Daniel Chapter 1
Part 3 Growth And Service.
In Part 1, God’s qualifications for being a part of his kingdom was having a broken and contrite heart. It’s when we recognize our need for Jesus and come before him surrendering our lives for His Life.
Part 2 was about being equipped with God’s food and not the world’s food.
Today we are seeing how our investment into God will result into spiritual growth and a desire to serve God by serving others.
Notice the difference between the growth of the young men who chose to be fed by the Kings food as compared to Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and a Abendigo who chose to be fed by God’s food. It says the four young men looked healthier and better nourished than any of the young men who ate the king’s food. Then it goes on to say that God gave these four men knowledge and understanding of all kinds of literature and learning. And Daniel could understand visions and dreams of all kinds. In fact, when the king had all the young men before him, he saw that the four were 10 times better than all the others including the magicians and enchanters in his whole kingdom. The Lord said no one was found equal to the four so that entered the King’s Service.
That should be us as followers of Christ. Our pursuit of God should result into spiritual growth and a desire to serve God by serving others.
Acts 1:8 says that “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you….”
II Peter 3:18 says that God intends for us to “grow spiritually in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Philippians 1:6 remind us that spiritual growth is not something that happens once but it’s an ongoing process until Christ’s return. In other words, we should be investing our lives into the Lord, being empowered by the Holy Spirit, and growing more and more into the image of Jesus Christ. As this happens, we become great Servants of the Lord. Matthew 23:11 says the greatest among you Christians will be the ones who serve.
I fear some Christians will be disappointed on the day they meet the Lord because they’ll see that Christianity was more than just “asking Jesus into their lives.” It was about a relationship with the Lord Jesus and a relationship with others, the lost and brokenhearted.
CHALLENGE: Daily invest into God’s Word (Spiritual Growth) and Daily invest into the lives of others (Service).
