October 31, 2021 · Daniel 6:10

Shut Their Mouths

Now when Daniel learned that the decree had been published, he went home to his upstairs room where the windows opened toward Jerusalem. Three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to his God, just as he had done before.

“You take the courage to serve your God. You remain faithful to him. And then he remains faithful to you. We need to stay faithful to God, even in the hard times and the difficult times, and the questionable times, when we're bewildered, when we're upset. We need to say this: there are times when God allows the church to be persecuted. And I expect it's going to happen. If it's not in our generation, then in the generation of our children, or the one after that — it's going to happen. And it already happens in little places. We all experience the derision, the laughter, for being Christians. And there's that looking down at you that happens. But we haven't had the type of persecution that we're talking about, where you'll be persecuted for your faith like Daniel ends up being here. What might happen? And the point is, we need to be prepared. Not only might it happen — the Bible tells us it's going to happen. There's going to be a generation of Christians that end up facing a very evil situation. And it even says that eventually much of the church will be deceived. So we need to be the faithful that look past us and trust in God, so when that time comes up, we're prepared. We prepare ourselves. We prepare our children. Are you really ready to step up when that day comes? Because guess what? I want to put this out there: the faithful to God are rewarded, whether it's in this life or the next. But it often is — you're rewarded in this life. Sometimes it's interesting how, when you actually are faithful, when you stand up for your faith, or you take that thing that you didn't want to do, the reward that the Lord gives you in this life and time.”