Thoughtful

If that is the case, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us from your hand, O King. - Daniel 3:17

This life is hard, isn't it?  It matters not what our troubles are... whether they are chronic illness and disability, or divorce or infertility, or poverty or abuse.  Life is hard.

We long for a deliverer.

Just as Shadrach, Meshach and AbedNego in the story of the fiery furnace, we long to say proudly to our problems, “We have no need to answer you in this matter.” (vs.16)  There, take that!  We have a Deliverer, and He is able!

If we say this to our problems, we speak the truth.  We speak rightly.

But let's read on to the next verse, shall we?

“But if not, let it be known to you, O king, that we do not serve your gods, nor will we worship the gold image which you have set up.” - Daniel 3:18

What do we say when we reach the next verse in the scolding of our troubles?
It is certainly not easy for the next words we utter to be: “But if not”!

Oh, no, we don't want to consider that our Deliverer may not deliver us from our pains, our heartaches, or our fears.  We want to imagine that with great faith comes great earthly blessing.  That the right amount of hope produces a life of ease.  That if we only pray long enough, He will answer in just the way that we long for.

What these three men acknowledged, and what we need to understand, is that God is still God, whether He chooses to deliver in the way we picture or He chooses to allow hardships and work His wonders through them.

“Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”      


Do you know who uttered these words?  It was a man who had lost everything but His life. A man in torment daily, even hourly.  A man whose wife urged him to curse God so that he could die and get it over with.  A man whose closest friends and advisers judged him unworthy, and to blame for his troubles.

Everyone believed that God was bringing judgment upon this man through the hardships he was suffering.

This man was Job.  And as he struggled mightily to understand the whirlwind that had become his pitiful life, as he wrestled with emotions and realities I could never hope to understand, as his mind swirled with depressing possibilities and horrifying thoughts regarding the character of his God, here is what he uttered:
“Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.” - Job 13:15a

You see, Job had the key all along.  He knew what Shadrach, Meshach and AbedNego knew.  He knew that God is still God.  He knew that God does not torment and slay His own.

And what all of them understood was that if God chose to allow their deaths, then His will was to be trusted. And death was not to be feared.

For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain. - Philippians 1:21

How different would our lives be if we lived with this mentality?  The truth is that Christ has delivered us.  Once and for all time.  In the only way that matters.

As for the rest we will say:
“But if not, let it be known: Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”



Great Deliverer, let us never forget where our focus should be.  Help us always to trust in you.... not only through the hard times, but especially through the hard times.  In Jesus' Name, Amen...

 photo credit: AlicePopkorn via photopin cc photo credit: Art4TheGlryOfGod via photopin cc photo credit: AlicePopkorn via photopin cc