Daniel

Daniel: God and Government The setting of Daniel is the sixth century B.C. when the Jews are in exile in Babylon. You might wonder what such distant events might have to say to us today. First of all the book of Daniel will help us reflect on God’s rule in our world. It raises issues such as persecution, evil, suffering, power politics and forces us to think about how we are to live as Christians in a hostile world. Sec-ondly Daniel and his friends are models of faithful, wise and courageous men who offer us insights on how we might respond to the temptations and trials that we face. Thirdly, Daniel provides some of the background thinking to what Jesus has to say about the kingdom of God, his identity as “the Son of Man” and the end of the world. So there are many good reasons for reading Daniel. We will do chapters 1-6 in the coming weeks and look at chapters 7-12 over summer.