God’s Word for You

Daniel 3:28-30 Able to save

by Pastor Timothy Smith on Wednesday, October 1, 2025

28 Then Nebuchadnezzar said, “Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel and rescued his servants. They trusted in him, and set aside the king’s command. They gave up their bodies rather than serve and worship any god except their own God. 29 Therefore I make a decree: Any people, nation, or language that speaks anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego shall be cut to pieces. Their houses will be laid in ruins, for there is no other god who is able to save this way.” 30 Then the king caused Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to prosper in the province of Babylon.

The King of Babylon uses flowery language to declare the God of Israel to be a legal divinity for worship in Babylon. His words don’t really do much more than that. He acknowledges that God had sent an angel to help the men in the furnace, with which we agree.

Some translations have the king promoting the men, but the phrase really just means “caused them to prosper.” Restoring them to their former positions and giving them some gifts as well as a good reputation would account for the language used by Daniel here.

Notice that Nebuchadnezzar doesn’t command anyone to worship the God of Israel the way he had commanded everyone to worship his own statue. He only made it legal for the Israelites (and anyone else who cared to) to worship the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

If we compare the two gods in the chapter, the true infinite and almighty God and Nebuchadnezzar’s ridiculous 9 x 90 foot blind, deaf, dumb and powerless statue, we are reminded of many of the things God warns about in his many commands about idolatry. Idols cannot save. “They know nothing, they understand nothing, their eyes are plastered over so they cannot see, and their minds closed so they cannot understand” (Isaiah 44:17). Idols have to be fastened down with nails so that they won’t tip over (Jeremiah 10:4). They cannot utter a sound with their throats (Psalm 115:7).

But the LORD God rescued Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He did what an idol could never do. With a command to an angel, they were cared for in the furnace. They were not even hurt by the fall, much less harmed by the heat, or burned by the flames, or choked by the smoke. God sent his servant to be with them and protect them, just as the angel brought Peter out of prison (Acts 12:7-9).

Yet we must also be careful not assume that the Lord would always save our physical lives from any and every danger. This is neither the lesson of human experience nor is it the message of the Holy Scriptures. God sometimes permits the death of his saints, as he allowed James the Apostle to be killed (Acts 12:2) and John the Baptist to be murdered at the whim of a heathen girl and her wicked mother (Matthew 14:8-11). And of course the Lord also permitted the death of Jesus his Son on the cross. These things were all part of his permission and design. A believer may be taken from this life so that they will be spared further suffering. A believer may be taken from this life because their work for the kingdom of God has come to an end, and because it is time for others to take up the work that they did. It is also possible for a Christian to meet death on account of poor judgment resulting in an accident, but this is not a judgment on their immortal soul or their faith.

Therefore it is good and right for us to pray when we are in danger, or sick, or dying. God may choose to spare us, or he may choose to call us home. Paul said, “If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose?” (not that Paul had a choice at all) “I do not know! I am torn between the two. I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far” (Philippians 1:22-23).

And we must also be comforted about our prayers for the dying. If a physician tells us that a loved one, or we ourselves, have an illness for which there is no cure, it is not wrong to pray for recovery, and it is not wrong if we pray instead for a blessed and peaceful death. We are not sinning either way. There might be someone who, without thinking, might try to be very pious-sounding and talk about the wisdom and even the necessity of praying for both things. But I am not trying to comfort the pious. I want to comfort those who might be troubled and who even feel guilt about a prayer that they think that they failed to pray in the past. Prayer is a blessing and it is a good work. To pray is a good thing, but to fail to be, shall we say, “completely thorough” in our prayers, is no sin, and we need feel no shame about something we prayed about or did not pray about in the past. If you did what you thought best in the moment, you did well, because God placed that opportunity in your path, and you did what you did in faith, whether it was, in the minds of some, a partial good work, or a thorough good work.

Cheer up and be joyful in the Lord! He loves you, and he loves the things that you do. Do your tasks in faith and to his glory, whether they are ordinary things or extraordinary, and do not feel shame doing them. Do whatever he has given you to do, and when you are done and evening darkness deepens and you feel the need to rest, place everything in the Lord’s hands and go to sleep. He will let you know when it is time to wake.

I walk in danger all the way;
the thought shall never leave me
that Satan, who has marked his prey,
is plotting to deceive me.
This foe with hidden snares
may seize me unawares
if e’er I fail to watch and pray;
I walk in danger all the way.

I walk with angels all the way,
they shield me and befriend me;
all Satan’s pow’r is held at bay
when heav’nly hosts attend me.
They are my sure defense;
all fear and sorrow, hence!
Unharmed by foes, do what they may,
I walk with angels all the way.

Hans Adolf Brorson 1694-1764

Something Extra

THE PRAYER OF AZARIAH
13, 1:66-68   The three men praise the Lord

66 “Bless the Lord, Hananiah, Azariah, and Mishael;
sing praise to him and highly exalt him forever.
For he has rescued us from Hades
and saved us from the power of death,
and delivered us from the midst of the burning fiery furnace;
from the midst of the fire he has delivered us. 
67 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good,
for his mercy endures forever. 
68 All who worship the Lord, bless the God of gods,
sing praise to him and give thanks to him,
for his mercy endures forever.”

Here the poem returns to its apocryphal scabbard, placing words into the mouths of the three men in the blazing fiery furnace. The words continue to be excellent. Verse 66 is the closest that the entire 68-verse document gets to following the usual rules or forms of Hebrew poetry. It is in fact written or presented in parallelism, but borrowing from Hebrew examples:

“Rescued from Hades / saved from death”
  = synonymous (Psalm 33:19)
“delivered from the furnace / from fire delivered us”
  = synonymous (cp. Psalm 144:7)
“Give thanks… his mercy endures forever”
  = synthetic = Psalm 118:1
“Bless God of gods / sing praise”
  = synthetic = Psalm 136:2

Hades is a Greek term (verse 66), and this gives away the date of the poem as being very, very late, perhaps the second century. It occurs in the Greek translation of the Old Testament (Genesis 37:35), and in the New Testament Jesus and John use it as a parallel word to death or the grave (Matthew 16:18; Revelation 1:18, 6:8, 20:13-14).

This sing is a blessing to God’s people from the mind and pen of a believer. While it is not the inspired word of God, it is every much as helpful to faith and Christian living as any of the hymns and songs in our hymnals. May God bless us with this excursion into the glorious heights of praise.

In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith

 

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