Daniel 1 1-20         The Daniel Diet         10.30am Sun 29^th July 2007

Slide 1       Start

Slide 2       Flood pictures

We have had some terrible weather lately. Rain, rain, rain. Flood, flood, flood. Ten days ago our daughter Clara with the help of her next door neighbour was bailing rain out her back garden to prevent it coming under the patio door into the lounge. This good neighbour managed to modify his own garden, by taking up a curb, to drain the water away.

May be you, or someone you know, has been affected by the recent bad weather.  Is this a result of global warming, that some scientists warn us about? Who, or what, do you blame for our recent bad weather?

There can be times when we look around and think, “God don’t you love me? Why is this happening?” In truth God loves us all the time. All the time God loves each one of us. What he would like is our love, trust, and worship in return, all the time. . . .

Slide 3       King Neb

King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon invaded Jerusalem in 604BC, damaged the temple, stole its contents, and took many people back to Babylon, but the previous year a number of well to do hostages had already been taken to Babylon, including Daniel and his friends.

Slide 4       Daniel

Daniel had seen quite a change in his circumstances over a few months. He had been a member of a noble family in Jerusalem. If not royal. He had had the best money could buy - education, food, teaching. He’d also been blessed by God with strength, health, good looks, and intelligence.

Then the Babylonians besieged his home town, and he was marched off to exile in Babylon, at may be only thirteen or fourteen.  How would you be feeling? Have you ever had a really big move away from friends and family?

If you were Daniel would you be feeling let down by God and complaining? Or do you think the experience would help to make you realise, your complete dependence on God? Would you be worshipping and praising him more fervently?

Whilst he was being marched off to Babylon he might have heard about what the prophet Jeremiah was saying,

Slide 5       bible verse

"This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: The exiles I have sent into captivity for their own good. I will see that they are well treated. I will build them up and not tear them down. 24:5-6

Other people may have told Daniel, Jeremiah was a traitor for suggesting  they didn’t fight.

Slide 6       gorilla joke

Do you remember the old joke, “What do you call a gorilla armed with a machine gun?” ? ? ?

The answer is “Sir”.

The time for fighting had stopped, the Babylonians were definitely in charge. It was now a matter of being as nice to a gorilla as possible; hoping he wouldn’t select you to help with the target practice – by being the target!

Slide 7       In the Kings palace

The Babylonians believed they were taking these boys young enough to change them, to their ways. From people who worshipped God to people who worshipped the gods of Babylon.

Daniel decided he was going to co-operate, but without compromising his beliefs and worship of God.

The gifts that God had already given to Daniel, of good looks. good manners, and intelligence; secured Daniel an equivalent of a three year degree course at the top residential, Babylonian University – fees fully paid. But some of the practices in this university, which were considered privileges by the Babylonians and some other exiles, were actually considered very wrong by God.  

Slide 8       Attendant and Daniel

The food and wine may have been the best food and wine money could buy, but it had been offered to the gods of Babylon. (8a Babylonian god)

What was Daniel to do? (8b Question Mark))

Should he eat the food offered to the foreign gods of Babylon or not? If he ate the food people would think he was honouring the gods of Babylon. If he didn’t eat the food, he would starve.

May be at school or work there is bullying and swearing? Do you go along with it because if you don’t you will be the one who is bullied?

What do you do when faced with working with people who all fiddle their works mileage, spend works time slandering the boss, chatting up colleagues and generally not getting on with the job?

Do you give a tithe of your income to God and look after the poor as Jesus asks in Matthew 23:23? Are you afraid God won’t look after you? Maybe you know family members will also be annoyed, because of what they believe, they will miss out on if you tithe or do more.

Do you watch immoral television programs or even copy their ungodly behaviour?

We must think and pray to check we aren’t sinning, inadvertently, by just copying what others do.

(8c & 8d Bible verses)

As it says in Romans 12:2

Don't copy the behaviour and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will know what God wants you to do, and you will know how good and pleasing and perfect his will really is.

The book of Daniel is helping to teach us to decide to draw a line on some activities and say, “No” to our cultures view BUT in a gentle and courteous way. Daniel wasn’t aggressive, and didn’t demand his rights. He actually asked for compassion from people who really were his guards.

May be in these cases and others you could try a simple experiment like Daniel did? After thought and prayer.

Slide 9       Daniel’s proposal

 "Test us for ten days on a diet of vegetables and water," Daniel said.  "At the end of the ten days, see how we look compared to the other young men who are eating the king's rich food. Then you can decide whether or not to let us continue eating our diet."

I’m sure the experiment lasted the full three years of his training really. If at anytime during that three years they had, for a prolonged period, looked ill, I’m sure they would have been forced to eat more substantially.

When first given the title of this talk, “Daniel’s Diet”, I typed it in on Google, and was shocked to find some Christian American’s actually believe that it is Biblical to follow Daniel’s Diet permanently.

Slide 10     Daniel’s Diet

 Philip Bridgeman is the author of a book called, “Daniel’s Diet”, the ten-Day Detox & Weight Loss Plan. Add water and loose a pound a day promoters suggest.

I was reminded of dieting after Christmas 2 or 3 years ago. Lent arrived, and it seemed a strange time to actually start to eat puddings, chocolate and other foods that I’d given up for the diet.

(10a Shrinking Pam)  So I didn’t and continued loosing weight at just one pound a week. That is the only time I’ve every actually being slightly anxious that I might end up underweight. At Easter I weighted 109 lbs, which is ok for my height.

Just imagine if I had kept it up for just two years, I would have ending up weighing five pounds!!

Daniel’s diet with no meat or diary products or fruit and without mineral and vitamin supplements would normally, in the long term, be unhealthy.

Slide 11     Healthy Daniel and Friends

God honoured Daniel and his friends faith by providing their additional nutritional requirements supernaturally. Meanwhile Daniel and his friends were learning Babylonia  customs and laws, and getting to know the people who considered their God, a joke. But they didn’t stop honouring God.

There are things that happen to us that we have no control over, just like Daniel being forced to go to Babylon. But we can have control over how we react to circumstances. We also do have a responsibility to God for our behaviour and what we do to our bodies, our money, and the rest of creation.

Slide 12     Daniel and question mark

Who is usually in control of your life? Other people, your emotions and feelings, or God?

Slide 13     Food pictures

Perhaps you think, “I could never have done what Daniel did and watched the other students eating roast lamb, delicious fruit, and cream cakes”. Whilst you were was tucking in on a carrot. But is that true?

Slide 14     Gorilla and gun

What if you had been Daniel and your college attendant was like that gorilla with a machine gun held to your head and he said, “Only eat the vegetables”.

What would you have done?

If we believe our life is at stake we will take the necessary action to save ourselves. Yet our eternal life is at stake when we don’t follow God’s instruction. Yet we may claim we haven’t got the self control.

Slide 15     Daniel and attendant

We must each choose to make, reassess, and keep our own resolutions as circumstances change.

The choices are

·         Am I going to eat at the king's table or not

·         Am I going to just copy what everyone else around me is doing or not

·         Am I going to be owned by the Lord God or not

Slide 15     Daniel end slide

Resolve to follow God, courteously, like Daniel, no matter how life seems to be treating you. It will ensure you are the person Jesus died to make you to be.