Facing the Furnace

Quick answers. That’s what we want. And easy answers with no contingencies. The kind of answers that require no thinking or personal evaluation. Unfortunately, life seldom delivers this luxury. Events tend to tip and topple our sorted, categorized, and boxed collection of answers and conclusions. And this is especially true in the realm of faith, healing, and miracles.
The story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego (Daniel 3) seems to assault the established platforms of both the sides of the faith, healing, and miracles issue. These young men spoke words that confidently affirmed their faith that God was not only able, but in fact, would deliver them from the furnace. But they then continued on to declare the possibility that their deliverance just might not happen. According to modern thought, these two statements should cancel one another out! You can’t have it both ways. When these young men stated their lack-of-faith revealing words, “But if not”, they surely cancelled the power of their prior statement of faith.
Examine, with me, the normal use of the words “But if not” – “But” is used to form the bridge between two opposing certainties; “if” is used to recognize the potential of an alternative; “not” is used to acknowledge the acceptance of a denial.
According to the requirements of present-day easy answers, true faith is founded on absolute confidence that God is not only able and willing, but that He is going to come through with exactly what we want. True faith refuses to accept any uncertainty, alternates, or denials.
Our quick answer world has divided Pentecostal/Charismatic believers into two opposing camps. There is the “God will” Camp and the “But if not” Camp. The “God will” Camp believes that the “But if not” Camp is without faith, while the “But if not” Camp believes that the “God will” Camp is hyper-faith. Well, whatever kind of faith the 3 Hebrew young men had, it was the kind that moved the Hand of God!
Somehow, they saw no conflict between their two statements. Unknowingly, they put one foot in one Camp while putting their other foot in the other Camp. Yet God never saw one foot in a place of presumption and the other foot in a place of doubt. He just saw 3 young men standing together with both feet firmly established in a place of absolute trust in Him.
For Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego, “But if not” was not a sad admission of doubt, but instead it was a strong declaration of trust. Trust in the faithfulness, the wisdom, and the plan of God.