Ray Exum
Crystal Lake Church of Christ
April, 1998

I would like to ask you to look with me in the Old Testament at the book of Ezekiel. It is a book that we don't study very much in our Bible classes. I would like to read from Ezekiel and then from another book in the Old Testament at this time. Last fall we had a series of lessons on great women of the Bible. And so for these Sunday nights in April, I thought it might be appropriate to study men in the Bible, and I would like to limit it to the Old Testament and men from whose lives we can learn some great lessons.

Last Sunday evening we studied the life of Cain. We looked at Genesis 4, where God warned Cain to be very careful, because Satan was at the door waiting for him. Satan was waiting for Cain to make a serious mistake. Therefore, God warned him about his jealously, about his temper and so forth. Cain did not take that advice. He went ahead and made a real disaster of his life and became the first murderer in the history of the human race.

This evening would you look with me at Ezekiel 14 and notice in verses 13 and 14 how God was trying to tell the prophet Ezekiel just how bad the Southern Kingdom of Israel had become. God mentions three names here.

Notice the three names that are used here in Ezekiel 14: 13-14.

That is an interesting statement there. It was really a tremendous compliment to those three Old Testament men, Noah, Daniel and Job. As great as they were, God says even they could not cause him to relent from his plan to punish the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin. I would like to ask the question, not to demean any of these men, but out of respect of these three men, which one would we consider to be the most righteous?

Certainly Noah was an outstanding patriarch in the Old Testament and yet we have the account of where Noah got drunk. He had a problem with alcohol. He committed a very serious sin when he was in a state of drunkenness. We think about Job, and he was a great patriarch. He was a tremendous man, very spiritual. Any yet when you read through the book of Job you find a certain place where he said it would have been better if he had never been born. He was so depressed, so full of despair that he said it would have been better if he had just died at birth. And so maybe that was a weakness in his character.

But please think for a moment about Daniel. I might be mistaken about this but as far as I can tell, the Bible does not record any sin that Daniel committed. Certainly, he did commit sins, but nevertheless, when we look at the Biblical record, as far as I can determine from the Scriptures, there is nothing in the way of a weakness concerning Daniel that was ever recorded.

This evening, therefore, let us turn to the book of Daniel, the next book after Ezekiel, and let us study Daniel's life this evening as possibly one of the greatest and most righteous men described in the pages of the Old Testament.

As we consider the background to the book of Daniel, please remember that when Solomon died in 970 BC, the twelve tribes of Israel split. They went their separate ways. The Northern ten tribes followed a reprobate named Jeroboam who led them straight into idolatry. The Southern two tribes of Israel, Judah and Benjamin, followed Solomon's son Rehoboam. And so the Northern kingdom was extremely wicked and finally in 721 BC, God sent the Assyrians to destroy the Northern ten tribes of Israel, and that is what happened.

The Southern two tribes got progressively worse. And finally God decided, as we just read in the book of Ezekiel, that He was going to have to punish the Southern two tribes of Israel. God decided to use the Babylonians, or as they are sometimes called the Neo-Chaldeans. That's another term for the Babylonians. The Babylonians attacked the Southern kingdom of Israel in three ways. The first was in 606 BC. In the raid in 606 they took the royal families, the nobility, the educated, the professional classes among the Jews. Then the Babylonians came back in 597 and they captured more of the Southern kingdom. And finally in 586 BC the Babylonians broke through the walls of Jerusalem and destroyed the city. And the city lay in ruins until 536 BC.

Let's go back just a moment to the raid in 606 BC. In that raid of the Babylonians on the Southern kingdom of Israel, they took the educated class. In that raid, Daniel was captured and taken to Babylon as a slave. And also his three friends were captured and taken back to Babylon. In Babylon the government saw that these four young men were highly educated. They were very sharp. They were bright. They were still teenagers, apparently, and the government of Babylon decided that they would put these young men into three years of training, and train them for the diplomatic service on behalf of the Babylonian empire. That is the background to Daniel Chapter 1 beginning at verse 3. I'd like to read from verse 3 down through verse 21 of the first chapter of the book of Daniel.

This is a very interesting passage, I think you'll agree. Let's go back and notice some lessons from the life of Daniel that we can gather from this chapter and all of the other chapters of Daniel. I think it would be good first to notice the courage that Daniel had; that he exhibited here, particularly in verse 8, while he was a slave in Babylon. He defied the king of Babylon. Think for a moment what was working against his doing that. Daniel, and these three other young men, basically did not have a home to go back to. Jerusalem was under attack and would very shortly be completely destroyed. Therefore, as we think about these young men, if they got homesick, there was no home that they could be homesick about. The temple was going to be desecrated. The priests were going to be killed. Thousands and thousands of Jews were going to be killed. If you want to read more details about the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BC, you might want to read I Kings 25. It does not make very cheerful reading, but we have that account of the fall of Jerusalem. We have an entire book about the fall of Jerusalem, the book of Lamentations. If you want to read about how Jeremiah was so upset at seeing the city being burned to the ground, read the five chapters of Lamentations.

These four young men were a long way from home, and there really was no home for them to go back to. Something else was working against them. Did you notice that there was no mention of their parents? There is no mention of their relatives. It is very likely that their parents had been killed in the attack of 606 BC. You might think about Esther and the fact that she was an orphan and a captive in a foreign country in the same way these four young men probably were orphans in their late teen-age years. There's no mention of priests for the law of Moses. These were men that these four teenagers had grown up with, men they respected, and in all probability the Levitical priests had either been killed or placed in some kind of slavery. So everything behind them was cut off.

On the other hand, think of what was in front of them: the city of Babylon. We have an eyewitness account of what Babylon looked like in its glory. I'm referring to the Greek geographer named Herodotus. We have the works of Herodotus today and we can read his account of what it looked like when he traveled through Babylon in the ancient world.

Herodotus reports that the city had a wall around it that was 56 miles in circumference. Herodotus said that this wall was 300 feet high. That almost is difficult to believe. And yet these were educated people, civilized people in the ancient world. And this is what Herodotus reported. We do not doubt him in other things, and if he said that the wall is 300 feet high, then I think that we probably ought to take him at his word.

Herodotus went on to say that within the walls of Babylon, there was a tower to the pagan god Bel that was 600 feet tall. Again, think about something that massive in the ancient world. This is what Herodotus reported. He went on to report that within the walls of Babylon there were the hanging gardens. Maybe you have heard of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. One of those wonders was a reference to the hanging gardens of Babylon.

Nebuchadnezzar married a young lady from mountainous country, and he brought her to Babylon, a flat area. It is southern Iraq today. Very flat, very desert-like. And she was homesick for the mountains. Therefore, according to Herodutus again, Nebuchadnezzar had a mountain built within the walls of Babylon. Herodutus said that there were forests on the sides of this hill or this small mountain. He said that there were streams coming down the mountain where water had been pumped up by the engineers of Babylon; pumped up to the top and allowed to flow down the mountain. This was all done to please the wife of Nebuchadnezzar.

Think about how spectacular this must have looked to these teenagers! They must have been impressed by all that. Not only was the city impressive, but the offer that the government made to them was impressive. The offer was: you spend three years with us in training and instead of being a common slave hauling water or carrying bricks, you will be in the diplomatic core of this country. The reason I am going over all of this is because of this point: Daniel and his three teenage friends had every reason in the world to give in to the Babylonian empire. They could have been what we call today, "survivors." They could have said to one another, "Let's just go with the flow; let's just go along to get along; let's not cause any trouble."

Notice the tremendous psychological pressure that the Babylonian empire put on these four teenage boys by changing their names. We read through the English translations and it's not apparent what the name change was all about. The name Daniel meant "God is my judge". His new name Belteshazzar, meant "the treasure of Bel." Remember the tower of Bel, 600 feet tall. Apparently Bel was a pagan god of the Babylonians, so they gave him a pagan name. Hananiah means in Hebrew, "the Lord has been gracious to me." His new name, Shadrach, means "the inspiration of the sun." The name Mishael means in Hebrew "he who comes from God." Meshach, his Babylonian name, means "he who belongs to the goddess Sheshbach". Azariah means in Hebrew "the Lord is my helper." Abednego means "a servant of the god Nego." Why did they change their names so that they would honor these pagan gods? I think it is what we would call today, brainwashing. It was an attempt to break down these young men so that they would conform to the pagan religions of the Babylonians.

But please notice again Daniel 1:8.

The New King James says, "He made up his mind." The NIV says, "He purposed in his heart." Daniel made a decision. He was not going to be brainwashed. He was not going to be broken by the Babylonian empire. Someone might say, "Well, what is so bad about eating the king's food and drinking the king's wine?" Well, several things.

The food did not conform to the law of Moses. As our Jewish friends might say today, It was not kosher food." It violated the Levitical laws Leviticus 11; Deuteronomy 14: The Babylonians ate pork. They ate other unclean foods according to the old law. In all probability, this food was dedicated to the pagan gods of Babylon. Remember the discussion in the NT on that subject. The apostle Paul spent three chapters, I Corinthians 8, 9 and 10 talking about that issue: can we eat meat that has been dedicated in the name of a pagan idol? A long discussion there. Big problem at Corinth. Apparently that was the situation also in Babylon. In all probability, the Babylonians ate blood or drank blood that was forbidden by the old law. It is also forbidden by the NT for us to eat any kind of meat or anything that has blood in it, an animal that has been strangled from which the blood has not been drained.

Somebody might say, "Well, what's wrong with the wine?" Solomon had already written the book of Proverbs at this point. And if you will look at Proverbs 23, there is a warning there that Solomon gave against the use of wine. Certainly these four young men were aware of Proverbs 23:29-35; therefore, they chose not to drink wine in addition to not eating the meat of the Babylonians.

Notice please that Daniel honored the laws of God over the laws of the government. Whenever the laws of God conflict with the laws of the civil government, we have an obligation to keep the laws of God first. Therefore, verse 8 says, "Daniel made up his mind." That was that. It was like a steel door closing in his mind. He would not defile himself. He would remain faithful to the law of Moses. Well, this upset the official who was in charge of training all of these young men from these foreign countries, trying to train them so that they could be diplomats for the Babylonians. This official consulted some of the other officials and they came back and they reminded these men that they could lose their heads if they trained these young men in such a way as they would not carry out the king's requirements.

Notice how polite Daniel was in this chapter as he talked to these government officials. Very polite. Daniel said, "Why don't we have a test?" In verse 12: "Let's try this for ten days. We'll go by our dietary restrictions. We will not eat the king's meat or drink the king's wine. After ten days then you can be the judge." Verse 15 says that after this ten day test they looked better than all of the other young men that the Babylonians had captured from other countries around the world. We find, therefore, that even though Daniel was in his teenage years, he exhibited great courage. He defied the king of the most powerful government on the face of the Earth in 606 BC.

Let us notice something else about Daniel, and this is the fact that his example inspired these other three young men. They also joined him in defying the king about this food. Remember again, it would have been so easy to compromise. It would have been so easy for these four young men to have gotten together and to have said to one another, "Look, guys, Jerusalem is burning. We will never see our folks again. We will never see the Levitical priests again. Therefore, let's go along and let's have mental reservations about this, and let's just go along so that we will not be killed by the Babylonians." But Daniel made up his mind not to do that.

Have you even noticed that courage is contagious? Have you ever noticed in life that courage, if it is exhibited by one person, will likely spread to other people. And we never know whether or not that person standing over in the corner there by himself may not respond to our courage and also be courageous. We find, therefore, that these three other young men joined Daniel in defying the king of Babylon. In fact that influence upon them continued through the book.

Do you recall what happened in Daniel Chapter 3? Could you turn over there please just a moment to the 3rd chapter of Daniel. And here we have an account of just these other three friends without Daniel present. We assume that Daniel was probably out of the country on some kind of diplomatic mission. He is not mentioned in Chapter 3, but the other three young men are. And we find in Daniel 3 that King Nebuchadnezzar had built a huge statue and he had commanded everyone to bow down to it.

Notice the response in Daniel. 3:16,17, and 18 that Daniel's three friends made. Verse 16:

What a great example of courage! Where did that come from? From the example of Daniel in Chapter 1. Let us, therefore, always be willing to stand up for what is right and for what the Bible says and not compromise, and I think we will be surprised at others who will join us in also being courageous.

Let us look at one more thing about the life of Daniel. And that is the fact that he was greatly rewarded for his courage in defying the king of Babylon. Could you turn back to Chapter 1 again. There is a little statement right at the end of Daniel 1:21; it is very easy to pass over this verse. It says, "And Daniel continued until the first year of Cyrus the King." Cyrus was not a Babylonian king. He was a king of the Medes and the Persians. This means that Daniel lived past 539 BC. This is why we can assume that he was a teenager back there in 606 BC, by plotting the reign of the king Cyrus of the Medes and the Persians. It means that Daniel had outlived 4 kings of the Babylonians. God had blessed him to live beyond the Babylonian empire itself and into the days of the Medo-Persian empire. God, therefore, had blessed him with a very long and useful life and we assume that when we get to Daniel 6 that Daniel was probably in his 90's at this time. And yet he was still courageous.

Do you remember what happened with the Medes and the Persians and Daniel? There were some from among the Medes and the Persians who were jealous of Daniel and therefore they passed a law that everyone had to pray to the king. You could not pray to anyone else. Of course Daniel bowed down three times a day toward Jerusalem to pray to the one true God. We find that in Daniel 6 they arranged for Daniel to be thrown into the lions' den. This old man, in all probability in his 90's, dropped into the lions' den, and yet God closed the mouths of the lion. And do you recall what happened the next day to those who had accused Daniel of betrayal? The Bible says they were thrown in the lions' den, and before they hit the bottom you could hear their bones being crushed.

When did Daniel make that decision to be so courageous in the rest of his life? He made it as a teenager. And he was still faithful to it at the end of his life, probably in his nineties. When we look back at the life of Daniel, we see that once he decided not to defile himself with the king's food and the king's wine, everything else in life became easy. It is just that first decision that is difficult for some people to make. But once we make that decision that the Kingdom of God will come first, then everything past that point is going to be easy. Because past that point, it's not our problem concerning the consequences. That's God's problem to deal with. We have to decide whether or not we are going to put God first in our lives. Are we going to be as courageous as Daniel was?

If you get many church bulletins and some of our journals now you will, I'm sure, have read about the members of the Lord's Church that were recently arrested in the country of Laos. 39 members of the Lord's Church were arrested there on Jan. 30th of this year and were thrown into cells that were only 2 ft. by 6 ft. in dimensions. The Laotian government has now released all of those except 13, and they are charged with holding Bible studies in their homes in the country of Laos. These thirteen brothers and sisters in Christ will shortly be put on trial in Laos, and they can receive up to 5 years in prison for the crime of teaching other people the Bible in their homes.

Among those 13, there are 3 grandmothers who had Bible studies going in their homes. There was one 18 year old girl who is charged with teaching a two year old child Bible stories. So these 13 are still in prison, even as I speak, and will shortly go on trial. There have been many articles that have been published on this and the best one is the one that came this past week from the Campbell Street Bulletin in Jackson, TN. This is where our Bro. Jerry Lewis's parents are members. And as you leave the auditorium this evening, I'd like to give everyone copies of this. It gives some addresses where maybe we can write and have some kind of impact on our own government to use the Most Favored Nation status as a way of securing the release of these 13 brothers and sisters in Christ that we have. So it is certainly a sad situation and we can hope for the best that maybe through our influence and through the grace of God these 13 brothers and sisters will not go to jail for 5 years. Maybe we can all do something to assist in this matter.

But the question that comes back to me and should come back to all of us is this: What would we do in that situation? If it was against the law to teach people the Bible in our homes, would we still be willing to do it? Suppose that 13 members of this congregation were in prison this evening. We have 3 elders and 9 deacons here. That's 12 right there. Let's say that all of the elders and deacons had been placed under arrest last Jan. 30th and were still in prison and were awaiting trial and could receive up to 5 years in prison just for teaching the Gospel; for preaching the Gospel to people. What would be the reaction of this congregation? Would it stand firm or would it compromise and pull back on the teaching of the Gospel?

Have you ever wondered if there will be a congregation in Crystal Lake 50 years from today? Have you ever wondered if there will be a congregation in Crystal Lake 100 years from today? I have. There will be a congregation here if we have the courage that Daniel had. If we are adamant in not compromising what the Bible says; not giving in; not going along to get along. If we decide, as did Daniel, we will make up our mind to do what is right and it does not matter about the consequences. May the example of Daniel, therefore, inspire us to be courageous and never to give in when we are threatened by anyone concerning the preaching and teaching of the Gospel. I hope that this lesson has been an encouragement to everyone.

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