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Several years ago, I preached through Daniel, and I was just rereading it, and I thought, I'd love to preach Daniel chapter 5 again.
Fascinating passage. Maddie said, I like it when you teach stories like this because I can understand this a little bit better.
And I said, it's going to be great to just look at Daniel and Belshazzar, the feast, the hand.
We've known this story since we were very small. Those of us that have grown up in any kind of Christian church.
But I think tonight, you'll see some themes that maybe you didn't see at first notice, but now you'll be able to tell, easily come from the text.
How many people here read World Magazine? Some people read World Magazine. Not many. Some do.
Okay. World Magazine, years ago, the writer
Greg Dable said this in World Magazine. Across Nicaragua, and this is 1989, graffiti plastered houses, walls, and public buildings.
The most prevalent campaign slogan everywhere, graffitied, was Daniel 525.
Daniel 525. If you want to look and see what Daniel 525 says, you can.
Take a look at it. And it was invented for this reason. Vote for Daniel Ortega.
He is the fifth position on the ballot on the 25th day of September.
Vote for Daniel Ortega, fifth position on the ballot, 25th day of September.
Daniel 525. Isn't that interesting? Greg goes on to write, but Christians in Nicaragua saw a hidden meaning that only
God, the author of humor, could orchestrate. For Daniel 525 in the Bible reads,
God has numbered the days of your reign and brought it to an end. You have been weighed on the scales and found wanting.
Christians wondered if Daniel Ortega had unwittingly proclaimed the prophecy against his own rule.
The church waited, hoping the prophecy would bring an end, not only to the economic and social destruction of Mr.
Ortega's communist reign, but also an end to the oppression of the local churches.
It goes on, but at the very end, the story reads, Nicaraguans face their second free national elections.
October 20th, international observers were there again to see that the elections went forward as planned, but in the run up to the elections, an air of uncertainty with incumbent president
Violeta Camargo stepping down and Mr. Ortega's entry into the race remained.
Even the most pessimistic political soothsayer did not predict the extent of Mr. Ortega's loss.
He received less than 20 % of the popular vote, a thunderous victory for Mrs. Camargo and the 14 -party
UNO coalition. Daniel 5 .25. Isn't that interesting?
Well, to just dive into the book of Daniel, we have to say a few things, because it's chapter 5 after all, and basically what we're going to see is we're going to see that God is in control.
We've got these exiled people. Is God really going to fulfill His Abrahamic promise?
Can God be trusted? And the theme really throughout all of Daniel, you'll see it raising its head throughout
Daniel. In spite of appearances, God is really in control of the
Israelites, of the world, and even the Israelites who are in Babylon.
And so we come into Daniel chapter 5, and this is about 20 to 25 years after Daniel chapter 4.
So we're moving along. King Nebuchadnezzar's issue in chapter 4, 20 to 25 years later, we are now into Daniel chapter 5.
It's been about 70 years since Daniel chapter 1. Daniel's old, and he's gray, and we'll see him arrive on the scene as well.
If you'd like to have a theme maybe of all the book of Daniel, Daniel chapter 2, verse 21, and it is he who changes
God, who changes the times and epochs. He removes kings and established kings.
He gives wisdom to wise men and knowledge to men of understanding. It's a good message for them, and it's a good message for us.
By the way, I don't know what's going to happen today with the health care legislation, but I can guarantee you this, that no one will die one second earlier than God has decreed based on this health plan passing or not passing.
God is in control. We've been given this government. You might like this government or you might not like this government, but it is
God who does the changing. We'll just submit to them. We come here to chapter 5 to this feast.
Even my Bible, it says, Belshazzar's Feast. We are going to see how
God hates blasphemy, hates idolatry, hates those that worship anyone except Yahweh himself.
Let's just dive right in because that's almost what the text does. It just kind of suddenly and dramatically, it just says,
Belshazzar, the king, held a great feast. Just kind of walk in to this picture.
There's no explanation. We just jump right in. I remember going to the river when we were younger and it's about May, early
May, late April and we know it's still freezing cold and you just have to find yourself at the edge and just say, one, two, three, go.
I remember my friend and I, Scott Labs, would always bring my sister down and we'd say, okay, you know, if you jump in, we'll give you a dollar.
And then she'd jump in and then we'd say, well, we decided not to jump in, you know, you jump in first and we'll jump in.
And here, Belshazzar just jumps straight into the book, out of the book, chapter five,
Belshazzar, the king, held a great feast for a thousand of his nobles and he was drinking wine in the presence of the thousand.
You can study this on your own but the language here, Belshazzar, the king, who is
Belshazzar? Basically, between Nebuchadnezzar and Belshazzar, you have a series of people who were kings.
Belshazzar really isn't even the king of Babylon, he's just this local king.
And you can study this for a long time, the unbeliever said, see, Belshazzar isn't really
Nebuchadnezzar's son, it's all made up, there's nobody in church history or in world history who's named
Belshazzar until 1854, a British council named G .J.
Taylor was exploring southern Iraq and he found an inscription written at the command of Nabonidus, who's
Belshazzar's father, who ruled in Babylon from 555 to 539 BC.
And it says on that little repaired part of the temple, a prayer and long life and good health for Nabonidus and for his eldest son, any guesses?
Belshazzar. I love the way that works out. Nabonidus is the last king of Babylon and he basically says, you run the city for me while I go over here to Arabia.
It's almost like things are hot here, I don't want to stay here, you stay in Massachusetts and take care of Boston while I go down to Florida for the winter, except I'm there for 10 years.
And that's basically what is happening here. And Belshazzar's story begins almost like Nebuchadnezzar's story.
There's all kinds of royal pomp and splendor, there's all kinds of flourishing monarchy, but there's going to be trouble very, very quickly.
Historians say Belshazzar, not even biblical historians, say that he's impious. The stories go that he killed one of his nobles because he was hunting with his friend, the noble, and the friend, the noble, shot the animal before he did and he didn't like it, so he killed his friend.
Tradition also says that at a banquet, he killed one of his best men because one of his concubines, one of Belshazzar's concubines said about this man,
Gadades, that he was handsome. So he was a bad character, he was not very good at all, and you're going to see the tenor of this chapter.
You can see Daniel almost likes Nebuchadnezzar, but he disdains Belshazzar.
You're not going to see any love loss in Daniel's writing when it comes to Belshazzar. So, what happens?
He holds a great feast, fit for a king. Sometimes feasts aren't so good in the
Bible, though. It bodes not so well for some of these royal banquets.
And you can read Genesis chapter 40 for that, or Esther chapter 1, or Mark chapter 6.
This one's not going to do so well either. Why is he having this banquet?
Well, he's been in the city, you've got the enemies who are pretty much right outside the gate, and he's having a huge banquet.
Why? It's feast today because tomorrow we die. We're secure anyway. I think that's more the real reason.
They thought this city was impregnable. It had all kinds of moats around it with 100 fortified gates, and it had not been taken for 1 ,000 years.
So, we're in a city, there's all kinds of invaders outside, and they're going to try to get us, but what do we care?
We'll have a big feast. That's how important we are. That's how strong the city is, and we don't care about the forces.
So, you could probably even see outside the walls. What they did not know was
Cyrus's resourceful commander, I don't even know how to pronounce these people's names,
U -G -B -A -R -U, Ubaru. So, you'd think I'm making that up if I didn't pronounce it.
Ubaru was diverting the waters of the Euphrates so the moat would become not as deep so then they could attack the city.
They're having this huge party. He drank wine before 1 ,000. I found one king who gave a party in 879
B .C. to 69 ,000 people. So, you show how great you are as a king because you've got all this great food and wine and everything else that you can give, and you're such a great king.
Who cares about the chaos that's going on outside the walls? Verse 2, when
Belshazzar tasted the wine, this is like Daytona, start your engines. Nobody drinks until he starts, and you can just see the flags go.
Once he starts, everybody else can join. Let's all watch Belshazzar. Don't drink before he does.
When Belshazzar tasted the wine, he gave orders to bring the gold and silver vessels which Nebuchadnezzar, his father, had taken out, lots of continuity between chapter 4 and 5, which his father had taken out of the temple, which was in Jerusalem, in order that the king, his nobles, his wives, and his concubines might drink from them.
Daniel 5, verse 3, then they brought the gold vessels that had been taken out of the temple, the house of God, which was in Jerusalem, and the king and his nobles and his wives and his concubines drank from them.
They drank the wine and praised the gods of gold and silver, of bronze, iron, wood, and stone.
What do you think is going to happen? I think you know what's going to happen. Let me tell you this to start. You don't typically, if you're going to throw a feast and you're a king like this, invite the ladies in.
You don't invite the ladies in for this kind of feast. So why would he invite the wives and concubines in now?
You usually have the women over here in the harem. They're secluded. They're isolated. They're not around at all.
Why are they there? Well, you can imagine the licentiousness that's going to go on in this bacchanalian feast.
He begins to drink. You know, runners on your mark, get set, go, and off they go.
And he begins to drink out of some of these articles from Jerusalem, almost in disdain, blaspheming
God. And he goes on, yeah, you know what, that God Yahweh that we defeated, let's drink out of some of his gold vessels.
Maybe this is a wonderful way, kind of a novel way to entertain the guests. What should we do? What should we do this time to make it strange or interesting or fantastic?
Oh, we went to the king's feast and besides all the orgiastic things going on, besides all the alcohol, we were drinking from this deceased
God Yahweh's vessels. That'll be a good way to entertain the guests.
Here you've had these vessels, probably put in some kind of drawer someplace, 47 years, put to the side.
We're just going to keep those. And now they bring it out and they begin to what? Praise their gods.
By the way, look at verse four, praise the gods of gold and silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone.
That's not the gods they serve. They serve Marduk. They serve Bel. They worship
Nebo. They worship Ishtar. But Daniel writing knows like a good
Jew, like a good Christian, when you're going to say we're going to worship the god of Marduk, that's really a fake god.
It's just gold. It's just silver. It's not really a god.
Daniel writing as a monotheist knows that it's just all pagan imagination. There's no genuine god there at all.
And look, it says in verse three again, then they brought the gold vessels that had been taken out of the temple. This man has nothing on Herod.
You say, which Herod? I don't know. Pick one. They're all vain. The audacity of this man.
They drank the wine, praised the gods, shouted praises. And then verse five, suddenly the fingers of a man's hand emerged, began writing opposite the lamp stand on the plaster of the wall in the king's palace.
And the king saw the back of the hand that did the writing, sacrilegious, blasphemous, shouting praise songs to their god.
This man's hand emerged. You're going to take your hands and praise these false gods by holding these goblets and saying to Marduk?
Well, there's going to be another hand that's going to give judgment. By the way, this isn't God's hand.
People say this is somehow God's hand. I don't think this is God's hand. Does God have a hand? Well, Jesus has a hand.
You know, try to explain this to a kid. Does God have a body? And then they're like, well, Jesus is God. Jesus has a body.
This is not God the Spirit's hand, but this is a hand from God. It's supernatural.
This is not, well, he's in a drunken stupor and he sees a hand, but it's not really a hand.
Is that how the text looks? The fingers of a man's hand emerged. It's not from Belshazzar's perspective.
No, it's some kind of hand. Something supernatural is going on. This is not, you know, we've got a stain.
Let's see, do we have any stains here? Stains up in the tile? And, you know, wouldn't it be funny if one of those stains up there and the roof started to look like the
Virgin Mary or something? What would we do here at this church, really? There's a thousand different stains all across the world that look like a
Virgin Mary, and I'm just hoping it's not going to be at Bethlehem Bible Church because we'll have a lot of splaining to do.
That's certainly true. Nothing in the text makes it sound like it's some kind of weird vision.
This is some supernatural thing from God. It's a hand from God. And you can just see the way it's set up with the candelabra, certainly illuminating with the lampstand, and began writing opposite the lampstand on the plaster of the wall on the king's palace.
By the way, what is written on the king's palace walls generally? What do you write on there?
Old conquests. Victories. This is who I've conquered. This is how
I've conquered. And right on that, there's going to be another one who's conquered, but his name is going to be Bel Shazar.
Most everyone says, including Exposers Bible Commentary, perpetually recurring recital of tiles, victories, and exploits remind the spectator at every point of the regal greatness.
And here you have all my legends. Here's all Bel Shazar's legends up here. See, read it there, and all of a sudden, that's where that hand is.
I find that quite interesting. What don't you see in the text?
Smoke. Trumpets. Thunder from heaven.
Some kind of mist. Suddenly, the fingers of a man's hand emerged and began writing.
Did anybody else see this? Just the king? Was it just part of the fingers?
Was he sitting higher than the rest? I'm wondering if he sees something across the way, and they're just looking at the king, and he sees it.
I wonder what the king looked like. We do know what he looks like, verse 6.
Then the king's face grew pale. Ever seen someone who had a stroke?
That's basically what happened. And his thoughts alarmed him. No longer the prideful
Bel Shazar. These are all my conquests. And his thoughts alarmed him, and his hip joints went slack.
His knees began knocking together. He was terrified. He turned pale. I can just imagine, as everybody's partying, laughing, here's all the kind of drunken revelry that's going on.
Is that right? Revelry? I was going to say, what's the thing you play with a bugle? That's right.
It's not that. You can imagine, it just all stops. The dancing girls stop. They're motionless.
Musicians aren't playing. Waiters must be kind of stopping, short, looking.
I have my notes here. Sorry for the pop culture references. The sounds of silence are being played.
Or for those of you that didn't laugh on that one, there's a kind of hush. You could hear a pin drop now.
It's Sunday night. We kind of let our hair down. No tie. Verse 7, the king called aloud to bring in the
Caldeans and the Diviners. The king spoke and said to the wise men of Babylon, any man who can read this inscription and explain its interpretation to me will be clothed with purple, have a necklace of gold around his neck, and have authority as third ruler in the kingdom.
One will be the third ruler. That is to say, there's the king, who's down in Palm Springs.
I'm the local regent and Daniel's third. He's going to get a lot because I'm afraid.
His offer shows that he's very petrified. Purple, royal color, he gets all the stuff.
Then what happened? All the king's men came in, but they could not read the inscription or make known its interpretation to the king.
Then Belshazzar, remember he's already had his knees knocking, his hip joints going. He was greatly alarmed.
His face grew even paler and his nobles were perplexed. Maybe they can't see it.
Maybe it's some kind of abbreviation. Some say it's unpointed consonants.
They can't read it out. Maybe some kind of code they don't understand. Some weird shape.
The queen entered the banquet hall because of the word of the king and his nobles.
This is like the queen mother. The queen spoke and said, pull yourself together, especially in front of all these people.
Oh, king, live forever. Do not let your thoughts alarm you or your face be pale. She doesn't need any protocol to enter.
She's the queen mother. She talks more like a mom than a wife, doesn't she? There's a man in your kingdom of whom there's a spirit of the holy gods.
In the days of your father, illumination, insight, wisdom, like the wisdom of gods were found in him.
King Nebuchadnezzar, your father, your father of the king, appointed him chief of the magicians, conjurers,
Chaldeans, and diviners. He could figure out anything. Get him.
This, verse 12, was because an extraordinary spirit, this is interesting that she would know all this, knowledge and insight, interpretation of dreams, explanations of knots, literally, things tied up in a knot, enigmas, knotty mysteries, explanation of enigmas and solving of difficult problems were found in this
Daniel whom the king named Belteshazzar. Let Daniel now be summoned and he will declare the interpretation.
Now he either knew about this man, he had forgotten about this man, or he knew if he called this man, this man would give him a divine judgment message.
So maybe he doesn't want to call him, but what are you going to do? Then Daniel was brought in before the king, in his 80s maybe by now.
The king spoke and said to Daniel, are you that Daniel who is the one of the exiles from Judah, whom my father, the king, brought from Judah?
Hear his language? By the way, I'm the king, you're the captive. From Judah, the captive.
Calvin said he interrogates him as if he were a prisoner. I'm going to put you in your place. Don't forget I'm the king before you give me this interpretation.
I've heard about this spirit of the gods that's in you, verse 14. Brought in all my wise men, verse 15.
They can't know it. Verse 16, but I personally have heard about you.
You're able to give interpretations and solve difficult problems. Now if you're able to read the inscription and make its interpretation known to me, you'll be clothed with purple and wear a necklace of gold around your neck and you'll have authority as the third ruler in the kingdom.
Daniel said, and you've got to love this. Then Daniel answered and said before the king, keep your gifts for yourself or give your rewards to someone else.
However, I will read the inscription to the king and make the interpretation known. I'm not for hire like those other charlatans.
You can't buy me. One man said financial dependence on the listeners threatens constraints upon a speaker.
Let me say that again. Financial dependence on the listeners threatens constraints upon a speaker.
I'll never forget as long as I live, there was a church in Chicago with a master's seminary graduate at the church.
And this really, really rich man built the church. And when I said, I mean built the church, he paid for all the land.
There was duck ponds, bridges. It was one of the most deluxe churches I'd ever been in.
And I had been in it at a ballast or big conference. I remember sitting up next to Alistair and there's the man who built the church.
His daughter was going to unbiblically leave her husband. And then the church said, we're going to have to discipline your daughter.
And then the dad said, if you discipline my daughter, I will bury you in lawsuits and close the doors of the church.
And I remember that particular pastor calling pastor MacArthur saying, what do I do? And John saying, you know what to do.
So financial dependence on listeners threatens constraints upon a speaker. Maybe Daniel knew you're surrounded outside anyway.
It's not going to last long. You can give me keys to the kingdom, but it's over anyway. So third in charge isn't going to do me much good when everything's going to collapse.
Oh, king, the most high God, verse 18, granted sovereignty, grandeur, glory, and majesty to Nebuchadnezzar, your father.
By the way, you remember Nebuchadnezzar? It wasn't because he was smarter, more intelligent. He had a good pedigree.
He had more education. He had some kind of talents. He had a good operation of the empire.
He was an object of God's mercy. God granted to him all those things. You should have learned that lesson by the way he's implying because of the grandeur on verse 19, which he bestowed on him.
All the people's nations, men of every language feared and trembled before him. Whomever he wished he killed and whomever he wished he spared alive and whomever he wished he elevated and whomever he wished he humbled.
But when his heart was lifted up, you can see he's almost preaching to him now and his spirit became so proud that he behaved arrogantly.
He was deposed from his royal throne and his glory was taken away from him. Your next is basically what he's saying.
He was driven away from mankind and his heart was made like that of beasts. His dwelling places were the wild donkeys.
He's given grass to eat like cattle. The body was drenched with the dew of heaven until he recognized that the most high
God is ruler over the realm of mankind and that he sets over it whomever he wishes.
And now here comes the but, here comes the yet. Yet you, his son, Belshazzar, have not humbled your heart even though you knew all this.
Proverbs says a man who hardens his neck after much reproof will suddenly be broken beyond remedy.
Leaders get like this. Mussolini said that he worshiped no God save my own sovereign will.
That's exactly the way this man's acting. I'm not going to worship any God. I'll worship me. True or false?
Pride is a kind of plagiarism. It's a kind of stealing. It's true.
True or false? Pride is a form of insanity. Losing touch with reality.
Who's really God and who's really the created being? Sanity is, oh,
I see things as they are. God's a creator. God's holy. I'm finite. I'm fallen. Doesn't this whole chapter 5 reek of these words?
Tell me where I'm reading. Although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him.
But their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal
God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
Therefore, God gave them over in their sinful desires of their hearts to impurity, to shameful lusts, and to a depraved mind.
Romans 1. By the way, if you ever take a test in your entire life for theology, you don't know the answer, you just say
Romans 1. Because nine times out of ten, you're going to get that right. For us, sooner or later, everyone will be humbled before God and acknowledge his sovereignty.
He should have known what happened in chapter 4. It was 20 years ago, but he should have known. He didn't want to understand.
Look back in chapter 4, if you would, just for a minute. I thought that was fascinating to just see what happens.
Verse 26 of chapter 4, and in that it was commanded to leave the stump with the roots of the tree, your kingdom will be assured to you after you recognize that it is heaven that rules.
Isn't that a neat? Heaven rules. Lots of times you think, well, we don't really want to say as a Jew, God rules.
We don't want to say the word God, so we'll say heaven, but I love that statement. Heaven rules.
When you get that, you get everything. By the way, this has nothing to do with this particular context, but if you get that concept, not in just history alone, but in salvation, you'll get everything.
Heaven rules. Not just the way people are ordained to live in this world, but how
God ordains who goes to heaven and who doesn't. Heaven rules. You're going to learn a lot.
Belshazzar is just like Nebuchadnezzar, except worse. Look back at verse 30 of chapter 4.
Is this not Babylon the great, which I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?
So what happens when you marry a woman who's from the mountains, and now she's got to live with you in the desert, and you have to make the desert look like mountains?
Seventh wonder of the world. He didn't say, I'm indebted to you,
God. I know you've given me all these things. I'm a recipient. What do I have that I haven't received?
No. Nebuchadnezzar called his palace the marvel of mankind, the dwelling of majesty, the shining residence.
And then verse 31, while the word was in the king's mouth, cat got your tongue, a voice from heaven came, saying,
King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is declared, sovereignty has been removed from you. So here Nebuchadnezzar hears this audible voice.
Belshazzar saw some kind of real thing. You can't escape judgment from God unless you give him due honor.
Now back to Deuteronomy. Daniel chapter 5, verse 22. So what happens?
Yet you, his son, Belshazzar, have not humbled your heart even though you knew all this.
You've exalted yourself against the Lord of heaven. They brought the vessels of his house before you.
And you and your nobles, your wives, your concubines, have been drinking from them. It's not just pride, it's blasphemy now.
You've praised the gods of silver, gold, bronze, iron, wood, stone, which do not see.
Can't you hear Isaiah here? Which do not see, hear, or understand. But the
God in whose hand are your life, breath, and your ways, you have not glorified.
Then the hand was sent from him, and his inscription was written out. Here's the tombstone.
Here's the epitaph on his grave, basically. The inscription, verse 25. Now this is the inscription that was written out.
Basically it's units of money, but it's in kind of a funny tense. By the way, what do
I not see in this passage here? I do not see Belshazzar drinking more wine. I do not see laughter, comedy, hearty har har.
Look who's laughing now. No, look who's not laughing now. Here's the inscription. Basically it's a mina, mina, a shekel, and a half.
Except it's got to be interpreted a little bit, and so it would be literally translated, numbered, numbered, weighed, and divided.
Numbered, numbered, weighed, and divided. Mene, mene, tekel, ufarsim. Numbered, numbered, weighed, and divided.
Nouns that needed to be translated, and here's the interpretation of the message, verse 26. Mene. By the way, don't you like it when you get the interpretation?
Like when Jesus interprets his own parable? What are those lampstands in Revelation? Oh, you read the next verse, you go, oh, there it is.
I guarantee you I know what mene means. Verse 26. God has numbered your kingdom and put an end to it.
It would have been predetermined, but here it's coming to an end. It's like the numbering of your days in Psalm 90.
We count birthdays. Psalm 90 you personally count every day.
It's going to happen tonight, Belshazzar. You're done. Enough is enough. God is patient, but his patience does have an end, and everything's going to come to a screeching halt tonight.
All systems are going to get shut down. Your kingdom's over tonight. Verse 27. Tekel. You have been weighed on the scales and found literally too light.
I'll never forget as long as I live. You could probably listen to this someday. Type online in Google, Donald Gray Barnhouse, the scales of God audio, and listen to it.
You need to listen to that. Who's heard that? What have I taught you for the last 13 years?
The scales of God, and you can imagine some weighing scales, and if you put down the righteousness of Christ, God's holy law, all his demands, you're going to be found too light.
You can put baptism. You can put, I'm good. You can put, I'm nice. You can put, I'm confirmed.
I'm catechized. I'm all these things, and it's not going to be enough. You've been weighed and found too light.
Barnhouse does a great job. It's very evangelistic, and you need to hear that message, the scales of God.
You've been weighed, and you've found too light. 1 Samuel 2, it says of God, with him actions are weighed.
And number three, what the translation is found in verse 28, Perez, your kingdom has been divided and given over to the
Medes and Persians. Yeah, they're besieging the city in like five minutes.
Belshazzar gave orders. They clothed Daniel with purple, put a necklace of gold around his neck, issued a proclamation concerning him that he now had authority as the third ruler in the kingdom.
Verse 30, that same night, Belshazzar, the
Chaldean king, was slain. Tradition says, according to Herodotus and Xenophon, Daniel's report of the suddenness of his attack was true, wiped out, gone, dead.
Verse 31, kind of a very interesting postscript almost, so Darius the Mede received the kingdom at about the age of 62.
Pretty fascinating passage. Now, I'm going to ask you, if you had to tell me what's a takeaway from this passage, some principle, something that you'd say this would be a good lesson to learn.
It doesn't have to be the only point that the passage is trying to teach, that God's in control, and He's in control over the history of pagan empires.
Pagan rulers aren't going to frustrate the designs of God. You don't have to give me that one, but just give me another practical thing that you could say, based on this, here's a good practical application, a good takeaway.
If you're going to teach this in Sunday school, now I'm going to ask you. Scott, God hates pride.
And where could you go to talk about that someplace in Scripture? Pardon me?
Oh, you're going to go here at BBC. Good. I meant we're in the Bible. There's lots of places that the
Bible talks about God hating pride, because we're recipients, like we talked about earlier. Okay, good.
God hates pride. It's a deadly sin. It's an evil sin.
It doesn't recognize the grace of God in our lives. Thinking that it's unmerited favor.
It takes credit for something that God has given us. Okay, what else?
It's another lesson. Yes. God is in control of everything. That night, that very night.
I love it in chapter 4. Those words are out of Nebuchadnezzar's mouth, and then here's what happens. And here's the big party, and he's looking around.
This is all these people that I'm in charge of, and they're all here for me, and we don't care. We're the best. And then that moment, he sees something.
He turns pale. Good. All right. Yes. Okay, good.
As soon as you stop giving credit to whom credit is due, God will remind you. By the way, just a quick comment on that before we go any farther.
Do you think it's ever possible that God could let you go a little bit into the wilderness that you've been wanting to go to, so that sooner or later you might say,
I need to run back to God and his covering? Let me use an illustration and maybe describe it a little bit better.
Remember, Kim and I would walk through the Mount Hermon forest with the kids. So you tell the kids, you can go up as far as you want, but you have to make sure you can see mom and dad.
If you go too far, you can't see us. You've gone too far. And of course, it's always who can be first.
The dog wants to be first. You know, and then one of the, I mentioned another kids, but I already mentioned Maddie tonight, so she gets a buck.
I don't want to mention anybody else's name. But other people that I know, young men try to be going first.
Luke, that's worth that I know. And then it's fun, isn't it? As a parent, you know, don't go too far, don't get too far ahead.
And then all of a sudden you go, well, there's only one way to learn a lesson. And so you see a big redwood tree and you slip behind the redwood tree and you go, just wait a little bit.
What do you do? You see in about three minutes the kids running full blast, dad.
And then you jump out and scare them and say, I told you not to do that. Then you're close and they don't strangle, strangle.
They don't straggle off strangling the kids. DSS calls me.
I had a whole sermon about strangling the kids. It's the same thing here. I think
God has even ordained. If you want to walk without recognizing me as God and father and provider, then we'll ordain this, this, this, this disobedience that goes far ahead.
You want to do that? I'll let you do it. So then soon enough you come running back and stay close to me. Yes. Next.
Yes. God will not be mocked straight out of Galatians.
God will not be mocked. By the way, isn't that a refreshing thing to know that in spite of all the mocking that God receives today by all the secular culture, that one day the great adjudication day, the great white, great white throne judgment, there'll be no more mocking.
By the way, that's one reason why I know there'll be no one believers in heaven because all the believer, all the people in heaven are going to be praising
God, not mocking him. Okay. Yes. Right. Think about Daniel.
He could have been 85 years old. And what do we do with 85 year old people?
What do you say, Guido? Retire him. How old are you, Guido? 81. Talk to me in four years.
You're just a young whippersnapper. I've said this many times before, and I'll say it again.
Now, if I have to offend people at Bethlehem Bible Church with a musical style,
I'd much rather offend a 20 year old than I would a 70 year old. In other words, people say, yeah,
I don't really like the music, you know, because it's not rock and roll enough. If I play rock and roll music on Sunday morning for worship services, who am
I going to drive out? I'm going to drive out the godly, the mature, the gray hair, the ones that can help minister, the ones that can come alongside the 20 year old and say, by the way, your desire for rock music on Sunday morning is nothing more than immature selfishness.
And so get a life. And when you get into your car, listen to Striper. I mean, what are you going to do? I need those people.
I don't need the 20 year olds who look around like Tommy Nelson says, just kind of like this, not knowing what to do.
How old are you guys? Some of you, I'm sorry. You're more mature than the typical 20 year olds. Isn't it good to know you have a ministry until you're gone?
I said to Dottie last night, I said, you know, Harold's gone, but you have a ministry.
Even last Sunday, she was here teaching the ladies. You have a ministry here until the Lord calls you home.
So don't say, you know, I might as well go home now and be with Harold and the Lord. It's a good thing to be with the
Lord and to be with Harold, but it's not a good thing to long for that. So you're no earthly good. And so it was sweet for me to just talk to Dottie and you could tell
I'm here for a reason. I have a ministry. All right, next,
Josh, something that's made and manufactured.
So if you come to my house, you'll see those idols that I have there. Every time I go to a different country, I buy a little wooden idol and I set them there.
And of course, Kim always sets them down. It's kind of like when, when God's see, you know, the great God Dagon's laying on his face and you think, let's just worship that God.
But again, of course, for us in America, it's not necessarily a little goddess. It's somebody called a team called like the
Red Sox or something like that. I'm quite convinced that one of the biggest idols in all of the
USA is sports. It just comes in different flavors. It's the idolatry of sports, passion, money, thoughts.
You can listen to sports talk all day long. Sometimes I do, but it's just constantly, it's like a commentary on the
Bible. You know, we listen to, we listen to Chuck Swindoll talk about the Bible. You can turn to 98 .5
and just listen to commentary about your latest idol because you want to understand all that and the same kind of God that we can make and warm and worship.
And then we, the other half of that God, we, we put in the fire and are warmed by it. Actually, Colossians chapter three talks about idolatry and covetousness is greed.
That's what greed is. It's idolatry and covetous. Okay, good, good answers. Bruce, those who are faithful stand out in the crowd for better and for worse.
They stand out as a bullseye, but they stand out and God sees and God knows. That's excellent.
By the way, as the culture gets worse, real Christians are going to do better.
That is to say, it's not going to be like the South where you go, Oh, we're all born again Christians because we're
Southern Baptists. It's going to cost you. And the day we have to pay money because we're a Christian, a special excise tax, it's going to be a great day.
It's going to be a great day for Christianity because when you persecute the church, it flourishes because real
Christians stand up and God is going to build his church and the gates of death cannot stop it. Excellent. Steve, that's a great point.
And by the way, if these gods were so great, why couldn't they interpret what was going on? Ask Marduk.
Excellent. Yes, Russ. I think Belshazzar God was himself.
People say, I'm going to worship Marduk, but I think he was really worshiping himself, maybe even above Marduk.
But that is at the top of the list. No other gods. It's good insight here. Maybe I should do this more often.
I have to study less and just, you know, the last ten minutes, just ask you. Yeah, keep the questions easy.
Any other applications here? Yes. God will punish wickedness and sin.
Maybe not right away. Maybe slowly. Maybe later. Maybe everything won't be taken care of until the
Great White Throne. But by the way, every sin that's ever been committed in this universe will be punished by that person who committed it or by Jesus Christ.
Every single sin. Okay. Anything else?
Any other last points? I have one last scripture I want to go to. Maybe you could talk about drunkenness as a sin.
Maybe you could talk about God as patient. Maybe you could talk about other things.
Let me just show you one last thing. Please turn to Luke chapter 12. Luke chapter 12.
Here's my final takeaway application point. I think Swindoll does that a lot.
He teaches through a passage and then he gives three takeaways. So we had about eight takeaways tonight. But here's the last one.
Luke chapter 12. In the context of covetousness, verse 13, someone in the crowd said to him,
Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me. But he said to him, Man, who appointed me a judge or arbitrator over you?
Then he said to them, Beware and be on your guard against every form of greed, for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of possessions.
By the way, you can be greedy whether you're poor or rich. Just a reminder of that yesterday when
I went to Cumberland Farms and you have to stand in this huge line because people need to buy seven dollar cigarettes and spend fifty dollars on scratchers.
Sometimes I say it out loud depending on how big the person is. But I just think, you know, the lottery is for poor, stupid, greedy people.
It usually doesn't go over so big. Pardon me? It is now.
And if it's on Google, it's there for the rest of our lives. Verse 16.
And he told them a parable saying the land of a rich man was very productive. And he began reasoning to himself,
What should I do since I have no place to store my crops? There's a hint of Belshazzar in here. Then he said,
This is what I will do. I will tear down my barns and build larger ones. And there I'll store all my grain and my goods.
I will say to my soul, soul, Belshazzar, you have many goods laid out for many years to come.
Nobody's going to destroy you outside. This city hasn't been taken for a thousand years.
You got moats. You got walls and fortresses. Take your ease.
Have a bacchanalian feast. Eat, drink, and be merry. But God said to him,
I mean, this is the eternal version of the temporal Belshazzar version.
You fool. By the way, I hope this doesn't apply to anybody here tonight.
You fool. This very night your soul is required of you. And now, who will own what you have prepared?
So is the man who stores up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.
All our riches are found in Christ Jesus. And if you don't have Christ Jesus, you are a spiritual bankrupt person.
Very, very poor. But those of you who have Christ Jesus, you have riches. You have the co -inheritance with Christ Jesus.
May no one here at Bethlehem Bible Church tonight be the fool who is without Christ Jesus and is not born again.
Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, would you help us as we learn the lessons so seen in someone else with ugliness.
How ugly is Belshazzar. But Lord, we don't want to do the same things he did, except we are even
Christians. So would you help us not to be covetous, not to be idolatrous, not to trust in self, not to be greedy.
Lord, help us to look to you. We don't want to act foolish now, even as Christians. Thank you that you are sovereign over everything.
Thank you that the judgment meant for us, Christ intercepted. Thank you that we don't have to rely on secular wisdom.
Thank you that Calvary kills pride, so make it happen in our lives, even more.
And Lord, I pray for someone here tonight who is not a Christian, and they are prideful and have self -righteousness.
I pray that you would help them consider them their souls, that you would grant them repentance and faith under the