Shadrach, Mesgach, and Abed-nego

Daniel chapter 3 tells the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego three Jewish men who were forced, along with everyone else, to worship the image of the king of Babylon. As the story goes they refuse and are cast into a large furnace. I will tell the story in my own words.

Once upon a time the king of Babylon captured the city of Jerusalem and made all of its inhabitants become slaves. Some of the captured Jews had talents and skills in various professions and were made to work in those professions. Others like a guy named Daniel were prophets so the king of Babylon made him one of his wise guys. Anyway, this king of Babylon was called Nebuchadnezzar. Yes, that is his real name.

Now, Nebuchadnezzar thought very highly of himself and he even made a great big bronze statute of himself and he put it right beside the Rocky statue that was outside the sports stadium. After a while the king noticed that most people just walked by without saying much about the statue. Nebuchadnezzar didn’t like that at all. He expected everyone to wave hi to the statue and to tell all the people they meet on the street how wonderful the statue is and everything. Since no one was saying much about the statue he decided to have a fiddler from Kentucky brought in and play a jig. The fiddler’s name was Jed Clampet. The king made a decree that whenever the people heard Jed play the fiddle they were to bow down to the statue and pay homage to it; failure to do that would result in pain of death.

So at an appointed time Jed started a playin and all the people bowed down and worshiped the statue. However, some of the king’s henchmen noticed that not everybody was payin homage to the statue. In fact there were three Jewish guys who refused to bow down. When the king got word of it he called the three amigos in for a sit down. King Nebuchadnezzar asked Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego what their problem was, since they weren’t bowin down or nothing when the fiddler played a jig. The three Jewish amigos said that they served the Most High God and would not bow down to some silly statue. This made Nebuchadnezzar flip his lid.

Then Nebuchadnezzar said to the three amigos, “You listen to me you half wits. “I am the big cheese around here and if you plan on seein the sun rise tomorrow you better bow down to my statue.” Then the three amigos said to the king, “O king, we serve the Most High God and Him alone and we will never bow down to an idol.” Steam started comin out of Nebuchadnezzar’s ears. He said to his guards, “Bind the three of them hand and foot and toss them into the furnace.” Then the king had the furnace stoked hotter then it had ever been stoked before. It was so hot even the stokers got toasted.

Then the guards tossed the three amigos into the furnace. After a while the king walked across the balcony that provided a great view of the toasted amigos in the furnace. He sees the three amigos walking around and talking with someone. The king almost falls off the balcony. He says to his henchmen, “Didn’t you throw three guys into the furnace?” The henchmen say, “Yes.” Then the king says, “But I see four men walking around and the fourth looks like the Son of God.” Then one of the henchmen said he would have to double check with one of the king’s bean counters to make sure they got their numbers right. After checking they all agreed there were three men thrown in the toaster. However, when the furnace roll call was made it was determined there were four men in the furnace and they were walking around.

Then the king called out to the three amigos and instructed them to come out of the furnace. The three amigos came out and they were inspected for damage. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men agreed that the three amigos suffered no ill effect from the furnace. Then the king made a decree that all the people of the land must follow after the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, or face pain of death. The king seems to have a thing with decrees that are upheld by pain of death.

The faith of Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego is commendable to the point that they were apparently visited by a heavenly creature who many believe was Christ. I wonder what He said to them. Another interesting thing to consider is that since everyone in the furnace was walking around it is clear that the only ill effect the fire had on the men was their bonds. The men’s bonds were burned off enabling the men to have no restrictions. Maybe that’s how God sees us when we are going through fire, maybe He sees us as completely free.