Meshach, Shadrach, and My First-World Problems

© Celine Sparks, 2025

Someone wrote a song about it, and there’s been reverb from it in our conversations for the past year or so.

Even if. 

But the songwriters didn’t start the fire, or really, the furnace.

It’s all about three guys in the Bible with “Even if” attitudes along with names that look like they came straight out of the Scripps Howard Spelling Bee study book. 

When they were told by Old Neb, as my daddy always called him, to bow down to a false god or be thrown into the fire, they didn’t take a ten-minute break to come back with the answer.

Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to him, “King Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter.  If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us from Your Majesty’s hand.  But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”  (Daniel 3:16-18 NIV)

Even if.

That’s confidence in “The Goodness of God” which was our theme for a recent campus week-long event for teens. Well, maybe it was targeted for teens, but I widened (no comments, please) that bullseye and got in there with them.

Somewhere in the middle of Shogun grill heat indexes last week, and Mach 1 schedules, the ancient thought of “Even if” kept prodding me to persevere.

Even if. Even if there’s a sudden afterthought that maybe the new dining hall isn’t sufficient for the crowd after all, and the people are so thick it’s reminiscent of the Disney World parades where you’re not sure where your children are, but you can see Cinderella loud and clear. The first night before they started staggering meal times, I didn’t think it was possible in one supper period, or even one lifetime, to get to a line of food I wanted in this overstuffed food court arena, so I shouted above the clamor, “Give me some of whatever you’ve got in this line. I’ve always wanted to try brussel sprouts with salamii. Oh, the tea’s across the state line? I’ll take Coke Zero. Nick Saban endorses it." Sort of. I mean when someone gets paid millions and all they can force themselves to say is, "Try it for yourself," how bad can be? I’m not sure because it was flat before I found an actual chair to sit in.

Even if. Even if every class you teach is on the third floor and the elevator is over the legal limit, and two of the days you forget to write down what room you’re supposed to teach in, being the teachers rotate and all. Did everyone think I was really just wandering around perusing different identical classrooms? Shout out to Christa and Chelli for steering me right.

Even if. Even if your husband gives you his free iced coffee coupon, and you proceed to promptly lose it.

Even if I you go in the pouring rain to Sonic to get a wet anything to drink while you’re singing “Dip your finger in the water, come and cool my tongue” lyrics from the rich man and Lazarus song, and by the time you get to Sonic, the entire crew is being paid to sit at a picnic table because no one can take orders during a power failure.

Even if you try again the next day, and this time when you arrive, they’re out of the tea you’ve ordered and already paid for on the app.

Even if you only have two one-hour rehearsals to put together a show start to finish, and after the first rehearsal, you look at the co-director and say, “Do you think we’re in worse shape than we were before they came in here?” 

Even if the fire alarm goes off at ridiculous-thirty a.m. on the one year when they decide to postpone breakfast until 7:45 to let everyone sleep in, and

Even if you’re the only female standing there with the other all-male evacuees, with a hairbrush in hand which didn’t do its job.

Even if they start the intro video to your performance while you still have the entire troupe outside.

Even if a friend comes up to you with a stack of cards she found on the ground, beginning with your credit card and ending with your driver’s license, when you’re at the first staff meeting of the week, and you somehow think you’re still competent enough to make it through the next six days.

Even if, on another occasion, you leave your big-as-Alaska conglomeration of keys/hand-san/wallet/good-luck-charm-which-is-NOT-working on the ground outside the science building, 

Even if you walk all the way in lava temps to the dining hall, and leave your lanyard which also serves as admittance to the dining hall way up in your room which is at the top of Mt. Everest P. Vesuvius,

Even if this one time you decide to drive instead of walk to another point on campus, and that’s only because your side is cramping like there are twins in there ready to emerge, and when you arrive, you just wheel the car up on a curb because it’s the best you can do between contractions.

Even if later, in a locale far from the badly parked car, your husband feels pretty sorry for you – even enough to say “Here, let me go get the car for you, and I’ll come pick you up and drive you to the dorm,” and you’re feeling pretty special until he calls and says, “But for me to come get you, you’ll have to bring me your keys because I just realized I don’t have mine,” and you say, “Okay, how far did you get?” and he says, “all the way to the car.” When I arrived he was dehydrated, on the ground, and dressed in the evening’s Western theme costume, looking like that cowboy who used to say on commercials, “I’d walk a mile for a camel,” and at that point, he was pretty sure he was gonna have to.

Even if you’ve slept double in a twin bed for six days, and by the time you hit the mattress, it’s the best sleep of your life.

Even if there’s more that I probably shouldn’t go into, and some that I am absolutely  sworn not to go into . . . 

Let it be known, we will never worship another besides the One true and mighty, able to deliver. All my life He has been faithful.

The Goodness of God 

FHU Horizons 2025