The Good Steward

On, on October 5th, the city of Oklahoma you're you're gonna wonder what what I'm saying here has to do with Matthew, but it'll all come together in a minute here. Just be patient. On October 5th, the city of Oklahoma considered an amendment by the, local Human Rights Commission that would confer minority status to homosexuals. The proposed law would have, seen fines. Now I didn't say California now.

Nothing wrong with I said in Oklahoma City, this amendment was considered. And this proposed law would have seen fines levied on businesses and landlords, even schools and churches who were guilty of discriminating against homosexuals. Now the commission was, was, pushing for a law that would ultimately shut down those who repeatedly violated homosexual rights. This law could, see a church, for example, being sued or closed if it refused to hire a homosexual minister or demonstrated any form of discrimination against homosexuals. Now during the debate where this happened, this sermon is not about sexuality.

You'll see this in a minute, but it's an important idea or example. During the debate that ensued by the council of several concerned citizens who were there to voice their opinion against such a proposed vote, there was one individual that stood up, his name was Stephen Black, Stephen Black. And he, acknowledged openly that he was a former homosexual and, he pleaded with the council to reject such a law on the grounds that homosexuality was immoral, it was against nature, and it was also changeable and that he himself was a prime example of the ability of a homosexual to come out of that lifestyle and be completely renewed. In this public arena, this man told of his gay lifestyle and how he completely changed back to a normal healthy life because of his faith in Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit within him to overcome sin. In the end, the upshot of this is the council voted against the proposal, but not before the Human Rights Commission vowed to try once again.

I'm impressed. I don't know about you, but I am impressed with this man's courage in speaking up to leaders in high places and publicly confessing his faith in the lord Jesus Christ. There is a public I'm not confessing my faith in Jesus Christ. We're all brethren here. We're all here for the same reason, but this man, in a public place, confessed his abiding faith in Jesus Christ.

You know, the Bible is filled with examples of such men and women who didn't cave in when it came time to take a stand for God. Didn't cave in when it came time to take a stand what they believe was right according to God's will. This morning, I'd like to tell you the story of 3 such people from the Bible and draw from their experience 2 important lessons that hopefully will help all of us be courageous When the time comes to stand up for Jesus, and I don't know about you, but the time will come somewhere, somehow, whether it be at your family picnic or a gathering or at work or wherever, the time will come when you will have to make a stand for what you believe. You will have to make a stand somehow for your faith in Jesus Christ. Well, let me give you, the background, for the story that I'm going to tell you from the Bible this morning.

The story is set in that period of Jewish history when the, original kingdom of the Israelites had been attacked and divided and ultimately destroyed. Now when Joshua led the people into the promised land after they had been in the desert for about 40 years, the people went into the promised land and they subdued the land and they established control with each one of the tribes dwelling in certain parts of what is now known as Israel. With time, these tribes were formed into 1 kingdom, and they were ruled over by a succession of kings. The first being Saul, and then Saul was succeeded by David, and David was succeeded by his son, Solomon. Now while these kings ruled over the United Kingdom, there was peace and unity.

But after Solomon's death, war broke out between his sons in order to get control of the kingdom, and this resulted in a divided kingdom, a northern kingdom where 10 tribes lived and a southern kingdom where 2 tribes lived. Jerusalem was part of the southern kingdom. Now with time, the northern kingdom was destroyed by enemies. Actually, God allowed it to be destroyed because of their pagan and God allowed it to be destroyed because of their pagan and idolatrous ways, and only the small southern kingdom remained. Our lesson today takes place when the Babylonian Empire, a new world order, if you wish, began to threaten to take over the small southern kingdom of Israel.

At this time, the southern kingdom tried to mount a revolt against, the Babylonian Empire in order to break away from their grip and their dom denomination. And as a result, the Babylonian army was sent down to put down this rebellion in this southern this tiny little kingdom, in Israel. In the year 597, 597 BC, the Babylonian army led by Nebuchadnezzar came and subdued the city and carried away the wealth and the leading citizens, of that city back to Babylon and left behind the poor of the elderly to maintain the land and the city. Among the young noblemen that were taken into captivity was a man named Daniel and several of his friends. And we read the account of that carrying off in Daniel chapter 1.

So if you have your Bibles, read along with me as I begin to tell you this story. In the 3rd year of the reign of Jehoiakim, my king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged him. And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand along with some of the vessels of the house of God, and he brought them to the land of Shinar, to the house of his god, and he brought the vessels into the treasury of his god. Then the king ordered, Ashpenaz, the chief of his officials, to bring in some of the sons of Israel, including some of the royal family and of the nobles, youths in whom was no defect, who were good looking, showing intelligence in every branch of wisdom, endowed with understanding and discerning knowledge, and who had ability for serving in the king's court, and he ordered him to teach them the literature and the language of the Chaldeans. Chaldeans, by the way, were the Babylonians.

And the king appointed for them a daily ration from the king's choice food and from the wine which he drank, and appointed that they should be educated 3 years, and at the end of which they were to enter the king's personal service. Now among them, from the sons of Judah, were Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. Then the commander of the officials assigned new names to them. And to Daniel, he assigned the name Belteshazzar, to Ananias, Shadrach, to Mishael, Meshach, and to Azariah, Abednego. Abednego.

Now this is taking place here in the year 5 97. The royalty and the top people of the city are carried off into Babylonian captivity. The noblemen are put into the king's training service, if you wish, into college, Babylonian University, to learn the politics and the ways of the Babylonians for service, at court. Now in a subsequent invasion, 10 years later or so, in 586 BC, the Babylonians returned to Jerusalem. And this time, they completely destroyed the city, and they took into exile most of the remaining people.

It was during this period of Jewish history that Jeremiah, for example, was left behind in the the, city in order to, care for, the remaining things. And he prophesied that the people would be gone for 70 years and then return. It was during this time that a man called Ezekiel was carried off with this with the with the nobleman, and he preached among the people, in Babylon and, was kept captive there with them. And it was also, as I read, during this time that Daniel and his young friends were sent to the court of the king. Ezekiel was among the population, but Daniel and the other 3 went to the court of the king in order to be trained to become advisers to the king.

Now with time, the people settled into their new land and life went on, but their faith that they took for granted before they took their faith for granted before this time, this new land and this pagan country was severely tested. The story of Daniel and his three friends shines forth as a wonderful example of how these believers stood up for God even when they were challenged by the most powerful king in the then known world. Now we don't have time to read the whole thing, so I'll have to summarize it for you. But in in chapter 1 and chapter 2 of the book of Daniel, where I began to read, we read about the great king, Nebuchadnezzar, the ruler of the then known world, and a strange dream that he had. He dreamt of a of a huge statue.

This statue dream kind of intrigued him, and he wanted to know what it was about. And he sent for all of his great wise men to try to interpret the dream, and none of them could interpret the dream for him. Finally, Daniel and his friends who had been trained as royal advisors and as such, Daniel is also brought in to interpret the dream that the king had about this great statue. And Daniel, as we read the story, successfully interprets the dream for the king regarding the statue. And as a reward, the king appoints Daniel and the other 3 Jewish boys to important positions in the government.

Now the story could have a happy ending there, but the king decides to use his dream about this statue as an excuse to solidify his political power. And so he builds a real statue made with gold, and he makes it 90 feet high, and he commands all of his officials and political allies to meet before the statue and to bow down and begin to worship it or else they will die. We read that story in chapter 3 of Daniel beginning in verse 1. So read along with me about the king, the statue, and the great feast or the great worship feast that he designed for himself. It says, Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold, the height of which was 60 cubits, and its width 6 cubits.

He set it up on the plain of Dura, the province of Babylon. Then Nebuchadnezzar the king sent word to assemble the satraps, the prefects, the governors, the counselors, the treasurers, the judges, the magistrates, and all the rulers of the provinces to come for the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up. Then the satraps, the prefects, and the governors, the counselors, the treasurers, the judges, the magistrates, and all the rulers of the provinces were assembled for the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up, and they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up. Then the herald loudly proclaimed to you the command that's given all peoples, nations, and men of every language, that at the moment you hear the sound of the horn, flute, lyre, trigon, psaltery, bagpipes, and all kinds of music, you are to fall down and worship the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the king has set up. But whoever does not fall down and worship shall immediately be cast into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire.

Therefore, at that time, when all the peoples heard the sound of the horn flute, lyre, stringing, psaltery, bagpipe, and all kinds of music, all the peoples, nations, and men of every language fell down and worshiped the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar, the king, had set up. Now you need to understand something about this passage here. This was more politics than religion. And for most of the people that were there, this was just one more god that they added to their collection. In those days, they were used to worshiping a lot of god.

So one more god, one less god, what's the difference? If it solidifies your alliance with the strongest king in the world, you go to his party. It's his party. If he says you bow down, you bow down. And by doing that, you keep your job, you keep your political alliance, you stay out of trouble.

Didn't have a whole lot to do with religion. However, for Daniel and the 3 young Jews, this was a challenge that needed a courageous response. So we keep reading in chapter 3 beginning verse 8, the problems that they began to have with this particular situation. For this reason at that time, certain Chaldeans came forward and brought charges against the Jews. They responded and said to Nebuchadnezzar, the king, o king, live forever.

You yourself, o king, have made a decree that every man who hears the sound of the horn, flutes, liers, chrigging, psaltery, and bagpipe, and all kinds of music, is to fall down and worship the golden image. But whoever does not fall down and worship shall be cast into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire. There are certain Jews whom you have appointed over the administration of the province of Babylon, namely Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. These men, O king, have disregarded you. They do not serve your gods or worship the golden image which you have set up.

Now the situation here is complicated enough, but to make matters worse, jealous officials begin to accuse Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego of not bowing down to the statue. You notice they leave Daniel alone because Daniel is, at the moment, too high up in the administration to, attack him. These 3 are out in the provinces, you know, local governors in the provinces. Daniel's at the royal court next to the king. So they attacked the 3 and accused them of not falling down and worshiping the statue.

In verse 13, it says that Nebuchadnezzar in rage and anger gave orders to bring Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Then these men were brought before the king. Nebuchadnezzar responded and said to them, is it true, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, that you do not serve my gods or worship the golden image that I have set up? Now if you are ready at the moment, you hear the sound of the horn, flute, lyre, chriggens, psaltery, and backpipe, and all kinds of music to fall down and worship the image that I have made very well. But if you will not worship, you will immediately be cast into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire.

And what god is there who can deliver you out of my enemies? Well, I want you to notice the diabolical challenge that the king makes to the young men. He tells them number 1, you're gonna worship or you're gonna die. It's as simple as that. You worship or you die.

And then he kinda puts a little twist on it. It's bad enough that he drives a knife in. He put the little twist on it. He says, and I dare your god to save you. He says to them, what god is gonna save you?

Go ahead. Show me. You guys are big time religious freaks and nuts. Show me your god. Now is the time to show me if your god can save you.

You see, in those days, the generals fought the battles, but it was the gods who were credited with the victory. Remember when I read in chapter 1 verses 1 to 7, they said that when they went into the temple in Jerusalem, they took out vessels and holy objects out of the out of the temple, and they brought it to their own temple and put it into their own temple of their gods? The reason for that is that when they would come into their own city after, winning a battle or a war, they would parade the vessels from the opposing people's gods or temples to demonstrate that their god was greater than the god of the enemy. And by putting the vessels in their own temples, it was a form of one upsmanship, of religious one upsmanship. And so the king, you see, is saying, show me the power of your god if he can get you out of out of this particular mess.

Now the Jews, if you notice, are fenced in, which with what seemed to be an absolutely impossible situation. I mean, number 1, if they worship the idol, they sinned. And for a Jew, the worst possible sin, the sin of idolatry. Well, if they didn't worship the idol, they died in a pretty horrific death than death. If they accepted the challenge, if they said, oh, yeah.

Well, we'll show you our God is able to do this. God, okay. Now is the time. Show them. Well, then they became a God, and that is also a sin.

And if if they went to their death meekly without saying a word, then they would be, dishonoring their people. They would look like cowards because they hadn't responded anything to the king. I mean, they were boxed in. No way to go. It seemed like an impossible situation within Sirmona of Oz, but I want you to look at the way that they responded to the king.

Verse 16. It says, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, oh, Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to give you an answer concerning this. We don't need to answer you. We don't need to give you an answer. If it be so, our God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king.

But even if he does not, let it be known to you, O king, that we are not going to serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up. Oh, what a beautiful answer. What an inspired answer. First of all, they say to the king, oh, king, if our God wants to, he can save us. Don't make no no mistake about that.

If God wants to, he can save us. In other words, you're saying to the king, oh, king, don't judge the strength of our God by our particular weakness at the moment. Don't do that. You know, they were fully convinced of God's ability, and whatever happened to them did not change in their eyes who God was. Whether they lived or died, that didn't change who God was.

You know, such an important idea for us to remember when we begin judging God's love and God's ability merely on the circumstances of our lives. You know, we decide what kind of God we have by what kind of circumstances exist in our lives. Whether our our circumstances are good or bad, we decide that's what God has loved. But God is always more generous than our best situation, and he is always stronger than our worst fear or worst situation. And these young fellows understood that.

Another thing that they said to the king was this, they said to him, whether God wants to save us or not, doesn't make a difference. God can save us if he wants to, but whether he wants to or not, doesn't make any difference because we are determined we're not gonna serve you. We're not gonna do what you wanna do. No matter what you do to us, we're not gonna do what what you want us to do. No matter who you are, they said, you cannot make us do what is wrong.

Go ahead. Take your best shot. You can't make us do what is wrong. And there is another valuable example for us today who are under constant pressure to compromise what is right because doing right sometimes is unpopular. Speaking and doing right is sometimes politically incorrect or inconvenient socially.

I could just imagine mister Black and the scorn that he must have suffered at the hands of the commission. I mean, I could just imagine people just sitting there, just nodding their heads, saying, well, that poor fool. If if this guy had to beat another one of these wacko religious Greeks, you know. I mean, could you imagine the the the the scorn that this man must have endured at that time? Now the balance of this chapter, verse 19 all the way down to 30, and again, you don't have the time to read all of it, but the balance of the chapter describes what happened after they made this reply to the king.

Well, first of all, the king was pretty angry, and he just, you know, sent them off to the furnace. He threw them into the fiery furnace, which was, by the way, a kiln, it was a it wasn't like a small, it was a huge thing that they used to make bricks, so they could really crack the heat up on that thing, and they threw them into this particular furnace. And if you read the story, you find out that they were saved by a 4th individual. They're walking around, the fire is burning, and all of a sudden there's a 4th individual in there, with them. And the story goes on, or the Bible goes on to tell us that they walked out of the furnace eventually and nothing happened to them.

Their clothing didn't even smell like smoke. They were completely saved from the fiery furnace. Now the most amazing thing that I find in all of this is that the king, after seeing this great miracle, began to glorify God publicly, and he rewards these these guys who are thrown in because of political jealousy. What does the King do? He rewards them with even a higher political office because of their faith.

Well, this event changed the king's life, and it teaches us, I believe, 2 very important lessons that could change our it didn't change their life. It didn't change the life of these young men. Their life was the same. I mean, they got a higher job and all that, but they were essentially the same people. No.

It changed the life of the king. And I think there's a couple of lessons there that could change our lives significantly if we took the trouble to learn them and internalize them. First lesson is this, these men here had absolute faith in God's ability even though they did not know his will for their lives at the moment. It is easy for us to have faith when we've got the picture right in front of us. We know exactly what's gonna happen.

Where's the faith there? The Bible says we walk by faith, not by and by sight. These men had absolute faith in God's ability even though they didn't know what the plan was for them. Even though many times we don't always know the details of God's plan for our lives, let's not doubt this ability. It's okay to be confused about the plan.

It's okay to be not sure about what the future is gonna be like. It's alright sometimes to wonder, you know, about the wisdom of it all, but let's not doubt God's ability to save us. Let's not doubt his ability to forgive us. Let's not doubt his ability to know that we don't know the future, but he knows the future. Let's not doubt his ability to know the future, to give us the strength we need to get through what we have to get through.

Let's not doubt his ability to provide everything that we need, his ability to protect and to mature and to comfort us. And ultimately, let's not doubt his ability to raise us from the dead. They have the fiery furnace. We have a grave staring at us day after day after day. Let's not doubt his ability to raise us from that grave.

Paul tells us in 1st Corinthians chapter 6 verse 14, and God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power. Let's not doubt his ability to do that. In this context, let us be assured as a people, that god is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think. Ephesians chapter 3 20. Let's not doubt God's ability.

You can doubt your own. That's fine. And you can doubt your partners and you can doubt the government. You can doubt all those things, but let's not doubt God's ability to do the things, certainly the things that he's promised us. Another lesson is this, these men were absolutely committed to obedience.

Yeah. They were committed to the Lord and so on, but they were committed to obedience. These people were not just kinda dependable kind of people, they were committed to obedience as a way of life. Their minds were made up long before as to how they would react if faced with a situation. They decided long before that they would obey god.

Remember when I read chapter 1 verses 1 to 7, it says when they first arrived in Babylon, they refused to eat the king's food. You know, the king had prepared food for them and they were Jews and the food was partly food that they were not allowed to eat. They refused to eat that food. And if you read the story, you'd find out that they made a kind of an arrangement with the, with the with the chief there, to to to have a different kind of a menu to eat. So many problems.

So many problems are so easily handled when we decide ahead of time that we are going to obey. So many problems are easily handled. So many decisions become crystal clear if we decide way ahead of time that we are going to obey rather than wait at the last minute to figure out what am I gonna what am I gonna do. Yielding to the Holy Spirit within us is so effectively done when we are committed to obedience. I think that's a message so important for, younger people, people that, that I work with at Oklahoma Christian, that, they should make up their minds, at at at the ground level, at the very beginning, how they're going to conduct themselves.

You know, I read a survey, a study about young girls who became pregnant out of, you know, teenage pregnancy. And the doctor, the psychologist that was making this study, was saying that one of the big problems is that, these young people don't make up their minds how they're going to react until the very moment that it happens. They don't talk about it. They don't talk about how they'll react. They don't talk about it with their partners, with their boyfriends.

And so they're together, the lights go out, they fumble around in the dark. Nobody's talking to, each other. And all of a sudden, when the doctor says, well, did you plan to get pregnant? The girl answers, no. It just happened.

Of course, it just happened. Why? Because nowhere along the way was the decision made on, consciously that when I find myself in this situation, this is exactly how I am going to respond. These young men here give us a clear example of making up your mind from the very beginning so that when we are in a situation, whatever it is that will that threatens to compromise our values and our beliefs and our souls, we've already made up our minds What we're going to do, we just have to follow through. We would save ourselves so much grief and pain.

We would accelerate our own personal growth and the growth of the church if we would decide to commit ourselves to obey God now so that when the challenge comes, we are ready. I mean, it goes from things as important to our intimate sexual lives and purity to things as as, everyday, if you wish, things that come up every week is coming to church. You know, in our house, and I think it's like that in your house, we don't decide on Sunday mornings. Well, what do you guys think? We're going to church today?

I don't know. Let's check the weather channel. You know, we don't do that. We're going to church. I mean, that's it's just part of life.

You know? We don't decide, are we gonna have breakfast this morning? Of course not. It's where's the Cheerios? Well, it's the same thing.

Sunday morning, Sunday evenings, Wednesday night, there's no at our house, there's no question. Do we go to church on Wednesday night? There's no question of that. It's part of our lifestyle. There's no decision to be made because we've decided ahead of time long ago that that would be part of our normal spiritual growth pattern to a chair to attend church in a regular basis.

Now these Jewish men faced the challenge of a king and his fiery furnace and walked away because they believed that God is able. Whether they were saved from death or not, they believed that God was able. And secondly, they were committed to obedience, whatever the circumstances. When we in this day, in this time, when we hope, when we dream, when we plan, do we pray knowing that God is able? When our dreams crumble and our plans and prayers go unanswered, do we lose faith in God or do we continue to honor him no matter what?

Knowing that he is able. You know, it's easy to praise and trust God when you're on the mountain top. It's when you're down in the valley that trust and praising God really counts. It it it's when we can trust and praise God from the bottom of the valley that we show that our faith is genuine faith. And finally, are we committed to obedience?

Have we already made the decision to do the Lord's will in every situation, or are we still obeying when it's convenient and comfortable and making excuses for the rest of the time using the well worn excuse, well, nobody's perfect. You gotta use less, well, nobody's perfect and more, I repent. I will do better next time. That would that would certainly contribute more to spiritual growth. These men saved themselves, and they converted their enemy because they refused to compromise right from the beginning.

Our salvation, brothers and sisters and friends, our salvation and the salvation of those in this world rests on no less a commitment to such an obedience for ourselves and for this church. If we haven't already done so in our own lives, I encourage us as we close-up the lesson today, I call on you today to place your trust in God. No matter what your life is like, place your trust in me. And secondly, make a decision today if you haven't already done so. Make your decision today that whatever the situation in the future, your choice will be to obey God's will.

Now for some of us here, these decisions may mean that today, for example, we may have to obey God's command to repent, to be baptized, to confess our faith in Jesus Christ, and to become a disciple of Jesus. Or perhaps the command that you obey is that to give up sin or give up being unfaithful and to ask, the prayers of the church in order to be restored. As every as we do every week, we make an invitation, to allow you to respond and to allow you to have the church minister to you through prayer. If you do have a need, we encourage you to come forward now as we stand and as we sing our song of