Holly S - Courages Faith against opposition

Scripture: Daniel chapter 3

Scripture: Matthew 26:70-74

Topic: Courages Faith against opposition

INTRODUCTION:

Hey hey everyone,

If I haven’t said hello to ya yet, my names Holly and I’m just keen to share with you guys what’s been

on my heart.

LETS PRAY

So our theme this month is Courages Faith and I’m going to be sharing on courages faith against

opposition

Scripture: Daniel chapter 3

So I’m gonna be explaining a story from Daniel chapter 3, its quite a long story so i encourage you to

read it in your spare time or when your just chilling at home. So this story is about a king named

Nebuchadnezzar and 3 men named shadrach, meshach and abednego.

So, king Nebuchadnezzar, He built a big gold statue and this statue was there so that every single

person had to bow down to this statue on his command.

If king Nebuchadnezzar told you to do something, you done that. So what was his command to

bowing down to this statue of his?

In Daniel chapter 3 verse 5, it actually says ‘When you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre,

harp, pipes, and other musical instruments, bow to the ground to worship King Nebuchadnezzar’s

gold statue and anyone who refuses to obey will immediately be thrown into a blazing furnace.” So

anyone that refused to bow down to the kings statue after hearing all these musical instruments

would be thrown into a big fire pit.

Either you bow down and worship king Nebuchadnezzar or you are put to death.

Now the 3 men that I mentioned just before, shadrach, meshach and abednego. These men did not

bow down to the statue, therefore the only way option for them, was to be thrown into the fire just

as the king commanded.

Now, People didn’t know that shadrach, meshach and abednego were refusing to bow down until

someone actually went to the king and said ‘’hey hey, there are three guys that are not doing what

everyone else is doing’’ ‘’ they are not doing what they are meant to doing - they gotta be sorted out

real quick.

POINT: Courages Faith against opposition / who is your opposition

I know for me, I hear about the word faith which is already scary enough sometimes and then you

add the word courages to it as well. Like okay - What even is courages faith? I would think that

Courages faith is usually something that you can’t handle on your own, something that isn’t meant

to make you comfortable . I would say It is something that stands out.

Story to capture the young peoples attention

So I’ve actually got a story for ya, i was in high school actually, i won’t tell you what year ��. But

there was this party that was going to be happening and pretty much, most, if not all of my friends

were going to be going. My friends were saying this would be so sick, it will be so fun. It’s gonna be

our first “big party” we are gonna be with everyone else and they were,like convincing me to come.

They would say Holly, just come, just come, you’ll have fun. It will be our first real party for high

school etc etc.

now this right here was a time for me where I was like oh my gosh,, this is a chance for me to go out,

have fun, get out there and just be with friends and just not care what others thought, like who

cares - it’s just a one time thing. It just felt like the best opportunity right?

Then I kinda started thinking of what would people think if I DONT go , what are people going to

think of me and what are they going to say to me if I don’t go. Like I got to go now .

So, a couples days had passed and I was like, actually ya know what, I’m not going to go to this party,

I don’t know exactly what the defining moment was for me but I did know - it went against what I

knew what was right for me. Did I want too go to this party? Heck yes I did. But it was a choice.

That for me was courages faith and it stood out. You know what I mean by stood out? I felt like

people looked at me like “rightio holly” or like “yeah okay holly” “your boring”. And then I felt like

my friends become my opposition.

You know what , the act of courages faith in the story of shadrach meschach and abednego was

that they still obeyed God rather than man. They obeyed God even when people didn’t know what

they were doing.

I didn’t know what people would say about me, think about me and how it would make me feel

but it was a time for me where I had to act of something that didn’t necessarily make me “feel”

good at that time, but what I knew as right for me at the time.

So In the story of shadrach meschach and abednego,

There was an obidence that everyone else acted on to bow down as soon as the musical

instruments started playing, because that was what was commanded , it was commanded by the

king and you feared for your life if you didn’t do this.

Shadrach, meshach and abednego had opposition from everyone as they were the only ones that

knew who there God was and refused to bow down to anyone else.

shadrach, meshach and abednego actually had no need to defend themselves when they were

called out.

Although They knew they would get thrown in the fire as a consequence,

They knew that God was able to save them from both the burning fiery furnace and from king

Nebuchadnezzar himself. But if not they also knew that they must do what was right even if God did

not do what they expect or hoped him to do.

We don’t know if Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego knew that the Jesus was with them in their

trial ,

so this means - Sometimes we are aware of Jesus’ presence in our trials and sometimes we are not

but that doesn’t change the fact that he is always there.

We will feel like we have people against us , we feel like we have opposition against us but we know

that we have Jesus and that’s seriously such a cool thing to know.

What is courages faith to you?

Has there been a time that you have felt like you have wanted to do something but people would

look at you a certain way?

There’s a man in the bible named Peter and Peter followed Jesus after Jesus got arrested. If you

followed or knew Jesus at this time , your life was at risk, Peter was approached and they asked him

if he knew who Jesus was but he wilted and denied Jesus.

Scripture:

o Matthew 26:70-74 (Peter denying Jesus)

o 70 But he denied it before them all. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he

said.

o 71 Then he went out to the gateway, where another servant girl saw him and said to

the people there, “This fellow was with Jesus of Nazareth.”

o 72 He denied it again, with an oath: “I don’t know the man!”

CONCLUSION:

You know, It is one thing to make a stand for Something, it is a even bigger thing to stick to your

stand when just straight up asked asked and especially pointed out in front of others. -

There’s going to be times where we will act on courages faith and no one will see it and there will be

times where it’s obviously pointed out and you cannot even avoid it.

So as I invite Joel up , I just want you to think about - who do you choose to be your opposition when

you act on Courages Faith…