But If Not…

Each year, around November, Jeremy and I would sit down and make a cohesive plan for the next year. Church theme, student ministry theme, topics, lesson plans, activities, etc. In 2021, our Student Ministry theme was “That’s Messed Up” and we spent the year learning about the deeply flawed people in the Bible and the God Who redeemed their stories for the sake of the Gospel. By God’s design, I was scheduled to speak about Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego on the Sunday night after Jeremy went on the ventilator.

I wrestled with it. I knew I had to stick to the plan and obey the Spirit of God, but oh, how my flesh did NOT want to say what I knew I had to say!

“But if not….”

During the lifetime of Daniel, three young Hebrew princes were taken captive and made slaves in Babylon; their families, killed. Even under these circumstances, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego grew in faith and favor. Which is why they were given audience with Nebuchadnezzar when he was made aware of their disobedience. He gave them one last chance: bow, or burn.

Daniel 3:16-18 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. If this be so, 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. But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

Three young men with big problems, but even bigger faith.

But faith isn’t just believing that God will rescue me. It’s not just naming and claiming all the promises. Faith is more than expecting to get what I ask for. Faith isn’t disillusioned when I don’t get my way. Faith focuses on Who God is, rather than what He does for me. Real faith is trusting that God is still absolutely right, even when He says “no.” Faith is inalterable trust.

Even if my spouse dies. Even if He doesn’t heal me. Even if He doesn’t save my child. Even if He doesn’t restore the relationship. Even if my desperate prayers don’t change the outcome. Even if all is stripped away.

Mercy Me puts it this way:
I know You’re faithful and I know You can
Save through the fire with Your mighty hand.
But even if You don’t, my hope is You alone.

Or, as Job said, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”

That’s the lesson I taught my students that night. And now, I have an audience, watching to see if I really believe what I teach:

• My God Can
• My God Will
• But if Not

I will still worship my God and not bow to another.

The Hebrew boys were, indeed, thrown into a furnace so hot that the men who threw them in burned to death. But when Nebuchadnezzar peered in the window, he saw four men walking around in the flames. Not three. Four. Immanuel. God with us.

For the child of God, there is always another in the fire, and His name is Jesus. So when my students peer into my furnace of suffering, my desire is that they see Him. I want them to know that, although God doesn’t always keep us out of the fire, He does walk through the fire with us. He didn’t protect Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego from the fire, but He did protect them in the fire. And when they came out of the furnace, not a hair on their head was singed nor a thread of their clothes, burned.

And when I come out the other side of this furnace of grief, (whether in this life, or in Glory) I will not have spent one moment alone, and God will not have wasted one ounce of my pain. I don’t yet know how He plans to redeem it, but making beauty from ashes is His specialty.

After all, a pagan king’s heart was changed because three young men had the faith to say, “We know our God will deliver us…”

“But if not, we will not bow.”

April 27, 2022