Here we see how people’s jealousy towards us and wicked scheming against us cannot cause us any harm, provided we abide in the secret place of the Most High and dwell under the shadow of the Almighty.

Daniel receives a position of distinction among the 3 main rulers of the kingdom under king Darius, and had authority over 120 satraps of the kingdom, inspite of the fact that he was on exile in a foreign land. This was because he possessed an excellent spirit! For this reason, king Darius intended to appoint him over the entire kingdom, vs 1-3.

This naturally aroused the envy of the other satraps who sought ways and means to bring him down in the sight of the king, vs.4. Having found no valid basis to do so, on account of Daniel’s impeccable character of being trustworthy and guilty of no negligence or corruption, *they realised that the only way that they could get him into trouble was in relation to his religion, for they knew that he would not compromise therein even if he had to lose his life, vs 5!

How many of us Christians today can honestly claim to have a similar testimony before those who come in touch with us? Thus, the satraps subtly schemed against Daniel by convincing the king to sign a royal edit saying that no one could pray to any other God but the king for one whole month, and if they disobeyed that command, then they would be thrown to the lions, vs 6-8! Unknowingly, the king accepted their proposition, not realising that it was specifically aimed at getting Daniel into trouble, vs 9. Nevertheless, despite the cruel law that was passed, Daniel did not compromise on the times of prayer that he usually maintained throughout the day and made no effort whatsoever to hide this from anyone, vs 10.

This inevitably got him into trouble and when the matter was presented before the king, the king now realised the plot behind the cruel plan, and tried his best to rescue Daniel, but on finding none, the king was left with no option but to carry out the edit as was normally done, vs 11-15!

However, the king assured Daniel that the God whom he served would surely come to his rescue, vs 16. And that is exactly what happened, vs 17-23! Daniel credited God for His mighty deliverance, giving reason for the same as him being innocent, and not having intentionally harmed the king in any way.

Besides this, he also maintained perfect trust in God. On the contrary, the king now commanded those who plotted against Daniel to be thrown into the den instead, together with their wives and children, and needless to say, the lions completely overpowered them and crushed all their bones, vs 24!

This brought great honour to the Lord’s Name not only in that province but throughout the provinces that king Darius ruled over, vs 25-27. So Daniel prospered during the reign of Darius and the reign of Cyrus the Persian too, vs 28. Truly there can be no one who will do us harm if we are devoted to consistently doing what is good in God’s sight, 1 Peter 3:13.

For the harm that they seek to do to us,God will make sure to cause it to work together for our good, Romans 8:28.

Daniel’s conscience was perfect towards /God and this was seen in that he was completely at rest while being thrown into the lion’s den and after that too!

He neither made any effort to fight those men to save himself!
He knew that as he lived in integrity before God, God would uphold him and fight his battles. Very often, because we lack integrity before God, we fight our own battles and God can do nothing much for us as a result!

On the other hand, as we determine to walk in the fear of God and not in the fear of man, we will find God standing for us and fighting our battles, even if some renowned wordly king or wordly people stand against us. Let us be in this number, Amen.

Rowena Thomas
Mumbai, India.