²⁹ But Peter and the apostles answered, ^(A)“We must obey God rather than men.

¹⁵ Now if you are ready when ^(A)you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, to fall down and worship the image that I have made, well and good.^[a] But if you do not worship, ^(B)you shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace. And ^(C)who is the god who will deliver you out of my hands?”

^16 (D)Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. ¹⁷ If this be so, ^(E)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.^{[b] 18} But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

⁷ All the ^(A)high officials of the kingdom, the prefects and the satraps, the ^(B)counselors and the governors are agreed that the king should establish an ordinance and enforce an ^(C)injunction, that whoever makes petition to any god or man for thirty days, except to you, O king, shall be cast into the den of lions. ⁸ Now, O king, establish ^(D)the injunction and sign the document, so that it cannot be changed, according to ^(E)the law of ^(F)the Medes and the Persians, ^(G)which cannot be revoked.” ⁹ Therefore King Darius signed the document and ^(H)injunction.

¹⁰ When Daniel knew that the document had been signed, he went to his house where ^(I)he had windows in his upper chamber open ^(J)toward Jerusalem. He got down on his knees ^(K)three times a day and prayed and ^(L)gave thanks before his God, as he had done previously.

¹⁸ So they called them and charged them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. ¹⁹ But Peter and John answered them, ^(A)“Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, ²⁰ for ^(B)we cannot but speak of what ^(C)we have seen and heard.”