After a specific time the sanctuary shall be cleansed. While this may refer to a heavenly sanctuary, it is not impossible that the sanctuary of the greatest interest to God consists of the hearts of His saints.

It may be true that God is ready to anoint a new Holy of Holies—the hearts of His faithful saints.

Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, . . . to anoint the most Holy [a Holy of Holies]. (Daniel 9:24)

Perhaps what Daniel 8:9-14 is telling us is that God intends to give great authority and power to the forces of wickedness and darkness so they (certainly without intending to) will shake sin and rebellion out of God's elect, beginning with those who are closest to God—that is, whose lives are hidden with Christ in God.

This concept is entirely in keeping with the Scriptures and with church history. It is necessary that offenses come but woe unto them through whom they come.

Why is it necessary that offenses come? It is necessary because our personalities are so desperately wicked. The soulish rebellion in us is very deeply entrenched, spreading to every part of our personality.

Dying physically, while it may relieve some of the pressures of the lusts of the flesh, will not change our rebellious nature. Our rebellious nature is not a law of sin that dwells in our flesh, it is our very self-will, self-love, self-centeredness. It is original sin in us.

God is ready to deliver us from the chains of satanic lust, covetousness, occult practices, and violence. Such deliverance is a relatively simple matter.

However, our inner rebellion is original sin. We must choose to do the will of the Lord at every moment.

God's answer to the rebellion that is in the saint is the personal cross of the disciple. We must take up our cross and follow the Lord Jesus. It is the cross of imprisonment, of suffering, that destroys rebellion from us and makes us part of the unshakable Christ.

The cross has two arms and both of them are prisons. The one arm is the placing of us in situations that we despise but in which we must remain if we are to be obedient to God.

The other arm is the withholding from us of our most intense desires.

We cannot break out of God's prisons without breaking God's laws.

"I cannot stand this for one more minute" we moan, but the pain continues for another thirty years.

It is impossible to survive God's prisons unless we do what the Lord Jesus said. We must lay up all of our treasures in Heaven, expecting never to have them until after we die. If we do not place our treasures in Heaven there is no way in which we can remain in God's prison. Sooner or later we shall either force our way out or else be deceived and enticed out of the Lord's will.

The Lord Jesus was the first to be tested so rigorously in obedience (although Abraham's offering of Isaac stands as a monument after the miserable failure of Adam and Eve).

To be continued.