Daniel 3:16-28

¹⁶ Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter.  ¹⁷ If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king.  ¹⁸ But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”

¹⁹ Then Nebuchadnezzar was furious with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, and his attitude toward them changed. He ordered the furnace heated seven times hotter than usual ²⁰ and commanded some of the strongest soldiers in his army to tie up Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego and throw them into the blazing furnace.

²¹ So these men, wearing their robes, trousers, turbans and other clothes, were bound and thrown into the blazing furnace.  ²² The king’s command was so urgent and the furnace so hot that the flames of the fire killed the soldiers who took up Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, ²³ and these three men, firmly tied, fell into the blazing furnace.

 

²⁴ Then King Nebuchadnezzar leaped to his feet in amazement and asked his advisers, “Weren’t there three men that we tied up and threw into the fire?” They replied, “Certainly, O king.”  ²⁵ He said, “Look! I see four men walking around in the fire, unbound and unharmed, and the fourth looks like a son of the gods.”

²⁶ Nebuchadnezzar then approached the opening of the blazing furnace and shouted, “Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out! Come here!”  So Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the fire, ²⁷ and the satraps, prefects, governors and royal advisers crowded around them. They saw that the fire had not harmed their bodies, nor was a hair of their heads singed; their robes were not scorched, and there was no smell of fire on them.

²⁸ Then Nebuchadnezzar said, “Praise be to the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, who has sent his angel and rescued his servants! They trusted in him and defied the king’s command and were willing to give up their lives rather than serve or worship any god except their own God.

 

Dear heirs of the Reformation,

 

            We have an often used saying that goes like this:  “Actions speak louder than words.”  One action that we do very often that can say several different things is the act of standing up.  What possible things might you be saying when you stand up?  That will depend on circumstances, such as where you are, who is around you and what else is happening.  Sometimes the message sent by standing up is one of defiance toward someone else.  In other situations standing up may say that you are courageous and strong.  In different circumstances, standing up may say that you respect and revere someone or something.  For instance, in a courtroom, we stand up when the judge enters in respect to him and the law he represents.  Another example of standing up to show respect is when we pray together in our worship services.  We usually stand up to pray, saying to our God, “We respect, honor and stand in awe of you!”  And finally, there is another use of the words “stand up” that is more figurative.  When someone is principled, honest and reliable, we will say, “He’s a “stand up” guy.”

           

            In Daniel’s account of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego before King Nebuchadnezzar, there is a lot of “standing up”.  Which of those statements made by standing up was being made by those men when they were standing up?  Perhaps some of each of the statements applies.  King Nebuchadnezzar “heard” a statement of defiance to his order when they were standing up.  They showed courage and strength by standing up and speaking honestly in front of the king.  There was respect in their standing before the king.  We don’t hear them speaking disrespectfully.  And also, their actions were true to their beliefs as God-fearing Jews; they took a stand on principle.  They were “stand up” guys. 

 

            The same would be true of the reformers of the 16^th century, men like Martin Luther.  They also had to stand up before some of the most powerful people in the world of their time.  Their standing up spoke courage, strength, defiance tempered with respect, and principle.  Reforms, changes, took place in the Church through these people and their stand.  God’s word became the sole source of teaching and practice among them. 

 

            We are heirs of these reformers.  From them we have received God’s blessing of his word in its truth.  That word assures us that our status with God has been reformed or changed; from sinner damned to the fires of hell to saint destined for the glory of heaven, all by his grace in Christ Jesus.  Our change in status causes changes or reforms in our lives.  It changes how we think.  We strive to make godly changes in our lives.  In this way, then, you and I are also “reformers”.  From our lesson about Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego we learn today that

                                               

                                         God’s Reformers are “Stand Up” People.

1.      With Jesus they will stand in God’s judgment.

2.      With Jesus they stand up under fire.

 

The men Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego had to stand up because their nation of

Judah had fallen down.  God’s people of Judah had fallen under God’s judgment which had come in the form of the Babylonian Empire and its king, Nebuchadnezzar.  Because of Judah had fallen to the temptations to worship idol gods of surrounding nations and because they had fallen to their own earthly, selfish, ungodly desires, the Lord allowed the Babylonians to overtake Judah and drag into exile tens of thousands of Judah’s “Upper Crust”.  The Babylonians had deported the up and coming, bright and brilliant young people who worked in the Judean government and businesses.  They pressed them into service in the Babylonian government, along with people from other countries under Babylonian control.  Babylon stood atop the world and King Nebuchadnezzar wanted to make sure all those foreigners working in his government understood that.  So he had a huge, 90 foot tall image of gold erected.  We don’t know what it was.  It may have been a statue of him.  It may have been an image of one of their gods.  Maybe it was just a tower.  Whatever it was, it was a tribute to Nebuchadnezzar and the gods of Babylon.  To make sure these foreigners understood that Babylon stood atop the world, Nebuchadnezzar order that when the music played, everyone was to bow down and worship this image.  Death by fire was the punishment for disobedience.

 

            Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego understood who truly stands atop the world.  The LORD, God of Israel, Maker of heaven and earth stands above all.  They understood that He is the only God.  They also understood that they had fallen short of what he demanded of them, just as their fellow Jews had individually and collectively as the people of God.  They understood that they fall under his judgment and by rights should spend eternity suffering in the fire of God’s anger over their sin.  But they also understood, by his grace, that he is the God of mercy and grace!  In his mercy and grace he had promised the first sinners and all their descendants that he would send a Savior from sin and hell.  The promised Savior was to come from their nation of Judah.  They understood that the Savior would stand up in their place in living before God and in suffering the fiery punishment for their sins.  They understood that the Savior to come from their nation of Judah, Jesus, would stand with them in God’s judgment on their lives.  And with him, they would stand in and through that judgment of God.  For that reason, they remained standing when the music played and everyone else bowed before Nebuchadnezzar’s monument.  For that reason they stood up to Nebuchadnezzar, telling him that he could order them thrown into the fire but the God whom they serve would save them from it if he determined it was in their and his best eternal interests.  And even if their God wouldn’t save them from Nebuchadnezzar’s fire, through the promised Savior he would save them from the worse fire of his judgment on their sinful lives.  They understood that where a person stands with God is the most important thing in their lives.

 

            By God’s grace you understand this.  The central message of God’s word is about a person’s standing with God.  That message had been corrupted in the church in which Martin Luther grew up.  But after digging in the Scriptures, Luther was blessed to find the central message, the eternal gospel.  He brought it into the open again.  Through that message Luther, like Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, understood that his standing with God had been changed  through Jesus Christ from condemned sinner to saved saint.  He understood that the innocence of Christ became his through faith in Christ.  Luther understood that with Jesus, he would stand in God’s judgment.  This is our Reformation heritage.  This is what has been passed on to us.  Through the Scriptures alone we understand God and his dealings with us.  In those Scriptures we are made to understand that we, too, have fallen under God’s judgment.  We have been idolatrous, bowing to our selfish desires and the influence of our culture as shown by our lives, our self-centered dealings with God and with each other in our families, church and society.  But only in those Scriptures do we find out how God has mercifully dealt with us.  Only there do we find that with Jesus, our Substitute in life and death, we will stand in God’s judgment.  Only in those Scriptures do we hear that “now a righteousness FROM God, apart from law has been revealed, to which the Law and the Prophets testify.  This righteousness FROM God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe (Romans 3:21,22).  Jesus stood in our place before God so that we will be able to stand up in God’s judgment to live forever with him in peace, holiness and joy!  With our standing changed, we become reformers, reforming or changing things in our lives.  We live now by God’s guiding.  We stand up to temptations to bow down to our own desires or to the urgings and suggestions of our ungodly culture.  God’s reformers are “stand up” people.  With Jesus they will stand in God’s judgment.  Because of this standing with God, with Jesus his reformers will also stand up under fire.

 

            Under the threat of death by fire, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego stood up while every one else bowed down to Nebuchadnezzar’s monument.  They stood because Jesus would stand for them in the fire of God’s judgment.  To continue standing up had to be hard because Nebuchadnezzar in his anger over their defiance ordered the furnace cranked up seven times hotter than normal.  It was so hot that the soldiers who had tied up the men and led them to the opening of the furnace were killed by the heat just outside the furnace.  Yet Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego continued to stand up as they fell into the flames.  When their bodies should have fallen to the floor of the furnace to lay there being turned into ash, Nebuchadnezzar saw them standing up and walking around.  To his amazement, he saw a fourth person, an angel of the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, walking and talking with them.  So total was the rescue that when they again stood up before Nebuchadnezzar outside the furnace, their bodies and clothes were unaffected by the fire – no singed hairs, no burned clothes, not even the smell of smoke!  As they were taken to that fire, they didn’t know what the Lord would do.  Would he save them from the fire, or not?  Didn’t matter, as they had told Nebuchadnezzar.  The Lord had saved them through his Savior from the fire of his anger over their sin.  Eternal life was in their hands. 

 

            God’s reformers of all ages stand up under fire with Jesus.  In our gospel lesson Jesus told his disciples they would have to do so (Mark 13), and throughout the book of Acts it’s documented.  Our remembrance today is especially of Martin Luther and the reformers of the 1500’s.  Under fire from the church and from the government, they stood up to speak the truth of God’s word.  Jesus’ apostles and Jesus’ 16^th century reformers stood up under earthly fire because they knew that with Jesus they would stand up under God’s judgment.  If Jesus brought them through the fires of earthly pressure and threats, they got to keep telling the good news.  If Jesus decided they would die under fire, they would get to stand with Jesus before God their Judge and be judged innocent and would be welcomed into heaven.  It’s a win-win for God’s reformers who stand up under fire. 

 

            God’s reformers are still under fire and are still standing up.  God has changed your standing with him through Jesus.  You are his saints, his holy ones.  You’re eternal destination has been changed from hell to heaven.  Jesus will stand up for and with you in the judgment.  And so with confidence and peace you stand up under earthly fire such as pressures from peers to go along with sinful activity.  You teenagers are stand up people when you stand up in word and action for God’s gifts of marriage and sex when you save sexual activity for marriage.  You teens and younger are stand up people when you are guided by God’s word to respect and obey the authorities in your lives.  You parents are stand up people when you love your children and show your love by guiding them in what’s right and wrong rather than worrying about being your child’s “BFF”.  You husbands and wives are stand up people when you stick to your marriage promises to love, honor, cherish and take care of your spouse even when times get tough between you.  You senior saints / reformers are stand up people when you face illness and disability expressing your confidence in Jesus’ promises of life everlasting through patient bearing of your physical burden. 

 

            With Jesus, you will stand in God’s judgment!  Your standing with God has been changed / reformed from sinner to saint.  This is his doing, to his glory!  Since you will stand up through the judgment, keep standing up on his promises and commands, for God’s reformed people who are reformers of their lives are “stand up” people!