"Dance conforming to the music"

"Now when you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipes all kinds of music, if you are ready to fall down and worship the image I made, very good. But if you do not worship it, you will be thrown immediately into a blazing furnace. Then what god will be able to rescue you from my hand." (Daniel 3:15).

In chapter 3 of the book of Daniel, the king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar constructed an enormous statue of gold and called the princes of his kingdom to inaugurate it. Beyond this, he resolved that all of the people ought to worship it. The signal for the moment of worship would be when various instruments were played. The king gave the order as if it were a sentence: Whoever does not adore the image will be thrown in the furnace of blazing fire. As a result of this, all the people worshipped the image at the sound of the music; all minus three that is, three servants of God: Shadrach, Meshach, Abed-nego. They were discovered and taken to the king.

In our day it is no different, in a society with various methods of communication act as dictators and kings who order a sentence in relation to alcohol, clothing, music, language, saying: whoever will not "dance in conformity to the music" will be "thrown into the furnace." That is, he will be excluded from society; and many with fear give in, believing these threats to be true. The servant of God is in the minority. What is our reaction in front of the majority, are we going to confront them or will we have a change of attitude?

We should not give in to such threats and follow the world. We should hear the will of God: Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world - the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes, and the boasting of what he has and does - comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever." 1 John 2:15-17. We ought to act as those three servants of God who resisted the order of the king, knowing not whether God would save them from the furnace or not. They did not worry about the consequences, because only one thing mattered, God was with them (Daniel 3:16-18).

To follow the mandates of society should not be a part of our pattern, we are Christians and as such we recognize that we are to be different than the world and like unto Christ. Beyond this, society tries to show that various sins are common to every man; that they are not sins at all. For example: divorce, homosexuality, impure relationships, are things that are common to society, among other sins.

"The music that tempts us to sin" plays before us every day and in a manner very subtle so that we will not perceive that it is a trap leading to sin. Thousands of people are obeying that call, and fear the taunt, "are you going to adore the "statues of gold of sin" or be "thrown into the furnace of fire" by society? The decision is yours. But when the world comes to an end and exists no more, it will be the "society" of those who remain faithful who will be exalted, and those who heed the call of the "music" will be "thrown into the furnace of blazing fire" only that furnace will be eternal.

-Lucas Marques