Daniel has been one of my favorite Bible characters for a while now. Last summer I went to camp and the theme was “Serving the Lord Continually”. The main speaker preached basically the entire week from Daniel 6:16b “Now the king spake and said unto Daniel, Thy God whom thou servest continually, he will deliver thee.”. King Darius said that right before Daniel was thrown into the lions den. Why was Daniel being thrown into the lions den? Because the king had passed a decree that no one was to pray to any god or person other than the king. Daniel chose to serve God, instead of the king. Here is a man that was taken away from home at a young age. Taken away from parental guidance, taken away from everything that was “normal” and familiar to him. He was taken to a foreign land, and still did not quit serving the Lord! But what stuck out to me was that he didn’t just wake up that day that the decree went out, and think “Well, I guess I’ll serve the Lord this once.” or “I guess I’ll serve the Lord today.”. No! He had made that decision a long time ago! Have you ever come to a fork in the road of your life, and you had to make a decision, and whatever path or decision you took was going to change your life for ever? Yes! We all have. For Daniel, his “fork in the road” came soon after he was taken to Babylon. He and his three friends were offered the kings meat and wine. Now the kings meat and wine were normally offered to gods, and it was considered wrong for the Jew to eat of it. Their parents were nowhere around. None of the Jewish leaders and officers were around. They could have easily eaten of it and gotten away with it. But God had His eye on them! He was watching and waiting to see which path they were going to take. The Bible tells us “Daniel 1:8 But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king's meat, nor with the wine which he drank: therefore he requested of the prince of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself.” That is when he made his decision. And from then on the Lord began to bless him! Was his life a bed of roses? Far from it! Daniel had a lot more struggles then many of us face! But he had the comfort of knowing that he made the right decision, and because of that the Lord was right by his side through everything he went through! I have a feeling that had Daniel not made that decision at the start, his story would have been very different, and perhaps not even written in the Bible. We make decisions every day. Are you making the right one? If you have and you are going through struggles, and the devil starts making you doubt if you have made the right decision or not, go back and read through the book of Daniel. You will see that you are not the only person in the world that the devil throws that to! I think it will encourage you. It encouraged me. I hope everyone has a wonderful week!!!
<Anna>
