called a “convocation year.”

     •   This began at Passover.

     •   All timing prophecy is based upon cycles, periods related to this ceremonial or convocation year, beginning in the Spring at the Vernal Equinox.

     •   See Appendix I for a list of Jewish months.

This “ceremonial year” is based on the cycles of the moon.

     •   This relates to prophecy and the great plan of redemption.

     •   The last or seventh month, Tishri, was perhaps the most important.

•    It had three Feasts – Trumpets, Atonement and Tabernacles.

•    Expositor White said in The Great Controversy that as the Spring Feasts portrayed timed events surrounding the first coming of the Messiah, so the Fall Feasts would do the same for His second coming (The Great Controversy, pp. 399-400).

•    The Biblical record suggests that understanding was precise.

At the time of the Old Testament Jews the days of the week were numbered (without names) – except the seventh day – it was called the “Sabbath.”

Thus far we can say:

     •   God’s clocks “week of seven months” began on Abib 1, year one, at the deliverance of Israel!

     •   The month begins at new moon.

     •   Deliverance was at full moon – Passover – Abib 14.

     •   The Feast of Weeks, 49 days after the Exodus – God visited them at Sinai (though it wasn’t called that until later).

     •   Since this “week” template coincides with the creation week:

•    One day is equivalent to one month!

2.  The “Week of Seven Years” Clock

The weekly cycle template is seen here also.

“Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto the LORD. Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof; But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the LORD: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard.” Leviticus 25:2-4.

Every seventh year was to be a Sabbath year:

     •   When did this year begin?

     •   God’s calendar always began at Abib (Nissan) (Exodus 12:2) at the Passover month!

Why was this Sabbatical Year important?

     •   Slaves were to be set free (Leviticus 23:39-46)

     •   Land was to lie fallow

Freedom of Slaves:

     •    “Beginning” of Sabbatical year

•    Symbolizing that God’s faithful will be set free at the beginning of the seventh millennium

     •    God’s people – Israel – are not to be slaves but heirs of His kingdom.

     •    God’s people are to be free on the seventh.

Land Rest

     •    This was to be a “Sabbath to the Lord” (Exodus 23:10-11, Leviticus 25:4).

     •    This was as holy as the seventh day.

     •    This was to be a test for God’s people. (Faith-building – utter recognition of divine sovereignty)

What would happen if this was not kept?

•   A curse was pronounced on the church (Leviticus 26:32-38).      •   The land would become desolate.      •   They would be scattered into heathen lands.      •   Cities would be wasted.      •   Many would fall by the sword.      •   They would perish in heathen lands.

Was the land-rest for agricultural/soil buildup?

•    No

•    The land produced threefold on the sixth! (Leviticus 25:21)

•    It had nothing to do with physical soil needs (though it may have benefited scientifically).

The Sabbath year tested the corporate faith of the church Israel, similarly as He tested their faith regarding the Sabbath and the sixth-day supply of manna (Exodus 16:4).

•    It is an end-time metaphor for the final test of God’s people.

•    The seventh millennium God chooses how your Sabbath will be kept!

Since this “week” of years template coincided with the creation week:

•    One day is equivalent to one year!

     Is God’s year 365 days?

     •   It is based on the cycle of months (a month is 29.53 days).

     •   In the cycle of “new moons” (the solar cycle meant, therefore, that it could be 12 or 13 months)

     •   This is why a year is phrased in the Bible as: 

•    “Time”

•    Hebrew – “mowed” – appointed time, festival, special year

•    Chaldean – “iddan”

     “Seven times” in prophecy means “seven years,” as an example.

3.  The “Seven Weeks of Seven Years” Clock

     This sets the Jubilee cycle.

     •   Introduced in Leviticus 25:8-34

     •   Cycle of 49 years plus one

     •   1–7    1–7    1–7    1–7    1–7    1–7    1–7 [1–7 – next cycle begins]

          [Seven cycles of seven years]

     •   Each seventh year was a Sabbatical year.

     •   The last seventh ended a 49-year cycle.

     •   The next year:

     •   Was the Jubilee year

     •   It was the first year of the next cycle of sevens and 49’s.

     Why was the Jubilee year so important?

     •   It was a second Sabbath year in a row.

     •   God’s people had their “land restored” and every 7th year people were freed.

     •   It was an “eighth.” [Always in prophecy the “eighth” means restoration] – a beginning again (land, debts, etc.).

     At the eighth millennium will come the New Earth.

      Those now are the three new clocks introduced to God’s church.

     •   Are they important today?

     •   Absolutely – they are vital to prophetic understanding.

     •   The fulfillment of the “everlasting covenant” comes within these “prophetic clocks.”

“Week of Seven Years” – Important Issues

God sentenced Israel based on this clock.

     •   Remember, a “year for each day?”

     •   When at Kadesh Barnea

     •   Sent spies into Canaan

     •   Were there 40 days

     •   “After the number of the days in which ye searched the land, [even] forty days, each day for a year, shall ye bear your iniquities, [even] forty years, and ye shall know my breach of promise.” Numbers 14:34.

     •   That sentence came two years after that clock was set up.

     •   For each “day” they got one year of punishment.

Was there another time that God sentenced Israel based on one of His clocks?

     •   The “week of seven years” comes into play again.

     •   But this time for each “Sabbatical week of years” missed, they would be in captivity.

     •   “And this whole land shall be a desolation, [and] an astonishment; and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years.” Jeremiah 25:11.

     •   “To fulfil the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her sabbaths: for as long as she lay desolate she kept sabbath, to fulfil threescore and ten years.” II Chronicles 36:21.

This is so important to see!

     One Year of Captivity = One Sabbatical Year (7th year) missed

If they were in captivity 70 years, how many years of time were they in rebellion?

     •   490 years

     •   They began to go into captivity in 605 B.C.

          490 + 605 B.C. = 1095 B.C.

What happened at this time?

     •   Time of Sampson – apostasy of Israel deepened

     •   Time of Boaz and Ruth – symbolic of Christ and land being redeemed

All prophetic time issues /periods are based upon God’s seven time clocks (plus a millennial cycle).

Now we can begin our Daniel 9 study. We’re going to need those clocks.

Daniel’s Narrative

“In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, of the seed of the Medes, which was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans;” Daniel 9:1.

By now Daniel is approximately 80 years old – in 538 B.C.

Darius is king (first year, likely only a year)

     •   Mede

     •   Cyrus was his conquering general of Babylon and the succeeding king.

The “realm of the Chaldeans” was the Medo-Persian Empire.

     •   Daniel is still working in the courts. He doesn’t retire till the first year of Cyrus (1:21).

“In the first year of his reign I Daniel understood by books the number of the years, whereof the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.” Daniel 9:2.

Daniel is studying the books.

     •   Expositor White notes: “Still burdened in behalf of Israel, Daniel studied anew the prophecies of Jeremiah. They were very plain–so plain that he understood by these testimonies recorded in books ‘the number of the years, whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that He would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.’ Daniel 9:2.” Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 554.

     •   Why is the Biblical “books” plural?

     •   Scholars feel that it relates to the “letters” of Jeremiah (Jeremiah 25:11-12, 29:10, 30:18, 31:38) – but it likely related also to Leviticus 25 where the Sabbatical prophecy was first outlined.

     •   The prophecy of Jeremiah was written in 605 B.C., the first year of the captivity and the year Daniel was taken.

Daniel was “studying” and then “understood” the timing issue.

     •   The Hebrew captives hadn’t been freed (the symbolic 70 years were from “breaking” the restoration Sabbath years).

     •   The land hadn’t rested (symbolic of time set aside to acknowledge His sovereignty).

What did Daniel do?

     •   He began a convocation of prayer, laying out the issue before God in a most amazing way.

“With faith founded on the sure word of prophecy, Daniel pleaded with the Lord for the speedy fulfillment of these promises. He pleaded for the honor of God to be preserved. In his petition he identified himself fully with those who had fallen short of the divine purpose, confessing their sins as his own.” Patriarchs and Prophets, pp. 554-555.

Daniel believed in predictive prophecy, and now he expects it to be fulfilled.

“And it shall come to pass, when seventy years are accomplished, [that] I will punish the king of Babylon, and that nation, saith the LORD, for their iniquity,” Jeremiah 25:12a, 33:7-8.

What comes next is beautiful. What is behind Daniel’s prayer has incredible meaning to us today! That becomes part of our next lesson.

Franklin S. Fowler Jr., M.D.; Prophecy Research Initiative © 2004