Backfire!

God has a way of making the enemy’s evil tactics backfire against him!

The story of the miracle in the fiery furnace gets best at the end:

“Because the king’s order was urgent and the furnace overheated, the flame of the fire killed those men who took up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.” (Daniel 3:22, ESV)

When Meshach, Shadrach and Abednego refused to bow down to Nebuchadnezzar’s big idol, the king was enraged. So he did the only thing that a man without God knows to do. The king turned up the heat.

“How dare you defy my command,” the king cried out.

“Turn up the heat!”

“Yes your royal majesty” his minions assured, “the fire is now twice as hot.”

“Who are these Hebrew boys to refuse my edict? Who do they think they are? Unappreciative Jews.” The more he thought about it, the angrier he became.

“Turn up the heat again.”

“Yes, your royal boastfulness,” the minions declared. “The fire is three times as hot.”

“Will you bow down now to my statue, Meshach, Shadrach and Abednego?”

“We have no reason to even talk to you,” the men of God proclaimed.

“Turn up the heat!”

“Yes, your royal stubbornness ….”

“Turn up the heat again.”

“Yes sir. We’d like to report, oh royal temper tantrumness, it’s as hot a fire as is possible. Seven times hotter than normal.”

Well, I paraphrase. But you get the point. King Nebuchadnezzar’s plan of making the fire hotter and hotter only served to kill his own minions. His plan backfired on him—literally.

When Jesus hung on the cross, the powers of hell had turned up the heat sevenfold. It backfired on the devil. It backfired on the religious and political authorities. The cross, the place of God’s searing judgment, dismantled the strongholds of this world and burned up our sin. No weapon formed against the people of God can prosper because God always has a way of making the enemy’s plans backfire. And that’s the Gospel!