The Book of Daniel, Seventy Weeks Are Determined, Daniel 9:24-27 - Lesson 37

In our study of the book of Daniel we have learned that prophesy is progressive.

Chapter two revealed the history of the nations with their ultimate end caused by the stone that was cut out of the mountain without hands.

It will be this crushing of the nations that ushers in the kingdom of God which shall never be destroyed, a kingdom which will stand forever.

Chapter seven opened up to us some details about the kingdoms of men specific details about the king that reigns during the time when the crushing stone does God’s bidding.

This is the king who speaks great words against the most high, who wears out the saints, who changes times and laws, and who is given power for a time, and times and the dividing of time.

He is given a three and one-half year period to do Satan’s bidding but in the end his dominion is taken away.

In chapter eight we learned of another king, Antiochus Epiphanes, the forerunner of the king of the end times, a cruel king, certainly Satan manifest in a man, whose power was mighty, a destroyer of the holy people.

Through this man God gives us a picture of that man who is to come in the end times.

He is again a man who is Satan incarnate, a man who attempts to stand up against the Prince of princes, the Lord Jesus Christ but is crushed without hands.

In chapter nine we are given a chronology that tells us the time that God has determined for all of this to take place.

We read of that in: Daniel 9:24-27,  Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.  Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.  And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.  And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.

Seventy weeks of years or a period of 490 years will be required to bring about God’s will for his people Israel.

This is not prophesy concerning any people other than the people Israel.

This is not a prophesy that applies to the church of Jesus Christ but only applies to God’s chosen people Israel.

This period of time concerns the Jew.

It concerns the land, it concerns the city of Jerusalem.

It does not concern itself with periods of time where the Jews are not in the land.

It does not cover the period that we are presently in, the church age, nor the period wherein the Jews are dispersed.

The period that we live in today, the age of grace, the church age, is between the first 69 weeks and the seventieth week.

So therefore the six things that are given in chapter nine that must take place in the seventy weeks that are determined are things that concern the Jew and the city of Jerusalem.

There are things in this list that certainly fit the church but as we study what God intends to do before the kingdom comes we must confine our thoughts to the fact that they are to be done with reference to the Jew and the Holy City.

The first of the six things that takes place during the seventy weeks is to finish the transgression.

Transgression means a revolt, a rebellion.

In this case it means a national revolt, a nationwide rebellion.

This rebellion must be finished and it will not be finished until the Jews as a nation repent and turn to God.

This indeed will happen for God will bring it about.

There will come a time at the end of the tribulation period, when the remnant of Israel will recognize the one whom they pierced and repent and turn to God thus ending the transgression, ending the revolt, ending the rebellion.

He tells us of this happening in:

Zechariah. 13:6-9,  And one shall say unto him, What are these wounds in thine hands? Then he shall answer, Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.  Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the LORD of hosts: smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered: and I will turn mine hand upon the little ones.  And it shall come to pass, that in all the land, saith the LORD, two parts therein shall be cut off and die; but the third shall be left therein.  And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people: and they shall say, The LORD is my God.

The rebellion of the Jews will then be finished.

The second of the six things that takes place during the seventy weeks is to make an end of sins.

Again this has to do with a specific people Israel, at a specific time.

Paul speaks of this people and this time in:

Romans 11:25-27,  For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.  And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob:  For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.

Taking away their sins is the end of sins that was told to Daniel in chapter nine.

This will take place after the fullness of the Gentiles be come in.

This takes place after the church age, after the rapture of the church, at the end of the Great Tribulation period when every eye shall see Him when He shall deliver Israel and make an end of sins.

The third of the six things that takes place during the seventy weeks is to make reconciliation for iniquity.

Here the Holy Spirit is speaking of the iniquity of Israel.

Iniquity means unrighteousness, wickedness, ungodliness, moral evil.

Reconciliation means to cover, to expiate or condone, to placate or cancel, to atone, to cleanse, to forgive.

So the statement "make reconciliation for iniquity",

means that an effective covering for unrighteousness, wickedness, ungodliness, moral evil must take place.

Daniel confessed, "We have sinned, and have committed iniquity" and God hereby responds by telling Daniel that there is a day yet future when Israel’s sins will be pardoned and forgiven.

Now we know that the sins of all men, Jews and Gentiles have been atoned for in Christ’s death at Calvary.

His death satisfied the father and is sufficient for all.

There needs no other atonement, neither for the Gentile nor the Jew.

But this atonement is efficient only for those who receive Him.

Israel is still living in rejection of her Messiah, therefore her atonement still waits the acknowledgment of Jesus Christ as the only Redeemer.

When she accepts the subsitutionary sacrifice of Jesus Christ, her iniquities will be pardoned and forgiven, and this will come to pass at the end of the seventy weeks.

The Jewish nation will be converted as a nation, a conversion of which Isaiah wrote.

Isaiah 66:8,  Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children.

Christians are born again one by one but Israel will travail as a mother travails and the nation will experience the new birth.

Reconciliation for iniquity will then be complete.

The fourth of the six things that takes place during the seventy weeks is to bring in everlasting righteousness.

Everlasting righteousness is what will come about, for sin and iniquity have run their allotted course and are to be kept in check by righteousness.

At the end of the seventy weeks when Satan will be bound, Christ will usher in the age of righteousness.

Only when Israel is in a state of rightness on the earth will there be righteousness on the earth.

Jeremiah wrote of this time in:

Jeremiah 31:31-34,  Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah:  Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD:  But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.  And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.

Christ’s 1000 year reign on earth will be a kingdom of righteousness.

Psalm 85:13, Righteousness shall go before him; and shall set us in the way of his steps.

Psalm 96:13,  Before the LORD: for he cometh, for he cometh to judge the earth: he shall judge the world with righteousness, and the people with his truth.

Psalm 97:2,  Clouds and darkness are round about him: righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne.

Isaiah 32:17,  And the work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever. And my people shall dwell in a peaceable habitation, and in sure dwellings, and in quiet resting places;

The fifth of the six things that takes place during the seventy weeks is to seal up the vision and prophecy.

When all is fulfilled there is no need for visions and prophecy.

Paul spoke of the cessation of prophesy in:

I Corinthians 13:8,  Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.

After the seventieth week, when Israel worships the Messiah and had been forgiven, cleansed from her sin and been restored to her land, all prophesy and visions have been fulfilled so that faith will step aside for sight.

The king will be on his throne ruling in righteousness with the purpose of the prophesies having been realized.

We can then look back and see the fulfillment of every jot and tittle of God’s word.

The last of the six things that takes place during the seventy weeks is to anoint the most Holy.

There are different understandings of this term "the most Holy", but the Hebrew word used here for Holy refers to a sacred place.

Many Bible scholars believe this refers to the most holy place of the new millennial Temple as described in Ezekiel 41-43.

The building of this temple is still future.

The anointing of this "Holy Place" will be by the divine presence, so that this anointing includes both a place and a person.

We can read of this anointing in:

Ezekiel 43:1-7,  Afterward he brought me to the gate, even the gate that looketh toward the east: And, behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east: and his voice was like a noise of many waters: and the earth shined with his glory.  And it was according to the appearance of the vision which I saw, even according to the vision that I saw when I came to destroy the city: and the visions were like the vision that I saw by the river Chebar; and I fell upon my face. And the glory of the LORD came into the house by the way of the gate whose prospect is toward the east.  So the spirit took me up, and brought me into the inner court; and, behold, the glory of the LORD filled the house.  And I heard him speaking unto me out of the house; and the man stood by me.  And he said unto me, Son of man, the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever, and my holy name, shall the house of Israel no more defile, neither they, nor their kings, by their whoredom, nor by the carcases of their kings in their high places.

Seventy weeks or 490 years are determined upon thy people and thy city.

When God determines there is no stopping Him for all his Word will come about and be realized.

Most of the seventy weeks are past but one week remains, and in that one week God’s will will be done as it was done in the first 69 weeks.

We as Christians await the coming of the Lord and then God’s last week of determination for Israel will enter earth’s stage and all the players will fulfill their parts.