Many churches throughout the world use a Bible reading schedule called a "lectionary." It's just a fancy word meaning "selected readings." Posts like this reflect on the readings for an upcoming Sunday or other Church holiday, as found in the historic one-year lectionary.
Our Old Testament reading from Daniel seems chillingly familiar to many in current American Christianity, and probably even more so to people in some parts of the world. "Wait," you say. "Nobody is being fed to lions because they pray." Granted, but let's take a look at the overall situation.
Daniel was known as someone of faith. People knew he prayed to God regularly. And those who disagreed with Daniel on unrelated grounds wanted to find an accusation that would stick. In their zeal, they searched in vain. Daniel was honest and ethical. his opponents had to create a situation which would provoke him to convict himself.
They did this by arranging for a civil law which he would disobey. No prayer to anyone but the king for the next month. They knew Daniel would not change his practices.
Ardent secularists who want to remove Christians from the public sphere promote laws and regulations which Christians, as a matter of conscience, will not be able to follow. This is at the heart of moves to compel businesses to enter into endorsements they may find offensive. It is at the heart of removal of conscience exceptions which force pharamcists and other medical personnel to support on-demand abortion. It is at the heart of binding counselors so they can't help a person affirm the gender identified by their biology, but rather have to endorse the narrative that the person's mental concept should override DNA. It is at the heart of endorsing prayers in accord with neo-paganism but rejecting trinitarian prayers.
Christians will disobey these mandates. We guard truth and conscience. We may not be fed to lions, but we can certainly be banned from polite society, be defamed, and be insulted. Worse could certainly come.
Like Daniel, though, we stand firm and act in accord with what we have come to believe. The Lord will care for us, to whatever extent he wants, on earth. We trust that he will also guard us to eternity. We stand fast.
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