Heavenly places? And what, may we ask, qualifies as a heavenly place? And what makes any place heavenly? Surely it is not a corporal or external "place" within itself. Unequivocally Christ Himself gives the answer. It is "where I AM!" Glorious promise!"I will receive you unto myself that where I AM, there ye may be also!" To paraphrase: I'm going away - but when I return - for you - I'll never again go anywhere without you! You'll always be in my presence, and I in yours! Heavenly places? Consider the Kingdom of Heaven. What sort of kingdom would it be without Christ the Lord, its King?

"Nebuchanezzar spake and said unto them, Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, do not ye serve my gods, nor worship the golden image which I have set up? . . .if ye worship not, ye shall be cast the same hour into the midst of a burning fiery furnace; and who is that God that shall deliver you out of my hands?" He had to ask, didn't he? "If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king" We know the story: "And he commanded the most mighty men in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego . . these men were bound in their coats, their hosen, and their hats, and their other garments . . .and these three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, fell down bound into the midst of the burning fiery furnace. Then Nebuchadnezzar the king was astonied, and rose up in hast, and spake, and said unto his counsellors, Did not we cast three men bound into the midst of the fire? . . .Lo I see four men, loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt; and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God" O king, I should think to make one small change - I would say, the form of the fourth is the Son of God! Our three Old Testament brethren had been bound, bound, bound. But now they are made free. Of course! "If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed!" John 8:36. Heavenly Places? Again Christ Himself declared, It is "where I AM!"

A Fiery Furnace heated seven times more than it was wont to be heated; a Heavenly Place? A most remotely and unlikely haven you say? How ludicrous! Are we to believe that a fiery furnace could be in the greatest stretch of imagination, a heavenly place?

Again, what did Jesus say? If you are in a luscious green valley through which flows a gentle stream with its banks overhung by shady trees; with vines of grapes dressed in green and deep purple; where the deer graze quietly in fertile pastures: If I AM there, it is a heavenly place? We say again, it is not the corporal or external place itself that creates the heavenly atmosphere; it is the Person!

"Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thy hand, O king." That is, He is able to deliver us out of the fire; He will deliver us even in the midst of the fire! "Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt." If they be delivered out of the hands of the king, then of a truth are they delivered into the hand of the Son of God! My dear friend, let's make application. It matters not the heat of the fiery circumstances which our Lord allows us to face: He is able to deliver us from, He will deliver us even in the midst of them! The burning fiery furnace is no binding factor; our deliverance is to be found in a Person. He that is able to still the storm and calm the waves; to roll back the waters of the Jordan and the Red Sea, can bring the showers of Spring into the midst of the Furnace!

"Then Nebuchadnezzer came near to the mouth of the burning fiery furnace, and spake, and said, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, ye servants of the most high God, come forth, and come hither." Our three Hebrew brethren were not feverishly scrambling to get to the mouth of the furnace that they might escape. Returning to John chapter 14 and verse 27: "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." Peace and fear would be strange bedfellows! Those Hebrew boys remained in the fire. Why go back out into the world? It affords no peace. Jesus hath said, My Peace I give you. That Peace was not to be found in the presence of the king; it flowed forth from the abiding Presence of the Prince of Peace! Dear reader, the world and its refinements can offer us no peace from the furnace: indeed there is a far more grievous furnace awaiting it. Walk with Him in the fire; walk, I say, in the Peace of His Presence! (Notice, the king did not call for the Son of God to come forth from the fire. Could we assume that He is waiting there; for the next Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego?)

"Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, do not ye serve my gods, nor worship the golden image which I have set up?" While we would worship the Eternal God of Heaven, the world is ever insistent that we conform to their "image," that we bow before the god of mammon.

What an extraordinary privilege! To be in a place separate from the world; to worship in the very presence of the Lord of all! So what, if it be in the midst of a burning fiery furnace! The Hebrew brethren had come in from the world, a place of death, into the Presence of Life Himself. If the Way into the presence of Truth and Life be found by entering the mouth of the furnace; so be it.

If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thy hand, O king."

"Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is" Jer. 17:7. Do we go too far in saying in light of the scripture that Hope is a Person; the Lord is Hope? In Titus chapter 2 and verse 13 we receive this exhortation: "Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." I think we will do no damage to the scripture if we read it this way: "Looking for that blessed hope, the great God and Saviour Jesus Christ, and the glorious appearing."

"And he answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire."

"What a fellowship, what a joy divine" - walking in the midst of the fire with Jesus? A beautiful old hymn that I have grown to love is, O For a Closer Walk with God. And that's what Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego were doing! They were in a most literal sense, experiencing a closer walk with God! A lesson for us: a closer walk with God may be for you and I, in the midst of a burning fiery furnace. "Prone to wander, Lord I feel it; prone to leave the God I love . . ." The fiery furnace: no straying from His presence here!

"He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young. Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand" Isa. 40:11. And of course, "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me;" How those Hebrews could relate to that verse! I suppose that none would deny that the burning fiery furnace qualified for the valley of the shadow of death! But I will fear no evil: I will not fear the king, nor his decree; I will not fear though he have me thrown into the midst of the fiery furnace; I will fear neither furnace nor its exceeding heat - for thou art with me. "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril or sword? For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" Rom. 8:35, 38-39.

The fiery furnace, a place of safety? I would contend without reservation, that there was no place to be found, either on earth or in heaven, that was safer than the burning fiery furnace - for they were walking with the Son of God; their Deliverer, their Peace, their Hope, their Communion, the Object of their worship.

There are countless other comparisons that could be made; and if the reader so desire, may he or she meditate in the boundless treasure of the scriptures - for they continually make known the Person of our glorious Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.

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