Now if you are ready at the time you hear the sound of the horn, flute, lyre, and psaltery, in symphony with all kinds of music and you fall down and worship the image which I have made, good! But if you do not worship, you shall be cast immediately into the midst of a burning fiery furnace. And who is the god who will deliver you from my hands? Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego answered and said to the King, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. If that is the case, Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us from your hand, O King. But if not, let it be known to you, O king, that we do not serve your gods, nor will we worship the gold image which you have set up”. Daniel 3:15-17
Hello family. It’s been ages. We missed being here as much as you do too. I am glad to let you know that we are still on our series on “Fear no evil”. Here is a good point to start; Whenever God keeps sounding the same warning over a prolonged period of time, there is a serious need to pay close attention and settle down to fully capture what God is saying repeatedly. The book of revelation would put it this way: “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches” Rev. 2:7a.
In this generation, there seems to be a set of invisible rules that guides our conducts and this is already finding its way into the Church front. There seems to be an urge for rushing spiritual food; ever moving in doctrine and quick to move from one aspect of learning to another without paying attention to digging deeper into that one topic God inspires us to learn about. True treasures that the world adores the most in our world are not found on the bare ground all around. They are valued treasures that sometimes require guided and organized searching process to find! But are we willing to pay the sacrifice to find these gems because we know the value attached to getting them from wherever nature placed them and refining them for the use of consumers? This is exactly the way our quest for God should run. We are meant to stay on a Spoken word of God for as long as the Spirit of God would have us dig into it in the place of intimacy and concrete study of the Bible. To this end, we shall be considering the evergreen story of the three Hebrew boys in Babylon as recorded in Daniel 3 and we will be picking necessary lessons needed to further understand how to fear no evil in our generation. Welcome to the Fire Experience!
In every generation, standing for God and following His ways always come with a price. It is either you worship the cultures and practices of this world or you face the consequences of not doing so. I am sure you have most likely heard stories of how people refuse to take bribe at work or do something illegal due to their faith in Christ and as a result get sacked. This and many more are the kinds of fate faced by true lovers of God that keep trying to live by what they’ve learnt about God while finding means of livelihood. It is sad that it will not get any better as the day unfolds; it will rather get worse because of the increase in the efforts of the world of darkness in frustrating life out of every true professing believer. Now that you know what might most likely happen to you peradventure you go against the ways of this world while at anywhere you find yourself, what is your resolve? Will you allow this reality to alternate your stand for God like some so-called believers keep doing day by day, or like the few others standing in faith, will you stay with God and follow His ways to the core? This was exactly the agreement the 3 Hebrews signed with God in Daniel 3. Let’s check the details!
Who you are allegiant to doesn’t matter to the devil and the high ranking officers of this world, until you start to wield power and influence over the general public.
The king of Babylon woke up one day and embarked on a project of making a golden image and he later announced that this particular edifice must be bowed to and worshipped at the sound of musical instruments. The King here was performing more than a physical and innocent event as a lot of us think! It was an activity that was secretly meant to check the side each of the important stakeholders in the empire belonged to. Why were commoners not invited? Why were students and children not invited or mentioned in the decree of the King? The answer is simple. He only needed the actively important drivers of the affairs of the Kingdom to dance to his tune, other entities in the population will simply follow the same version. It is true that who you are allegiant to doesn’t matter to the devil and the high ranking officers of this world until you start to wield power and influence over the general public. There are certain levels in life a man is not permitted to attain until he associates with a fraternity! You must belong to a Kingdom! You must be representing the interest of a greater authority. Who is backing you up and energizing all you do physically is more important to the world than the actual actions you are pulling. So, the 3 Hebrew boys happened to be part of this important sector of the population, just like some of us would enter into those higher ranks by means of work, influence from God and man, etc.
Men that know God are known by their sacrifice and lifetime commitment to God.
On the set date of what can be called the celebration of allegiance, in verse 8, we saw that certain Chaldeans came forward and accused the 3 Hebrew boys before the King because it was discovered that they did not bow to the King’s golden image as ordered by the King. It is possible that there might be few individuals in the Kingdom that were not really interested in bowing to any image and it is really no problem, but for these three, who reigned in their hearts is a matter of importance to the King. Why? This verse explains it fully: “There are certain Jews whom you have set over the affairs of the province of Babylon…” Dan. 3:12a. So, the same way God doesn’t joke with power and influence in the life of a man, the world system also understands the unspoken power that rolls with being popular and holding a special place in the heart of numerous people. King Nebuchadnezzar was full of anger as he asked the question that points us to the phrase “fear no evil” in this article. “…and who is the god who will deliver you from my hands” Dan. 3:15b. at this point, our champions of study knew what they bargained for! They represented a Kingdom whose foundation was not physical! Their knowledge of God expressed in the verses that follows showed that they had truly met the person of God and were operating in a good relationship with God as at that time!
Doing exploits for God only comes when we truly understand God and His ways.
In verse 16-18, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego declared their stand for God and refused to bow to the golden image built by King Nebuchadnezzar. They surely faced the consequence; they were thrown into the burning furnace! In the times they lived and also the times we live in this generation, mere and cheap words about God won’t save you for so long before you will need to stand to defend your bold claims about God. We live in a generation that is result driven! Your failure in proving to them that God is all powerful might lead you into serious trouble. It is very interesting that it was the same King that God’s hand touched and he began to see that the boys were not getting roasted but instead they were speaking to a strange fourth man in the fire! They looked at evil in the face and boldly said: NOT TODAY! This is the power of true revelation of the person of God. Doing exploits for God only comes when we truly understand God and His ways. The king eventually worshipped the God of Israel and made a decree in support of that God! We shall be drawing out lessons from this story quickly in the next paragraph.
If you will not run away in the days you need to stand for God, then you must know something about God that is strong enough to keep you from falling.
One important evil we must not fear is the consequences, persecutions and feedbacks that land on us as a result of our stand for God. The price for standing with God varies through different phases of our lives but it is true that as we rise in influence and power with God and man, the price for standing with God keeps increasing! If you will therefore not run away in the days you need to stand for God, then you must know something about God that is strong enough to keep you from falling. The knowledge of God is what will weaponize you to become God’s envoy indeed in this generation. What you know about God matters! What revelation of God has dawned on you in your course of walking with Him? It is this knowledge of God that controls the kind of results men should expect from your life! We can discern the weight of God you carry just by looking into your character and how you respond to arising situations. Knowing God truly takes time. This is why the devil will always fight the attention of anyone that gets very serious with the desire to truly know God and follow hard after God. No man is greater than his revelation of the person of God. Our convictions about Him keep shifting as we journey deeper with God per time.
It is the knowledge of God that controls the kind of results men should expect from your life
The 3 Hebrews could stand before their King and declare that they would only obey God not because they were trying to be faithful to a religion or proving how rebellious they could be; but rather because by the quality of their walk with God, it already became too late for them to deny God secretly or openly! God was real to them! They had fellowshipped with Him, stayed in His presence and encountered His numerous dimensions at different times which built their faith in God to the point by which they were too sure of who they represented even to the point of death! Can this be said of your relationship with God? What do you know about God that is already constraining you from touching some things on earth presently? What have you stopped doing and totally surrendered to God all because of your love and allegiance to God? Men that know God are known by their sacrifice and lifetime commitment to God.
Our goal is to raise the banner of Jesus high in every mountain of influence of man here on earth
In conclusion, in our own days here on earth, we must not hold back from standing for God in our “Babylon-like” affairs in this world. The golden image of King Nebuchadnezzar is more than a memorial and historical edifice; it is also a system in Babylon that seeks to glorify the ways and desires of the fallen man rather than God! It is a symbol of rebellion against God just like the tower of babel. So, if the golden image is real and is still appearing in our own time, then the spirit of Nebuchadnezzar is still very much around here too! This refers to the human custodian placed to keep the greedy quest for money and power alive all through every generation. The names keep changing but the agenda remains unchanged! This is why believers must build up strong and formidable spiritual intelligence necessary to make them rise as the HEBREW BOYS of this generation! Our strategy in God’s Kingdom hasn’t changed too! The eternal Kingdom agenda of God is still intact in every generation. We live to depopulate hell and foil the devil’s agenda in our days. Our goal is to raise the banner of Jesus high in every mountain of influence of man here on earth. As we tie everything up here at this point, I leave you with this powerful passage that communicates our allegiance to God. “Then saviours shall come to Mount Zion to judge the mountains of Esau, and the kingdom shall be the Lord’s”. Obadiah 1:21. Remain blessed.
This is powerful