Today, I am reading and commenting on  Daniel 3-4.

I love the story of the fiery furnace.  It holds such important lessons for us.  This morning I was struck by a phrase which I never thought about much in the past.  When Nebuchadnezzar confronted the three friends over their failure to worship the golden image he had erected they responded by saying, “we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. ”  Notice that they did not say that they did not need to defend themselves at all before him, just that they did not need to do so “in this matter”.  “This matter” was their refusal to bow down and worship the image of gold which he had set up.  They rejected his authority over them in the matter of who or what they worship.  They then asserted that their God could, and would deliver them from his attempt to punish them for refusing to accept his authority in this matter.   Finally, they stated that even if their God did not deliver them from his punishment, they would not follow Nebuchadnezzar’s dictates as to how, who, or what they should worship.  We should follow their example.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.