October 27, 2019 – Reformation Text: Daniel 3:17
Dear Friends in Christ,
Have you ever been hot? I mean beyond the usual summer temperature, the raging fire or the hot flashes. You are sticky and suffocating and sweat is all over your body. It’s as hot as hell and you can’t find any relief. All because . . .
“THE HEAT IS ON!”
Just ask Hannaniah, Mishael, and Azariah. Maybe you know their VeggieTales names: Shack, Rack, and Benny. In Daniel 3 they are called by their Babylonian names – Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
It’s 6th century BC and these three Hebrews stand on a plain in Babylon in the midst of 300,000. They had better blend in, bow down and sell out. King Nebuchadnezzar has made a golden statue standing 125 feet high. He then declares that everybody better bow down or the heat will be on.
Surely these three will assimilate. Peer pressure. What’s wrong with doing it once? You know, fellas, I am not a big fan of fire.
We know, don’t we? We stand in a culture with millions telling us to conform to the present evil age. We are called to confess the Son of Man before men and we shrink like a little rag doll. We think it would be better to be comfortable and compromising then face the heat.
When faced with putting the best construction on things, when faced with moral compromise or get along to graduate or get promoted, we fudge a little with God’s Word. Who is going to be hurt if I do it just this once? I don’t want to be roasted like a s’more on the campfire of life.
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, are ready to take the heat. “If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us.” Nebuchadnezzar gets so mad that he orders the furnace to be set seven times hotter. It is so hot that the men who take them up to dump them in the furnace die from the heat just by being in the vicinity.
What happens when three stand against 300,000? What happens when the baptized take a stand? What happens when believers say that “enough is enough and I will not bow down to political correctness and amoral standards of behavior.” Nebuchadnezzar can answer that in Daniel 3:25: “Look! I see four men walking around in the fire, unbound and unharmed, and the fourth one looks like a Son of God.” There is always a fourth man in the furnace. Always!
He is the same Son of God, Son of Man, who has been given authority, glory, power and the one who all the nations worship. He writes our names in His book and He delivers us on the last day from the eternal fire so that we have the fullness of everlasting life.
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego make a bold stand and the result is hair that is not singed, clothing that isn’t burnt and they don’t even smell like smoke. Try not smelling like smoke the next you are around a campfire! Only the Son of God’s protection can save these men from not smelling like a bowling alley.
This same Son of God enters a furnace once again. This time He is against the world. The heat is on. It is sweltering and sticky and suffocating. The Palestinian sun is out and the sweat is rolling down His bleeding body. It is as hot as hell, because that is what He is up against, because of your sin and mine. He has cracked lips and a parched throat. “I thirst!”
Three days later He comes out of this fire alive and unbound. He makes this promise from His heart to yours: “When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze; for I am the Lord, your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.” (Isaiah 43:2-3)
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego made a bold confession. In 1517 there was another bold confessor and then many bold confessors. They refused to bow down, or blend in, or sell out. Martin Luther, Philip Melanchthon, John the Constant were just some of the names. In 1530, they presented the Augsburg Confession that begins with Psalm 119:46: “I will speak of your decrees before kings, and I will not be ashamed.”
It all started when Luther read the Book of Romans. “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” “Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more.” “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were great confessors of their faith. They said in Daniel, “But even if God does not save us now, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship your image of gold.” God is empowering us to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord and that there is new life in Him. To confess that the three solas of the Reformation are the true and correct exposition of the Word of God – grace alone, faith alone, Scripture alone – and that they all point to free salvation in Christ crucified alone.
In the name of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit, we refuse to blend in, bow down or sell out to any person, ideology, movement or government that would rob us of the Gospel. When the heat is on, we will take our stand. God help us!