Wednesday, October 4, 2017

Daniel 2:48,49 – “Faith in the Real Workplace”


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

48Then the king made Daniel great and gave to him many great gifts and he made him ruler upon the all of the province of Babel and chief ruler upon the all of the wise men of Babel, 49and Daniel asked from the king and he appointed upon the service of the province of Babel to Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and Daniel [was] in the gate of the king.

At first glance, this seems like just an “Aw, that’s nice” passage, and then we quickly move on. Apparently that is how almost everyone sees these two verses, as I found very little commentary written on them, and even some commentators said nothing at all.

But to me these two little verses are jewels to sit and ponder, literally overflowing with very, very helpful truth for people who want to live for God in a real world, and especially in the real workplace.

Here are Daniel and his friends. Their entire lives have been blasted upside down. Just three or four years before they were normal teenage boys in Jerusalem thinking about what careers they might embark on and which of their little Jewish girlfriends they might marry. Suddenly Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian army appeared on the scene and nothing has been the same since. The boys were ripped away from their families, and the future they had imagined was shattered to dust as they were carried far away to Babylon and placed in the service of that king.

Ever since then, they have modeled for us how to live for Christ in a godless, pagan world. And as I have said before, what I find enormously encouraging and instructive about the book of Daniel is to realize that what we’re reading about is believers in the workplace – believers at their jobs. Babylon is no “Christian” workplace for the boys to thrive in, but then neither are most of our jobs. For 99% of God’s people, we spend all day every day in a world that could care less what God thinks of their practices. As we try to be people of integrity, we’re not in danger of being thrown into a fiery furnace, but we all know our workplaces can dole out some pretty miserable consequences when somehow our faith runs against the grain of their intentions. We also know that our work assignments often seem impossible, just like the boys and the interpretation of this dream of the king’s, and there too our faith is challenged. Finally, as we plod away day after day we are (or should be) very aware that these people we work with desperately need to know this God they apparently don’t care about.

Once again, here we are. Another day in the real world lives of our Daniel and his friends. Once again, they were just minding their own business, doing a good job at whatever they were given to do, when suddenly the decree has gone out they are to be executed because the other wise men can’t do what the king is asking.    Executed.    Dead.    At that point, they didn’t know “the rest of the story.” For all they knew, their heads would soon be in baskets. And how did they respond? In faith. In real, living faith. They continued to be men of integrity; they continued to be polite and make requests properly … and threw themselves into the arms of the Lord. Like Jesus, “When threatened, He did not retaliate; when He suffered, He made no threats. Instead, He entrusted Himself to Him who judges justly.”

Our friends did exactly what we all should do all day every day at our jobs – be people of integrity and entrust ourselves to Him who judges justly.

It is worthwhile to note, in the very next chapter, they will do exactly that and get themselves thrown into a furnace. Today, it gets them promoted higher than any of them could have ever imagined! Think about it – all Daniel has done is live his faith. All he has done is be humble, pray, invite his friends to pray, and sincerely try to do what his boss has asked, and, in this case, the Lord has honored that faith and, instead of being executed, suddenly Daniel and his friends are promoted to the very highest positions in the king’s service. And what does that mean? It means no doubt very high salaries, palatial mansions to live in, the most expensive chariots to drive – practically everything a young man could ask for.

I take from this the realization that, whenever I am faced with one of these crises at work (and really we face at least small versions of it all day every day), I need to be like Daniel and just be a person of integrity, try to do my best, and trust God with the outcome. I may be successful and be greatly honored. Or I might get thrown in a furnace. But no matter, I can live in the quiet confidence that my God is the Most High and He rules in the lives of men and nations. My job is to serve Him. His job is to run the universe. And I know He’ll do it well – whatever that may mean for me.

That alone is enormously helpful truth for living in a real world. But there is way more in these two little verses. We can ponder why the Lord is doing this. Why promote these young fellows so high? On the one hand, it is no doubt a blessing of the Lord for their faithfulness. Like Solomon they did not ask for riches or long lives but simply wisdom to live today, and the Lord says, “Then I’ll give you both.” But there is a much bigger picture going on here than just some young men and their lives. God has just raised four Jewish boys to the very highest levels of power in the government of Babylon, the ruling power of the known world, and the very place where their fellow Jews have been carried captive. God is no doubt show-casing to the world His greatness and also placing the boys in positions where they can do good to their own captive people. Our good God can accomplish all of that in one miraculous event.

Then stop and ponder too what the boys have been promoted to – the government of Babylon.  Babylon. Not Judea. This is seriously about like an American POW being promoted to serve in the government of Nazi Germany! This is not the country these boys want to be governing. It is not the people they want to serve. And yet how do they handle it? With integrity and faith, like always. We can take from this that we don’t always get the job we want. We may end up in some places we really don’t want to be. Yet, if that is where the Lord has put us today, how should we deal with it? With integrity and faith – just like Daniel and his friends.

To see what I mean, look closely at the two verses and think about it. Where does Daniel get placed? He’s made the head man over all the wise men of Babylon. “Wise men.” And what are they really? Astrologers. Soothsayers. Necromancers. Conjurors. Wizards. Shamans. Fortune-tellers. Tarot card readers. Think about it! The very profession itself is abhorrent to an Israelite. Back in Israel, such people were to be executed! And where is Daniel? Placed in charge of them! It’s about like one of us being “promoted” to head up all of the king’s royal abortion clinics or all of the king’s royal brothels! The job itself would be not only undesirable to us but actually abhorrent! Can you imagine Daniel sending a letter back home to his parents saying, “Guess what? I’ve been made the head of the necromancers!!!” You would think his Jewish parents’ first response would be horror. This is precisely one of those places where I suspect any one of us as normal evangelical Christians would probably think we need to refuse to work in such a position. But Daniel didn’t.

But Daniel didn’t.

He accepted the position.

As they say, “Put that in your pipe and smoke it.”

It’s bad enough that he has to serve in the court of the very king who will destroy Jerusalem. It’s bad enough he had to attend Babylon U. and learn all the vile methods of the “wise men.” Now Daniel and his friends get promoted to the very highest positions in that pagan, godless world.

Yet they took the jobs and no doubt did them well.

I remember years ago pondering in my mind whether it was even possible for a thinking Christian to be president of the United States. My head was so full of legalistic scruples I just couldn’t imagine how one could occupy that position without almost constant compromises. But then I watched Ronald Reagan and I saw that, even though he went to all the dinners and drank their wine and danced with his wife and served over a country that was aborting babies under his very nose, yet it was an enormous blessing to have such a good Christian man serve as our president. I could see that somehow he could disregard all my scruples and yet do tremendous good to this country and to the world itself. It was quite a mystery to me at the time, but I knew something was “right” about it and longed to understand.

And here I see Daniel doing the very same thing.

Of course, what I have learned over the years is that it all comes down to “Love God, love people.” Christianity isn’t about all the scruples. It’s about loving God and people. And the fact is we can do that from almost any position – even as the head of the necromancers or high up in the court of a pagan king. I will even go so far as to suggest, if we had to, we could do it as head of the king’s royal brothels – if that is where we found ourselves.

Can I inject here that, in America, we think we are basically free to work wherever we want to, that we don’t “have to” work at any job. That is true but only to a point. The fact is it is very expensive to live and I can’t just quit a job if I don’t have another already lined up to go to. Even in America, if you quit your job, you have no idea how long it will take to find another and whether it will be any better than what you left any way. My point is that, in the real world, and to a very large extent, we’re no different than Daniel. We don’t really have a whole lot of choice what we do or do not do at work. We’re given assignments and expected to carry them out. And like Daniel, a good Christian will take most of it with a smile and seek to do their best – no matter where they find themselves. And I know – but, but, but …!!! I’m just saying, “Put that in your pipe and smoke it.” I think we can learn a great deal from Daniel, if we only lay aside our traditions and actually listen to what the Lord is telling us through him – and again, especially in our workplaces.

I could say so much more about this, but, in the event anyone stumbles across these feeble scratchings, I hope I’ve challenged you to think very deeply about what it means to be a practicing Christian in a godless, pagan workplace. I will close my thoughts by just suggesting that what the Lord wants of us is very, very different than the impressions we get today. We need to get our truth from the Bible, not from our traditions, and I hope I have at least challenged someone to think that through. Once again, that is precisely why I study the Bible – I find in it a very different “faith” than what we all seem to think it should be. I want to live Jesus’ faith – and that can only come from the Word of God itself.

I want to live a real faith in the real world, in my own very real workplace – just like Daniel.

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