NOTES for Dan 3:1-33

The prayer of the youths and the song praising everything created by God, like the story itself of how Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego refused to worship the golden image and passed through the trial by fire, are often mentioned in later books of Holy Scripture (1 Macc 2:59; Heb 11:34) and later in Christian worship. It is no accident that this testimony of faith holds such a place in the life of the Church. Here we clearly see the unity of spirit that binds the Old and New Testaments, the righteous and saints of the chosen people and of the Church of Christ. As the youths testified before Nebuchadnezzar that "our God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us from your hand, O king," so the apostle Paul also said amid trials: "the God to whom I belong and whom I serve."