for letting me speak today. And today's topic, are we on? Okay. Okay. Good morning. For all those online, again, my name is Reverend Dale Twigg. I've been asked by Pastor John to speak today, and I thank you so much for having me. I am a pastor, co-pastor of a ministry called Life Impact, and we help the homeless and the poor all up and down the 422 corridor. We help people who are poor and homeless in Pottstown, in Redding, in Norristown, and all the way up to Lancaster. And that's what we do. So you'll hear our name, Life Impact. You look on Facebook, you'll find tons of stuff that we do this spring and this summer. We'll be doing a lot of outreaches to the poor and homeless. We welcome you. We had a huge barbecue for the homeless last year. hundreds of people came up so I was so excited amen so that's what we do we love the ministry we love the Lord and that's what we do it for that those that are poor I'm also a hospice chaplain I travel all over Montgomery and Chester County helping those that are dying and the families that are grieving I've been doing that for 17 years and I just really feel called to that But God took me out of the states and has sent me to all around the world. This August, I'll be going to my 27th country as a missionary. So I've been to 27 different countries as a missionary. So I'm a missionary, I work for the Lord all around the world, because I believe, you know, we want to help the poor right in our area, but we want to help them all around the world. Jesus said, go into Judea and Samaria and all the earth to proclaim the gospel, amen? So if you're ready, I would like you to turn with me to Daniel chapter 3. That's today's topic and sermon title is Fiery Trials. And before I even start, I know that some of you are going through a fiery trial right now. Some of you are having a very difficult time, and I'm so glad you came into the service today because this message is here for you. God brought you here for a reason to hear this message. And I want you to know that even though you're going through your fiery trials, just like that song we sang that said, even when I don't see Him, He's working. Even when I don't feel Him, He's working. God is working for you in your fiery trial right this very minute, and He's here to help you. Amen? So let's get into Daniel chapter 3. It's in the Old Testament. A lot of you know the story of Daniel, and everybody's familiar with his great story. We learned from a kid that Daniel was in the lion's den, right? Daniel was in the lion's den. We know that story. But a lot of us don't know this other story that, to me, is so amazing in Daniel chapter 3. Let me give you a little background. We'll go to the next. That slide's good. Daniel chapter 3, in the context of the previous chapters, In 605 BC, the king of Israel was Jehoiakim. He was the king of Judah. And all of a sudden, this king from a neighboring country in Babylon started getting powerful. His name was Nebuchadnezzar. I sort of say that when I'm sneezing. It makes it easier. Nebuchadnezzar! That's what it sounds like, but his name was Nebuchadnezzar. He was the king of Babylon, and he was full of power. He started taking over all the other kingdoms around him, and he sacked Jerusalem. In 605, he started attacking Jerusalem and Israel, and by 586 BC, Jerusalem fell. And so he brought all these people from Jerusalem to his kingdom, and Daniel was one of them. And Daniel brought his three friends with him that were taken captive to serve the king Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon. Daniel got famous for interpreting Nebuchadnezzar's dreams. And he found favor with him. So Nebuchadnezzar raised Daniel and his three friends up to a higher status to be a leader and official over all the affairs of the province of Babylon. It was a huge, huge role that God gave Daniel. And he said, wait a minute. If I'm going to come, I want to bring my three friends. They're my great three friends. I want them to be with me. And so they all were in a great position of power serving over the province of Babylon. Next slide. So, I want to get into chapter 3, but before we get into the passage I want to go to, let's get the little summary from verses 1 to 18. King Nebuchadnezzar, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I guess full of his pride and full of his power, built this 90-foot statue of gold. And I bet you $100 that it looked just like him, right? And he said, all of a sudden, when you hear the music, everyone, I want you to bow down and worship to this golden statue. And when the music was played, everyone had to bow down. And he said, if you do not bow down to this golden statue, I will throw you in a fiery furnace. Now, this was just not any old fiery furnace. The Babylon Empire had a huge, monstrous, fiery furnace, like a giant cauldron, bigger than the ones we even see in the steel mills back in the day. It was so big, it was meant for smelting iron ore. And that iron ore was used to make the weapons that they used to fight against all the kingdoms around them. It was monstrous. And it could house, you could throw in people in there. That's how big it was. Daniel's three friends, and let me tell you their names, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. That's a little tongue twister, I don't even want to get into their real names, that was their Babylon names, but Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were Daniel's friends, and they had such amazing faith, they said, we will not bow down and worship this golden statue. Nebuchadnezzar was furious at this, of course, because he had pride. It was probably his image. And he said, you must bow down to me. And they said, no. They demonstrated faith. And he said, we will not obey. But the three men exercised amazing courage and faith. And they said this. They said this, the response to Nebuchadnezzar is amazing. In Daniel 3, 16 to 18, if you want to follow along, it says, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to even answer you in this matter. But if the case is, our God, who we serve, will deliver us from this fiery furnace, and He will deliver us from your hand, O king. But if not, Be it known to you that, O King, that we will not serve your gods, we will not worship the golden image which you have set up." What amazing faith, amen? They said, even if you throw us in this fiery furnace and we die, we will still not bow down to this golden image because our God of Israel is bigger than this golden statue. Much taller, much higher, much bigger, amen? Can I get an amen? Amen. So they said no. They said no to this. What amazing courage. Let's go to the next slide. This is our main passage that I want you to read with me. Next slide, please. Oh, sorry. Thank you. Daniel chapter 3. If anyone has a Bible, follow along with me. We're going to be in verse 19 to 25. And I'll read it, and you guys can follow along. This is the New King James Version I'm reading, by the way. It says in verse 19, Then Nebuchadnezzar was full of fury, and the expression of his face changed. Isn't it interesting that when we get angry our face changes? Our whole different person. It's not who we are. toward Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He spoke and commanded that they heat the furnace seven times more hot than usually heated. And he commanded certain mighty men of valor who were in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Don't ask me why he wants to bind them. They're throwing them into a fiery furnace. Why do they need to be bound? They're going to be burned up anyway. But he bound them. That's very important. I'll show you in a minute. and cast them into the fiery furnace with their turbans, their other garments, and were cast into the midst of the burning, fiery furnace. Therefore, because the king's command was urgent and the furnace exceedingly hot, the flame of the fire killed those men who took up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego." I guess they weren't really strong men of valor. They burned up. And these three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego fell down bound in the midst of the burning fiery furnace. Verse 24. Then King Nebuchadnezzar was astonished Into the midst of the fire, he said to his counselors, did we not cast three men bound into the midst of the fire? They answered and said to King, oh, yes, true, we did. Look, he said, I see four men loose, walking around in the fire, and they are not hurt, and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God. Very words from Nebuchadnezzar. Very words from Nebuchadnezzar. He said, the fourth is like a son of God. Amen? And we all know who that son of God was. It was Jesus Christ in His pre-incarnate state. He was in that fiery furnace with them. Four people, he showed up. Jesus always shows up at just the right time. Amen? Amen. So next slide. So these fiery trials, I'm going to go through you with three important things that we learn from these fiery trials. And like I said, many of you here are going through a fiery trial. Please listen to this message because it pertains to you. God will use your fiery trial to release us, refine us, and restore us. Amen? The first one. Let's go to the next slide. God will use the fiery furnace And the fiery trials we're going to do to release our shackles. All right, if we look close, look with me in the verse 20. All right, and now for the sake of Pastor John and Dr. Carter, I'm going into the Hebrew of this, just in your honor. As a good seminary student, I'm going into the Hebrew of this. And look at this verse, in verse 20, it says, Nebuchadnezzar commanded his mighty men of valor, who by the way were died in the flames, to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Now, that word bind is found four times in just these three verses. Daniel said that word on purpose for a reason. Now, bind in the Hebrew, actually an Aramaic word, is lekafata. It's from the Aramaic word kafat, meaning to fetter. So they weren't just bound with ropes. They were fettered with shackles. fettered with shackles. All right, let's remember that. Now in verse 25, look down in verse 25. All of a sudden, when we see, Nebuchadnezzar looks into the fiery furnace and how he looked in was this giant furnace had bellows, bellows to make the fire hotter. When he pulled the bellows out, there was this hole and you could see through the hole in the furnace. And he looked in that hole and he said, he said, I see four men loose. not bound, but loose, walking around. And the Hebrew word for that word, loose, is shirayin. It's from the root word shiray, and it means to free, or to unbound, or even better, to unburden. Amen? As in loading a pack animal, you unload this pack animal from all of its burden and all the things, you unburden it. So we see that God uses this fiery trial that we are going through now to burn off the ropes, to break the shackles of our own sin. that binds us and burdens us. Jesus Himself said this, The Lord Jesus says, I'm going to burn off those shackles. I'm going to unburden that load that you have on your back right now that's troubling you, that's holding you down. I'm going to release you from it. Amen? So the first thing that fiery trials do to us is it releases us from the sin that holds us down. The second one, next slide, is refine. God uses fiery trials to refine. He refines our hearts. He is the process of sanctification. Now, remember this word is a process. Sanctification is a process. It's not instant, right? In fact, it'll be all our lives until we die. We are going through sanctification, but Jesus is making us more like him through that process. He refines us. It even says in 1 Peter 4, 12 to 13, Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which you are going through to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you. God knew it. He knows what he's doing. But rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ's sufferings, that when his glory is revealed, you may also be exceedingly glad with joy. I mean, his glory will be revealed in you. Now, remember that word glory. The next verse, Romans 5, 3 to 5 says, And not only that, but we also glory, that same word, in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance, and perseverance character, and character hope. It's a building block. Perseverance, character, and hope. And guess what? Hope does not disappoint us, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit given to us. Amen. This is a process of sanctification that we go through that God takes us and he uses a fiery trial to do it sometimes because we're stubborn because we don't trust him or maybe we're still angry or we're still like doubting. He uses a fiery trial to build those blocks of sanctification to bring us through tribulation, to bring us through persecution, to bring us through perseverance and character and then hope. Hope and his glory that we will see one day. Amen. So let me tell you, the goldsmith uses this refining process. Now this refining process is found all throughout the Old Testament, and a lot of times it says the refining took seven times. Seven times refined silver, seven times refined gold. It's a smelting process. I want to ask you people here, now what do you think the temperature that melts gold will be? What is the temperature that melts gold? Anyone know? Nope. You know what? That's how much a pizza oven is. Pizza oven is usually around 700 degrees. That's pretty darn hot, isn't it? To melt gold, it takes 1,948 degrees, three times more than a pizza oven. And you know what? The process of the goldsmith melts that gold down into a liquid. And one by one, each time, he let the dross, it's called dross, and the impurities come up from the top of that gold. And he takes this little instrument, and he slices it off. He pushes it off. He pushes off that dross. And then he does it again. He refines it again. He puts it back into the fire until it's liquid. And all those impurities come up again, come up again. And he slices them off to the top, takes them all away. And seven times, it takes at least seven times, maybe more. And sometimes with us, with our fiery trials, it takes seven times because we're stubborn, or seven times because we doubt, or even more. But you know what he does? He takes all those impurities in our heart, all those sins in our heart, and he brings them up to the top, brings them up to the top, and he takes by his Holy Spirit, and he takes them right off the top, right off the top, until guess what? Finally, we are pure like gold. And what is the standard by which the goldsmith knows that that gold is pure? Does anyone know? He looks in the gold to see His own image. Amen? That's what God does to you. God will sanctify you over and over, pulling up all those sins, all that dross, all those things, skimming off the top until what? He sees His own face in you. That's what the Bible says. Paul says, we go from glory to glory until we see the face of the Lord shining on us and back to others. Amen? Amen. So that is the process of refining. Go to the next slide. Let's go to restore. So God uses fiery trials to restore us to a right and closer relationship with Him. Amen. Look at the book of Daniel. Of course the big question he called the elephant in the room Who is this fourth man? Who is this fourth man in the fire? It's Jesus, the Son of God. Right. Amen. And what tells us that is He is with us in the midst of the fiery trial. He does not abandon you. He suffers with you. That's the whole point. He goes there to bring you back to Him. God Himself came to rescue us in the form of His Son to save us from the fiery hell Fires and fiery trial in hell so form us to become more like Him. Amen? Let's look at Philippians chapter 2. This is what it says. And Pastor John knows this one. It's called the Great Kenosis. Hebrew word, Great Kenosis. It says, He made Himself of no reputation, speaking of Jesus, taking the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of man, being found in the appearance of a man, He what? He humbled Himself. It's called kenosis. He emptied himself. Jesus emptied himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. That proves to us that He emptied Himself to come down to us to be right in the middle of our fiery trials as the fourth man. Amen? Do not doubt. Psalm 23, I want to tell you this, this is one of my favorite psalms. I do a lot of funerals, unfortunately, because I'm in the hospice. But you know what? This psalm just blows my mind. If you study it and you look, and you know how we study pronouns, right? In the third person pronoun, it says he or she. He or she goes to the store. The second person pronoun says, why don't you, why don't you go to the store? And the first person pronoun says, I, I will go to the store. So we learn about pronouns, right? David changes up the pronouns in this passage. I never even knew this, but I studied this. In the first three passages of Psalm 23, we know the words, right? The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul, right? But guess what? Look at this in the fourth verse. Right at the perfect moment, he changes it up. He says, Why does he change that up right there? Why does he change that up? Why do you think? because God wants to be so close to you in your deepest, darkest valley, your deepest, darkest, fiery trial, your deepest, darkest time, right next to you. We're not talking about the Lord anymore, we're talking to the Lord, amen? He's right there and He says, I'm with you, I'm in your valley, I'm in that fiery trial, I will hug you, I will hold you, I got this, you can do it. He's with us, amen? And the rest of that psalm, Psalm 23, he says, you, from the rest of that psalm, you anoint my head with oil, you prepare a table before me in bright presence of my enemies, and you lead me on paths of righteousness. You, Lord God, are with me. Amen? So we have to understand that God wants to be closest in our darkest times. He never leaves us alone. Amen. Let's go on to the next slide. So let's review this. God uses fiery trials to release us from our sin. The sins that so easily entangle us, like it says in Hebrews 12. He also releases things that bind us and shackle us or enslave us. What is that sin today that is holding you back? What is that sin today, that shackle that is burning you and holding you down from being all you can be? Maybe you're going through an addiction. Maybe an addiction of drug or alcohol or gambling. Maybe you have anger and you can't forgive. It's unforgiveness of someone that hurt you badly. Maybe it's lust. Maybe it's pornography. Maybe that's a sin that you cannot give up. Maybe you got into a habit of lying and being deceitful. Maybe unfaithfulness to your partner. You know, there's so many sins that hold us down, hold us down and burden us. The fiery trial unburdens us, takes those off, breaks those shackles and takes them away and releases us from that so we can be all God wants us to be. Amen? The fiery trial also refines us. It sanctifies us. And this is a process. And look real close in this slide. In his own way and in his own timing. Because guess what? We're impatient. We want it to happen right now. Who likes a fiery trial? I don't. Nobody likes a fiery trial. We want it to go away now, today. Right? But in God's timing, which is always perfect, His way, which is so righteous, He does it. And eventually, if we trust Him, we will reflect His image. Like the goldsmith who sees his own image in the gold. Amen? Third one, the fiery trial restores us. Restores us to a right or correct and closer relationship with God from the way He planned that relationship to be from the very beginning. Psalm 23, which I just talked about, tells us that God is right there with us to go through those fiery trials. Right there with us saying, I got you in this deep, dark valley. I got you. I'm holding you. You are not alone. I will use this to restore you to me. So we'll be close like brothers. We'll be close like father and son, father and daughter. We'll be close and we'll be restored to a right relationship with God. Amen. Amen. So, the fiery trials that we go through, and again, some of you are going through them right now. Let's go to the next slide to review this. It says, fiery trials, though seemingly very difficult to bear, yes they are, have a deep and greater purpose and plan that we cannot immediately see. We may not see it right now, right? But then we look back five years from now. Now I know why God did that. Hindsight is always 20-20, right? We see back and we say, wow, I never saw it in the middle of the fire, but I see now that God used this for my greater good, right? So things we cannot see, but they require trust in God, who works all things out for our good. Romans 8-28, you know the verse, God works all things out for our good, to those that love God, to those that are called according to his purpose, amen? If we allow God to work through these fiery trials, we will come out shining like gold and have an amazing testimony to share with others. You will shine like gold and people cannot help but see it. It will shine out. Just like it says in Matthew 5, 16, let your light shine so all may see your good works and what? Glorify your God in heaven. Let me tell you, at the end of this passage in Daniel 3, guess how Nebuchadnezzar responded. When he saw four people in that flame, and they came out, he said, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, come out of that fire. And they came out of the fire, he furnished, not a hair in their head was burned. Their clothes were not singed, but guess what was loosened? Guess what was gone? Their shackles were gone, but not a hair on their head was singed. God will take off your shackles, but He will save you. Amen? He will save you. And guess what? You will shine like gold, and you cannot help but glorify Him. Nebuchadnezzar himself, he exclaimed, Wow! Now I believe in the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. And then he declared to his whole kingdom, Everyone must observe the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. And if you don't, I'm going to cut you to pieces and throw you in that fiery furnace. So he's using the fiery furnace for the people who won't obey the Lord God Almighty. God is bigger than any 90-foot statue. He is huge compared to that. And God will not allow people to worship anything but Him. Well, we have to trust Him. We have to trust them. We have to trust this process. It is a process, right? Sometimes it's difficult, but we must go through it. Romans 5, again, it says we have to go through those building blocks. Don't show that yet. We must go through those building blocks of tribulation, of perseverance, of character building, and then hope. They're building blocks to cleanse us, to refine us, and to build us. And I want to share with you a personal testimony of my own fiery trial I went through. A couple years ago, I was going through a really fiery trial. I broke up with someone, and I broke my heart into a million pieces. And it was hard for me. And I was crying every night on my bed. I would get on my knees, and I'd pray, and I'd cry out to the Lord. I'd say, Lord, I can't handle this. I can't handle this breakup. It hurts my heart. I feel betrayed. All those feelings come out, right? And every time I'd pray about this fiery trial that I was going through, this heartache, this breakup, I heard a still small voice that said this. Trust the process. Trust the process. Trust it. I'm with you. It is a process. I'm taking you through it to restore you, to refine you, to release all the things that are holding you down. Trust me in this process. I will go through it with you. So every time I go down to pray, and I pray many times, and I get down on my knees on the edge of my bed, and I start praying, and I start crying. And even before the words come out of my mouth, this voice says, trust me. Trust this process. Trust this process, and I'll bring you through it. Amen? I got to the point where I just stopped praying about it, because I felt like, oh, he's going to tell me to trust the process again. He already knows what I'm going to say. So fast forward a year later from this fiery trial. I'm telling you now, I'm not ashamed to say that I love thrift shops, right? I'm sure we all do. And sometimes you find a great gem, right? I was in a thrift shop that summer, and I found this shirt. I'm wearing it today. I found this shirt, and it was almost brand new. I thought, wow, this is a great, nice-looking shirt, isn't it? It fits really well with this suit, right? I can use this for work when I visit my hospice patients, right? But it was in the summertime, and this is a long sleeve, so I put it in the closet. But I was thankful that I got a great deal on this. I think it was like $6 for this shirt, amen? So I put it in the closet. I'm still going through that trial. I'm still having a heartache. I still come down on my knees and I pray, Lord, help me through this. And every time he would say, trust the process. I'm taking you through it. You will get through this fiery trial. And so fast forward again to the fall of that year. Saw this this shirt, and I said okay. Hey, I'll break it out and wear. It's a nice fall day It's a long sleeve and the first time I broke it out of the closet I put it on and something it felt real funny. It felt like really funny down here There was like something scratching me something scratched me on the inside I didn't know what it was so it took the shirt off and I turned it inside out and you can show the slide now This is what it said somebody Somebody sewed fabric into that shirt on different patches and wrote in permanent marker this phrase. Can you read it? Trust the process. I'm praying, keep praying, I am. Trust the process, keep praying, I am. So right here in this shirt, there are two patches that somebody sewed and wrote in magic marker that phrase just for me. How was I to know that I picked up that shirt? How was I to know? And how was that person who wrote that to know that I would find it? God knew, right? God knew. And amazingly, I immediately fell on my knees and I started crying. And I said, Lord, I have no doubt now. You have shown it more clear to me than ever that I trust in you. You're going to take me through this process and I will come out shining like gold. So all of you here today that think your prayers are just hitting the ceiling and they're not coming to God, those of you who are going through a fiery trial and think God doesn't hear you, God doesn't know, He does. This is proof right here. This is proof. Living proof that someone wrote on the shirt, the inside. Trust the process. The very same phrase that God kept telling me over and over for a year. How amazing is that? God will hear your prayers and God will answer you. Amen? He will bring you through this fiery trial. Doubt. Have faith that He will take you through it. He's with you, just like in Psalm 23. He's with you. He says, I'm with you. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil in this fiery trial, because you, Lord, are with me. Amen. Now, today, some of you, again, are going through that fiery trial. I don't know what it is, but the Lord knows. And He's hearing your prayers. He's going to bring you through it. But you must trust the Lord as your Savior. For those of you who have not fully given your life to Christ, You can't help going through this trial. You're going to go through this trial and He's not going to be with you. He wants to be with you, but you need to be with Him. So I'm going to give you an invitation right now. If you've never accepted Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, or maybe you've been far away from the Lord, maybe you need to be brought back to the Lord, maybe you need to recommit your life to the Lord today. I want you to do that today. I want to give you an opportunity. Anybody here or anybody online who have not accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior, Raise your hand. I want you to say proud. Raise your hand if you need help. Anyone who wants to recommit their life to Christ, raise your hand. We need that. We need that recommitment. We need that. And I'm going to pray a simple prayer for all of you online and for those of you here to just let the Lord heal you and bless you. I'm going to say, Lord Jesus, I need you. I want you to be that fourth man in the fire of my fiery trials. I need your help, Lord. I accept you as my Lord and Savior, and please be near me. Please take me through this trial. Please be my Lord in the depths of this valley of the shadow of death, and heal and strengthen me. Hold me tight. I want to live for you. Thank you, Jesus, for your merciful love, and you're always with me with your power and strength. In Jesus' name, amen. Thank you all for listening to this. And I just pray, I just pray that through the fiery trials you may be going through, don't forget,