Daniel 3

Well, good morning.

Let me add my personal welcome to the welcome already mentioned. We’re just thrilled everyone is here today, and it is my privilege to preach God’s Word. I want to invite you to turn to Daniel chapter three—prophet Daniel chapter three. Now, this is one of those passages that I am sure you know to some extent, and sometimes one of our challenges is to look at a passage like this and let it just wash over us, as God’s Word does what only God’s Word can do. I can remember knowing the background and the story from the time I was very, very small, and it has lost nothing of its power. But there is more here than you might remember, so we’re going to read it whole. This is the Word of the Lord through the prophet Daniel.

“King Nebuchadnezzar made an image of gold, whose height was sixty cubits and its breadth six cubits. He set it up on the plain of Dura, in the province of Babylon. Then King Nebuchadnezzar sent to gather the satraps, the prefects, and the governors, the counselors, the treasurers, the justices, the magistrates, and all the officials of the provinces to come to the dedication of the image that King Nebuchadnezzar had set up. Then the satraps, the prefects, and the governors, the counselors, the treasurers, the justices, the magistrates, and all the officials of the provinces gathered for the dedication of the image that King Nebuchadnezzar had set up. And they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up. And the herald proclaimed aloud, “You are commanded, O peoples, nations, and languages, that when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, you are to fall down and worship the golden image that King Nebuchadnezzar has set up. And whoever does not fall down and worship shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace.” Therefore, as soon as all the peoples heard the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, all the peoples, nations, and languages fell down and worshiped the golden image that King Nebuchadnezzar had set up.

Therefore at that time certain Chaldeans came forward and maliciously accused the Jews. They declared to King Nebuchadnezzar, “O king, live forever! You, O king, have made a decree, that every man who hears the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, shall fall down and worship the golden image. And whoever does not fall down and worship shall be cast into a burning fiery furnace. There are certain Jews whom you have appointed over the affairs of the province of Babylon: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. These men, O king, pay no attention to you; they do not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

Then Nebuchadnezzar in furious rage commanded that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego be brought. So they brought these men before the king. Nebuchadnezzar answered and said to them, “Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, that you do not serve my gods or worship the golden image that I have set up? 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?”

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. 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. 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.”

Then Nebuchadnezzar was filled with fury, and the expression of his face was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He ordered the furnace heated seven times more than it was usually heated. And he ordered some of the mighty men of his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and to cast them into the burning fiery furnace. Then these men were bound in their cloaks, their tunics, their hats, and their other garments, and they were thrown into the burning fiery furnace. Because the king’s order was urgent and the furnace overheated, the flame of the fire killed those men who took up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. And these three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, fell bound into the burning fiery furnace.

Then King Nebuchadnezzar was astonished and rose up in haste. He declared to his counselors, “Did we not cast three men bound into the fire?” They answered and said to the king, “True, O king.” He answered and said, “But I see four men unbound, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods.”

Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the door of the burning fiery furnace; he declared, “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out, and come here!” Then Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego came out from the fire. And the satraps, the prefects, the governors, and the king’s counselors gathered together and saw that the fire had not had any power over the bodies of those men. The hair of their heads was not singed, their cloaks were not harmed, and no smell of fire had come upon them. Nebuchadnezzar answered and said, “Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel and delivered his servants, who trusted in him, and set aside the king’s command, and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any god except their own God. Therefore I make a decree: Any people, nation, or language that speaks anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego shall be torn limb from limb, and their houses laid in ruins, for there is no other god who is able to rescue in this way.” Then the king promoted Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the province of Babylon.”

A few years ago, I was introduced to Shadrach. I was preaching, and a man came up and he said, “This is my pastor,” and the pastor’s first name was Shadrach. That’s a great name for a preacher. It is, however, a Babylonian name. We remind ourselves of what comes in Daniel chapter one and Daniel chapter two, and we know that this is the result of the exile, and as typical in the ancient Near East, Nebuchadnezzar and others, before and after him, who had been involved in the exile, even as they conquered Jerusalem and they took off the holy things and took them away, they also took the cream of the crop. It was a captivity particularly in which you had Nebuchadnezzar in the tradition of others, and again, those before him, and they sought to bring the young men—particularly who would’ve been the leadership class for the people of God—and they brought them to be a part of the leadership class of Nebuchadnezzar’s empire.

They renamed them. They had Jewish names, as you remember from the text. They gave them these Babylonian names: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. And of course this is the prophet Daniel, and Daniel in chapter two interprets one of Nebuchadnezzar’s dreams. And this is something also—which is very much a part of the court in the ancient Near East—you would have kings, and they would be surrounded by all their advisors, and there would be all the paraphernalia of royalty, and you would know when they’re coming because there’s some kind of music is played, and so you are to bow down and prostrate in order to be ready to show your absolute obedience.

You look at this, and now we come to chapter three, and what’s interesting is that in chapter two, Nebuchadnezzar recognized Daniel’s unique ability to interpret the dream—that’s what happened again, of course. And even as he recognized Daniel’s unique ability, he recognized that it was Daniel’s God who gave him this ability. I’m speaking this way because this is exactly the way Daniel tells us to speak. And then in chapter three, of all things, Nebuchadnezzar sets up this giant idol, and even as we look at the text, we realize the dimensions of this idol are massive. Nebuchadnezzar made an image of gold, whose height was 60 cubits and its breath six cubits. He set it up, and then he gathered all the people and the paraphernalia of his empire and said, “I want you to worship this idol; you shall do so according to this formula, and the one who will not worship and bow down to this idol shall be cast into the fiery furnace.” In all likelihood, this was the god Nibu or Nibo.

It’s in Nebuchadnezzar’s name. The Babylonian meaning of Nebuchadnezzar is likely Nebu — protect your heir. And so there’s an idolatrous name from the pantheon of Babylonian gods that is in Nebuchadnezzar’s throne name, so in all likelihood, this was an idol to his throne god. And so it is obedience to Nebuchadnezzar, It’s the recognition of his imperial power—the power of life and death as we know—and it was also the power of Nebuchadnezzar’s god, this idol that was set up that is to be acknowledged in this court worship, which was dictated over and over again in this passage. In this case—the three Jewish young men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego—there’s, evidently, jealousy about them in the court. With Nebuchadnezzar, you have these outsiders who were brought from Jerusalem, who now have these powers in offices that are placing them in authority, and a court intrigue is found in every court. Just don’t ever miss this. Wherever there is a court, wherever there’s a power, wherever there is a king or an emperor, wherever there is a president or a prime minister, there is going to be a struggle for influence and power and proximity to the king.

Now, even as Nebuchadnezzar made this a matter of imperial primacy—that one is to, at the right time, with the right signal, is to show obeyance and bow down and worship the idol that he has set up—even as he does that, with all the stipulations and all the royal authority, which is repeated throughout the text, these three young men will not bend the knee, they will not bow down to the idol. They are committing, in effect, a capital crime. And they were detected doing so. The king had made an edict, he had handed it down, that if anyone does not bow down to this idol with specific instructions about when it is to happen, then they are to be thrown into the fiery furnace, and a part of that is also a part of the horror of the idolatry and the paganism, which is frankly common in many places of the world in terms of history and perhaps even recent history. But in the ancient Near East, the ruins of high places, where people were burned to satisfy the anger of the gods, those places are still discovered also just to our south – in Central and South America.

The idea is that you burn human beings as a sacrifice to placate the deity, so that the deity’s wrath will not be poured out. Some of this was just for placation, some of this was for fertility. You get the point: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego are now enemies of the state, they’re enemies of Nebuchadnezzar because they are the enemies of Nebuchadnezzar’s god. They will not bow down and obey him, and so they’re brought before the king, and you notice, the king doesn’t skip a beat. He does exactly what he said he would do. He orders that the three young men shall be thrown into the fiery furnace, and they are, and it’s a very quick sequence. They’re thrown into the fiery furnace, but even as they’re thrown into the fiery furnace, the soldiers of Nebuchadnezzar, who put them into the furnace, they are consumed and killed, but then as they look inside the furnace, they see four men. Three were put in. This is a puzzlement to everyone involved.

Nebuchadnezzar says that this is Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and an angel. Certainly true—the angel of the Lord is there with them. It’s a picture of Christ; it’s a foretaste of things to come. They’re not alone in this fire. They’re not alone in this furnace. They’re not singed. Nebuchadnezzar orders that they’d be brought out of the furnace, and they were brought out of the furnace, and when they came out, you couldn’t even smell smoke. This is clearly an undeniable indication of divine protection, and this God—whoever protected Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego—guess what He just did? He just bested Nebu.

Nebu may be sitting out there in the plane with his golden head, but you know what? Yahweh, Jehovah just saved his three men from the fire and was even present with them in the form of an angel. So notice what Nebuchadnezzar does, and Lynn, look at it carefully, because I think you might find that you misremembered this, so let the text correct us. “Nebuchadnezzar answered — verse 28 — and said, ‘Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel and delivered his servants who trusted in him… Therefore, I make a decree—in verse 29—any people, nation, or language that speaks anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego shall be torn limb from limb and their houses laid in ruins, for there is no other god who is able to rescue in this way.'”

Now, if you just go over one chapter and you go to chapter four after Nebuchadnezzar’s, well, his—it’s a sequence of dreams—it also means that at one point he is reduced to being like a beast, and then he’s brought out of that and he is restored, look at verse 34: “At the end of the days, I Nebuchadnezzar lifted up my eyes to heaven, and my reason returned to me, and I blessed the Most High and praised and honored him who lives forever, for his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, ‘What have you done?'”

Now, this is where I think we have to be careful. We have to be very careful because, I think, as Christians reading this text, we overread it instinctively, alright. So we don’t want to underread a text, we don’t want to overread a text, we don’t want to miss anything that’s in it, but we don’t want to see anything in it that’s not in it. Okay, so what’s in it? Nebuchadnezzar recognizes the power of the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He recognizes even the superior power of the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego over even his own tribal deity. In chapter four, he speaks, as we just saw and just read of Yahweh, of Jehovah: “His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endured from generation to generation.” At the end of the passage, he says: “None can stay his hand or say to him, ‘What have you done?'” Now here’s how you overread the text.

We need to note what Nebuchadnezzar said and what he didn’t say. He didn’t say—there’s only one God, and that is the God of Israel, the God who has made covenant with this nation and has shown his faithfulness to them, he’s the Creator of the entire universe, he is the Lord overall—he doesn’t say that. He keeps speaking of the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, or the God of Daniel. And so we have something here that is very significant. It’s very significant. Nebuchadnezzar is led to the point where he has to recognize his deity—the image of which he has just set up in order to be obeyed—that deity is not as powerful as the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. But he’s not a convert. History records he’s not a convert.

We underread the text by saying, “Well, this is just some kind of court expression.” No, it’s a lot more than that. But you can overread the passage by saying he has now become a follower of the one true in living God. That he hasn’t done. He hasn’t done that, and it requires some careful look at the language to recognize that’s not what he does. He doesn’t speak of his god now being the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. And so you look at this, and you recognize, well, you have taught in the Scriptures that one of the most basic fundamental truths about God is expressible in the term monotheism. It’s one of the most basic theological terms: there is only one God. That is one of the major points of the entirety of the Scripture. There is only one God. There is not a pantheon of gods, and this is one of them. There is only one God, and that means exactly according to the logic of the Old Testament, all other gods are false idols.

Then we know that monotheism is contrasted with another big word, which is polytheism, and if mono means one, poly means many, so polytheism means—it’s a belief system that recognizes the existence of many gods. And so whatever is happening here in Babylon is some form of polytheism, but it’s a specific form of polytheism, and once I mention this third term, it explains exactly what’s going on here. That term is henotheism, H-E-N-O-theism, and that means a hierarchy of gods. That’s what’s going on here. This isn’t monotheism, not at all. That idol is there. This is not mere polytheism—just a bunch of gods, choose one— it’s henotheism, which means the gods themselves are understood to be in battle, and some are stronger than others, some are weaker than others, some have this particular talent, others don’t have them. But as he sees the god who can save Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from the fire, well, this is a powerful god. And so powerful that Nebuchadnezzar does not want this God’s wrath. He would rather have their God’s protection, so anyone who says anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego now is the enemy of the empire.

Okay, let’s just face it. This is an amazing story. It’s just absolutely amazing. There’s a reason why you’re not going to find a children’s story Bible that doesn’t have Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in them. You’re just not going to find it. You’re not going to find a book that doesn’t have it, because you can’t miss this story. In one sense, it is one of these focal passages in the Old Testament that just tells us again of the faith of Israel and its obedience to the one true and living God. Israel is being punished in this passage, in this exile, for its disobedience, but praise be to God—there is a remnant. Praise be to God. There is a remnant, and that remnant is represented here by Daniel, but in this very chapter by Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

Okay, there’s something else here, and this is not an easy passage to read aloud, formally, and it’s not because we don’t want to miss this. Daniel, chapter three is also biblical satire. I detected a little sense of it as I was reading the text; I detected some of you were thinking, “This sounds ludicrous.” Yeah, it does. Daniel wants you to see all of the folderol about Nebuchadnezzar, for all the stupidity that it is. Look at it again. “Therefore, — Nebuchadnezzar rules, — you are commanded, O people’s nations and languages, that when you hear the horn, the sound of the horn, pipe, lie, or trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, you are to fall down and worship the golden image that King Nebuchadnezzar has set up.” Over and over again, just look at verse seven: “Therefore, as soon as all the peoples heard the sound of the horn, pipe, lie or trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, all the people’s, nations, and languages fell down and worshiped the golden image the king Nebuchadnezzar had set up.”

Verse 10: “You, O king, have made a decree that every man who hears the sound of the horn, pipe, liar, trigon, harp—do you get it, do you get it, okay—bagpipe and every kind of music shall fall down before the image.” Over and over and over and over again. This is Daniel making fun of the ridiculous court language. This is the way the pagans do, they just pile up titles for themselves. Who is Charles? Who is Charles III, King of Britain? Oh no, the titles are like a page. He’s the duke of this, he’s over the dukedom of that, it’s this little kingdom of this, the principality of that, where you find a throne—you find a lot of words. That’s what you find. You find a lot of advisors, which means you find a lot of idiots, and you find a lot of words.

This is a very wordy business. And it just goes on and on and on and on and on, and this is why, even as Daniel is giving this by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit—this is the inerrant, infallible Word of God—we are given an exact record as Daniel wants us to have it. It kind of turns into a weird Disney movie, where some idiot in an animated figure is introducing the king and simply says et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. That’s what this is. And so on the one hand you have this depiction of henotheism, this horrible paganism in its effect. You also have this picture of human power and its manifestations, but it’s a picture of biblical courage. That’s why we’re drawn to this. We’re not drawn to it because of the satire, and we’re not drawn to it because of the mere depiction of ancient Near Eastern henotheism. We’re drawn to it because of the example set for the people of God by Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

We are living in a time which is not just like this time. We are not facing a great idol set up on the National Mall, between the Capitol and the White House, and with a certain signal, we are all being called and commanded to worship and bow down before that idol. That’s not the shape of our challenge, and yet it is. It’s not exactly, but it’s not exactly not either. Christians alive in this generation, and I speak particularly because there’s so many young people in the room and you make us very happy. We know—and I speak to those who are the students at Boyce College and the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, I speak to all those who are, well, younger than I am, and that means the vast majority of you—you are going to see things, you are going to face challenges, you’re going to face worldview opponents, the likes of which we have not seen in our time. You are going to face forms of idolatry, you are going to face forms of moral coercion, the likes of which Christians in this country have not yet seen. I don’t pose as a prophet. I don’t have to. The signs are already there. The warning signals have already been sent. The shapes of the arguments are already there. The offices are already in place. The officials are ready for action.

A cake baker in Colorado who is well known for his artistry made headlines again this week. Some of you may have seen it just in the last few days because Colorado passed a non-discrimination ordinance that says that he can’t, even in his artistic expression, refrain from using that artistic expression for that which he finds sinful, which is to say making, say, a same-sex marriage wedding cake. And he has defied the regime, and he’s been defended in court—the Alliance Defending Freedom, other wonderful Christian attorneys have stepped in. And we keep talking about him because it keeps coming back. Jack Phillips, they keep coming at him. No sooner does it go all the way to the Supreme Court, and at least on procedural grounds, the Supreme Court offered him some protection, but not all that much because just a matter of days, if not hours later, they’re on him again.

A transgender person goes in the bakery and demands a cake with a message that he won’t write, and just this week, again, on procedural grounds, the Colorado Supreme Court said, “Not this time,” but they’ll be back. They’ll be back. And this is a period, say, from 2018 to the present. So this is our time, and this kind of thing is coming. I am continually contacted by executives, companies, and professionals in the various professions who say to me, “I feel a tightening of the noose.” I understand what’s happening right now in medical schools. The pro-abortion side is working very hard to make it virtually impossible that you can graduate from medical school without some rotation that involves participation in abortion. And the reason is—this has already happened to some other countries, and you can imagine what they are—it’s already happened to some other countries where they say, in order to reduce the stigma of abortion, we’re going to require anyone who will graduate from medical school and get a medical license to participate in an abortion, just so that there is no one in this profession, who has not participated in an abortion.

If you don’t bend the knee, you can’t be a doctor. If you don’t bend the knee, you can’t be a cake baker. It’s not the same as being thrown into a fiery furnace, but it is the same logic. It is the same pressure to conform. It is the same coercion, it is the same, it is the same opposition, by the way, to monotheism. So as we think about the great worldview clash of our day, when you think about the issues of the L-G-B-T-Q revolution, you think about the challenges to religious liberty, you think about the war upon the unborn, and you look at all of this, you recognize that the only resistance to this movement is monotheism, that the only opposition is that there is one God, and it is he who made us in his image, and it is he who declared that every single human being is made in his image, and thus every single human being is a divine gift and is to be protected at every stage of life and development from fertilization until natural death.

If you don’t have monotheism, brothers and sisters, you’re going to have abortion. And the same thing’s true: who gets to say what marriage is? Who gets to say who a boy is? Who gets to say who a girl is? Who gets to say any of these things? Well, if you don’t have one true and living God, then you’ve got nothing more than a political struggle to see who wins, for a time. One of the amazing things about the contour of our current challenge is that the people on the other side are absolutely certain that they’re winning. They’re absolutely certain that they’re winning. Their frustration is not that they’re losing, their frustration is that they’re not winning fast enough.

And so I don’t mean to put this in crass political terms, but you can’t avoid the political terms. You look at a map of the United States, and on the east and on the west you’ve got — blue, and then in the middle of the country — red, and the red is slowing down the agenda of the blue, and the blue is getting a lot more frustrated, a lot more frustrated. So I look at it in the room, and I just want to tell you something; here’s one of the signs of God’s favor, okay — believers in the Lord Jesus Christ breed. Be thankful for that this morning. One of the ways that happens, by the way, is that we actually know by God’s general and special revelation who a boy is and who a girl is. We also know what marriage is, and we know that we are not only a created people, but we are a commanded people: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.”

A friend in Seattle a few years ago sent me an article, and the article was by a professor at a very liberal institution, and most of them are—most of the professors and most of the institutions—and I mean really liberal. And so this was a response of this professor to the fact that progressivist leftists in the United States have a very low marriage rate compared to others, a delayed childbearing rate, and then a smaller childbearing rate. So they’re not having babies. I know some are, but just by and large they’re not. Babies get in the way. They’re not a help to get tenure at Harvard. They’re little needy people. And so this particular professor was saying, “We have a problem, because as you look at red and blue America, blue America isn’t having babies. Red America is. And so we have a problem. These conservative families—go-to-church people—they have babies.” And then he said, “But then I realized we win in the end. We win in the end because they’re going to raise them, they’re going to change the diapers, they’re going to feed them, they’re going to take care of them, they’re going to nurture them, and then they’re going to turn 18, and the minivan’s going to drive up to my campus, and they’re going to dump them out, and then he’s mine.”

That’s what they believe. And you know what? They’re right. They’re right. We have far too many Christian families who just show up and open the minivan door, and out goes the 17- or 18-year-old, and he comes back a pagan. She comes back a pagan, because that’s what they say. If you just will let them change the diapers and do all the feeding and all the… then they drop ’em off in their mind. Now, obviously, this is a generalization. It doesn’t happen in every single occurrence, but the point is—on America’s college and university campuses, you know what’s set up in the middle of the lawn? An idol. And you don’t see it, but it’s there. You look at the secularization of American higher education; it doesn’t leave a vacuum. It’s filled with something, and it’s an idol, an idol of ideology, of critical theory, of—you name it. It’s an -ism.

Last night I was reading—from the left—a leftist critique of political progressivism. Now, political ideological progressivism is pretty far left. So if you’re reading a leftist critique, it is like someone who looked at Mao and said, “Not tough enough.” Way out there, but it was helpful. That’s why I want to look at some stuff like that. And this book is really, really helpful. Because critiquing, say, the tenured left on American college and university campuses, this particular theorist said, “They’re just not radical enough. This isn’t working fast enough.” Let me ask you a question about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. I want to ask a why question, a who question, and a when question.

Okay, so the why question is: why didn’t they bend the knee?Why didn’t they bow down the idol? And the answer is—they can’t. Because they know who is the one true and living God. And so the who question is who told them that God did. All you have to do is look, for instance—I’ll just mention one book—the Book of Exodus. It is just so clear about the false gods and the true God, and God commanded you can’t bow down to any other God. “You shall have no other gods before me.” Which, by the way, is a recognition of the temptation then of henotheism. It’s there; it’s present now too in the hierarchy of political identities and ideologies. But the why question and the who question have to be accompanied by the when question, and so I want to ask you, when did they decide they could not bend the knee? When did Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego decide, “When the idol is put up and we are commanded, we can’t bend the knee?” When did they decide that?

Well, I want to suggest to you, they had to have decided it long before they saw the flames. They had to have decided it probably long before they were taken captive. They must have decided it long before they were taken as exiles to Babylon. They must have decided long before Nebuchadnezzar offered this command because they didn’t have to think about what not to do; they already knew what not to do. That’s instructive for us too. When will we make the determination that we will not bend the knee? Here’s my warning. You better do it before the trigon, and the harp, and the loot sound. You better make that determination before a Nebuchadnezzar hands down his decree, and we better mean it when we say it.

One last thing in this text, I want us to see. It’s astounding. Look at verse 18. Well, I’ll tell you what, go back to 16, just so we get the full paragraph. “Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego answered and said to the king.” Remember, this is when they’ve been brought before him and they’ve been accused of not bowing, and they were guilty as charged, the king has said they’d be thrown into the fiery furnace. “Then this Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego answered and said to the king, ‘O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. 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.'” Notice what they said. Notice this doxology in one sense, this statement of absolute defiance: “Our God is able to deliver us.” And you’ll notice they said, “We don’t have to think about what to say. We don’t have to come up with an answer because the answer is clear. We’re not going to bend the knee, and our God is powerful to deliver us.” Okay, that’s great, right? I mean, that’s what we want to say. That’s where the children’s Bible is going to incline us. God is able to deliver us.

We need to know that and believe that. But that’s not even the reason why I’m pointing to this paragraph. It’s the next sentence, verse 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.” Wow. Brothers and sisters, this is astounding! And this is what’s missing from the memory of so many believers about this passage, because what we remember is that our God is able to deliver us, and he does; but we don’t remember they went on to say, “But if not, we’re still not going to bend the knee.”

Okay, so what do we do with this? “Our God is able to deliver us, but if not…” The but-if-not in this case is not a question as to whether he’s able to deliver, it’s a historical question, “Does he deliver us now?” And notice that they understand the promise of deliverance. They do. They understand the promise of deliverance. Our God is able to deliver us. And there’s this massive trust in God, the one true in living God. “He’s able to deliver us, but if not, be it known to you, oh king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

I want us to think about this for just a moment. And that next sentence, they don’t say, “Well, maybe he’s, on the other hand, not able to deliver us.” That’s not what they mean. Clearly, they mean maybe he doesn’t deliver us now. Okay, so I want to offer to you a doctrinal expression that I never heard before I offered it, and you’ve never heard before, I think. I believe this is a doctrinal truth, but you understand I’m saying this—it’s not a new truth. I didn’t receive some visit from an angel this morning. I didn’t hear a voice when I was shaving, crying out to me, “Here comes a new doctrine.” All I mean by this is, we have a new way of expressing what the Scripture teaches. It struck me that what this passage points towards is a doctrine of eschatological vindication, a doctrine of post-mortem vindication. Shadrach, Mishach and Abednego realized that even if they went into the fire and their bodies were consumed, even if Nebuchadnezzar and all his satraps and princes and governors—and you know the list—even if they left that day thinking, “Our God just bested their God,” there’s going to come a day–you know the words– “When every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord the glory of God the Father.”

Have you thought about this? We’re not promised in this life vindication. I’d like it. I’d like to have a parade of people come and apologize to me for having the wrong position on any number of issues. I’ll admit, I’d get good sleep the night before in order to be; I don’t want to miss a bit of this, alright? I’ve done so much engagement in the media in which I just look at people and go, “Hey, the scariest thing is I think you actually mean this and I don’t think you’re lying, I’d feel better if you were.” And there have been all kinds of situations in which we look at a cake baker, or we look at a medical student, or we look at a student in a high school who’s in trouble for doing the right thing and saying even the word “God” or offering some kind of Christian identity. We look at people who are being coerced.

We look at the power that is on the professions, look at the coercive power on the campuses. We look at the power of the government, we look at all this, and we would like immediate vindication. I’d like an apology sent to many people in this country from the US Department of Justice. I don’t think that letter’s going to come. But you know what? The Scripture tells us that we’re not promised vindication in this life. We’re not promised vindication in this age, but the Lord will vindicate his truth.

I don’t want to leave us just in Daniel. I want to give you a word of exhortation from the New Testament. Hebrews chapter 11. There is no time to read the entire chapter, as wonderful as that would be, but I just want to refer to the closing paragraphs of Hebrews chapter 11. Beginning of verse 17:  “By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, ‘Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.’ He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back. By faith Isaac invoked future blessings on Jacob and Esau. By faith Jacob, when dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, bowing in worship over the head of his staff. By faith Joseph”, and then you see Moses, but we’re going to have to skip down and look at verse 32, just for the sake of time. “And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets—  who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises – that sounds good – stopped the mouths of lions – Daniel –quenched the power of fire, – Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, – escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Women received back their dead by resurrection…” Okay, so good so far, but then listen what follows? It’s in the same paragraph. It’s saying the same spirit. It’s the same assurance. “Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated— of whom the world was not worthy—wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.” Now look at verse 39 and 40, just live on this.  “And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.”

Okay, so as we close. Three men put into the furnace, four men seen. Nebuchadnezzar says, it’s an angel of their God. It certainly was. It’s also a promise of Christ. And we look at this, and we recognize—we are not alone. We are never alone. We can even be tortured. We can be sawn in two, and we are not alone. Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were rescued out of the fiery furnace so that their clothing was not singed and they didn’t even smell of smoke. But God doesn’t promise that to all his people in trial. He does promise that there is coming a day when all things will be known and he will execute perfect judgment and demonstrate infinite righteousness. And on that day, all of those who are His will be vindicated, not because of who we are, but because of who Christ is. It would be nice to have that vindication in this life, but we’re not promised it. But that’s okay. We’re promised it on that day.

But in the meantime, we’re called to faithfulness, and that faithfulness is going to be costly. And we better decide now that we’re willing and determined to pay whatever the price, and then to await the glorious vindication of the one true and living God, who will not let a single hair of his own be lost forever. Let’s pray.

Father, we are just so thankful for this passage in your Word, how we’re thrilled to It. Father, may we not only be thrilled to It, but be instructed by It. We pray that your Holy Spirit will apply this Word to our hearts to produce in us the courage of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego for the challenges to which you have called us and every person in this room. Father, we pray this in the confidence of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and in His name we pray, amen.