Backfire!

Pastor author and Bible teacher Alan writing whatever I will maybe let not trip the Christ follower into any distraction from true worship idols are cute they are harmless, they are tolerable, they are death agents tools of demons and tricks of hell designed to enslave us and in the end they all must come down for life in a whole I'm Daniel Britton excited for you to hear the teaching today. In the series called Daniel is presented in an older church in North Carolina. If you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program.

I will make sure you know how to get our special resource right now you can be yours for your donation this month to Alan Reich ministries as you listen to today's message go deeper as we send you today's special offer. Contact us at pastoralan.org or call 877-544-4860 that's 877-544-4860. More on that later in the program but now let's get started with today's teaching here is Alan Wright were in a series on on Daniel is remarkable stories and today we get to the story about his friends in the fiery furnace onsets and it's a what a story is a story about the redemptive nature of God's plan how it's amazing how sometimes the enemies attempts can just backfire on this is part of what makes I think law-abiding citizens find extra hearty laughter and the stories of criminals following justice seems a little sweeter when the wrongdoer has a plan that backfires on them and and he's caught by his own mistakes, therefore they are. I love is a luxury about 20 of these things, but true stories. For example, drug possession. Defendant Christopher Jensen while on trial in Pontiac, Michigan, claimed that he been searched without a warrant, and the prosecutor reported that the officer didn't need a warrant because there been a suspicious bulge in Mr. Janssen's jacket that was suspected to be a gun.

The defendant who happened to be wearing the same jacket in court that day handed over the garment to the judge, so the judge could examine it, whereupon the judge discovered in that pocket a packet of cocaine and the article said the judge laughed so hard that he required a five minute recess to compose himself or in Colorado Springs. A man robbed a corner store at gunpoint and after the cashier put the cash in a bag. The robber spotted a bottle of scotch back behind the counter and demanded that we put in the bag as well.

The cashier refused saying I don't believe you're over age 21, where, believe it or not, a dispute arose over the robber's age, until finally, the article says the thief relented and showed his drivers license as proof of essay cash is that all right after you are over 21 gave him the Scott and of course probably call the police with the name and address of the robber but my favorite story is about a lineup that took place at the police station.

The DA had requested a robbery victim to come in and to look at the lineup of five people.

The suspect was actually the last of the five and each man in the lineup was told he needed to step forward and say the words, give me all your money and I also like some change in quarters dimes and nickels and then step back and so each of the people in the lineup. They stood for the night said their lines just as they were supposed to, until it came to the suspect who by this time had gotten agitated and stepped forward and blurted out that isn't even what I said I you might be at arranging spiritual but I tell you this. No weapon formed against you shall be able to prosper. And in fact your would-be thief in the enemy, the serpent of old is gonna come subject to the redemptive plan of God, and in fact of the matter.

Those things that the enemy has meant for evil. God has a way of bringing about for your good.

The message today is called backfire the day the enemies plan backfired on him. It's a message about Daniels three friends and it is a message about your victory and mine in Jesus Christ.

In Daniel chapter 3 about 600 years before Christ.

Daniel and his three good friends Shadrach me shack and Abednego that's their Babylonian given names they they are deported as part of Nebuchadnezzar's policy sacked Jerusalem. He destroyed the temple and Daniel and his friends found himself favored even though they are foreigners, but when Nebuchadnezzar constructs a 90 foot golden statue and demands that everyone bow down and worship the image every time they hear the music Daniels friends. They refuse, and we pick up the story in Daniel chapter 3 at verse eight.

Therefore, at that time certain Chaldeans came forward and maliciously accused the Jews.

They declared king Nebuchadnezzar, O king, live forever you a king and made a decree that every man who hears the sound of the hornpipe large Dragon heart bagpipe in every kind of music shall fall down and worship the golden image. 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 me shack and Abednego these men okaying pay no attention to you.

They do not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set the Nebuchadnezzar in furious rage, commanded that Shadrach me shack and Abednego be brought so they brought these men before the king Nebuchadnezzar answered and said to them isn't true. Shadrach me shack, Abednego, that you do not serve my God to worship the golden image that I've set up that if you're ready when you hear the sound of the hornpipe large Dragon heart bagpipe in every kind of music you fall down and worship the image I 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 me shack Abednego answered and said to the king.

Oh Nebuchadnezzar, 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 okaying, but if not, be it known to you okaying that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up. Then Nebuchadnezzar was filled with fury and expression of his face which changed again, Shadrach me shack and Abednego he order 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 me shack Abednego and cast them into the burning fiery furnace. Then these men were bound in their cloaks or tunics or 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 me shack, Abednego these three men, Shadrach me shack and Abednego fell down into the burning fiery furnace, thinking Nebuchadnezzar was astonished and rose up in hazy declared to his counselor. Do we not cast three men bound into the fire answered and said to the king true okaying any answers said but I see four men unbound walking in the midst of the fire and they are not hurt in the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods, Nebuchadnezzar came near to the door. The burning fiery furnace.

He declared Shadrach me shack and Abednego servants of the most high God come out and come here Shadrach me shack and Abednego came out from the fire and the satraps the prefects the governors and the kings counselors gathered together and saw that the fire had not any power over the bodies of those men, their hair, 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 me shack and Abednego, who sent his angel delivered his servants who trusted in him, and set aside the king's command and yield up their bodies rather than serve to worship any god, except their own God. Therefore I make a decree any people may share language speaks and now everything begins to change the story seem this began with King Nebuchadnezzar having a terrible dream.

It was a dream that was very troubling to him and he couldn't rest until he really understood it, and so his soothsayer said toasted drinking that will give you its interpretation. He said no.

Here's what I demand. I need to really know that that that that someone is really heard of supernatural revelation and so I demand that knowledge you give an interpretation of the dream, but you must tell me what it is that I actually dreamed and of course all of the Wiseman said no one but the gods know what you have dreamed it is impossible.

No one can do this and yet it was the Nebuchadnezzar issued a royal edict and said that unless someone told him his dream and the interpretation of the dream that all of the Wiseman in the land would be destroyed and Daniel and his three friends would have been included in that mass execution so either out of desperation or great faith or both.

Daniel declared that he would get the revelation that the king required, and indeed the Lord showed Daniel, the king's dream and its interpretation. In short, the dream foretold the ultimate demise of Babylon and the rise of three more political empires that would be followed by 1/5 kingdom they would start small but would be unshakable and would take over the world challenge right will have more teaching moment. Today's important series. It's shocking how quickly American values have changed.

Suddenly, most people don't go to church or have a biblical worldview. Everything has changed so much that maybe you feel like a foreigner in your own culture.

I was a Christian supposed to live in a post-Christian world we fight against it. We decide our light in the midst of it. We pull away from it. These are the same questions that faced a young exile named Daniel in Babylon 600 years before Christ.

Though he was an alien God showed the young man favor when you make your gift to Alan Wright ministry today will send you Pastor Alan's eight messages on Daniel of favorite foreigner in an attractive CD album on a USB thumb drive or through digital download is our way of saying thanks for your partnership.

You may feel like a stranger in this world is God should favor to gain his farmland God's grace is upon you today. Your gift today will only help you walk in the grace of God during these troubling times will also help someone else.

This ministry is only possible and prayerful support listeners like you when you give today will send you today's special offer call 877-544-4860 877-544-4860 or come visit Pastor Alan.org today's teaching now continues here once again is Alan Wright what was Nebuchadnezzar's response to Daniel's prophetic insight was it to fall on his knees and trust in the great God of Daniel. Not at that time it was not. Was it to wisely start strategizing for some sort of succession plan to the front.

No, instead what the king did was he built a giant statue and image laden with gold that stood 90 feet high, held a big dedication ceremony and heralded an edict commanding that all peoples, nations and languages whenever they hear the sound of music there to fall and worship the image when people are lost and afraid because of the inevitable destruction of their earthly hope they gravitate towards idolatry. That's what causes idolatry. If you don't have a relationship or connection with with the living God than the desperation to have a God, and the longing to get some sort of assurance that there will not be the demise that you fear causes you to set up an idol and idol is something that you construct with your own resources exalted as life-giving and invite others to worship it along with you and I will is something that is lifeless, but it is attributed as if it has life-giving power idol could be almost anything some people it might become money monies. Money is a useful thing but if you begin to think the way that I can deal with my fear of the uncertainty of the future is to simply fill my bar and filled us.

My bank account more more if you think that that is your assurance, then it can become an idol to you and many people worship at the idol of materialism or it could be something like approval of others. If I say I must have everyone's approval for really feel good about my life.

Then it can become and I see what we have no assurance of final and full blessedness construct golden images to give us a false sense of security. It is those who know that they are fully, finally and forever blessed that have no need for idols.

Jeremiah prophesied actually to the Babylonian exile and this was part of his prophetic word from the Lord. Every Goldsmith is put to shame by his idols for his images are faults and there is no breath in them. They are worthless work of dilution at the time of their punishment. They shall perish every Goldsmith is put to shame by his idols because the idle void of any real power serving only as an anesthesia for angst but never a cure mocks the idol maker. Here's how it happens if you say I have to have money, then the idol that you put on the shelf called called money and wealth looks down at you in any time the stock market takes a little depth. It laughs in your face, and now you feel worse than you did before you ever put it on the shelf. If you ever said well I have to have the approval of others, and you make an idol out of it you put it up on the shelf in the first time that somebody rejects you, it hurts all the more, and your idol laughs that you would mocks you and says look, you've been rejected and then you find yourself trying all the harder to win others approval. See the answer to the idol of of money are the idol of approval or any other kind of idol you might ever have in your life is not to actually find and fulfill a sufficient supply of money or approval. The answer and the piece comes only when you take the idol down off of the shelf. The answer comes when your idols turn to dust answer comes when you're connected to the living God, who says whether you have money are you don't have money. Fear not for I am with you one who says to you whether you get approval from others or you do not, I have approved of you, through Jesus Christ, and my shed blood, so idols must come down. Whatever the idol may be. Let not it trick the Christ follower into any distraction from true worship idols aren't cute.

They aren't harmless, they aren't tolerable. They are death agents tools of demons and tricks of hell designed to enslave us and in the end they all must come down to Daniel's three friends.

They knew God, they knew God was the giver of life.

They knew God to well to be enamored with the statue, or any statute.

They knew that it was a phony idol that had no breath to give their refusal to worship the idol was not just a mere adherence to the 10 Commandments.

It was a relationship where in they knew the source of life.

It was essentially as if the Hebrews were saying we will be more alive in your furnace even if our bodies burn because we will be worshiping God, then we would ever be.

Simply breathing an existing outside of the furnace with no God.

We are more alive, praising the Lord than we are getting all the acclaim of the world to turn away from the living Lord to a lifeless idol is to turn away from life itself. He who seeks to keep his life loses that, but he who loses it for my sake, finds it and the king's henchmen. Not only did not understand this sort of thinking, but they hated they hated the fact that these Hebrew young men would not bow down to the statue and therefore they hated the men and when Nebuchadnezzar learned about it. He himself was enraged. He was furious because when you refuse to worship someone else's idol idol maker is threatened.

The world just hates it when you won't bow down to the world's idols. It's an ultimate threat to someone's worldview when you don't need what they say that you need and if you ever see somebody who is not subject to all the idols of the world is not enamored by the things that the world is enamored with who sees the glittering 90 foot golden image and does not have any need to bow down to it, there be two things that happen many, many people would want to throng and be around such a man and find out what the secret of the peace and joy was in his heart, but those the power wielders the brokers the religious elite and aristocracy they would decide despise such a one, and so it was with Jesus.

Jesus just came and had no need for any of the golden idolatrous images because he had an uninterrupted and perfect fellowship with his father in heaven and the crowds crushed in upon him to learn and hear the words of life, but those who were the powerbrokers. They despised him and so it was that Nebuchadnezzar was furious and he mocked and he said you will be thrown into my fiery furnace, and he asked the all important question who is the God who will deliver you out of my and it's as though the text says, good question.

Your Royal highness, glad you asked.

It we got a story to tell you so me shack Shadrach and Abednego come and appear before the king, and he says will you bow down and they say no thank you and he says to them, how dare you define my order do not realize I can snuff out your lives with just a motion of the finger a look of my and not of my head and they said we don't really even need to talk to you about it they didn't fight with the king they didn't put the king down. They didn't try to start a revolt they just said we don't have any need to talk about it because some things in life are just nonnegotiable's and this is one of them. We don't worship idols, and we know the Lord and so we can do it where we're not going to worship this lifeless thing and then they said our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand.

Oh king, but be it known to you oh king that we will not no matter what serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up beloved. Here is a theology you could build your life upon our God can and our God will but no matter what I will praise him still God can deliver us out of this party furnished how God will deliver us out of your hand but if it doesn't come in the way in which we envision it happen was still not going worship your idol and were still going to praise the Lord because at the end of the day. King whether our bodies are burned up in the fire or whether we are spared from this fire. At this time, the end of the day all God will still be alive on his throne, and your statute will still have no breath or power whatsoever.

God can God will write today's the data enemies plan backfired on. It's shocking how quickly American values of changed suddenly most people go to church or have a biblical worldview. Everything has changed so much that maybe you feel like a foreigner in your own culture. I was a Christian supposed to live in a post-Christian world we fight against it. We decide our light in the midst of it.

We pull away from it. These are the same questions that face the young exile named Daniel in Babylon 600 years before Christ. Though he was an alien God showed the young man favor when you make your gift to Alan Wright ministry today will send you Pastor Alan's eight messages on Daniel of favorite foreigner in an attractive CD album on a USB thumb drive or through digital download is our way of saying thanks for your partnership. You may feel like a stranger in this world is God should favor to gain his farmland God's grace is upon you today. Your gift today will only help you walk in the grace of God during these troubling times. It will also help someone else.

This ministry is only possible and prayerful support listeners like you when you give today will send you today's special offer call 877-544-4860 877-544-4860 or come visit Pastor Alan.org idols are talked about much every day, at least in those terms. I don't think it seems to be a little bit of an archaic word may be, but but they really are just as prevalent and dangerous. Today is at all absolutely. Idolatry is is prevalent is prevalent today is any any day. It just comes up in different forms, but any time day know that we say my eye okay II believe in God but also need to have you fill in the blank in order to be happy and fulfilled that that likely becomes an idol in our life. And so this story about giant. I that Nebuchadnezzar built is just a reminder to us of how much God opposes all idolatry is a daily email devotional that matches today's teaching delivered right to your email inbox free. Find out more about these and other resources@pastorallen.org that's Pastor Alan.org. Today's good news message is a listener supported production of Alan Wright ministry