Recently, I came across a chord from a great 1700 Puritan by the name of John Owen.

John Owen said what an individual is in the secret on his knees before God.

He is and no more.

Today we're going to look at a man who was in secret before God, and that's who

he is and who he was. But before I get to his prayer, and I'm so thankful that a secret prayer

was recorded and that survived 2,600 years so that you and I can be

blessed with it today.

But before I get to the prayer of Daniel in chapter 9, let me just go through Daniel's

bio if you like or curricula vita so that those of you who have been

following would remember, and those of you who have not, can catch up. Just to remind you that it was

the year 605 BC, when King Nebeckett Nasser of Babylon, which is modern day Iraq, invaded the land of Israel, and there he destroyed

all that he could destroy in the land of Israel.

And then he captured a large number of people and took them into exile in the Babylonian

Empire so that they literally became slaves.

But four people out of the masses that got taken into exile, four young people, Daniel was one of them.

Most likely he was about 14 years of age.

They happened to excel, and therefore they received a scholarship to study at the King's College, the King of Babylon's College. And there at the King's College, they excelled in every way. They excelled in knowledge, excelled academically, and excelled physically despite of the fact that they

stood firm and refused to defile themselves with the food that was offered to idols.

Daniel, who was probably 14 years of age, at that time, has survived many tough days.

He was taken into the highest authority until one day,

when the Persians took over that land and the world, he became the prime minister,

number two men in the land. And yet, out of jealousy, some of his colleagues incited the king to throw him into the den of lions. And as we saw in the very last message from the book of

...