Sermon Tone Analysis

Dan. 3: 1-18

 

          Last time we looked at Daniel and his friends in Ch. 2; they were in a fix! Neb.

dreamed a terrible dream and he woke up demanding the interpretation of it.

His wise men said, tell us the dream and we will interpret it; yet Ned didn’t make it that easy for them.

He basically said; No, you tell me the dream I had and if it is right; then I will know that you can show the true interpretation.

Man what a request!

The king was saying; “Read my mind and if you don’t or can’t then you will die!”

Aren’t you glad you don’t work for a person like Ned.

Always having to guess what he or she is thinking and hope that you are right!

Well, the wise men couldn’t give what the king requested for they were just men themselves.

They only had the wisdom of the world to go by; and they were drawing up blanks.

However, word of the king’s demand came to Daniel who went before the king and was granted a window of time to pray and seek the Lord’s wisdom concerning Neb.’s

dream.

The answer might be hid from just mere men; but nothing is hid from God!

So in Ch. 2; 17-19 says; /“Then Daniel went to his house, and made the thing known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions:  That they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret; that Daniel and his fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.

/

/Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a night vision.

Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven.”

/

/ /

          Daniel and his friends had a time of prayer and the answer was revealed and so Daniel made his way to the king with the answer to his dream.

This just goes to show that there are just some things that need to be prayed about before acted on.

There are some times when we need to pray until the answer comes!

Prayer takes on a whole new meaning, when you get what you need from the lord through prayer.

Then in 2; 19-49 Daniel proceeds to tell the King not only the dream itself, but what his dream meant.

God was showing that He really is in control of the world.

God was showing that there maybe questions and doubts about why our present circumstances seem to go against what we know about God; yet God reassures Daniel that He’s still on the throne by revealing the future empires.

We aren’t going to look at the dream and the interpretation; yet it is worthy of your notice and your thoughts.

/So here is a handout/ to help you put things in perspective as you read these verses on your own.

Basically put, Neb dreamed about a great big statue; probably like the one in the handout.

The interpretation of it is pretty simple; in v36-45 is where God reveals the next three gentile world empires.

/Two things to keep in mind./

/ /

/The times of the Gentiles/ (Luke 21:24) really began with the Babylonian captivity, 521 b.c., and will extend to the time when Gentile nations will no longer assert control over the city of Jerusalem.

[1]

/The fullness of the Gentiles/ (Rom.

11:25) is the time of the Rapture, when Christ’s Gentile bride will be completed and taken from the earth and when God will resume His dealings with Israel.[2]

God here is giving out the latter day events as far as the world powers go.

The Jews since the time of the captivity have been under Gentile rule.

In this revealing of the future, there is Neb.

whom God allowed to become this great “head of gold” to fulfill God’s will on the earth.

God still has his way in the heavens and in the earth.

Look at v44-45 we see the last world power to rule the earth; which is the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus is this stone that smites this image and it crumbs!

John the Revelator put it this way when he saw it:

/ Rev 19:11 And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war.

/

/Rev 19:12 His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew, but he himself.

/

/Rev 19:13// And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God.

/

/Rev 19:14  And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean.

/

/Rev 19:15  And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.

/

/Rev 19:16  And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.

/

 

          Daniel has just revealed a whole lot of prophecy, which includes the last Kingdom to stand; the kingdom of Jesus Christ.

By telling all that was in his small little mind; Daniel and his three friends were promoted to a great authority in the kingdom.

Through this prophecy teaches that God is in control; we want to pass it so we can come to the events of ch.

3.

 

          Ch.

3 opens up some 20 years later; but yet we see that Neb.

is yet the same egocentric person.

Just like the lost people today they twist and distort the things of God ordained to bring a person to repentance; so does Neb.

The dream that was given to warn him and humble him that there was someone greater than himself; he turns to his own advantage and builds the statue in his dreams to satisfy his own ego.

I.

The Statue and the King’s Command  v1-7 

Neb.

was attempting something more than just rearing up an idol unto himself.

He was trying to unite his people under the guise of religion.

Nothing unites a people than a belief in something or someone; that’s a strong tie that binds folks of all different walks of life together.

Neb.

knows that if his kingdom will be great it will be because there is an oneness there among his people.

The Statue was set up and the command went forth; “/And whoso falleth not down and worshippeth shall the same hour be cast into the midst of a burning fiery furnace,” v6./

 

A.

Music in worship.

We can’t help but see here that music was playing apart of this new worship experience.

The decree was Dan 3:10  “…when every man that shall hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, and all kinds of musick, shall fall down and worship the golden image…”

 

          I don’t want to make this message all about music; but I want to say that music does put a person in the frame of mind for worship.

Don’t think that just because something has the title “Christian” on it that it is really Christian music.

And it’s not just what the pastor wants or thinks is right.

The final authority for music as well as for any other question that pertains to this life or practice is the bible.

Don’t be so naïve to think that the devil doesn’t have his hand in the music business.

What does the bible tell us about these questionable things?

/Jo 4:1 Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.

/

          Before we leave remember this.

If God has music that honors him (not just hymns written hundreds of years ago) but even good music like “How great thou art” written I think in the 1960’s made popular of all people by Elvis Presley.

If the God has his music; believe me the devil has his, so you ought to be wise to know the difference.

So the majority sees no problem in worshipping the way a man tells them to.

They are mindless robots just doing whatever they are told, so as to keep their lives the same.

Almost everybody was conforming to the new trend, this new fad, except for three men that stood tall while everybody was bowing.

They were Daniel’s friends of ch. 1 and 2; Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

They were not conforming as the rest; because they had something called convictions which would not let do what they knew was wrong even just for the sake of saving their hide.

They refused to go the way of the world, and worship an idol in the place of their God.

It is interesting to note that we don’t hear or see Daniel in this whole chapter.

A lot of people think that he was away on the king’s business in some faraway land; yet he would have done the same thing as his friends.

B.

The world attempt to change us.

The world will always try to pour Christians into their mold of what they say we ought to worship God.

If you let the outside world tell you how to live, worship or anything else that you need to do; it will!

If we are to please God; we can’t be pleasing to this world!

We can’t have it both ways.

We are either going to have to obey God and live for him, or we are either going to obey what ever comes down the pipe from the world.

A lot of churches and Christians, and preachers are following that route.

The latest fad, the newest trend, the newest bible of the month; please these things scream conforming to the world, conforming to man’s ideas about godly things!

We are not going to reach the world by being just like the world!

If we did we would have nothing to offer them, that they couldn’t find outside the church, a find a whole lot more of.

Read you bible; Paul didn’t take on the Greek way of doing things to reach the Greeks.

Jesus didn’t sub come to the pressure of the Pharisees and Sadducees to get a following.

If we are to offer the world something; let’s offer them the example of how God has changed our useless, wasted lives; ruined by sin and self and has been changed it into something useful and beautiful.

By the way that’s the one thing that every skeptic and critic can not argue against; that is a changed life for the better.