We're getting into just the first 12 verses for today. I intentionally already let the cat out of the bag. This is not gonna go the same for King Belshazzar as it did for King Nebuchadnezzar. But we want to look at this chapter in enough closeness and detail that we're able to find many of the lessons that are in it as we can. So that's why we'll take, we'll break it up, instead of just doing one lesson on the whole chapter, we'll break it up into multiple weeks. Something that's interesting about this chapter, Chapter 1 opens up Daniel when he's first coming into Babylon. We get the story of when he is one of the young boys, young men, who are taken. He's one of the captives of Judah, and Israel's in exile. They actually were kicked out of their land because they were not following God and His commands, and God promised that He would do this. He prophesied that they would take place. And so we see Daniel and his friends being set up as Jews who are in a foreign land, Babylon, and God is guiding and protecting them, even in their youth. So we see the introduction of this. Chapter 2, we see stories of Daniel and Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar has a dream, and Daniel is the one who can take that dream and interpret it for him. We see Chapter 3, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, faithful Jews not bowing down to the false idol, Nebuchadnezzar, and God saves them through the furnace. and they are not touched or hindered. And then chapter 4, we see Nebuchadnezzar again having another dream, needing interpretation, and only Daniel can help, and then God humbles this king. So we've been seeing throughout this whole book that God is the God of not just the Jews, but he's God over all, and his kingdom is over all, and that's why we have this whole series called God's Kingdom Unrivaled. There is no rival kingdom that could go up or against God and His power. He is the sovereign of sovereigns, Lord of lords, King of kings, and if we're Christians and He is our God, then it doesn't matter the political landscape or who's in power. We know that our God is the highest of high, and no matter the circumstance, we are to be faithful to God and trust that He will take care of us. Sometimes we are in political favor, sometimes we're in political oppression. Either way, we can thrive by following God. These are the big ideas of this book. But as we get to chapter five, it's actually, we're kind of going on a mountain's journey. Like chapter one, two, three, four, five. is kind of the top of a mountain, if you will, and we're gonna come back down the mountain, chapter five, six, seven, and we're gonna see, we're gonna explain a little bit more of that probably next week, but we're seeing lessons that are gonna be repeated. And so chapter four and chapter five are actually linked. They're gonna be saying very similar lessons, but they're not exactly the same lessons. They're similar, but not exactly the same. So what's interesting as we transition from chapter 4 to chapter 5 is that it's very abrupt. It's a very quick change, and it's actually a lot of time has passed. When we were looking at Daniel in the previous times, he was in the court, he was one of the chief magicians, but he was not an old man. We're going to see that many decades have passed since this past chapter. and that there's a new king who's ruling, and it wasn't just the next king, it was like the third king after the most recent king. So, fast forward, you know, somewhere between 40 and 50 years in between chapters. There's a long time, multiple decades, in terms of what's going on here. So, our main question for today is really around this chapter 5, King Belshazzar, and it's what are we to learn about God from the story of King Belshazzar? Well, what are we to learn about God? This whole book is about teaching us about God. sovereign God and how He interacts with people. We're going to be answering that in just a minute, but I want to read a few things before we do. In fact, let me read this quote from Sinclair Ferguson as he kind of gives us a little bit of context about this transition between chapter 4 and chapter 5. He says, the book of Daniel is not merely a record of the history of God's people. It's not like meant to be a full history book. in the exile in Babylon. In fact, the author shows relatively little interest in chronology in the historical section of the book, which is what we're in right now. We must look elsewhere if we want to understand the events of Jewish or world history in the period covered by Daniel. That's not the point of the book, is to give you just a history lesson. Instead, as we have seen, the book is concerned with the spiritual conflict that underlies history and comes to the surface in dramatic form in particular events of crucial significance to the kingdom of God. What is at stake in the exile is the threat posed by the kingdom of this world against the kingdom of God. This perspective helps to explain the abrupt way in which Belshazzar appears in chapter five without introduction, biographical information, or explanation of his place in the line of succession to the throne of Babylon. I think it's helpful to realize the book of Daniel is not meant, first and foremost, to be a history book. It's not meant to be like, well, this is what happened to the people of Israel during that time. It's true that it's telling historical events, but it's actually primarily a theological book before it's a historical book. It's historical in that it's telling you true things, but it's theological. It's telling you specific things and giving you specific stories so that you can learn something about God. And so that's why Daniel, the writer, didn't feel the need to tell you all the juicy details that has happened to the things of Israel in between Nebuchadnezzar and Belshazzar because it's not the point. The point is, who is God and what is He like and how is He interacting with the kingdoms of man? Let me tell you a story about how that teaches us something about God. That's what's going on here. So, that being the case, let's jump into explaining this, and then, again, we'll get to our question and our points for this morning. Verse 1, King Belshazzar, again, just jumps right into it, King Belshazzar made a great feast for a thousand of his lords and drank wine in front of the thousand. Already, this is an interesting story because King Belshazzar, besides him not being introduced, and it starts off with a king who wants to throw a party. A thousand is probably not a literal number, it's probably a figurative number to say a lot of people. It's not like, oh, you know what, he had 999 or 940. It's probably a lot of people who were there. And what's interesting about the story is that he drinks wine in front of them. And what we know from this time, and it's not that uncommon, is that in order to drink wine, that would have been considered something more lax and not dignified. Like if they were throwing a party, if you will. Well, often if there's a party, the king is separated from the people. The king is not in front of the people. So it starts off with, there's a king, he's throwing a party, this big party, and he's with the people. And so right away, if you're an ancient hearer, you should go, uh-oh. Something's wrong here because we have a king who's throwing a party pretty casually as if there's no distinction between him and the people. Where's this going? You know, it should already pique our interest. So what happened? Verse two, King 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. And we'll stop here just for another comment. First of all, It's very interesting. This book, like most of the Bible, has critics. There are liberal scholars, there are atheistic and non-Christian opponents to the Bible, and many people in the past have used this particular chapter about King Belshazzar as ammunition against saying that the Bible's not true. They've said that because in the ancient artifacts up until a certain point, There was no mention of a King Belshazzar over Babylon. And people are like, oh, see, this is just one of those made-up stories that you're a fake god and you're fake Christianity, you're fake Old Testament. That's not a real thing. We know who the real kings were because we could see them through these Babylonian artifacts who the line of the kings were. And so people would say, this isn't a real thing. This is fake. This is false. Well, surprise surprise, there's a reason why people didn't know about Belshazzar. First of all, we did know about Belshazzar, but it did come out later in archaeological finds and such. that when the Babylonian kings were mentioned, there were different names that were mentioned. One of the last Babylonian kings that was known was actually Belshazzar's father. He had a different name, Nabonidus, I think is how you might say it. The reason why people wouldn't know of Belshazzar is because his father was considered the king, but his father, because of some religious disputes and some other things, ended up choosing to live the last decade of his kingship outside of Babylon. And what he ended up doing was setting up his son, Belshazzar, as, if you will, a co-king, like a co-ruler, a co-regent, and that his son would be over Babylon and King Nebunidus would be outside of Babylon, but would still be considered the king of Babylon. And what we end up seeing actually, if you remember, later it said, when Belshazzar says, Oh, somebody tell me what the dream is. I'll give you everything. I'll give you a gold cord, and you'll be third in line to the kingdom. Why is he third? Normally it's second, right? It's normally like, I'll make you second in the kingdom. We know that in Joseph. You know, like, hey, I'll make you number two. Why would he be third? Well, it's because it's King Nebunidus, then Belshazzar, then. So King Belshazzar can't give you the second. he could give you below him. So actually, surprise, surprise, the Bible's right again. We find out, we don't need to worry about the truthfulness of the Bible, it's true. And people also have tried to attack the Bible at this moment, because they would say, hey, Belshazzar, wait a minute. If we're getting this timing right, this is many decades later, and Belshazzar is not the son of King Nebuchadnezzar. There's no physical relation there. Because it keeps saying there, in fact, in verse two it says, It says that he commanded the vessels of gold and silver that King Nebuchadnezzar, his father, had taken out of the temple in Jerusalem. And they go, wait, his father? That's not his father. His father's King Nebunidus. What's going on? But let me read to you this. Hopefully this is helpful, too. This doesn't mean that the Bible's wrong. It just means that it's a way of speaking. And this is a very common way of speaking. In fact, they didn't Well, let me read it here. Sinclair Ferguson says this, father has a variety of relationships. That's a word that's used for a variety of relationships. Nebuchadnezzar is called the father of Belshazzar in verses 2, 11, 13, 18, 22 in this chapter. And it is widely recognized that in Scripture and in the ancient Near East generally, not just Scripture, but like all over the place, in ancient Near East. Father denotes a variety of relationships, from natural fatherhood, true, to simple ancestry, like not your direct father, but maybe way down the line in your ancestry. The way in which the Jews appealed to Abraham as their father in their conflict with Jesus in John 8, 39. This was readily understood by the earlier commentators. For example, John Calvin wrote, the prophet calls Nebuchadnezzar the father of Belshazzar since it is usual in all languages to speak of ancestors as fathers. In any case, the Old Testament employs no separate term to designate more remote ancestry. Grandfather and great-grandfather are unknown terms in the Old Testament. We actually don't have any biblical terms for grandfather or great-grandfather. Just the word father. That's all there is. So people try to attack the Bible and say, wait, he's not its direct father. This is false. No, it's just one of those terms that are used like that. In fact, you don't even need to be in the same lineage to be called father. Rulers could be called father, or you could be a spiritual...or you could be a son. So, in fact, Paul calls Timothy, my son. Right? In the New Testament. That's even many centuries later. So you could be a spiritual son and not actually be through the bloodline lineage. You could be a spiritual father and not be actually in the bloodline lineage. Or we could say, even now in American history, we would say our founding fathers. And we're not related to them, but they're the ones who came before us. So people kind of get too nitpicky about these things. It's usually people who have bad intentions, who don't believe the Bible, who don't believe in Jesus, who are trying to find things that are wrong with that, but they end up coming up short. So just a little bit of help and a good way to bolster our faith to say, this is true, no problems here. But let me then ask this question because this is all setting up our first point. We're asking the question, what are we to learn about God from the story of King Belshazzar? And we're gonna see that this is our first point for this morning. You can write it down if it's helpful for you. What are we to learn about God? It's that our most high God sees the blasphemy of men and he will not be mocked. Our Most High God sees the blasphemy of men, and He will not be mocked. We see this because that is exactly what is going on in this story with King Belshazzar. King Belshazzar is clearly some ruler who's more worried about partying than he is about ruling the people. He wants to drink wine, he wants to get drunk. In fact, we can tell from this passage that it was more than just a drinking party, it probably included Lots of women, I mean, he had wives and concubines. It was probably a pretty inappropriate place with a lot of people there. And what does he do? He calls for the vessels of God that were taken from the temple. They actually belonged to the Jews, and they were supposed to be God's particular set-aside, set-apart vessels, and he wants to use them for ways that they were not intended. It's blasphemy. It's taking God's things and using them wrongly. So, let me read in verse 3. It says, "'Then they brought the golden vessels that had been taken out of the temple.'" See, it's letting you know that, that when Babylon took over Judah, and they took over the Israelites, and they brought them to their land, they took their sacred items from the temple, and they said, And Nebuchadnezzar did this, and he stored them. And so what did he do? He took them out of the house of God in Jerusalem, and the king and his lords, his wives and his concubines, drank from them. And if you were a good Jew back then, you would have went, You can't drink from those. Those are God's. Those are special. Those are sacred. Those are not common. Those are only supposed to be used in God's temple for God's worship. Don't desecrate something that is sacred. Don't bring it down and make it common. Ah, that tearing of the robes. It's very offensive. Blasphemy. It's unfortunate that in our day and age, it seems like we are less Our experience of blasphemy is not as strong as it has been in previous centuries. And I think it's because we don't honor God or see Him as righteous, as holy, as He truly is. I mean, there are reasons why people took off their shoes and their sandals when they thought that God was in their presence. And if you think about it, these were the holy vessels that were supposed to be in the temple, which is where the presence of God is supposed to be. So these vessels were not supposed to be for common use. So, look what they do in verse 4, they drank the wine, and not only did they take them out of the temple and use them for not worship, this is false worship going on, In inappropriate worship, verse four, they added false worship to it. They drink wine and praise the gods of gold and silver and bronze and iron and wood and stone. Insult to injury, they used it for the wrong purposes and gave glory to vain idols. It's actually disgusting and wrong. And I pray that we would grow. In fact, if you don't cringe at blasphemy, if you don't know what blasphemy is, I pray that you would grow in that. But if you don't cringe at blasphemy, I pray that you would pray, Lord, make me more sensitive. to how righteous you are and how offensive things are. In fact, let me just read from the Baptist Catechism about the third commandment. It's one of the ten commandments, right? You know, the first commandment, no other gods before me. Second commandment, we not make any carved images or can't worship God besides the way that he commands us to. The third commandment is you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain. It's blasphemy, and most people think that just has to do with using God's name as a cuss word. Well, clearly that's blasphemy, but it's much more than that. It's doing anything that would defame or degrade God or any of his particular sacred things or works. Let me read Question 60 of the Baptist Catechism is, what is forbidden in the Third Commandment? The Third Commandment forbiddeth all profaning and abusing of anything whereby God makes himself known. It's a much broader category. It's not just his name, it's anything that that we would profane or abuse by which God makes himself known. If you look at the children's catechism, the thing that's connected to blasphemy is God's name, his word, and his works. So that would include the temple, that's his work. That would include his people. If you do something against his people, you're blaspheming God because those are his people. So it's his vessels, it's his temple, it's his worship, they're degrading that. We should go like, ah, stop! Stop that. So God sees the blasphemy of men and he will not be mocked. So let me read this quote from Danny Akin about this, intended to mock the God of Judah. The act is intended to mock the God of Judah and to celebrate the gods of Babylon as being superior. Appearing in public and drinking with its guests, was not traditional protocol for the Babylonian king. No doubt, Belshazzar wanted to make this banquet special, and one way to do it was to make a spectacle of Judah's God. Belshazzar takes holy vessels and treats them as nothing more than common utensils. He then goes further and uses them in worship of false gods. You know, God sees this, We're gonna see in the next verse, immediately he responds to it, but we're gonna get that in a little bit. You know that whole patience thing, that God is patient with people as they sin, and he was patient with Nebuchadnezzar? We're gonna see there's some immediate reaction here. God does not let this go by. And he deals with it quickly. But I think it's important to be reminded, if we don't already know, of this verse in Galatians. These verses, Galatians 6, 7 through 8. Do not be deceived. God is not mocked. For whatever you sow, whatever one sows, that will he reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption. Today's lesson is a sharper lesson. It's a sharper takeaway because God is dealing with things quicker. Last chapter, he gave a lot of space. He gave a whole year for Nebuchadnezzar to repent of his pride. But in this one, we're seeing God be blasphemed in a way that he is not going to tolerate and he's gonna deal with much more quickly. And this gives us opportunity to pause and to ponder and say, are we? Are we sensitive to blasphemy? Are we engaging in blasphemy, maybe even without knowing it? A lot of times, people will do things and say things unintentionally. In fact, that's why there's this whole category in the Old Testament about making offerings for unintentional sin. You were doing stuff that you didn't know was bad, but it was bad. A lot of time, we aren't necessarily sensitized or trained in these things. We should be sensitized to blasphemy, to treating God as common, or the things that he does as common. And we need to know that it's important that he will not tolerate certain things. In fact, 1 Corinthians 6 gives this quote as well in the New Testament that's related. Galatians says, God will not be mocked, you will reap what you sow. If you're going to be a blasphemer, if you're going to be doing things that gets God upset, then expect the heat from God. 1 Corinthians 6 says, or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. See, a similar one. Don't be deceived. God will not be mocked. Do not be deceived. You can't act like this. You can't do this. Do not be deceived, neither sexually immoral, nor idolaters, which is what he was doing, nor adulterers, which is what was also happening in that party, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, which is what happened with the vessels, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, what was going on, revilers, what was going on, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God." There's clarity. God is holy. His law is clear. He has standards, and yes, He's a good God, He's a patient God, He's a merciful God, but there's a time when mercy and patience run out. There's a time where God begins to bring punishment and execution. Clearly, we're dealing with a pagan king here. We need to keep in mind what that means for us as we're Christians. We'll talk about that in a little bit, but we want to not lose or miss this clear teaching from Daniel 5. This is meant to be picked up. You were meant to be offended by this, and God is offended. How do we know? Let's look at our second point. First, what do we learn about God? Our Most High God, number one, sees the blasphemy of men and He will not be mocked. Second point, our Most High God warns sinners of the seriousness of their offense. Most High God warns sinners of the seriousness of their offense. Let's look at verse 5. Immediately, Immediately God responds to this. He doesn't just let it go on for hours and hours. Immediately the fingers of a human hand appeared and wrote on the plaster of the wall. of the king's palace opposite the lampstand. In fact, even opposite the lampstand. Why is that in there? Because if you understand that phrase, opposite the lampstand, that would have been used whenever there was the Ark of the Covenant and the mercy seat opposite the lampstand. That was the very presence of God. So opposite the lampstand is where God is. So God and his vessels are supposed to be where he and his presence are. And you're doing blasphemy Idolatry in my presence? Uh-uh. The hand comes out ready to say, not okay. And that's, God responds quickly and immediately because the sin is serious. And the king saw the hand as it wrote. Now, apparently, King Belshazzar understands the seriousness of what's going on because look what happens in verse six. Verse six, then the king's color changed. What is he, a chameleon or something? What's happening? His colors change? No, he's scared out of his wits. I mean, whoa, a hand shows up riding on the wall? And his thoughts alarmed him. What is this? What's going on? His limbs gave way. His knees knocked together. In fact, many commentators at this point said the Hebrew is actually a little more specific at this point, that a lot of the English translations maybe try to cover up the literal interpretation is that his loins became loose, which means he probably messed himself. He messed himself. He got that scared. And his knees knocked is what is likely the Hebrew behind that, that his loins got loosed. This was serious, and Belshazzar gets the message, uh-oh, I have majorly offended some God, likely the Israel God, right? Because that's whose vessels these are, unless he's dumb and not getting it. But God shows up immediately and starts to warn him for what he's doing. And this is what God does. God warns sinners. God makes sin clear. Some people don't give enough weight to God's righteousness. They don't think He's righteous and holy enough. They need to see He's good, He's holy. He should not be trifled with. This is our God. So some people don't give God's righteousness enough due. Some people don't give sin enough due. They don't think sin is that big of a deal. Oh, it's okay, I can do what I want. God is a nice God. He'll forgive me. No, no, no, both are wrong. God is holy, God is righteous, and sin is terrible and must not be tolerated. This is not just an Old Testament thing. This is true for all of us, but we see this being repeated and repeated again. I mean, I just read it from the prayer this time in Psalm 2. Let me read it again. God warns people of their sin. Psalm 2, 10-12, God warns those who apparently have earthly power that He gives them. He says, That's actually sounding a little bit like, I mean, he's not serving the Lord, but he's got fear and trembling, that's for sure. This is true. This is true of our God. The same God in the Old Testament is the same God in the New Testament. He really is holy, and he warns sinners, don't Don't go against me, be warned and be wise to serve me, serve my son, serve with fear, serve with trembling, rejoice. And then in Psalm 14, it talks about what the evildoers, who they think they are, but actually they should have fear of God. Have they no fear, no knowledge, all the evildoers who eat up my people as they eat bread and do not call upon the Lord? They are in great terror for God is with the generation of the righteous. You cannot go against God and you cannot go against God's people. You should be really scared if you try. We've lost often a fear of the Lord, a trembling in his presence, making him common. May it never be. In fact, even in the New Testament, it calls out the seriousness of sin. 1 John 3 makes it really clear. I mean, this is offensive language. It says, Verse 9, abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God. By this it is evident who are the children of God and who are the children of the devil. Whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother." You know, we hear this even in the New Testament. There's a high standard of loving the Lord and obeying Him and not sinning. A lot of times in our New Testament, we rightfully preach a God of grace and a God of mercy. We rightfully do that, but grace and mercy only make sense when you understand the seriousness of sin and the righteousness of God. They actually don't make sense. It's not gracious if it's not a big deal. It's not merciful if you're never gonna expect to have justice, but if you expect that justice and you expect honor to God who's honorable, then it's a big deal when he forgives you. It's a big deal when he doesn't extend the wrath that we justly deserve. So, I mean, John, the apostle, just says it clearly. Hey, if you're sinning and sinning, you're the devil. You're like your father, the devil, who just is sinning and sinning and sinning. And that's how we know who's real and who's not. It's the ones who are not entrapped and enslaved in their sin, but they actually are following their father in heaven, not their father the devil. It becomes a mark of a true Christian that you, to see, do you love God? Do you hate sin? Do you love other Christians? That becomes a mark of understanding, if you truly have faith, that is saving faith. So a question for us, I mean, we see this story. Let's not miss it. What are we supposed to learn about God? I mean, he sees blasphemy and he's not gonna be mocked. And he warns sinners of the seriousness of their sin, of their offense. So a question for us is, when was the last time that you were physically distressed or broken over your sin? When was the last time that you, kind of like King Belshazzar, as a way of speaking, wet your pants? and said, oh no, you lost your color. And she said, I have offended God. It is not okay what I've been doing. Is that a part of your experience? because it's appropriate if we understand the righteousness of God, and it's appropriate if we understand the seriousness of our sin, that we would be broken over our sin. In fact, it would be a true example that your faith is real, that you hate your sin, and that you don't want to do your sin, and that you're sorry for sin. Now, I ask this question because I think it's appropriate to this text, but not to bring a heavy blanket over us, just to bring a sobriety to us, to bring a seriousness to us, to not lose sight of who God is and how He works. But it is a part of our experience. If we are Christians and we're in Christ, We don't have to fear God's wrath and punishment for our sin. We have placed our faith in Christ alone, and so we don't have to worry about God smashing us all the time. But we don't lose respect for God. We don't lose honor for God. We don't lose fear for God. In fact, the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord. We actually, if anything, we fear God more as Christians than we did when we were Christians. We care about pleasing God more when we are Christians than when we weren't Christians. We care about honoring His name, giving Him praise, giving Him His due, putting to death our sin. We know the seriousness of our sin more as Christians than we do as non-Christians. So it's true, even though we don't have to worry about our ultimate punishment, because Christ has taken that on the cross, if you're in Christ. If you're not in Christ, you have to worry about that judgment. You have to worry about your sins being paid for, not by Christ, but by you. That's what hell is for. Hell is to pay the penalty for sin. But if we're in Christ, if we placed our faith in Him and Him alone, we don't have to worry about ultimate judgment, but we still have to be concerned with His honor. We still have to be concerned with how we speak and what we allow other people to do or say about God. We must live in a way that pleases God and not wink our eye at sin. God doesn't wink His eye at our sin. He dealt with our sin by crushing His Son on the cross for us. He took it serious. We are to take it serious as well. Well, let me keep reading here. Actually, let me read before we move on one passage. It's one we've read before, but it's worth saying now. James chapter four. This is a New Testament passage, and it's dealing with sin. What do we do when we understand the seriousness of our sin? We draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. This is actually good news. When we see the seriousness of our sin, what do we do? We run to Christ, and we say, oh Christ, forgive me again. Help me, please. Help me, I'm not taking you serious enough. I want to be pleasing, I don't want to be disrespectful. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, meaning do something to get rid of the filth. Don't just let yourself stay in that filth and that dirty. No, remove that from your life. Seek to get that out of your life. Remove those bad influences. Remove those bad habits. Purify your hearts. Ask God to change your hearts. Lord, I don't want to think that anymore. I don't want to engage with that anymore. Cleanse me from inside. Change me from inside, we pray. And it says, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. I mean, that's a bodily distress, is it not, when we are encountered with our sin? Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. This is the New Testament. This is a part of us fighting sin as Christians. So, God sees the blasphemy of men, and He is not mocked, and God warns sinners of the seriousness of their offense. Let's keep reading Daniel 5, verse 7. The king called loudly to bring the enchanters. How does he respond? Does he stop his sinning? Does he confess? What does he do? He runs to all of his normal ways of living. He runs to his cabinet. Okay, bring in the experts. Bring in my people who are on the payroll, who are supposed to be working for me to figure this out. That's why I'm king, right? So what does he do? He uses earthly means. He brings in the enchanters, the Chaldeans, the astrologers. If you're familiar with what we've gone over, this sounds awfully familiar to the past chapters, right? He's relying on earthly means. And what does he say? 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. He's using his power and his might and his status to protect him. He's offering his earthly wealth and goods. So he's clearly seeing somebody who's scared but not repenting, they're using ungodly means to try to deal with this. Verse eight, then all the king's wise men came in, and they could not read the writing or make known to the king the interpretation, and then King Belshazzar was greatly alarmed, and his color changed, and his lords were perplexed. So what good did that do him? No good at all. He ran to his cabinet, he used his earthly power and means, and it actually didn't solve the problem. It left him empty and scared like he was before. That's what happens when we're stuck in our sin and we're trying to fight sin without God. It just leaves us empty, scared, no further along than when we left. In fact, we're worse off because now, what, we're embarrassed, we've maybe lost money, we've spent time and energy, and we're even worse than when we started. This is a good picture for us. But let's look at our last point for this morning, knowing that we're gonna spend more time in this chapter in the coming weeks. What are we to learn? God sees the blasphemy of men. He's not gonna be mocked. He warns the seriousness of the sinner's offense. And now, what does he do? God, our most high God, he provides his prophet to guide sinners before judgment. God provides His prophet to guide sinners before judgment. This is important. God is kind. God is patient. God is offended, but even in His offense, He still makes a way and creates space for more repentance. What happens with Belshazzar, he uses his own, he uses his own methods and his own earthly ways, his worldly wisdom, right? Literally, the wise men of Babylon, how good were they? Not good. But what does God do? We're gonna see that through this queen mother, Daniel's gonna come back on the scene. So let's see here, for the rest of our, our chapter, verse 10, and the queen, which was likely King Nebunidus' queen, because he had his wives and concubines in the party, so it was probably the queen mother. The queen, because of the words of the king and his lords, came into the banqueting hall. She wasn't even there at the party, she heard about it, and so she comes in for help, kind of like mom to the rescue, and she says, oh king, live forever. Let not your thoughts alarm you or your color change, which a lot of commentators say that this is probably a jab. Like in some ways you say, oh, live the king, but you're not supposed to point out that he's distressed. She's like, hey, you know, it's not, don't worry about it. There's kind of this like, ooh, okay, that's probably not good that she said that. That might have been a jab there. But verse 11, there is a man in your kingdom, that's probably another jam, like, hey, there is help here, in whom is the spirit of the holy gods. She's obviously pagan, polytheist. She's attributing his power to the gods, not to the god. In the days of your father, light and understanding and wisdom, like the wisdom of the gods, were found in him. And King Nebuchadnezzar, your father," and that's repeated, your father, the king, made him chief of the magicians, enchanters, Chaldeans, and astrologers, verse 12, because he was an excellent spirit, knowledge, and understanding to interpret dreams. explain riddles, and solve problems were found in this Daniel, whom the king named Balthasar. Now let Daniel be called, and he will show the interpretation." This is actually a moment of grace, because what happened? He tried in his own strength, he used his own wisdom, he called on his cabinet, he's offering his kingdom, and nothing. He's scared, and it was just like he was before. But what happens? It takes his mom to come from outside the party into the party. You think she came on her own? No, God's sending her. God's using this providential situation to bring up Daniel, and he would have been likely in his 60s, some even say his 80s at this point. He would have been an old man. Hey, there's this guy in your kingdom that you're not aware of, but you should be aware of. He's done this before. He can help you, sort of a thing God brings us about. And I think it's important to end on this note that it's true, God will not be mocked. And God makes sure that you know the seriousness of your sin. But God does send people to guide you. in your sin. This is how he's always done it. He's always sent his prophets ahead of time to give guidance and help. I mean, prophets were often the people who were calling people to faithfulness, right? And that's who this Daniel is. He's been out of the scene for many decades. He's getting called back in to work here. And God does that. He calls people to bring truth so that help could be had. The question is, will people receive that help? We're gonna get to King Belshazzar later and how it's not gonna go the same as Nebuchadnezzar, but let me just show some examples. I mean, John the Baptist is a clear, actually the last of the Old Testament prophets. when he shows up on the scene during the time of Jesus, Matthew 3, verses 7 through 10, here's an example of this very same dynamic. But when he, John the Baptist, saw the Pharisees and the Sadducees coming to his baptism, these would have been the ones not following God or Christ, he said to them, you brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not presume to say to yourselves, we have Abraham as our father, for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now, the ax is laid at the root of the trees. Every tree, therefore, that does not bear fruit, bear good fruit, is cut down and thrown into the fire. God does this. He sends his prophets to guide sinners along the way, to tell people about the coming judgment. He's kind in this way. Just go to the end of our Bible, Revelation. I mean, he tells kings. Notice, in John the Baptist, he tells the rulers, right? The Sadducees, the Pharisees, the rulers of the people. In Revelation 6, it's these kings, these rulers of the earth. Chapter 6, verse 15, it says, and the kings of the earth and the great ones and their generals and the rich and the powerful and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and the rocks, fall on us and hide from us the face of Him who is seated on the throne from the wrath of the Lamb. For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand? This chapter is much more about God's judgment, and it's important for us to be encouraged by God's sovereignty over people and over...you know, we've seen that a lot. I mean, God has saved His people again and again, even in the book of Daniel. But this fifth chapter is really a different tone of a chapter. It's God not putting up with stuff. But he's talking about these, he deals with something immediately. He brings terror and fear to sinners like this pagan king. But he still does send his prophet. He still makes a way for them to know the truth. And that can give us much comfort. It can give us much comfort because this Daniel, he ends up being just a picture of Christ, the truer and the better prophet. the one who really has come to save us from the judgment of God, the one by which can give us the message of salvation, the one that can help us not need to be smashed, not need to be stuck in our sins, not need to be dishonoring God or blaspheming God, not needing to be aware of wishing we knew more of the seriousness of our sin. No, Christ is the one who actually calls us to the seriousness of our sin. Does this not remind us of when Christ, in the Sermon on the Mount, when he says, you've heard it said, You know, you've heard it said about what? About anger or about murder. Well, I'm telling you, if you're angry, it's like murdering. You've heard it said about adultery. If you're lusting, it's adultery. Christ does not take the sting off of sin. He says it's serious. This is really just a truer and better example of Christ and what He's doing. And really what it comes down to is that Christ is the prophet, and he is the one who is going to save us from God's judgment, because he dealt with the seriousness of sin. And that's why we know these famous verses, John 3, 16. but have eternal life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already. He didn't come into the world to condemn it because it was already condemned. But whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. Verse 19, he goes, and this is the judgment, that light has come into the world, and people love the darkness rather than the light, because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his work should be exposed. But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God. And this is what we have to really end with. It's true, God takes sin seriously. He calls sinners to account, and He tells them that judgment is coming. But good news is that He sent His Son, Jesus, to be the one to not only tell us that judgment is coming, but to save us from the judgment who's to come. And so may we, because of faith in Christ, still see the seriousness of our sin, still ask for forgiveness day in and day out. Yes, Christ forgives us. He says He is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins. But that includes us seeing our sin. That includes us confessing our sin. That includes us hating our sin. That includes us putting away our sin. That includes us replacing our sin with the truth of repentance, of a heart that loves the Lord, that does not want to partake in those things. In fact, you know, I left out a part in John 3, verse 8, on purpose so that we can read it now. John 3 says, whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, right? This is the bad news. Hey, don't be a child of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. So it's true that without Christ, we are sons of the devil. But with Christ, that work can be destroyed and we can become a son of God. And if we are sons of God, if we are in His people, then we have forgiveness. and we have a new power, and we have a new heart and a new hope, and we have a new light and a new life. So let me end on this verse. Wonderful good news of Christ being the one who takes the punishment for us. It was talked about in Isaiah 53, well-known passage. But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. Upon him was the chastisement. that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord laid on him the iniquity of us all. Praise God that Christ is the one who not only warns us of the judgment to come, but then is the one who's able to save us from the judgment to come, amen? Let's pray. Father in heaven, thank you for this Daniel chapter five, and Lord, may we not miss, Lord, what you're teaching us, the seriousness of sin, that you are not, it's not okay to blaspheme you. We cannot do whatever we please, Lord, no, there are consequences. We must live in your world according to your ways and your laws. And Lord, oh, thank you, thank you, thank you that you sent Jesus. Thank you that you sent him to teach us, to warn us, to guide us, and to save us. And so Lord, grow us in our salvation, grow us in our knowledge of Christ, grow us in our love for Christ, and grow us in our carefulness in honoring you, so that all that we do is please you. It's in your name we pray, amen.