Transcription
In the context of the provided text, "corridors of power" refers to the places where significant power is held and exercised, often implying political, corporate, or influential social circles.
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Corridors of power. And this is part four of "In the Corridors of Power," and my subtitle is "Agendas and Games." Agendas and games. In the corridors of power, there are agendas, and there are power games that are played. And one of the reasons why only a few people rise to function in places of power is because sometimes the games are far bigger than them, and they are not sure of how to manage the agendas that are at play there.
I believe God has called us in this season to rise to places of influence in our places of specialization, in our careers, in our nations, in our workplaces. And I believe that we have to be equipped to fight the battle in those areas.
There are three statements I want to make before we even read any scripture today. The first statement, you know it already, but it's important to make us aware of it: that there is a natural world and there is a spiritual world. There is a natural world and there is a spiritual world. The world we live in is not all that there is. It is the natural world. We see it. We live in it. We act in it, and we are familiar with it. But it is not all that there is. There is a real world that we do not see, and it still functions. And in that world, there is God. There is Satan. God is a spirit. Satan is also a spirit. So there is a natural world and there is a spiritual world.
Second important statement is that the spiritual world influences the natural world. They don't live exclusive to themselves, these two worlds, but the spiritual world influences the natural world. We humans think that we are in charge of everything that happens around us, but the reality is that our world is subject to the spiritual world.
And the third important statement I want you to note is that both God and Satan use people to do their will. Both God and Satan use people to do their will. God uses people. Satan uses people. Many of us know God as good, as kind, and loving. So our mental picture of him is someone who is nice, beautiful, and pleasing. And we know Satan, on the other hand, as evil, as wicked, and destructive. So our image of Satan is nasty, distasteful, and ugly.
As a result, we equate anything that looks nice, beautiful, and pleasing to God. And anything that doesn't look that way, we say is for Satan. So anytime Satan camouflages himself as nice, beautiful, and pleasing, it is very easy for us to take his work as the work of God because of the image we have of God.
And in the corridors of power, the believer must be very aware that there is a spiritual power play going on. In the corridors of power, we must be able to discern what is behind the ideas, the people, the attitudes, or the actions that go on there. And today, we're going to go back to the book of Daniel, and we're going to learn a few things about the agendas and the power play and how to survive in that environment.
Daniel chapter 1, verse 3 to 4. We read it the last time, but we'll read it again. And then Daniel chapter 1, verse 8. Daniel 1:3-4: "And then the king instructed Ashpenaz, the master of his eunuchs, to bring some of the children of Israel, and some of the king's descendants and some of the nobles, young men in whom there was no blemish, but good-looking, gifted in all wisdom, possessing knowledge and quick to understand, who had ability to serve in the king's palace, and whom they might teach the language and literature of the Chaldeans."
"Then verse eight, 'But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with a portion of the king's delicacies, nor with the wine which he drank. Therefore, he requested of the chief of eunuchs that he might not defile himself.'"
In these two passages, we see two different agendas at play. First, we look at Nebuchadnezzar's agenda. Nebuchadnezzar was the king of Babylon. He was a man on a mission, a man with a global aspiration. He was a man with a big agenda. And I would try to summarize his agenda in two ways. First, to impose his worldview and his gods on the world. To impose his worldview and his gods on the world.
When Nebuchadnezzar went to conquer nations, he wasn't just doing it politically, just to gain land and territory. He also was doing it because he believed that his god or his gods needed to be worshiped by all the peoples of the earth. So he was on a spiritual agenda as well, not just a political agenda. Behind the political agenda was a massive spiritual agenda. So he was pushing a spiritual worldview from his spiritual point of view. Now, if you saw Nebuchadnezzar conquering, you would just say, "Well, this is just another politician," or, "this is just another king who is trying to take territory." But behind him, there was an agenda. It's very important.
The second thing was that Nebuchadnezzar wanted to compel all people to bow to his image. Nebuchadnezzar understood the power of image. He knew how to control people. If Nebuchadnezzar lived in our days, we would say he understood branding. He knew the power of branding, how to brand himself. There's no greater brand than to make a golden image of yourself. Nebuchadnezzar, in Daniel chapter 3, made a huge golden image of himself and instructed everybody to bow to that image or to bow to that brand. So Nebuchadnezzar was on a spiritual mission. He was also on a mission to impose his brand, to impose his image over the entire world. And he did that by conquering nation after nation and making sure that his philosophy becomes the predominant philosophy.
But Nebuchadnezzar was not the only one with an agenda. He had an agenda. But Daniel also had an agenda. Daniel understood that he had been conquered. He understood that he had been defeated. He understood that his people were now slaves. But that didn't stop him from also having an agenda, a purpose. And Daniel's agenda can be summarized in two ways.
One, to introduce his God, Yahweh, to Nebuchadnezzar's kingdom or to the Babylonian kingdom. He wanted Nebuchadnezzar to know that Yahweh was the only God and that he ruled in the affairs of men. He saw his presence in Babylon as an opportunity to make his God known in their corridors of power. So although Daniel had been conquered, his people had been conquered, and he had been enslaved, he still carried with him something that said, "Wherever I go, I would make Yahweh known. I would make the God of Israel known."
So there's going to be a conflict of agendas. Nebuchadnezzar wants to control Daniel. Daniel wants to control Nebuchadnezzar. Both of them want to control. And behind it, there is a spiritual reason. Nebuchadnezzar is doing it spiritually. Daniel is doing it spiritually. All of them want the God they worship to be the supreme one. So Daniel's agenda is to introduce Yahweh to Babylon or the God of Israel to Babylon. And so he studied the Babylonian system. He walked in the corridors of power. He understood the Babylonian system. But if you watch Daniel throughout, he never bowed to that system. Never bowed to it because he understood that he had come to Babylon not to submit to Nebuchadnezzar's agenda but to perform a different agenda which he believed had been given to him by God. It's very important.
The second way you can see Daniel's agenda was that Daniel, right from the beginning, wanted to influence the decisions of the king of Babylon. Daniel was determined to outshine and outperform everybody that Nebuchadnezzar listened to. Now, when Daniel went to school in Babylon, he was put in the University of Babylon, and he started his three-year course. And Daniel was determined from day one because it was in that school that the chief policymakers, influencers in Babylon, were raised. Daniel understood that. And so right from school, he wanted to come out number one so that when he emerged, he would be in a position to influence what happened to Nebuchadnezzar.
Sometimes believers do not know why God brings them into the corridors of power. Some see it as a matter of luck or chance. Others see it as a matter of personal advancement. But Daniel saw it as a divine assignment. If you are ever going to aspire into the corridors of power, you have to determine before you get there whose agenda you are going to push. Why are you there? Why has God put you in that position? Why are you in that position? Are you just there to better your life? Are you just there because you were lucky? Are you just there because you were fortunate, the circumstances of life put you in that place? Or you are there because there is a hand that is guiding your movement?
For those who know that they get to the corridors of power by an agenda, they are very conscious of everything they do in that place. Now, many times, we just want to assume that people are in the corridors of power just for themselves. But my understanding is when people get to the corridors of power, they are either pursuing God's agenda or Satan's agenda. It's as simple as that. Either pursuing God's agenda or Satan's agenda.
Whether they sit in Number 10 Downing Street or in the White House, or they sit in, uh, where's the China one, I don't know how they call it, or they sit in Russia, or they sit at the Flagstaff House, or they sit at Rock, wherever they sit, they are pursuing an agenda. They may not even be aware of the agenda, but there is a force seeking to dominate humans by using the ideas of those people.
So whenever you listen to and watch the news, anytime a superstar arises, whether as a sports icon, entertainment icon, somebody that the world begins to look up to and listen to, anytime somebody rises in power, anytime a new discovery is made, anytime new social concepts gain prominence, ask yourself this simple question: Whose agenda are they promoting?
Anytime you see that all of a sudden the whole world is doing something else. And I'm not trying to impute evil to anything, but all of a sudden, social media becomes powerful, and everybody's Googling, everybody's Facetiming, and everybody's Facebooking, and everybody's Instagramming, and everybody's WhatsApping, and you're wondering, what is it promoting? Don't just look on the world as if things are just happening. Things are not just happening. Things are happening for things to happen. Things are happening for things to happen.
And the fact is, many times, not always, not always, but many times, sometimes people whom we like on the world stage may also be at the same time promoting Satan's agenda because things are not as simple as they seem. And it's not even a matter of whether the person is a believer or not a believer. A believer may be promoting Satan's agenda, and an unbeliever may be promoting God's agenda because God uses people, and God finds whom he can use, and Satan is also looking for whom he can use, and when we yield to either of them, we get used by them.
So what is your agenda for desiring to be in the corridors of power? Whom will you serve? Whose agenda will you push?
So let's see how Nebuchadnezzar tried to play his agenda. Daniel chapter 1, verse 5-7. Daniel 1, verse 5-7. Now, this is after Daniel and his companions had been enlisted into the training program of Nebuchadnezzar. They are now in