Daniel 5

I’m part of a Facebook Group where people post photos of things they find at auctions, antiques, yard sales, etc. but they aren’t really sure what it is or how valuable it is.

And that’s a game that I’ll play on occasion with my own kids—”What is this thing.” Oh, that’s a really old tater masher.

Oh, that’s what we call a rotary phone.

And there are some objects I’m thinking, I have no idea what this thing is. But I bet some of you a bit older than I am could identify it. That’s the thing with technology and such…what is invented in one generation and all the rage in one generation, just becomes a normal thing in another generation, and ends up discarded by the next.

But it’s not just stuff that this happens to. The same thing is true of institutions, of beliefs, of movements, everything. D.A. Carson has said it well,

"One generation believes something. The next assumes it. And the third will forget and deny it."

Let’s not just make this a nerd talk. If you’re younger—say 20 and below—you don’t really feel this a ton. Everything just is. But if you’re older and older than older…you feel this in every fiber of your being.

I don’t really get on Facebook that much at all, like seriously if I respond to a post it’s either b/c I’m tagged in it, or b/c it was one of the first 5-6 things that came up on my feed when I checked it randomly throughout the day. But on occasion I’ll see these things shared where we’re mourning days gone by.

I remember when kids used to...

I remember how this country used to...

I remember how when I was a kid...

I remember how the church used to be...

You know what…every generation says these things. For those of you who are 5 or 10 or 20 or 25 or just keep going…we’re all going to say this. We are always only 3 generations away from absolutely losing something.

That means that unless it’s rediscovered there will be a generation that never sees Bo Jackson run up a wall and throw Harold Reynolds out at home plate. Or worse yet, there will be a generation that doesn’t even care.

And it’ll be the same thing with the stuff you’re passionate about right now. It fades. And that hurts a little, doesn’t it.

Daniel is going to speak to that this morning in Daniel 5. As we place ourselves into the text here, we try to think about life as a Babylonian. You remember the heyday of Nebuchadnezzar. World domination. You always won. Your team was the greatest.

The hanging gardens are beautiful. Everybody is talking about them. You live in luxury. Conquering lands. Everybody fears you. You’re awesome and amazing and everybody knows it…you get whatever you want…what a great time to be alive.

But as we enter into our text it’s at least 23 years from the events of chapter 4…probably more. Nebby died in 562 BC and…well I don’t want to spoil what happens here…but the Persians overtake the Babylonians in 539.

Remember that when we leave the world of Daniel 4, that Nebuchadnezzar is humbled and he is “praising and extolling and honoring the King of heaven” and Daniel is his bud. Things aren’t just good for the Babylonians but it seems as if the Jewish exiles are also thriving. They have been pretty well fulfilling the words of Jeremiah 29—Babylon is thriving and so are they.

Now listen:

Daniel 5:1–9 ESV

King Belshazzar made a great feast for a thousand of his lords and drank wine in front of the thousand. Belshazzar, when he tasted the wine, commanded that the vessels of gold and of silver that Nebuchadnezzar his father had taken out of the temple in Jerusalem be brought, that the king and his lords, his wives, and his concubines might drink from them. Then they brought in the golden vessels that had been taken out of the temple, the house of God in Jerusalem, and the king and his lords, his wives, and his concubines drank from them. They drank wine and praised the gods of gold and silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone. Immediately the fingers of a human hand appeared and wrote on the plaster of the wall of the king’s palace, opposite the lampstand. And the king saw the hand as it wrote. Then the king’s color changed, and his thoughts alarmed him; his limbs gave way, and his knees knocked together. The king called loudly to bring in the enchanters, the Chaldeans, and the astrologers. The king declared to the wise men of Babylon, “Whoever reads this writing, and shows me its interpretation, shall be clothed with purple and have a chain of gold around his neck and shall be the third ruler in the kingdom.” Then all the king’s wise men came in, but they could not read the writing or make known to the king the interpretation. Then King Belshazzar was greatly alarmed, and his color changed, and his lords were perplexed.

Daniel 5:30–31 ESV

That very night Belshazzar the Chaldean king was killed. And Darius the Mede received the kingdom, being about sixty-two years old.

Sermon Introduction:

Remember what I said earlier about three generations? Well, Nebby died in 562, he was succeeded by an evil dude w/a weird Babylonians name from 562-560 and then chaos ensued for the next few years and until in 556 Nabonidus —who we think might have married the daughter of Nebby.

So Nebby—> Chaos and Nabonidus —> and then his son that we see in Daniel 5—> Belshazzar...

And look at all the things lost so far. No Daniel, no appreciation for YHWH in fact it’s now open blasphemy, and they are just using these holy instruments like their nothing…it’s living off the privilege of the wealth, all things which would have been assumed and by the end of the story the whole empire is lost.

Why does Daniel tell us this? What purpose does this story have in the overall theme of the book of Daniel? And what does it say to us today?

So, Daniel is structured in such a way that chapters 4-5 give us the core of the message. They show us the humbling of Nebuchadnezzar and the humbling of Belshazzar. But more than this it shows us that God is sovereign over even foreign kings.

Proverbs 21:1 is true across the board.

Proverbs 21:1 ESV

The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; he turns it wherever he will.

And so this serves as an encouragement. And it’s kind of showing us even what we saw in the visions of Nebuchadnezzar. Every human kingdom will fall. That three generations thing is always going to happen—except it’s NEVER going to happen with the kingdom of God.

Oh, yes, don’t hear me wrong. There is such a thing as the Dark Ages. There are generations and places and families and communities and all of those things where the gospel can pretty much disappear from among them. Absolutely. But big picture—the kingdom of God will never fall.

And so what this does, when we’re holding all this sand between our fingers, when so much is fickle, when we see things collapsing around us, when we’ve got outdated tater mashers, when nobody knows who Skeletor is anymore, or Bo Jackson, or even our own name, our own legacy, our own homes, all the things we’ve held near and dear...

This is, in some ways the same message that we saw in Luke 12 and that goober who kept building bigger barns to store all of his stuff. Jesus says, “store up treasures in heaven.” And that’s the answer to these fleeting kingdoms. It’s like the old poem,

Only one life, will soon be past, only whats done for Christ will last.

That can be a depressing message. Or it can be a deep encouragement. Kind of depends on what you are living for.

And so, let me show you this from Daniel 5.

In these first 4 verses we see an absolute defiance of God and it’s a defiance of his “father” Nebby. Now a little historical note here.

First, for quite a few years people thought—man Daniel, really blew it in his history. This is just a fiction because there was never a leader named Belshazzar in Babylon.

But then they discovered this big cylinder with all this Babylonian writing on it…and somewhere on there was mention of the firstborn son of Nabonidrus…Belshazzar.

But it sounds like he’s the king. There is no record that he was the king. And it sounds like Nebuchadnezzar was his dad. Well, not so fast.

Look down at verse 16. Notice there all the promises which he is making to Daniel. Why does he say “third ruler in the kingdom”? Well, we’ve found out that Belshazzar isn’t big Kahuna in 539. That’s still Nabonidrus. He’s the second in command, he is a co-regent. Which is why he can only offer the position of “third ruler”.

And what about that whole business about his “father” Nebuchadnezzar? That one is easy. That word often refers to an ancestor. Which would have been true. Nebby was likely his grandpappy.

Again…three generations. And what he is doing is defiant and blasphemous. And so as not to leave any question the second he drinks this wine out of these holy instruments, God shows up and there is writing on the wall.

You’ve heard that phrase, haven’t you? The writing is on the wall…it means that it’s all over, done for, the writing is on the wall, you don’t stand a chance. That phrase comes from this story.

So, he’s just done this very blasphemous thing…intentional…he knows what he is doing…he’s making a mockery.

And there’s another little side note here. The year is 539 BC. There was prophecy and belief that it would be in 539 that the Jews would be rescued from Babylonian rule. And so, Belshazzar, who would have known this…takes it as an opportunity to flex. Haha, oh, looks like your big ol’ God sure rescued you out of our hands....

In verse 6, his color changes, his limbs gave way, his knees knocked…what a vivid picture. I read somewhere that it could be translated somewhere that he wet himself. And the king calls loudly....”Come here…tell me what this strange words mean”. Read this writing! Tell me what it means.

And as we see often in Daniel, none of them can do it. Again, it shows how impotent the wise men were. This sounds just like the other stories we’ve read so far. Babylonian wisdom will only take you so far. It’s completely unable to read the handwriting of God.

This reminds me a little of what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 2:14

1 Corinthians 2:14 ESV

The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.

But the queen…would this have been the daughter of Nebby (likely) tells her son about a guy who used to rock at doing stuff like this. Which leads me to ask a question. Why did Daniel fall out of favor. Why had Belshazzar not heard of Daniel?

Well, what’d I say at the beginning. The second generation, Nabonidus and his wife, are just going to assume the beliefs of Nebby. They aren’t going to own them, Daniel is just a thing…he’s just a part of the kingdom…something at their disposal…one tool in the giant Babylonian shed that can be pulled out at any moment.

What has happened is that God’s Word takes a backseat. It’s just assumed. This is the same thing which plagued the Israelites. Hosea 13:6

Hosea 13:6 ESV

but when they had grazed, they became full, they were filled, and their heart was lifted up; therefore they forgot me.

Belshazaar hears this, he’s excited. And offers Daniel all these great things in verse 16. I’ll make you third in the kingdom, I’ll give you gold, purple, all this authority, I’ll make you awesome Daniel—like one step away from my awesome.

And, oh, that we would learn from Daniel here. Daniel 5:17

Daniel 5:17 ESV

Then Daniel answered and said before the king, “Let your gifts be for yourself, and give your rewards to another. Nevertheless, I will read the writing to the king and make known to him the interpretation.

He serves the king still, that’s Jeremiah 29 still informing his life, it’s him still speaking truth, etc. but he refuses the gifts of a fallen kingdom. You can keep the power of your fallen kingdom—I don’t want it.

Daniel doesn’t try to wield it for godly aims. He doesn’t think, “oh, if I were in the seat of power…how much could I accomplish...” Nope. He doesn’t want anything to do with the gifts of a fallen kingdom. The sooner we learn this lesson the better.

Daniel interprets the handwriting. But before he did this he reminded him of where he had fallen. Listen to Daniel 5:22-23

Daniel 5:22–23 ESV

And you his son, Belshazzar, have not humbled your heart, though you knew all this, but you have lifted up yourself against the Lord of heaven. And the vessels of his house have been brought in before you, and you and your lords, your wives, and your concubines have drunk wine from them. And you have praised the gods of silver and gold, of bronze, iron, wood, and stone, which do not see or hear or know, but the God in whose hand is your breath, and whose are all your ways, you have not honored.

Then Daniel tells him what the words mean. It means your days are numbered, they’ll be brought to an end, you’ve been weighed and found wanting, and your kingdom is going to be divided and given to the Medes and the Persians.

And that very night he was killed, and Darius received the kingdom. (I don’t think it means that Darius did the killing or that Persia took over on that very day) but it does mean that Belshazzar—second in command, son of the king, was killed on that day for his blasphemy.

What do we do with this story?

This is really an illustration of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream. Every kingdom but the kingdom of God will fall. This is what we see in the New Testament when it talks in the language of everything being judged through fire---only what’s of Christ will last. That is what is pure…all the impurities will drop away. And if you don’t have Christ, then there will be nothing left on that day.

That’s the big picture point of this text. But how do we apply that specifically? What does that mean for me today?

Let’s think about this with something silly. When I tell teenagers about Michael Jordan and their like, “Oh, I think I’ve heard of him....” That bothers me. It makes me feel like a little something inside of me is dying.

I’m the guy who had a perfect attendance in junior high up until October 6th, 1993. The day Michael Jordan retired. Watching basketball games with my uncle, pretending to be Michael Jordan (it’s amazing what a 5’0 nothing white kid can do in his own imagination), all of this was part of who I was. And so it hurts a little to see that kingdom fall b/c it’s like a little death to me as well.

But all kingdoms fall. Even that of Michael Jordan. Now, that’s a silly illustration. But what happens when the things we’re talking about isn’t a basketball player?

This is the kind of stuff that Paul was talking about in Philippians 3. There he listed all of these things that were part of his identity. “tribe of Benjamin, Hebrew of Hebrews, a Pharisee, zealous for the law...”

And this is where it gets really tricky. Because many of these things that he lists here…they are connected to his relationship with God. But they are at the end of the day periphery stuff. They aren’t the substance.

They are morally neutral—until they aren’t. What I mean is that it’s totally fine for him to be a “Hebrew of Hebrews”, no harm really. Until that becomes ultimate. Until this is where he plants his identity.

You see, some of these things might have been avenues to an authentic relationship with God. But then they get all distorted and twisted and we start worshipping the road that gets us there.

Everything that’s not central to the kingdom of Christ will fall. We hear that and we think about wicked leaders and we cheer—and it raises up our hope—and we are excited about the prideful Beltshazzar falling. As we rightly should be.

But it also means that there are things connected to our experience with Christ, maybe good things in our life, things that are part of our culture that we loved, that will fall.

In 2007 I was a youth pastor and we had a mini-revival. Kids were coming to know Jesus like every week. I was preaching through 1 John, we were singing early 2000’s praise and worship music, I was putting together kind of ridiculously horrible power-point slides (the latest and greatest technology), probably making references to Skeletor and Michael Jordan and the kids were getting the references…so many kids came to know Jesus, many of them still doing ministry.

Now imagine if I said, you have to preach through 1 John if you want kids saved, you need to play David Crowder Band songs, and you have to use a PowerPoint presentation? Now, if I go back in my mind and think upon those times—I think fondly. It’s a part of me. I loved that experience.

But we did some of those same things today…lame-o. It’s not the same generation of kids, not the same experience, it’s different. Those periphery things fall.

You’ve got those too. Training union, everyone having a hymn in their hand, certain sermon styles, weekly revivals, we can go on and on.

And there are things for our students now that they are doing that will have the exact same experience in 20-30 years. Every kingdom that isn’t Christ will fall—and this includes the stuff connected with Jesus, the avenues we use to get to Jesus, etc. We can call these artifacts. At one point they symbolized a certain thing…but they lose some of that effectiveness over time. And we tend to equate those roads to Jesus with Jesus himself…and then when those roads get bumpy, or they get closed, etc. we mourn.

And we can be really tempted to put all of our resources into preserving them, into keeping those old paths smooth and the way you MUST travel. And then we’re fighting about the road to Jesus and we miss Jesus Himself.

Everything that’s not of Christ will fall. And it’s okay if it does. Lot’s of periphery stuff. It’s not bad if it goes away.

But there is also something we need to think about related to this story in Daniel. G.K. Chesterton once said, “Do not remove a fence until you know why it was put up in the first place.”

Belshazzar would have done really well to have asked, “how come we’ve never drank wine out of these goblets before?” And it would have been really good at Nebuchadnezzar trained his children, and trained his children to train his children in this particular thing. For them to know…don’t mess with YHWH.

You see Nebuchadnezzar’s statement in Daniel 4:37

Daniel 4:37 ESV

Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven, for all his works are right and his ways are just; and those who walk in pride he is able to humble.

This didn’t get translated to the next generations. They lost it.

And that’s another point to make from this passage. The importance of teaching and training the generations. Not in the artifacts. Not making sure they keep your culture, or your paths to Jesus, but in the gospel of Jesus Christ, in the kingdom that will never fall.

Again, that’s the major point of this text. The kingdom of God will never fall and all others will. What are you building into, what are you living for? Is my family built upon Christ? Is my job? My finances? My relationships?

Repentance for making things Christ that aren’t. Fighting for fallen kingdoms.

Repentance for clothing yourself in the gifts of a fallen kingdom.

Repentance for living for a fallen kingdom.

--

Let’s close by looking at the temptation of Christ. He’s taken upon this high mountain and the devil says to him… “Look at all of this. I’ll give it to you. It’s yours. You can rule, you can reign, you can have all the power.... I’ll set a robe upon you, give you gold, all the gifts of my kingdom…if you but bow down and worship me.

Now think of everything Jesus could do with that. Same types of things Daniel could have maybe done in Daniel 5…he could have rescued people, he could have ended all the horrible and awful things, he could have ruled and reigned---this offer is even better than that given to Daniel, for Christ would be second in command…second only to King Satan.

But Jesus turns it down for the same reason Daniel did. This is the offer of a fallen kingdom. Why would he trade his birthright for a pot of stew? Why would he hitch himself to a kingdom that is falling? Why would he betray the eternal kingdom?

No! “You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve....” Only one kingdom stands. And the Father has called Jesus to lay down His life. His kingdom, His kingship, His ruling will come through suffering and laying down His life as a ransom for many.

That’s the nature of His kingdom. It’s a laying down your life, loving your enemies, type of kingdom. And it alone will stand. I wouldn’t trade that for all the powers of this fallen kingdom.