Be Real Together:

Take a few minutes to catch up, tell stories, and laugh together. Trust and friendship take time to build. If you’re launching a new DNA, one person should tell their story — what do we need to know about you? Next week, have another person in your DNA share their story.

Read Together:

The Context
In Daniel 1, King Nebuchadnezzar (the King of Babylon) has overtaken
Jerusalem, he’s sacked and enslaved God’s people who reside there, and he’s putting them through a Babylonian boot-camp to indoctrinate and train them in their new nationality.

Read Daniel 2
Open up to Daniel 2 and take turns reading out loud.

Grow Together: Observe and Apply

An Impossible Situation
Daniel 2 begins with a dream about the future. Early in his reign, King Nebuchadnezzar begins having dreams that haunt him to the point of sleep deprivation. In Ancient times, dreams were regarded as significant. Often people assumed their dreams were messages from their gods, predictions about future events. The King was a highly resourced man, and part of what he had available to him were supposedly the wisest and most spiritual leaders from within his community. After being asked three times to describe the dream and interpret it, these magicians, mediums, sorcerers, and Chaldeans finally give up. These so-called “wise men” have nothing to offer, admitting that they’ve never been given such a tall order and are certain they can’t fulfill it.

The King is so angry that he gives orders to destroy all the wise men of
Babylon and included in that execution list is Daniel and his 3 friends
Hananiah, Azariah, and Mishael. Imagine what Daniel must have felt when he caught wind of this. He’s innoncent, but it doesn’t matter. Consider the impossible nature of this situation.

Are you currently facing a situation that seems impossible or have you faced a seemingly impossible situation in the past?

Where Do You Turn?

As humans, while we often have several options in terms of how to respond to impossible situations, there are really 3 choices:

• Look outward (to others)
• Look inward (to yourself)
• Look upward (to God)

A good indicator of where you’re at spiritually is where you turn for hope FIRST in a moment of crisis.

If you’re honest, where do you tend to turn in crisis? Outward, inward, or upward?

The Interpretation / Our Hope
Daniel knew he was stuck in an impossible situation without God’s help. So Daniel and his friends pray, and apparently after that, they go to bed. That night, the Lord provides Daniel with both the details and interpretation of the King’s dream! We see that though the future is unknown to us, the future is absolutely known to God.

The dream, in short, reveals a large statue, ultimately in the image of King
Nebuchadnezzar himself. Daniel’s prophecy reveals both a haunting reality and a hopeful eternity.

• We exist in a world that is run by corrupt human leaders.
• For millennia, we have seen the rise and fall of great kingdoms and national superpowers.
• We’ve made the same mistake as those who have gone before us - we have put our hope in our own strength and position.
• Yet one thing is certain: everything that looks valuable and long lasting will all be dust in the wind, never to be seen, felt or held again.
• The true God of heaven, the one who establishes and removes earthly
  kingdoms, wanted his people to know that all human kingdoms will ultimately be replaced with his everlasting Kingdom!

In what ways have you tried to build your own kingdom apart from God? How does it give you hope today knowing that you have King Jesus who can set your feet on solid ground and give you a place in God’s eternal family?

Pray Together:

Jesus, you are our King. Forgive us for how we’ve tried to build our own kingdoms apart from you. We repent for putting our hope in our own strength and position. Thank you that you are the King who is solid like a rock and that you will establish your kingdom like a mountain, which no man can ever destroy! Thank you for the hope we have in you today and the promise of life in You for all eternity. Your will be done, your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. In Jesus’ name we pray, AMEN.