>> Pastor Eric
00:00:32.201 Well, welcome everyone to Freedom Church. Can we give God a great big hand?
00:00:36.420 He is so good. Such an awesome testimony, Sly.
00:00:39.780 Thank you so much for sharing about kids camp.
00:00:42.080 I was there all three nights as well and just saw so much life, so much excitement,
00:00:46.280 so much joy. And if you didn't hear, next service, the 11:00 a.m.
00:00:49.760 service, we're going to have a family service, so you're welcome to stay for
00:00:53.380 another round. We're also going to have kids doing some of the songs
00:00:57.320 that they learned. They're going to be involved in the big room with all the
00:01:00.400 adults. I say the big kids and the little kids are going to join together for the
00:01:03.920 second service. We do have the nursery available for the second service if anyone
00:01:06.600 has infants or little ones. But we're going to have a cookout at
00:01:11.040 part of the 11:00 a.m. service, probably around 11:45 to noon, we're going to have
00:01:14.960 a cookout. Hot dogs, hamburgers, drinks, all kinds of fun.
00:01:18.120 Trying to create some fellowship, some relationship, get to know some people
00:01:22.040 other than, "Good morning, how are you? Good," and go about the rest of your day.
00:01:25.720 So if you want to come back, even if you're like, "I got plans," leave, you're
00:01:29.320 welcome to come back. Come back around 11:45 and stick around for the cookout.
00:01:33.160 We'd love to have you join us for that part of today as well.
00:01:37.860 One other thing I want to share before we jump into the word is this fall,
00:01:41.920 really felt like we need to do something more for training and
00:01:45.780 equipping people. And there's a saying, it's in the Bible, Matthew
00:01:49.640 9:35, that "The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few."
00:01:53.780 I heard somebody mention this on a podcast recently, they said, "The harvest is
00:01:56.680 plentiful, but the workers are unequipped." That people want to serve,
00:02:00.660 people want to be involved in the ministry and the kingdom work, but they're not
00:02:04.540 trained and equipped. And I take it very seriously of Ephesians 4, where it says my
00:02:08.340 responsibility as a pastor is to train and equip the
00:02:12.240 saints to do the work of the ministry.
00:02:14.520 I'm not the only one doing the work of the ministry.
00:02:16.680 Like last week, we saw dozens of volunteers, leaders,
00:02:20.320 leading kids ministry, where I wasn't doing the work, they were doing the work.
00:02:24.080 They were imparting God's word to these kids, leading them and pointing them
00:02:28.100 to Jesus. And I want to invite you to be a part of what God is doing through
00:02:31.940 Freedom Church, to get involved and be trained and equipped.
00:02:35.020 We have something called Next Steps that you can be a part of.
00:02:37.400 You're going to hear more about that later.
00:02:39.260 But also, one of the things that for more of a formal training, more
00:02:42.760 education, there's a college called Highlands College. It's in Alabama.
00:02:47.000 They're a great college, reach tons of people for ministry training.
00:02:50.940 They have a whole leadership institute.
00:02:52.540 They have a lot of things for secular world, but they're a Christian college first
00:02:55.900 and foremost. And what we're going to do is we actually have the ability to, we're
00:02:59.640 working with Highlands College Leadership Institute for certificate
00:03:03.560 programs. Now, if you want to learn, you want to grow, you want to get more
00:03:07.520 formal education, we're going to be facilitating online classes.
00:03:11.460 They're doing most of the work. I'm not coming up with all the classes.
00:03:14.660 There are people way smarter, way more experienced than me that are going to
00:03:17.500 provide the content. I'm just going to provide an opportunity as Freedom Church for
00:03:21.560 us to gather together to facilitate a class where we can
00:03:25.440 use their content, be online, you're going to be a virtual student of theirs, but
00:03:29.380 we're going to use as Freedom Church, putting it into our context.
00:03:33.060 How does it fit for us here in Murrysville and the surrounding area?
00:03:36.220 So what I'm asking, there's a lot of information, a lot of details I can share with
00:03:39.920 you, but I want to encourage you. We're starting this fall, in five weeks from
00:03:43.720 now, for the first round of classes. There's a two-year certificate program.
00:03:47.660 There's three different certificates.
00:03:49.400 But if you're interested at all, you say, "I just want to learn more," I want you
00:03:52.520 to scan that QR code on the screen. If you're like, "I don't know how to do QR
00:03:55.340 codes," go to our website, go to Events, find the
00:03:59.180 HCLI, or Highlands College Leadership Institute, and sign up.
00:04:02.900 You're not enrolling in school, you're signing up to get more
00:04:06.040 information. I'll be able to email you all the information this week.
00:04:09.740 So if you're even slightly interested, please sign up so
00:04:13.680 that I can send you the information, give you all the details, answer all the
00:04:16.880 questions that you have, the cost, when we're going to meet, all those things.
00:04:20.640 But I want to encourage you, we're trying to be very intentional and very
00:04:24.140 purposeful with training and equipping you, not
00:04:28.140 just to serve in Freedom Church, because all these classes, they're actually going
00:04:31.380 to help you as a Christian, as a husband, as a mother, as a parent, as a
00:04:35.380 sibling, as a follower of Jesus in everyday life as well.
00:04:38.900 So, get signed up for that, get registered, and then I'll follow up with you of all
00:04:42.860 that information. Really looking forward to more things coming in the fall, all the
00:04:46.780 exciting outreach and opportunities we're going to have as well.
00:04:49.900 But with that, let's jump into the word.
00:04:51.960 I want to put up first kind of a focus for us today.
00:04:54.580 Stand firm, trust God, don't bow. Will you repeat that
00:04:58.520 with me? Ready? Stand firm, trust God, don't
00:05:02.440 bow. And we're going to unpack each of those today, looking at the
00:05:06.500 story found in the Book of Daniel. If you're new with us, we've
00:05:10.520 been going through Old Testament stories, seeing these timeless truths
00:05:14.500 and how they apply to us today. Today's story, you can see
00:05:18.300 also on the slide, that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
00:05:21.340 How many of you ever heard of those guys? Right? Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego.
00:05:24.969 It's found in Daniel in the Old Testament.
00:05:27.220 I want to give you a little bit of the scene.
00:05:28.780 Most people know the Book of Daniel as Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, the blazing
00:05:32.180 furnace, or the fire, or they know Daniel in the lions' den, right?
00:05:36.180 Ever hear of Daniel in the lions' den?
00:05:37.940 That's going to be a little bit later in Daniel's life.
00:05:40.140 We're going to actually focus
00:05:41.800 on that fiery furnace first today.
00:05:44.020 But I want to set the context to help you understand.
00:05:47.520 So this was taking place in the land of Babylon, the ancient empire of
00:05:51.560 Babylon, which is in modern-day Iraq.
00:05:54.340 So the Middle East and Iraq is the geographical location.
00:05:57.780 It's around 600 BC, so 600 years before
00:06:01.740 Christ came. So now we're over 2,600 years
00:06:06.028 in our past from today. And we see the Babylonian
00:06:09.768 Empire was conquering and overthrowing all the other nations and
00:06:13.468 empires around it. They actually went and conquered Jerusalem,
00:06:17.408 which is where the Hebrew people were, the Jewish people at the time.
00:06:20.948 They conquered them, they took them all captive.
00:06:23.168 About 15,000 to 20,000 Jews were taken captive at that
00:06:26.628 time to Babylon. And the king, which was common to do when a nation
00:06:30.608 would conquer another nation, they would try to find the young men,
00:06:34.828 because they could take those young men.
00:06:36.268 The king actually orders this, the king of Babylon.
00:06:38.188 He says, "Find all the young, good-looking, healthy, strong men
00:06:42.048 and bring them in. We're going to train them, we're going to educate them in the
00:06:46.008 Babylonian ways." They're going to indoctrinate them
00:06:49.908 because they knew if they could get the young men to follow the way
00:06:53.888 of Babylon, they could sway the entire nation.
00:06:57.408 This is common and customary within any nation that's doing that.
00:07:01.068 We see that still applies today. When young men, when
00:07:04.928 the men of the culture, whatever direction they typically go is typically the
00:07:08.928 way of the rest of the culture. That's why statistically, when young men are in
00:07:12.788 church, when men especially are in church and following Jesus and
00:07:16.808 living out their faith, the kids in the family are four or
00:07:20.688 five times more likely to grow up following God as well than
00:07:24.628 when it's just the mom. Nothing against the moms, but man, dads,
00:07:28.448 men, you have such an influence in the younger generation.
00:07:32.428 Whether you have kids or not, you have the ability to influence the
00:07:36.168 culture around us. You have the ability to influence the next generation when you
00:07:40.168 truly walk and follow Jesus with your life.
00:07:43.728 So, this is what the king ordered. He ordered all these young men to be trained
00:07:47.568 and go into this program. For three years, they're going to be trained the
00:07:50.828 Babylonian ways. And out of all those 10,000 to 20,000 people,
00:07:55.068 four people are named in Daniel chapter 1.
00:07:58.128 Verse six, it says, "Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and
00:08:01.748 Azariah." These four young men were chosen all from the
00:08:05.488 tribe of Judah, and the chief of staff renamed them.
00:08:08.598 Many people don't know they actually have a Hebrew name.
00:08:11.048 Those Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, their names were changed to the
00:08:15.048 Babylonian names Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
00:08:19.148 We'll see how many times I can say that today.
00:08:21.428 But their names, they actually were Hebrew people, Hebrew men who
00:08:25.448 followed God, and they were given Babylonian names.
00:08:28.788 Think about our culture today. People are given their
00:08:32.708 birth name, but now many times culture's trying to change our names, trying to
00:08:36.808 get you to think you're somebody different, cause confusion.
00:08:39.808 This is such a picture of what happens around the world.
00:08:43.668 That there's an enemy, there's confusion, there's chaos, which Babylon really
00:08:47.268 represents confusion. And really any society,
00:08:51.028 government, or authority that tries to control, twist, distort,
00:08:55.368 and cause confusion in people's lives.
00:08:57.748 So here are these four young men in a foreign land with a foreign
00:09:01.688 language, foreign customs, prisoners of war, and
00:09:05.668 they're going to be trained, and they're given new names, and this training period
00:09:09.648 begins. Then we get to Daniel chapter 2.
00:09:13.198 It says, "One night during the second year of his reign." So this is actually in
00:09:16.828 that training period time of three years for these guys.
00:09:20.038 Nebuchadnezzar, who's the king, had such disturbing dreams that he couldn't
00:09:24.028 sleep. He called in his magicians, enchanters, sorcerers,
00:09:27.828 astrologers. He demanded that they tell him what
00:09:31.448 he had dreamed. Now, Babylon was, and actually
00:09:35.208 most of current-day occult worship, like
00:09:38.648 demonic, diabolical worship and activity, can be pointed back
00:09:42.548 to Babylon. These sorcerers, magicians, enchanters, astrologers,
00:09:46.748 all these things were very common in Babylon, and they encouraged it.
00:09:50.248 They promoted it. And even the king here, he calls them to come help him.
00:09:54.448 He's calling upon evil, demonic spirits to help him,
00:09:58.328 and none of these guys, none of these people are able to know what
00:10:02.228 he dreamed. Now, we give him a little bit of a pass because if King Nebuchadnezzar
00:10:06.208 has this dream, and he tells all the people, "Tell me what I dreamed." And they
00:10:09.528 say, "Well, tell us the dream and we'll interpret the dream." He goes, "No, no, no.
00:10:13.328 You, if you really are magicians, if you really are sorcerers, if you
00:10:17.128 really have this power, you'll be able to tell me what I dreamed before I tell it
00:10:21.068 to you." So none of these guys can, and they say, "Nobody could ever tell
00:10:25.048 you this. Only the gods would know, and they're not here on
00:10:28.968 Earth."
00:10:30.148 So king gets so upset, so furious, he threatens to kill them.
00:10:34.128 Instead, he's so furious, he orders that all of the wise men, all of them,
00:10:37.878 including all the Magi, all the people together in Babylon to be
00:10:41.648 executed. And because of the king's decree, men were sent to
00:10:45.428 find and kill Daniel and his friends, too.
00:10:48.388 He's going to wipe out an entire group of young, bright,
00:10:52.528 strong men because they couldn't answer his request.
00:10:56.988 So Daniel, he's going to be killed.
00:10:58.888 Daniel, he goes with his friends, and he goes to his friends and says, "Guys, we
00:11:01.508 got to pray." The first thing that Daniel and his friends did was they
00:11:05.288 prayed to the true God, to the God of Heaven. And God reveals this secret.
00:11:09.788 God actually tells Daniel and his friends what the dream was and the
00:11:13.568 interpretation. So Daniel asks to go talk to the king, and Daniel gets
00:11:17.528 before the king, and he says, "There are no wise men, enchanters,
00:11:21.068 magicians, or fortune-tellers who can reveal the king's secret.
00:11:24.468 But there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets, and he has shown
00:11:28.448 King Nebuchadnezzar what will happen in the future.
00:11:31.568 Now, I will tell you your dream and the visions you saw as you lay on your
00:11:35.068 bed."
00:11:37.348 Daniel says, "I can't tell you what your dream is." Same thing,
00:11:41.448 Joseph, if you remember in Genesis, Joseph in the Old Testament, he had dreams
00:11:45.408 that God's the one who interprets the dreams.
00:11:47.308 God's the one who gives them the ability.
00:11:48.988 Daniel follows suit and says, "I can't interpret or tell your dream, but there's a
00:11:52.788 God in heaven who can." And he actually tells—
00:11:57.004 the king what he dreamed. And what the king dreamed about was this
00:12:00.624 massive statue. This big statue that had different types of
00:12:04.224 material. There's gold as the head, there's silver in the chest and the
00:12:08.244 arms, there's bronze on the waist, there's iron on the
00:12:11.984 legs, and then iron and clay. And he depicts and explains it in detail.
00:12:15.904 He says, "This is what you dreamed about," and that there's a big rock that was cut
00:12:19.924 not by human hands, and it comes and smashes this entire
00:12:23.704 statue down to dust. He said it's like chaff in the wind that's going to be
00:12:27.524 blown away, and this rock becomes a big mountain that
00:12:31.284 covered the Earth. And then he explains what this meant is he said, "These are
00:12:35.304 representing different kingdoms. Yours, King Nebuchadnezzar, is gold.
00:12:39.604 You are the first of the kingdoms." But what he tells him also is, all these other
00:12:43.624 kingdoms that follow after you, they're all going to be destroyed.
00:12:46.864 In verse 44, he says, "During the reigns of those kings," he said, "in
00:12:50.804 all this time, all this history, the God of Heaven will set
00:12:54.904 up a kingdom that will never be destroyed or conquered."
00:12:59.224 King Nebuchadnezzar was going to die someday. His kingdom was going to fall.
00:13:03.004 As every kingdom, as every country, as every government, as every nation, it
00:13:06.904 will fall eventually. But the kingdom of God will
00:13:10.544 never be destroyed and never conquered.
00:13:13.924 It's the only kingdom that lasts for eternity.
00:13:17.324 He says, "This kingdom will crush all these kingdoms into nothingness,
00:13:21.504 and it will stand forever." Then King Nebuchadnezzar, in verse
00:13:25.444 46, threw himself down before Daniel and
00:13:29.044 worshiped him. He commanded his people to offer sacrifices
00:13:33.044 and burn sweet incense before him.
00:13:36.124 The king said to Daniel, "Truly your God is the greatest of
00:13:39.764 gods, the Lord over kings, a revealer of
00:13:43.444 mysteries, for you have been able to reveal this secret." He's in awe.
00:13:47.464 He's amazed at this man who could tell him what he dreamed and
00:13:51.404 the interpretation, and he connects it to God.
00:13:54.274 And now the king, in chapter 2, ends with King Nebuchadnezzar falls
00:13:57.924 down worshiping. It says he's worshiping Daniel, but he also
00:14:01.544 acknowledges that there is a God who's the greatest of all gods.
00:14:05.084 Again, they worshiped many gods at the time.
00:14:07.464 He says he is the Lord over kings. It's like if the
00:14:11.304 story ended there, it'd be great. Yes, the king of Babylon, this
00:14:15.064 evil pagan man, is now bowing down and
00:14:18.324 worshiping the one true God.
00:14:20.984 But something happens between chapter 2 and chapter 3.
00:14:24.084 We don't have it recorded, but scholars say about 15 to 20 years
00:14:27.984 pass by. So at this point, things continue.
00:14:30.944 Daniel and his friends, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they're in high political
00:14:34.684 office. They're given positions of power and influence.
00:14:38.104 But then we get to chapter 3,
00:14:40.224 where now these three guys that are mentioned, Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, they
00:14:44.084 would be about 30 years old. Okay so, time has gone by.
00:14:47.944 They're no longer teenagers. They've been in the culture for quite a while.
00:14:52.444 King Nebuchadnezzar has this high point at end of chapter 2 worshiping God, to
00:14:56.184 now chapter 3 that opens with King Nebuchadnezzar made
00:15:00.144 a gold statue
00:15:02.164 90 feet tall and nine feet wide. He set it up on the plain
00:15:06.044 of Dura in the province of Babylon.
00:15:10.504 He made a statue very similar from what he saw in his dream.
00:15:14.524 There's a picture of-- It doesn't describe it more than the 90 feet tall
00:15:18.524 and nine feet wide. Most people depict it as a full man statue,
00:15:22.464 kind of like the last picture. Some say it was probably like an obelisk or a
00:15:26.144 column with him on top, something such as.
00:15:28.564 We don't know exactly what it looked like.
00:15:30.584 All the Bible gives us is the dimensions of it.
00:15:33.484 But if you can picture, and this is actually almost to scale if you look at the
00:15:36.544 size of the people at the bottom, how massive, how ridiculous this
00:15:40.464 massive monument, this statue of himself.
00:15:44.764 King Nebuchadnezzar was not worshiping anything other than
00:15:48.484 himself, and he wanted people to worship him.
00:15:51.084 And actually, I think I interpret this as he heard what God
00:15:55.044 said about his kingdom and kingdom and kingdom, but now years have gone by.
00:15:59.344 More of his pride, more of his power, more of his influence, that I believe he
00:16:03.184 made this statue saying, "You know what?
00:16:05.024 My kingdom's the only one that's going to last forever.
00:16:07.404 My kingdom's the kingdom of gold." That I am the greatest, that he truly
00:16:11.384 is and believed that he was God.
00:16:14.043 He either forgot what God had said, or he just decided to go
00:16:17.924 against it altogether.
00:16:20.504 So he sends messengers in verse 2 to all the high officers, the
00:16:24.304 officials, governors, advisors, treasurers.
00:16:26.704 He went to everybody, the federal, the state, and the local government.
00:16:29.624 He went to everybody and said, "Everybody must come to the dedication of the
00:16:33.444 statue that he had set up." So they all came.
00:16:36.464 And then in verse 4, it says, "A herald shouted out." A herald is someone who takes
00:16:40.244 a message from the king and shouts it to the people, communicates it to
00:16:44.244 the people. Here's this herald, he's shouting to the people, "People of
00:16:48.304 all races and nations and languages, listen to the king's
00:16:52.264 command. When you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither,
00:16:56.244 lyre, harp, pipes, and other musical instruments," basically, if you ever hear
00:17:00.184 music, "you must bow to the ground to worship King
00:17:03.784 Nebuchadnezzar's gold statue. Anyone who refuses to
00:17:07.764 obey will immediately be thrown into a blazing
00:17:11.545 furnace. So at the sound of the musical instruments, all the
00:17:15.305 people, whatever their race or nation or language,
00:17:18.984 bowed to the ground and worshiped the gold statue that King
00:17:22.364 Nebuchadnezzar had set up." I want you to picture this for a moment.
00:17:26.325 We can just read through the Bible, or we can stop and put ourselves, imagine what
00:17:30.224 it'd be like to be in this place. This vast plain, the plain of Dura, and there's
00:17:34.124 this massive gold statue. It looks ridiculous, but it would be such an amazing
00:17:38.164 sight. What a feat of craftsmanship to build this
00:17:41.924 massive thing. And here's all the people, thousands of people.
00:17:45.804 Think of the most amazing opening ceremony of the Olympics or the
00:17:49.824 World Cup today. What's the biggest possible
00:17:53.384 celebration? And there's this dedication ceremony.
00:17:56.804 The media's there. All the government officials are there.
00:17:59.504 All the leaders are there. Everything, everyone you know, pretty much, is there to
00:18:03.504 see this massive thing. And all the music starts to play,
00:18:07.664 and everyone bows down.
00:18:10.524 What are you going to do?
00:18:13.364 with the atmosphere, the music, the excitement, the emotions.
00:18:17.224 Look, everyone else is doing it. There'd be such an immense
00:18:20.684 pressure.
00:18:22.424 The government's doing it. Your friends are doing it. Your family's doing it.
00:18:26.284 Man, everybody else is doing it. It's actually the law, and there's
00:18:30.304 a real threat attached to it that you're going to be thrown into a blazing
00:18:34.424 furnace if you don't.
00:18:37.704 But there are three men
00:18:39.404 who don't bow.
00:18:41.424 In fact, some of the other astrologers, the Magi, the enchanters, they go
00:18:45.403 to King Nebuchadnezzar and say, "Hey, there are these Jews, Shadrach,
00:18:49.124 Meshach, and Abednego, whom you've put in charge of the province of Babylon." He
00:18:52.624 says, "They pay no attention to you, Your Majesty.
00:18:55.284 They refuse to serve your gods and do not worship the gold
00:18:59.324 statue you have set up."
00:19:02.324 They tattle on them and they say, "Hey, there's these three guys, they're not
00:19:05.864 bowing down."
00:19:07.584 These men, these three young men were standing firm,
00:19:11.344 trusting God. They did not bow to worship the golden
00:19:15.004 statue.
00:19:16.564 Now, it doesn't say that they were running around protesting, shouting with
00:19:20.084 bullhorns, trying to get everybody else to get up.
00:19:23.074 They just refused to bow to the culture.
00:19:26.084 They stood their ground and did what they knew was obedient to
00:19:30.104 God. And you know what happens? Many times, we
00:19:33.464 compromise. Compromise doesn't always look like these major
00:19:37.484 things, but compromise starts with one step, but then the next
00:19:41.284 step, then the next step. These men actually stood in their
00:19:45.084 faith well before they were faced with this challenge.
00:19:48.144 Actually, in Daniel 1, it talks about how they chose not to eat of the king's food.
00:19:51.984 They chose not to defile their bodies by eating unclean food and
00:19:55.824 drinking wine. They stayed the course in honoring God with their lives
00:19:59.804 and with their bodies. So they get to this big decision point.
00:20:03.654 Their decision was already made before they had
00:20:07.604 to make the choice. They knew they were not going to bow to
00:20:11.344 anyone but God.
00:20:13.184 So Nebuchadnezzar, he flew into a rage.
00:20:15.784 He ordered that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego be brought before him.
00:20:19.664 When they brought them in, Nebuchadnezzar said to them, "Is it true?"
00:20:25.384 Now, we give Nebuchadnezzar some credit.
00:20:27.284 He didn't just take people's word, but he brought these men in and
00:20:31.024 questioned them. "Is it true that you will not bow and worship my statue?
00:20:36.264 Is it true? I've heard these rumors.
00:20:38.124 Now, standing before me, tell me into my face, will you not
00:20:42.024 bow and worship?" And he actually says in verse 15, "I will give you one more
00:20:45.324 chance to bow down and worship the statue I've made when you
00:20:49.324 hear the musical instruments." He gives them some benefit.
00:20:51.684 Maybe he said, "It's like, hey, guys, maybe you didn't read your emails.
00:20:55.264 Look, I get it. We all get them. Right? You didn't read your emails.
00:20:58.464 I'm going to give you one more chance
00:21:00.864 to bow down and worship." In case you're wondering, they didn't have email. No.
00:21:04.004 But I know nobody really thought that.
00:21:05.464 But the reality is he's giving them an option to get out.
00:21:08.584 He doesn't really want to kill these guys. He likes these guys.
00:21:12.464 Remember, they helped interpret his dream.
00:21:14.904 He knows they serve the Most High God.
00:21:18.264 But he says, "If you refuse, you will be thrown immediately
00:21:22.064 into the blazing furnace. And then what god will be able to
00:21:25.824 rescue you from my power?"
00:21:29.884 He's saying he
00:21:31.744 believes he has a power above the gods.
00:21:34.504 He believes his kingdom is greater than the Kingdom of God.
00:21:38.804 Now, it's one thing to obey God and do right, and even
00:21:42.664 defy the king when you're on your own.
00:21:45.384 But imagine these guys standing face-to-face with King Nebuchadnezzar,
00:21:49.844 the most powerful man on the planet, and he's questioning them.
00:21:54.004 "Is it true you won't bow down to my statue?
00:21:57.124 You know if you don't do this, I'm going to kill you, and it's not going to be
00:22:00.974 pleasant. You're going to be thrown into a fire, burned alive." These
00:22:04.744 young men had to stand before the most powerful man on the planet
00:22:08.644 and not break, not compromise, not give in
00:22:12.464 or bend their convictions, but stand firm,
00:22:16.204 trusting in God and choosing not to bow.
00:22:19.924 You see, what you might not know unless you know the context is these young men,
00:22:23.613 they were brought from Jerusalem to Babylon.
00:22:25.944 Most likely, they were 12 to 15 years old at the time.
00:22:29.803 So they would've had 12 to 15 years of a
00:22:32.564 foundation knowing about the God of Abraham, Isaac,
00:22:36.544 and Jacob, the one true God, the God Yahweh.
00:22:39.544 They would've known the Ten Commandments. They would've known the law of Moses.
00:22:43.444 They would've known that when there was this big idol, this statue that was
00:22:47.084 created, and they're told to bow down, their minds probably would've went
00:22:51.024 back to Exodus 20, the Ten Commandments, the second one of which says,
00:22:54.974 "You shall not make any carved idols or images, and you
00:22:58.984 shall not bow down and worship them." So now they're in this place of
00:23:02.984 saying, "Well, the king is saying we must bow down, but
00:23:06.704 God says we should not bow down. What are we to do?" And
00:23:10.664 we find this all through scripture that it's okay to
00:23:14.644 disobey government, it's okay to disobey authority,
00:23:18.644 when those laws, the law of man, violates
00:23:22.484 the higher law of God. I'm not telling everybody to go do
00:23:26.224 anarchy, to go protest, go burn down stuff.
00:23:28.844 That's the opposite of what God would have us do.
00:23:31.524 But whenever a law is passed that violates the
00:23:35.304 higher law of God, we can stand against it.
00:23:38.964 We can obey God. We see it in scripture in Exodus 1, the
00:23:42.764 Pharaoh in Egypt at the time. He ordered that all Hebrew boys
00:23:46.844 would be killed. He said, "Kill all the Hebrew boys." Like the midwives, as the
00:23:50.544 babies are born, just kill them. And the women, the midwives, they said,
00:23:54.574 "We can't do this. We fear God," and they disobeyed
00:23:58.544 the Pharaoh's orders.
00:24:01.204 The Pharaoh's law was kill the children.
00:24:03.524 God's law says, no, we protect life.
00:24:05.644 We preserve life, that we don't kill the innocent.
00:24:09.244 Later, in Acts 5, Peter and John, they're before the Sanhedrin, before
00:24:13.044 the law of the time, and they said, "Stop preaching about Jesus.
00:24:16.664 Hey, no more talking about Jesus. No more preaching the gospel." They said, "Who
00:24:20.204 are we going to obey, you or God?" They rejected the
00:24:24.104 law of man to obey the higher law of God, and they
00:24:27.904 continued to preach the gospel.
00:24:31.528 Here these guys are before the king,
00:24:35.648 and he made a law to worship this idol, but they knew they could not
00:24:39.348 worship because they had a foundation.
00:24:41.888 They had a belief in God before them.
00:24:44.428 Let me tell you, everyone who has kids, even if you don't have
00:24:48.228 kids, how important it is to train and teach our children and the
00:24:52.208 next generation the word of God, the truths of God, so
00:24:55.988 that someday, as these young men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, had 12 to
00:24:59.708 15 years of understanding God, now here they are in a foreign
00:25:03.648 land. Such as many of our universities, such as many of our workplaces,
00:25:07.888 such as many of the world that we live in, the internet alone, our
00:25:11.588 children, and the people we all are facing, we're in a Babylon.
00:25:15.128 We're in a world, a culture, that wants to remove
00:25:19.028 our Christian faith and put something else in to conform us
00:25:23.268 into the image of the world rather than be conformed in the
00:25:27.088 image of God. These young kids, these young men,
00:25:31.238 were able to stand firm, trust God, and they did not bow to the
00:25:35.148 world. That's how important it is for us today to teach our
00:25:38.928 children. That's why we emphasize children's ministry and youth ministry and
00:25:42.748 helping reach the families and reach people, because we know they're
00:25:46.628 going to continue to grow up in this Babylonian world that we live in, and we want
00:25:50.568 to help them stand firm and not bow to the
00:25:54.528 world.
00:25:56.108 So let's repeat that. Repeat these three things with me. Ready?
00:25:58.988 Stand firm, trust God, don't bow.
00:26:03.248 It's not just for the children, but it's for each and every one of us.
00:26:06.948 So Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they reply to the king.
00:26:10.358 I kind of love how it's written here.
00:26:11.528 He just says, "O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you."
00:26:15.948 Can you imagine the boldness they had?
00:26:17.528 This guy just threatened to kill them, and they know he has all the power to
00:26:21.468 do so. But they say, "We don't need to defend ourselves.
00:26:25.028 If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God whom we
00:26:28.768 serve is able to save us. He will rescue us from your
00:26:32.648 power, Your Majesty." I feel like they threw that little "Your Majesty" in,
00:26:36.948 just to make sure they're respectful.
00:26:38.418 You can respectfully disobey people.
00:26:41.388 You can respectfully disobey government and authority.
00:26:44.968 And in verse 18, it says, "But even if he doesn't, we want to
00:26:49.008 make it clear to you, Your Majesty, that we will never serve your
00:26:52.828 gods or worship the gold statue you have set up."
00:26:58.228 Even if God doesn't save us, we're still going to
00:27:02.028 serve him. Even if
00:27:04.948 we're burned up in the fire,
00:27:07.368 God can rescue us. God can deliver us.
00:27:09.548 These three men stood alone
00:27:13.448 amongst all the other people. There's nobody else mentioned that stood against
00:27:17.448 and defied the king's orders.
00:27:20.068 And many times, faithfulness,
00:27:22.348 trusting God,
00:27:24.128 looks and feels lonely.
00:27:26.508 It can feel like you're the only one at work.
00:27:29.408 You're the only one at school. You're the only one in your whole family
00:27:33.548 that wants to do things God's way, that wants to
00:27:36.808 pray, that wants to seek His word, to seek His will.
00:27:40.608 Standing out and going against the current can feel scary.
00:27:44.448 But you know what goes along with the current?
00:27:47.088 Dead fish. Living fish go against the current.
00:27:50.728 You can't go against the current unless you're really alive.
00:27:54.068 Unless you're really pushing yourself, and going against the current is actually
00:27:57.728 what strengthens you rather than just drifting with culture.
00:28:01.748 But it takes courage to stand. There's actually three
00:28:05.528 different types of faith mentioned in the Bible.
00:28:08.048 I'm going to cover these kind of quickly. But three different types of faith.
00:28:10.868 One of them we see here in Daniel, but there's another faith. It's a saving faith.
00:28:14.448 Ephesians 2, verses eight and nine.
00:28:16.688 It's when you believe and accept what Jesus did for you on the cross.
00:28:20.528 That's salvation. It's by grace we are saved, not
00:28:24.388 by works. So a faith that says we believe and
00:28:28.188 accept what Jesus did for us on the cross, that's what saves us.
00:28:31.868 There's also the gift of faith. It's a special ability that's given
00:28:35.908 to you, to rely on God in
00:28:39.728 difficult situations. It's like when your entire world's falling apart, when
00:28:43.568 everything doesn't seem like it's going right, you still have faith in
00:28:46.848 relying on God. That's found in 1 Corinthians 12, that it's a gift
00:28:50.768 that's given to you. The Spirit gives it to you.
00:28:54.208 And then the third one here we see in Daniel is trusting faith.
00:28:57.188 When you believe God is able to work on your
00:29:00.748 behalf. They had a trust, they had a
00:29:04.128 faith in God that God would deliver them, that God would save
00:29:08.028 them.
00:29:09.208 But no matter what, they were still going to be faithful to God.
00:29:12.428 They say, "King Nebuchadnezzar, we just want to be really clear.
00:29:14.848 We will not serve your gods. We will not bow down to your statue.
00:29:18.568 We serve a higher power. We serve the God of all gods."
00:29:23.768 And that
00:29:26.088 but even if he doesn't, is such a statement to
00:29:30.048 remember for ourselves because God is still good even if he doesn't
00:29:33.868 answer our prayers the way we want him to.
00:29:36.788 God is still loving even if he doesn't show up the way we want him
00:29:40.708 to. I know many of us, we face trials, we face hardships, we face things,
00:29:44.728 but even if He doesn't heal you, He is still
00:29:48.658 a healer. Even if He doesn't show up financially in the timing that you
00:29:52.728 want, He is still provider. Even if He doesn't protect you from
00:29:56.548 all trouble and all problems, He is still the deliverer.
00:30:00.328 God is still God. He is still good. He is still perfect.
00:30:03.988 He is still loving. He is still who He says He is and who He
00:30:07.888 is in His nature, even if He doesn't show up when
00:30:11.788 we ask Him to or answer all of our prayers with yes.
00:30:15.988 I'm so thankful God doesn't answer every prayer with a yes.
00:30:21.408 Can we thank God for the noes in our life?
00:30:25.208 If God would've answered everything I asked for, I'd probably be dead.
00:30:28.868 I'd probably be in a lot worse place in my life, in my relationship.
00:30:32.348 I know I would be, because all the things I wanted were not what was best for me.
00:30:36.832 But God gave me more than enough for what I needed. Just like my children.
00:30:40.752 My children ask for things. They want ice cream for every meal.
00:30:44.412 If we just give them ice cream and candy and cookies, whatever,
00:30:48.162 "Yes.
00:30:49.632 Whatever you ask of me, it's a yes." If that happens, they're going to be extremely
00:30:53.332 unhealthy.
00:30:55.172 Instead, we say no because we give them what's best.
00:30:58.952 God does the same thing for us. We go to God, we pray, "God, will you give me
00:31:02.792 this? God, can I have this? God, will you make this happen for me?" God knows
00:31:06.992 what's best for us and what's not,
00:31:10.052 and many times, his noes are actually to help us, to
00:31:14.172 save us, to prevent us from going down a path that we should never have gone
00:31:18.072 down before.
00:31:20.152 So I'm going to read through this next section, kind of summarizing and
00:31:23.652 highlighting some of the points here.
00:31:24.912 I want you to catch the story, catch what happens.
00:31:27.892 Here they are before King Nebuchadnezzar. They say, "We're not going to serve you.
00:31:30.912 We're not going to bow down. God's going to rescue us, and even if he doesn't,
00:31:34.132 we're still going to worship him. We're going to be faithful to him." So
00:31:37.012 Nebuchadnezzar, he's so furious that he has these guys ordered
00:31:41.031 to be bound up, and actually, he says, "Turn the furnace up." He said,
00:31:45.002 "Make it seven times hotter." It's like as hot as it can
00:31:48.092 possibly get. And he orders some of the strongest men in his
00:31:52.132 army to bound these guys with rope.
00:31:54.332 So they bind up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego with rope, and then they throw
00:31:58.212 them into the fire. Now, because he made the furnace so hot, the
00:32:02.112 Bible says that the soldiers themselves were consumed in the flames,
00:32:06.172 that they died themselves as they were throwing these three guys
00:32:09.792 into the fire themselves. Suddenly,
00:32:13.632 Nebuchadnezzar jumps up in amazement and he says, "Didn't we throw three men
00:32:17.852 into the furnace?" And everyone says, "Yes, Majesty, we did." He says, "But there's
00:32:21.732 four men, unbound, walking
00:32:25.192 around inside the furnace." Imagine the picture that they would've
00:32:29.032 seen. It makes sense. Nebuchadnezzar is amazed at what he's seeing.
00:32:32.812 He says, "I see four men, and the fourth one looks like a
00:32:36.712 god."
00:32:38.292 Then Nebuchadnezzar, he came as close as he could to the door of the flaming
00:32:41.892 furnace and shouted, "Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, servants of
00:32:45.832 the Most High, come out! Come here!" In verse
00:32:50.972 26, it says, "Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego stepped
00:32:54.412 out of the fire."
00:32:57.272 Remember, the soldiers that threw them in were consumed. They died.
00:33:01.492 Here they are inside the fire. They were bound with rope.
00:33:05.432 They could not get out, and the fire that they went into, they
00:33:09.312 stepped out of the fire. And then the next verse, it says that all the government
00:33:12.932 officials crowded around them, and they saw that the fire had not
00:33:16.752 touched them. Not a hair on their heads was
00:33:20.572 singed. Their clothing was not scorched.
00:33:23.472 They didn't even smell of smoke.
00:33:27.732 What an amazing
00:33:29.892 story that happened. This isn't just a fairy tale.
00:33:32.132 This is a real-life event. These men were thrown into a fire
00:33:36.012 bound, but what did the fire do? It didn't consume them, but it
00:33:39.972 did burn up the ropes.
00:33:42.012 It burned up the very thing that was binding them, holding them back,
00:33:45.932 holding them down, and many times, God doesn't prevent us from the
00:33:49.932 fire, but he joins us in the fire. He won't prevent you
00:33:53.932 from all trouble or all hardships. Jesus actually said, "Trials will come.
00:33:57.972 Temptations will come. Problems will come." But he joins
00:34:01.592 us in the fire. He doesn't just let us go on our own, but he's
00:34:05.452 right there with us. That fourth man in the fire, they say, is a Christophany.
00:34:08.632 It's a foreshadowing. It was Jesus himself, Christ himself,
00:34:12.712 in the fire. He's the one who unbound them. He's the one who protected them.
00:34:16.232 He's the one who let them walk out of the fire.
00:34:19.272 And I know every single one of you have experienced fire in your life.
00:34:22.572 You've experienced difficult situations, difficult
00:34:26.132 seasons.
00:34:27.592 You get to step out of the fire. On the other side, when we trust
00:34:31.372 God, we don't bow down. We stand firm in our
00:34:35.372 faith. These three men had such a testimony
00:34:39.272 that their ropes were burned up.
00:34:41.533 It's like a piece of metal. When a blacksmith puts a piece of metal in the
00:34:45.212 fire, it's not to destroy it, it's to heat it up so that it's
00:34:48.752 malleable, that it can be forged into something.
00:34:51.953 But also, that heat makes it stronger.
00:34:54.892 The tempering of it makes it stronger.
00:34:57.212 The trials and the fire that we go through in life, God allows it to
00:35:00.872 happen so that we aren't just a piece of metal that's a paperweight, but to be made
00:35:04.792 into something useful, we have to go through fire.
00:35:08.212 We have to go through trials. We have to go through those difficult pressure
00:35:12.212 seasons because God wants to forge us into
00:35:15.732 something useful and something stronger for him.
00:35:19.552 Amen? Amen. God used this fire to forge these men and
00:35:24.212 be useful to point an entire nation to himself.
00:35:27.152 Verse 28, King Nebuchadnezzar said, "Praise to the God of
00:35:31.132 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
00:35:33.272 He sent his angel to rescue his servants who trusted in him.
00:35:37.672 They defied the king's command." He's talking about himself.
00:35:40.162 "They defied me and were willing to die rather than serve or
00:35:44.112 worship any god except their own God." Now imagine if the
00:35:48.072 king gave them a pass. What if the king was like, "Hey, guys, I really
00:35:52.112 like you guys. I don't want to do this, so we're just going to move you farther
00:35:55.872 away. We're going to send you somewhere else.
00:35:57.592 I'm going to send you away on a mission trip," or whatever.
00:36:00.472 What if he just said, "You guys, we just keep it quiet, okay?
00:36:02.612 If anybody asks, you bow down." But what if he gave them a pass?
00:36:06.072 What if God prevented them from having to go into the
00:36:09.832 furnace?
00:36:11.072 Then they wouldn't have been able to point people to God nearly as much as
00:36:14.972 coming out of the fire unsinged, unscorched, not even
00:36:19.052 smelling like smoke. Imagine the testimony this entire
00:36:22.792 nation, the king himself, has to declare that no
00:36:26.612 one can rescue like this God.
00:36:30.272 There is no other God who can rescue like this.
00:36:34.612 Verse 29.
00:36:37.764 The trials and the fires and the things in our life,
00:36:42.084 if God prevents us from ever going through them, how can He receive the glory?
00:36:45.864 How can we be strengthened? How can we be sharpened?
00:36:47.784 How can we be refined to be molded into His image?
00:36:51.604 So my prayer is that you would see your past and all
00:36:55.564 those trials and all the fires and all the hardships as something that you
00:36:59.524 can learn from, that you can grow from, that you can see how God is moving in those
00:37:03.544 things. But also the next fire that comes.
00:37:06.664 Maybe you're in a fire right now. Maybe you're in a difficult situation right
00:37:10.524 now. You have a difficult diagnosis. You have a difficult relationship.
00:37:14.484 There's something going on in your life right now.
00:37:17.284 I want you to know this, there is no other God who can rescue like our
00:37:21.184 God.
00:37:22.424 Amen?
00:37:24.424 So let's put that, stand firm, trust God, and don't bow.
00:37:26.924 Let's repeat it one more time. Stand firm, trust God,
00:37:31.284 don't bow. 1 Corinthians 15:58. It says,
00:37:34.854 "Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm.
00:37:38.924 Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves
00:37:42.544 fully to the work of the Lord because you know that your labor in the Lord is
00:37:46.484 not in vain." We're going to stand firm.
00:37:49.904 We're going to trust God and not bow to the image or the
00:37:53.764 world or the culture that's trying to shape us.
00:37:57.204 But there is one person we bow to.
00:38:00.084 We can stand against everybody else, but there's one that we will bow to.
00:38:03.924 In Philippians 2:10, it says that, "At the name of Jesus,
00:38:07.964 every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the
00:38:11.964 earth, that every tongue will confess that Jesus
00:38:15.804 Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the
00:38:19.464 Father." Will you stand to your feet, please,
00:38:22.884 if you're able?
00:38:25.944 We stand firm in our faith. We stand firm
00:38:29.864 trusting that God is the one who saves us.
00:38:32.464 We stand firm with that gift of faith, believing that God is still good
00:38:36.404 no matter what our situation or our circumstances look like.
00:38:40.374 We stand firm, trusting that God is able to work on our
00:38:44.304 behalf, not according to our will, but according to His.
00:38:48.944 Will you stand firm, trust God, and not bow
00:38:53.144 to the world, not bow to the culture, but be firm
00:38:56.904 in Christ?
00:38:59.264 And then also to say, "God, we bow down to you.
00:39:02.224 God, we bend our knee to you. We confess with our mouths to you, God, that Jesus Christ
00:39:06.584 is Lord. Whether we believe you are or we've made you
00:39:10.504 our Lord, you are Lord of lords and King of kings, and we
00:39:14.964 don't want to wait till heaven to bow, but we bow to you now.
00:39:18.004 We confess to you now. May our lives demonstrate
00:39:21.334 to others and to this world that we will not bow
00:39:25.104 down to the world, we will not bow to culture, but we bow down to the one
00:39:29.004 true God, the God of heaven and earth."
00:39:32.994 "God, we thank you, Father, that you left heaven and came to earth,
00:39:37.284 that you didn't just shout from a distance, but you ran into the fire.
00:39:41.604 You went into the storms. You went into this world.
00:39:44.544 You went into death itself and conquered it so that we
00:39:48.404 could step out of the fire, we could step out from this world, we could step
00:39:52.404 out from the past that we have and our sins and our lives and the
00:39:56.204 stuff that's been put on us, that we can walk in freedom,
00:40:00.644 and God, that we could point others to freedom as well."
00:40:03.774 "God, I pray for every single person here, everyone listening to this online,
00:40:08.164 God, that we would stand firm in you. God, we would trust in you.
00:40:12.584 We would not bow to this world, but God, we serve you and only you.
00:40:17.144 God, I pray you'd give us our next step and help us surrender our lives more fully to
00:40:21.124 receive the honor, the praise, and the glory for everything
00:40:25.084 we do in our lives. God, use us, forge us,
00:40:29.064 refine us. God, allow us to go through the fire with
00:40:33.124 you and come out on the other side. I pray, God, you burn off all the
00:40:37.084 ropes, all the bondage, all the stuff that's holding us in, that's
00:40:40.844 trapping us and keeping us from fulfilling the
00:40:44.584 purpose that you have given us.
00:40:47.624 God, I pray you give us our next step and help us surrender our lives more fully to
00:40:51.264 you. In Jesus' name, I pray. Amen."
00:40:55.124 Amen. You guys can be seated. Sly's going to come on up.
00:41:00.344 Again, you're welcome to stick around for second service. Come back for a cookout.
00:41:04.164 We're going to have a great time.