Daniel, Episode 5: The King Who Praised God

Hey Carpool Crew! I'm Pastor Justin, and today we're back for episode 5 of our journey with Daniel. Can you believe we're already here? This is our last episode with Daniel, and it might be my favorite one of all, because today we find out what Daniel's whole life added up to. And it is bigger than you would ever guess. Let me catch you up one more time. Last episode, Daniel spent the night in the lions' den. An old man, around eighty years old, sealed in a pit full of hungry lions, all because he kept praying to God when a sneaky law said he couldn't. But God sent His angel and shut the lions' mouths. And when the sun came up, King Darius ran to the den, called out in a shaky, scared voice, and heard Daniel call back. Alive. Not a scratch on him. So now picture that morning. The king is standing at the edge of the den. The stone is rolled away. And here comes Daniel, climbing up out of that pit, perfectly fine, while the lions sit there quietly behind him. Can you imagine the look on King Darius's face? Now, I have to be honest with you about what happened next, because the Bible doesn't soften it, and I'm not going to either. The jealous men who built this whole trap for Daniel? King Darius had them dealt with, and it was severe. This was a rough, ancient world, and that's how kings handled it. We're not going to camp out there, but I won't pretend that verse isn't in the Bible. The big point the story is making is that evil plans aimed at God's people do not get the last word. The trap those men dug, they fell into themselves. But that's not the part of this story I want to live in today. I want to live in what King Darius did next. Because it is incredible. Darius was not one of God's people. He was a Persian king. He had grown up worshiping other gods. At the start of this whole thing, he had even signed a law telling everybody to pray to him. But after one night, after he watched a den full of lions leave an old praying man completely untouched, King Darius was a changed man. So this powerful king sat down and wrote a letter. Not a little note. An official royal command, sent out to every person, in every language, in his entire empire. Stretching across the whole known world. And listen to what this king, who used to worship idols, told the whole world to do. This is Daniel chapter 6, verse 26. The king wrote, "I issue a decree that in all my royal dominion, people must tremble in fear before the God of Daniel: For he is the living God, and he endures forever; his kingdom will never be destroyed, and his dominion has no end." Do you hear what just happened? The king of the most powerful empire on earth just told the entire world to honor the God of Daniel. He called Him the living God. He said this God lasts forever, and His kingdom can never be destroyed. A king who used to bow to fake gods made of wood and gold just pointed his whole empire to the one true God. And I want you to stop and ask the question the whole series has been building to. How did that happen? How does a pagan king end up writing a letter telling the world to worship God? It happened because of one faithful person. It happened because, decades earlier, a scared teenager got dropped in Babylon and decided to keep belonging to God. It happened because a young man pushed away the king's food and stayed the same kid when nobody from home was watching. It happened because an old man kept his windows open and prayed even when it was against the law. It happened because that same old man trusted God in a pit full of lions. One person. One ordinary, faithful person, who just kept saying yes to God, day after day, year after year, for his whole long life. Daniel never preached a sermon to King Darius. He never argued with him. He never tried to win a debate. Daniel just lived a faithful life, right out in the open, where the king could see it. And that faithful life pointed an entire kingdom to God. Let that sink in for a second. Daniel never had a microphone. He never had a stage. He never had a big platform or a huge crowd cheering for him. For most of his life, almost nobody back home even knew if he was still alive. He was just one man, far from home, quietly doing the right thing, year after year, in a place that didn't worship his God. And by the end of his life, a king was telling the entire known world about the God of Daniel. That did not happen because Daniel was loud. It happened because Daniel was faithful, and God did something with that faithfulness that Daniel never could have planned or imagined. That is the one thing I want you to carry out of this whole series. One kid who stays faithful can point a whole kingdom to God. You might think you're too young, or too small, or too ordinary to matter much for God. Daniel started as a kid who got taken from home with no power, no voice, no say in anything. And God used his faithful life to reach a king and a whole empire. You are not too small. The way you live, day after day, where people can see it, is one of the loudest things about you. So let me make this real for you. You probably have your own little kingdom. It's your family. Your classroom. Your team. Your friend group. Your neighborhood. And the people in your kingdom are watching how you live, even when you don't think they are. When you're the kid who stays kind when everyone else gets mean, people notice. When you tell the truth even when it costs you, people notice. When you include the kid nobody includes, people notice. When you stay calm and pray instead of falling apart, people notice. You might never give a speech about God. But a faithful life, lived right out in the open, points people to Him, just like Daniel's did. You could be the reason somebody in your kingdom looks up and wonders about your God. And here is something to remember about your kingdom. You don't get to pick when people are watching. The kid who's quietly faithful when nobody seems to care is the same kid God can use in a big moment later. You might be sitting in class today thinking nothing you do matters to anyone. But somebody in your kingdom is watching how you handle things. A little brother or sister. A friend going through a hard time. A kid who doesn't believe in God at all and has never once met somebody who really does. You could be the very first real picture of Jesus that somebody ever sees. So here's what you can do, not just this week, but for your whole life. Just keep being faithful in the small, everyday stuff. You don't have to be loud about it. You don't have to be perfect. Daniel wasn't trying to change a kingdom. He was just trying to stay faithful to God in front of him, one day at a time. And God did the changing-a-kingdom part. You be faithful. Let God handle the rest. Now, since this is our last episode with Daniel, let's take a minute and look back at everything we learned together, because his whole life tells one beautiful story. In episode 1, Daniel got taken from his home, and we learned that you can be dropped somewhere new and scary and still belong to God, because He goes where you go. In episode 2, Daniel faced the food test, and we learned that who you are shouldn't change just because nobody from home is watching. In episode 3, a law was made against praying, and we learned that when doing right gets you in trouble, you keep doing right anyway. In episode 4, Daniel spent the night in the lions' den, and we learned that God was with him in the den, and that brave prayer is never wasted. And today, in episode 5, we learned the biggest one of all. One kid who stays faithful can point a whole kingdom to God. Look at how those connect. The little kid who learned that God goes with him grew into the man who pointed a kingdom to that same God. Every small yes added up. The food test prepared him for the lions' den. The faithfulness nobody saw became the faithfulness the whole world saw. That's how God works in a life. He uses the small, quiet, faithful days to build something you could never see coming. Daniel reminds us of someone, doesn't he? Daniel was faithful even when it might cost him his life. He was sealed inside a place of death behind a heavy stone, and he came out alive. Many, many years after Daniel, Someone else was sealed behind a stone, and He came out alive too. Jesus. And Jesus didn't just survive His own kind of den. He beat it forever, so that you and I could belong to God and never be alone in any den again. Daniel points us to Jesus. So here is the most amazing part of all. You don't have to be as brave as Daniel all on your own. The same God who shut the lions' mouths, the same Jesus who walked out of His own grave, lives in the people who follow Him. When you stay faithful in your kingdom, you are not doing it with your own strength. You are doing it with His. Daniel wasn't special because he was stronger or smarter than everybody else. He was faithful because he belonged to a God worth being faithful to. And so do you. So thank you for riding along with us through the whole life of Daniel. From a scared kid far from home, to an old man in a den of lions, to the reason a king praised the living God. What a story. And remember, your story is being written right now, one faithful day at a time. Thanks for riding along today on Carpooling with Heroes of the Bible! That wraps up our journey with Daniel, but there are so many more heroes ahead of us, more ordinary people God did extraordinary things through. So stay close, because next time we'll meet someone brand-new. And remember, you are never too small for God to use, because He made you, He's with you, and He loves you. I'll see you next time, Carpool Crew. ================================================