13 Mar How Daniel Dealt with Office Politics
Daniel 6:6-9 –Then these high officials and satraps came by agreement to the king and said to him, “O King Darius, live forever! All the high officials of the kingdom, the prefects and the satraps, the counselors and the governors are agreed that the king should establish an ordinance and enforce an injunction, that whoever makes petition to any god or man for thirty days, except to you, O king, shall be cast into the den of lions. Now, O king, establish the injunction and sign the document, so that it cannot be changed, according to the law of the Medes and the Persians, which cannot be revoked.” Therefore King Darius signed the document and injunction.
For Christians, where you work is where you witness. So much of our time is spent on the job, and so many relationships shaped through the workplace, that living out our God-given convictions can lead to great ministry, as well as great misery.
In Daniel 6, the Babylonian empire, which took Daniel as a slave, was conquered by the Medo-Persian empire. As a new king set up a new kingdom, Darius started by establishing the rule of law. Amazingly, the now elderly Daniel is chosen to serve in the second kingdom as he did in the first. He was chosen because an “excellent spirit was in him”. Living with character by the power of the Holy Spirit, Daniel’s character was so exemplary that he was chosen to function much like a Supreme Court Justice.
As often happens, office politics quickly erupt. A few other governmental leaders don’t like the outsider Daniel having so much power. But, despite spending roughly seventy years working for corrupt political leaders, his enemies can find literally nothing to smear his reputation. So, to take him down, they make a new law that only the king can be worshipped as god for thirty days. They lie in saying that the policy was agreed to by all, as there was no way Daniel would have agreed to it.
The moral of the story is that sometimes we get in trouble for doing something wrong, but sometimes we get in trouble for doing something right. In this instance, Daniel was a good employee but was now faced with compromising his God-given convictions or losing both his job and his life. For every believer, the same kind of day invariably comes where we are torn between doing what our boss says, and what our boss’ Boss says.
How have you been caught between doing what someone in authority told you to do and what God tells you to do?
In addition to this introduction to and overview of Daniel, you can find the corresponding sermons, daily devotions, men’s ministry resources, and hundreds of additional sermons and Bible teaching resources for free at markdriscoll.org or on the Mark Driscoll Ministries app.
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