The plot goes on the calculation that, whatever happens, this man may be
trusted to do what his God tells him, no matter who tells him not to do
it. And so on that calculation the law, surely as mad a one as any
Eastern despot ever hatched, is passed that, for a given space of time,
nobody within the dominions of this king, Darius, is to make any
petition or request of any man or god, save of the king only. It was one
of the long series of laws that have been passed in order to be broken,
and being broken, might be an instrument to destroy the men that broke
it. It was passed with no intention of getting obedience, but only with
the intention of slaying one faithful man, and the plot worked according
to calculation.
What did it matter to Daniel what was forbidden or commanded? He needed
to pray to God, and nothing shall hinder him from doing that. And so,
obediently disobedient, he brushes the preposterous law of the poor,
shadowy Darius on one side, in order that he may keep the law of his
God.
Now I do not need to remind you how obedience to God has in the past
often had to be maintained by disobedience to law. I need not speak of
martyrs, nor of the great principle laid down so clearly by the apostle
Peter, 'We ought to obey God rather than man.' Nor need I remind you
that if a man, for conscience sake, refuses to render active obedience
to an unrighteous law, and unresistingly accepts the appointed penalty,
he is not properly regarded as a law-breaker.
If earthly authorities command what is clearly contrary to God's law, a
Christian is absolved from obedience, and cannot be loyal unless he is a
rebel. That is how our forefathers read constitutional obligations. That
is how the noble men on the other side of the Atlantic, fifty years ago,
read their constitutional obligations in reference to that devilish
institution of slavery. And in the last resort--God forbid that we
should need to act on the principle--Christian men are set free from
allegiance when the authority over them commands what is contrary to the
will and the law of God.
But all that does not touch us. But I will tell you what does touch us.
Obedience to God needs always to be sustained--in some cases more
markedly, in some cases less so--but always in some measure, by
disobedience to the maxims and habits of most men round about us. If
they say 'Do this,' and Jesus Christ says 'Don't,' then they may talk as
much as they like, but we are bound to turn a deaf ear to their
exhortations and threats.
'He is a slave that dare not be
In the right with two or three,'
as that peaceful Quaker poet of America sings.
And for us, in our little lives, the motto, 'This did not I, because of
the fear of the Lord,' is absolutely essential to all noble Christian
conduct. Unless you are prepared to be in the minority, and now and
then to be called 'narrow,' 'fanatic,' and to be laughed at by men
because you will not do what they do, but abstain and resist, then there
is little chance of your ever making much of your Christian profession.
These people calculated upon Daniel, and they had a right to calculate
upon him. Could the world calculate upon us, that we would rather go to
the lions' den than conform to what God and our consciences told us to
be a sin? If not, we have not yet learned what it means to be a
disciple. The commandment comes to us absolutely, as it came to the
servants in the first miracle, 'Whatsoever He saith unto you'--that, and
that only--'whatsoever He saith unto you, do it.'