Sunday, July 15, 2018

Daniel 3:4-7 – “Commanding Hearts”

As always, here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:

4And the herald calling in strength,
“To you being said, peoples, nations, and languages,
5‘In the time which you hear
the sound of the horn, the pipe, zither, lyre, harp, pipes, and the all of the kinds of music,
 you will fall and you will worship
 the image of the gold
 which Nebuchadnezzar the king has set up;
6And whoever does not fall and worship at the moment
will be cast to the midst of the furnace of the fire burning.’”
7Therefore, in the moment when hearing the all of the peoples
the sound of the horn, the pipe, zither, lyre, harp, and the all of the kinds of music
falling the all of the peoples, the nations, and the languages worshiping
the image of the gold
 which Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up.

I’ve been studying the next few verses, but I want to ponder one more thought before I move on, and that is the folly of anyone thinking that power can change hearts.

What Nebuchadnezzar is trying to do is done all day every day all over the face of the earth – not only in governments but in churches and workplaces and families and pretty much anywhere people gather. It is true, if you have the power, you can get anyone to do anything. What I mean is, if you have the power to truly hurt someone, you can get them to say or do almost anything. And if the power you have to hurt them isn’t enough to move them, you just need more power. If a fiery furnace isn’t enough to exact obedience, then fire it up seven times hotter!

Of course, sometimes power may first seek to control others by offering them sufficient rewards. You could almost say the opposite of my assertion is true – that if you have the power to (significantly) reward people, you also can have considerable power to get them to do or say anything you want them to.

But, either way, what we’re dealing with is “getting other people to do what we want them to.” These thoughts of course lend themselves to discussions of “leadership” – good leadership, bad leadership, etc. A “good” leader is typically thought of as someone who has an unusual ability to get people to do things. A “good” leader in the business world is someone who can rally the troops around some goal and actually see it happen. A pastor is a “good” leader if he can implement programs and ministries in the church and see people rise up and clearly, visibly implement those programs or ministries. It would be generally agreed that Nebuchadnezzar was one of the greatest administrators (leaders) in human history. He extended Babylon’s rule from India to Egypt and ruled over it all. Even this whole “golden image” episode we’re considering in Daniel 3 is an amazing illustration of leadership.

Of course, his particular style of leadership was cruel dictatorship, but, we have to admit he did get essentially the entire civilized world to submit to his rule. I will say again, if you have the power, you can get other people to do or say almost anything you want them to. The story before us is a prime example. The leaders from basically the entire civilized world are bowing to this image at Nebuchadnezzar’s command.

And they do. Nebuchadnezzar must be quite proud of himself. The whole world bows when he tells them to. He can assure himself he has the submission of his entire kingdom. There they are bowing, right when he told them to.

But, as he congratulates himself on this signal accomplishment, he is failing to realize a very, very important reality. He has not changed their hearts. Oh, yes, they are bowing. Oh, yes, they’ll exclaim, “O king, live forever!” They are doing and saying all the right things.

But does he really have their hearts?

The fact is that all the power in the world, all the outwardly demonstrated acts of obedience someone can command, all the right words verbally expressed tell you nothing about the person’s heart. Do they really agree? Do they really believe these things? Are they really loyal?

As long as you exact those expressions with power, you’ll never know what’s really in their hearts.

Power does not change hearts.

I think of a church I knew where there was a very strong leader and good administrator. And he really was. The guy was just a naturally gifted leader. And he got essentially the whole church saying the right things and doing lots of right things. But as soon as he left, it all fell apart. And why? Because the truth is their hearts were never in it. They were simply doing and saying what they were told. He had the “power” of very persuasive leadership, an unusual ability to get people to do and say what he wanted ... but he couldn’t change their hearts.

As parents, we all desperately want our children to grow up and “do well.” We do our best to guide them and teach them and correct them while they’re growing up. But I remember reading one of the old reformed preachers way back then and he made the statement, “You’ll never know how much of your teaching your children have really embraced until they are on their own, living their own lives.” What he was saying was, you may have the power as a parent to command all sorts of behaviors and even stated beliefs. But the one thing you do not have is the power to change their hearts. Their “heart” will only show once they are no longer under your power. Then you find out what they really did and did not embrace.

Just in the last few years I have come to realize from the Bible that one of the supreme dignities of the human race is our freedom of choice. What that comes down to is the plain fact that each individual has a heart of their own – that place where they ponder and consider and think over the things they’ve seen and heard, where they dream, and desire, and hope, and become convinced of what they really believe is true and best for them. And the plain, simple fact is that NO ONE can command that heart. If you have the power, you can get them to do and say almost anything, but nothing you do can touch that heart.  Someone once called it “the unassailable citadel of the human heart.”

Hearts cannot be commanded. They can only be wooed. Jesus knew that. He didn’t come to earth and say, “Believe in Me or die.” He didn’t grab His disciples by the collar and say, “Follow Me or else.” This is precisely why it was true that “a bruised reed He did not break and a smoldering wick He did not put out.” That’s why His message was “Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest.” He was “drawing them” with “cords of love.”

When we are trying to get others to do something or believe something and find ourselves angrily demanding their compliance (like preachers screaming from their pulpits and bosses issuing fearful threats), we can rest assured the task before us is hopeless. It isn’t first of all them that needs to change. It’s us.

It is true that sometimes all that is needed is physical compliance, as in an advancing military column, and that may be all good and well. But when that same leader or we have started thinking we can command those same people’s hearts, we may rest assured we’ve embarked on a fool’s errand. Someone commenting on this passage said, “And what could be more foolish? It is attempting an impossibility. Force cannot reach the mind. Force may make cowards, it may make dissemblers, it may make hypocrites and apostates, but it never did, and never can make a convert.”

In our story, three young men didn’t bow. Three young men were seen standing. The truth is, there were a lot of hearts still standing that day – but Nebuchadnezzar didn’t know it, because he had the power to make their bodies bow. May you and I have the wisdom to know the difference.

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