Latest / Your Daily Portion with L. David Harris / 11 26 2023 Nebuchadnezzar
Transcript
- 0:01Most of us eat every day, some of us too much because yesterday's food
- 0:06is not enough to supply energy for today's needs. Why then, do some
- 0:10of us expect yesterday's portion of heavenly manna, the word of God to keep
- 0:15us through today's challenges. On this program, we are going to change all
- 0:20of that. Let's experience God's words today and receive the power we need to
- 0:25live healthy, vibrant lives. Welcome to your Daily Portion with your host,
- 0:31author speaker, Elle David Harris. Good morning, good morning, Good morning.
- 0:34It is Sunday, November twenty six, twenty twenty three. Hello,
- 0:39my name is El David Harris. I am your host, and this is
- 0:41your Daily Portion where we give you God's Word every single day, and today
- 0:46is no exception. We are continuing in our Lesson study series. God's mission,
- 0:51my mission, and our caption for today is nebucud Nezar, nebucud Nezer.
- 0:58We'll get into that discussion in jail a moment, but first I'd like
- 1:00to say welcome to you and say thank you to all of you who continually
- 1:04come in day in and day out. You're on TV, you're on the
- 1:07radio, you are listening on watching on various online platforms and podcasting aggregator sites.
- 1:15And you are spreading. You are spreading the good news of Jesus Christ
- 1:19that we are sharing from day to day. And for that God is faithful
- 1:23to you, because the Bible does say, how beautiful are the feet of
- 1:27those upon the mountains who spread the good news that God has given us of
- 1:33salvation. Right, So thank you, and I thank God for you.
- 1:37Let's go ahead and pray and then we will get under way. Father in
- 1:41heaven, thank you for giving us the new day that you've entrusted to us
- 1:44the beginning of the week. Father, Please teach us how you can save
- 1:49us in no matter what situation we find ourselves, and then we can reach
- 1:53others, very powerful people in for the kingdom in Jesus name, I pray,
- 2:00Amen and Amen again. So yesterday we talked about the mission to the
- 2:05powerful, and I gave an example of a man here in Jamaica who is
- 2:08very good at reaching powerful people. And there are so many others like that.
- 2:13There are many of you who are watching or listening right now who have
- 2:16that same mission. God's people as a whole have a mission to whoever God
- 2:23sends along our journey. Okay, nebukud Nezar is an example of a very
- 2:29powerful man. And yeah, God used some people who may not have seen
- 2:37to be the likeliest candidates to reach him. But it was a weird story,
- 2:43right, So let me read this real quick and then ask you a
- 2:46question. Right. A striking example in the Bible of how God reaches powerful
- 2:52unbelievers is the story of King nebukud Nezzar. I would say, saga,
- 2:59what are a few things that we can learn from his story? Let me
- 3:01just begin here. God loves us so much that he was willing to give
- 3:09an understanding of future things, even to a man who did not love him.
- 3:15Right. God gave nebiculd Nezzar a vision, and nebicud Nez lived way
- 3:21back in the Old Testament times. Okay. He gave nebiculd Nezzer a vision
- 3:25of things that were to come. And some of those things are still playing
- 3:30out in our day in twenty twenty three, you see. And so when
- 3:34God gave him that that dream, call it a dream, call it a
- 3:38dream, he needed to know what it meant, and so he called all
- 3:43of the leaders in his society that he had empowered to be like advisors and
- 3:50so forth. And he said, I need you all to give me the
- 3:54understanding of my dream. And of course the men that did not know God
- 4:00were saying, well, just tell us the dream and then we'll give you
- 4:01the understanding King. And the King was like, no, no, no,
- 4:04no, no, no no no no no no no no no no,
- 4:06no no no. I need you to tell me the dream and then
- 4:10the understanding, because I see what you're trying to do here. Well,
- 4:13nobody could do that. And the men said, no, no, there's
- 4:16nobody on planet Earth that can do that. You're asking something that no king
- 4:19has ever asked. And by the way, that answer belongs to the gods,
- 4:25and the gods don't dwell among people. And so, to make a
- 4:28long story short, God positioned his children Daniel, Hananaiah, micheel Azariah in
- 4:35such a way that they could have an encounter. They could have an encounter
- 4:41with the king. And to make a long story short, God interpreted the
- 4:46dream for nebuchad Nezzar, and then these young men became prominent in the king's
- 4:54court. Okay, that is not exactly the order, but you understand the
- 4:58story now, good. So there comes a point now when God has already
- 5:01revealed the succession of kingdoms, and nebukad Nezar would have been the head of
- 5:06the kingdom that started the story. And God said, you are that head
- 5:11of gold in this image, of this image that he was given in his
- 5:15dream. And nebukud Nezar, being the proud man that he was, a
- 5:18self absorbed man that he was, he was like head of gold. Hmm,
- 5:23I don't want to be the head of anything. I'm going to make
- 5:26an image that is entirely gold, that does not represent any kingdom coming and
- 5:30supplanting mind. I'm going to be here forever. And so he erects an
- 5:35idol in the plane of Dura, or a great big statue in the plane
- 5:39of Dura, made of gold, which was one of the materials in the
- 5:44image that God had shown him in his dream. And he commanded that everybody
- 5:48from all over the region, all over the land, that they when they
- 5:51heard the certain music playing from these certain instruments, they would bow. They
- 5:57would bow to that idol, which was a reference to his power and notoriety.
- 6:03So one, two, three, the music plays, and then everybody
- 6:09bows except three people. Now we understand that Daniel was not there. Okay,
- 6:15three people did not bow? Well, who were those people? They
- 6:18played the music, these three did not bow, And the Bible says that
- 6:23God, that that God positioned them, really, if you want to say,
- 6:27to witness for him. And so the king, getting from the tattle
- 6:30tales, you know, tattletales, said, King, there's some guys that
- 6:34you brought into your kingdom. They did not bow. Did you not command
- 6:39that when you would play the music, that this this, that everybody should
- 6:43bow. Well, these men that you brought in here did not bow.
- 6:46They are from the captivity. We know them as the people of God.
- 6:49But they say the Israelite slaves. Okay, they come from that. And
- 6:54so he's like what he brings those young men in. He says, hey,
- 6:58I heard that you did not bow. So in the moment that you
- 7:01hear the music, I'm gonna give you an opportunity, right here and right
- 7:03now, in the moment that you hear the music, I need you to
- 7:06bow. And those young men said, oh, King live forever. We
- 7:11are not careful to answer you in this matter. Our God is able to
- 7:15deliver us. And if he will not deliver us, we still will not
- 7:19bow to your idol. Of course, they were saying they worshiped God and
- 7:24God only, and so he gave him an opportunity. Boom, He has
- 7:28the music played and they don't bow, and he said, well, who
- 7:30was this God that's going to deliver you? Who is this God that's going
- 7:34to deliver you? Yeah? Okay, Well. Bible says that he had
- 7:40a fiery furnace prepared seven times hotter in order to destroy them. And when
- 7:46that place was set up to destroy them, those men who threw them in
- 7:50were destroyed. The fire was just so hot. The Bible says that he
- 7:55threw those three young men into the fiery furnace. They were bound. Hah,
- 8:00they were bound by their hands, thrown down into the fiery furnace.
- 8:05And the Bible says that at a moment, he looks down into the fiery
- 8:09furnace and sees that they're walking around, but they're not alone. This is
- 8:11where it gets even better. They are not alone. There is a force
- 8:16walking around. And Nebuchadnezer said, did we not throw in three? Behold
- 8:20I see four, and one looks like a son of the gods. We
- 8:24say, the son of God, Jesus Christ went into that fiery furnace with
- 8:28Ha with those three young men, and the Bible says that when they came
- 8:35out of that fiery furnace, they were not burned, their clothing was not
- 8:37burned, they did not smell like smoke, they were not harmed in any
- 8:41way. Jesus turned that place into an air conditioned resort HA because they were
- 8:46worshippers of the One True and Living God, Blessed be his name, and
- 8:52so the king had to recognize that the God of Heaven, the God of
- 8:56Heaven, was with his children. Of course, the story goes longer where
- 9:01the king lost lost his mind and forgot that moment. And then God,
- 9:07because he loves him so much, took him through seven years of trial,
- 9:11seven years of training, seven years of cultivating his character and teaching. And
- 9:16at the end of those seven years, as we see written in the Book
- 9:20of Daniel, chapter four, his testimony, he learned that the One True
- 9:26and Living God, Blessed be his name, was worthy of worship and praise.
- 9:30And guess who was the Who were the chief witnesses to him? Three
- 9:33young men who simply kept their faith intact and did only what God told them
- 9:39to do. We have a mission to the powerful Peace. Thanks for joining
- 9:45us listening. Friends. Always remember we cannot live by bread alone, but
- 9:50by every word that comes from the mouth of God. This has been your
- 9:54daily portion with El David Harris. Make it a great day. Yeah,