Your Integrity - Daniel 6

Let's spend the time in quietness now before the Lord as we listen and as this is played through and ask that God will really bless us here this evening. Well the reading tonight is from Daniel chapter 6 and it's the whole of the chapter. Daniel chapter 6. It pleased Darius to appoint a hundred twenty satraps to rule throughout the kingdom with three administrators over them, one of whom was Daniel.

The satraps were made accountable to them so that the king might not suffer loss. Now Daniel so distinguished himself among the administrators and the satraps by his exceptional qualities that the king planned to set him over the whole kingdom. At this the administrators and the satraps tried to find grounds for charges against Daniel in his conduct of government affairs but they were unable to do so.

They could find no corruption in him because he was trustworthy and neither corrupt nor negligent. Finally these men said we will never find any basis for charges against this man Daniel unless it has something to do with the law of his God. So the administrators and the satraps went as a group to the king and said oh King Darius live forever.

The royal administrators, prefects, satraps, advisors and governors have all agreed that the king should issue an edict and enforce the decree that anyone who prays to any God or man during the next 30 days except to you O King shall be thrown into the lion's den. Now O King issue the decree and put it in writing so that it cannot be altered in accordance with the laws of the Medes and Persians which cannot be repealed. So King Darius put the decree in writing.

Now when Daniel learned that the decree had been published he went home to his upstairs room where the windows open towards Jerusalem. Three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed giving thanks to his God just he had done before. Then these men went as a group and found Daniel praying and asking God for help.

So they went to the king and spoke to him about his royal decree. Did you not publish a decree that during the next 30 days anyone who prays to any God or man except to you O King will be thrown into the lion's den. The king answered the decree stands in accordance with the laws of the Medes and Persians which cannot be repealed.

Then they said to the king Daniel who is one of the exiles from Judah pays no attention to you O King or to the decree you put in writing. He still prays three times a day. When the king heard this he was greatly distressed.

He was determined to rescue Daniel and made every effort until sundown to save him. Then the men went as a group to the king and said to him remember O King that according to the law of the Medes and Persians no decree or edict that the king issues can be changed. So the king gave the order and they brought Daniel and threw him into the lion's den.

The king said to Daniel may your God whom you serve continually rescue you. A stone was brought and placed over the mouth of the den and the king sealed it with his own signet ring and with the rings of his nobles so that Daniel's situation might not be changed. Then the king returned to his palace and spent the night without eating and without any entertainment being brought to him and he could not sleep.

At the first light of dawn the king got up and hurried to the lion's den. When he came near the den he called to Daniel in an anguished voice, Daniel servant of the living God has your God whom you serve continually been able to rescue you from the lions? Daniel answered O King live forever. My God sent his angel and he shut the mouths of the lions.

They have not hurt me because I was found innocent in his sight nor have I ever done any wrong before you O King. The king was overjoyed and gave orders to lift Daniel out of the den and when Daniel was lifted from the den no wound was found on him because he had trusted in his God. At the king's command the men who had falsely accused Daniel were brought in and thrown into the lion's den along with their wives and children and before they reached the floor of the den the lions overpowered them and crushed all their bones.

Then King Darius wrote to all the peoples, nations and men of every language throughout the land may you prosper greatly. I issue a decree that in every part of my kingdom people must fear and reverence the God of Daniel for he is the living God and he endures forever. His kingdom will not be destroyed his dominion will never end.

He rescues and saves he performs signs and wonders in the heavens and on the earth. He has rescued Daniel from the power of the lions so Daniel prospered during the reign of Darius and the reign of Cyrus the Persian. May the Lord bless his word.

Turn to Daniel in chapter 6 and we read of this remarkable man in the latter part of the fourth verse. They could find no corruption in him because he was trustworthy and neither corrupt nor negligent. I want to speak to you about one of the most valuable commodities that there is in the world today.

A commodity that every society needs as a whole and every individual on his or her own. I'm referring to the quality of integrity. What does integrity mean? Well it's got the connotation of moral soundness, completeness, wholeness.

If you like being able to trust somebody. As many of you know I'm just back from the USA and if there's one thing that comes out amongst all the addresses that I've heard, the Congress I was attending in Washington and in talking with some of the religious leaders of that land, it is that America is passing through a crisis as far as integrity is concerned. Who do we trust? Time magazine which circulates in larger quantities in the States and in this country where its circulation is nonetheless very high ran a special edition just a month or two ago asking on the front cover what has happened to ethics in America.

Back in the days of Richard Nixon there was wheeling and dealing behind the scenes in terms of the election to be and as a result certain men were imprisoned. One of the men who actually was converted and chairing that remarkable Congress in Washington was one of them. There was scandal throughout the whole of the White House that a presidential candidate re-running for presidency could in some way condone a bunch of men to go and burgle the headquarters of the Democratic Party.

And then much more recently Washington creeped once more because of what has been going on, though unknown to the president, behind the scenes in the selling of arms to the Contras in South America and the deflection of profits from curiously agreed sales of arms of all country to Iran. And then, and this was really what was rocking the religious establishment, one of the national broadcasts in America known as PTL, a religious broadcasting company, had to make a confession that its main leader had been engaged in an illicit relationship with a woman for a long period of time and his own wife was dependent on alcohol. The Watergate scandal was followed by the Irangate scandal, now followed by what some are laughingly referring to as the Pearlygate scandal.

It's a question of integrity, moral soundness. Who do you believe? Now we can't stand back and survey the American situation as though we in this country were quite exempt from this type of problem. We've had many difficulties writ large nationally in recent years and we have many moral conundrums that are facing us today, even in our hospitals, where some child-to-be can be aborted, though the foetus has been in the mother's womb for 20 plus weeks, and in the next ward, as a result of a premature birth, a child is being kept alive, though of the same weeks in terms of length of pregnancy.

Now there is a class moral dilemma, at least to someone with a mind like mine. Here is a challenge in the whole area of integrity. What is right? What is wrong? One of the difficulties in some examination boards in America, and I'm not too sure that the United Kingdom is innocent of this particular problem as well, is how do you keep students from cheating in examinations? How do you ensure that the work that is offered is their own work? And there was no cribbing.

You see, integrity is not just something that affects the White House, the challenge of being honest, it affects ordinary people. It affects you and me. So I want to ask you, what price your integrity? But it seems to me that in some areas, integrity is as degraded in price as many of the firms who've suffered from the collapse of the stock market in recent days.

What price? Integrity. We're spotlighting Daniel, and we're doing so because here in the Old Testament, you've got this classic example of a man who actually has a name that means God is judge, being put in a sort of pincer movement, squeezed on both sides, as to whether what he claims to be and what he claims to believe is really so important to him that he will not modify or manipulate his convictions to fit a particular bundle of circumstances, for that is compromise. You can't retain integrity and compromise your beliefs.

A man came to me some ago, and he sold me a cartload of lies. He asked me if I would bless, pray, commit to the Lord, his marriage. He didn't tell me that he and his wife-to-be had been married twice before, and that the circumstances were such that in no way could I have, in any sense, put my blessing, so to speak, raised my voice as an invocation to the Lord to, in some way, own that new liaison.

The integrity of the man went out of the window when I discovered what he and his so-called wife had done, and incidentally, though I'm not saying it's a cause-and-effect relationship, they were split apart within three months. But here is Daniel, and you will discover that this man is quite extraordinary, because what he claims to be he is, and what he believes he will not modify, even though he risks the ruin of his profession, even though he risks the termination of his life. Daniel is a sort of Hebrew whiz kid.

The Hebrews have had many of those. It's remarkable how many brilliant Jews there have been. And Daniel finds himself to have caught the eye of King Darius.

Not that the king was unusually perceptive, because you see, Daniel, those of you who are in on the story will be aware of this, Daniel has already made his mark on two previous monarchs, one by the name of Nebuchadnezzar, who, if you like, has awarded Daniel a traveling scholarship to Babylon. And he has nurtured Daniel, and he's discovered that Daniel is one of the most astute mentally and spiritual people that there is in the whole of the kingdom, to the extent that he was able to interpret a couple of mysterious dreams that Nebuchadnezzar had. Nebuchadnezzar's successor was Belshazzar.

And the esteem that Daniel had in Nebuchadnezzar's day was transferred to the to the monarchy of Belshazzar. And again, with astute perception, Daniel was able to predict that ere long Belshazzar's monarchy would come to an end. He was weighed in the balances and found wanting.

You remember that mysterious disembodied hand and that finger which wrote on the walls, and how Daniel interpreted those letters, those words, weighed in the balances and wanting. Now when Darius heard of Daniel's reputation, he immediately brought Daniel into the forefront of his administration. He caught his eye.

Something like men and women have caught the eye of Margaret Thatcher. And Daniel is placed as one of the top three in the country, and it looks as though he will eclipse the other two and become the prime minister. Verse three, now Daniel so distinguished himself amongst the administrators and the satraps by his exceptional qualities that the king planned to set him over the whole kingdom.

Now listen to me, and you youngsters particularly hang on to this. You might feel that success in terms of power and influence, whether in the realms of politics, whether in the realms of trade union affairs and management, or even the church, is the thing to go for. Well in one sense it's not wrong to have ambition to be successful, but success can bring with it its own peculiarities, its own great dangers.

It takes a very steady hand to carry the full cup of success and not to spill a drop. Do you know something? Billy Graham is nigh on 70 years of age. I thank God for Billy Graham, not just for his preaching, though I admire that.

I thank God from the depths of my being that that man has never compromised in any area of his faith. They've thrown the mud at Graham and it's always dried and fallen off and left him unblemished. Would to God that some of the TV evangelists in America had used Billy Graham as their example and kept themselves away from both money and women to the extent that alas those two has impaired the witness of so many teachers and politicians.

But here's Daniel and he's a successful man, like Graham is a successful evangelist, and now he's going to find himself on the horns of a terrible dilemma because you see when you are successful, particularly in the secular realm, not only does the devil want to get at you but he will use other people to get at you too. Now some of you may feel that that's dramatic, some of you may not even recognize that there is such a person, a personage as the devil, but nonetheless the Bible makes this very, very true, makes it very, very clear that the devil exists and his concern is to sully, is to tarnish the reputation of everyone, for the one thing the devil does not want in your life is an integrity remaining intact. And I'm not just talking about evangelists and politicians, I'm talking about the 15 year old kid in track two, the 18 or 20 year old in track one, I'm talking about my brother elders and my deacons and Sunday school teachers and ordinary members of this congregation.

The one thing the devil does not want you to retain is your integrity. So a scheme is devised to create an embarrassment for Daniel. His enemies realize that there is nothing, alas, that they can bring in terms of a financial charge against Daniel.

They could find no corruption in him. We will never find any basis for charges against this man Daniel. One has the impression that Daniel, with the influence and the power that he had, controlled something of the wealth of the empire.

And one can imagine the scrutiny that these men directed towards Daniel, checking the small print on the accounts, the petty cash, the expense account, any way to find something that would be mud that they could sling at Daniel and it would stick, so that they could then bring this before the king and expose Daniel. And with spy-catcher enthusiasm, they watched this man like hawks and there's nothing that they discovered. You see, as far as finances were concerned, Daniel was impeccable in the way that he controlled affairs.

I was listening to a Christian senator in Washington plead in the heart of the capitol for a reinstatement of Christian ethics in the financial wheeling and dealing of the stock exchange of America. Insider deals, vast sums of money deflected one way and another, the whole economy reeling because so many men or some men have tremendous power. And one of the reasons behind what has happened during this past week is a total lack of confidence in the whole of the capitalist philosophy that undergirds the economy of the West.

And the basic reason, my friend, and I am no trained economist, the basic reason is this, there is a lack of utter integrity in the Western world in the handling of finances. And you can't gain savings, for even the copy book of the United Kingdom is hardly unsullied in this area. But you see, you could check Daniel's finances and you couldn't find one shackle that had been misappropriated.

You see, he's an honorable man. He can't be bought. Men of integrity aren't bought.

Men of integrity will not cheat. They'll not cheat in the area of finance. They'll not cheat in the area of sex.

They won't take another man's wife. They won't engage in infidelity because they're men of integrity. And Christian young people who are concerned to live their lives in an honorable way before the Lord, so they too in a disciplined fashion, and it's hard when you're 18 and the blood is thumping its way through your body, that they won't cheat on their partner.

They'll wait for physical expression of love until they're sure that the person that they're alongside is the one that God has given them in life, so that if it be the case in courtship they've made a mistake, they won't have handled what belongs to somebody else. The bride can come down the aisle in the years to come without a conscience that's plaguing her, and without thoughts. I wish I could have come here in a much more innocent, pure fashion.

I wish the bridal gown illustrated my heart and my conduct down the years. You sell your integrity at a tremendous price for your given guilt as a result. The weakness, so to speak, of Daniel, inverted commas, was his faith.

We'll never find any basis for charges against this man Daniel unless it has something to do with the law of his God. Isn't that marvellous? You see, the strength behind Daniel, the strength behind any young person, boy or girl, in terms of integrity, is what they have built up down the years of their lives. Someone has said this character, like embroidery, is made stitch by stitch.

When you were a kid of seven and your mother encouraged you to pray, as some Christian mothers do, it was part of a weaving process that was helping to build in your character. If you've maintained that habit of prayer and Bible reading, and coming along to church, and coming to communion, and being baptised, and so on and so forth, it's helping to strengthen character. And you will discover at the beginning of this prophecy that bears the name of Daniel, that even as a young man in his teenage days in Babylon, he nailed his colours to the mast, and he said to the then king, I won't eat food that's been offered to idols.

Not easy for a young chap in the barracks to get down on his knees and pray in front of his mates, nailing his colours to the mast right at the beginning of his army career, that he belongs to Jesus Christ. Not easy in the sixth form college, not easy in any of the secondary schools, when Christians and evangelicals particularly are in a minority position for you to nail your colours to the mast, but the more you do, the more you build strength of character, the more you help to bind together those characteristics in life that add up to the quality of integrity. So these men who've devised this cunning plot, Darius the king has made the edict that no one is to pray, no one is to worship any other god, but the God King, Darius himself.

When Darius signs that verdict, and Daniel gets to know, what does he do, verse 10? Well he carries on in his own sweet way, and it is a sweet way. Now when Daniel learned that the decree had been published, he went home to his upstairs window, where the, his upstairs room, where the windows open towards Jerusalem. Three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to his God just as he had done before.

Daniel, you're daft. Look, let's have a chat with Daniel. You see, what's on the line, Daniel, is your job.

You worked hard, didn't you? To get yourself a PhD in Babylon. Because that's basically what he did. You control so much power and so much authority.

You're still relatively young, though you're no more, you're not in your teenage days anymore. Nonetheless, you're at the crest of life. Now, now, Daniel, there's just a little bit of manoeuvring.

Change the location where you pray. How about that for a brilliant idea? Instead of upstairs in the room, down in the cellar. Instead of in your home, why not go out to the fields? After all, the location of your prayer is not important.

God can hear you anywhere, Daniel. But Daniel doesn't need your lesson in theology, he's a great theologian himself, thank you very much. Daniel knows that all this is, is in effect manipulation that's going to make him bend on this principle.

He's not a showman in prayer, he's not a Pharisee, he's not standing in a public square wanting everyone to say how holy he is. He is just maintaining a pattern that he has practiced for the years of his life up to this point, and should he in any way modify that principle because of Darius, then he feels his integrity has gone. Now there'll come a time in your life, and here I think I have the Spirit of the Lord, there'll come a time in your life when you will have to decide between the manipulation of your principles and the retaining of your integrity.

Don't say you weren't warned. You were. It may not be publicly.

You may not have certain people who've been watching you all the time ready to exploit you. But a character, integrity, is what a man maintains in private when nobody else is watching. Did you get that? When nobody else is watching, your integrity then is often tested.

Integrity and reputation are not the same. They're nearly the same, they're not quite. The distinction is this, reputation is what we give to you.

Reputation is what you give to me. But reputation can be completely wrong. What I project may be a false image, maybe I'm a good actor, and you have got an understanding of me which isn't really true.

Somebody has said that there are some men who, if their reputation crossed with their character in the street, they'd never recognise it, because there's such a difference. Your character is what you really are. Your reputation is what others say of you.

Your character is checked always by God. Your reputation has a much more superficial test by other men. Now Daniel is not going to sell.

He doesn't have to make the distinction between his reputation and his character, because they're married. What God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. And that is really how you and I as Christians ought to understand these words.

I want to be what I am. I want to appear what I really am. I don't want to hoodwink people into thinking me to be what I am not.

Daniel was a man who loved the Lord. So what does he do? When his life and his job are in the balance, he climbs upstairs, he goes into his room, and he opens the window, and he kneels towards Jerusalem. Why towards Jerusalem? Well Jerusalem is the place where the temple is.

In the temple there's the altar, and on the altar three times a day is offered the sacrifice for sins. And Darius, Daniel recognises this. He has in mind what you and I understand in a more full way in these days, that God has made an atonement for the sins of the world.

He's made it possible for you and me to have an audience with Him. And so Daniel will continue to pray. Incidentally it was Muhammad who copied the practice from the Jews.

Did you know that? I've got bowing towards Mecca seven times a day. The Jews bow towards Jerusalem three times a day. Now we don't need to bow towards Jerusalem, because we have one Saviour who's offered the sacrifice for sins forever.

And our Jerusalem is the heavenly Jerusalem above. But wherever we are during the day, we should be in an attitude of prayer at some time as Daniel was, but with not the same challenge and threats as Daniel had to undergo. Shall I tell you something? Shall I tell you who the king of the lions was in Babylon? The one who had the lion's heart were not those ferocious beasts waiting for Daniel's body.

The man with the lion's courage was Daniel himself. He couldn't care about the edict of the king, because it crossed with the edict of the king of all kings. And for Daniel there was no option, you see.

But there really wasn't another possibility, because this is a man of integrity. You see, the temptation that comes Daniel's way is like a pack of cards, and the devil will dole these cards out. He'll use them again and again and again.

In principle they're always the same card. Bow down and worship Me, and all the kingdoms of the world I'll give you. Remember those words? The devil has the audacity to play the card in front of Jesus.

Joan, Joan of Arc, turn from your voices. Turn from your own moral and spiritual leadings. Obey the threat of the Inquisition.

Play the card, Joan. She won't do it. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Pastor Niemöller, German religious leaders, 1940 or thereabouts.

The Reich, Hitler's regime, which that madman believes will ultimately control the whole world, is now flexing its muscles. The German evangelical church, almost to a man, has buckled under the authority of Hitler. Niemöller, do the same.

Bonhoeffer, do the same. Not a bit. So Bonhoeffer's taken away and killed, and Niemöller goes into concentration camp during the whole of the war.

You see, these are men who recognize that integrity is so valuable, that to lose your life or to lose your job and still retain it is worthwhile. I put it in illustrations which are dramatic, but I have boiled it down. I've reduced it to its essence.

I've tried to show you kids in the galleries, and some of you younger ones, sprinkle downstairs, because I've pushed you all to come downstairs these days. I've tried to show you that your integrity will have been or will be sooner or later in the balance as the devil comes along playing his card. But the window to Jerusalem, the heavenly Jerusalem, is open.

The thought of the altar, of the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus, of all that He went through for you to atone for your sins, that too is a fact that you know. And on the basis of that, what the devil offers, and the compromise, and all the manipulation, and all the maneuvering to make your ethics sub-Christian, it's not worth it there to be a lone. Can you do that? Will you do that? You see, I'm not even bothered about the fact that Daniel escaped in the end.

I really don't think that that's important. I mean, it was important as far as the historical narrative is concerned, but I'm not even dealing with the deliverance, because the mightiest thing is this, that Daniel remained incorruptible, though all these pressures were placed upon him. Look, I'm picking up the sensation that there are people who are saying, you know, you've hit so many nerves in my life right now that I'm feeling desperately uncomfortable.

I remember times when I traded my integrity. I wish to God I hadn't, but I did. And I said, for somebody here, it was last week.

For another, it was last month. For another, it was years ago. What can you do to help a man who wasn't like Daniel? Do? I can't do anything, but I can take you to a king who came before Almighty God, a king who had the whole world, so to speak, almost at his feet.

I refer to David, threw all the opportunities away because of a woman that led him into adultery and murder and the loss of reputation. And he says to this God, against you, you only have I sinned and done this evil in your sight. Restore unto me the joy of my salvation.

This God, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus, can reinsert integrity in your life, but He'll not do it if you're going to play fast and loose. He'll not do it if you're not really real, because to reinsert integrity means directing to you the benefit that accrued from His Son and from His Son going through hell. But when you receive that integrity from the Lord and you preserve it, you build a character and a lifestyle that is superior to anything that this world offers with all its compromise, with all its manipulation.

I want us to bow our heads in prayer, and I want us to come before the Lord and ask Him afresh, just to speak His healing Word into our minds and into our memories. Let's ask Him to take control of our thoughts and our actions. God be in my head and in my understanding.

God be in mine eyes and in my looking. God be in my mouth and in my speaking. God be in my heart and in my thinking.

God be at my departure.