A selection of verses showing that sometimes it is necessary to make a stand where God’s principles are threatened.
The midwives in Egypt made a stand against the king of Egypt who told them to kill the baby boys:
17 But the midwives feared God, and didn’t do what the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the baby boys alive.
Daniel’s three friends Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego refused to worship the image that king Nebuchadnezzar had set up despite severe consequences:
16 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered the king, “Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. 17 If it happens, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace; and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. 18 But if not, let it be known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image which you have set up.”
Peter and John made a stand against the Jewish authorities who told them to stop preaching:
18 They called them, and commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus.
19 But Peter and John answered them, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, judge for yourselves, 20 for we can’t help telling the things which we saw and heard.”
The apostle Paul tells the Romans to resist being conformed to this world:
2 Don’t be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what is the good, well-pleasing, and perfect will of God.
The apostle James echoes the same sentiment:
4 You adulterers and adulteresses, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hostility towards God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
27 Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.
These chapters have links to this theme:
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