...But Daniel
Notes
Transcript
Have you ever had an unexpected event happen in your life?
This is Peggy Johnson, and Peggy lives in Texas on 6 acres of land.
And something really unexpected happen to Peggy a couple weeks ago because a couple weeks ago she was cutting her grass and while she was in the middle of her yard with no trees around,
a snake fell from the sky and landed on her arm and began to attack her.
But it actually gets worse, because it turns out did not just fall from the sky, but it was dropped by a hawk.
So now the hawk ends up attacking swooping down and attacking Peggy for steeling its prey.
So now the hawk and the snake are both attacking her,
So finally the hawk gets the snake but the snake is wrapped so tightly around her arm that it was not coming off.
And she says it took about 15 seconds to finally flail the snake off.
Anyone have a new fear unlocked.
Charlie are you still okay cutting the church grass?
But you know on a serious note unexpected things in life happen a lot don’t they?
And sometimes they can be so much more destructive then that.
Because a lot of times when an unexpected event happens its not just a 15 second problem, but it is something that can shake your life.
a fire happens and you loose everything
A job lays you off or and all the sudden you are thinking what now.
A dream you have been working for flops and all the sudden you catch yourself wondering was everything leading to this a waste?
You receive a diagnosis, and the uncertainty of the event sends your mind spiraling and thinking of every single outcome.
And this morning we are starting this new series called in the fire and we are looking at the story of a few guys named Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abendigo
And really where we are today starts with an unexpected event.
And so we will be in Daniel 1 and we will not get to every verse (for the sake of time) but we are going to just start in verse one and two. Because this tells us what the unexpected event was. It says this:
1 In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it. 2 And the Lord delivered Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, along with some of the articles from the temple of God. These he carried off to the temple of his god in Babylonia and put in the treasure house of his god.
So this is a very fast start to the story because it starts with in the third year of Jehoikims reign Jeruselum was besieged, by Babylon forcing them to surrender or be destroyed.
and not just that but it says that that the Babylonians take some of the items from Gods temple and bring it to the temple of their false god.
And in the ancient world this was to show that their god had defeated your god.
And so essentially it sent a message that your god is either dead or weak and not worthy of worship.
And so I want you to see the picture that is painted here.
because their city is captured,
It would have been severally weekend and damaged
Their king was killed
They now how a new nation rulling over them
and on top of all of this they are thinking our God is weak and defeated.
But it actually gets worse because look in verses 3-7 it says this:
3 Then the king ordered Ashpenaz, chief of his court officials, to bring into the king’s service some of the Israelites from the royal family and the nobility—4 young men without any physical defect, handsome, showing aptitude for every kind of learning, well informed, quick to understand, and qualified to serve in the king’s palace. He was to teach them the language and literature of the Babylonians. 5 The king assigned them a daily amount of food and wine from the king’s table. They were to be trained for three years, and after that they were to enter the king’s service. 6 Among those who were chosen were some from Judah: Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah. 7 The chief official gave them new names: to Daniel, the name Belteshazzar; to Hananiah, Shadrach; to Mishael, Meshach; and to Azariah, Abednego.
So they take the best people in Jerusalem (making Jerusalem even weaker)
and you can picture these people leaving everything they own and all of their friends and family and they are forced to walk to Babyloin by foot.
Does anyone know how far that walk is?
It is far! it would have been roughly 1678 miles by foot and a lot of scholars believe this would have taken 4-5 months a
And you can picture them on this long walk reflecting on the aftermath.
And whats interesting is this is part of the process of that the Babylonians would use to try and make these Jews abandon their God and ideology and follow the Babylonians god and ideology.
Its almost like how a lot of you know I ran a marathon,
And I ran it through world vision (which is a charity) and at the end of the marathon you are beat up, or at least I was.
I mean mentally and physically I could not move.
And there are all of these tents at the end for these charities, and they have music, food, massage tables and they are trying to convince you that you should run for our charity next year because you come to the end and you have a mesuse waiting for you.
Look how much pain you are in and how good it is over here.
And in a way this is what Babylion is doing because these people are mentally, physically and spiritually dead,
But they come to the end of this walk and approach one of the most powerful and beautiful cities of the ancient world
And they are given the best food (which Jews were actually not supposed to eat) and wine
And they were educated like the Babylonians
and not just that but the 4 men we talked about (Daniel, Shadrack, Mishack, and Abendego),
Had their names changed from these names that actually signified they worshiped their God,
to names that signified they followed the god of babyloin.
And I just imagine all of this happening and them go maybe we should not worship our God, because when we followed him we were taken over, and things were terrible, but now things seem great.
we are treated like royalty.
And here is the thing I want you get because life happens (the unexpected things happen)
and often when happens we see that the things of babyloin and we say this looks nice
My marriage is falling apart but this person seems to get me
I am so stressed, and this habit might not be great for me, but it calms me down
Maybe this method isn’t the most Christlike method, but its powerful and it gets results, so maybe its okay to do.
I mean we chase falshy things, and if we are not rooted we will chase them.
I love this quote by Eugene Peterson that says:
“The World is not the context for dealing with God; but God is the context for dealing with God (and the world).”
The flashy things should not inform our faith, but our faith should inform us about the flashy things.
Because they can look good or promise one thing but the issue is either it doesn’t deliver or its completely temporary and shaky,
In fact during just Daniels time, he served under four kings, because new nations kept coming it, but you know how many Gods he served? One.
And I want you to notice what happens in this story because for these four men they are choosing to be faithful, and there is a defining moment in this passage that I want us to read out loud together.
Because things have gone wrong, their god has seemingly been defeated, they see these flashy things
And this in verse 8 it says this.
Read this out loud with me:
“But Daniel…”
All of this happened but Daniel…
And reading the rest of this verse...
8 But Daniel resolved not to defile himself with the royal food and wine, and he asked the chief official for permission not to defile himself this way.
Daniel (and really Shadrack, Meishak and Abendego), made a decision that they were going to be faithful to God.
And said we will not eat the food that has been sacrificed to the babyloin god
They could have said its easier and looks better to eat it
They could have said everyone else is eating it
They could have said no one will know if we are going against God, because we are 1600 miles away from home in another country.
But instead they said we will follow God.
It is amazing how when you are rooted in your faith you can resist the pressure you face.
Has anyone ever been scuba diving or on a submarine. I have not
but when you scuba dive or go in a submarine you can only go a certain depth, because all the sudden the pressure gets really strong.
in fact they say its actually harder to get to certain depths in the ocean they landing on the moon.
But whats crazy is there are certain fish and animals that can survive in those depths. You know why?
The pressure in the fish is actually as strong or stronger then the pressure that is around them.
Let me just say this… The pressure that we face to chase the shiny things in our world can be strong,
But when the pressure of our walk with God is stronger,
We will not just survive, but its amazing what God can do in us in those high pressure places.
And this is what happens with Daniel because the pressure of his faith is so strong, that he decides I will not follow the Babylonians god.
and lets look at this last part because a couple more things happen and I would encourage you to go back and read this section later but I want to focus in on verse 9 and then jumping down to verses 17-21 because I think you will notice a theme here. It says this:
Daniel 1:9 (NIV)
9 Now God had caused the official to show favor and compassion to Daniel,
Daniel 1:17–21 (NIV)
17 To these four young men God gave knowledge and understanding of all kinds of literature and learning. And Daniel could understand visions and dreams of all kinds.
18 At the end of the time set by the king to bring them into his service, the chief official presented them to Nebuchadnezzar. 19 The king talked with them, and he found none equal to Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah; so they entered the king’s service. 20 In every matter of wisdom and understanding about which the king questioned them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and enchanters in his whole kingdom.
21 And Daniel remained there until the first year of King Cyrus.
Did you notice what happened?
Their lives have been altered drasitically, they have these shiny things luring them in.
but in the middle of all this God is faithful to them
He is not dead like some of the people thought, but he is moving behind the scenes and redeeming those areas for good.
You know in life there are things that happen that God does not desire,
In Genesis God created the world without death or pain, but when sin entered the world things became quickly broken.
And there is a lot of hope here, because this morning there can be somthing unexpected in your life, things can be falling apart, and you might be even saying God can you here me?!
Are you their? are you defeated? whats happening?!
You might be on this 4 to 5 month walk in the aftermath, but God is still working.
You might have a family that is broken, but God is working
You might have lost everything, but God can work
You might have that diagnosis, but God is working
you may be lonely, but God is working
What would it look like to allow us to chase after God even now?
Even in the brokeness of this moment.
As we close we will be singing this song called available, and I would maybe this morning theirs a brokeness or a pressure your facing, what would it look like to come to God brokeness and say I am avalable, have it all.
Will you pray with me.
