One of the most carefree passages in the bible must be today's excerpt from Daniel. In the very heart of the furnace we see the supposedly doomed victims walking around as nonchalantly as if they were on a picnic on a balmy, spring day in Nebuchadnezzar's garden. The young men had defied the tyrant and in loyalty to the truth of God had refused to worship the king's idols. Their loyalty to the truth won from heaven a wonderful helper who preserved them unsigned from the dreadful fire. They were free men.

In the Gospel Jesus promised His listeners that the truth would set them free. The truth Jesus is referring to here is the truth that salvation would come to them through belief in Him rather than through the Law of Moses. The Law of Moses was good and noble but did not, in itself, bring the strength to enable its adherents to live up to its high demands. It was preparatory. The fullness of life-giving law would come with Jesus.

To believe in Jesus, Truth itself, is not merely to accept His statements as accurate. To believe in this context is to establish, with God's grace a personal reliance on someone we can trust. It is a falling in love with someone by whom we know we are loved. Such belief in Jesus will set us free to walk amid our trials with some of the nonchalance of Daniel's three young heroes.