Episode Transcript
Good morning to everybody.
You take God's precious word and turn to the book of Daniel, chapter 3.
God willing, we'll be expounding verses 9 through 12.
Had a good time in Sunday school class this morning.
Looking forward to having a good time in the study of God's Word with you as well.
The title of the message this morning is gold instead of God.
Remind everyone that we have dinner on the grounds after The service this morning, and just right here next door in their fellowship hall.
So, everyone's welcome to come.
Doesn't matter if you brought anything or not, everyone's welcome to come.
We'd love to have you.
Daniel chapter 3, verse 9-12, gold instead of God.
In our verses last week, Nebuchadnezzar required all the nations to bow down and worship the 90-foot-tall image that he set up.
And in that text last week, we learned about the anatomy of false worship.
False worship consists of divine revelation.
Demonic perversion, human submission, and then hostile division.
Under the threat of being cast into a burning fiery furnace if they didn't comply, when the worship music began to play.
Everybody bowed down and worshiped the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar set up.
Everybody, that is, except those godly Jews.
Who we've been reading about in this book.
And their refusal to worship that idol is what brought the hostile division to light.
For when they refused to bow, certain men immediately went to go tell the king, hoping that they'd be put to death.
This morning, by God's grace, we're going to focus on the accusation that these accusers made against these godly men to King Nebuchadnezzar.
For this accusation reveals a threefold manner in which men attempt to oppose and replace the Lord Jesus Christ.
And what do we call that?
The spirit of what?
Antichrist.
Man, y'all are great.
Y'all are great.
The spirit of Antichrist.
Learn about it now in the Old Testament, and when you get in the New Testament, you'll understand it.
So, the threefold manner in which men attempt to oppose and replace the Lord Jesus Christ.
So, let's begin our exposition.
Hoping to get these godly men in trouble with the king.
Verse 9, they spake and said to the king Nebuchadnezzar, O king, live forever These men approached the king under the guise of respecting his person and his power, but I believe they only cared about protecting their own power.
After Daniel explained the prophetic dream to King Nebuchadnezzar, if you'll remember the king promoted Daniel to a very high position, as Pharaoh did Joseph, if you'll remember, in Egypt.
The king promoted Daniel to a position of great authority in his empire.
And then, at Daniel's request, the king set Daniel's godly companions over the province of Babylon If you'll look with me in Daniel 2, verse 49, look back with me there real quick.
Then Daniel requested of the king, and he set Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego over the affairs of the province of Babylon.
But Daniel sat in the gate of the king.
Now, these Jews were prisoners of war who had been taken captive by the Babylonians.
Don't forget that.
And can you imagine defeating your enemies, capturing your enemies, and then suddenly the people you took captive are promoted over you?
And became your boss.
That's a hard pill to swallow, but that's what happened.
And I believe these Chaldean accusers were pretty sore over these godly Jews' promotion.
I believe they were sick and tired of being bossed around by some foreign religious do-gooder.
They wanted their power back.
They wanted to go back to the way things were in the good old days.
And getting these Jews cast into the burning fiery furnace seemed just like the way to do it.
So to get Nebuchadnezzar To have them cast in that furnace, they appeal to him in the spirit of Antichrist.
Which has been working in the hearts of men since the fall of our parents in the Garden of Eden.
Remember, again, the spirit of Antichrist is the demonic desire. to oppose and replace God's kingdom reign here on earth.
There were three appeals they made to the king which correspond to this spirit of Antichrist.
The first one being, if you're taking notes, pride.
The God I am Pride, the God I am.
Look here now in verse 10.
Thou O King, hast made a decree that every man that shall hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sacbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, and all kinds of music, shall fall down and worship the golden image?
Look with me now in verse 11.
And whoso falleth not down and worshipeth, that he should be cast into the midst of a burning fiery furnace.
You, O king, made that law.
Nebuchadnezzar was a proud man, and they were appealing to his pride.
Pride is at the heart of the spirit of Antichrist.
Pride is the heart of the devil and what caused him to fall.
You made a decree, O king.
The devil wants us to think that life is all about us.
He wants us to think the world centers around our needs, our desires, our happiness, our plans, our opinions.
He wants you to think that the most important thing in life is for you to be happy.
I'll tell you, that's a lie.
Pride was the devil's downfall.
Writing about the disqualification of a pastor.
The Apostle Paul said in 1 Timothy 3:6, not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride, he fall into the condemnation of what?
Of Judas?
No, the devil.
The devil.
Pride caused the devil to exalt himself in his own heart, determining that he would no longer be a servant of God, but he would be God Himself.
This was Nebuchadnezzar's downfall as well.
Nebuchadnezzar lifted himself up in his heart above God Putting himself in God's place.
In verse 10, underscore the word decree, thou hast made a decree.
That's a Chaldean word, and it's a very interesting word, that word decree.
It literally means flavor.
You've made a flavor.
You've made something tasty, King.
Isn't that interesting?
Figuratively speaking, Nebuchadnezzar had tasted the idea.
Of forcing people to worship the golden image that he made, and he determined that to be good.
Oh, I like that You see?
Tasting that idea.
I like that a lot.
Not only did the idea taste good to him, but the root word of this Chaldean word Means to cause someone to eat.
To cause someone to eat.
Nebuchadnezzar's degree tasted good to him, and now he demanded everybody to eat it.
But we weren't created to live by man's word, right?
We were created to live by God's word.
God determines what is good, and then God feeds us the good thing that He has established for us.
Deuteronomy chapter 8, verse 3b says, Man doth not live by bread only.
Now, listen, someone has a homemade loaf of bread.
Who has that?
Is that you?
Chris, hold it up so the cameras can see it, would you?
Get a picture of that homemade bread he's got.
Y'all got it?
That's some good stuff.
That's Jeremy bread.
Y'all haven't got it?
Well, we'll get it on there.
Let me see it, brother.
I'll give it back, I promise.
Mmm.
You get it now?
Look at that.
Do you like this bread?
Does it taste good?
That's why you love it.
It's good bread.
And so he tastes it, and because it tastes good.
Now, if you put this in your mouth and it tasted sour, would you eat it?
No.
But it tastes good.
And so that's the way God's word's supposed to be.
God makes things that are flavorful for our spirits.
And he says, man shall not live by bread only, not just the physical food, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live.
God determines what is good, what is tasty, what is flavorful for us, and then He feeds us that good bread of His word.
Nebuchadnezzar, however, wanted His word to be the people's bread.
You see?
But his bread was not good for the people.
And those godly Jews weren't going to eat it.
Nevertheless, in the spirit of Antichrist, he wanted them to live by his word.
And he was ready to force it down the people's throats if necessary.
Pride, the God I am.
Nebuchadnezzar was putting himself in the place of God.
The heart that is full of pride is empty of God.
Because it puts self on the throne instead of God.
Appealing to Nebuchadnezzar's pride, these men said, look if you would, in verse 12, there are certain Jews whom thou hast set over the fairs of the province of Babylon Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego these men, O king, have not regarded thee.
You set these Jews over the province of Babylon, they don't give you the respect you deserve, King.
Daniel wasn't the target of this particular accusation, he was at the forefront of the dream.
But these men are at the forefront of the image.
Now let's look at the next method of the Spirit of Antichrist.
We have seen pride, the God I am.
And now we see polytheism, the gods I imagine.
Pride, the God I am.
If you're taking notes, polytheism, the gods I imagine.
Look back in your text.
They said, These men have not regarded thee.
They serve not thy gods, plural.
Not God, but gods.
The belief in many gods is called polytheism.
Theism, of course, and then poly meaning many.
Polytheism, the Babylonians had many gods.
These gods, they hadn't revealed themselves to Nebuchadnezzar as Daniel's God did.
They were the imagination of men's hearts.
They couldn't reveal the dream that Nebuchadnezzar had.
Only Daniel's God could do that.
But Nebuchadnezzar figured probably that the more gods he had, the better off he'd be.
I mean, it kind of makes sense.
I mean, why would you settle for just one god when you can have many?
Why not have a whole bunch of them at your disposal?
So, I want you to understand this morning that Nebuchadnezzar did not forbid the Jews to serve their God.
They weren't arrested for serving Jehovah.
They were arrested for not serving the many false gods and bowing to the image.
It's a difference The king didn't mind them serving their God.
He just demanded they serve his gods, too.
They serve not thy gods, they said.
Polytheism, the gods, I imagine.
Now, what's wrong with polytheism?
And believe me, don't think polytheism isn't here in America because it's already entered the White House.
Vice President J.
D.
Vance's wife believes in polytheism.
Like Nebuchadnezzar, she worships many gods.
And like Nebuchadnezzar, she goes to church with J.
D.
Vance, who is Catholic.
She has no problem with J.
D.
Vance worshiping his God, just like Nebuchadnezzar had no problem with the Jews worshiping their God.
She obviously, by going to that church, has some degree of respect for JD's God, or she wouldn't be attending the worship service.
But polytheism is the spirit of Antichrist.
It may seem harmless enough, but it cleverly opposes and replaces the one true God.
Religions that embrace polytheism, they assign a particular duty to the gods they imagine.
This god's over the thunderstorms, this god's over the agriculture, this god's over this or over that.
If you study the gods of Babylon, You'll find out that there are more gods than you can keep up with.
Don't look in the Bible and see, well, there's Baal.
Well, they had Baal.
Baal meant false God, and Baile meant all the false gods.
They had a bunch of false gods, the Babylonians did.
It was mythology, Babylonian mythology.
Now the chief god of the city of Babylon they had one for Babylon and the chief god of the city of Babylon was The God Marduk.
Marduk's parents were also gods, and they had sibling gods as well.
They were just one big family of gods who married and had little baby gods, just like our families.
And being born from parents, Marduk wasn't always the chief god.
Well, he couldn't be.
There was a time when he wasn't born, he wasn't around.
No, he had to work his way up to being the chief God.
You know what he had to do to get it?
He had to kill the goddess Tiamite to get that position.
So once he killed that goddess, he then became the god, the chief god of Babylon.
You see, before the world began, these gods were always fighting and killing each other, Brother Doug.
Oh boy, they just squabbled all the time.
And that's just the kind of gods we want governing our lives, isn't it?
The kind of gods that can't get along with each other?
The kind of gods that can kill each other and that can die like us?
According to the Babylonians, the guard Marduk killed the goddess Tiamite and then made our universe out of her dead body.
There you go.
How about that?
Polytheism.
The gods I imagine.
Y'all were laughing when I said that.
Do you know why?
Because when people invent gods from their own imagination, they end up with gods as stupid as they are.
And that's really what happens.
That's what happens.
And this foolishness wasn't limited to the Babylon because the Babylonian mythology was then shared among many world empires because what did Greek have?
They had Greek mythology.
What did Rome have?
They had Roman mythology.
And then, when Jesus comes, and suddenly the gospel of the kingdom comes.
The whole idea of this one God that created everything is in charge of everything, and there are no other gods but Him, that flew in the face of everything that they believed for centuries.
So, this was the concept that Nebuchadnezzar had at this time.
Can you imagine having that kind of worldview?
You can probably see why Nebuchadnezzar wasn't ready to accept the one true God at this time.
Oh, he knew about him because of the dream.
But can you imagine living with the idea that gods can die?
Can you imagine having gods that can be slain by other gods?
Can you imagine having gods that are only controlling certain aspects of creation, but they're not controlling everything?
A God that can die is not eternal.
A God that can fail is not omnipotent.
A God that shares control is not fully in control.
A God that is one of many is not wholly trusted and wholly loved by anyone.
The lie of many gods denies the truth of the all-powerful, all-knowing, ever-existing, never-failing God of the Bible whom we serve.
That's why it is the spirit of Antichrist.
It opposes and replaces our God.
Nebuchadnezzar admired Daniel's God, but he denied the truth of who he was by simply Adding Daniel's God to his collection of all the other gods.
Before a polytheist can become a child of God, he must accept the truth of God as revealed in the Bible.
Which denies the existence of any other God but Him.
Remember what God said in the first part of the Ten Commandments: I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage, thou shalt have no other gods before me.
And that's how come they weren't bowing themselves to this image.
Pride, the God I am.
Polytheism, the gods I make.
Next, power.
I'm sorry, polytheism, the gods I imagine.
Next, power, the gods I make.
Let me say that again.
Pride, the God I am.
Polytheism.
The gods I imagine, power, the gods I make.
They said, These men don't regard you nor serve your gods.
Look back in your text, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.
That's the God He made.
You see, what these people needed, they had all these gods that they couldn't see.
They needed the personification.
Of what they adored, so they could have an object to worship.
Do you know what that is?
That's counterfeiting the Godhead.
Because Jesus is the personification of our God.
He's God personified God becoming a man before us.
That's how come the Apostle John says, That which we have seen, that which we have heard, which we have handled.
Of the words of life, the word of life.
It is Jesus Christ.
The word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory.
Glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
So, this is what they needed.
They're trying to counterfeit the Lord Jesus Christ by making an object that can consolidate their spiritual beliefs And bring it down into an object they can adore.
Power, the gods I make.
He said, No, worship the golden image which thou hast set up.
Jesus is the image of the invisible God, and thus He is the object of our worship.
Colossians chapter 2, verse 9 says, For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.
The image that Nebuchadnezzar made is the spirit of Antichrist, which is why the book of the Revelation says the man of sin will do the same thing.
He'll cause a great image to be made.
To be the object of the people's worship before Christ's return.
The God I am, when you consider yourself a God, the world centers around you.
The gods I imagine.
When you imagine your gods, you customize your religion to your own liking.
The God I make, when you make a God, you become the creator.
This is the spirit of Antichrist, for without Christ was not anything made that was made.
Jesus is not only the object, He's the maker.
He's not an object made.
He's the object that made me and you.
The God I am, what I say becomes the people's bread.
The gods I imagine, what I imagine becomes their religion.
The God I make, what I create, becomes the object of their worship.
And that gives Nebuchadnezzar total control of the people's hearts, which is exactly what the devil wants to have.
That's why you'll see this replayed again at the end of the world before Jesus comes.
It's going to be more sophisticated.
It's going to be on the cutting edge of technology.
It's going to have all the greatest theological minds, the greatest philosophers, the scientists.
Everybody's going to be behind it.
Except the remnant of godly people who refuse to bow to anyone other than the Lamb of God.
It's the spirit of Antichrist.
Every place is God's word The bread with man's word.
It replaces God's revelation with man's imagination.
It replaces God's Son with man's image.
We'll close with prayer, and then, God willing, we'll go next door.
Father, we thank you so much for your precious word.
Lord God, we're so grateful for the book of Daniel.
We're so grateful for your scriptures.
God, they open our eyes and they give us understanding.
So that we understand, Father God, what makes this fallen world tick.
And we understand, Father, what makes this fallen world fall.
And we understand, dear Lord God, what will make this fallen world new.
And we thank you so much for him.
In Jesus' precious name, bless the food we're about to receive and the fellowship as well.
In Jesus' wonderful name, amen.
