Convenience or Conviction?

Daniel 1:8 - "Daniel determined not to defile himself..."

Daniel had passion for nothing else but God. This passion was what drove every aspect of his life. If you know anything about Daniel, you know that he didn't care what other people thought about his relationship with God. In fact, you probably also know that Daniel didn't care what other people thought so much that he was willing to die for his faith.

There was a crucial decision making point in his life that he knew would impact him and his way of life forever. The King had issued a decree that no one could pray to anyone else but to him and anyone who did would be thrown into the den of lions. This would have been a good time for Daniel to throw in the towel if there was ever such a time. I'm sure he didn't want to die in the mouths of hungry lions, but he knew he didn't have much of a choice in the matter.

At this point he was pretty high up in politics and he knew that if he were to pray to The Lord three times a day like he always did that someone was bound to see him. People tend to keep their eyes on important people... waiting for them to mess up. So, the short of the long is that someone did see him and the King was bound to the decree he instituted and had to throw Daniel into the lion's den even though he didn't really want to do that since he liked Daniel.

So, it turns out that God rescued Daniel from the lions. Simply awesome.

It's not a secret that it's hard to live a completely authentic, free from fear all the time, kind of Christian life. But that's what Daniel determined to do. Daniel 1:8 says, "Daniel determined not to defile himself..." This was referring to the kinds of food he was going to eat according to his beliefs, but this determination permeated his whole lifestyle. He did not and would not defile himself in any other area of his life either. I believe his strength in the hard times came from his devotion to prayer; his communication with The Father. He could not have handled the fear of knowing he may be ripped to shreds by lions if it wasn't for the strength he received from The Lord through his knowledge of who He is and what that meant to him. He built a regular routine into his life to pray three times a day and he never quit even when his life was in danger!

Daniel's relationship with God was not a relationship of convenience, it was one of conviction! Nothing would stand in the way of his love and devotion for God.

When we look at our own lives and how we handle our faith in public, how does it stack up to how Daniel lived his life? Do we avoid talking about God because we're scared of what people will think or say? Do we only follow Christ when it's convenient and we don't have an opposition or feel embarrassed or do we not care what people think... like Daniel?

Are we willing to commit and resolve in our hearts, by God's grace, that our relationship with Jesus is going to be one full of prayer and conviction that nothing can match, or are we just going to "follow" Him when it suits us? Our world is falling apart and it's going to get increasingly harder to follow Jesus.

There will come a time when we'll have to stand firm or deny what we've been claiming all this time. Will you stand firm? I pray so.

Bry...