Grace for the Fire

Ever wonder if you would hold up under religious persecution? How would you respond if given the choice to deny Christ or face a grisly death?

These questions occasionally haunt me. I read stories of heroes in Scripture or history who kept the faith and I wonder if I could do the same. I believe I am a Christian and I hope I would display unflinching faith in suffering, but what if I don’t?

This morning Ian Duguid helped me do away with these anxious wonderings. He was commenting on the well-known story of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in the fiery furnace:

“God has not promised to give us the grace to face all of the desperate situations that we might imagine finding ourselves in. He has promised to sustain us only in the ones that he actually brings us into. He therefore doesn’t promise that we will be able to imagine how we could go through the fire for his sake, but he does promise that if he leads us through the fire, he will give us sufficient grace at that time. Like manna, grace is not something that can be stored up for later use: each day receives its own supply” (Iain Duguid, Daniel, p. 53).

That’s right, there’s no grace for my imagination. But there’s plenty of grace for whatever God has ordained for me to walk through. My job? Declare Jesus as Lord today and not imagine "a graceless tomorrow."