At the time of this writing, my pastor has been preaching on The Daniel Factor. Catchy, I know. It’s a pretty long series, but for good reason. Other than Christ Himself, Daniel is a perfect candidate to mirror in this age we live in. Scripture says he had an excellent spirit, and we know this to be true from his response to plots against him and his ability to help various leaders during times of crisis. But the excellence came from a character founded on the truth he heard in his youth, not the gifting we’ve admired and hoped for ourselves.
We’re always searching for truth yet always overlooking the source. Is God OK with this? Colossians 2:6-8 says,
“As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving. Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ.”
Notice that verses 6 and 7 mention several steps:
- Receive Christ Jesus the Lord
- Walk in Him (become rooted and built up in Him to establish your faith)
- Abound in this lifestyle to the point that it breeds a heart of thanksgiving
Now, here’s where things go awry.
Seeker-friendly churches usually keep churchgoers at step 1. They promote the lovey-dovey Jesus who died for our sins that we may live (never defining what this living truly consists of). By being stuck and lacking heaven-approved truth, churchgoers can’t walk with Christ properly. They may get baptized, pay their tithes, and volunteer their time, but their spirit man is as dead as split ends. Hair may grow, but it can never be healthy and flourish if the ends are splitting to the root.
Seeker-friendly churchgoers aren’t the only ones struggling, though. There are believers attending churches that preach sound doctrine, yet they struggle to remain rooted in Christ and to submit to His building process. How can this be when the truth they’ve received is heaven-approved? Because they carry false ideas about God and how this walk is supposed to go. They received Christ based on the truth, but while walking with Him, they’re still holding onto the idea that comfort and their desires will come as long as they keep being good Christians. And the longer you walk with Christ, He will show you that being a good Christian does not mean you won’t hear “no” from the Father.
Notice who we are receiving in step 1. We are receiving the One who took the fall with us in mind. The One who overcame hell and took the sting away from death, and because of that, He is worthy to be ruler in our lives, not just a caring Savior. We’ve made a mental note that Christ saved us, and that’s it. We haven’t truly received Him as One who rules over our passions, desires, and will. And when our will doesn’t become God’s will, we will prioritize what we want in this life every single time. At that point, forget about a heart full of thanksgiving. Get ready to abound in bitterness, ingratitude and covetousness.
How does this tie to Daniel?
As Pastor Tavares Robinson puts it, “Your faith needs truth for it to be genuine. Faith does not grow in error.” Imagine if Daniel had been handed down erroneous teachings before reaching Babylon. His entire prayer life would have included petitions to go back to Jerusalem and for God to help him take back everything the Devil stole from him. Daniel was able to thrive in bondage because he had the right foundation in God. So when it was time to walk with God in a foreign land, Daniel remained rooted and submitted to the building process. As a result, we saw a man with faith so established that no plot could move him and a thankfulness so abundant that he couldn’t keep it hidden (Dan. 6:10).
What does this have to do with truth coming from demons?
Well, demons are skilled in lying, but they are also masters at packaging lies with a mixture of the truth. It’s important that the truth we hear matches that which is written in Scripture. To go even further, it should not only match but also be in its proper context. This is how we win half the battle of staying rooted in Christ: we have received the accurate version of Him. The other battle would be to fight off the ideas we’ve taken on before salvation and even after that seek to pull us up by the roots, never getting to a place of strong faith.
Paul tells believers to watch out for those seeking to cheat them out of everything they have spiritually received through philosophy and empty deceit. Demons get behind those who make it their duty to pull you away from the true foundation. And they don’t just pull you away; they replace your foundation with something else other than Christ.
But Paul makes it clear that Jesus is the only true foundation (1 Cor. 3:10-11). And anyone building on this foundation ought to be careful. Why? Because one day it will all be judged. I don’t know about you, but when the Day of the Lord comes, I don’t want to live under the impression that Christ is my firm foundation, but in reality, it was idealism, humanism, or even materialism found at my root. I don’t want to live life with stalled spiritual building projects because I have not fully understood the life, death and resurrection of Christ Jesus. I don’t want to abound in bitterness because thankfulness never got a chance to bloom.
In an age where spiritual advisors, pastors, preachers, and teachers spring up in your neighborhood and on your social media feed, it’s important to ensure that the truth they are presenting to you is founded on the true Christ Jesus and not the false one—the all loving, never judging, just Savior but never Ruler, Jesus.
Daniel thrived in a land that changed his name and depleted his hope for a future of posterity. How? By having the right foundation that preceded godly character. While gifted, Daniel was no super hero. But he never lost sight of the truth he received. That’s something to not merely admire, but to mimic in these Last Days. Let truth founded on Christ be your compass until the Lord calls you home.
