[Devoted1]

"No Backing Down"
By: Zach Wood
Daniel 3:17-18 (NLT)
If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God whom we serve is able to save us. He will rescue us from your power, Your Majesty. But even if he doesn't, Your Majesty can be sure that we will never serve your gods or worship the gold statue you have set up.


Decisions are around us each and everyday. Some decisions are hard, while others are quite easy. How are we especially at making decisions that will determine our obedience in standing up for what we believe? I'm sure none of us have been thrown into a blazing inferno like Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, but we still face times of decisions in which it's hard for us to stand up for what is right. As I think of my own life, I can look back and see so many times where I could have stood up firm for Christ, but chose to keep my mouth shut and go along with the crowd. How that must have hurt and broken my Savior's heart.

Sad thing is, really, that many times we don't even flinch after having gone along with the crowd. I honestly don't know what I would have done if I was one of those boys about to be thrown into a furnace. This so much reminds me of the song, "This Is Your Time" by Michael W. Smith. He talks about how Cassie Bernall had a gun to her head and STILL proclaimed her faith and died for her belief in God. The first line of the song says, "It was a test we would all hope to pass, but none of us would want to take......Faced with the choice to deny God or live, but for her there was one choice to make."

Can you look through your past week, months, or even years and remember times you went along with the crowd because standing up firm for your faith would have caused you humiliation or even a severe consequence? It makes me cringe that most of us probably will never face a blazing inferno in which we're threatened to be thrown into for not going along with the crowd, but that we still struggle with humiliation and ridicule. I'm amazed at how Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego displayed their faith in God and went through what could have ended their lives. They decided to obey God, whether or not they would physically die. But God protected them from the fire(which was heated 7 times hotter than normal).

We want to say that we would choose to obey God in a test of this magnitude.......but would we? So maybe the question should really be phrased to each one of us as, "What 'blazing inferno' keeps us from standing up strong for God"?

[hockeydad]

I would like to be able to say that if I were to be cast into that furnace for Jesus' sake, I could do it. But on the other hand I would have serious doubts if I could stand by and let my wife or my children be thrown in.

I pray that I am never put to that kind of test.