Daniel 9:3, NKJV Then I set my face toward the Lord God to make request by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes. In biblical narrative, to set one’s face signifies an internal posture of determination and resolve. 2 Chronicles 20:3, ESV Then Jehoshaphat was afraid and set his face to seek the LORD, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah. Luke 9:51, ESV When the days drew near for him [Jesus] to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. No

Daniel 9:1-2, ESV In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, by descent a Mede, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans—in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that, according to the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet, must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years. Perception is everything. We can live our entire lives without ever perceiving the spiritual significance—and

Last week we read these famous words of Mordecai to Esther in Esther 4:14: “For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?” And today we’ll look at Esther’s response: Esther 4:15-16, ESV Then Esther sent this reply to Mordecai: “Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast fo