The first four chapters of Daniel are about Daniel and his three friends
serving under under King Nebuchadnezzar.
Nebuchadnezzar conquered Israel, and took the Jewish people as prisoners,
servants, and slaves back to Babylon, which today is called Iraq.
Nebuchadnezzar reigned 43 years and then died.
Then Nebuchadnezzar's son, Evil-merodach, reigned 2 years.
Then Nebuchadnezzar's son-in-law, Nabonidus, reigned for 17 years.
(Let's do the math: 43+2+17=62 years. We will soon see that this
is important information.)
Nabonidus made his son, Belshazzar, his assistant.
King Nabonidus had to leave Babylon on a business trip. Persia had
take over some of Babylon's trade routes, and Nabonidus went to try to reopen
those routes. He left Belshazzar in charge while he was away.
It seems that Belshazzar was a kid at heart. He was like a teenager,
left home alone, when his parents are away on a trip. "Let's have a
party!!!" And that's what Belshazzar did.
Here is the story about that party in Daniel 5 (New Living Translation).
King Belshazzar
gave a great feast for a thousand of his nobles and drank wine with them.
While Belshazzar was drinking, he gave orders to bring in the gold and silver
cups that his predecessor, Nebuchadnezzar, had taken from the Temple in Jerusalem,
so that he and his nobles, his wives, and his concubines [women from his
harem] might drink from them. So they brought these gold cups taken
from the Temple of God in Jerusalem, and the king and his nobles, his wives,
and his concubines drank from them. They drank toasts from them to
honor their idols made of gold, silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone.
At that very moment they saw the fingers
of a human hand writing on the plaster wall of the king's palace, near the
lampstand. The king himself saw the hand as it wrote...
...and his
face turned pale with fear. Such terror gripped him that his knees knocked
together and his legs gave way beneath him.
The king shouted for the enchanters, astrologers,
and fortune-tellers to be brought before him. He said to these wise men of
Babylon, "Whoever can read this writing and tell me what it means will be
dressed in purple robes of royal honor and will wear a gold chain around
his neck. He will become the third highest ruler in the kingdom!"
Why third highest ruler?
Belshazzar was the second highest ruler. Daddy Nabonidus was number
one.
But when
all the king's wise men came in, none of them could read the writing or tell
him what it meant. So the king grew even more alarmed, and his face
turned ashen white. His nobles, too, were shaken.
But when the queen mother heard what
was happening, she hurried to the banquet hall..
Queen Mother? She was either (1) Belshazzar's mother, Nabonidis'
wife and Nebuchadnezzar's daughter, or she was (2) Belshazzar's grandmother,
Nebuchadnezzar's wife.
She said
to Belshazzar, "Long live the king! Don't be so pale and afraid about this.
There is a man in your kingdom who has within him the spirit of the holy
gods. During Nebuchadnezzar's reign, this man was found to have insight, understanding,
and wisdom as though he himself were a god. Your predecessor, King Nebuchadnezzar,
made him chief over all the magicians, enchanters, astrologers, and fortune-tellers
of Babylon. This man Daniel, whom the king named Belteshazzar, has a sharp
mind and is filled with divine knowledge and understanding. He can interpret
dreams, explain riddles, and solve difficult problems. Call for Daniel, and
he will tell you what the writing means."
Apparently folks in Nabonidus' & Belshazzar's government had forgotten
about Daniel. If Daniel was 18 years old when he was taken captive
and began his training to serve the court of Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 1), he would have been 78 and
80 years old by this time. He was one of the old guys, retired, perhaps
living on a pension for former government staff. His ideas were old
fashioned, and did not fit in with the culture of Belshazzar's generation.
Knowledge may progress, evolve, and change in time. But the wisdom
of past is still valid today. Oh, that we would have sense enough to
learn those lessons of wisdom from God's Word, so that we would not have
learn them the hard way, like Nebuchadnezzar did (Daniel 4), and as Belshazzar was about
experience.
So Daniel
was brought in before the king. The king asked him, "Are you Daniel, who
was exiled from Judah by my predecessor, King Nebuchadnezzar? I have
heard that you have the spirit of the gods within you and that you are filled
with insight, understanding, and wisdom. My wise men and enchanters
have tried to read this writing on the wall, but they cannot. I am
told that you can give interpretations and solve difficult problems.
If you can read these words and tell me their meaning, you will be clothed
in purple robes of royal honor, and you will wear a gold chain around your
neck. You will become the third highest ruler in the kingdom."
Daniel answered the king, "Keep your gifts
or give them to someone else..."
Daniel was not impressed by
Belshazzar's offers of reward. He was too old and too wise to have
any great personal ambitions for promotion, power and wealth. Besides,
Daniel already knew what the writing on the wall meant, and because he knew
the message on the wall, he also knew any reward that Belteshazzar could
offer would be completely worthless.
"...but
I will tell you what the writing means."
Now Daniel begins a little history lesson for Belshazzar.
"Your Majesty,
the Most High God gave sovereignty, majesty, glory, and honor to your predecessor,
Nebuchadnezzar. He made him so great that people of all races and nations
and languages trembled before him in fear. He killed those he wanted to kill
and spared those he wanted to spare. He honored those he wanted to honor
and disgraced those he wanted to disgrace. But when his heart and mind
were hardened with pride, he was brought down from his royal throne and stripped
of his glory. He was driven from human society. He was given the mind
of an animal, and he lived among the wild donkeys. He ate grass like a cow,
and he was drenched with the dew of heaven, until he learned that the Most
High God rules the kingdoms of the world and appoints anyone he desires to
rule over them."
We saw all this in detail in Daniel 4. Now Daniel continues with a
harsh scolding for Belshazzar.
"You are
his successor, O Belshazzar, and you knew all this, yet you have not humbled
yourself. For you have defied the Lord of heaven and have had these
cups from his Temple brought before you. You and your nobles and your wives
and concubines have been drinking wine from them while praising gods of silver,
gold, bronze, iron, wood, and stone--gods that neither see nor hear nor know
anything at all. But you have not honored the God who gives you the breath
of life and controls your destiny! So God has sent this hand to write a message."
Belshazzar knew that history, but he never really understood that the lesson
his grandfather Nebuchadnezzar had to learn through his experience was a
lesson also for Belshazzar - and for all of us.
Nebuchadnezzar was no angel. Nonetheless, God dealt with him, and he
learned a hard lesson. But whatever wisdom and truth Nebuchadnezzar
had learned was not picked up by his grandson. Faithful parents
do not necessarily have faithful children. We see that in the Bible,
...in history, ...and even in our own families.
One wise man said: Good Parents sometimes accept "little sins".
But their children take those "little sins," and they stretch them, and they
swallow them, and they are ruined by them.
St. Paul said: "Do not be fooled.
You cannot mock God. Whatever a man plants, that will he also harvest."
(Galatians 6:7
)
Daniel continues...
"This is
the message that was written: MENE,
MENE, TEKEL, PARSIN.
This is what these words mean:
Mene means `numbered'--God has numbered the days
of your reign and has brought it to an end.
Tekel
means `weighed'--you have been weighed
on the balances and have failed the test.
Parsin
means `divided'--your kingdom has
been divided and given to the Medes and Persians."
Let's set up camp for a while on that middle word: TEKEL = WEIGHED.
Question: How does not decide who gets to go to heaven?
Perhaps the most popular view is that God keeps two lists:
GOOD
DEEDS
_________
_________
_________
|
BAD DEEDS
_________
_________
_________
|
...and if we have more good deeds than bad deeds, we will most certainly
be able to go into heaven. ...and if we have LOTS of bad deeds, then
God will compare our lists with the lists of good and bad deeds of other
people to see if we are better or worse than them.
Another version of this view is that God as a balance scale, in which he
puts all our works, good and bad...
The truth is, like Belshazzar, we have already been weighed and we have all
failed the test.
The good prophet Isaiah, when saw himself standing before a holy God, he
had to admit that he was not so good. "All our righteousnesses is like stinking, dirty
rags." What Isaiah actually wrote in the Hebrew language compared
his "holy acts" to menstrual cloths.
Not a pretty picture!
(Isaiah 64:6)
St. Peter, after he caught a net full of fish through the power of Jesus'
word, told Jesus, "Lord, go away from me!
I am a sinner!" (Luke 8:5)
St. Paul wrote: "I know that nothing
good lives in me...
I do not
do the good things I want to do,
but I do
the bad things I do not want to do. " (Romans 7:18,19
NCV)
So the "bad deeds" side of the scale gets not only bad things we do.
Piled on top of our bad deeds are the good things we should do.
The Bible makes it very, very clear. We all fail the test of the balance
scale. We are guilty, not just because of what we do, but because
of who we are.
Someone once asked British journalist G. K. Chesterton, "What's wrong
with world?"
Chesterton answered: "I am!"
So, how can we go to heaven?
The Bible teaches that
Jesus Christ takes all the bad stuff from
our scale,
and He puts it all on His scale.
And he takes all His own holiness
and he puts it on our scale.
"God made him [Christ] who had no sin to
be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."
(2 Corinthians 5:21)
"Christ carried our sins in body on the
cross so we would stop living for sin and start living for what is right.
And ou are healed because of his wounds." (1 Peter 24 NCV) Click here for an picture of this
verse.
Yes, God has weighed you on His balance. In Christ you pass the test!
What about Belshazzar? Did he repent, as did his grandfather, Nebuchadnezzar?
No... as we see in the way he responded to Daniel's words.
Then at
Belshazzar's command, Daniel was dressed in purple robes, a gold chain was
hung around his neck, and he was proclaimed the third highest ruler in the
kingdom.
Belshazzar was impressed with Daniel's ability to read and interpret the
message on the wall. But the message itself never touched him.
While Belshazzar partied, the engineers of the Persian army were outside
the city walls, digging a canal to change the flow of the river that ran
through the city, under the city walls. The army that conquered Mighty
Babylon didn't need to go over the wall. They only had to go under
it.
That very night Belshazzar, the Babylonian king, was killed. And Darius
the Mede took over the kingdom at the age of sixty-two.
We pray:
Father, help us never forget
that the handwriting
is on the wall
for all
of us.
Same as Belshazzar had his end,
so will we have our
end.
We understand that our own good deeds fall
short.
Same as Belshazzar, we fail the test.
We trust in the promise of Jesus,
that he has taken away
the record of our sins
through
His death on the cross,
And He has given to us
His own perfect holy
record,
credited
to us.
Thank You, Lord!
