[MUSIC PLAYING] Welcome to our new series. Welcome to church. And turning your Bibles to
Daniel Chapter 1 this morning. Kudos to our incredible
creative team in putting that video together. [APPLAUSE] I'm going to throw something
up on the screen, a quote. "Religion must die in
order for mankind to live." These are the words of TV
host and atheist Bill Maher. In 2008, he put
out a documentary that was designed to make
religious people, people of faith, look
like utter idiots. In fact, he called
them terrorists. Look at the quote again. "Religion must die in
order for mankind to live." That is not very different from
what Karl Marx famously said in 1843. "Religion is the
opium of the people." I'm believing that you have
probably seen that or heard of that before. That's the philosophy of Karl
Marx, the founder of Marxism. After Marx came on the scene
and people were dazzled by him in Russia, the
followers of Karl Marx yanked all the
religious teaching from the school system, and
they outlawed criticism. Anybody who would speak
against atheists or agnostics was punished. They then burned 100,000
churches in Russia. And so the clergy of the country
demanded religious freedom, as you might expect. And because they demanded
religious freedom, they were sentenced to death. Now, don't think this
happened 1,000 years ago. Between 1917 and 1935, 130,000
Russian Orthodox priests were arrested,
and 95,000 of them were executed by firing squads. That's recent history. I've told you before about
my first day of college. I told you this story
on many occasions, how my professor found
out that I was a believer, and he stood and in front of
a class said, pointing at me, my aim in this class is to
dismantle your belief system. It is this dismantling
of our belief system that happens to be the aim of
people both outside the church and inside the church, sadly. On one end of the spectrum,
you have progressive liberals on the left, and on the
other end of the spectrum you have Christian
deconstructionists, all who want to marginalize
us as being sheer idiots if we believe in this book,
if we teach our children the truths of the Bible. And what they want is basically
for us to shut up and go away. That's their agenda. They want to remove our
voice from the public square. In short, they want us
to conform, just shut up and do what we say. A psychologist by the
name of Nicholas Humphrey was lecturing at
Oxford University, and he admitted in
his speech his goal. And I'm going to quote it. His goal is to argue
in favor of censorship against freedom of expression. And then he even admitted who
he was aiming at in particular. Again he said, "Moral
and religious education, especially the education
a child receives at home." I want you to see what he
said in that speech, made a shocking statement. He said, "Children have
a right not to have their minds addled by nonsense. And we as a society have a
duty to protect them from it. So we should no more allow
parents to teach their children to believe, for example, in
the literal truth of the Bible than we should allow parents
to knock their children's teeth out or lock them in a dungeon." Interesting that he would
equate teaching your kids the Bible with child abuse. That is the same ideological
stance as Communist Russia. That is the same
ideological stance as any totalitarian regime. But you need to
know that there's a method to their madness. It comes in stages. First, they will
redefine vocabulary. They use words
you're familiar with, and they'll on purpose choose
noble, lofty sounding words that nobody would argue against. Who would dare oppose equality? Who would dare speak out
against freedom or science? Problem is, the meaning
they pour into those words are vastly different from
the understood meaning of those words. So they'll use vocabulary
that you're familiar with, but they begin redefining it. Second, they will
stigmatize their opponents. If you don't agree with
them, they will label you. They will vilify you. They'll call you names. They'll call you homophobic. They'll call you xenophobic or
Islamophobic or misogynistic or sexist, or the big
one now is racist. And the reason they do this is
they just want you to shut up. Don't say anything at all. Because if you
can label somebody as phobic or unscientific,
you can then perhaps take away their First
Amendment right of free speech and even get them
banned, canceled, from Facebook or Twitter
or any big tech platform. The Apostle Paul said, "I
beseech you therefore brethren, by the mercies of
God, that you present your bodies holy and
acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed
to this world, but be transformed by the
renewing of your mind." A better translation, I
think, is the Philips version. "Don't let the world squeeze
you into its own mold." Well, how do we do that? How can our little
voice and our presence stand up to the
giant of conformity? Fortunately, a little
kid by the name of Daniel shows us how, in
Daniel Chapter 1. I don't have time to read and
comment on the whole chapter, but we are going to
read sections of it. And I want to begin with the
predicament that Daniel was in. Now, let me give you the
long and short of it. Nebuchadnezzar, the King of
Babylon, has gained power. He has taken over the known
world, the world of the Middle East. He has taken captive Jerusalem. And he has brought
people with him to Babylon, including
Daniel and his friends, and he is looking for servants
for his palace in Babylon. That takes us into
verse 4, where we read, "young
men in whom there was no blemish,
but good-looking, gifted in all wisdom,
possessing knowledge, and quick to understand, who had ability
to serve in the king's palace, and whom they might teach
the language and literature of the Chaldeans. And the king appointed
for them a daily provision of the king's delicacies and
of the wine which he drank, and three years of
training for them, so that at the end
of that time they might serve before the king. Now from among those
of the sons of Judah were Daniel, Hanania,
Mishael, and Azariah. To them, the chief of
the eunuchs gave names. He gave Daniel the name
Belteshazzar; to Hanania, Shadrach; to Mishael, Meshach;
to Azariah, Abed-Nego." I'm going to fill in
a couple of the gaps. A battle had just taken place,
one of the most famous battles in history. If you're a history buff,
you'll know of this, the Battle of Carchemis. Happened in 605 BC. Carchemis is an area today
in present-day Turkey. It is where Babylon
defeated the combined armies of Assyria and Egypt. When that battle was
won, Nebuchadnezzar was large and in charge. He was the new sheriff in town. The rest of the world
was easy pickings. So he could pick off less
powerful kingdoms, including the kingdom of Jerusalem. So in that same year, 605
BC, he attacked Jerusalem. He did it again and 597 BC. He did it again in 586 BC. The last time he did it,
he destroyed the city, burned the temple with fire. But on that first
date, 605 BC, is when Daniel was
kidnapped from his home and taken 1,600 miles
away to live now in the courts of
the Babylonian king. I've told you on a few
occasions that I've been to Iraq a few times,
the area of Babylon. First time I went was in the
Gulf War, the first Gulf War. And we were trying to get in. Planes could not
fly into Baghdad, so we had to take a taxi
from Ammon, Jordan, all the way across the Jordanian and
Iraqi desert to get to Baghdad. It was 25 hours one way
and 25 hours back one way. So we did this drive, and
we hired a taxi driver who was a chain smoker. I just want you to feel
for my predicament. One cigarette after
another after another after another all day long. And his favorite
music was Madonna. So he had a stack
of Madonna tapes and a carton of cigarettes. I felt like I was in the
Babylonian captivity. Has nothing at all
to do with this text. Just wanted to throw
that in free of charge. Nebuchadnezzar had a four-tiered
process to get to these kids. Number one, he isolated them. He took them from their
home, took them away from their friends, took
them away from their parents, took them away from their
temple, their worship, their religious influence,
and sequestered them in a new environment. He isolated them. Second thing he did is
he indoctrinated them. He reeducated them. Notice it says they were taught
the language and the literature of the Chaldeans. Now, you read and go,
that's not so bad. That's like a free
college education. The government's
paying for that. Language and literature
of the Chaldeans? Sign me up. But the goal was
not just academic. The goal was to reorient their
way of thinking to a Babylonian worldview. It was a three-year program. The literature of the Chaldeans
promoted the Chaldean worldview of many gods. There's not one
God like they were taught in Israel, in Jerusalem. There are many gods. And so the worldview changed
their thinking about God, about life, about mankind. Archeology also has shown us
that the Babylonians practiced divination. They looked at the stars
to predict the future. They took the livers
and entrails of animals and put them on a plate
and let them wiggle around and somehow they looked at that
and could predict the future. All of that Daniel
and his friends would be taught in school. Basically, it was a three-year
cultural assimilation course to get them to forget
everything they learned as kids. I don't know. That sounds to me
a lot like college. I don't want to poke fun at
college, but a lot of how true that can be, that,
like in my case, you'll get professors
who are paid to teach integrated
zoology or biology or whatever is the discipline,
and they'll go out of their way not to teach that but to
undermine what you taught them, actively so. So they were isolated. They were indoctrinated. Third thing that
Nebuchadnezzar wanted to do is intimidate them. They were intimidated. In verse 5, we read that they
were given a daily provision of the king's delicacies and
of the wine which he drank. Now again, that doesn't
sound bad at first blush. You're in college and
you get free food. Sign me up for that,
especially this food. If you're a Jewish kid eating
falafels in Jerusalem every day and now you're in the biggest
city in the world given delicacies, those are perks. That's like desserts
and fine meals and all the wine you can drink. Leo Oppenheim,
the scholar, said, but the food that was offered
in the Babylonian court was first offered
to Babylonian gods and then brought to
the king's table. So all of that would
be used to intimidate these young Jewish minds. And they would start
thinking thoughts like, well, why should I believe in my God? First of all, I never ate
like this in Jerusalem. Second, my God couldn't
protect me from all of this. And Babylon itself
was intimidating. The Greek historian
Herodotus says the walls of the city of
Babylon were 80 feet thick, 320 feet tall, and 56 miles long. If you walk through the center-- the opening to the town
called the Ishtar Gate, which I have done in
its rebuilt ruins, you're on a street
that's 65 feet wide made out of limestone flanked
by red tiled sidewalks ornately decorated. The River Euphrates runs through
the center of town parallel to that street. You would see the most
magnificent palace in the world and one of the seven
wonders of the world called the Hanging
Gardens of Babylon. Any Jewish teenager would
drop their jaw at wonder. Wow, where am I? This is awesome. They'd be enamored by it. And then the fourth
thing Nebuchadnezzar did is he redesignated them. He took away from
them their most personal, private
possession, their name, and gave them new names. It's basically
social engineering. So the name Daniel,
his Jewish name, is a name that means
"God is my judge." His new name given
by Nebuchadnezzar is Belteshazzar, which means
"may Bel protect the King." Bel is one of the chief
deities of Babylon. Hanania meant
"beloved of the Lord," but his new name was Shadrach,
which means "illumined by Aku," the moon god. Mishael means "who is like
God," but the new name, Meshach, means "who is like
Aku," the moon god. And Azariah means
"the Lord is my help." That's his Jewish name. But he was given
the name Abed-Nego, which means "servant of Naboo." All of these are pagan
deities, and they had so many that they worshipped. But what I want
you to latch onto is that they are banning words. They are banning foreign names. And the only words
allowed is the words this new culture has
provided for them. Sound familiar? So that's the
predicament they were in. Now, the predicament takes
us to the second phase, that is, the protest. So we read what we read,
but look at verse 8. What's the first
word in the verse? But. But. That's a good sign. But Daniel-- See, it
doesn't say "and Daniel" or "so Daniel" or "therefore
Daniel," but "But Daniel." So immediately, we have
opposition to the pressure. The pressure represented
in the first seven verses is met with a "but Daniel,"
a negative conjunction. "On the contrary." What we have going here
is Daniel, young Daniel, young teenage Daniel,
making a choice. And the choice he is making
is, will I conform or will I not conform? So look what it says. "But Daniel purposed
in his heart that he would not defile himself
with a portion of the king's delicacies nor with the
wine which he drank. Therefore, he requested of
the chief of the eunuchs that he might not
defile himself." Notice that Daniel's choice
began with inward conviction. It says he purposed
in his heart. That is, he made a
choice deep inside. After soul searching, he
came up with his choice. So this is really good news. All the indoctrination,
all the intimidation, all the isolation,
all the redesignation is met by Daniel's
determination. You have a young
teenage boy who's been abducted saying
at this point, nope, not going to cross that line. So he's determined. He purposes in his heart. Listen, the power to not conform
to the culture around you is always an inside job. It always begins on the inside. And it happens
when your decisions become your convictions. Anybody can make a
decision, a choice. But when those
decisions and choices become your defined nature, your
conviction, "this is who I am," it's different. Now listen, the effectiveness
of the rest of Daniel's life depends on this very moment. If he doesn't make
the right choice, Daniel would not make
the right impact. This choice that
he makes that day will determine the man
that he will become every day after this day. He's making a very,
very important choice. I want you to see
what WA Criswell-- he's been in heaven
a while, but look at what he said about this. He said, "All of life is filled
with crises and decisions. There are right decisions,
wrong decisions, high roads, low roads. And almost every day, there
will be a fork in the road. Where you are today is due
to the turn in the road you took yesterday. You are the product
of your choices. You are where you are because
of the choices you have made." And you have many more to make. So your decisions must
become your convictions. Purpose of heart. Purpose of heart. So it began with an
inward conviction, but notice something else. It included a
spiritual definition. Notice that Daniel
doesn't see the delicacies offered him as delicacies. Daniel sees the delicacies
offered him as defilement. He didn't go, hot dog! I'm a teenager and I get
all the wine I can drink and all the desserts I can have? He didn't see it that way. Look at verse 8. "Daniel purposed in his
heart that he would not defile himself with the portion
of the king's delicacies nor with the wine
which he drank. Therefore, he requested of
the chief of the eunuchs that he might not
defile himself." I know, you're still
thinking, what's the big deal? Food is food. Not to Daniel. He's a Jewish kid. And according to
his law, Jewish law, there are certain kinds
of food you can eat and certain kind you can't eat. And when you can eat it,
it's called kosher cuisine, and when you can eat
it, it's unkosher. And it's a practice
still to this day. So according to levitical
laws, you certainly couldn't eat stuff that has
been sacrificed to pagan gods. And the way the Babylonians
prepared it evidently was not according to Jewish kosher law. So he just says,
not going to do it. And then he said, I
don't want the wine, because the wine had been
poured onto pagan altars. That was their practice. And then the rest of the
wine was taken undiluted, and the Jews didn't
drink undiluted wine. They would mix their
wine, 20 parts of water to one part of wine, because
wine was basically used by the Jews to kill germs. So the idea of
something that was offered to a foreign
god that might give me an altered state
of consciousness as well as this pagan revelry,
no, I'm not going to do it. So he called it a defilement. And I know, you
might think, yeah, I still don't see
what the big deal is. Daniel is not in
Jerusalem, he's in Babylon. So dude, accommodate. When in Babylon, live
like the Babylonians. Your parents aren't even around. Your friends aren't even around. The rabbis aren't here. Nobody's going to see. Do what you want. You've got a lot of excuses. That's the deal. Daniel wasn't
looking for an excuse because Daniel was
living with purpose. And when you live with purpose,
you don't look for an excuse. The only reason you
look for an excuse is if you don't have
a purpose to live for. So he had a purpose. He had a name. He had a goal. He's saying
basically to the king and to the king's head
of the eunuchs, look, you can isolate me and
you can re-educate me and you can intimidate me
and you can redesignate me, but you can't change me. This is who I am at the core. No matter what happens,
this is who I am. I'm not afraid of that. Which brings up a topic. What is it that defiles you? There's all sorts of
things that taint us, that pollute us, that corrupt
us, that can contaminate us. And they could be
movies or TV shows that you now feel the freedom
to binge on, websites you go to, places you frequent,
relationships you're involved in. What I am suggesting
from the scriptures is that you develop
the conviction to say no so that you will
have the occasion to say yes. Develop the conviction to
say no so that you will have the occasion to say yes. When you close the
door to defilement, you open the door
to development. God will do some great thing. You say no to certain things,
new opportunities the Lord will spring into your path. Now, it all begins in the heart. It all begins deep inside. It begins with a belief
system, a mindset, that no matter where
I am at, whether I'm in Jerusalem or Babylon, whether
I'm in church or in Starbucks, no matter where I might
be, God is always there. The camera is always on. The microphone is always on. It says in Proverbs
5, "The ways of man are before the eyes
of the Lord, and He ponders all of his paths." Remember the story
of Moses before he became Moses the leader? And he was disgruntled because
he knew that the Egyptians were oppressing the Israelites. And he looked one day, and
he saw an Egyptian beating an Israelite. And Moses went over
and killed him. But this is what the Bible says. Moses looked this way,
and Moses looked that way, and then Moses killed him. You know what his problem was? He didn't look that way. And if you live that way-- I'm looking this way and that
way, so are people looking? God is always looking. And Daniel knew that. Even as a young teenager, he's
in Babylon going, God's here. God's here. So that was his protest. That's the predicament. That's the protest. But I want to show
you something else. I want to show you the petition. Go back to verse 8. "Daniel purposed in his heart
he would not defile himself with a portion of the king's
delicacies, nor with the wine which he drank. Therefore he requested--"
notice that word-- "he requested of the
chief of the units that he might not
defile himself. Now, God had brought Daniel
into the favor and goodwill of the chief of the eunuchs,
and the chief of the eunuch said to Daniel, 'I fear my lord
the king--'" I'm afraid of Nebuchadnezzar "--who
has appointed your food and drink.'" This is
his menu, not mine. "Why should he see
your faces looking worse than the young
men who are your age? Then you would endanger
my head before the king." Look, our king isn't a nice guy. He cuts heads off. Mine's next. "So Daniel said to the steward
whom the chief of the eunuchs set over Daniel, Hananiah,
Mishael, and Azariah, 'Please test your
servants for 10 days, and let them give us vegetables
to eat and water to drink.'" So it's a vegan diet. "'Then let our appearance
be examined before you and the appearance of the
young men who eat the portion of the king's delicacies. As you see fit, so deal
with your servants.' So he consented with them in
this matter and tested them for 10 days.'" Now watch this. Daniel isn't just reactive. Daniel is proactive. He's not just
resisting an order. He is requesting an alternative. So please note, first
of all, in verse 8 it says, "Daniel requested." Doesn't say "Daniel demanded"
or "Daniel picketed" or "Daniel yelled and protested and
screamed and defamed." He requested. That's showing honor. Look at verse 12. What's the first word? What does Daniel say? "Please." His mama taught him right. He uses please and thank you. "Please test your
servants for 10 days." See, Daniel is not some
holier than thou kid saying, look here you filthy pagans! He's respectful. He's nice. He is honoring. And God brought him into
the respect and honor of the servant,
head of the eunuchs. Did you know in
Proverbs 16 it reads, "When a man's ways
please the Lord, he makes even his enemies
be at peace with him." That's what you
have happening here. Yeah, be a nonconformist, by
all means, but be a nice one. You don't have to be a mean one. You can be a nice one. Don't try to pick a fight. In 2 Timothy chapter
2, verse 24 it says, "And a servant of the
Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to
all, able to teach, patient, in humility correcting
those who are in opposition if God perhaps will
grant them repentance. Some people, some Christian
people, some preachers, always seem mad, mad at those
that disagree with him or her, rebuking political leaders,
ranting about what is really a personal opinion. Ben Franklin was right. He said you'll catch
more flies with honey than you will with vinegar. I want you to remember
what I'm about to say. You need to be winsome
if you want to win some. You need a winsome
personality if you want to win others to Christ. You need to be winsome
if you want to win some. So Daniel requested,
and Daniel said please, here's an alternative. Let's do a test. Still, I don't want to forget
that Daniel was not silent. He spoke up. He didn't agree. He dug his heels in. There was a line
he wouldn't cross, and he made it known
that he wouldn't cross. Against this onslaught of
Babylonian cultural pressure that is thrust on him, he
says, I will not conform. No. It's not that he's
going to change Babylon, because he won't. Babylon will not change because
of Daniel's ministry there. Oh, yeah, you'll get a king
in chapter 4 confessing the God of heaven,
but they're going to continue in their
pagan practices. They're not going to stop
worshipping their false gods. They're not going to
stop being corrupt. And the judgment of God
will rest upon Babylon. So he's not going
to change Babylon, but that's not
what this is about. Daniel's not trying
to change Babylon. Wasn't about changing Babylon. This is about not letting
Babylon change him. It's this cultural conformity
that I will not bow to. And I think this is important,
especially in this day and age. If your agenda becomes, we've
got to take America back, you're going to
die disappointed. If you think you're going to
go back 200 years to Founding Fathers Ville, you're going
to be very, very disappointed. That ship has sailed. There has been too
many elections. There have been too
many laws passed. And yes, there are certain
things we can hold on to, but it's really not about
trying to get America back to where it was. It's about the church standing
strong in the midst of it. [APPLAUSE] I'm not called to be
worried about America. As a pastor, I'm more
worried about God's people. It's time for the
church to refuse to conform to the culture. It's time for the
church to refuse to go along with the agenda. It's time for the
church to refuse letting the culture tell
us how to raise our kids or how to live our lives. [APPLAUSE] They can live any way they want. They just don't have to tell me
how I'm going to live my life or what I'm going
to teach my kids. Now, it's funny, because they're
always saying to people like me and people like us, stay
in your lane, Christians. Stay in your churches. Stay in your cubicle. Stay in your corner. Don't get involved
in our issues. What's interesting
about that is they have no qualms getting
involved in our issues, sticking their nose in our
tent, trying to mandate all sorts of things to us. And all the while they say,
separation of church and state. Yeah, they don't even
know what that originally means, typically. And so they say,
separation of church-- get out of here, church. But they want the state to
impose things on the church. And if we don't, they resort
to humiliation and vilification and censorship. All that to say
this, and I believe this with all my heart-- we
are living in a Daniel moment. We're in that moment. [APPLAUSE] We have unprecedented
pressure all around us, so we need to pray for
the same kind of wisdom that Daniel had in the
moment that he had. Certain things I'm
going to refuse, just so you know going forward. There are certain
things in this culture-- I don't care what
government says. There's certain
things I will refuse. But I'll do it with respect. I'll do it with a smile. They may lock me up
and put me in jail, but I'll do it with class. So that is the petition. [APPLAUSE] Good. You'll be my cell mate. I want to close with
this, the payoff. There's a payoff to all of
this, and that is verse 15. If you're wondering, well,
all of this saying no, what did it get Daniel? Verse 15. "At the end of 10
days, their features--" these little vegan kids. "The end of 10
days, their features appeared better and
fatter in flesh." Now typically, that is not a
compliment, but in this context it really is a compliment. Hey, you're looking fat. Thank you. [LAUGHTER] Because that would
score them points. "At the end of those days,
they looked better and fatter in flesh than all
the young men who ate the portion of
the king's delicacies. Thus, the steward took
away their portion of delicacies and wine
that they were to drink and gave them vegetables." I know Daniel became
their enemy after that. Like, really? Now we can't eat dessert. We're eating your stupid
vegetable and water diet. "As for these four
young men, God gave them knowledge and skill
in literature and wisdom, and Daniel had understanding
in all visions and dreams." So God honored their
commitment, first of all in their appearance. They looked great. Second of all in
their prominence. They graduated at the
top of their class. They aced the test. Look in verse 19. "The king interviewed
them, and among them all, none was found like Daniel,
Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. Therefore, they served
before the king. And in all matters of
wisdom and understanding about which the
king examined them, he found them 10 times
better than all the magicians and astrologers who
were in his realm." 10 times better. Literally in the
Hebrew text, 10 hands. 10 hands. So that's like
horse measurement. The idea is that one
of Daniel is worth 10 of these magicians from
the Babylonian court. 10 times better. Appearance, prominence,
and there's a third payoff, influence. Influence. Verse 21. Look at the very last
verse of the chapter. "Thus Daniel continued until
the first year of King Cyrus." Now, we would just read
through that and not really camp on that, but
I need to explain that. We believe Daniel came to
Babylon as a young teenager because he lives through
the entire 70-year captivity into his latter years. And for him to live
70 years in Babylon, he must have gotten
there as a teenager because the introduction
of King Cyrus is in 536 BC. So from 605 BC to 536 BC
through the entire captivity, Daniel had influence. He influences King
Nebuchadnezzar in chapter 2, 3, and 4, introduced
Nebuchadnezzar to the God of
heaven in chapter 4. He influences Belshazzar in
chapter 5, the handwriting on the wall incident. All the way to Cyrus. The Medo-Persian Empire that
takes over the Babylonians. And I'm going to add
something else to that. I would say that
Daniel's influence even went beyond that, because
years later, centuries later, it says, wise men from the
East showed up in Jerusalem saying we have seen
his star in the East and we have come to worship him. The Magi. The Magi were Babylonian
priests from the court of the Babylonian King-- Babylon, then Medo-Persia. The big question
is, how on Earth would Babylonian priests know
to look for a Jewish king unless a guy told them about it? In fact, if you know
the book of Daniel, that's the theme of the Book
of Daniel, the Jewish King who will rule the world. And years later, they were still
being influenced by Daniel. So here's the
takeaway this morning. Go against the flow. The flow out there
is pretty strong. It's a cultural flow. It's a political flow. It's a moral flow. It's a musical flow. Go against it. Go against the flow. It's not easy to do it. It's hard to go
against the flow. Any dead fish can
float downstream. Easiest thing to do is go
along with what everybody thinks and tells you to do. Fit in. Don't speak up. That's easy. Anybody-- everybody does that. Don't. Go against the flow. Be a live fish. Buck the system. Go against the flow. Stand up for Christ. Don't be ashamed of the gospel. I want to close by reading to
you something that was found. This is from the 1920s and '30s. It was found among the papers,
a journal, of a missionary to Zimbabwe after
he was martyred for his faith in Christ. He writes this. "I am a part of the
fellowship of the unashamed. The die has been cast. I have stepped over the line. The decision has been made. I am a disciple of His, and
I won't look back, let up, slow down, back
away, or be still. My past is redeemed. My present makes sense. My future is secure. I'm done and finished with
low-living, sight-walking, small planning, smooth
knees, colorless dreams, tamed visions, mundane
talking, cheap living, and dwarfed goals. My face is set. My gait is fast. My goal is heaven. My road may be
narrow, my way rough, my companions few, but
my guide is reliable and my mission is clear. I will not be bought,
compromised, detoured, lured away, turned back,
deluded, or delayed. I will not flinch in
the face of sacrifice or hesitate in the
presence of the adversary. I will not negotiate at
the table of the enemy or ponder at the pool
of popularity or meander in the maze of mediocrity. I won't give up,
shut up, or let up till I've stayed up, stored
up, prayed up, paid up, and preached up for
the cause of Christ." [APPLAUSE] You live like that,
world will not know what to do with
that kind of boldness, that kind of nonconformity. And that's what this missionary
wrote, and they killed him. But I got to say, that's
a good way to go out. All the ways I could think of
going out of this world, that sounds pretty good. Thank you, Father, for
the love of Daniel, for the truth that was
taught him by his parents, the Jewish faith
he was raised in, that there is one God in
Heaven who is sovereign, in control, sets up
kings, deposes them. All of this incredible theology
that is exhibited in this book that he knew as
a young teenager. And so bold to be able to stand
before a king who could execute anybody and often did
and say to his servant, yeah, I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to
cross that line. I am going to stand up to
this giant of conformity and not be conformed
to this world but transformed by the
renewing of my mind. Lord, help us in
these last days. Help us to be faithful
to you, to always be aware that you are with us. And you're not just
watching in a way that is a detached character
watches, but you're watching as a involved
father would watch. You care. You are concerned. You hear, you see not only
what we say and think and do, but what others say
against us or about us. I pray that we would
live with the reality that your determination
and your evaluation of us is far weightier than what
anybody else might think of us, because that'll
just set us free. It'll set us free to be bold,
set us free to be courageous, and set us free to live
unencumbered lives. Thank you, Lord, in Jesus' name. [MUSIC PLAYING] We hope you enjoyed this special
service from Calvary Church. We'd love to know how
this message impacted you. Email us
MYSTORY@CALVARYNM.CHURCH. And just a reminder, you can
support this ministry with a financial gift at
CALVARYNM.CHURCH/GIVE. Thank you for joining us for
this teaching from Calvary Church.
