The Writing Is Still On The Wall
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The great Babylon is nearing its end. We’ve seen over and over again in the account of Daniel that God rules sovereignly over the kings of this earth. In Chapter 5 we’re introduced to a new ruler in Babylon by the name of Belshazzar. The text tells us that Nebuchadnezzar was his “father”, but we know based on history and other ancient texts that this is most likely referring to lineage and succession.
He could have been a grandson to Nebuchadnezzar, but wither way, that doesn’t effect the meaning of the text. Historians do know that Belshezzar was not the actual king, but more of the de facto king, and a man by the name of Nabonidus was 1st in power.
Notice how Belshezzar offers the one who can interpret the dream a position of 3rd in the kingdom. Makes sense sine Nabonidus is 1st, and Belshazzar is 2nd, which leaves the 3rd position as the next most powerful position available.
Something we could not know from reading this text alone is that on the doorsteps of Babylon, just as chapter 5 is kicking off, the medo-persian army is at the outside and ready to overthrow Babylon. We can’t see that in the text, but it was predicted by God in Nebuchadnezzar’s first dream.
v30 of this chapter goes on to say that that very night the king was killed. Not of natural causes, but by the invasion of the medes and persians, in direct fulfillment of God’s Word.
Now, all of this is significant. Because look at v1. King Belshazzar made a great feast for a thousand of his lords and drank wine in front of the thousand.
This is exactly how the world lives in light of the reality of God’s existence. The king throws an extravagant party, which is not all that uncommon for pagan kings to do. What is uncommon is that the king would be present with his subjects.
So he’s drinking wine in abundance, he invites a thousand of his Lord’s and drank in front of them, and if that wasn’t enough, after tasting the wine and being filled with the glory of his own majesty he takes it a step further.
v2. 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.
So now, he calls for his harem join him, and then remembers how years ago, Nebuchadnezzar in this great conquest over Judah, had taken the temple artifacts our of the temple and brought them into the temple of their gods. This was to attempt to show power over the God of Israel, but that’s not enough for Belshazzar. So he asks that the artifacts be brought in to the party and that the vessels be filled with wine and that they drink their fill from these vessels in direct defiance to God and his holiness, praising the gods of gold, silver, bronze, iron, wood and stone.
This is what we call profanity.
To profane something is to take something that is good, and beautiful, and intended for good, and use it for something far below its intended purpose, so that you devalue that it.
When Callie, my wife, makes something amazing for dinner, with hours of preparation and careful ingredient’s to make the perfect flavoring for her family’s enjoyment, only to have one of us cover it in Ketchup, or BBQ sauce before eating it. We have profaned that food.
Or some of you black coffee drinkers who so appreciate the natural goodness of the coffee bean roasted and brewed to perfection, when you see that cream and sugar go into someone’s coffee you see it as PROFANED!
But there are some serious examples we can give:
When a person who is made in the image of God with beauty and dignity from God, takes their body or their life and uses it for things it was never intended to used for…that person degrade and profanes what is the Lord’s creation.
All of Babylon by this time has heard the dreams that were interpreted by Daniel, and the decrees issued by the previous king that God is the most high and should be worshipped, but now, Belshazzar is king, and he denies the truth of God’s decree that Babylon will not long be the reigning empire. So he rises up in sinful drunkeness and no doubt orgies, and profanes those artifacts the God gave to Israel to show his holiness to them.
Instead of calling for a fast in a time of impending destruction, he calls for a feast. The sinner who is set on his or her ways, reveling in their sin, enjoying their pleasures, calling others into it, and profaning the good things of God are guilty of the sin of Belshazzar. Belshazzar leads this party, toasting one false god after the next as he leads them into blasphemous worship.
Matthew Henry - “Drunken worshippers, who are not men, but beasts, are the most proper for the service of dunghill deities, that are not gods, but devils. They drank wine, and praised their idol-gods, as if they had been the founders of their feast and the givers of all good things to them.”
Those who will never heed the warnings of men will one day, sooner or later, see the reality of God and be forced to serious consideration of Him.
v5 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. 6 Then the king’s color changed, and his thoughts alarmed him; his limbs gave way, and his knees knocked together.
May God interrupt many a pagan rulers in our world just like this. May God interrupt blasphemous and satanic ritual. May God interrupt our sinful hearts when we choose to profane what God has given to us, and to use it for our own gain or glory.
This miracle takes place in the great room where the party is proceeding, and what is VERY CLEAR, is that God is able to terrify the most terrible. Belshazzar may have been able to drown out the noise of Cyrus’s army outside the gates, but he could not ignore this hand that wrote these words on the plaster of the wall.
This was personally written to the king.
He WATCHED the hand write the words. And notice the placement of the warning. “opposite the lampstand.”
Perfectly placed for all to see, lit up by the light of the lampstand, perhaps even the lampstand from the temple of God, one of the artifacts that was requested. And now, it lights up this hand.
He’s not afraid of what is written, because he doesn’t yet know the interpretation of it. He’s afraid, because as he sees this hand, he knows it’s the hand of God, and his guilty conscience afflicts him.
The conscience is an incredible thing. Paul tells us in Romans 2:13 For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.
So the conscience is that agent of God, which every person has, that either accuses or excuses the sin in their lives. Now, whether you accuse that sin or excuse that sin, either way you prove that there is a law from God written on your heart that we will give an account to, and one day EVERY HUMAN WILL GIVE AN ACCOUNT!
Belshazzar is struck to the core, interrupted in his sin, and the whole place is brought to confusion and terror as the king frantically begins to seek the interpretation of it.
v7 - 9
He yells or help, and then offers great prosperity to anyone who can give the meaning of the writing. Just like the first two times with Nebuchadnezzar, the world has nothing to offer someone who is seeking to be right with God. There is no wisdom on earth that can interpret the problem of sin and how to deal with it. There is no astrologer on earth who can figure out the meaning of anyone’s life.
The things of the Lord are understood by the Spirit, and one must seek the Spirit of the living God for the meaning of life, and how a sinner can be saved.
When he sees that none of his resources can buy the interpretation for him, he becomes even more terrified.
People can be so troubled about the problems around them, grasping for help in every direction, terrified at every turn, distracting themselves with sin and drunkenness, and temporary sinful pleasures, and yet God’s word has been given to us so that we might know the truth and be free.
There was at least one other person in the kingdom with wisdom, besides Daniel.
The queen, (literally the Queen-Mother), hears about the matter and comes into the banquet hall. This is not Belshazzar’s wife, because the text has already said that his wives and concubines were there. This was either the wife of Nebuchadnezzar, or Nabonidus, but she knew the history of those first two dreams, and these Jewish boys who were brought in in captivity, and this Daniel that God had used by God.
v10-12
Daniel has not been pushing in. He’s not there at the party. He’s not called in with the enchanters and astrologers, even though he was previously elevated above them. But he is known in the kingdom by the queen as what kind of person? There is a man in your kingdom in whom is the spirit of the holy god’s.
She doesn’t know the full truth, but she knows what she’s seen, and what Daniel has faithfully testified to over the years. Now, Daniel is in his 90’s, and he will be called upon again because God is with him.
She calls him Daniel, by his Jewish name, which no doubt he continued to call himself rather than the pagan name he was given.
These are the things that are mentioned about Daniel.
Wisdom - God-like wisdom
light and understanding were found in him
an excellent spirit
knowledge
able to explain mysteries and solve problems.
The point is that God had gifted him, and Daniel knew God.
Oh to know God, and be used by God. There isn’t difficulty on earth that that reality cannot comfort. To be like Christ in this world, and have the Spirit of the living God dwelling within us because of faith in Jesus, so that while the world reals and shakes, we have been granted peace by His blood that passes human understanding.
That phrase “explain riddles and solve problems”, literally means “the loosening of knots.”
That’s what the Gospel does, you know. That we can know why the world is the way it is, why people are evil, and why a holy God would love his enemies and even save them by dying for them. That we can know his goodness, and have his peace, and the comfort of forgiveness and eternity in His love, because Jesus suffered for us and rose from the dead.
The knots have been loosened! Praise God! But there are many out there who are still in their sin and revelry, ignoring the impending doom outside the gates and we need to warn them. Quite literally “The writing is on the wall”, but they cannot understand. We must tell them. The Spirit must open their eyes and reveal it to them.
Like Daniel, be ready to be called upon when you’re needed, because if you’re in Christ, you too have the Spirit of excellence in you, and have what the lost in our world need in order to see, that Christ is the true King, His reign is forever, and his Kingdom is for all who trust in Him.