Praying with the Prophet Daniel

So I turned to the Lord God and pleaded with him in prayer and petition, in fasting, and in sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to the Lord my God and confessed:

“Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant of love with those who love him and keep his commandments, we have sinned and done wrong. We have been wicked and have rebelled; we have turned away from your commands and laws….

You have fulfilled the words spoken against us and against our rulers by bringing on us great disaster. Under the whole heaven nothing has ever been done like what has been done...

“Now, our God, hear the prayers and petitions of your servant. For your sake, Lord, look with favor on your desolate sanctuary. Give ear, our God, and hear; open your eyes and see the desolation of the city that bears your Name. We do not make requests of you because we are righteous, but because of your great mercy. Lord, listen! Lord, forgive! Lord, hear and act! For your sake, my God, do not delay.”

from the 9th chapter of Daniel

Not long after this prayer, Daniel had an astonishing vision. One that would change the course of his already faithful life. But before that vision came to him, he was so struck by the events of his day, he felt called to a season of mourning. Daniel submitted to habits of emotional and spiritual cleansing. In his own words he “mourned for three weeks. I ate no choice food; no meat or wine touched my lips; and I used no lotions at all until the three weeks were over.”

I am praying this prayer with Daniel not because I believe COVID-19 has any correlation with the moral life of its victims. No, not at all. I realize that in times of separation and crisis, we are expected to esteem the power of the empire and bow at the feet of the Emperor's tower. And that is precisely what we are not about to do, no matter how tempted some fellow saints may be. 

Daniel, like the preacher in Ecclesiastes, moved into the house of mourning when he saw the destructive power of vanity in the livelihood of his people. He left his choice food, his usual freedom to move about. He committed to stations of petition and confession. Though Daniel was highly esteemed in the government of his day, he knew he was also enslaved by it.  For him, wisdom meant taking that vexing knowledge to God and being active but not overcome. It meant connecting with God’s people by praying for them. While Daniel must have hated the distance between him and his home, he did all that he could to display determination and faith in God.

This morning many of us will attend church via wifi connection, across various distances. For worship leaders tripping through tech, and for worshippers trying to connect… the frustration might result in stress, moving mindsets from “we got this!” to “we hate it here”. 

Dear friends, please let wisdom silence your despair. Press on. Move all the way in to this season. Dedicate your days to praying, fasting if that is feasible, and editing your appetites from what you know you can or should go without. Take to your prayer stations. Be shamelessly disappointed at the times, which is a natural and human response! But let wisdom save you from becoming shocked or overwhelmed. Let her deliver you from doubt. For just as God’s love is not defined by this season of isolation, God’s power is not contained in your access to: Your fave brunch location, your babies’ school, your local library. Being able to enter these places is not a testimony of God’s blessing in your life. Ask anyone who has never been welcomed. Ask any hyphenated American.

I pray this morning that the wisdom of Daniel would set to work on our faith communities as well. I am saddened to hear that St. Louis has lost our first life to COVID-19, while I am hearing that influential, trusted churches here and around the country are planning to gather for in-person worship today. I do not know the difficulty of having worship for people who can’t access the internet. I can imagine it, and I know that it takes a lot of work to serve a congregation when people are unable to meet together.

But the argument from many for gathering together has been to “resist the sensations of Satan” and defeat the spread of this virus through prayer. Meanwhile God is calling us to defeat our foolishness and remember that church buildings are a construct, no matter how beautiful and -yes- blessed. They are not the origin story of our people.

Our birth-stories are in the desert, in the mountains, in the tabernacle, the temple for a little while, then to the catacombs. The stories of exodus and exile hold more history than we want to see. The story of New Testament persecution and underground church are our most recent biblical narratives of meeting together. We were made for the challenge of finding ways to fellowship through forced separation. And in this Daniel-time of sickness and danger, we can display Daniel-faith by taking Daniel’s steps. 

“I mourned for three weeks”: Change your routines, shift your countenance. Know that it’s ok to be sad about this season! People are perishing, they cannot breathe and it is because of proximity to others. This is awful! 

“I ate no choice food; no meat or wine touched my lips”: Deprive yourself of what you know is sheer preference and not necessity. How might we redefine our essentials in this time of everything shutting down? Is your necessity God or a particular type of gathering? 

and I used no lotions at all until the three weeks were over: Do not take all your usual comforts. I believe that many of us are called to financial fasting. I believe many churches hesitate to close because they will lose the weekly offerings they depend on. I wonder if they fear financial footholds more than they worry for the lost connections. 

Let wisdom show us the difference between stability and a stumbling block. The thin line between a precious gift that must be stewarded, and an idol that demands our moral manipulation.

Look at the active havoc of the world’s empires, detest it and desire change. We cannot assume we are entitled to do anything “as usual”.

Reverend Traci Blackmon wrote “Jesus has left the building and the church must follow Him.” I would plead with you to follow the Savior and all of your faith family, into a challenging season that God has already prepared us for. Enter a time of mourning. Let go of the choice times and places you think you require. 

This is not an easy fight, but Wisdom is with us and she’s no lightweight. If we follow her we will see. She reminds us that since there is nothing new under the sun, our history holds a helpful testimony. When new Christians were driven into hiding, they sent letters to be copied and read in different regions. All the faith family heard the same greetings. When the ancestors were forced to worship in the Hush Harbors, they shared community care concerns and plotted freedom.

But there is another part of our story that we need in this age: the story of the song. Different plantations did not permit Black people to congregate. So we sang across the fields to each other, we sent messages in music and hid maps in our hair. Somehow we all knew what we were singing about without having it explained or being able to draw close enough to talk. I believe the Holy Spirit passed sacred songs between us, it seems that the Spirit will uphold this timeless tradition. Let’s pray together.

O Lord, we come this morning, Knee-bowed and body-bent before Thy throne of grace. O Lord—this morning— bow our hearts beneath our knees, and our knees in some lonesome valley. We come this morning— like empty pitchers to a full fountain, with no merits of our own. O Lord—open up a window of heaven, and lean out far over the battlements of glory, And listen this morning.

Our loved ones are taking ill, nurses are dying, our young people remain at risk and confused. Asian friends who suffer prejudice are now in greater danger of being harmed. We are not sure of anything. We are not safe.

Shelter us in Your wisdom, O Lord, for You told us that Wisdom is an inheritance, a good thing. We find ourselves burdened still. For our hearts are in the house of mourning, and we have followed wisdom here. We are longing to go out rejoicing, but we’ve seen the government strip protections for vulnerable people, we hear sirens through the night and taste tears all the day. We are trying not to say , “Why were the old days better than these?” For it is not wise to ask such questions.

(and honestly, we did dread 2019 as well.) Often we are nagging children, pulling at your garments edge, rarely quiet and question-less enough to hear you whisper your care. Lord, we would have the cup of life, no more from the cup of sorrow, we would plant in fields of plenty, no more arid spaces where apathy cries out from the soil. We are longing to take action, we desire Your justice and we need Your cleansing, today Lord, right away. Because no matter how we try, still we see turmoil, still we sit in exile. Still, and still and still… we hate it here.

Ecclesiastes 5 // Ecclesiastes 7 // Daniel 9 // Daniel 10 // James Weldon Johnson