Daniel 5 - Application Over Accommodation

Tom Shrader examines Daniel 5 and the famous handwriting on the wall incident during Belshazzar's feast. He contrasts Belshazzar's prideful response to God's judgment with Daniel's unwavering integrity at age 80, emphasizing that pride is the root of all sin and that God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. The teaching challenges believers to maintain faithfulness regardless of age or circumstances.

“The number one sin in your life, in my life, our life, is pride. And everything else flows from it.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: Integrity Under Fire (2005)

Recorded: March 10, 2005

Duration: 46 min

Themes: pride, humility, integrity, faithfulness, judgment, grace, character, steadfastness, struggling with pride, facing moral compromise, aging believer, workplace ethics, counter cultural living, mentor, elder, long time christian

Scripture: Daniel 5, Daniel 4, 1 Corinthians 15, Matthew 5:3, Matthew 5:20

Theological Themes: divine judgment, god's sovereignty, sanctification, spiritual maturity, biblical integrity, old testament narrative, god's grace, christian distinctiveness

Full Transcript

Open your Bibles to Daniel chapter 5. We're working our way through a study of the first six chapters of the book of Daniel, and we've titled this series "Integrity Under Fire."

Let me spend a little time reinforcing what you already know. When we talk about integrity, what we mean is the set of convictions that we have developed and coupled with the execution of implementing those in our life. So for you and me as Christians, we have this handbook, this Bible that comes along and says, "Do this and don't do this, live this way, don't live that way." These ought to be core things that you do in your life. On top of all that, what's most important—and we'll talk about it later—is the attitude of your heart.

There is a tendency, and we spend really our whole life trying to beat this down, to isolate that thought process to Sunday morning or to church. That's not enough. You and I are Christians, and because we're Christians—when I say "you and I," I'm speaking very generously here—my assumption is that in this room there are some of you who are not Christians. You either know it or in the course of a day like today you'll become aware of it. As Christians, we don't have the privilege of saying, "Well, there's a compartment of my life over here, this spiritual thing, but then I go out into the business world and that's different, or I'm single and I begin to date and that's different." No, as a Christian, that Christianity affects every aspect of my life.

So there's a distinctiveness to the way we live. We are—and some of you who are involved at our church are going to see an overlap here—we're studying the Sermon on the Mount right now, which is the Magna Carta of our counter-Christian living. It says we are different. We're counter-culture.

We Are Counter-Culture From the Very Beginning

By the way, let me show you something very interesting. How counter-culture are we? The first verse of the first book of this Bible says, "In the beginning God created heaven and earth." That's counter-culture right there. We didn't get by the first verse without bumping against the culture we live in. So we're counter-culture. We're swimming upstream.

Jerry Colangelo a couple years ago said this: "I will tell you categorically that as the stakes have increased in sports, more opportunities have popped up for people in every area of the industry to bend the rules, to take shortcuts. The ethics of business have deteriorated. The business seems not only to have in the earlier days been more innocent, but also more ethical."

So there's the strain. You live in a world—this isn't hard to see—you live in a bottom-line world. When you leave here and you go to the sales meeting today, they don't care how you look. They don't care what's going on at home. They don't care how much sleep you got. They want to know how many deals did you close, how many deals are pending, and what have you got in the pipeline right now. The other stuff's fine and we'll mess around with it because it may have some effect on the bottom line, but in business—and I want you to understand this—in the world setting, in business, the bottom line is the bottom line. That's how you're measured.

The World's Bottom-Line Mentality

It's not just there. When I pick up the sports page, I'm looking to say, did he win? Did he lose? I don't want to hear about your knee hurting. Did you win it or did you lose it? I want to know how many runs you gave up. I want to know what you shot. I don't care if the wind blew. It blew for everybody. That's the way we begin to think.

A Christian comes to this and says, "No, the process is more important than the bottom line." The bottom line takes care of itself. For us, as we turn to say Jesus is Lord, for us as slaves, what we need to understand is what God wants from us is our obedience.

Christianity Is About Belief, Not Just Behavior

Now, really important—we camp on here for a second, then we'll move on. When we talk about Christianity, however, we are not talking about behavior. We're talking about belief. We're talking about what you believe as being more important than how you behave. I'm not trying to disconnect the two, because what you believe must affect how you behave. But you have all sorts of people who are not Christians who are going around acting in some sort of an ethical way. They'll feed the hungry, or they'll get some turkeys together at Thanksgiving, or they'll help rebuild a house, they'll do some extreme makeover, or they'll do whatever these things are, and we tend to identify those as Christian. Those are works that are done by a person who's not a Christian.

A Christian is somebody who believes that they have sinned, their sin has separated them from God, there's nothing that they can do to appease the Holy God, and that's why Jesus came, died—and let's add something very important—and rose again. Here's what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15: "If there's no resurrection of the dead, then Christ hasn't been raised, and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, and your faith is also in vain." The word "vain" there means useless. It's of no value.

If Christ didn't rise from the dead, then this whole thing is a waste of time. If Christ didn't rise from the dead, clearly my teaching has no value to it, and our faith is absolutely useless. Why? Because the Christian faith is based on the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

I give you this heads up every year. We're heading toward Easter. As we do, you'll see stuff in the newspaper, you'll hear stories on the radio and on television, and you'll see people who say they're Christians, who say they don't believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ. Well, according to the Scripture then, they aren't Christians at all. Because if I confess with my mouth that Jesus is Lord, and

believe in my heart that God raised Him from the dead, I will be saved. In other words, if I don't believe that Jesus rose from the dead, I'm not a Christian. I may call myself a Christian, my church may say I'm a Christian, they may ordain me as a Christian, but the Bible says no.

So when we talk about Christianity, I like to add the term Biblical Christianity. Biblical Christianity is believing what the Bible says to be true, planning for my life and death accordingly. And that doctrine drives my behavior. That's what we're talking about. Integrity, integrity under fire.

A Historic Faith

I love this story today, and I'll tell you why. Because I can give you the date that it occurred. It was October 12, 539 B.C. The reason I love to be able to tell you the date is to be able to show you this is a historic event. Our Christian faith is a historic faith. These aren't a bunch of cute little stories that some ancient minds assembled because that primitive mind couldn't grasp these great big truths. These are actual occurrences. And you and I have the privilege sitting here, what, 2,500 years later of stopping and looking and seeing and studying these and applying them to our own life.

Let me give you a little background as we turn to Daniel chapter 5. We have in our study had a couple of heroes or role models. Daniel himself, though remember he was totally absent in chapter 3, and Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego became the focus of that study. Then last time in chapter 4, the hero or the role model was Nebuchadnezzar.

We fast forward now. Nebuchadnezzar is now dead 23, 24 years. There are two kings at this time. One is passive. He's the silent king, the silent partner, not around much, not an issue. The king that's really running everything is Nebuchadnezzar's grandson. His name is Belshazzar.

Enter King Belshazzar

Belshazzar, you'll see here, will be identified as Nebuchadnezzar's son. The word that's translated here, father, could be translated grandfather, ancestor. As we put it together, we see Nebuchadnezzar is Belshazzar's grandpa. So there's a new king in town.

Daniel's off the scene. He's gone. Daniel at this point is about 80 years old. So he's gone, though still alive and about to burst onto the scene yet again.

Look with me at verse 1. "King Belshazzar gave a great banquet for a thousand of his nobles and drank wine with them. And while Belshazzar was drinking his wine, he gave orders to bring in the gold and silver goblets that Nebuchadnezzar, his father, his grandpa, had taken from the temple in Jerusalem so that the kings and the nobles and their wives and concubines might drink from them. So they brought in the gold goblets that had been taken from the temple of God in Jerusalem and his kings and nobles, their wives, concubines drank from them. And as they drank the wine, they praised the gods of gold, silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone."

A Wild Party

Here's what's happening. You've got a gigantic party going on. And I'm going to suggest to you it was a wild affair. Lots of booze, probably a little bit of sex going on, and these guys are pretty well liquored up.

It doesn't say that, does it? Let me show you how I know it's a wild party. If you look at verse 2 and verse 3, you brought your wife and your girlfriend. That's a big deal right there. You're bringing your wife and you're bringing a girlfriend and you're getting it on together. It's a party time.

Second thing is, these guys are lit up pretty well. How do I know? They are toasting the God of wood. Now, in all my drinking days, I got loaded a lot, but I never said, here's to the God of wood. I think we can unpack it for you a little bit.

They're in the city. Remember the city? The walls of the city, 350 feet high, 87 feet wide, used to raise chariots around them. It was a secure area, impenetrable by any sort of opposition. The Euphrates River ran through the town, so they had plenty of water, plenty of food, plenty of growing time.

The Problem with Inherited Wealth

And now, here's what happens. After a while, you've seen it. Some of you are in the process of taking businesses or finance or wealth or resources that you've earned, and you're getting ready to pass them on to the next generation and the next generation. Typically, that doesn't work very well. Here's old Belshazzar, and he's had a pretty easy life, so there's not much left to do but party.

Again, archaeologists have uncovered the room that this probably took place in. And on the wall, about 10 feet up, would be an area that would be carved out, and that's where the king and his entourage would sit. So there's Belshazzar and his wives and his girlfriends and his friends, and all this is going on. And they're drinking.

I'm going to suggest to you, I think, that as they begin to praise the gods of gold and silver and bronze and iron and wood and stone, those are the things that are important to them. As you drink often, I think there's a tendency to sometimes get a little philosophical, isn't there? And they go back.

Personal Application on Drinking

God saved me. This was interesting, because I'm March 25th anniversary as a Christian, March 6, 1980. Another significant day was December 11, 1980, was the last day that I had a drink. We don't take a position in here. God says don't get drunk. If you want to have a drink, there's certain freedoms that go with that. There's just warnings that I would give you that go along with it as well.

Saved in March, quit drinking in December. There's some time in there when I'm a Christian and drinking. And one day, I pick up the newspaper and it says, Prescott Downs, that's the racetrack up in Prescott, horse racing, is having quarter hot dog nickel beer Friday. I'm a little bit of a health food nut, so I grab my guy. We get our administrative assistant and say we got important tasks for you today. You be the driver. And we're going to Prescott Downs for the races.

So we drink all day. We're coming out. Some of you have been

to Prescott recently, or maybe you just moved here. Well, that Prescott that's there now is nothing like the Prescott that was there 25 years ago. As you drove in, there was basically one place to stop, and that was the Circle K. It's still there.

We're coming out of Prescott. We get by the Circle K. I said, you need to stop at the Circle K. We need to get some trail juice. We don't know how this is going to be. If we break down or something, we better have something to drink on the way back down.

We're coming back down. And I remember this so vividly. We get to Dunlap and the freeway. I'm in the back. They're in the front. And this is the culmination of this philosophical discussion. And I said, pronounced, declarative statement, exclamation point, Jesus Christ has changed my life. The guy in the front, and I have to take out a couple of words, but the guy in the front turned around and said to me, you look like the same blanking, blanking drunk to me.

Now there's two points here. One's a minor point. We got back to my car, and I sat in my car and cried for an hour and a half, wrestling with whether I was indeed the same old drunk, or whether in fact, being a hypocrite, playing a role, or whether in fact I was a sinner saved by grace. That's not the focal point.

The Party Takes a Supernatural Turn

The focal point was, as we drank, we became much more philosophical. These guys are sitting around. The party's going on. They're praising the things that are important to them. They're talking about the gold and the silver and the iron and the bronze and the wood and the stone. And in the middle, and probably, you know, who are we and why are we here type of discussion? What's life all about? That kind of thing.

In the middle of this, everything stops. Something takes place that takes the entire party and silences it and literally begins to sober them up immediately. Verse 5, "Suddenly the fingers of a hand appeared and wrote on the plaster of the wall near the lampstand of the royal palace. And the king watched the hand as it wrote. And his face turned pale, and he was so frightened that his knees knocked together and his legs gave way."

You have heard the term, I see the writing on the wall. That's the origin of this. I see the writing on the wall. There it is. All of a sudden, here he is. He's just toasted the god of wood. He's looking around and there's a hand that appears. There's the fingers.

And remember, he's perched up here, ten feet above all of this, presiding over all of this drunken orgy. And he sees the finger and it's scraping out something in the wall. It stops him. Everybody sees it. He senses it's something very, very, very special. And God's getting ready to move. God's getting ready to move in his life the way He moved in Nebuchadnezzar's life.

Two Different Reactions to God's Encounter

There are two, however, totally different reactions. Remember what happened to Nebuchadnezzar? We'll look at the details in a minute. But God encounters Nebuchadnezzar, breaks him down, breaks him apart, takes him about as low as you can go, not for the purpose of destroying him, but to build him back up so he'd understand who God is. And all of a sudden, Nebuchadnezzar would be a new man. And he responded. Belshazzar doesn't.

There's the handwriting on the wall. He's petrified. Look at the state he's in. He turns pale. He's frightened. His knees knock. What's he do? Verse 7, if you've stuck with this for a while, it's the response that we see from Nebuchadnezzar and all these other guys. What's he do? He calls out for his enchanters, his astrologers, his diviners to be brought to him. These are his magicians. What are they? These are his spiritual consultants.

Something supernatural is taking place. He gets all these guys together and he says, whoever reads this writing and tells me what it means, will be first, clothed in purple. It's this picture of royalty. It's a position of power. Second, he'll have a gold chain placed around his neck. Get a little Mr. T starter set here. We'll have the gold chain and we'll have all the stuff that goes with that here.

And here's what's important. And he'll be made the third highest ruler in the kingdom. Why third highest? Two kings. Remember? Got Belshazzar. Got the silent king. So, how powerful are you? You're the second most powerful person functionally here in the entire kingdom.

The Wise Men Fail Again

Then all the king's wise men came in and they could not read the writing or tell the king what it meant. So, Belshazzar became even more terrified. And his face grew more pale. And the nobles were baffled.

Something's going on. Maybe you've been here. Something's going on and it's beyond your control. It's out of your control. There may be some things you think you can do but in reality, ultimately, the die is cast.

The Illusion of Control

Susan and I had this discussion yesterday. Because there's a new... I frankly, until the last however many months it's been, have been pretty ignorant about cancer in general and breast cancer in particular and inflammatory breast cancer I'd never even heard of until a few months ago. And so now I read up on it and have a lot of conversations about it and get kind of privy to it. And the survival rate 10 years ago on what Susan had was 1%. And it's now about 23, 4, 5%. So that's good.

You see a lot of people and you start to... It's amazing how much stuff is on television stories. So, you'll see people... For example, when John Edwards' wife... John Edwards' wife was just diagnosed with the same thing. I don't know about inflammatory but breast cancer, remember, right after the election. And one of the things she did is she got her girls together and they shaved their head. Because they knew the hair was going to fall out and this was their way of taking control of the situation.

And we were talking about this in general yesterday and Susan just said, you know what's silly? You're not in control. You can do all these things but you're not in control. That's a great reminder. We can do all these things. And let's get sickness

out of there because you're all feeling good today and it's not that. But you can do all these things at business. You can make the right call. You can negotiate properly. Sign all the contracts. Have the motivated seller, motivated buyer. Everything's perfect. But all of a sudden, the deal falls apart. It just falls apart. Why? Well, the buyer, seller, sister's cat needs to go to the vet on the day of the close and they can't be there and they are not flexible so they just assume not close.

You've got other deals where you don't do anything. About all you do is introduce them to the escrow officer in the title company and the deal closes. Why? Because ultimately, you work and work and work and work and God's going to bless where He blesses. Now, we can argue with that, wrestle with that, but it's the way it is. These guys sense. Belshazzar understands he's out of control. It's beyond his control. Something's happening. It's powerful. He equates it to something spiritual. He gets the idea that the gods are at work and he's conceptually right. It's not gods. It's God, singular. And there is something that's about to happen and it is for Belshazzar cataclysmic.

The Queen's Wisdom

Look what happens in verse 10. The queen, hearing the voices of the king and his nobles, came in the banquet hall. "O king, live forever," she said. "Don't be alarmed. Don't look so pale. Get your act together. Suck it up. There's a man in your kingdom who has the spirit of the holy gods in him. In the time of your father," and again, let me remind you, that word could also be translated grandfather or ancestor. "In the time of your ancestor, your grandfather, he was found to have insight and intelligence and wisdom like that of the gods. King Nebuchadnezzar, your father, your father the king, I say, appointed him chief of the magicians and the enchanters and the astrologers and the diviners. This man's name is Daniel. And maybe you've never heard him called that. He was also called Belteshazzar. And he was found to have a keen mind and knowledge and understanding and also the ability to interpret dreams and explain riddles and solve difficult problems. Call for Daniel and he'll tell you what the writing means."

I could go nuts applying this, but I won't. Here's a guy who ought to know a little bit of history and it would make a big difference in his life. It is so important for us to understand the past, to understand what's taken place, to understand why things are the way they are. And the queen's saying, "I can't believe that you've never heard of this guy. Didn't your grandpa ever come in at night and tuck you into bed or you'd be out fishing and as you're talking, didn't he ever say, 'Hey, there was this guy? Let me tell you about this time we threw these guys into the fire and we thought they were going to die, but not only did they live, we saw a son of the living God in there with them. Didn't he ever tell you this? Did you forget it? Did you not know?'"

He doesn't wait around for an answer. Daniel comes in. I mentioned earlier, he's 80 years old. He's disappeared from the scene. Probably too significant of a man to kill, but just put out the pasture and forgotten about.

The Daniel People in Your Life

I've got about 20 minutes here. Let me pause, because this popped into my mind yesterday while I was teaching this. Have you got people like Daniel in your life? And by that I mean, people who were significant people and you've just let them, either intentionally or accidentally, put them out to pasture. There are people who could bring so much to your life, professionally, relationally.

And anybody in here remember the name Fred Smith? Fred Smith from Dallas? Anybody? A couple. When I became a Christian, Fred Smith was hot. Fred Smith was like the business guy in Dallas. He was the man. He was one of the most high-profile Christian businessmen in the country, traveled around the country. I mean, this guy was incredible.

Tyler comes in the other day. This is my son-in-law. And he said, "Guess who I just talked to on the phone?" I said, "I don't know." He said, "Fred Smith. You ever heard of him?" I said, "I just assumed he was dead." He said, "No. I just talked to this guy. His name pops up on a bunch of work that I've done. So I just got on the phone and called him. You know the guy?" And I said, "He's an incredible guy." He said, "He's living in Dallas. Probably at the end of his life. He's very sick. But he said, I talked to him for like an hour. I got all this wisdom on him."

And I'm thinking, what a great picture. I'll guarantee you there's people who've played roles like that either on a larger stage or in your life who you've just forgotten about. You just don't stay in touch anymore. Here's old Daniel. Walking around. Nobody talking to him. Doing his own thing.

Daniel Before the King

So the king calls him in. And the king said, verse 13, "Are you Daniel, the one of the exiles that my father the king brought from Judah? I have heard that the Spirit of the gods is in you and that you have insight and intelligence and outstanding wisdom and that the wise men in the enchanters who were brought before me to read this writing and tell me what it means, but they can't explain it. Now I've heard that you give interpretation to solve difficult problems. If you can read the writing and tell me what it means, you will be clothed in purple, have a gold chain placed around your neck, and you'll be the third highest ruler in the kingdom."

Got the scene? Here's the king. There's the writing. Daniel, tell me what it means. Daniel is 80. There's something potentially really cool about 80-year-old people. It's all encapsulated here in Daniel's answer. Look at his answer. "You may keep your gifts for yourself and give your rewards to someone else."

Take that gold chain and stick it. I don't need that gold chain no more. I didn't sell out when I was 16. I'm not going to sell out when I'm 80. I wasn't for purchase at 16. I'm not for hire now.

A couple of years ago, I was invited

to do a testimony lesson out in Sun City. I love being around old people generally. Some get a little sour, pretty self-absorbed, a lot of ARP thinking and all that. But if you can break them from that, you can learn a lot.

Probably about 200 people here. And as I'm driving out, it occurs to me, some of them are not going to be here for next year's annual banquet. They're going to die. So I feel like I need to deliver that message. Never seen these people before, so I thought I should interject a little humor at the beginning. So I started with, you know, I'm from Iowa, IOWA, I owe the world an apology, you know, idiots out wandering around. They did all the old stuff.

There's a lady sitting about where the rail is, so she's about two tables back, who can't hear very well. And she assumes because she doesn't hear well, no one else does. So she leans over to the person next to her and says in a voice about like this, "What did he say?" The lady obviously whispers to her and she responds, "That's not funny." So I got my gal here.

So I'm doing my thing. I figure, because my intent, like if Karen were to fall asleep right now, or doze off, my instinct is not to let her sleep, my instinct is to drive, and drive, and drive, and I'm going to win her somehow. So now this gal is, I got her in the crosshairs. So I'm kind of working my way, even talking and roaming and working through the tables, and I'm working and I'm grinding and I'm grinding and I'm making these points, and I turn to walk away. I'm walking away and she says to the person with her, "He reminds me of my son-in-law. And that man put my daughter through hell." That was the whole... So then I said, I'm not going to win her—too much baggage there.

The Freedom That Comes with Age

You get around old people, there is a certain freedom that can be harnessed and be very positive. You don't really care that much anymore about the stuff you used to care about. And maybe in the old days, a gold chain and the third highest power in the land and all of that other stuff would have been appealing to you. There was a day when you'd bust your pick for that. Maybe even mortgage your family for that.

Old Daniel says, you can keep all that. That's not a motivation to me. Nevertheless, he said, I'm going to tell you what the writing means.

Daniel's Reminder of Nebuchadnezzar's Fall

Here it is. I'm reading now from chapter 5, verse 18: "O King, the Most High God gave your father Nebuchadnezzar sovereignty and greatness and glory and splendor. And because of the high position He gave him, all the peoples of the nation and men of every language dreaded and feared him. And those the king wanted to put to death, he put to death. And those that the king wanted to spare, he spared. And those he wanted to promote, he promoted. And those he wanted to humble, he humbled. But when his heart became arrogant and hardened with pride, he was deposed from the royal throne, stripped from his glory. He was driven away from people. Given the mind of an animal, he lived with the wild donkeys and ate grass like cattle. And his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until he acknowledged the Most High God is the Sovereign over the kingdoms of men and sets over them anyone He wishes."

That really is a summary of Daniel 4. Remember? That was Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar's on top of the palace. He's been warned by God through a dream that Daniel's interpreted that indeed, he will fall. Twelve months later he's on top of the palace. He's looking around. Remember what he saw? He said, I built this, and I did this, and I did this. And while the words were still in his lips, God struck him down.

God's Opposition to Pride

I will tell you what God hates, and that's pride. So the Scripture says, God is opposed to the proud—not neutral. He's actively engaged in opposition to the proud, and He gives grace to the humble. The number one sin in your life, in my life, our life, is pride. And everything else flows from it.

You may want to... I've had guys want to argue that and say, no, no, no. My problem isn't pride. My problem is I like to mess around. Well, why do you like to mess around? Well, I like the way it makes me feel, I like the excitement of the hunt. I like conquering a gal. I like messing around with my wife. I like to think that I still got it. And I said, doesn't that sound like pride? From pride flows all these other things. And pride will stop you spiritually.

The Starting Point of Spiritual Life

Again, I apologize for a little repetition to those of you from the church. We're looking at the Beatitudes, the starting point. Matthew 5, verse 3: "Blessed are the poor in spirit"—those that are spiritually bankrupt, those that don't come pridefully, like the scribes and the Pharisees. Those that don't come pridefully, but those who come humbly, broken. And they say, you know what, God? I bring nothing to the party. There's no good thing dwelling in me.

I may be able to put on a facade or be able to play a game for a while, but God, in my heart, my heart is desperately wicked. Even the good things I do, when I'm really, really honest about it, even the good things I do, I do for the wrong reasons. And Belshazzar, that was your grandpa until he came to this point in time where he understood who God was. And he was broken before Him.

Doctrine Versus Ethics

Again, if I can put that in our context, that's that differentiation between a doctrine and ethic. When you look at Matthew 5, key verse in the Sermon on the Mount, chapter 5, verse 20, here's what Jesus says to these Jewish people gathered around: "Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you won't enter the kingdom of heaven."

You and I hear that and we go, that's no big deal. We understand the Pharisees and the scribes were part of the guys that sold out Jesus. That's not the reputation they had at that time. Here's an old Jewish saying: If only two people could go to heaven, one would be a scribe and the other would be a Pharisee. So now you say to these people, unless you're more righteous than the scribe and the

Pharisee, who they already think are the most righteous people in the land, you aren't going to heaven. These people are hearing, we're screwed. We don't have a chance. There's no way. There's no way our righteousness is going to exceed that.

But then Jesus begins to tell them what He's talking about. He's not talking about behavior. He's talking about behavior that's motivated by a right heart. He's not talking about the law. We love the law. Do this. Don't do this. Don't commit murder. Perfect! Haven't committed murder in a long time. I'm in. Safe.

Jesus Exposes the Heart Behind the Law

But Jesus comes along and says, wait a minute. If you hate your brother, you're a murderer. Ouch! Don't commit adultery. No problem. Oops! But if you look on a woman, you've lusted after her, you're guilty. They're not going so well. I love it when He says, don't do this, don't do this, don't do this. But then here's what He says. Love God with all your heart, which I have not yet been able to accomplish for one second. And love your neighbor as you love yourself. Ooh!

See, what Jesus drives us to is this reality that our pride needs to be broken. We humble ourselves before God. He does heart surgery. He takes out that hard, prideful heart and He puts in it a heart of flesh. And all of a sudden now, you're moved and motivated not by promoting your agenda, by promoting God's agenda. And Nebuchadnezzar saw that, Belshazzar. Are you?

The First Message: Your Days Are Numbered

Verse 25, here's the inscription. Here's what it says. Mene, mene, tekel parson. Mene means this. God has numbered the days of your reign and brought it to an end. We talk about this all the time. The psalmist writes it this way. Teach us, speaking to God, teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom to understand how to live.

We had a guy in our study down in Tucson. And he came on one day. And I'm always fascinated by people who lose weight. I mean, I constantly have... I'm in a fat period right now. So this is hard. And I know the answer. I think the answer is eat less and exercise more. I think those are two components that will make a difference. Don't know. But there's another option.

I saw an infomercial and I'm kind of the infomercial king. They've got a new one now. Have you seen the one where you just hold that thing? And by holding this, it works out your whole body. I want it to work. I don't know if it works. I want it. He said, I can feel it in my pecs. And I said, so can I. So can I just watching it. I know it does. Whew, I'm exhausted. I want it to work.

So we had a guy. He comes into the Bible study. And he looks terrific. He's lost a bunch of weight. I said, man, you look good. He said, thanks. I said, no, no, no. You look really good. Are you exercising? He said, no. I said, ooh, this could be good. Okay, this could be a winner. So what are you doing?

And he said, I have brain cancer. And they tell me I'll be dead in 90 days. And I said, ugh. So are you kidding? And he said, no. I said, man, you really look good. Literally within a week, you could watch his body start to deteriorate. At the very end, and 90 days later, almost to the day he was dead.

At the very end, they brought him in one day. And they kind of had it. And they sat him in the front. And one of the friends who hadn't seen him in a while came up to him. And I happen to be privy by proximity and the fact that I like to eavesdrop a lot to the conversation. And I'm listening to the guy. And the guy comes up to him and says, you know, I know you're sick. I know it's rough. I know you're terminal. And the guy sitting there said, so are you.

And that's a great reminder. I mean, in our house right now, it's real easy for Susan to say, eh, life may be over. But she may live longer than me. And even if I live 30, 40, 50 years past her, or she lives 30, 40, 50 years past me, in a sense it's irrelevant because at the end we're both dead. That's the point. So the handwriting's on the wall. Here's the first thing. You're going to die, Belshazzar.

The Second Message: You've Been Weighed and Found Wanting

Here's the second thing. You have been weighed on the scales and found wanting. There is this standard. And you've been placed on it and you didn't measure up. Because it's not a human standard even though you're a king. It's not a human standard. It's a godly standard.

You and I love that. We love to look around and say, I'm not doing so bad. Why do you say that? I'm way better than them. I'm way better than them. I'm way better than her. I'm a lot better guy than that guy.

I know I told you this, but it's absolutely true. I remember one night feeling a little bit low and sitting in a place like this and having a few shooters and I'm talking to a guy and I said, you know, I'm really not worth much. And he said to me, no, Tom, you've got great value. Again, absolutely true story. I said, really? And he said, yes. You can always be used as a bad example. And I said, oh, okay. That's not bad. I said, tell me what that... He said, I tell my wife all the time when she starts to get on me, I'll say, I'm not as bad as Tom. I said, oh, okay.

Well, that's what we love to do. But here's the problem. If we're going to evaluate our life and there's a standard, here's the standard. It's not me. It's not you. It's God's standard of perfection. And no one measures up.

Our Desperate Spiritual Situation

You may be sitting here and maybe this is a whole new thing to you. Something's happened to your life. You've reached this point. You say, I need something spiritual. You know, we see that at church a lot. People come in and I'll say, they're here for the... Why are you here? Well, our kids need this. And that always makes me laugh. Apparently, you outgrow that because you don't need it. But as a kid, you need this. I don't understand that.

But you're here and you're going, what is that? All of a sudden, I want you to understand how desperate your situation is, spiritually. I don't know anything about the finance and all that. You figure it out. Talk about spiritually. Spiritually, we are entirely, utterly, completely

sinful before God. And we have no way out. Nothing you can do. No church you can join. No book you can read. No money you can write. No check you can give.

USA Today had a survey. I love those surveys. I don't have it with me, but basically it said, what would you pay for? It was like, I'd pay $55,000 to be president for a day or whatever. But it got down and said it would pay $436,000 to know you're going to heaven. I got a deal for you, my friend. For like $100,000, I can get you in. You can get in for free by understanding who Jesus is and coming to Him.

And then He says, "MENE, MENE, TEKEL, PARSIN." What that means is, your kingdom is going to be divided and given to the Medes and the Persians.

The Fall of Babylon

Let me close this because we're getting close here. Then Belshazzar commanded Daniel to be clothed in purple. A gold chain was placed around his neck. He was proclaimed the third highest ruler in the land. And that very night, Belshazzar, the king of the Babylonians, was slain. Darius the Mede took over the kingdom at the age of 62.

Wait a minute. I thought they had a walled fortress city. God said, "Listen, you're out." The Medes take over and not one man is killed. You know what they did? They got the core engineers together. Everybody's in the party. They rerouted the river. They walked right in through the riverbed. They take over the city and killed the king.

See, can I remind you, the main character in this story isn't Belshazzar or Daniel or Nebuchadnezzar. The main character is God. And when God says your time is up, your time is up. There's a sense, cut me slack here, in which you're immortal until God's done with you. Nothing's going to take you out of here early. And the flip side of that is once God's done with you, once your days that are numbered are up, you're gone. And you're all going to face that.

Lessons for Life

A couple of helpful things I think, just to remember as we understand all of this, is to understand like Daniel, which I love. Daniel's out to pastor, but he doesn't quit. That you and I as Christians now, I'm flipping around as Christians, we're in a marathon race. We run all the way through to the end. We don't stop.

Like Daniel, we're not available for sale. God's going to give you insights and gifts and talents and you use them. If you're here and you're a Christian, that's the charge. If you're here and you're not a Christian, then just like Daniel says to Belshazzar, remember Nebuchadnezzar who was proud and arrogant and is now broken and humble. That's what you need to do before Him.

The Heart of the Gospel

That's why Jesus died. This is a very important time of the year that we're coming up on in the church calendar as we come into Good Friday and Easter. Because it forces us to look at the epicenter in the history of mankind. Everything prior to it looked up to it. Everything since looks back to it. The crucifixion and the resurrection which had to it an aspect of past, present, and future.

Jesus died. And for those of us who are Christians, it means our past is forgiven. Our present has with it worth and value, reason, purpose, and our future is beyond anything we can imagine. In fact, as I was driving in today, it was so cool. I got right to where I'm turning off on McDonald's coming over and there's Mercy Me just as they strike up "I Can Only Imagine." I can only imagine what this is going to be like. Someday, what am I going to do? Am I going to stand in awe? Am I going to dance in praise? I don't know.

I know this, that for me, I'm talking about Tom now, for me death is certain, but equally certain is heaven because of what Jesus did and God opening my eyes to see that truth. Have you seen that truth? If that's true in your life, then heaven is your hope. You're as certain of heaven as the saints that are there. What an incredible statement that is. You're as certain of heaven as the saints that are there right now. And nothing can separate you from God's love for you.

It doesn't mean, by the way, that life's going to be easy. It doesn't mean there aren't going to be challenges and difficulties. It means God's in control.

Looking Ahead

Almost done. One more significant event in Daniel's life and probably the event that He's most identified with. We'll look at it next week.

Father, help us see this truth. Help us understand who You are. For those that are here that would say, no, I'm not a Christian, open their eyes to see the truth of who they really are spiritually before You. Strip away all the facade. Let them see themselves as they really are. Sinful people. And on their own, helpless, hopeless, desperate. But quickly let them understand the provision that You've given them through Your Son, Jesus Christ. God, we pray to You in His name. Amen.

Have a great week. We'll see you next week.