Series: Flowers in the Desert
Daniel 6:16-21 (Daniel in the Lion’s Den)
Daniel 6:22 (an Angel shut the lions mouths)
Jeremiah 29:11-13 ESV
Jeremiah 29:5-14 The Message
From time to time we are all reminded that our perspective in life needs to be ‘held softly’. So, let’s do a perspective shift for just a moment.
Pretend you are a ladybug protecting a desert Iris from bugs that could destroy the flower.
Ladybugs play a important role in the earth’s ecosystem. Ladybugs are actually beetles that eat plant eating insects. By doing so, they balance the ecosystem.
They are very colorful beetles for a reason…in the bug world their color warns other bugs to leave them alone.
Ladybugs can survive harsh winter cold temperatures. They can also survive in the desert.
If you are an aphid (a ladybug) you might live in a bush, a tree, or a garden.
You can live in a forest, in grasslands, in a river, in a city, in the desert, in the frozen tundra, or in rainforests.
Once there was a ladybug sitting on a leaf doing its ladybug work. Without warning the ladybug had been carried off to a foreign land far far away from where it was born. It had lived near a desert but it was taken away to a land known as the Fertile Crescent, or the land between two rivers.
When it was captured it was with human boys who were captured as well. The ladybug didn’t see any other ladybugs around.
They traveled for many many days before they stopped in another place.
Even though the ladybug was taken to a foreign land it knew there was work to be done. The ladybug didn’t waste any time. The ladybug set out to find and destroy other bugs that destroy plants.
The ladybug was determined to help the plants survive in the foreign land.
Even though life was not easy in this strange land the ladybug did eventually find other ladybugs in the foreign land.
The ladybug eventually settled into its new home and it thrived in this new place.
Once the lady bug was sitting on a leaf and it was taken off to a den where lions lived, but the lions didn’t bother the ladybug.
What was really strange is that the lions didn’t even bother the human who was thrown into the den. (Daniel 6:16-21).
The ladybug sat all night with the man and the lions did not bother the man.
The next morning when the man with a crown came to check on the man in the den with the lions, the man told the king, “My God sent his angel and shut the lions' mouths, and they have not harmed me, because I was found blameless before him; and also before you, O king, I have done no harm.” (Daniel 6:22).
While in the foreign land the ladybug heard a message given to humans who had also been captured and taken off to this foreign land as well. The message said, “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.” (Jeremiah 29,11-13).
The humans were told while they were in the foreign land, “Build houses and Make yourselves at home. “Put in gardens and eat what grows in that country. “Marry and have children. Encourage your children to marry and have that you’ll thrive in that country and not waste away. “Make yourselves at home there and work for the country’s welfare.
“Pray for Babylon’s well-being. If things go well for Babylon, things will go well for you.”
Yes. Believe it or not, this is the Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies, Israel’s God: “Don’t let all those so-called preachers and know-it-alls who are all over the place there take you in with their lies. Don’t pay any attention to the fantasies they keep coming up with to please you. They’re a bunch of liars preaching lies—and claiming I sent them! I never sent them, believe me.” God’s Decree! This is God’s Word on the subject: “As soon as Babylon’s seventy years are up and not a day before, I’ll show up and take care of you as I promised and bring you back home. I know what I’m doing. I have it all planned out—plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for.
“When you call on me, when you come and pray to me, I’ll listen.
“When you come looking for me, you’ll find me.
“Yes, when you get serious about finding me and want it more than anything else, I’ll make sure you won’t be disappointed.” God’s Decree.
“I’ll turn things around for you. I’ll bring you back from all the countries into which I drove you”—God’s Decree—“bring you home to the place from which I sent you off into exile. You can count on it.” (Jeremiah 29:5-14, The Message)
The ladybug thought it sounded like good solid advice and so it continued to work and do its job in the foreign land protecting plants from evil bugs that eat them. The ladybug protected plants in the desert like the Hope Iris.
Many many years later when the city where the ladybug lived lay in ruins, a soldier with green boots visited the country near the place of the land between two rivers. He traveled across the desert with thousands of men to get to a safe place where he would stay for a season. He was very near the place of the land between two rivers.
Even today for that soldier with green boots the message from God stands, “I know the plans I have for you…”
Spiritual Practice: Your Plans
Know this…God does see you. God knows you and is even now preparing you for the plan He has for you.
In God, Deborah