Be Still And Know

Daniel 10:18-19 Then the one who looked like a man touched me again, and I felt my strength returning. “Don’t be afraid,” he said, “for you are very precious to God. Peace! Be encouraged! Be strong!” Daniel’s amazing courage comes across powerfully in this book. His willingness to face up to tyrannical kings and even hungry lions is very impressive, but that isn’t the whole story. We also meet Daniel when he is feeling ill and weak. The vision he received about the future in the previous chapter left him feeling terrible for three weeks. He was in a state of mourning throughout that time and commented: “my strength left me, my face grew deathly pale, and I felt very weak” (Daniel 10:8). Like Daniel, we can all identify times when we have felt on top of the world and then other moments when we have felt completely weak and useless. None of us can be strong all the time. It was in this time of great weakness that God sent a messenger to Daniel telling him how precious he was to God. When things go badly, o