“Then King Nebuchadnezzar was astonished; and he rose in haste and spoke, saying to his counselors, “Did we not cast three men bound into the midst of the fire?” They answered and said to the king, “True, O king.” “Look!” he answered, “I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire; and they are not hurt, and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God.”Daniel 3:24-25
The book of Daniel is a book of Biblical Prophecy, but it is so much more. We see God giving us prophecy, but He is also showing us that He loves us and cares for us more than we can dream of. I know in my life I have at times wondered just what God was doing, but I trusted Him and it all worked out to not only my good it worked out to give God the Glory.
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego, had absolute confidence in God. “We know God can deliver us from the fiery furnace.” They also recognized that God’s will might be different from their desire, but they didn’t make their own obedience contingent upon God doing what would be pleasing to them. Here is where we fall far short of this standard. We pray, “Lord, just get me out of this mess, and I’ll do whatever you wish.” We make tearful promises to try to negotiate a contract with the Lord. But here were men who didn’t try to rewrite the script. They just said, “Lord, we don’t know how You are going to do it. We don’t even know for sure what You’re going to do, but we believe in You.
Nebuchadnezzar apparently was able to observe the interior of the furnace from a safe distance. What he saw, however, brought him to complete astonishment. He could not believe his eyes and in his excitement stood up and asked his famous question in verse 24. Yes, three men had been thrown into the furnace, but Nebuchadnezzar saw four men. What’s more, they were free, unhurt, and walking around in the heat and flames, making no attempt to come out. Most astounding of all was Nebuchadnezzar’s statement that “the appearance of the fourth man is like a son of the gods.” Who was the fourth person in the furnace? We are not for sure who this fourth man was, it could have been an angel or it could have been Jesus Christ. We only know that God was taking care of His servants.