Kenneth Copeland - Never, Ever Compromise
Turn with me to the Book of Daniel. The Book of Daniel is 12 chapters of never, ever compromising. From the time that Daniel was a very, very young man and it kept growing and the situations kept becoming more serious and more serious and more serious, and he refused to compromise on any level. He refused. Now, right there in the first chapter of Daniel in the 8th verse they had... Well, let's just start at the beginning where... "In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, came Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, on Jerusalem and besieged it".
Now, he took it over and captured all these people and the king, verse five, "The king appointed them a daily provision of the king's meat" or his food, the way he ate "and of the wine, which he drank, so nourishing them three years that at the end thereof they might stand before the king". So all of the young men that they captured, they had to learn the language and they must learn the customs, and they're looking for the brightest and the best that they can use for different purposes and so forth. And so they were going to fatten them up. And that's probably what they was ever going to do was fatten them up. Verse seven. "Under whom the prince of the eunuchs gave names. And this is when he changed Daniel's name to Belteshazzar and Hananiah, Shadrach and Mishael, Meshach and to Azariah, of Abednego". "Daniel," listen, watch it, look at it, "Purposed in his heart".
Now he's young here. "Purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king's meat nor with the wine which he drank. Therefore, he requested of the prince of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself". Started right there. He refused to compromise. Now God brought Daniel into favor and tender love with the prince of the eunuchs. Now look at the 12th verse. And he argued with him. He said, "Now you guys are going to wind up looking bad and it's going to cost me my head or something here". But then, verse 12. "Prove thy servants, I beseech thee, 10 days. Let them give us vegetables to eat and water to drink". 10 days. "At the end of 10 days, their countenances appeared fairer and fatter in flesh than all the children, which did eat the portion of the king's meat".
Started right there. He would not compromise it. Now I want to take some time here. It's no accident that this first example of not compromised is food. Food has been a blessing and a problem ever since the Garden of Eden. It was a major temptation with Jesus. Jesus fasted for six weeks. Now I've never been on a fast that long, but I have been on extended fast. And it only takes about on a complete fast where you're not having anything, but water and plenty of that, it doesn't take but a few days and hunger goes away. I mean, it just disappears. And then after a few days longer than that, you don't want to eat anything. It's kind of repulsive to you. But now the Bible said, "And then he hungered".
Now the physical process once you have used up all the resources of your body, now your brain is going to be the last thing that dies. When starvation sets in, the brain demands food. Now I've never experienced that, but I've read people that have and talk to people that know medically what happens. Your body begins to feed on its own organs trying to keep the brain alive. And I'm told that it is a hunger that is beyond anything anybody can imagine. Satan didn't say a thing to Jesus until starvation had set in. You remember what he said to Him? Turn these stones to bread. Boy, that's dirty, isn't it? He knew He could do it. Satan knew He could do it. And Jesus knew He could do it. Had He not been able to do it, that would not have been a temptation. Huh?
So I'll tell you Jesus used the Word on him and with the devil it is downhill the rest of the way. So it's very important. The first sin was a violation over something to eat. It took me a long time to learn and I had trouble with it from the time I was just a young boy, young man. And I've always carried way too much weight, way too much weight. And now I don't weight but 165 pounds. But for a short time when I was very young, I weighed 260 pounds. Now that's dangerous for somebody no larger than I am. I just fought that thing and fought it and fought it, I got born again, filled with the Holy Spirit and went to ORU and the Lord said the day I left to go to ORU, I was 30-years-old and weighed about 225 pounds. And the Lord said, "You start today. You get that fat off of you". I said okay. I didn't know what I was doing, but I had an order from heaven.
And I went before the Lord. I said, "Lord, how do you get delivered from food"? I said, "Thank God You delivered me from smoking". Now I never was much of a drinker, but I wasn't above it. And I did some of it while I was in the Army. But I said, "And you delivered me from alcohol, how can you deliver me from food"? He said, "I delivered you from smoking, I didn't deliver you from breathing. I delivered you from breathing the wrong stuff". He said, "I didn't deliver you from drinking, I delivered you from drinking alcohol and other stuff that's just stupid to drink". I said, "I still don't get it". He said, "I can deliver it from sugar". He didn't call me dummy, but I thought that's the next thing I thought. "Yeah, dummy".
So I began to realize it's management. It all falls on that level, but I won't go into all that. But it's very interesting that this was the first non-compromise that Daniel faced seriously serious compromise, but he didn't do it. And it just went from there. And one thing right after another. Well, I'm not done with that yet. Go to chapter three. Now as Daniel began to be promoted, this is just a major revelation here. He began to be promoted once he began to step out and not compromise. Now the king had a strange dream. Hey, Art, wouldn't it be something somebody came to you and said, "I dreamed a dream. I don't know what it was. What was it"? And he called on the best he had and they said, "King, what was the dream"? He said, "I don't know. I need you to tell me". And he said, "We can't tell you if you don't know the dream". He said, "I'm going to kill you if you don't". Then they said, "We can't do that". But Daniel did. The non-compromiser did. Amen.
What does that mean? That means that this man could handle that kind of revelation and once he gave the king the dream and the answer to the dream and what it all meant. The Bible says the king worshiped him. Now whoa. But that's what it says. The king worshiped him. Now that's dangerous on the guy that'll compromise. Now you start making up dreams. He'll start having some big dreams. And you know what I've noticed over the years? I mean, I've been doing this for 54 years now. And I noticed this. When people start making up prophetic words and making up prophetic dreams, they're usually bad, doom and gloom. It's never anything good that there's a great blessing coming. No, it's, "Oh, the world's about the blow up".
If you notice you get around people that that's all they do is prophesy on one another. It's like your husband's about to leave you and then your dog's going to die. It doesn't turn out to be good because when you're making it up, you're receiving those thoughts from somewhere. Did you know you've never had an original thought? There's a lot of people who say, "Well, there's God and there's you, and then there's me. And I have original thoughts". Really? Come on. John and my son asked me one time, and John and I are a whole lot alike. We like the same things. He said, "Daddy, how is it that you always know what I'm about to do"? I said, "Because I did it before you did, boy. I already had all those thoughts. I can look at your face and tell you what you're thinking". And sometime he didn't think that was all that good a deal.
But anyway, but when thoughts don't just originate in the brain, they come from somewhere. We have thoughts that come from out here. We have thoughts then that come from our own experiences. And then we have thoughts that come from the inner man. And somebody that doesn't know God, you can't trust the thoughts they have in their inner man. And even people that are born again, but get over in a spiritual area they don't know anything about and doing it for the wrong purposes, you can get into some messy stuff. It can cause a lot of trouble. He actually, the king answered to Daniel and said, "The truth that is your God, the God of gods, the Lord of kings and a revealer of secrets, seeing thou couldest reveal this secret".
The king made Daniel a great man and gave him many, many, many great gifts and made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon, the chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon. And Daniel set in the gate of the king. A compromiser doesn't come to that, but a person that refuses to compromise, you're always... Well, let me put it this way. I have observed, I can't say just always just blank always, but most of the time and the probability is this. You stand up and you don't compromise, you know good and well the devil's going to come at you with something else and it's going to have to be more tempting than that because he's already found out you're not going to fall for that deal. Well then, you stand up against that.
Well, what's going to happen to you? You're going to get promoted if you're in the ministry, if you're in business, if you're teaching school. I don't care where you are. You're going to get the chance to compromise your faith and you're going to get the opportunity to do it. And when you don't do it, it doesn't end there. And it may even look like it got you in trouble for doing it, but you still don't compromise even if they run you off because there's somebody else that's looking for you, dear. Somebody needs you, somebody needs what you know and they find out that you won't compromise you've all of a sudden become valuable in their eyes. And if you didn't get any promotion for a while, there's just something that happens down in here. Oh, you won a victory and you got stronger. Your character increased. And it just makes you harder for the devil to deal with you, glory to God. Amen.
"Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold whose height was threescore cubits or 90 feet tall and nine feet wide". Verse two. "Nebuchadnezzar the king sent together to gather the princes, the governors, the captains, the judges, the treasurers counselors, the sheriffs and all the rulers of the provinces". So he's gathering up all of the heads of all the different branches of government to the dedication of the image, which the king had set up. "Then the princes, the governors and captains and the judges and treasurers and counselors and the sheriffs and all the rulers of the provinces were gathered together under the dedication of the image. Then an herald..." So it went out on the media. "To you it is commanded, O people, nations and languages, at what time you hear the sound of the cornet, the flute, the harp".
What in the world is a sackbut? That is an old English word for lyre, L-Y-R-E. Other translations and later translation translate it lyre. Now if you think about it, you know what that is. It's a triangular-shaped string instrument. I'll call it a Russian banjo. Let's see, how can I... Oh, you remember the movie Dr. Zhivago and that young girl played the lyre? Well, I'm glad to movie didn't call it a sackbut. I mean, but anyway. I just can't figure out a nice way to say that, but that's what that's talking about. So right there, mark a line through that and write lyre, L-Y-R-E. The lyre singing, psaltery singing and your cross-reference if you have a cross-reference English Bible like mine, or you can look it up and in Strong's Concordance.
Dulcimer is symphony and all kinds of music. So what I gather from this is most likely you've got orchestras playing in different areas all kinds of music. And these orchestra instruments, you had a string instrument, you had a horn. And so people are singing and they have symphonies. This is a huge deal. It is loud and it is all over the place. "Who so falls not down and worships shall the same hour be cast into the midst of a burning fiery furnace. Therefore, at that time, when all the people heard the sound of all that music, fell down and worshiped the golden image. Wherefore at that time, certain Chaldeans came near and accused the Jews".
Now they already are envious. They want to make sure that those Jew boys, I mean, they just stepped in there and took over that Daniel and that Belteshazzar, whoever his name is, a little Hebrew squirt just come in here. And the king thinks he's the greatest thing. He's coming in and interpreted a dream or something, and just made him the head and made those Jews over all of our provinces and we're having the answer to them. So they want to make sure what happened when Jesus came and began to preach the blessing, instead of the curse? Tens of thousands of people. No synagogue in the country could get a crowd unless Jesus was there. They'd pack it out and He would heal somebody just assures He's there. "You watch Him. He's going to do it. He's going to heal somebody on the Sabbath. Let's kill Him".
That wasn't what it was about. It was the fact they can't get a crowd. Then came this young fellow by the name of Saul of Tarsus, broke rank and became one of them. And then he started getting crowds. I mean, he would come in and he'd just go to the synagogue, nobody even knew who he was and he'd just start preaching. And they'd say, "Hmm, listen to this". "I mean, hey, I believe this guy's got something here. This is good. Let's get him back next week". In the meantime, "Oh no, did you see that crowd of Gentiles he had yesterday? Wow, Lord God. They packed out the whole street. They won't come to our synagogues. We can't get. Look at this. Thousands of them, thousands of them. No, there's got to be something wrong with him. There's something wrong with him. It's got to be bad. It's got to be" and said they were filled with envy. When you become a non-compromiser, a little teacher's pet. Huh? Oh yeah. So envy stuck its head in.