Daniel 1:8: “But Daniel made up his mind that he would not defile himself with the royal delicacies or the royal wine. He therefore asked the overseer of the court officials for permission not to defile himself.”

There are some things you just have to make up your mind about. Joshua asked the people, “Decide for yourselves today whom you will worship… but as for me and my family, we will worship the Lord” (Joshua 24:15). We also need to respect people when they have made up their minds and recognize that you are dealing with an independent individual who has made up his or her mind.

We see this with Daniel: Daniel made up his mind. How you communicate that is another issue. He could have created a scene; he did not. He could have made everything into a mess; he did not. He could have tried to argue; he did not. He was in a difficult situation: a slave, a captive, somebody we would say has no say in the situation and is just supposed to “flow along.” “What is your own? You have been told to do this—just do it. Are you not happy that you are here? You could have been killed by your captors.” Regardless of how little somebody may have thought Daniel was, and how he was just supposed to be glad he even got there, he still made up his mind: “I am not going to defile myself.”

You can argue with him; it does not matter. That is your own. Based on his own conscience—and whatever you are not convinced about and you do, Paul said, “for that person it is sin” (Romans 14:23)—he made up his mind, “I am not going to do this. I am convinced I should not do this.”

It could be in big or small things. It could even be things where the other person is free to make a different choice. It may not even be an obviously immoral thing, but you can make up your mind. You can make a decision. You can decide, “This is what I am going to do. This is how I am going to do it.” You can make up your mind. Look at what Daniel did.

“Then God made the overseer of the court officials sympathetic to Daniel. But he responded to Daniel, ‘I fear my master the king. He is the one who has decided your food and drink’” (Daniel 1:9–10). This authority is coming from up, up, up.

“Daniel then spoke to the warden whom the overseer of the court officials had appointed over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah: ‘Please test your servants for ten days by providing us with some vegetables to eat and water to drink. Then compare our appearance with that of the young men who are eating the royal delicacies; deal with us in light of what you see.’ So the warden agreed to their proposal and tested them for ten days” (Daniel 1:11–14).

What I am trying to say is that there is an interesting manner of approach here. Even though you have made up your mind, there can be wisdom in how you communicate it.

Sometimes, when you have made up your mind, you do not even need to communicate it. Communicating it can be the problem—especially when you are dealing with a hostile situation.

Part of the wisdom sometimes may be not communicating it. One of the prayers Paul prayed for a church was that their love would abound more and more “in knowledge and every kind of insight,” or discernment (Philippians 1:9). So we see Daniel communicating his strong decision, his firmness, with skill here. He is saying, “This is the direction I want to go. Test us. See the result.”

Sometimes, until there is a result, you cannot even communicate it. Daniel is saying, “Give it ten days; you are going to see the results. I am making up my mind.”

Sometimes people make up their minds and then need to change the mind they have made up, because after some time, you see that what you decided is not working the way it should. You will need to repent and change your ways. You have made up your mind in this direction; it may be the wrong direction. So the earlier you are able to retrace your steps, even in the thing you said you had made up your mind about, the better.

God bless you.