Sermon - Lenten Midweek 5 2019 - Daniel 3:1-30

Strangers in a strange land, that’s what Daniel and the three young men felt like. Nearly every Christian knows their names: Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego. However, many Christians probably don’t realize that those were not their real names. The story of Daniel takes place during the Babylonian Captivity when a number of Hebrews from Judah were taken captive and moved to Babylon. When the captives were taken from their homelands they would be given new Babylonian names in place of their original names.

And so, Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego were originally named Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. Their new Babylonian names were likely the names of Babylonian pagan gods. These new names were to distance the captives from their home country and force them to acclimate to their new home. They most certainly felt like strangers in a strange land, because they were.

They made a few concessions when taken captive, such as allowing their names to be changed. But they didn’t give in to everything, especially when it was a matter of faith. So when commanded by King Nebuchadnezzar to “fall down and worship the golden image that King Nebuchadnezzar had set up,” even at the threat of “immediately being cast into a burning fiery furnace,” they refused to bow down and worship this 90 foot tall golden idol.

This is the story of three young men who are strangers in a strange land who hold the 1st commandment sacred: You shall have no other gods. Even when all of the pagan peoples surrounding them, including all of the upper echelon of society, simply at the sound of “the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, fall down and worship the image” that Nebuchadnezzar had set up, these three men do not. 

Why? Firstly, because their Lord God commanded them not to worship other gods; secondly, because there aren’t actually other gods to worship; thirdly, because the whole thing is a farce, it’s a satire, it’s a comedy! Pagan worshipers are like Pavlov’s dog, salivating at the ringing of a bell, bowing down and worshipping a big statue every time they hear some music! Indeed, this is a very strange land.

King Nebuchadnezzar can’t even fathom any sort of “god who would deliver” them out of his hands. The gods of the pagans are no greater than the power of some earthly king! (Who by the way in a later chapter is humiliated by losing his mind such that he wanders about in the wilderness behaving like a wild animal eating grass.) But the three young men didn’t just worship some powerless pagan idol, rather they worshiped the one true God and 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, O king.”

So, the king was pretty ticked off at that challenge. “Nebuchadnezzar was filled with fury, and the expression of his face was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He ordered 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, Meshach, and Abednego, and to cast them into the burning fiery furnace.”

Yet, the three young men didn’t fear Nebuchadnezzar nor the fiery furnace, because they trusted that their God would save them. But probably not like this. For the king was astonished when he saw that the three young Hebrew men were standing in the fire together with a fourth man who “had the appearance like a son of the gods.” When Nebuchadnezzar commanded the three men to come out, they walked out of the fiery furnace unscathed.

Yes, the preincarnate Christ was present in that fiery furnace with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego and delivered them from the flames and the strange land in which they dwelt. So too is Jesus present with us today to deliver us from the flames of hell and the strange land in which we dwell. 

Like the three young men, we’ve been taken captive by a foreign pagan nation here on earth. To some extent we make concessions when possible with the strange culture around us, but not all the time, and especially not when it comes to the first commandment. 

Today I suppose we don’t have giant gold covered idols of pagan gods erected in our town squares which we’re forced to bow down towards. But the strange land around us does set up idols and false gods, nonetheless, which we’re expected to bow down and worship instead of the only true God. 

Many Americans worship at the temple of athletica, with huge meccas of worship located in every major metropolis, each stadium complete with its own liturgy and rites of entrance. Many Americans worship in their tribe’s political temple, making vows to support the correct political god through the regular liturgy of campaigning and participating in the sacrament of voting. Nearly every American sets up home altars where they worship, either their dinner table filled with food, a garage filled with cars, an entertainment center filled with a TV, an investment portfolio filled with money, or a chair devoted to staring at a smartphone. Everyone has their idols, as strange as they are, whatever they may be, and the temptation is to worship at the altars of your idols instead of the altar of the living God. 

So let us look to the example of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who in the face of a fiery furnace and certain death, worshipped the true God alone instead of joining in the strange idolatrous worship of the people surrounding them. Let us trust in our God, set aside our culture’s command to worship idols, and yield up our bodies rather than serve and worship any god except our only true God. 

For our God is the same God of the three young men. He will rescue us from the flames of the fiery furnace, even the fiery furnace of hell! Jesus is not only with us, but He goes before us into the flames and suffers reproach on our behalf. Jesus endured the agony of the cross so that we might not perish nor even enter into the flames of hell but be saved from them altogether. There is no other god who is able to rescue in this way, only the one true triune God who alone we trust, worship, and adore.