WES HUMBLE

It’s Cool in the Fire The story is told that a national magazine assigned a photographer to take pictures of a forest fire. They told him a small plane would be waiting at the airport to fly him over the fire.
The photographer arrived at the airstrip just an hour before sundown. Sure enough, a small Cessna airplane stood waiting. He jumped in with his equipment and shouted, "Let's go!" The pilot, a tense-looking man, turned the plane into the wind, and soon they were in the air, though flying erratically.
    "Fly over the north side of the fire," said the photographer, "and make several low-level passes."
    "Why?" asked the nervous pilot.
    "Because I'm going to take pictures!" yelled the photographer. "I'm a photographer, and photographers take pictures."
    The pilot replied, "You mean you're not the flight instructor?"
Source unknown; submitted by Brett Kays

It is very important that you know whose hands your life is in. Life is fragile. Things happen that leave us cold and feeling helpless.

This is the story of three young men who didn’t loose their trust in God when life fell apart around them.

We are all tempted to ask God why when challenging things happen in our lives. Many times we face temptations or opportunities to take detours away from faith in God in our life because of circumstances which come our way.

We should be keenly aware that trusting God means that we have to learn to trust Him. We must understand that challenges which come our way are normal and part of the excitement of being a Christ follower.

I want to tell you a story this morning. It is a story about three young men. They were away from home due to the fact that they had been taken from their homeland by the invading soldiers. They find themselves in a strange country surrounded by people they didn’t know.

The key word that you need to remember from today is trust. If you and I truly trust God with our lives there are several things that we can count on happening in our lives.

I. If you trust in God your faith will be challenged.

The king set up a large statue of himself. This statue was to be worshipped. The whole kingdom was brought together and when the music was played everyone was to bow their knees. This definitely provided a challenge to the faith of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. In fact the Bible says that the decree of the King was very simple:

“Anyone who does not kneel and worship shall be thrown immediately into a roaring furnace.”

These young men had been appointed to very high positions in the kingdom. They were outsiders to be sure but they had proven themselves to the King by their faith in God when they first arrived. He had promoted them and now they were being asked to bow down to another God. The first law given to Moses was that you should have no other Gods before the God that Jews served. They were being challenged. Another one of the commands that God gave us simply says that we are to worship no graven images.

You and I will face challenges to our faith. I am reminded of what it is like to work in the secular work place. Many of you face challenges to your faith on a daily basis. Some of you face challenges in your home with a spouse who is not a Christ follower; some of you face things at school. We often talk about the challenges face in the public school system but I went to both public and private schools growing up and I can tell you there are challenges to your faith. Every one of the college students that are here can tell you that not everyone who goes to a Christian college is a Christian. You have to determine in your heart that you are going to trust God and follow Him no matter where you find yourself.

II. If you trust in God you will be faced with opportunities to compromise.

Here is what the Bible says happened to these three young men.

“The band started to play, a huge band equipped with all the musical instruments of Babylon and everyone—every race, color and creed—fell to their knees and worshipped the gold statue that King Nebuchadnezzar had set up.”

It would have been very easy to give in to the pressure of the crowd when no one else was left standing. We all will face moments where we are called to stand up and with God.

Can you imagine that scene? Thousands of people get on their knees and right in the middle are three young men who are standing. Can you here the thoughts that must have been going on in their head? “Just do this one thing. . . Nobody will see you from home. . . Do it to please the King. . .It won’t hurt you. . . It will soon be over. . .” The Bible says they steadfastly refused. They refused to save their lives by doing something they knew was wrong.

All of us are face challenges to our faith on a regular basis. There are opportunities to compromise what we know to be right.

This is very important. You cannot separate your faith from the choices you make in your everyday life. Ones faith is not to be reserved for Sunday’s only. Trusting God will make you a different person seven days a week, twenty four hours a day, three hundred and sixty five days a year.

All through the Bible you can read of people who were challenged in the area of compromising their faith. From Joseph to Jesus you can read of temptation and how to overcome it.

I recently encountered someone wanting to do some work in my home. With no shame they assured me I could save a lot of money if they would tell the insurance company a lie. The guy actually looked at me and said, “I’ll just tell them. . .even though it is a lie.”I quickly told him that he was not to lie on my behalf. I would rather pay the extra money than lie.

We are faced with those kinds of opportunities everyday. Trust in God will demand that you stand up strong in the face of compromise.

In Matthew 26, Jesus declared a day of Judgment is coming when his sheep will be separated from the goats. Strangely enough, some scientists at the Institute of Animal Physiology in Cambridge, England, have added a new twist to Jesus’ classification of sheep and goats. These lab-coat intellects have crossed a sheep with a goat in test-tube experiments and they call their new hybrid a “geep.”

Although it’s a new reality in the laboratory, it’s nothing new in the church. For centuries people have been trying to walk the barnyard fence and enjoy the benefits of being a sheep while maintaining the unruly liberty of roaming like a goat. Unfortunately for such compromising individuals, Jesus did not reserve a spot for “geep.” You’re either following the Shepherd as one of his sheep, or you’re part of the goat herd.

We are promised in I Cor. 10:13, “No test or temptation that comes your way is beyond the course of what others have had to face. All you need to remember is that God will never let you down; he’ll never let you be pushed past your limit; he’ll always be there to help you come through it.” (The Message)

III. If you trust in God you will find confidence to submit to His will.

These three young men found an incredible strength which allowed them to be confident in God and His ability to eventually come through. The classic phrase is found in verses 17-18.

“Your threat means nothing to us. If you throw us in the fire, the God we serve can rescue us from your roaring furnace and anything else you might cook up, O king. But even if he doesn’t, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference, O king. We still wouldn’t serve your gods or worship the gold statue you set up.”

In spite of the consequences and the dreadful alternative facing them Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego refused to worship the golden image of the King.

In Job 13:15 he expresses this kind of confidence that comes from trusting God. Job’s life had fallen apart yet he says with confidence, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”

The writer of Romans had this same confidence in Rom. 14:8, “For if we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. Therefore whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s.”

The refusal of these three young men made the king furious. They were thrown into the fire. What a terrible experience. Trusting God will allow us to be confident in submitting to His will.

Not long before his death, Henri Nouwen wrote a book called Sabbatical Journeys. He writes about some friends of his who were trapeze artists, called the Flying Roudellas.They told Nouwen there's a special relationship between flyer and catcher on the trapeze. The flyer is the one that lets go, and the catcher is the one that catches. As the flyer swings high above the crowd on the trapeze, the moment comes when he must let go. He arcs out into the air. His job is to remain as still as possible and wait for the strong hands of the catcher to pluck him from the air.

One of the Flying Roudellas told Nouwen, "The flyer must never try to catch the catcher." The flyer must wait in absolute trust. The catcher will catch him, but he must wait. John Ortberg, from sermon "Waiting on God," Preaching Today #199

IV. If you trust in God you will never be alone. You can commune with Him even in the fire.

They were in the fire but they were never alone.

“Suddenly King Nebuchadnezzar jumped up in alarm and said, “Didn’t we throw three men, bound hand and foot, into the fire?”

“That’s right, O king,” they said.

“But look!” he said. “I see four men, walking around freely in the fire, completely unharmed! And the fourth man looks like a son of the gods.”

All of us are going to walk through the fire in our lives. Some of you could testify to that even in the last few weeks or year.

I have listened to some of you very carefully as you walked through the fire and the testimony is consistent. While you didn’t like it and some days you didn’t feel very spiritual about your experience, the word is that you were closer to God in the fire than you are on a normal day when everything is going fine.

God will not leave us alone.

Isaiah 43:2, “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, Nor shall the flame scorch you.”

I Peter 1:6-7, “In this you greatly rejoice though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it be tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”

V. If you trust in God you will compel others to honor Him.

Verses 28-30 contain a great testimony from a pagan king. When this was all over and the young men at been retrieved from their fiery trial the king was truly beside himself with admiration for God.

“Therefore I issue this decree: Anyone anywhere, of any race, color or creed, who says anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego will be ripped to pieces, limb from limb, and their houses torn down. There has never been a god who can pull off a rescue like this.”

The reason we don’t give up when the heat is on is that God sometimes uses our circumstances to show others His strength.

The phrase that I like to remind myself of is will this make me bitter or better?

If these three young men had compromised how different the outcome would have been. Often we are placed in a situation of difficulty where it means that if we trust God and seek His grace to endure the trial, others will be blessed and touched by our testimony.

The testimony of these young men can be summed up by the words of Psalm 66:10-12, “For You O God, have tested us; You have refined us as silver is refined. You brought us into the net; you laid affliction on our backs. You have caused men to ride over our heads; we went through the fire and through water; but You brought us out to rich fulfillment.”

    Action Steps:

        1. Be aware.
        2. Be honest about your struggles.
        3. Be willing to allow God to work with you through your circumstances.
Jessica Lynch, 19, of Palestine, W.Va., had been missing with 11 other U.S. soldiers from the 507th Maintenance Company. The unit was ambushed near Nasiriyah after making a wrong turn during early fighting in the invasion of Iraq. Five other members of her unit were later shown on Iraqi television answering questions from their Iraqi captors.Lynch had been listed as missing in action but was identified by the Pentagon Tuesday as a POW. She was not among the seven U.S. soldiers - including the five from the 507th shown on television - formally listed as prisoners of war.

I don’t know Jessica religious background but I can guarantee you that she prayed over her eight days of captivity. The story that is unfolding of here rescue is incredible and very moving. The story of the Iraqi individual who got word to the military by walking many miles is heroic. What I have been pondering is the terrible treatment that she has endured. That is only beginning to surface. Broken bones, gunshot wounds and a head laceration. Apparent she was tortured and mistreated by her captors.

She was in the fire and she endured like a well trained soldier. Only God knows what must have gone through her mind but she didn’t give up hope and she didn’t cave in to the pressure.Just like our story from the Bible today even politicians were impressed enough to testify. "You would not believe the joys, cries, bawling, hugging, screaming, carrying on,'' said Lynch's cousin, Pam Nicolais, when asked Tuesday about the rescue. ""You just have to be here.''Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., called the rescue a miracle.

""God watched over Jessica and her family,'' Rockefeller said through a spokesman in Washington. ""All of West Virginia is rejoicing.”

Now I know that there are some of you who are here this morning and you feel like you have been held hostage. You feel like you are in the furnace or fire this morning. Some one here is no doubt considering doing something that you know would be a compromise against what you know is right.

Be strong.
Be confident.
Be willing to trust God.

Romans 8:35, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril or sword? As it is written: ‘For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.’ Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death no life, nor angels no principalities nor powers, nor things present not things to come, not height not depth, nor any other created thing shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

2003/04/06

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