Serving God in the Furnace (Part 1 of 2)

When the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar erected a golden image in his own honor he required everyone bow down and worship it. For those who refused, a fiery furnace awaited. So why didn't Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego simply go along with the crowd?

Today on Truth for Life, Alistair Begg considers their resolve and asks, what will we do? Daniel 3 and verse 1, Kim 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 Nebuchadnezzar had set up. And they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up. Then verse 4, And the herald proclaimed aloud, Your 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 had 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, the pipe, the lyre, the trigon, the harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, all the peoples, nations, and languages fell down and worshipped the golden image that King Nebuchadnezzar had set up. Therefore, at that time, certain Chaldeans came forward and maliciously accused the Jews. And then they point out that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who had so recently been exalted to a position of usefulness, are the very ones who are leading the charge against the whole notion of bowing down to this gigantic statue. As a result of that, they are called, as we will see, and the king asks them if this is actually the case, and they reply that, yes, it is the case, verse 18, but if not, if we're not delivered, let it be known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.

I think we'll just leave it there. Father, thank you that we have the Bible open before us. We pray that you will enable us to understand what it says, to believe what it conveys, to obey your Word, and to trust resolutely in you, the God of all faithfulness. For we pray in Jesus' name.

Amen. Well, I hope we're beginning to get the picture here of the impact of this book that is penned by Daniel, perhaps with a little help from his secretaries, as it conveyed the truth of God's faithfulness to the exiles, some of whom had been caught up in the first wave along with Daniel and his friends, others who were coming later. There were actually three waves, if you check the historical books, that brought these exiles finally into the bondage of Babylon. And in chapter 1, we saw that God, who is sovereign, had guided Daniel in his faithfulness and in his friends to a position of honor in Babylon, and he, the same God, guides his faithful people in the world. In communicating that, the need that was being addressed was that God's people would inevitably be wondering whether God was actually in control of everything, whether he was really in control of these foreign powers and deities.

And if he was not, the temptation that was there was for them to compromise. In chapter 2, we realize that the God of heaven is the God who deposes and sets up kings, and he will, in the end, bring all human kingdoms to an end and will establish his own everlasting kingdom. Now, here in chapter 3, in what is one of the most well-known parts of Daniel, we discover that in the context of what is apparent defeat, that God is able to deliver his people from the furnace, expressly from this immediate incident in this fiery furnace, but the very experience of exile is referred to in Isaiah as God's people being in the furnace of captivity. And he is making it clear that whether God does act in deliverance or whether he doesn't, that God's people must serve him as God even if their refusal to bow to the foreign gods results in their death. Now, it's in light of that that we come to the chapter. And I want to quote the old Puritan who had had a great number of points in his morning service. At one point he had said, 17thly, and feeling somewhat sorry for his congregation in the evening, he said to them, I realize this morning my sermon had a tremendous amount of points.

I want to be good to you tonight. My sermon tonight will be pointless. And this study in chapter 3 is essentially fitting that framework. We're going to, as best we can, simply follow the narrative, and hopefully you will come up with a very, very good outline of your own, which you can give to me afterwards and I will use when I try and preach this again. All right, the end of chapter 2, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego are promoted.

They now have a new profile, an increased profile, and as a result of that, they are not able to go under the radar when it comes to the command of the king. There is quite a change in Nebuchadnezzar from the end of chapter 2 to the beginning of chapter 3, verse 47. The king said to Daniel, Truly your God is God of gods and Lord of kings and a revealer of mysteries, for you have been able to reveal this mystery. And as a result of that, he gave Daniel high honors and so on, and Daniel, being a good fellow, wanted his friends to be included in the promotion, and that's how they end up where they are here. But now we are in chapter 3, and King Nebuchadnezzar, who obviously liked the idea of being told that in the description that Daniel had given of the dream, that he was the golden head of the operation, and apparently, with the elapsing of time, and there is some significant passage of time between the end of chapter 2 and the beginning of chapter 3.

It's not days, weeks, months—it's years. And whether Nebuchadnezzar has just simply grown forgetful of what he said, or whether his great protestation of allegiance or interest in God had been ultimately only skin deep, or whether pride had just simply crept up on him as a result of being able to experience what it meant for him to be the head of gold, we are unable to actually say, but what we do know is that he has now determined that it would be a great idea to build this fantastic statue that was going to climb into the sky, and he was going to set it up on the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon. Now, why would it say, in the province of Babylon?

Don't we know that? Well, again, there's nothing in there that is inconsequential, and the writer wants us to realize that he's doing it exactly there in the province of Babylon, in the realm of Shinar, which is where the Tower of Babel was erected, as we reminded ourselves the other morning in Genesis chapter 11. And on the occasion when they erected the Tower of Babel, you remember they said, Let us make a name for ourselves and build this great tower. And here, says Nebuchadnezzar, I think that's a great idea, and I'm going to make a name for myself, and I'm going to make sure that everybody knows about me and everybody understands just who I am and what I've done. Well, pride reveals itself in all kinds of ways, and dramatically so here, as he gathers all of his satraps and prefects and so on. And again, the emphasis is important.

What he's doing is he's putting together the main body of his officials at the occasion of the dedication so as to show to the surrounding peoples that at the very heart of his organization, there is a unified commitment to what he wants, namely for these people to bow down before this great statue. And the organization is pretty good, as you would see. They've got the various instruments in there.

When the band plays, that will be your signal. And I notice that you found the introduction of bagpipes quite interesting. I presume that was your sniggering.

It's not uncommon. The English have bowed down before our bagpipes throughout all of the wars, and they may not be the most tuneful of instruments, but they do strike fear into the average Englishman. And I, for one, am quite happy about that. But of course, the great threat that accompanied the music was that if you don't, when you hear the music, bow down, then you will be cast into a fiery furnace. This, of course, was not rhetoric, as the people would know. One cross-reference will help you in this.

I'll give it to you. Jeremiah 29, where in Jeremiah 29 we read of two individuals who fell foul of Nebuchadnezzar in relationship to these things. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, concerning Ahab, the son of Coliah, and Zedekiah, the son of Messiah, who are prophesying a lie to you in my name. God says, Because they are lying to you and are using my name to do so, I will deliver them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and he shall strike them down before your eyes. Because of them, this curse shall be used by all the exiles from Judah to Babylon.

And here's the curse. The LORD made you like Zedekiah and Ahab, whom the king of Babylon roasted in the fire. So Nebuchadnezzar was a real bad character. And when he made his threats, they were not idle threats. Therefore, this is no small thing for Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to be confronted by this challenge. And the furnace itself was a significant affair.

I don't know much about these things. Only what I read and what I read suggested that these furnaces in Babylon were constructed a bit like some of our nuclear power plants in some ways. Or like a railway tunnel with struts that went up that had openings in the top that provided the opportunity to bring in air. And the fuel was charcoal. And with the right circumstances, it could be heated, we're told, to 900 or to 1000 degrees centigrade.

So, perfectly good for a very, very good pizza and for a very, very burned hot dog. And certainly providing no difficulty in just taking a life into itself. And so it is, we're told, that as soon as all the peoples, verse 7, heard the sound of the horn, you bet your life, the peoples and the nations and the languages, they fell down and worshiped the golden image. It's quite a salutary picture, isn't it? Of the king somehow or another having a vantage point, perhaps from being up here like this, and he looks out over a scene that would be the lake scene without water. And all he sees, as far as I can see, are the bowed down heads and the robes and the headdresses of people who are as senseless in their response as the statue to which they respond. I've long believed that Paul Simon has read definitely his Old Testament a great deal. I think that the opening line comes out of the Psalms.

I haven't had a chance to check with him. Hello darkness, my old friend, I've come to talk with you again. That's a line from the Psalms, not directly. And the people bowed and prayed to the neon god they made.

And here they bow down in a picture of absolute subjugation. And in verse 8, the protagonists emerge, the pivotal event in the story appears, and at that time certain Chaldeans came forward and maliciously accused the Jews. They came to the king very obsequiously, and they reminded him of what he had done. And once again, for emphasis, there is the repetition back through the instrumentation. The reminder as if the king needed a reminder that whoever doesn't fall down and worship shall be cast into a burning fiery furnace.

And then here we go. There are certain Jews whom you have appointed over the affairs of the province of Babylon. In other words, this is a bad idea on your part, king.

You should have known that in the first place. You appointed them, the inference being we would never have appointed them, and they don't pay any attention to you. They don't serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up. Now, as a result of that, we're told, verse 13, that the king, in a furious rage, commanded that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego be brought. And so they bring them in, and Nebuchadnezzar says to them, Is it true that you don't serve my gods or worship the golden image that I've set up? Now, he doesn't wait for an answer.

It's rhetorical. He says, However, I'm going to get the bagpipes cranked up and the trigon and the lyre and the pipe and the horn. I'm going to give you a chance. I'm going to give you one more chance. Okay, fellas, get ready now. Play that funky music, white boys. Come on.

You get that going. And I'm going to give you a chance, fellas. You have one more chance to bow down. Verse 16, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, We really don't need to give you an answer in this. If this be the case, 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. It's quite striking, isn't it? Now, if only we could be reading this for the first time. It's one of the great benefits of a Christian home that you know these stories from your infancy. I often wonder what it must be like to come to the Bible in later years and for all of these stories to be brand new to you. So you start reading through Daniel, and you come to this, and you get to this verse here, and you're saying to yourself, I wonder what happens next.

Do they go for it, or what do they do? And that's what the first readers must have been saying, because it's written to them. And as they read of the event concerning these three men, and the story is read out for them, they're listening and saying, what are they going to do?

Are they going to bow down to this thing, or what will they do? And Nebuchadnezzar verse 19 is then filled with fury. The expression of his face was changed.

Interesting detail. And the order of the furnace heated seven times more than it was usually heated. That means he got it as hot as he could.

I mean, a thousand degrees is not going to make any difference to, I mean, what's a few degrees between friends when you're fried? No, but what does it tell us? It tells us about the nature of the miracle.

This is not, somebody can come up with some story, well, it wasn't really very hot on a Tuesday, he didn't get it, usually it's hot. Don't you love it when people try to make the miracles, you know, explain the miracles by making the miracle bigger than the miracle actually is? You can find it in William Barclay's commentaries where, you know, Jesus didn't walk on the water, the boat was only at four inches, and that's why it looked like he was walking on the water.

You're telling me he got a boat that weighs like half a ton with 12 guys in it, and it floats in four inches of water? That's a bigger miracle than the jolly miracle itself, for goodness sake. No, you don't have to try and fix the Bible. Just leave the Bible as it is. God knows what he's doing. He knows what he wrote. Now, here we go.

What is it? They don't pay any attention to you. Well, that wasn't true. But what should they do? What would you do?

What will we do? After all, they didn't have to take it seriously. They could bow down on the outside but not on the inside. After all, they thought a statue was a bit of a joke, and God knew that they thought that. Therefore, they could have said, well, we're not really hurting anybody by doing this. I mean, nobody's harmed by it. All the kind of routine rationalizations of contemporary American evangelicalism would very quickly be brought into play to explain why it was that it really is a bad idea to do anything other than just get with the program and join the group.

But what do they do? No, we're not going to do that. Why not?

Well, it made them feel good about themselves. No. Why not?

Well, they like to be part of the big group. No, I'll tell you why not. I'm going to read to you why not. You shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, by showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. In other words, they obeyed God because they must obey God.

Not because it worked out best for them, but because God is to be obeyed. You see, when we take our Christian lives into the realm of that which is most suitable, amenable, comfortable, understandable, we largely begin to extract it from the context in which what it means to be a disciple of Jesus actually says. And to the extent that we have done that, we make ourselves peculiarly vulnerable if the day does come when the only thing that will actually hold us to the line is simple, straightforward, unerring obedience to the Word of God. That God has said this, and therefore, whatever it might be, and I resist again, as I said the other morning, the temptation to go down all kinds of rabbit trails in my own mind.

Many of you are filling in the blanks. You're sensible people and you understand this. Today's message reminds us that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were determined to obey God no matter what the consequences. Now, what causes that kind of steadfast confidence, and how can we take a stand in our generation when so many around us seem to be willing to compromise? That's the topic of Alistair's brand new book titled Brave by Faith, God-Sized Confidence in a Post-Christian World.

Alistair warns that today's culture is becoming progressively less tolerant of Christians and our beliefs. The book Brave by Faith draws from Daniel's experience and encourages us to remain firm in our faith, to trust God entirely even when it seems like no one is willing to stand with us. As you read this book, you'll be challenged to think ahead about how you will respond to a trial before the trial arrives. Request your copy of the book Brave by Faith when you donate online at truthforlife.org slash donate or give us a call at 888-588-7884. And if you'd like to purchase the book as an audio download, it's available in our online store along with the Brave by Faith study guide that's perfect for small group discussion. You'll find all of these resources on our website at truthforlife.org slash store. I'm Bob Lapine. Be sure to listen tomorrow as Alistair reminds us what we can count on in the midst of the fire to keep us from melting in the heat. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life where the Learning is for Living.