Daniel 3:27 “And the princes, governors, and captains, and the king’s counsellors, being gathered together, saw these men, upon whose bodies the fire had no power, nor was an hair of their head singed, neither were their coats changed, nor the smell of fire had passed on them.”

We are fast coming to the end of another year! How has your 2024 been!? So much has happened in my life this year, and I’m so thankful to my Lord Jesus Christ who’s been in it all… but it definitely hasn’t been without fiery trials!

I wouldn’t think to compare myself to the sufferings and trials of those past and present whom I consider to be real Christians and myself a shame in comparison, but nonetheless, we all have our own battles which are significant and unique to us.

The Bible says “Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you:”

Christian, don’t be shocked when it gets hot in the kitchen! Trials are promised to us, and suffering for Christ’s sake is a vital part of the truly Christian experience “For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake;”

Yes, we’d all rather an easy life… but there is a reason and purpose for fiery trials, because God will draw us closer to Christ and make changes to our lives in ways not possible other than through them… and there is eternal profit and sure rejoicing at their conclusion… and their captivity does conclude, take heart!

I’ve quoted part of a famous story from the Old Testament, a story to inspire a generation, when three Hebrew boys get thrown in a literal burning fiery furnace for daring to defy the king’s unrighteous decree. No, the government isn’t always right.

And the king got mad at them. Anyone got hot at you? These boys had a king hot at them! Obedience to the faith is as controversial these days as it was back then… and for these guys, Daniel chapter 3 was their fiery trial. Maybe 2024 was yours.

But God, spare me from them! Where’s the easy way out? Where’s the exit? …But God sometimes wants us in them. After all, it was in the fire that these guys had revelation and fellowship with Christ like few of us will ever have… most of us would never go “that far” for Jesus’ sake.

But the detail to note today is what happens after the fire, because after these guys were taken out the fire, it was noted that “nor the smell of the fire had passed on them.”

If you’ve ever sat around a campfire, or been near a fire any length of time… you know that the smell of the fire can kind of get on you. You can tell someone who’s been near a fire just by the smell on their clothes. And until they shower and change clothes, you can smell the fire long after the fire is gone.

Have you ever seen how past experiences have affected people who have gone through them? For so many people those experiences stay with them, and not for the better. And they may get through the experience… but they don’t past the experience.

These boys got past it, you wouldn’t have known what they’d been through. It’s always amazing to me some Christians I know who have been through the fire, and yet their light has never shone brighter for Christ.

I’m rarely in this case! As Christians, we can get very hen pecked, defensive, hurt and damaged by what we go through, and our experiences can make us very bitter, resentful, mean spirited or even fall out on God and other people.

So we really need to lock in on Jesus Christ, as these guys did. After all, it was through faith in Christ, according to Hebrews 11 that these guys “quenched the violence of fire”. And as Abraham “took the fire in his hand” in Genesis 22, we need to decide whether we are going to let the fire handle us, or let Christ handle the fire for us.

Whatever lot has been cast into your lap… Jesus Christ can dispose of it. And as children of God in this world, whatever the fire, yet we are untouchable and kept by him “he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not.”

And so if you are saved, you can be untouched by the fire, and you can go through bad things differently to how people of this world do. Let those trials be a triumph and testimony to our Saviour, as theirs was.

A guy called Stephen got stoned to death in Acts 7 for preaching the gospel to some Christ haters… but there was no smell of the fire on him, his very last words were forgiving them and rejoicing in the imminent embrace of his Saviour.

None of us have had it as bad as Stephen yet! If God’s grace could be that abundant toward him, surely his grace and strength can carry us also. And so let the afflictions which the Bible says are “but for a moment”, let them work for us as the Bible says they do, because through them God is working “a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory”.

Let them fall out for the furtherance of the gospel as Paul wrote to the Philippian church, let God produce good out of the evils you have gone through as he did in Joseph’s life. Leave the fire behind, and take overcoming through Christ with you into 2025… because he has overcome the world… and because people are watching you just as they were watching these three Hebrews, and because his preserving power in your life will change the lives of spectators watching your spectacle also.

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