Daniel 3, God in the Fire
The Revelation 13 Connection

In the first 2 chapters of Daniel the issues were obedience and loyalty to God. Here in chapter 3 this is taken one step further to include the issue of worship. Here in chapter 3 we have an attempt by the powers that be to impose a form of false worship on the people. And the whole world apparently is willing to go along with the idea -- All that is except for three young men who dared to stand firm for God when the whole world bowed down before an image of gold.

Now there is more that a passing resemblance in what happened that day long ago on the plain of Dura and the events presented in Revelation 13: And that is by design. The stories in Daniel illustrate the experiences that God’s people will go through near the end of time. They illustrate the kind of living faith, of solid determination to remain loyal to God no matter what, that God’s people in the last days will need. And the story found in this chapter illustrates one of the greatest crises, one of the greatest tests of faith that God’s people will be called on to endure at the end of time. It is a test that will leave behind only those who love the Lord above all else - even more than their own lives -- Those whose faith cannot be shaken by either the scorn, the ridicule, or the threats of the world.

Revelation 13 tells us that at the end persecuting authorities will erect a symbolic image and require everyone to worship it. Increasingly severe penalties will be imposed to compel this worship, beginning with severe economic sanctions and ending with death decrees. Daniel 3 tells about an attempt to compel the worship of a literal image under pain of death. It also tells how God stood by those who stood for Him.

Keeping in mind the lessons of Daniel 3, lets take a brief look at Revelation 13.

Tell me, Is this beginning to look familiar. It should. In the story of Daniel 3, God has graciously given us an actual case history of just exactly this kind of situation. In Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, God has shown us the character that God’s people must have in the end if they are to successfully resist the overwhelming pressures placed on them to worship the image. God has shown us the kind of determined faith that we must have even in the face of death - even when there appears to be absolutely no possibility of deliverance. Remember, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego saw no token of deliverance before they were tossed into the fire. Not until they were actually tossed into the flames did God intervene. So it will be in the end - There will come a time when to all appearances it will seem as if evil has won and God’s people have been abandoned by God and left to their own fate - and they will echo Jesus cry on the cross when he said “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me.�?But God’s people are not forsaken. This last trial that God’s people will have to face will reveal to all the world whose are God’s and whose are Satan’s. It will purge all pretenders. Only those who have a real and personal relationship with Jesus will remain.

At the same time that the beast is commanding all people, on pain of death, to worship the image to the beast, (At the same time that the beast is enforcing its command to worship the image with severe economic sanctions), God also calls all people to worship Him, the only true God - the Creator of heaven and earth.

It is easy to be brave before the crisis comes, it is easy to be brave when you are standing with the crowd -- but it is when the crisis comes and we must stand alone that we see ourselves as we really are.