In Daniel Chapter 1 we see a group of Israelites, God’s chosen people, are taken into captivity by the King of Babylon, and then Ashpenaz, the chief Enuch, is ordered to take the best of the best–the nobles of the Israelites–and begin to groom them for service to the Babylonian King. We can only assume–that for the most part–if you had spoken to any one of these Israelites, they would have admitted to believing in the one true God, Yahweh. They may have also, and probably did, believe in other gods. The Israelites had been flirting with the world and the false gods around them for so long that they were beginning to look less and less like Israelites.
The Israelites in their covenant with God were strictly forbidden from eating certain types of meat–meats which the King of Babylon served freely and abundantly at his table. Daniel did not want to defile himself by doing something that he knew His God had forbidden him from doing. But of this whole group of Israelites in captivity, we only see one boy step up and take a stand for his God, and then of that entire group, only three others follow suit and take a stand with him.
Is it possible that you are in a group of Jesus believers who are starting to look a lot like the world around you? Can you tell the difference between yourself and the Babylon you live in? Sometimes we get so comfortable and used to the way we live, and the believers around us are living in the same lackadaisical, way that we don’t feel we are wrong. If you will listen closely, God is calling you out of your comfort zone into a life that is far more exciting and asking you to take a stand for your generation and those thereafter. Stand up and be different from the Babylon around you–Be like Jesus.
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