When Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego
Refused to worship any but their God,
The king decreed that they be bound, and cast
Into a burning, fiery furnace. Then
The king, astonied, saw amid the flames
Not three men bound but four men loose—the fourth
Who walked with them was like the Son of God!
When we refuse to worship and bow down
Before an image of the carnal mind,
And we are cast into the furnace fire
Of hate's revenge on its destroyer, Love,
Our God is able to deliver us.
And, like those Hebrew men, we too shall find
We have no hurt, no single hair is singed.
The fiercest flame can only burn our bonds—
The fetters of false sense—and set us free.
The fire that purifies claims but the dross
Of human self, while Christ's own hand imprints
The precious metal with our Father's seal.
And after the ordeal, no smell of fire—
No memory of our fiery trial shall stay.
We walk forth free, Love's tender lesson learned—
There we too found the Christ, the Son of God!
