Daniel 5          God’s Graffiti!             26th August 2007        Pam Leake

A number of years later, 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 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 honour 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 lamp stand. 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 honour and will wear a gold chain around his neck. He will become the third highest ruler in the kingdom!"

  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.

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." (Daniel 5:1-12 NLT)

Daniel said to King Belshazzar -

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 honoured the God who gives you the breath of life and controls your destiny!  So God has sent this hand to write a message.

  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." (Daniel 5:23-28 NLT)

That very night Belshazzar, the Babylonian king, was killed.  (Daniel 5:30 NLT)

THIS IS THE WORD OF THE LORD                (1)

(2) At the time of this story, 539 BC, Babylon was surrounded by the Medo-Persian armies. And Belshazzar knew it. So why was he going ahead with this big feast? Because he thought the city was impregnable.

The walls were so thick that four, full chariots could race abreast around the top of the city walls. A 30 foot mote surrounded Babylon which was guarded day and night. A city which at one time housed 1.2 million people.

The River Euphrates ran through the centre of the city providing an ample water supply.

At the time the city was under siege, they had twenty years supplies of food stored inside. So if they couldn’t go outside to harvest their crops, so what!

So smug Belshazzar and his arrogant nobles, and their wives and concubines were having a feast and getting totally blotto, drunk.

Consuming to much alcohol has been a problem for centuries. People foolishly use it to deaden their inhibitions and make themselves feel self confidant.

Belshazzar like many people of today wanted total freedom, liberty from worries, cares; and what other people said, . . . including God. But also, as he had POWER in this his country, he believed, he didn’t need to respect or obey God.

Liberty was defined by Justice S. D. O'Connor in an America court in 1992 as “the RIGHT to define one's OWN concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.”

People’s of all nations should have freedom, liberty to make their own choices. But it means we can get our choice completely wrong by pushing God out of the picture.

In truth only one person has the ability, liberty, and power to control the universe, and that is God. Many people mistakenly believe their personal choice would bring them be true freedom and happiness. Some even believe they can make it happen.

But freedom from God given boundaries in our lives, brings disintegration, to our lives. Just as it does, to the man in this cartoon, who removes his boundaries.

(3) Belshazzar’s granddad was Nebuchadnezzar, and he knew his granddad was a worshipper of God before the end of his reign.

(9a) King Nebuchadnezzar had ruled over Babylon for almost forty-five years. He had become a believer, but then became too smug and arrogant. God had then shown Nebuchadnezza  how he, God was all powerful. Nebuchadnezza then spent seven years totally out of his mind.

Eventually he repented and re-committed his life to (9b) God, and he said, "Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and glorify and honour the King of heaven. All his acts are JUST and true, and he is able to HUMBLE those who are PROUD”. (Daniel 4.37)

Nebuchadnezzar worshipped and respected Almighty God for the rest of his life.

(10) Four kings, and a few years later, his son  Nabonidus was on the throne. Nabonidus had a son Belshazzar. It is thought that by the time of Daniel 5 Nabonidus had been living in North Arabia, for ten years, leaving Belshazzar, who didn’t honour God, as co-regent in Babylon.

Belshazzar knew God was real and powerful from his knowledge of his grandfather alone. But Belshazzar was deliberately antagonising God by doing what he knew God hated.

The devil knows God is real and powerful. He probably believes, selfishly, that God was unfair, wrong to throw him out of heaven for his sins.

(11) Nebuchadnezzar had taken the sacred cups used for worship in the Temple in Jerusalem and had them stored in a safe place.

Belshazzar decided to make his party even more outrageous than it had been so far and ordered theses gold and silver cups to be used in idol worship.

He knew toasting idols was something God would consider blasphemous. But he was deliberately goading God and he believed God wouldn’t act.

Belshazzar may not have remembered Daniel but he knew all about God’s judgement, grace and forgiveness from his granddad, Nebuchadnezzar. He must have known about his granddad’s experiences.  Belshazzar, unlike his granddad, was completely unresponsive to God, God’s pleas, and God’s grace. God is patient, but God is also just, and he does, and will judge.

Watch and listen to this Video clip. The alien puts some people’s thoughts about God quite well!

(12) Alien song clip words -

First I was afraid
I was petrified
Kept thinking I could never live
without you by my side
But then I spent so many nights
thinking how you did me wrong
I grew strong, I learned how to get along
and so you're back, from outer space
I just walked in to find you here
with that sad look upon your face

Weren't you the one who tried to hurt me with goodbye
you think I'd crumble,

you think I'd lay down and die
Oh no, not I, I will survive!

None of us can survive for eternity without God by our side.     

(13) God was offended. May be this act was the final straw. It takes different things to offend each one of us. May be you wouldn’t be that concerned if witches say stole our church communion cups and used them for their worship, and then returned them apparently undamaged.

 Perhaps blasphemous graffiti on the church walls would seem more horrific.

Perhaps you can remember how you felt when something personal or of sentimental value was damaged or destroyed. Photographs, a favourite toy, a family heirloom.

God can be offended too, and it wasn’t just in the Old Testament that offending God could result in death.

Remember Ananias and Sapphira who dropped down dead in Acts 5 for lying to the Holy Spirit. Peter says to Ananias, “You weren't LYING TO US BUT TO GOD." (Acts 5:34 NLT)

God should be respected, held in awe. Respect for other people and God is being destroyed today in the name of tolerance. Many are no longer in awe of God. They treat him with disdain. God probably doesn’t exist and anyway if he does he is a wimp he won’t act, he isn’t interested in us, some seem to believe.

Belshazzar knew he had disobeyed God in doing his own thing, and made the mistake in assuming God was a patient wimp,  rather like some people believe today. But God is a just judge.

Not that God is a meany! He gives us a lot of freedom. He lets us choose our destiny – but make no mistake –

ultimately he is in control.

(13a) Remember what Paul says to the Galatians -

Don't be misled. Remember that you can't ignore God and get away with it. You will always reap what you sow! (Galatians 6:7 NLT)

(14) Then Belshazzar saw that writing on the wall. He didn’t know what it meant, but he knew it was from God, and it was bad news. What else would explain his reaction?

Can you imagine the scene? Everyone in that room has just raised a sacred cup in a toast, to a pagan god; then a moment of silence; maybe they hear the scratching of a finger nail as it scratches the plaster off the wall; they turn and look, and see a hand with no arm attached, writing on the wall.

At first there is total silence, except for the noise made by the hand writing; then someone screams. At first each person thought the drink was giving them hallucinations, but quickly they realise, as everyone is obviously seeing the same, it can be no hallucination.

Fear and the knowledge of his guilt quickly sobers up King Belshazzar. He is terrified.

 Apparently his knees knock, and ‘his loins are loosened’ according to the original Hebrew words.

 My dictionary says, the ‘Loin’ is the area on each side of the backbone of a human or animal between the ribs and hips.

I’ve read the suggestion that he had such a dreadful jelly like, sinking feeling in his abdomen, that he wet himself, if not worse, He was just so freaked out!

Brave King!

Maybe partly to save face he offers whoever can translate what it says on the wall, the position of “third highest ruler in the kingdom". In other words, his second in command.

Not all the royal family was at this drunken orgy. When the queen mother, probably Belshazzar’s grandmother, hears what is going on, she suggests he send for Daniel. Daniel is now probably in his eighties and retired.

(15) Daniel says,

“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."

In other words, King – you’re finished, you’re dead!

(16) Meanwhile during that banquet, the ancient Greek historian Herod-itus tells us,  the Medo-Persian military commander ingeniously devised a way to divert the Euphrates River running through the city.

So the water levels around the moat, and in the city, sank, just enough to allow his armies to wade across, thigh deep, under the cover of darkness.

Babylon, supposedly secure behind massive walls was now being conquered at the very moment Daniel was talking to Belshazzar.

Belshazzar underestimated his enemy who diverted and dried up his river.

(17) We have an enemy who wants to dry up the river of God’s Holy Spirit flowing over and through us. He wants to divert God’s river by filling our minds, and actions with things that will divert us away from God.

(17a) So humble yourselves before God. Resist the Devil, and he will flee from you. (James 4:7 NLT)

Some people believe that just because they once made a commitment to follow Jesus, that they will have everlasting life, even if they then ignore God and His will in their lives. Remember Peter says,

(18) “they will have to face God, who will judge everyone, both the living and the dead.” (1 Peter 4:5 NLT)

As Paul says to the Hebrews Christians –

(19) You have COME TO JESUS, the one who mediates the new covenant between God and people, . . . which graciously forgives. . . .  See to it that you OBEY God, the one who is speaking to you. . . .  (20) How terrible our DANGER if we REJECT the One who speaks to us from heaven! . . . Let us be THANKFUL and PLEASE GOD by WORSHIPING  him with HOLY FEAR and AWE.(Hebrews 12:24-25,28 NLT)

(21) On the Day of Judgment we will all be weighed like Belshazzar. Which way will the scales tip for you?

Do you trust in and follow Jesus.

SCALES

Remember, God is always willing to forgive, sincerely repentant people. He knows who they are before they do. Nebuchadnezzar was someone who worshipped God, messed up, and then repented, and lived his final days as a follower of God. His grandson Belshazzar hardened his heart against God. When weighed the scales for Belshazzar tipped to death.

Watch the alien clip again. It is funny but also has a very serious message.

(22) Show Clip.

I will survive.

No not without Jesus I won’t and neither will anyone else. It is an easy choice really; disregard or abuse God and receive death, or love and obey God and receive

(23) “Life in all its fullness”.

Our personal choice.

I’m going to say a short prayer. If you want to make it your prayer too please join me by saying, “Amen” at the end.

Prayer.

Lord I praise glorify, and honour you the King of Heaven. Thank you for loving me, and help me show my love for you in return.

Father, please forgive me for the times I have acted without consulting you, or have behaved contrary to your will.

Please give me the faith, courage and confidence I need to do your will at all times.

In Jesus’ name.

Amen

(24)