SA Ep93 - May the Fourth

SA Ep93 - May the Fourth

People say this time of year, “May the fourth be with you.” It is said in fun, but there is a truth far greater than the phrase itself. There truly is a Fourth who is with His people. Not in imagination, not in story, but in reality. When the fire is at its hottest, when the pressure is at its greatest, and when the situation feels beyond control, the child of God is never alone. The question is not whether the fire will come. The question is who will be with you in it.

Transcript

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Welcome to the Seeking Approval Podcast. I'm Dr. Chris Smelster from Gilead Baptist Church. You know life moves fast, and faith is not meant to be rushed. I want to take some time and slow down with you and have some honest conversations from the Word of God about daily living. So join me here today on Seeking Approval. Back in 1977, there's a very popular movie that hit the big screen called Star Wars. And in that movie there was a very famous saying that has now become infamous. Well, since that time they have deemed May the Fourth Star Wars Day, and it's a play on words of May the Fourth be with you. Well, there was also, before 1977, a great event that took place, and it happened in the area of Babylon under the King Nebuchadnezzar, and it's a far greater truth than any force you would ever know. There is truly a fourth who is with you. And we can find him in Daniel chapter number three. In this chapter of Daniel chapter number three, or in this portion of scripture where Daniel chapter number three happens, we're dealing with a very familiar account where Nebuchadnezzar had created an idol, and he had deemed it necessary that everyone, when they heard the trumpets, were to bow down and worship the idol that he had created. But you see, there was three Hebrews that had been captured along with Daniel, who the book is named after, the author of the book, and they were refusing to bow down. In fact, they said that they would not serve his God. They would not bow down to the God of Nebuchadnezzar, that they would only serve the true and living God of Israel. Well, that did not sit well with Nebuchadnezzar, and the punishment for that was to be put into the furnace of fire and burned alive. These three men, most people know them as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, but that was their name given by Nebuchadnezzar. Their godly names were Hananiah, Meshel, and Azariah. And what they did is what every believer must face at some time. Now we're not talking about a literal fire that you and I may be thrown into. We're talking about a fire of trial and adversity, of tribulation that we will face at some point along the way. Some fires are hotter than others. Some are dealing with death and separation, which is one of the hottest fires that you would probably face on this side. Some people say that diseases such as dementia and Alzheimer's is worse than death because it's a living death. Some may be smaller than others as far as the fires may not be as hot as others. Maybe it's a financial struggle that you're facing at a certain time, or other things that maybe you you um you know you can make it through, but maybe you can't see the other side. I don't know what you may be facing or what you have faced, but the fact is you have faced something that either you bow down and give in to it, or you stand your ground. But there really is no middle ground. You either bow or you burn. And that's where they were, that's where they were at in Daniel chapter number three. And in fact, uh their answer to the king has an echo of strength and fortitude and complete reliance upon God. They said in uh verse number uh 17 and 18, he says, uh they said, Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace. But if not, be it known unto thee, O King, that we will not serve thy gods. I don't think that that is a uh uh a statement of of uh uncertainty when they said, but if not. Because we don't know if that is what it is is God's intent for us to uh see the end of our earthly life. What they did know is that God was going to protect them, whether he protected them in the fire or whether he delivered them from the fire uh through death, they knew that they were going to be protected. But notice this God did not stop the furnace from being heated. In fact, the king heated it seven times hotter. He didn't remove the thread, he didn't tear down the furnace, he didn't change the king's mind. Now, it can God do that? Absolutely. God can step in in a supernatural way, he can take that disease from you, he can uh uh just he could send a check to you in the in the mail that you weren't expecting to pay the medical or the uh the financial uh burden that you have. He can uh all the sudden someone who has uh had uh uh great animosity towards you, whether it's a friend or a family member or co-worker, can all of a sudden just have a change of heart that's unexpected, a complete 180 that was out of nowhere. Can God intervene in those ways? Absolutely he can. He reserves the right to do any of those things. And we see many times throughout scripture and many times throughout history where God has done things like that. But that's not always the case. Matter of fact, more times than not, God doesn't remove the fire. He doesn't stop the heat, he doesn't change the mind of the others that are around you. We expect God to work in that way. We pray for deliverance, and when we mean deliverance, we mean remove the situation entirely, God. But often God's plan is not to keep us out of the fire, but it's to be with us in the fire. To be an example, to show us that He is greater than any fire. And though the furnace was heated seven times harder than usual, in fact, it was so intense that the men who were putting them into the furnace were actually killed by the heat. God was still with them. And this is no symbolic fire, this was real fire, this was deadly fire, this was overwhelming fire. And there are times in life that feel just like that. There are situations that are not small in our life, pressures that are not light or easy. Sure, there are burdens that we can set in our church pew or or drive in our car and and say a little prayer, you know, God be with me today. I have such and such thing going on. But there are those times whenever the burden is so heavy, the situation is so real that you almost can't even pray. I don't know if you've been there before. I remember when uh my mom, before she passed away from cancer, she had had a heart attack unexpectedly. And she'd actually passed away for quite a few minutes. I can't remember all the the details. Uh it was twenty-something uh twenty-seven minutes that my dad had done um CPR or my dad didn't CPR for uh like eighteen or nineteen minutes, and then by the time the paramedics got there, uh they continued, they put they strapped that machine onto her that actually did the uh compressions. It was a very violent machine. Um and it was almost ten minutes later or so that they finally got uh a very faint pulse. So for however long that is that she was not alive and was only being uh sustained by the exterior um uh uh pumping of of the CPR in the machine. When they finally got her to the hospital, to the emergency room, they uh she was barely just hanging on. And as we sat in the waiting room that that that day in in the emergency room there was uh it was almost that you couldn't pray. And I had my Bible with me. I I always have my Bible and and I I just sat there and I read out a psalm. And um that's all I could do is just read the same chapter over and over and over. It was so hot, it was so intense, it was so real that I almost couldn't pray. And I don't know if you faced one of those those times in your life, and if you haven't, God bless you for that. Thank God that you have not faced one of those. But if you have, you understand that in those moments you realize very quickly that there are many things that's out of our control that we cannot fix, and we wouldn't even have the words to fix it if we could. And that's what leads us to one of the most powerful verses in all of not just in this account, but really in all of Scripture. One that if we ain't careful, we'll almost just write it away as fairy tale. It comes in verses twenty-four and twenty-five. It says that Nebuchadnezzar Nebuchadnezzar the king was astounded or astonished and said, Lo, behold, that's what that word means. I see four men loose walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt, and the form of the fourth is like the son of God. They put three in, but the king saw fourth, and it's that fourth man that changes everything. That fourth man, he saw them walking around, they had bound their hands and feet, the fire burned the ropes, but it did not burn them. They were not falling apart, they were not screaming and welling, they were walking around, they were moving freely. And inside the very place that was meant to destroy them, there they are, moving around. And why? Very simple. Because of the fourth man in the fire. The presence of God transformed that fire into just another everyday situation. Something that was so intense, something that was so unbearable, something that could not be explained to God became just another day, just another event, just another minor problem, a bump in the road, if you will. The fire didn't go away, but the power of the fire changed. The danger didn't disappear, but the effects of it were removed. The trial remained, but it no longer had dominion. Because that's what the presence of Christ does in our life. That's what he does for you and I. The problem may not go away. The sickness, the disease, the uh the loss of a loved one, you they may not come back. We were able to see my mom again when she had the heart attack. She was able to fight through, and God was able to walk her through that fire, and we had we had her for another two years after that before uh cancer set in, and her body was just no longer able to fight. You may not be able to see them again when when that when that time comes, the fire may be real. But but Christ is bigger than all situations. Every saint of God is gonna face their fiery furnace at some point. Something that's just as real. It's pressure from the world, sickness, loss, a season where everything seems to be going wrong upside down, backwards, uncertain, overwhelming. And in those moments, it's when the enemy will whisper to us that you're alone. God can't help you in this one. This one is too big. This is the one that's going to do it. But Daniel chapter number three stands as this testimony that says otherwise. And you say, but but if if God is is good, then then why death? Why do I have to be separated from the one that I love? Remember what the end goal of all of this is. The end goal of this is not for us to live on this earth forever. The end goal of all this is to live with Christ, to reign with him. And in order to do that, we're either going to have to go through death or go through the first rapture. That's that's the only options that we have. And so for those who have already gone home, like uh my mom when we were sitting in the in the room, she was the last month or so of her life, she spent in the in a hospital bed. And uh a few times there during those uh those last few weeks, we would be sitting and talking, and I would tell her to say, Mom, I'm I'm I'm jealous of you. Why? So you're about to know everything. You're about to win. You're gonna win the game. You're gonna make it to where we're supposed to be. She say, Oh hush. I said, But it's real, Mom. I mean, you're I have to I have to do all this. I have spent hours studying just to understand a portion of scripture. And I still don't understand all of it. I still don't don't get it all. And you're just gonna know it. You're gonna see it all in in real life, in real time. You're gonna see what Revelation chapter 5 is talking about. You're gonna see those things that Paul saw when he was carried into heaven. You're gonna see what Moses saw when God showed him all the things of heaven and the temple and and those things. You're gonna see all that. You're gonna know it all. And here I'm still gonna be struggling trying to to study it out. So when even in death, the worst that the world can do to us even in death, Ecclesiastes tells us in in in in in I guess in basic terminology, Ecclesiastes tells us that that death is just the doorman. Death just opens the door so that we can walk through to the grand prize. I know that doesn't make it easy on this side, that doesn't make it easy for those who are left here, but our time is coming as well when we'll be able to walk through that door. We'll be able to see God, we'll be able to see our loved ones and our friends and and those who have gone before us. God is not distance in our trials, he's not absent in our suffering, he's not watching from the the shoreline with his hands over his eyes, uh shading himself from the from the rays of the sun or from the rain that's falling, and saying, You know, I'll be there in a minute. Let let me let this calm down for a second. And then when they came out of the fire, on the other side of all this, in chapter in ver in uh verse number twenty-seven, it says, Nor was uh hair on their head singed, neither were their coats changed, nor the smell of fire had passed on them. That, my friends, is complete and absolute deliverance. They didn't even have the smell of smoke on them. It didn't that you couldn't even I don't know if you've ever uh smelled burning hair before. We had a lady that lived near us when growing up that she had a uh a barbershop beauty shop in in her in her house, and every Saturday evening was their hair burning time. I guess they collected all the hair all week long, and instead of putting it in the garbage, they would just throw it on a fire out back. Oh my heavens, it stunk so bad. And these boys when they come out, they didn't even have the smell of one singed hair on them. That is complete, absolute, utter deliverance. So, what does this mean for you and I today? It means that we need to stop measuring our situation by the intensity of it or how it feels or what it looks like, and start measuring it by the fourth man that is with us. We need to stop looking at the fire with fear and start looking at Christ in trust. We need to understand that his presence is greater than our problem. It means that even though we don't understand the situation or what God might want out of us in the situation, yet we can rest assured in the fact that he has not left us, he will not leave us, and he will not forsake us. So as the movie made popular in the 1970s and eighties, and now even on into the 2000 and twenties, I'll say it to you today. May the fourth be with you in your trial, in your burden, in your quiet moments when you're doubting or in fear, may the fourth be with you. Because the fire doesn't have the final say. Satan will not win. And I encourage you to take your eyes off the flames and fix your eyes on the Father. Because He's there, He's with you then, now, and forever. May the Fourth be with you today. Thank you for joining us today on Seeking Approval. You know our faith oftentimes grows in quiet places. I hope today's conversation gave you something worth carrying throughout the rest of this day. And join me, Dr. Chris Smelser, again next time as we continue thinking, learning, and walking together. Until then, grace and peace to you from Seeking Approval at Gilead Baptist Church.