Making Your Summer Count For Christ!

Pray First:

(I have some information in front of me that I feel is extremely important!)

Today is May 11th: Seniors:

1. 1,987,200 seconds till summer

2. 33,120 minutes till summer

3. 552 Hours till summer

4. 23 days (June 3rd)

Everybody else:

1. 1,036,800 seconds

2. 17,280 minutes

3. 720 hours

4. 30 days (June 10th)

(LET ME GIVE YOU SOME MORE NUMBERS)

School Reopens:

1. 10,195,200 seconds

2. 169,920 minutes

3. 2832 hours till school reopens

4. 118 days (September 6th)

What is this 118-day period of time called? Summer!

This is almost 17 weeks. I need two volunteers. (THE MEASURING-TAPE ILL.)

“Making My Summer Count For Christ”

-In this 118 day time period, you can either make your summer count for Christ or for yourself. Some of us might produce a summer of sadness and others joy, it is not to late to change your path.

-Seniors, even though you do not have to come back to Fresta next year, (unless you want to), this summer can be a turning point that can have a direct impact on the rest of your life, from choosing to college or not, or maybe to get married or not.

-The chose is up to you.

-When I thought about 10,195,200 seconds till summer was over, it just showed me that God gives us ample time to make the right decisions and the wrong decisions. Plus, He gives us enough time to take advantage of the many opportunities He places in our paths to count this time for Him.

-You have 118 days to make a difference for Christ.

-Are you up for the challenge?

-God knows what you are going to do this summer, from all the days you are going to sleep in late, I remember, when I was in 6 or 7th grade, I would stay up all night playing video games and then sleep real late the next day, I did this so much that it became a habit and my sleeping pattern was all messed up. So I would be up when it was dark and asleep when it was daytime. I felt like an Eskimo in Alaska during the wintertime. Don’t do that!

-When you are a student, summer is a time period that we tend to break all the habits that we have built during the school year.

- Schedules are totally opposite, no teachers to bother you, no more homework!

-(I thought I would at least get one amen, for no homework!)

-It is like we are taken out of our normal environment and thrown into an environment that is foreign to our way of life while we are in school.

“Background INFO-Daniel”

-This is a lot like the story of Daniel’s life. I want to set the scene for you so you can understand where Daniel is in his life when we see him in chapter 1.

-The book of Daniel opens up with King Nebuchadnezzar, who is the king of Babylon, going into the land of Jerusalem and capturing Israel’s king, the king of Judah. The reason why this occurred was that Israel became worse than the surrounding nations, and the king of Judah led the inhabitants of Jerusalem astray. The Lord, after many warnings and much long-suffering (2 Chr. 36: 14-20), executed His judgment, which He had threatened, by the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, who "burnt the house of God, and broke down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all the palaces with fire, and destroyed all the goodly vessels. And then those that had escaped from the sword, were carried away to Babylon" as exiles (2 Chr. 36: 19-20). The dominion of the earth was committed to the king of Babylon (see Daniel 2: 37, 38), and it is in the midst of this new order of things, that God preserved a true remnant and seed, and this is where Daniel and his companions are found in the first chapter of the book of Daniel. Daniel was an exile in a foreign land. Daniel was taken out of the culture he grew up in and thrown into another culture that he was not familiar with. He was brought into a strange land, where he was unfamiliar with his surroundings, just like the summer time can be for some of us.

-What was Daniel’s age when he started school? -The Education Custom at that time for youths in Persian began at 14 years old and ended at 17. “Children" in Hebrew means youths of twelve or fourteen years old. Daniel could have been in 8th or 9th grade.

-The king’s selected young men for his service for political purposes to take over other countries that the king was invading. The king would choose individuals of the elite classes of the land that he would invade who would become immersed in the Babylonian ways and customs and either return to positions of influence at their homeland or stay in Babylon in important positions.