THE HANDWRITING ON THE WALL
After working just a couple months a young man approaches his boss and request an absurd raise and working less hours. The boss smiles and shares this reply, Times Square is a bowtie-shaped plaza five blocks long between 42nd and 47th Streets. A jaguar can run about 50 miles an hour. In Kasakhstan the average monthly salary is $190 U.S. dollars. In 1974 West Germany won the FIFA world cup. Saturn is the 6th planet from the sun and finally, nobody knows if DB Cooper got away or not. The young man sat bewildered, but responded slowly. I don’t get it? The boss shook his head, That’s right, you don’t get it.
Sometimes what’s obvious is not obvious to everyone. Not everyone understands.
WHY DON’T PEOPLE EMBRACE GOD, FAITH? Look at four passages, insights to the difficulty for those who don’t get it.
The man who has only the powers of nature of existing as a human being in the flesh alone, the faculties derived from Adam, but lacks the supernatural principle of saving grace; who has a soul in his body, but no divine inspiration in that soul; or who is not truly enlightened and renewed by the Word and Spirit of God, and therefore has no other way of obtaining knowledge but by his senses and natural understanding; because of his stubbornness, ignorance, denial, rebellion cannot or does not have the ability to understand or apprehend spiritual truths from God. He lacks the lens and the ability to grasp scripture. They read but the message remains mysterious to them. This again is one of the messages provided in the book of Daniel. God is truth and only God can reveal that truth.
When someone says, The handwriting is on the wall they are normally referring to the fact that the answer is quite easy or is in plain sight. However, the true writing on the wall was not clear–only Daniel could interpret it and only God was able to reveal it. To you, you know what the handwriting on the wall is now, it’s abundantly clear, it’s obvious what it says. The wicked go away into eternal punishment, but he righteous into eternal life, (Matthew 25:46). Daniel 5 is a repeated message of the handwriting on the wall? Not everything is obvious to everyone.
1 Corinthians 2:14 states, But a natural man (worldly, living in the flesh) does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.
1 Corinthians 1:18 adds, For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
1Corinthians 1:27, but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong.
Matthew 11:25, At that time Jesus said, I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You’ve hidden these things from the wise and intelligent, and have revealed them to infants.
THOSE WHO FAIL TO LEARN FROM THE PAST. . .
DANIEL 5:1-4, BELSHAZZAR
JUST BECAUSE GRANDPA (or others) GOT IT DOESN’T MEAN YOU’RE GOING TO
Chapter 5 begins with Belshazzar. He’s the last king of ancient Babylon. He reigns for a short time during the life of Daniel AND he doesn’t get it. Interesting, his name, means Bel protect the king. He is operating from the powers of nature; of being a human being. His choice in this position is to trust a made up god called Bel (baal); meaning lord or master. A lot of Bels and whistles. The Bel or Baal of Babylon was supposedly Marduk (god of thunderstorms).
Praying to something created by God that somehow becomes your God. Scripture continually puts all the other gods up against God Himself and all the other gods are proven to be ineffective, powerless and in actuality exist because God MADE them. Creature worshipping the created.
Belshazzar didn’t gain much from the stories of Nebuchadnezzar. In vs 1-4 he holds a feast (eat, drink and be merry), for a thousand of his nobles. So tons of people come to celebrate his position, power and possessions. Makes a horrible mistake. He mocks Gods, vs 2, When Belshazzar tasted the wine, he gave orders to bring the gold and silver essels which Nebuchadnezzar his father (term of endearment, grandfather or ancestor – father Abraham) had taken out of the temple (desecration begins) which was in Jerusalem, so that the king and his nobles, his wives and hs concubines might drink from them. And so they do in vs 3.
Interesting piece in vs 4. They don’t get it. The gold and silver of God is different than the gold and silver of man. This act is a great sacrilege, using the sacred as seductive.
Gold, silver, and copper are the first three on the list of seven metals of antiquity as they are the first three to be discovered from a human history perspective.
Only gold, silver, and copper qualify as genuine, noble metals based on their electron structure, making them resistant to corrosion and oxidation; they resist bacteria and viruses. These 3 (coincidence, don’t think so), became the core constructors for the Temple.
So the mocking of God is found in vs 5, they drank the wine and praised the gods of gold and silver, of bronze, iron, wood and stone. The reference to this mockery is found in Psalm 115:4, Their idols are silver and gold, the work of man’s hands. They have mouths, but they cannot speak; they have eyes, but they cannot see, they have ears, but they cannot hear, they have noses, but they cannot smell, they have hands, but they cannot feel, they have fee, but they cannot walk, they cannot make a sound with their throat, those who make them will become like them, everyone who trust in them. HE, THEY DON’T GET IT. Be careful not to make the sacred seductive.
AT SOME POINT, NOW/LATER, WHEN GOD IS MOCKED
HE WILL SHOW UP – DANIEL 5:5,6
These are pagan people (a life lived a part from God). So it’s not a stretch to understand that for them drinking would lead to and have the desire of drunkenness. I’ll walk a thin line here. When consumption moves past Psalm 104, where wine is intended to gladden the heart and instead reaches dysfunctional proportions, the Bible identifies this as sin. Millions of people drink to reach a dysfunctional state. That’s what’s going on here. They are drinking as to lead to debauchery, Ephesians 5:18, don’t get drunk on wine which leads to debauchery, instead be filled with the Spirit.
Belshazzar is looking for a buzz to receive something from Bel Marduk, god of the thunderstorm. He is literally PURSUING THE PROGRESSION OF James 1:14,15 (read).
A. PROVIDE AN ILLUSTRATION I HOPE YOU FORGET BUT YOU PROB- ABLY WON’T. Aren’t you grateful that you’ve not just seen the hand writing on the wall, but you get it, you know what it means. Just leav- ing behind the season of Thanksgiving (gratitude) and moving to- wards the season of Christmas (celebration, joy) NO ACCIDENTg r a t i t u d e
(opposite of gratitude is hidden in the word itself under the Greek and Latin, plus Roman influence)
g r a t i (t u d e)
(tude is Latin plural form of toot, as in toot your own horn)
g r a t (i) t u d e
I refers to the eye of the soul, the Greek emphasis of what enters the soul from the outside and makes you who you are, selfish/inward OR benevolent/outward)
(g r a t) i t u d e
is the Roman slang for RAT
signifying when you toot your own horn you are in reality a rat, taking, taking, taking from the world and giving nothing in return
SO THE OPPOSITE OF GRATITUDE IS A HORN TOOTING RAT