How Long till the End?

Daniel chapter 12 and reading from the first verse:

“‘At that time shall arise Michael, the great prince who has charge of your people. And there shall be a time of trouble, such as never has been since there was a nation till that time. But at that time your people shall be delivered, everyone whose name shall be found written in the book. And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above; and those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever. But you, Daniel, shut up the words and seal the book, until the time of the end. Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.’

“Then I, Daniel, looked, and behold, two others stood, one on this bank of the stream and one on that bank of the stream. And someone said to the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the stream, ‘How long shall it be till the end of these wonders?’ And I heard the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the stream; he raised his right hand and his left hand toward heaven and swore by him who lives forever that it would be for a time, times, and half a time, and that when the shattering of the power of the holy people comes to an end all these things would be finished. I heard, but I did not understand. Then I said, ‘O my lord, what shall be the outcome of these things?’ He said, ‘Go your way, Daniel, for the words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end. Many shall purify themselves and make themselves white and be refined, but the wicked shall act wickedly. And none of the wicked shall understand, but those who are wise shall understand. And from the time that the regular burnt offering is taken away and the abomination that makes desolate is set up, there shall be 1,290 days. Blessed is he who waits and arrives at the 1,335 days. But go your way till the end. And you shall rest and shall stand in your allotted place at the end of the days.’”

Amen.

And the verses to which I should like to draw your attention begin in verse 5 and end with verse 13.

The title that I’ve given to our study this morning is a question that is routinely asked by the average nine-year-old boy sitting in the service with his parents, and it’s a question that some of you have been asking since the beginning of chapter 7. And our title is “How Long Till the End?” “How Long Till the End?” It’s not chosen arbitrarily. You’ll find that it actually is there in the text. And so, as the first of two important questions in the text, I’ve taken it as our title.

Now, if you turn just for one moment back to the middle of chapter 7, let me remind you that it is there that we have this vision that Daniel receives of “one like a son of man” coming to “the Ancient of Days”:[1]

And to him [is] given dominion
 and glory and a kingdom,
that all peoples, nations, … languages
 should serve him;
his dominion is an everlasting dominion,
 which shall not pass away,
and his kingdom one
 that shall not be destroyed.[2]

And it’s almost as if that little section of the middle of 7 can serve adequately as the fulcrum for our studies in Daniel, inasmuch as the first half of the book leading up to that sits on the one side, balances on one side, and then the unfolding story of conflict and battle and war that we have been looking at for the last while is on the other side of that fulcrum.

And it is the reality of that vision concerning the Lord Jesus Christ himself that enables us not to get bogged down and not to get lost in our studies throughout the book. Because between chapter 7 and chapter 12, we are dealing with, we have been dealing with, these conflicts which are cosmic, inasmuch as they take place in the heavenly realms, but they are also temporal, insofar as they have been worked out on the earthly plane. And the whole historical framework takes us from the time of Daniel and all the way through to the return of the Lord Jesus Christ himself.

And it is only when the people of God, as you can see here in verse 7—when the conflicts come to an end, it will be within the context of the shattering of the people of God. You will see that just in the final phrase or two of verse 7: “When the shattering of the power of the holy people comes to an end all these things will be finished.” So that gives us a fixed point to which this book finally refers.

And according to what we find in the book is that the final fixing of the world’s brokenness is going to be preceded by the shattering of the power of God’s people. Now, I think it’s important for us to allow that to settle in our thinking for just a moment. And one of the ways we can get to it is by asking ourselves rhetorically: As we view the process that will lead us to the end of the world, do we think in terms of the gradual Christianization of our world? In other words, are we anticipating that, along with the Beatles, “You’ve got to admit it’s getting better, a little better all the time”?[3] And then eventually, when it is supremely better, then there will be the great final note that is sounded, the trumpet blast, and the ushering in of the kingdom.

The final fixing of the world’s brokenness is going to be preceded by the shattering of the power of God’s people.

Well, we can pray to that end and preach to that end and live to that end, but we will be disavowed of that kind of notion by just a straightforward reading of the Bible—not just here in Daniel but just reading the Bible in its entirety. One commentator puts it like this: there’s going to come a “point in history where it appears that darkness has really won the day. It will seem as if the Antichrist is going to continue for ever. It will seem as if the church has been entirely obliterated, for there will no longer be any sign of it.”[4] That’s a staggering thought when you think about us sitting here, talking about building into the next generation. Someone might immediately say, “Well, is there any point in doing that?” Yes, of course, there is, as we will see as the text unfolds.

Luther in his commentary actually went as far as to suggest that “there may well come a time when the pulpits will be completely silenced and the preservation of the church would be in the hands of the fathers within their own families.” Now, that may seem like a bizarre notion to us sitting here in this kind of context this morning, but it wouldn’t be regarded as bizarre by our brothers and sisters in North Korea, nor in certain parts of the Middle East—nor would it have been regarded in the 1930s, in mainland China, as a strange notion. Mao Tse-tung in the Cultural Revolution decides to burn the churches, to chain the gates, to destroy the entire impact of the gospel. Well, the people that were living in that moment may well have said, “Well, that makes perfect sense, because we seem to be facing such persecution that the very gospel itself is obliterated from our land.”

Now, let’s set that in our minds as we go through the text and try and see whether we can work this out.

First of all, you will notice that down by the riverside—verse 5—Daniel is confronted by someone asking what seems to be just an obvious question. Now, you’ll remember that back in the beginning of chapter 10, we said that 10, 11, and 12 formed one long piece. And if you go back to the beginning of chapter 10, you will discover that it was there by the great river, by the Tigris, down by the river, that these visions were unfolding.

Well, here we are towards the end, and we’re not sure just how many people are here in this scene, but there were two others, definitely: one on one bank of the stream and one on the other bank of the stream. “And someone”—presumably one of these two (or it could have been Daniel himself, I suppose; he could be speaking in the third person)—“and someone said to the man clothed in linen…” That man clothed in linen we’ve also met in chapter 10, which I’m sure you immediately made note of yourself as you were listening: “Aha! That must be the same person as we saw in chapter 10.” And you’re right. And the question is addressed “to the man clothed in linen, who,” according to the ESV (that’s our text), “was above the waters of the stream”—verse 6. And then in verse 7: “who was above the waters of the stream.” I think it’s the King James Version that says that this individual was hovering—hovering—over the waters. I think that’s quite helpful, because the angelic notion of this personage is such that it’s an enigmatic character at best. And so, he was probably, as the King James Version is suggesting by its translation, in that kind of quasi mode that is conveyed in that way.

The question, as straightforward as it is, is there at the end of 6: “How long shall it be till the end of these wonders?” or “these astonishing things,” as in the NIV. Now, this is not an unfamiliar question. Back in chapter 8 the question was asked, and here, as it is asked once again—presumably, I’m going to take it, by one of these two on either side of the stream—it is a reminder to us that even angels do not have a perfect knowledge of the things in which they themselves are involved.

You say, “Well, that’s a small point.” It’s a small point, but it’s worth noticing. Remember in 1 Peter chapter 1, where Peter begins by talking about the wonder of salvation—how it has been planned by God the Father, procured by God the Son, made available to us, real to us, by the Holy Spirit—and he goes on to speak of these things, and then he says, “Even angels desire to look into these things.”[5] They, as it were, stand on the outside marveling at it. They are present at the incarnation. They announced the news that this child has been born who will deal with the sins of men and women, but they do so as objective bystanders, not as participants in the scheme of things.

One of our elders of old, who’s now gone on to heaven, when I preached on 1 Peter, reminded me—and this is many years ago now—reminded me of a hymn that I’d forgotten, which begins, “‘Holy, holy’ is what the angels sing.” Some of you of a certain vintage may know it. Others of you have decided that you don’t want to know it. But anyway, the verse that he reminded me of goes like this:

“Holy, holy” is what the angels sing,
And I expect to help them make
The courts of heaven ring;
But when I sing redemption’s story,
They will fold their wings,
For angels never [knew] the [joy]
That our salvation brings.[6]

So what is true of salvation is also true in terms of these visions. The angels do not have a perfect knowledge of that in which they participate, and that is revealed by the fact that they, I take it, are actually asking the question, “Is this going to go on forever?”

Now, in verse 7, that is responded to by “the man clothed in linen, who was [hovering] above the waters of the stream.” And it was responded to in a way that is marked by, I want to suggest, three things, and I’ll just give them to you.

Number one: by gravity. By gravity. I don’t mean because he was hovering above the stream. I mean by gravitas, by the solemnity, is what I mean. The process of oath taking, when you read it in the Old Testament, is often accompanied by the raising of a hand, but not by the raising of two hands. For homework, you can check this out. For example, in Genesis 14, there is the raising of a hand.[7] In Exodus 6, there is a raising of a hand.[8] But here in this context, you will notice that “I heard the man clothed in linen, [hovering] above the waters …; he raised his right hand and his left hand toward[s] heaven and swore by him who lives forever.” In other words, again, you know there’s no underlining. One of the ways in which we can detect a matter of peculiar emphasis is the way in which it is conveyed. And so, there he makes this statement in a way that is both solemn and grave.

Secondly, it is marked not only by gravity but also by mystery. What mystery? Well, the mystery that attaches to the phraseology “that it would be for a time, times, and half a time.” Now, those of you who’ve been around for these studies know that this is not new phraseology to us. We encountered it, again, back at the beginning of this section, in chapter 7. And on that occasion we said, “We can spend a long time here on ‘a time, times, and half a time,’ or we can stand far enough back from it and say, ‘Whatever else it means and conveys, it conveys this: that many years, periods of time, must elapse before God fulfills what the prophet by this vision has declared.’”

So in other words, it is not something that is immediate. It is something that is over an extended period of time. And those periods of time, identified in this way, take Daniel well beyond his own time. That’s why we noted last time that these things relate to “the time of the end.”

So, gravity, mystery, and certainty. What is the certainty? It is that what God says will happen will actually happen—that God is sovereign over all of the events. And the mysterious time is tied, as we noted at the beginning, to the shattering of God’s people. Says Joyce Baldwin, “Suddenly and surely, at the appropriate [time], divine intervention will interrupt history’s course.”[9] “Divine intervention.”

You see how radically different it is to have a view of the world that begins with a sovereign creator God who exists outside of time, who establishes the parameters—geographically, historically—of the unfolding story of history, and who at dramatic moments in time intervenes with time in order to set forward his purposes. And an angel came and said that “the child that you are going to bear, Mary, will be called the Son of the Most High, and he will sit on David’s throne, and his kingdom will never come to an end.”[10] A dramatic intervention in time, preceded by many interventions by God: the exodus of the people of God from Egypt; the falling of the walls of Jericho; the experience of the exile, over which he is sovereignly controlling; the repatriation; the ongoing dramas of persecution and tribulation. Think it out. Either we live in a random universe and our world is completely chaotic, or the Bible’s record of things is as stated. And that’s the certainty that is conveyed in this: that there is going to be a moment in time.

Now, what we need to face up to—and this is why I asked the question at the beginning—is the fact that the visible sign of that moment will be the helplessness of believers in the face of persecution. Isn’t that what it says? It is then going to be “when the shattering of the power of the holy people comes to an end” that “all these things” will “be finished.” So in other words, the kingdom of God in all of its fullness is not going to come in on a great triumph. It is going to intervene in history at the point where it appears as though the persecution has been so fierce that there is no recovery from it at all—in other words, when the people of God are at their most helpless, at their most hopeless, as Luther says, perhaps where the church pulpits are completely decimated and silent, that the kingdom of God then will appear.

Remember, Jesus says, “In such an hour as [you] think not the Son of man [will come].”[11] “When you think not.” Well, when would you think so? You would think so when everything is going tremendously well: “This must be a great time to come in on the triumph of it all”—the expansion of the world’s evangelism and so on. But no, the word here: he lifts his hands, both of them, and swears by he “who lives forever,” and he says, “You’ll get the end at the time when there is the shattering of the people of God.” So the idea that we are just sort of moving inexorably in some great triumph just is not true to the Bible.

Now, think this out. When you review history and when you focus on periods of history where those who have named the name of Christ have faced fierce persecution, what do you realize? You realize that they have often seen it as the end. They’ve often said, “This is the end.” And they weren’t mistaken, in the sense that these very things that they experienced will mark the end. It wasn’t the end of the end, but it was like the end is going to be. It was, if you like, a microcosm of what will ultimately happen.

On Monday night, when we were together at Severance and I was quoting from Frank Houghton’s hymn—“Thou who wast rich beyond all splendor all for love’s sake becamest poor”—I was recognizing the fact that that was written by Houghton as a bishop in the Szechwan province of China in 1934. And it was subsequent to the horrific death of John and Betty Stam, two young missionaries from Moody Bible Institute who were taken captive and finally beheaded by the Communist Red Army, leaving behind a little girl who wasn’t even a year old. John was twenty-seven. Betty was twenty-eight. If you’d asked those people then, “Is there anything that could get any worse than this?” they would have said no. They would have said, “This must be the absolute end.” Here’s the context.

But what we find here is that the danger, I suppose, is that when you focus on that, some people are tempted then to use that kind of thing to calculate when the real end is going to be. Don’t worry about when the real end is going to be. Pay attention to today. Pay attention to today! What’s on your diary for the rest of today? Today is dealt with in light of what is in here in Daniel 12. It’s not in here in order to give you fun with your calculator in the afternoon or to develop some bizarre program of the end times. That’s such a bizarre idea, and yet routinely enjoyed. No! There we go.

Here’s what’s going to happen. Here’s the solemn pronouncement. And Daniel said, “Super! That’s great! Got it. That wraps it up. Let’s go for lunch.” No! Here he goes again—and this is the great encouragement of the book for me every time I find these words: “I heard, but I did not understand.” That ought to be a signal to some of us, who are so convinced that we do understand. “I heard, but I did not understand.”

One of the classic things in reading this, again, is Daniel’s response to revelation. God reveals himself in a dramatic way in a vision, it gives to him a word of prophecy, and he then goes to his bed for a week because he’s so overwhelmed; or he turns completely white and goes into a dead swoon; or he says, “I was appalled,” or whatever else. So I’m never really unduly upset when I hear the reaction of some people to my sermons. I think if that was Daniel’s response to a dramatic vision from God, no wonder people want to take to their bed for a week after listening to some of these studies. But that’s just the way that history goes.

“I heard, but I didn’t understand.” What does that tell me? It tells me that being a man of faith does not mean you understand everything. Being a man of faith doesn’t mean you understand everything. So beware of the people who understand everything—especially when it comes to these things, especially it comes to “1,290” and “1,335.” Run for the hills when they give you an absolute, watertight explanation. No.

Of course, the fact that we don’t understand everything doesn’t mean that we can’t understand anything. But the life of faith, in Daniel’s case, is lived inevitably in the realm of unanswered questions. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be the life of faith, would it? I mean, if every question is answered, what do you need faith for? So the life of faith is lived within the realm of unanswered questions—unanswered big questions, such as is found here in Daniel 12, but also unanswered questions in our individual lives.

You see, the full significance—the full significance—of this is hidden even from Daniel: “I said, ‘O lord, what shall be the outcome of these things?’ And he said, ‘Go on with you, Daniel. Go on, Daniel! These words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end.’” What’s he saying? He’s saying, “This is actually not something that you should be unduly concerned about, Daniel. What you need to know will be clear to you. And the fact that you don’t fully get it is not a matter of great alarm.”

The life of faith is lived within the realm of unanswered questions.

You see, only after the event will a prophetic word be seen to have been fulfilled. Right? Only after the event. So, the wise men came and stirred up Herod and the whole of Jerusalem, because Herod was stirred up: “We have seen this star in the east, and we have come to worship him. Where is this king?” So Herod brings in all his scribes and his wise men, and he says, “Hey, is there anything in the Bible about this, in the old writings?” And they said, “Oh, yeah! In Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it was written by the prophets.”[12]

Well, what did Micah make of that when he was writing it? His wife said to him, “What were you writing about this morning?”

He said, “Well, I was writing about how in Bethlehem of Judea the Messiah will come.”

And she said, “Well, how do you figure that out?”

He said, “Well, I haven’t fully figured it out. I just wrote it down.”

“Yeah, but why’d you write it down?”

“Well, because God has spoken to me and told me this.”
His wife said, “You better be really careful with that stuff.”

Same for Isaiah: “What were you doing this morning?”

“Well, I wrote a really good passage this morning: ‘He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities.’”[13]

And his wife said, “Well, who’s that?”

He said, “Well, I’m not entirely sure. It’s about a Suffering Servant. It’s about one who is to come.”

Well, we understand far more than Isaiah did when he wrote it. Why? Because prophetic history is only seen to be what it is looking backwards, not looking forwards.

Now, when you realize that, it will help you. It will make you more cautious. The mysterious prophecy that is contained in this final section will only be understood as God unravels history in an unseen future. Right? Think about it. If this takes us all the way to the return of Jesus Christ and the appearance of the Antichrist, what could possibly have been written down for Daniel to help him understand? “I heard, but I didn’t understand. So I said, ‘Well, what’s the outcome going to be?’ ‘Well, you don’t worry about that. But let me tell you this.’” Verse 10: the separation that we noted last time between the righteous and the unrighteous, between the wise and the foolish, between the wicked and the righteous, will work itself out in that period of time.

In other words, during the events that are conveyed here, the people of God will be refined and they will be purified. We’ve seen that, again, back in chapter 11: “And some of the wise shall stumble, so that they may be refined, purified, and made white, until the time of the end, for it still awaits the appointed time.” That’s 11:35. And while the people of God are being refined, the wicked, who will continue to oppose God, will not have a clue about what’s going on, in contrast to the wise, who shall understand. Understand everything? No, understand this: that God is sovereignly in control of what he’s doing. In other words, the wise look at the world entirely differently from the wicked: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”[14] This is where wisdom starts: where we understand that we live under the overarching control of a God who made us. People say, “No, we don’t. No, we don’t. We’re here as a result of time plus matter plus chance.”

Well, you see, it’s not a surprise, then, that a view of the world evolves from there in every area of life. And I don’t know where you are this morning, but that might be you.

But loved ones, as I said to you last time, the distinguishing that the Bible does between people is not on the basis of height or weight or intelligence or ethnicity. It is in relationship to their response to God’s revelation of himself. God has revealed enough of himself to make every one of us accountable. Therefore, we’re accountable. We know, both by creation and we know by conscience, that we exist as a result of God’s creative handiwork. Now, what are we going to do with that? We turn our back on that and say, “No, I suppress that; I repress that; I don’t want to accept that as a view of the world”? Then we go on in our own way, and we discover that having failed to worship the Creator, we then worship the creature. So then we’re preoccupied with the planet. We’re preoccupied with ourself. We’re preoccupied, and understandably so. It is a view of the world, it is a view that comes from Scripture, that the Bible says is wise as opposed to wicked. The wicked will go on their way unwittingly actually providing the test, the refining test, without themselves being subject to it.

I quoted last Sunday night the dramatic lines from that hymn: “But sinners, filled with guilty fear, shall see God’s wrath prevailing”—the grapes of wrath, Revelation[15]—

Shall see God’s wrath prevailing.
For they will rise and find their tears
Are wholly unavailing.
The day of grace is past and gone;
They trembling stand before the throne,
All unprepared to meet him. [16]

Now, Jesus takes that picture of wise and foolish—wise and wicked, if you like—and he says, “It is the wise man who has built his house upon the rock. It is the foolish man who has built his house upon the sand.”[17] He’s picking up what it said in the Old Testament about these very things. “The wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.”[18] But the wise will flourish like trees planted by a riverbed.[19] And all on account of God’s grace.

You see, the reason for the incarnation is God’s immense love towards those whom he has made, who have turned their backs on him. Why would he ever come and deal with any of us, who by nature sinned from the get-go? Rebellious against our parents, poor in our attitudes, sinful in our activities, and so on. We got a whole retinue of stuff. So why would God not just say, “Ach, forget you guys”? Why does he, when he floods the world, provide an ark? Because he’s God! Why does he intervene in this way? In order that we who deserve his just judgment may be the recipients of his amazing grace. The wicked live their lives untroubled, unblessed, and unaware, but those who are wise will understand.

“Well,” you say, “let’s stop there.” Well, no, we have to deal with verse 11 and 12. Just a word. I’m glad to be running out of time. “And from the time that the regular burnt offering is taken away and the abomination that makes desolate is set up, there will be 1,290 days.” Now, some of my best friends take this absolutely literally, and they say that what is being described here takes us back now to the immediate time of Antiochus and that it is describing the period of time from the removal of the burnt offerings—which he did, remember, setting up his own altar—and the rededication of the temple, or between the removal of the burnt offerings and the death of Antiochus himself. And that may well be right. You can go back and read chapter 8 and think it out for yourself.

Others of my friends view this symbolically and take it in terms of the seventy sevens of years. Remember when we went through that? What a memorable evening that was! And we noted the way in which it comes out as a period of seven, a period of sixty-two, and then a half. And if half of seven, I figured out, is three and a half… I worked hard on that this week. And so, that would mean that we got a half sort of hanging out there, right? So that means that 1,290 days is pretty close to three and a half years. So, that would kind of fit. Yeah, but it doesn’t really—unless you’re taking it symbolically. And even if you are, what are you going to do with the fact that it then adds on another six weeks and takes it up to 1,335? You’re looking at me, going, “Okay, you’re the one that we allow to study the Bible. You tell us.” Well, I’m baffled by it! And the only thing I can say is that it is conveying this truth: that the people of God will actually endure to the end.

You remember Jesus says in Matthew 24—it’s in Mark 13 as well—he talks about the master going away and coming back. And he talks about the master being delayed. And he says, “The really faithful ones are the ones who are faithful even if he’s a little delayed in coming back”[20]—you know, even if he’s another six weeks. Even if he doesn’t come back at 1,290 but if he comes back at 1,335, they are still faithful, irrespective of when he actually comes.

Now, isn’t that the assurance that is being given here? “From that time”—whether it is the time that comes to an end finitely in Antiochus or whether it is, as I’m suggesting to you, pushing us all the way to the end of time—“blessed is he who waits and arrives at the 1,335.” That’s what Jesus says: “You’re blessed, he who endures to the end.”

So, that’s the word: “Daniel, let me say a final word to you: go your way.” “Go your way till the end. And you will rest and stand in your allotted place at the end of the days.” “Go your way. Get on with it. You’re an old man now. You probably don’t have much in front of you. You will rest”—a picture of death, sleep—“and you will stand in your allotted place.”

And people say, “Well, there’s no resurrection in the Old Testament.” Yes there is. Yes there is. We already saw that in the early part of it: “Many of those who sleep in the dust will awake to everlasting life, and some to shame.” We know that is true. And so he says, “Daniel, this is what I want you to do: I want you to just keep doing what you’re doing right till the end. Eventually, you will sleep the sleep of death. You will stand in your allotted place at the end of the days.”

And you know what? That’s kind of all you need to know. I mean, that’s about it, isn’t it? What a finish to the book! “Daniel, keep doing what you’re doing. You’re going to die, but death won’t be the end.” What are we going to say to one another? Same thing: “Go your way. Go and have your lunch. You will die. In Christ, you will rise. He has a place for you.” “Yeah, but what about…” “Go your way. You will die. You will rise. He has a place for you.”

Now, think about it. Those who’ve made the biggest impact in the world are the people who have gone their way in light of the fact that they knew they were going to die and in the reality of the resurrection. You take, for example, the Stams. I mentioned them earlier. Twenty-seven and twenty-eight years old! That, from a human perspective, is an unbelievable waste of a couple of lives, isn’t it? And now, when you read of these kind of things, the reframing of history, you know, says, “You know, these people went over there to—they were doing colonization, you know. They were introducing these poor Chinese people to this dreadful, you know, American way of life,” and so on. That wasn’t what they were doing. They weren’t doing that at all! They went there to tell them about Jesus. “Well, why didn’t they just leave them? They had Confucius.” Because Confucius can’t save! No one can save, except Jesus. That’s why they went and died: to tell people that in the face of the onslaught that is coming, there is only one secure place of safety, and it’s in Jesus.

Right around the same era, that’s when Eric Liddell went to China. You remember Eric Liddell? Of course you do. You know him. He’s my favorite character out of Chariots of Fire. I tell you about him about once every three months. And it’s time. Remember, Liddell is an athlete playing internationally and for the University of Edinburgh. He’s also a Christian. His sister gives him a bad time because she thinks he’s more preoccupied with athletics and not concerned enough about God’s plan for his life. In the memorable scene in the movie, she’s giving him a bad time at the end of a Bible class, and she says to him, “Eric, listen: God made you for himself.” And he says, “Aye, Jenny, I know. He made me for himself. He made me for China. But he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel his pleasure.”[21]

You see, there was no dichotomy between the gifts that God had given him in athletics and his desire to tell others about Jesus. The place that God has set you is your place. I can’t go there. I don’t have access to your place. I can’t come in that factory. I don’t live on your street. I can only help you here and do what I’m supposed to do where I live. But you’ve got to do it there. You’ve got to go on your way, in the awareness that you’re going to die, and so are the people to whom you speak going to die, and in the awareness that they will be resurrected and you will be resurrected, and some to everlasting shame and contempt, and others to everlasting life. Then that changes everything. That changes the way you sweep up a factory floor. That changes the way in which you give an injection. That changes the way in which you pass out cash at the bank. It changes everything!

That’s why when Eric Liddell left Scotland—and he left by train—he goes out of the railway station in an amazing scene where, with a great big crowd gathered around him—and not all church people, but people who were fascinated by him because of his athletic prowess—and he lets the window down on the train, and with the crowd silenced, ʼcause they know he’s going to speak, he shouts, “Christ for the world, for the world needs Christ!” right out over Waverly Station. Well, what a ridiculous thing to do! What an arrogant rascal! What about Allah? He can take care of them. What about Krishna? He can take care of them. What about… What about…

No, loved ones. You see, here’s the great issue. Here’s the great issue: “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name given under heaven amongst men whereby they must be saved.”[22] That is why world mission is a logical deduction from the reality of who this Jesus is. If he came as a child in the manger to live as a man, to live a perfect life on our behalf, and to die the death that we deserve, then we are beyond comprehension unless we are diligent about saying to our friends, “How about Jesus?”

And you know what he did? He then led them in the singing of a hymn. And it’s our closing hymn this morning. And it’s a great hymn:

Jesus shall reign where’er the sun
Doth his successive journeys run,
His kingdom stretch from shore to shore,
Till moon shall wax and wane no more.[23]

And then he goes off on the train, and he goes to China, and he gets a brain hemorrhage, and he dies as a schoolteacher. Well, what another dreadful waste! There’s another life gone down. He should have stayed home and played rugby. Why did he go out way there and do that? That’s ridiculous! And the Stams as well, getting their heads cut off.

Do you know how many Christians were in mainland China in the 1930s? They reckon less than a million. The official figures in mainland China today are eighty million. The unofficial figures are beyond one hundred million genuine believers in mainland China.

You see, unless the seed falls into the ground and dies, it just remains alone.[24]

It’s good stuff, isn’t it? Go your way. You’re going to die. But you will rise. He has a place for you. And you don’t have to go to will call. He’ll be there to welcome you himself.

Father, thank you for the Bible. I feel like we should start all over again and see if we can get it right on a second go, but that’s enough for now. Help us, Lord, not to play fast and loose with the Scriptures. Help me to make clear to the congregation my own absolute conviction concerning its absolute trustworthiness, sufficiency, and authority. And help us to go out from here into this Christmas week in the awareness of the fact that you have established our way, that all the days of our lives have been written in your book before one of them came to be[25]—we won’t die a minute before you have planned for us—and that one day, through death, we will actually be ushered directly into your presence. What a wonder. What a message. What a privilege. What a Savior, in whose name we pray. Amen.

[1] Daniel 7:13 (ESV).

[2] Daniel 7:14 (ESV).

[3] Paul McCartney and John Lennon, “Getting Better” (1967).

[4] Stuart Olyott, Dare to Stand Alone (Darlington: Evangelical Press, 1982), 165, quoted in Dale Ralph Davis, The Message of Daniel: His Kingdom Cannot Fail, The Bible Speaks Today (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2013), 165.

[5] 1 Peter 1:12 (paraphrased).

[6] Johnson Oatman, Jr., “‘Holy, Holy’ Is What the Angles Sing” (1894).

[7] See Genesis 14:22.

[8] See Exodus 6:1.

[9] Joyce G. Baldwin, Daniel: An Introduction and Commentary, The Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity), 208.

[10] Luke 1:30–33 (paraphrased).

[11] Matthew 24:44 (KJV).

[12] Matthew 2:2–5 (paraphrased).

[13] Isaiah 53:5 (KJV).

[14] Psalm 111:10; Proverbs 9:10. See also Proverbs 1:7.

[15] See Revelation 14:19.

[16] [Bartholomaus Ringawaldt?], trans. William B. Collyer, “Great God, What Do I See and Hear?” (c. 1556, 1812). Paraphrased.

[17] Matthew 7:24–27 (paraphrased).

[18] Psalm 1:5 (ESV).

[19] See Psalm 1:3.

[20] Matthew 24:13; Mark 13:13 (paraphrased).

[21] Chariots of Fire, directed by Hugh Hudson, written by Colin Welland (Warner Bros., 1981). Paraphrased.

[22] Acts 4:12 (paraphrased).

[23] Isaac Watts, “Jesus Shall Reign” (1719).

[24] See John 12:24.

[25] See Psalm 139:16.