God’s Word for You

Daniel 6:4-5 A satrap trap

by Pastor Timothy Smith on Tuesday, October 28, 2025

4 Now, the administrators and the satraps kept trying to find grounds for charges against Daniel about his administration of the kingdom, but they could not find any accusation or evidence of corruption in him, because he was trustworthy. He was neither corrupt nor negligent. 5 Then these men said, “We will never find any basis for charges against this man Daniel unless it has something in connection with the law of his God.”

Here Daniel once again foreshadows Jesus with his life. Since there are other examples in Scripture of this we will profit from remembering them:

1, Cain planned and murdered his brother Abel (Genesis 4:8).

2, Joseph was persecuted by his brothers who, out of jealousy, considered killing him and sold him into slavery (Genesis 37:28).

3, Although Moses committed murder, he, too, was persecuted out of jealousy when one of his countrymen said to him, “Who made you ruler and judge over us? Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian?” (Exodus 2:14).

4, Aaron and Miriam opposed Moses out of jealousy and on account of the wife he married after his first wife died (Numbers 12:1-15).

5, Korah, Dathan and Abiram also opposed Moses and blasphemed the Lord, for which “they were brought down to the grave while still alive” (Numbers 16:31-32; 1 Clement 4:12).

6, Saul persecuted David, trying to kill him again and again, even though David did nothing he was not asked to do, and was more righteous than Saul at every turn (1 Samuel 19:1, 20:33; Psalm 59:1).

7, Mordecai was despised by Haman simply on account of his faith and his nation, and conspired to kill both Mordecai and his whole nation (Esther 3:6).

Surely there were more examples of such “self-harming jealousy,” but these are enough to show that godly men like Daniel are often despised simply because they are godly, on account of their faith, and because they do not hide their faith or forsake it the way that their persecutors have abandoned their own faith and want to destroy faith in other people (2 Timothy 2:17).

These things all foreshadow the jealousy of the Pharisees for Jesus. Their plan was simply this: “We shall kill Christ” (Mark 14:1), and the devil still wants to kill Christ in our hearts. In other words, he wants to kill our faith with doubt and distractions, so that we are caught looking elsewhere when our Lord will come knocking at the door. For he says, “Behold! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me” (Revelation 3:20).

Here in Babylon, it wasn’t enough that the Babylonians had destroyed the temple of the Jews and had taken them into captivity, now these rotten rascals were going to use Daniel’s faith in their satrap trap to bring him down, out of the king’s favor, get him fired from his job, and get him killed once and for all. Isn’t this just what the Pharisees tried to do with our Jesus? They kept trying to set a trap for him around his teaching and the faith of the people around him.

What Jesus went through was a part of his Passion, suffering those things for the sake of our souls and with the ultimate goal of atoning for our sins. “By one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy” (Hebrews 10:14). Praise him forever for his sacrifice!

In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith

 

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