Thankful Obedience

Daniel 3:8-18; 1^st Peter 2:1-10

Rev. Chris Harbin, Rocks Baptist Church—Pamplin, VA

27 November 2005

We are familiar with listing things for which we express our thanks. We write cards to share our thankfulness for thoughtful expressions and gifts of caring. We teach children to say, “Thank you,” to those who help them or extend them some kindness. At the same time we are aware that this can be accomplished by a heart devoid of thanks. What does true thankfulness look like? How can we express thankfulness to God?

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego faced an extremely difficult situation. Indeed, life for them had been no piece of cake. They were born to the threat of impending conquest and exile. Now they found themselves far from Judah, living as aliens in Babylon. Their clothing and their very names had been changed as part of the effort to subject them to Babylonian domination. Exile and subjugation sent a message that the Babylonian gods were more powerful than those of any other people. Babylon had authority over every aspect of their lives, down to the very names by which they were called. Ripped from their homeland, their king and other officials killed, imprisoned, or otherwise neutralized, they had been enslaved to the whims of Babylon.

All the things which gave them a sense of identity and spoke of their link to Judah had been ripped away from them. Now Babylon laid claim above their allegiance to Yahweh, as well. In many ways, this was the final test of their subjection. It was the last test regarding who they ultimately served. Would they live in obedience to Yahweh, the God of Israel who had seemingly abandoned them, or would they now bow in complete submission to the king of Babylon? Where did their true allegiance lie, and where would it be directed?

In many ways, this action was a meaningless formality. It would be a simple thing to gloss over any significance behind the proscribed bowing before the king’s idol. Such a form of obeisance was not the same as worship, after all. Any fool could note the difference between bowing the knee and bowing the heart. They were exiles and slaves, after all. What choice did they have but to obey the king’s order? Shouldn’t they just get on with life and ask the true God for forgiveness as they obeyed the king?

The three friends seemingly had so little for which to be thankful. They seem to have had even less reason to be faithful. They were cut off from their land. Their names now designated them as servants of the Babylonian deities. They were marionettes for the invading world power. Why should they bother? Why worry with serving Yahweh, when there was so much reason to wonder whether God still cared for them?

By our standard measures, we should look upon the three as fools. There was nothing to give the idea that God was faithful. There was no outright reason they would be spurred to honor God’s law, when simply bowing to an idol they did not believe in would keep them from harm. They were obstinate fools to take such a ridiculous stand against the power of the age. Defiant, foolhardy, reckless are the words we would normally use to describe them and their actions. Why risk their very lives?

There must have been something more than defiance that kept these three from bowing their knees. The pressure to conform was tremendous. There was no simple reason not to bow that would make any sense. Still, they looked beyond the simplicity of the action of bowing to the implications of the simple act. Would they pretend to serve the king or pretend to serve Yahweh? If they pretended either, they would simply be unfaithful to both.

God had fashioned the descendants of Abraham into a nation. They had pretended to serve Yahweh. They had made a show of bowing their knees while their hearts remained obstinate. As a nation, they had expressed in loud voices their thankfulness to Yahweh for taking them from Egypt, leading them into the land promised to Abraham, and granting them sovereignty under David. All the blessings God had bestowed on them had been received with open arms and expressions of joy. Their words of thanksgiving had flowed freely from their lips. Their hearts, however, had been silent. The deeds of their lives had not measured up to the words they had claimed. They had never truly bowed to express thankfulness in obedient service.

These exiles had grown up under a cloud of doom. It had been announced by the prophets for years. God had formed them into a nation, but they had rejected bowing their lives before Yahweh. They had bowed before the idols of the nations and sought whatever means they could use to further their own agendas of power. At the court in Babylon, the three had the chance to begin a reversal of posture as an example for the entire nation.

Nechadnezzar’s strategy was not to create loyal subjects to the deities of Babylon. He simply wanted an efficient means to further his leverage of power. When they would bow in fear before an idol he established, they would bow before any order he issued. Nebuchadnezzar wanted power. He had little concern for religious observance. He wanted a visible expression of the proof of his control over the people. They would bow before his whim, for he controlled the world!

Peter writes to believers in exile from Judah. Scattered among the nations with the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, believers were living throughout the Roman Empire. As the three friends in Babylon, they would be placed in awkward circumstances in which Rome wanted to flex its muscles. Peter writes to remind them of their identity that God has cast for them in Christ Jesus. This identity does not rely on issues of national sovereignty and geography. It is a matter of the heart.

Christ Jesus was also rejected, but this same Christ Jesus has become the foremost stone of the new temple of God’s creation. We are living stones to reflect the presence and message of God in Jesus Christ. As Peter reminds us, we are called to portray God’s message and presence. As a holy priesthood, we have a message to proclaim as the true expression of our thankfulness to God. The call to salvation is a call to take the good news of God’s mercy and grace to a world all around us.

Thankfulness must become more than words. True thankfulness becomes action. Thankfulness to God becomes faithful obedience. Our convention is still embroiled in controversy over words and the signing of faith statements. These may serve to express subservience to an established leadership, but they do not delve into matters of serving from the heart. Thankful faith is not about words and positions, but about the action and fruit of our lives. The gospel requires that we display our faith and thankfulness in deeds, as well as in words. It demands thankfulness to God expressed in the daily living of our lives.

How shall we express our thanks? Will we live our thankfulness through lives of obedient service? Will we live it from the abundance of our hearts? True thanks must come from the heart.

—©Copyright 2005 Christopher B. Harbin

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