Tag: courage

Daniel 3:15-18 (ESV)  ¹⁵ Now if you are ready when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, to fall down and worship the image that I have made, well and good. But if you do not worship, you shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace. And who is the god who will deliver you out of my hands?”

¹⁶ Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. ¹⁷ If this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. ¹⁸ But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

While I was reading this this morning, I thought “What is it about the faith of Shadrach, Meshack, and Abednego (Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah) that they were willing to stand against the king with such boldness? Maybe these:

• These three had seen their God working in their own lives.  Their friend and compatriot, Daniel, had answered an impossible call.  God, their God before Whom they stood, had not only given Daniel the impossible task not only to interpret the dream of the king, but to tell the king what the dream was in the first place.  The king had kept the details of the dream to himself to test the wisemen of the land.  None could say what the dream was.  They recognized this when they said “There is not a man on earth who can meet the king’s demand, for no great and powerful king has asked such a thing of any magician or enchanter or Chaldean. ¹¹ The thing that the king asks is difficult, and no one can show it to the king except the gods, whose dwelling is not with flesh.” (Daniel 2:10b-11)  But they didn’t know the God of Daniel, Shadrack, Meshack, and Abednego.

God gave the interpretation of the dream to Daniel, and Daniel was placed high in the king’s government.  Because of this, the three young men knew their God was true and powerful. The experience they had witnessed assured this.

• They also knew because that God dwelt within them.  What else could have emboldened these three men to stand before Nebuchadnezzar, the king of the great empire of Babylon and say in modern terms, “Either through our dying in the fiery furnace or by God’s joining us and protecting us, our God will still deliver us from you O king.”

You have to admit that was pretty gutsy.  But as believers we know the God of the interpretation of dreams, the God of the impossible. He lives here inside of us.  He loves us and supports us in all we do for Him.  We have the witness of His indwelling to rely on as well as the witness of His work in the world and in our lives.

• Shadrack, Meshack, and Abednego knew God’s will in the matter.  They had been told not to bow down before idols.  The second of the Ten Commandments had something to say about this:

“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. ⁵ You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, ⁶ but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. (Exodus 20:4-6)

Why is this important?

Theirs was an “even though” sort of faith.  Even though Nebuchadnezzar could kill them, they would still be delivered into the arms of the God who loved them dearly.  If we’re seeking the boldness of Daniel’s three friends, boldness to even stand before the king and defy him, we need to be sure in our hearts and minds of at least three things: 1. Ours is the God of the impossible.  2. The God of the impossible lives in us and will be with us in our bold stance, and 3.  We are following His Word in command or promise.  If we have these three, there will be a Fourth: Daniel 3:24-25  (NKJV) ²⁴ Then King Nebuchadnezzar was astonished; and he rose in haste and spoke, saying to his counselors, “Did we not cast three men bound into the midst of the fire?”

They answered and said to the king, “True, O king.”

²⁵ “Look!” he answered, “I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire; and they are not hurt, and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God.”