In the sixth century before Christ, the twin Kingdoms of Israel and Judah had fallen to successive empires of the ancient Near East, and the best and brightest of the Hebrew nation were deported to Babylon to serve their new earthly masters as court advisors. These exiles arguably had it pretty well-off compared to other conquered peoples (depending how broadly you take the word ‘eunuch’ in Biblical translations). Their captivity was not one of whips and chains, but of secluded luxury and forced conversion to the gods of leisure and decadence, notwithstanding the occasional murderous palace rage of the monarch. Around this time, the Lord spoke through the prophet Jeremiah to tell the exiles to settle in for the long haul. Babylon was their city now, their nation, and their mission in life to tend and bless.

Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease. But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. (Jeremiah 29:4-7)

Among these well-bred and born exiles were Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, renamed by the Babylonians as Belteshazzar, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. They lived in captivity in Babylon, and by faithfully serving in their new positions they were a blessing to their adopted exilic nation. Through them the earthly pretenders to the title “king of kings” would learn to glorify the actual King of Kings, and through their faithful example we can see how to live a life of obedience to the True Gospel while the world around us is caught in a whirlwind of lies, fear, and disillusionment. Daniel and his companions were selected because of their talents and obvious capabilities and connections. Exposure to the halls of power could either corrupt them, or they could spend a hard-fought life redeeming the halls of power.

But Daniel resolved that he would not defile himself with the king’s food, or with the wine that he drank… As for these four youths, God gave them learning and skill in all literature and wisdom, and Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams. (Daniel 1:8, 17)

The message of Daniel is simple; remain faithful to the Lord’s commandments; bless others by demonstrating faith; exemplify and commend humility to others around you. If you do this you can increase your blessings. “Blessings” in the Book of Daniel means something different than we might think; it means being slandered but ultimately vindicated, fed to the lions but emerging unscathed, or tossed into the fiery furnace for a chance to encounter “One like the Son of God.”

At the end of twelve months he was walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon, and the king answered and said, “Is not this great Babylon, which I have built by my mighty power as a royal residence and for the glory of my majesty?” (Daniel 4:29-30)

All of Daniel’s successive captors/patrons- the Babylonians Nebuchadnezzar and Belshazzar, as well as the Medio-Persian ruler Darius- each found themselves trapped by the false ideologies of ancient Near Eastern statism: the government was personified in the ruler, and that ruler (therefore the government) was deified as a cosmic authority. Except for Daniel and his companions, those who lived in the halls of power found this narrative convenient for self-aggrandizement, even as they knowingly manipulated it. The task of Daniel and his team was to speak and live out the ultimate Truth– that there is only one God worthy of praise, and that we are humble creatures of dust who are made to honor Him in all we do.

Both in the Book of Daniel and increasingly today we can see what happens when ideologues are so infatuated with their lies that any hint of the truth offends them to their core. The child who points out the Emperor is wearing no clothes is mobbed, beaten, and ridiculed. Eventually the structure built on the shifting sands of faithless principles faces a storm and proves the worth of its foundation. A noteworthy moment in Daniel’s life occurs after the hand writing on the wall and fall of Babylon. The city is sacked, the empire falls, a new administration takes over, but Daniel remains. His foundation carved in the “stone cut out by no human hand” would not be shaken by anything as ephemeral as the overthrow of the Babylonian Empire and shift in international power structures. And just as that golden head fell, so too would the chest of silver, stomach of bronze, legs of iron, and feet of mixed iron and clay rise and fall over the following millennia, yet that ultimate stone which is the Word remains today as a mountain immovable and unshakeable. We can see overhauls in our systems of politics, economics, communities, and even churches. We know Who will not change, so if we want to survive we must seek our meaning and worth in Him.

Then these men said, “We shall not find any ground for complaint against this Daniel unless we find it in connection with the law of his God.” (Daniel 6:5)

Expect attacks both in spite of and because of your faith. Expect to see God glorified for the same reason. We can know with certainty that the core message of Daniel is a timeless and fundamental truth. God reigns, and we should humble ourselves accordingly so that we may glorify Him as we bless others in whatever position we find ourselves. We are less certain about what the “halls of power” will look like in the future, but in our ReformersNFT community we are following a hunch that Web3 and crypto will be a key infrastructure in future power dynamics. Therefore as we engage this space as early adopters, we may be positioned to find ourselves like Daniel and his companions- representatives of faith in the living God, surrounded by idolatry and ideology, and always vigilant to resist the siren calls of worldly power. In this way we can be a blessing in our exilic home, and by leading in this way we can serve the Kingdom that is the stone which breaks all other earthly thrones and powers before it.

And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever. (Daniel 2:44)

(cover image courtesy of stock.adobe.com)