- It is going to rain.
- If that’s so, we should take an umbrella.
- But if not, it wouldn’t hurt to have one with us.
- I’ll throw you into the fiery furnace!
- If that’s so, God will save us.
- But if not, we still won’t worship you.
- If you do not worship, you shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace. And who is the god who will deliver you out of my hands?”
- If this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king.
- But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.” (Daniel 3:15-18)
I don’t know which translators first fiddled with those words to make them say in some translations, “Even if He does not.” (The NIV says it this way. You may find the words in your Bible in italics because those words aren’t really what it says; that’s why they are in italics.) How as a church did we start to believe that the three Hebrew men said, “But if God doesn’t save us, we won’t serve and worship your gods.” That doesn’t even make any logical sense. When they are a pile of ashes, they won’t serve his gods? What a laughable statement!
How did we get there? When did we stop believing our God saves?
Why did so many churches look like the world over the last year? They didn’t believe that God saves. Why are churches following the “wisdom of this world” which says you can’t go in the fire or you’ll get burned? They don’t believe that God saves.
The God of the Bible saves. The God of the Bible heals. The God of the Bible protects. The God of the Bible provides. Who is your God?
And that’s the worst part of it all. We don’t even know who He is. We don’t know the one we say is our God. Jesus didn’t die to “save” us. He died so that our relationship with God could be restored. We’re supposed to be in relationship with God. If you were walking and talking with God every day, how could you live in fear and be following the world?
The Tribulation 