In An Instant... Daniel 3:19 Dr. David A Baillie

Those of us who are older remember where we were on September 11, 2001.  I know we have a whole new generation growing up who have no actual recollection of that moment, but still many of us do. 

For others of us we remember where we were when Challenger exploded, and others remember the day Kennedy was shot, or that when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor.  

Those are huge, life-changing milestones that many of us share.  Then, for each of us, there are those milestones that we may not share with the world.   The day we got the diagnosis.  The day we walked in to work only to leave a few minutes later with no job. 

A few years ago, here in Indiana, I got a call from a friend one day who simply said, "Pastor, can you come over.  I just came back from the hospital, and there are no more treatments they can do."   So I turned the car around and drove to his house, and sat there next to him on his couch and just held his hand for a long time.  A couple weeks later he was gone. 

Life changes in an instant. 

In Daniel 3:19, the story of the fiery furnace, we find this line about Nebuchadnezzar:

Then Nebuchadnezzar was full of fury and the expression on his face changed towards Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-Nego...

Suddenly, in an instant, they were no longer leaders of the people, they were despised, and all that they had done was hold on to what they believe. 

​I wonder, if in the face of fury, if we would hold on to what we believe?