Tom Shrader begins a six-week series on living with integrity in hostile environments, drawing from Daniel 1. He shows how Daniel resolved not to defile himself with the king's food yet found a creative solution through respectful dialogue rather than confrontation or compromise. The teaching emphasizes that Christians can maintain their convictions while engaging the world around them without turning every issue into a battle.
“You can prove your convictions and protect them and achieve your objectives without fighting wars or caving in.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Integrity Under Fire (2013)
Recorded: October 31, 2013
Duration: 36 min
Themes: integrity, conviction, compromise, wisdom, courage, faithfulness, persecution, witness, workplace pressure, standing for beliefs, young professional, new believer, facing opposition, cultural conflict, business ethics, peer pressure
Scripture: Daniel 1, Romans 12:1-2, John 17, Hebrews 11
Theological Themes: sanctification, worldliness, biblical worldview, christian living, cultural engagement, moral purity, discipleship, godly character
Full Transcript
Today we start a new series—six weeks that will take us right through to Christmas break, which sounds so weird to say. The series is one of those that should be extraordinarily helpful to you in either giving you new tools or examining life in your business, in anything where you begin to decide you're going to live out this Christian faith. The story we look at—and if you have Bibles you can open them to the book of Daniel—is literally 2,600 years old and yet it's as fresh as today's newspaper.
The title of the series is Integrity Under Fire and the subtitle is Principles for Living in a Hostile Environment. We're looking at the first six chapters in the book of Daniel. What we see is that you and I who would say Jesus is Lord are carrying a dual passport—you have one that says citizenship in heaven, one that says US of A, and these are often in conflict.
The Tension of Dual Citizenship
I had a chance Sunday to teach down at New City Church. New City is on Central between Camelback and Indian School. It's a gentleman by the name of Brian Kruckenberg—we've had the chance to partner with him and be around as he moved out and literally just parachuted in and started that church. It's a wonderful place. If you have people who are looking for churches in that central area, it should be on your to-do list to visit.
Brian said I could talk about whatever I want, so I went to Romans chapter 12 verse 1 and 2, where Paul says in verse 1 essentially, because we're followers of Christ we should present our bodies to Him. I've been in Sports Illustrated twice—once as a photographer, which is interesting because I don't own a camera. I was at the last Iowa ASU game and I had a field pass from AP, and the guy said here's a camera. At the end of the first quarter he said are you taking any pictures? I said no. He said well take some pictures. I'm a big Kirk Ferentz fan, so I got as close to Coach Ferentz as I could, and I was snapping pictures.
I don't know if you remember that game or not, but it was 21 to nothing in a nanosecond, 35 to nothing in a heartbeat, and he was very frustrated. So I got a call on Monday, and he said one of your pictures is going to be in Sports Illustrated. It was right when they began to announce the number on a penalty call, so it used to be holding 10 yards first down. Now it's holding, but they announced the number of the player. They were just doing it, and Kirk apparently didn't like that, so they wanted a picture of Coach Ferentz frustrated. Well I had a roll of those.
So on the 50th anniversary of Sports Illustrated, there's a little picture about this big of Kirk Ferentz that says AP photo Tom Schrader, which is cool. The time before that, the U of A was coming up to play ASU, and there was a writer for Sports Illustrated who was following U of A for the week. Part of the Saturday morning process is chapel, and I was the chapel speaker. We did Romans chapter 12 verse 1 and 2, present your bodies a living sacrifice. According to the Sports Illustrated writer, the chaplain summarized this verse by saying, what it says is, give your bod to God. Now it sounded stupid then, it really looks stupid in Sports Illustrated, and it just sounds goofy, but it is what that verse says.
Because Jesus is Lord, I give Him my body, which is not just physical body—it's emotions, will, it's time, it's energy, it's effort. Then in Romans chapter 12 verse 2, He says, do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. The paraphrases say things like this: don't copy the behavior of the world, don't become so well adjusted to the world that you fit into it without even trying. The Phillips says, don't let the world squeeze you into its mold, but you'll be remolded from God from the inside out.
Swimming Upstream
So there it is—there's the tension that you feel. As I begin to say, I'm going to take these things and I'm going to incorporate them into my life, I feel like I'm swimming upstream. The reason is, you are.
The world comes along and says, I don't get mad, I get what? Even. Jesus comes along and says, turn the other cheek. The world comes along and says, if I'm in business, the bottom line is the bottom line. The faith comes along and says, no, the process is as important as the bottom line. So you're in those tensions all the time.
This is extraordinarily practical. I had a gal the other day that comes to PL and she was at our Little League game Saturday. I say Little League game—it's coach pitch, pre-Little League. She didn't know we were over there. She was there to watch somebody play on the other team, and it was just by the way, it was an amazing game.
We had a double play—it's the first double play of the year, a 4-6-3 double play, unimaginable. The last play of the game, Yale was in the outfield, he relayed to Braden, who was right on the edge, who threw a strike to home, so we have two miracles at this point. The kid at home caught the ball—miracle three—and tagged the kid out, last out of the game, and we won 21-20. It was an amazing game. It might be the greatest game ever played.
Living Differently in the Same Environment
Well, she had been on one side and she came over to our side and was there at the half inning. She said, I didn't know you were there, and she said the environment on both sides of the dugout were totally different. I think I said this to you a couple weeks ago—our guys are coaching, Brian and Tyler coach, and all they do is coach in a way that exhibits the love of Christ. These parents are now lined up to try to get on this team.
You got these guys on the other side—these dads are ruining, you can watch them ruin these kids. This is why you did this, you made an out there, you didn't listen to me there. It's sad. If you have a heart, and if you've ever been a kid, you look at it and go, you're ruining this kid.
This is practical all the way through. What we're really striking at here is an ethics crisis, a behavior crisis of really major proportion in every field. We can go into politics and talk about that. At the end of the first six years of the Reagan administration, a hundred and ten senior officials were indicted or under investigation. So it's not a Democrat-Republican thing, it's a human thing. As you begin to give power to these people, whether it's in business or in athletics or in an organization, the preservation of that power becomes really a big deal.
There was a grant that was submitted to the government. Forty-seven professors in a joint venture from Emory University and Harvard University applied for the grant. Upon review, they discovered that all 47 had falsified information for the grant. They say one out of three resumes that ultimately get a person hired are based on some sort of false data. So this is all over.
I went into Google and searched "ethical issues." In 0.17 seconds, I got 374,000 hits on every industry. I was stunned by this. There was a survey of 270 architects, engineers, construction managers, general contractors, and subcontractors. When asked if they'd experienced or encountered or observed construction industry related acts or transgressions that would be considered unethical in the past year, 84% said yes. 34% said many times.
They asked them where they saw the biggest problems: change orders, bid shopping, payment games, unreliable contractors, claims. 90% said bid shopping was unethical. That's interesting—they're getting you right at the front. 85% of the respondents thought that there should be stricter association enforcement, but only a third agreed that they needed more laws. We don't need more laws. We have a fundamental problem.
The Crisis of Character
Let me break our thought processes into three areas. We have these things that I would call theories. These are beliefs that are held but they're pliable. I had a guy the other day challenge me on something that I said, and we talked, and by the end of it he had moved me toward his position. That was a theory. A belief is where my mind's made up maybe, but I'm not quite ready to act. What I want to talk about are convictions. Those are those things that we believe and we're willing to stand behind. Integrity, words like character.
Character is never an issue if you don't have any. There was a pivotal moment I think, and it goes back to Clinton as a country, where it became clear that he'd lied. We define character in its loosest form as what you do when nobody's looking. The American people stood back and said the economy's good. We don't care what he does when nobody's looking. The conclusion of that is character is not an issue, and we've been downcycling at versions of that ever since.
Creativity Over Compromise
Well rather than throw darts at those guys, which we can do, what do you do when your conviction is challenged? I want to give you something today. You see it in the outline: it's creativity over compromise. Typically if my convictions are challenged, I think of one of two things. I'm either going to cave in, which never sounds appealing, or I'm going to stand my ground and I'm going to fight, and now everything becomes a battle. I'm going to make this an issue and that an issue, and oftentimes you have convictions about things that are preferential. So you see people at war in churches over music, over lighting, over seats.
Is there a third option here in a world that seems to be getting more polemic? This is exactly the time of year at church where I get the phone calls: "What's your position on Halloween?" And I always say, "Well I have Baby Ruth, Butterfinger," and I'm flip about it. Then a friend of mine came and said, "You know, I'm out of that background and this is a tough holiday for me." We get questions on school all the time: private school, home school, public school. Here's what we think—you're the mom, you're the dad, they need to be educated, you live with that. I don't want to draw a line in the sand, and if I'm going to die on every hill, and there are a lot of hills out there, I'm dying a lot. Is there a third option?
Daniel's Dilemma
We see it here in Daniel chapter 1. So let's get after it. Daniel chapter 1 verse 3. What has happened is that Nebuchadnezzar has guided the Babylonians through a conquest of the nation of Israel, and many in the nation of Israel have been killed, some have been taken captive. We meet some captives here.
Verse 3: The king orders the chief of the court officials to bring some of the Israelites. Now here's who he's ordering—they're from the royal family, they're from nobility, good pedigree and breeding. They're young men, probably ages 14, 15, 16. They're physically strong, they're handsome, they show an aptitude for learning, clearly a lot of potential early in life. Not a lot of achievement yet, but they're qualified to serve in the king's court. So here are these guys, these young Israelites who show a lot of potential, and the king's mindset is: Is there a way I can turn them into an asset for me? Good help is hard to find.
Verse 4: He said yes, he said I want to qualify them to teach them and to serve in the palace. So he's going to teach them the language and the literature of the Babylonians. He's going to immerse them in the culture. Now in the midst of this, these young guys begin to feel a tension here. It's a tension for us—it's the same tension.
You feel tension when you hear this call to be "in the world but not of the world." What does that mean? It's from John 17, the night before Jesus died, when He prays to the Father. Think about this: "Father, just as you sent me into the world, I'm sending them into the world." There's a constant call for those of us who are Christians to be engaging the world around us.
My experience has been, the longer I'm in the body of Christ, the less I'm engaged with the world. My friends become Christians, I listen to Christian music, I go to hear Christian comics, I go to a Christian bookstore, I read Christian books. Christian is not an adjective, it's a noun. I get asked all the time, "Do you know a good Christian plumber?" There's no Christian way to unstop a toilet—he can be a Christian who does this, but there's not a Christian way. "Do I know a Christian accountant?" I don't know of a Christian way to do a balance sheet. There's a way to do a balance sheet, and it's Christians who do that.
Here's what Paul says: we're ambassadors to this world. So the implication here is you should feel tension, and there should be a steady flow of tension in your life that's driven by contact with people and a world system. Don't be conformed to this world—He means the world system. Don't be conformed to the world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. There's that pressure you feel, and Daniel and these boys feel this.
The Challenge Begins
Verse 5: "The king assigned them a daily amount of food and wine from the king's table." Here's where the challenge is coming. They're trained for three years, and after that they'd enter the king's service. Among this, they changed their names, so we hear those new names: Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego.
Verse 8: "But Daniel resolved..." If you're one of those Bible circle guys, you circle, underline, put a box around that word "resolved." Daniel determined this in his mind. Daniel settled this issue.
I'm halfway through my steroid treatment, starting to feel the side effects moving away, and now it's time to get a hold of eating. Last night I was meeting the girls—I was having dinner with Sarah and Haley—and all the way over I was resolving what I would order. All the way over. I've learned: don't even give me a menu. Here's what I'm going to have. It's that resolution.
Daniel's Stand
He resolves in his mind that he's not going to defile himself with this food and wine. So that becomes the issue—it's a conviction. Look again, I make a plea here for his tenacity. Here's this 15-year-old boy in a struggle with the leader of the world. He's miles from home. No one would blame him for this.
He could have easily said everybody's doing it. He could have easily said it's 605 BC. He had a whole litany of excuses and no one would blame him. But he said no, this is a bigger issue. So here's what he does: he doesn't cave in, he doesn't make it a fight, he asks the chief officer for permission not to defile himself.
Verse 9: "And God caused the official to show favor and sympathy to Daniel. But the official told Daniel, 'Here's the deal, I'm afraid of my Lord the King who's assigned your food and drink. Why should you be looking worse than the other men your age? The King would have my head.'"
The Art of Dialogue
In practical terms, Daniel comes in and says here's my concern and here's what I want. This guy comes in and says here's my concern and here's what I want. The two of them sit down and begin to have a dialogue—something we don't do well anymore. It's a process of listening and understanding. If there's a trait that's lost in communication, it's the art of listening.
I mentioned to you a couple weeks ago there's a new biography out on Charlie Manson. They said the book that influenced him most was "How to Win Friends and Influence People." The Manson girls said when Charlie talked to us, he looked us in the eye, he listened to us, he didn't interrupt us. We felt a kinship.
I've started when I go into a meeting or breakfast or an appointment—I've started to either not take my phone or take it and set it down. I inevitably just out of habit pick it up, hit the button, and if I see there's a message from Sandy, I'll be right back to you. There's a message from Sandy, I start reading it, and if I'm the person on the other end, that takes that whole level of communication down a notch. If you watch TV—and I've watched less and less of the news stuff because I don't need a box with four people all talking at once and no one listening to the other person—you've just watched a total breakdown.
Finding Common Ground
Here are these convictions: step back and present your case and listen to the other guy. Daniel hears, "Here's the deal, my concern is not that you eat it, my concern is that you're going to look bad."
Verse 11: "Then Daniel said to the guard who was appointed over them," verse 12: "Please test your servants for ten days. Give us nothing but vegetables to eat and water to drink, and then compare our appearance with that of the men who eat the royal food and treat your servants in accordance with what you see."
All of a sudden, rather than this explosive situation, he said, "I got it, I got it. Let's try the test."
God's Intervention
Verse 17: "To these four young men God gave knowledge and understanding." Let me make the obvious connection to you: it's easy for us to study Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, but the story is about who? God.
You see in verse 9 it was God who gave Daniel favor with the chief official. In verse 17 it's God who gives knowledge. God intervenes. It's about Daniel, but it's about Daniel as he submits to God.
Now let me stop here and tell you one of the things I don't like about the book of Daniel, and that is everything works out well for Daniel all the time. He goes in the fire, he gets out. He goes in the...
When God Doesn't Provide the Exit Strategy We Expect
The lion's den, he gets out. He gets in this situation, he gets out. The reason I don't like that interpretation is I know human beings, myself included, will read this and think if I do all of this God will close the deal. God will bring my wife back, God will straighten up that kid, I won't get sick. If I get sick I won't be real sick. If I get sick because I got to die, there's got to be an exit somehow—it'll be a clean easy death.
I always had that in my mind. It's funny because I thought about dying since I was 12, since I saw my grandfather in his casket. I always knew I would die but I always had this picture that was somehow—I don't know if Norman Rockwell ever painted a death scene but a Norman Rockwell death scene. Minimum pain, maximum family, cinnamon rolls cooking though I couldn't eat them, fresh brewed coffee, everyone gathered around. "Papa will miss you." "Papa, any last words?" And then I would utter something that they'd write down and for generations. I just thought it would be that way. Now I'm not there but I'm certainly closer than I was and it doesn't feel like it's gonna unwrap that way.
God doesn't necessarily get you out of every situation you find yourself in by providing you what you think is the exit strategy. So you're in a bed, incapacitated, suffering a ton—God is still using you to minister to the people around you. Hebrews 11 lists all these giants of the faith, but then there's a pivot point in there where the author of Hebrews says "and some were sawn in two, others were beheaded."
I find myself reacting very strongly to those who would come along and say God wants you healthy and wealthy. If nothing else, first of all I think that theology is bad, but if nothing else, the human damage is awful. I've been in the hospital room to visit somebody after one of these health and wealth guys have been there and said if you had more faith you wouldn't be sick. That just doesn't make any sense, just practically.
So guard against this. I'll come back to this point again and again because you really see it in Daniel. He gets in there deep and God moves. That does not mean He's gonna move in the same way in your life. But God gives you knowledge, wisdom, gives you the gifts you have.
Daniel's Excellence in Service
Back to Daniel—he's learning all kinds of literature. Daniel could understand visions and dreams, which becomes important next week. At the end of the set time by the king to bring them all into the official court, they were presented to Nebuchadnezzar. The king talked with them—verse 19—he interviewed them and found that there were none equal to these boys. They entered into the king's service, and in every matter of wisdom and understanding about which the king questioned them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and enchanters. That would be his cabinet, his best and brightest in the whole kingdom.
Daniel remained there till the first year of King Cyrus, which means Daniel was there for about 70 years.
The Path Between Fighting Wars and Caving In
Here's the point: you can prove your convictions and protect them and achieve your objectives without fighting wars or caving in. I've already given you the three things you're gonna have to do with this. You're gonna have to listen to people, which is rare. Then you're gonna have to have a dialogue in which you try to understand the other person and what they're thinking.
I was watching last night about five minutes of O'Reilly and he won't quite try to understand where the other guy's coming from. I'm in a discussion the other day and somebody said, "These guys are trying to ruin the country." I don't know that that's true. The effect might be, but I don't know what the motive is. I don't have a chance to sit down, I don't know how to look in their heart, and I can't do anything about it. I'm worried about the people in my life with whom I see conflict, and I need to listen more and dialogue more. This takes a lot of work.
Five Action Points for Living with Conviction
Five points—that's a good thing about this series. Each week we give you some action points.
Number one seems to me to be obvious: you need to know your convictions. I was always a guy that if you had a rule you ought to enforce it. If it's on the books—we had a play in the NFL a couple of weeks ago, it was the Cowboys on the field goal where the guy pushed the guy. It's apparently a play that's never called, but it's a rule. If it's a rule, you got to call it. If it's not, get it off the books.
Like with my kids, I had very few rules. People ask me a lot about raising kids, and I watch them walk away disappointed. But I didn't have curfews, my kids never had chores, they didn't have jobs. I had a very clear way of how we raised them. Since I have girls, I get a lot of dads with girls and they'll ask, "How did you handle this? How old do they have to be to date?"
As I often do, let me tell you a story. I'm sitting in my office one day and Sarah comes in and says, "Do you know what happens in 485 days?" I said, "I don't know." She said, "I get a driver's license." I mean that day, that 16th birthday, we were down there. Now, is it okay to drive at 16? It doesn't matter—she's at the DMV, she'll be 18 by the time she gets out of there, so it isn't gonna make any difference. But it was in her mind. If you tell a kid that they can date at 16, they're gonna tell you, "You know what happens in 485 days?"
So when they said, "How old do your girls have to be to date?" I said, "I don't know. They just need to be able to date." I know 14-year-olds that I think could date and 34-year-olds that should never be near a date. You have to decide what these things are that matter to you.
The question is asked anymore, "How far can you go?" You all know what I mean—it's not about how much gas you have in a car. It's "how far can you go?" Well, I got a very different answer if I was sitting at the kitchen table with my dad, though we would have never had that discussion—this is theory. I had a very different answer if I was sitting at the kitchen table than if I was in the backseat of a '62 Ford Galaxy 500 (it was a great car). I got two very different answers.
So I have to know those convictions. I have to, in a sense, pre-decide my decisions. Here's the second thing: I've got to understand what's my objective in all of this? What do I want to accomplish with this conviction and now the defense of this conviction?
Having a Strategy for Your Convictions
The third thing is—and you see how this requires some thought—I need to have a strategy. I don't want to be contrary just to be contrarian. I had a friend who said, "I used to say no to my kids just to say no to them." I always thought that was dumb. I always thought I could find a lot of reasons to say no to them. If I'm a kid, I know me. You give me an irrational no, and now you're going to lose my heart. I'll go, "Well no, why?" "Well, just because." That's not compelling.
Number four: don't be afraid to present in a fair way, logical way, as far as it's possible. As far as it's possible, present your appeal in the midst of whatever the situation is and commit yourself to excellence. You're under a microscope. When you—especially if you take a position that you articulate from a Christian perspective—you need to understand when you say to your friends on a Thursday morning, "I go to this thing and it's kind of a Bible study, it's certainly a Bible-based conversation about life," that when you say that, you're now in their crosshairs. Their evaluation of you and the criteria by which they judge you and the strictness by which they judge you will be higher than how you judge yourself.
So all of a sudden you're in this conflict, and all I want you to see is conviction doesn't mean battle or caving in. My fear is everything has become so polemic—it's not just dealing with culture issues, it's culture warrior. Everything's in terms of battles and wins and losses, and it doesn't take much for you and me to fall into that same area with everything.
Two Important Warnings
So I have a couple of warnings. Number one: make sure the things you're elevating to convictions are not just issues of preference, or you're going to be dying on a lot of hills. Number two: caving in is not an option, but everything doesn't need to be a battle.
My experience has been, if you go—these are magic words, if you'll use them with people, it works every time—"I need your help. I just need your help here. I need your help to help me understand. I need your help." You've all done it. You're in an airport, there's a problem with the flight, the guy in front of you is going nuts, the person with the computer terminal has no authority to do anything, and this guy is screaming at them. If you're lucky you get to be the next guy in and say, "I'm really sorry about that, I understand this, here's my situation, can you help me?" Every time I've been there and that—I may not get from Phoenix to Davenport, but I get to Peoria, or I get to Cedar Rapids, I get to where I can drive.
World War Three is not inevitable in every conviction you have in your life.
Living Out Your Convictions
Well now you begin to live that out. Daniel resolved this situation—we're done. No, now you're going to see how you're used in the world around you. It's chapter two, Book of Daniel, next week.
Father, help us see this truth. Thank You for it. Thank You for the world that You've given us and where You've placed us. Sometimes it feels like constant conflict and tension. God, give us the strength. It's just a quiet strength—it's not this combative, antagonistic—it's "yeah, this is what I believe," but in the world around me I don't have to fight constantly.
God, give us the wisdom—that's what we want. Give us the wisdom to understand when to stand and those things that we need to dig in, and even then, let us do it with a spirit of gentleness and love, so at the end of the day people see, even when we disagree, that there's something about us that's different. God, give us eyes to see our lives as You see it. Give us the strength and wisdom to live in a world but not copy its behavior, not be squeezed into its mold, not become so well adjusted that we're just like everybody else. The only difference is we go to church on Sunday and pray once in a while and go to a Bible study—but no, our lives are transformed, our minds are informed, and our hearts and our lives produce a radical life change, and it begins with seeing the world as You see it.
God, give us Your eyes to see, give us a heart that beats like Yours, then give us the courage and the wisdom to live in a way that brings honor and glory to You. We pray in Christ's name, Amen.