The Hour He Refused to Move
"Now when Daniel learned that the decree had been published, he went home to his upstairs room where the windows opened toward Jerusalem. Three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to his God, just as he had done before. Then these men went as a group and found Daniel praying and asking God for help."
— Daniel 6:10-11
The men behind this law had a promotion to stop. Their rival was about to be set over the whole kingdom. They combed his conduct in office for anything chargeable and came up empty. So they built a law around the one habit they were sure he would never drop. The ban ran thirty days and no longer, and breaking it meant being thrown to lions. Waiting out four weeks would have cost him nothing that anyone could name. His rivals already knew the routine, which is exactly why the trap worked. According to the account, the order could not be taken back once it was signed. The king worked until sundown looking for a way to save him, and failed. The city he faced had been burned decades earlier, and its temple was gone. He had been carried into that foreign court as a young man. Faith shows in the ordinary thing you keep doing when nobody is making you and it has started to cost.