LEARN TO THINK FOR YOURSELF (5)

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 8 

“Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the...king’s delicacies.” Da1:8 NKJV 

Daniel held a top spot in Babylon’s government. But he lived by a different set of convictions from those around him. Because he wouldn’t eat their food or worship their idols, he landed in a lions’ den. But God brought him out and promoted him. Daniel didn’t live by the “just go along to get along” philosophy. If he had, his name wouldn’t be remembered today. Popular thinking loves the status quo. It puts its confidence in “the idea of the moment” and holds onto it with all its might. As a result, it resists change and forfeits growth and progress. And that’s particularly so as we age. Because it took all our energy to get to where we are in life, the idea of “moving” or “changing” doesn’t appeal to us as we age. But that doesn’t have to be your legacy. “They will still bear fruit in old age, they will stay fresh” (Ps 92:14 NIV). When the Promised Land was being divided up among the twelve tribes, Caleb was eighty-five. But he didn’t have a retirement or rocking chair mentality. He announced: “I am as strong this day as on the day that Moses sent me; just as my strength was then, so now is my strength for war, both for going out and for coming in. Now therefore, give me this mountain of which the Lord spoke in that day...And Joshua blessed him, and gave Hebron to Caleb” (Jos14:11-13 NKJV). A marker on a grave on Mount Everest says it all: “He died climbing.” Let that be said of you!