Episode Transcript
Daniel chapter three, Daniel chapter three, and remind everyone that next week is dinner on the grounds.
So we'll be having a nice lunch together, Lord willing, after our service.
God willing, we'll be expounding verses 19 and 20 this morning in Daniel chapter 3.
And the title of the message is Understanding the Anger.
Understanding the Anger.
In the previous verses last week, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego refused to bow down and worship the idol that King Nebuchadnezzar had set up.
The king offered them the opportunity to change their minds and be friends with the world.
But they assured the king that they would remain faithful to their God and not bow down to that image.
So for our context this morning, we're going to begin reading in verse 14 until we reach our verses this morning So let's look together in verse 14 and remind ourselves the context of what we're studying in.
Nebuchadnezzar spake and said unto them, Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego?
Do not ye serve my gods, nor worship the golden image which I have set up.
Now if ye be ready, that at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sack, but Psalter and dulcimer in all kinds of music, ye fall down and worship the image which I have made, well, or all's good But if ye worship not, ye shall be cast the same hour into the midst of a burning fiery furnace.
And who is that God that shall deliver you out of my hands?
That's the main question you want to remember.
What Nebuchadnezzar asked Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
He says, I'm going to throw you in the midst of a burning fiery furnace if you don't.
Bow down to this image.
And then he says, And who is that God that shall deliver you out of my hands?
So don't forget that question.
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter.
If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us out of thine hand.
O King.
But if not, be it known unto thee, O King, that we will not serve thy gods.
Nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.
And that brings us to our verses this morning, beginning in verse 19.
And let me assure you, the king did not like their answer one bit.
The Bible says in verse 19, Then was Nebuchadnezzar full of fury.
Let's pray.
Father, thank you for your precious word.
Thank you for these dear people who are here today.
I pray for those who are not.
Father, some perhaps because they're feeling poorly, some perhaps because of unfaithfulness, others perhaps because of carnal reasons.
The devil always trying to work some offense, something in their minds.
Some reason, Father God, to be upset or bitter or to be distracted by the cares of this world.
And we just pray, dear Lord God, for all of our precious members.
And we pray for their faithfulness to you, for their health, their safety.
And, Father, that those who are watching or attending this morning will be fed by your Spirit.
Teach us, we pray.
May all our eyes be upon you in Jesus' wonderful name.
Amen.
Then Nebuchadnezzar was full of fury.
And if you haven't noticed yet, Nebuchadnezzar has an anger problem.
This is the second time we've seen Nebuchadnezzar having a tantrum, getting angry.
And what we have to see is each time.
He's angry because he doesn't know the Lord.
The first time he was angry.
Was because his pagan religious advisors couldn't interpret the dream God gave them.
Remember that?
Look back with me in Daniel 2, verse 12.
Daniel 2, verse 12.
For this cause the king was angry and very furious.
So there's the first time.
And commanded to destroy all the wise men of Babylon.
That's how he got to know Daniel to begin with, remember?
So, because they couldn't interpret his dream, the pagan religious leaders, he was very angry, very furious, it says.
So, had the king known the Lord, he would have sought help from God and not from those pagan religious leaders.
And then he would have never had a cause to be furious to begin with.
So now this is the second time he's angry because Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego won't bow down to his idol But once again, if Nebuchadnezzar knew the Lord, he would have never made the idol in the first place, so he wouldn't have had a cause to get angry.
Are you making the connection here?
The king is miserable.
The king is unhappy.
The king has an anger problem because the king doesn't know God.
This world is full of miserable, angry people who don't know why they're angry.
Oh, they think they know why they're angry, but they don't.
If you would have asked Nebuchadnezzar the first time, he would have said, Well, I wouldn't be angry if I had some.
Some better pagan religious leaders who could interpret this dream for me.
That's the reason I'm angry because of these charlatan leaders.
If you had asked him the second time why he was angry, he said, Well, I wouldn't be angry if it wasn't for these Christians.
But he doesn't realize that if he had God, his cause for anger would be completely gone.
People who live in a state of anger, in disappointment, will remain in a state of anger. in disappointment as long as they fail to identify the true cause of their anger.
The truth is, most people don't have an anger problem.
They have a God problem.
And you don't have to be an unbeliever like Nebuchadnezzar to have a God problem.
A lot of Christians have a God problem.
They know the Lord.
They love the Lord, not as they should, but they love the Lord.
But they are not right with the Lord in some areas of their life.
Do you remember the story of Jonah?
Jonah was an angry prophet, an angry prophet of God.
Jonah was a man of God.
But Jonah didn't really have an anger problem, he had a God problem.
Jonah was a servant of God, but Jonah's heart wasn't right with God, so he was angry.
And like Nebuchadnezzar and people today, Jonah failed to identify the true cause of his anger.
When a gourd died, you know, the gourd, the plant, when a gourd died, which had given him shade from the sun.
He got angry.
Jonah chapter 4, Jonah chapter 4, verse 8 and 9 says, And it came to pass When the sun did arise, that God prepared a vehement east wind, and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wished in himself to die.
And said, It is better for me to die than to live.
And God said to Jonah, Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd?
Do you think you're right, Jonah, being angry at that gourd for dying?
Look how Jonah responded.
And he said, I do well to be angry, even unto death.
Yes, I'm right being angry at that gourd for dying.
And I can be angry to the day I die because of it.
Jonah had an anger problem.
Jonah thought he was angry at the gourd, but he was really angry at God for being merciful to the Ninevites.
That was Jonah's problem.
For had Jonah rejoiced at the repentance of the Ninevites, as any godly man would have, he would have never lost the gourd to begin with.
A heart that is right with God will rejoice in God.
I'm going to repeat that again.
A heart that is right with God.
Will rejoice in God.
I'm not saying that if your heart's right with God, you'll never be disappointed.
If your heart's right with God, you'll never be sad because you will.
If your heart's right with God, you're going to be heartbroken because we live in a sin-cursed, troubled world.
But if your heart is right with God, no matter what your situation is in life, you can still rejoice in the Lord and not walk around angry.
Habakkuk chapter 3 verses 17 and 18.
Habakkuk chapter 3 verses 17 and 18.
Said, although the fig tree shall not blossom, and let me tell you, I went for several years.
I've got a fig tree at home, and I finally got figs off of it this year.
I went for several years, and I didn't get any figs.
And that's no fun.
But you know what?
I didn't go around all angry about it.
I prayed about it.
I thought about cutting that thing down.
But I didn't go around all angry about it.
He says, Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines.
The labor of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat or no food.
The flock shall be cut off from the fold.
And there shall be no herd in the stalls.
You know what he's saying?
From an agriculture perspective, if I go completely bankrupt and have nothing to eat, that's what he's saying.
He says, look at verse 18, yet.
I will rejoice in the Lord.
I will joy in the God of my salvation.
Isn't that good?
See, the carnal man would say, I'm angry because my fig tree didn't blossom.
I'm angry because there's no fruit on my vines.
I'm angry because my olives and my fields and my flocks and my herd have been devastated.
But the true cause of his anger would be that his spirit was not walking with the Lord That would be the true cause of his anger.
For if he was walking with the Lord, though he had lost all these things.
He would remember that he still had Jesus.
And he would joy in the God of his salvation.
Christian, if you're carrying a bitter and angry attitude around in your heart this morning, You listening, Christian.
If you're carrying a bitter and an angry attitude in your heart this morning, let me tell you what your problem is not.
Your problem is not your spouse.
Your problem is not your job.
Your problem is not your finances.
Your problem is not your depression.
Your problem is not your health.
The problem is your heart is not right with God.
Because if it was right with God, you could say, if I lost all these things, if I lost my spouse, my job, my finances, if my depression was still here and I still had the same old nasty health trouble, yet I will.
Rejoice in the God of my salvation because I know God is ultimately going to deliver me from all these things, and I don't have to walk around all tense and angry about it.
The problem is, you're getting angry at the gourd when you should be rejoicing in the Lord.
Well, that's a handy thing to remember, isn't it?
If you're walking around all bitter, Now listen, I've been sad.
I've been real sad in my life.
But you know what?
At the absolute lowest points of my life, I could still rejoice in the God of my salvation.
I could still not walk around all angry and bitter and stuff all the time.
Why?
You can't.
You can't be in fellowship with God and be angry and bitter.
How can you do it?
How can you sit down in the pew when you're talking about the Lord and you're learning God's word and sit there and Man, if your mind's on God's word and what He's done for you, man, that error is going to go to, ooh, right, Brother Doe?
That's what it's going to do.
Woohoo!
That's right.
The problem is, you're getting angry at the gourd when you should be rejoicing in the Lord.
Christian, get your eyes off the dying gourd and start.
Putting them on the living Lord.
As long as we live in this sin-cursed world, we're going to have to deal with sin-caused problems.
But if we will cast our eyes on God, then we can rejoice because of Him instead of whine because of them.
That's what we need to do.
Nebuchadnezzar was full of fury.
Look back in your text.
And the form of his visage was changed.
Underscore was changed.
Was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
Now, when it says the form of his visage, that's talking about the look on his face.
And that look changed, means Nebuchadnezzar went from a happy face to an angry face.
These three men were some of Nebuchadnezzar's top people.
Keep that in mind.
After helping him come to understand the dream that God had given him through Daniel and praying for Daniel.
These men were like rock stars to him.
That's why he promoted them up.
He loved these men.
He knew that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were very beneficial to his kingdom.
So he was looking at them when they walked in with a peace-loving, friendly kind of let's get along together face when they walked in.
But something changed.
Something changed which filled the king with fury.
Which was now reflected on his face.
The question is: what changed between the king and his servants that changed the visage on the king's face?
What changed the relationship between them from friend to foe?
Just one thing: the three servants' faithfulness to God.
That's what changed it.
The three servants' faithfulness to God.
Do you know what can change your relationship with this world and a lot of people in this world?
Do you know what can change the relationship?
With your loved ones?
Do you know what can change a relationship with your friends and your co-workers and people that you once used to get along with real well?
Do you know what can change that relationship?
Your Faithfulness to God can change it.
Everything was fine between these two parties up until now.
The king was pleased with these three men.
The king was pleased with their work.
Most importantly, the king was pleased with their religion.
Remember, he bowed down to Daniel at first and said, Man, your God's a God of gods.
Man, the king was pleased with all of this stuff, especially their religion.
What changed all of this is when their religion got real.
You see?
You can have people be pleased that you're Christian, pleased with your Christianity, pleased that you go to church, pleased that you profess to know Jesus.
But what will change all of that and how they look at you and respond to you is when your religion starts to get real And you begin to be faithful to God's word and faithful to God's house, and suddenly you're going to find out.
That the world is walking one direction, and one day you're going to be faithful to God, you're going to find out you're walking the opposite direction of the world.
You know what happens when you walk the opposite direction of someone?
If Brother Shepherd's in front of me, we can walk just fine like that.
I can walk right behind him.
If we're walking the opposite direction, we're going to start stepping on each other's toes.
And you're going to find out that your faithfulness to God is going to start stepping on the world's toes.
And they're going to be angry.
The visage on their face will change.
The world will tolerate your religion.
The world will even celebrate your religion.
But at some point, Your obedience to God is going to take you in a different direction than the world is traveling.
And when it does, you're going to step on their toes And things are going to change between you and the world.
Nebuchadnezzar loved the Christian religion so long as it didn't mean anything.
Many in the world love the Christian religion so long as it doesn't mean anything.
But when Christians are faithful to the word of God, they're going to offend the world.
They're even going to, sadly, offend weak and carly-minded Christians sometimes.
They're just going to.
And their faces will change toward you.
And we don't want that to happen.
But you know what?
I'd rather deal with an angry face of a man.
Toward me than deal with an angry face of God toward me.
As long as God's smiling at my heart and my behavior The rest of the world can frown all they want to.
I just want my God to be pleased with me, and I want Him to be pleased with you.
Now, those angry faces are uncomfortable for Christians to deal with.
They are.
You know, a lot of times we don't witness to people.
Do you know why?
We're afraid of the angry faces.
Y'all probably, every one of us have probably experienced that.
Where we know, we think, you know what, I really feel like I need to share.
The gospel with them, or you feel like I need to talk to them about the Lord, but you imagine in your mind how they might respond abruptly or angry or rude or something.
We just kind of back off and we don't say anything, and then we leave and then we feel guilty we didn't talk to them.
Ever happened to anybody before?
Yeah, hands up everywhere.
It's natural to fear the angry faces.
It's natural to want to keep people smiling at you and happy with you and being pleased with you.
Nobody wants people angry at them.
It's uncomfortable.
John the Baptist would have never been beheaded had he not preached against the king taking his brother's wife.
When he did, he had an angry face to deal with and he lost his head.
Jesus would have never been crucified had He just stuck with the healing and food service ministry.
But when He stuck with the Word of God, He had some angry faces to deal with.
And Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego would have never faced the fiery furnace had they not been such sticklers about not bowing down to anyone but God.
Had just given a little and just bowed the knee, and everything would have been okay.
But when they stuck with God's word, they had an angry face to deal with.
And do you know what kind of Christianity the world wants you to have?
It wants you to have the same kind of Christianity that Nebuchadnezzar wanted these three men to have.
He wanted them to keep serving their God.
He wanted them to keep being believers in the God of heaven that gave him that dream.
He wanted that for them.
He respected them.
He respected their God to a degree.
But Nebuchadnezzar wanted them to have the kind of religion that didn't really mean much.
That's what he wanted.
And the world wants to do with Christianity what Cracker Barrel has done with their restaurant.
That's basically what the world wants to do.
They want to scrub it clean of all its meaning.
They want to keep the word church, but remove what the church stands for, what it's all about.
But we need to let Shadrach, Meshach, and Nebednego encourage us to continue to stand on God's word and never fear the angry faces.
God told the prophet Jeremiah in Jeremiah chapter 1, verse 8: Be not afraid of their faces.
For I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord.
Say, well, Brother Richard, God wasn't with John the Baptist to deliver him.
Oh, you know what?
Where's that king at right now?
Where's that king's wife at right now that wanted the head and the charger?
Where's that little girl that danced for the king right now that asked for the head and the charger?
They're in hell.
Unless they repented later and believed on the Lord.
But so far as we know, they're in hell.
John the Baptist, man, he's just fine.
He's just fine.
The Lord is going to, and you know what?
John's head's going to get put back on that body one day, Brother Doug.
He's going to have a glorified body just like Jesus.
John the Baptist is fine.
And so the prophet says, Be not afraid of their face.
God said the prophet, be not afraid of their faces.
You know, you know what?
That's a little portion.
Of Scripture, you can remember right now and commit to your heart.
And the next time that you think about standing up for God's Word and speaking up for the Lord.
And you feel that intrepidation inside you, and you're a little afraid, you remember that scripture.
The Lord's telling you, be not afraid of their faces.
And you go ahead.
And you take a stand on God's word and don't worry about it.
Nebuchadnezzar's face was full of fury.
Look back in your text now.
Therefore, he spake and commanded.
Underscore the words spake and commanded.
He spake and commanded.
Now what this has become at this point is a contest between two kings.
It's a contest between two kings, the king of Babylon and the king of heaven.
Once again, this is not about Nebuchadnezzar being angry at the men.
It's really about Nebuchadnezzar being angry with God.
He just doesn't realize it.
In Nebuchadnezzar's mind, God was getting in the way of his kingly power and glory.
Remember, he asked these men, who is that God that can deliver you out of my hand?
Well, he's about to find out.
But the first contest between the two kings was a contest of the power of their words.
Remember, concerning creation, God spoke the world into existence.
It was God's word.
And you know how God did it?
He spake and he commanded.
The same thing Nebuchadnezzar's doing in Psalm chapter 33.
Psalm chapter 33, verses 8 and 9.
The Bible says, Let all the earth fear the Lord.
Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.
Why?
Verse 9: For he spake, and it was done.
He commanded, and it stood fast.
God spoke, let there be light.
It was done.
He commanded, it stood fast.
The sun and the stars and the moon are still in the same place God put them.
When he put them there, God spake and commanded also that his people not bow down to any other God but him.
But now Nebuchadnezzar spake and commanded.
That God's people be burned for obeying what God spake and commanded.
You're seeing the clash here: it's the battle of words, the battle of two kings.
Both speaking and commanding opposite things and demands from the people.
God spake and commanded, and Nebuchadnezzar spake and commanded.
This was Nebuchadnezzar's real fight with God, his real source of anger.
The world's fight isn't against the Christians.
Let me say that again.
The world's fight is not against the Christians, it's against the Christ we serve.
Jesus said in the Gospel of John, this is an amazing verse to me.
Jesus said in the Gospel of John chapter 7 verse 7 the world what's that next word cannot You see, there's some things the world cannot do, and here's one of them: the world cannot hate you.
That's but the world does hate me.
But no, listen, Jesus said, the world cannot hate you.
But me it hates, because I testify of it that the works thereof are evil.
See, the king wasn't angry at John.
He thought he was angry at John.
He really had an anger problem with God.
John the Baptist?
Why?
Well, John testified that it was wrong of him to take his brother's wife.
But whose testimony was that?
It was in the law.
When he took his brother's wife, he uncovered his brother's nakedness.
That's how God put it.
He said, Don't do it.
There was one circumstance when you did after the brother died, but this was not that circumstance.
But this was the problem.
Jesus said: the world cannot hate you.
It hates me because of my word against it, that I'm a testify of the evil that it does.
Again, that's amazing, this statement.
The world does not have the capacity to hate you.
And do you realize what that means?
It means the source of the hate and the source of the anger in this world begins with a heart that's not right.
With God, Nebuchadnezzar hated Christ.
Because of what he commanded.
So Nebuchadnezzar commanded, look back in your text in verse 19 That they should heat the furnace one seven times more than it was wont to be heated.
In other words, you get that furnace seven times hotter than we normally get it.
Verse 20, and he commanded the most mighty men that were in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and to cast them into the burning fiery furnace.
And God willing, we'll pick back up here next Sunday.
But right now, just understand: this is how you understand the anger in the world.
This is how you understand the anger in your heart, Christian.
If you're walking around with a bitter, angry spirit all the time.
It's because your heart in some matter is not right with the Lord.
The Bible talks about loving God and hating your brother.
Can't do it.
Can't do it.
In the same way, you really can't be angry with your brother without a cause.
Without being angry at God.
You say, Well, I've got reasons.
I'm angry for this reason, for that reason, for the other reason.
That's not the spirit we're supposed to have.
The Bible says, be kind one to another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
Did you know that you sin every single day?
We come short of the glory of God every single day.
What do you think God's attitude is toward us right now?
Do you think God every day wakes up and just goes around like that thinking about us this way?
He's angry.
Every time he thinks about us, he's angry.
Could you imagine serving a God like that?
Well, you'd be scared to even pray to him.
How could you walk in fellowship with a God that was always bitter and angry with you?
Do you know why God doesn't have the angry face at you?
Because of Jesus.
Because of the cross, Jesus gave him a happy face.
Because when God looks at you, he sees Jesus.
If you're a Christian and you love the Lord, When you look at your spouse, when you look at the trouble that you're in, your finances, when you look at your health.
Do you know what'll turn this into this?
You see Jesus in every one of those problems.
You see Jesus in those people And you remember that God is going to overcome all of those things in Christ Jesus one day.
And you walk around with that happy face.
And you say, though there be no ox in the stall, no herd, no vine, no grape, no fig.
Yet will I joy in the God of my salvation.
Father, we thank you so much for your precious word.
Thank you for helping us to understand the anger.
That the bitterness that we carry around in this world is all because, Father, we're carrying around the bitterness of this world Father, instead of being angry at the gourd, we need to be rejoicing in the Lord.
And I pray you'll help us to do that and take this message to heart this morning.
In Jesus' wonderful name, amen.
