DWDP: The Downfall of Belshazzar and the Writing on the Wall – A Cautionary Tale of Legacy and Redemption

Discover how the echoes of the past can haunt the present as we dissect the tragic tale of Belshazzar, the son of Nebuchadnezzar. In our latest biblical reflection, we see the phrase "like father, like son" come to life in a most unfortunate way. Belshazzar disregards the wisdom his father gained from divine encounters and instead, surrenders to the seductive pull of wine and sacrilege. My narrative intersects with the story of a friend whose life swerved onto a redemptive path during his time in prison, underscoring the critical consequences of substance abuse and the perpetuation of harmful cycles that blur our moral compass.

As we turn the pages of Daniel chapter 5, the mystery of the message written on the wall unfurls before us. Daniel's interpretation of this divine sign offers a profound lesson on heeding the warnings of our faith. Join us as we connect the ancient wisdom with our modern struggles and invite you to become an integral part of our spiritual voyage through our online community. Engage with us, share in our discoveries, and let the lessons of history resonate within you, offering guidance and inspiration for your own life's journey.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

Welcome to More Than Medicine, where Jesus is more than enough for the ills that plague our culture and our country. Hosted by author and physician, dr Robert Jackson.

Speaker 2: 0:16

Papa, can you tell me a story? Do you really want me to tell you a story? Well, you go, get your brother and your sisters and I will tell you a story. Welcome to Devotions with Dr Papa. I'm your host, dr Robert Jackson, gather your Bibles and let's look into the written word, which reveals to us the living word, our Lord Jesus Christ. This week we're continuing in Daniel, chapter 5.

Speaker 2: 0:48

The title of my lesson is like father, like son. Medical doctors recognize that there are certain conditions that are inherited or passed from parent to child, things like carnaerotic disease, diabetes and certain psychiatric conditions. They're just passed down from parent to child. Unfortunately, there are tendencies that run in families for which there is no clearly definable genetic trait, such as alcoholism, drug abuse, child abuse. These are most likely learned behaviors passed from parent to child. There's no strict inheritance for these tendencies, because we all know alcohol or drug addicted parents who have children who are God fearing, upstanding citizens, and vice versa. We often hear the phrase like father, like son, or the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

Speaker 2: 2:04

In Daniel 5, we meet Nebuchadnezzar's son, whose name is Bel Shazar, and I'm here to tell you this apple did not fall far from the tree. Neither did he learn anything from his father's experiences. Now let's recollect a little bit. What were the experiences that Nebuchadnezzar had? Well, if you remember, he saw the fourth man in the fire, which we believe was a theophany, was a pre-incarnate revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ in the fire, with Shadrach, meshach and Abednego. He had his dreams interpreted by Daniel, in whom was a spirit of the gods, as Nebuchadnezzar described it. And Nebuchadnezzar spent seven years living like a beast of the field because of his pride and arrogance, until chapter four and verse 34. At the end of that period, I, nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven and my reason returned to me and I blessed the Most High and praised and honored him, who lives forever. Now, those were the experiences of that prideful king Nebuchadnezzar. And you would think that his son, bel Shazar, would know these things and would have learned something from his father and would have benefited in some way from his father's experiences. Did he not learn anything From his father, king Nebuchadnezzar? Well, the apple didn't fall far from the tree. In Daniel, chapter five, verses one and two, we begin today's lesson.

Speaker 2: 4:11

Bel Shazar, the king, held a great feast for a thousand of his nobles and he was drinking wine in the presence of the thousand. Did you catch that Drinking wine? Probably excessively. When Bel Shazar tasted the wine, he gave orders to bring the gold and silver vessels which Nebuchadnezzar, his father, had taken out of the temple, which was in Jerusalem, so that the king and his nobles, his wives and his concubines might drink from them. Then they brought the gold vessels that had been taken out of the temple, the house of God, which was in Jerusalem, and the king and his nobles, his wives and his concubines drank from them. Now, if that were not sacrilegious enough, they drank the wine and praised the gods of gold and silver, of bronze, iron, wood and stone. Now, this son of Nebuchadnezzar obviously didn't learn anything from his father. The wine flowed freely. Obviously it clouded his reason and his memory.

Speaker 2: 5:28

Now back up a minute. Some of you will remember when I interviewed a friend of mine about two years ago whose name was Jimmy McPhee. Jimmy, when he was 19 years old, while intoxicated and in a fit of anger, shot two men, killing one of them, and he ended up in prison for 45 years. Now, at about the 20-year mark, god impacted Jimmy's life and he became a believer in the Lord, jesus Christ, and he became an evangelist and a soul winner in the prison system. After 45 years he was released. I met Jimmy and he and I have become fast friends. And I asked Jimmy recently. I said, jimmy, what percentage of men who were in the prison system do you think committed crimes while under the influence of alcohol or drugs? And Jimmy didn't hesitate even a second. He said, dr Jackson, easily 60% of the men who were in the prison system committed their crimes while under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

Speaker 2: 6:44

And I say that to you because I want you to understand that this king, bel Shazar, acted foolishly while under the influence of wine and he forgot the lessons that he should have learned from his father, nebuchadnezzar. And they began to drink wine from the holy vessels, from the holy temple in Jerusalem. And not only that, they began to praise the pagan idols of Babylon. Now go backwards in time and begin to understand that this is a universal sacrilege, not just a sacrilege for him and his wives and concubines and all of his royal officials.

Speaker 2: 7:33

In Exodus, chapter 20, verses three through six, god gave a commandment to the Hebrews that was not just intended for the Hebrews. Listen to what God said. He said you shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol or any likeness of what is in heaven above, or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them or serve them. For I, the Lord, your God, am a jealous God Visiting the iniquity of the fathers, on the children, on the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing loving kindness to thousands, to those who love me and keep my commandments. Do you see the generational curse? Do you see the generational blessing? Do you see the universal application? It's not just for the Hebrews, it's for every nation, every ethnic group, every tribe under the sun.

Speaker 2: 8:37

God is the true and living God, he is the true king of the heavens and the earth and he is a jealous God and he doesn't share his glory with any other counterfeit God, any pagan idol. And when Bel Shazzar and his royal officials, his wives and concubines, began to praise the pagan idols using the holy vessels from the holy temple, it was just too much. God is not just the God of the Hebrews. Bel Shazzar's father, nebuchadnezzar, began to understand that after multiple interactions with the true and living God, and he ultimately confessed that God is the king over all, and all his ways are just. He is the king of heaven and all his ways are just. This commandment applied to all people everywhere. God is a jealous God and he shares his glory with no one else. Nor does he take kindly to his holy vessels from his holy temple being used to worship pagan idols.

Speaker 2: 10:03

So in verse 5 of chapter 5, the hidden hand of God suddenly becomes visible and begins to write a message to this prideful son of Nebuchadnezzar, who is immediately frightened out of his wits. Let's hear what the Bible says. Suddenly, the fingers of a man's hand emerged and began writing opposite the lamp stand on the plaster of the wall of the king's palace, and the king saw the back of the hand that did the writing. Then the king's face grew pale and his thoughts alarmed him and his hip joints went slack and his knees began knocking together. And, just like his father before him, his first reaction was to call the magicians, the conjurers, the sorcerers and the Chaldeans. And that's exactly what he did. But, just like in Nebuchadnezzar's palace, these men were impotent, they were powerless and they could not interpret the writing on the wall.

Speaker 2: 11:12

So who came next? It was the queen. Now, I don't know if this was the queen mother, nebuchadnezzar's wife or if it was Belchazar's wife the scripture doesn't make it plain. But this woman remembers Daniel and she advises the king to call Daniel. So Daniel is called in. The king makes him a promise that he will give to him many riches and a royal position third in the kingdom, if he can interpret the writing on the wall. And what does Daniel say? And Daniel says King, keep your reward, keep the position. But he said, I will tell you what the writing says. But before that, in verse 18 of chapter five, daniel gives this king, nebuchadnezzar's son, a history lesson and a fearless rebuke.

Speaker 2: 12:13

In verse 18, listen to what Daniel says O king, the most high God granted sovereignty, grandeur, glory and majesty to Nebuchadnezzar, your father. Because of the grandeur which he bestowed on him, all the peoples, nations and men of every language feared and trembled before him. Whomever he wished, he killed, and whomever he wished he spared alive. And whomever he wished he elevated, and whomever he wished he humbled. But when his heart was lifted up and his spirit became so proud that he behaved arrogantly, he was deposed from his royal throne and his glory was taken away from him. He was also driven away from mankind, and his heart was made like that of beast and his dwelling place was with the wild donkeys. He was given grass to eat like cattle and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven, until he recognized that the most high God is ruler over the realm of mankind and that he sets over it whomever he wishes.

Speaker 2: 13:25

Yet you, his son Bel Shazar, have not humbled your heart, even though you knew all this. What a rebuke, what a fearless rebuke, even though you knew all of this. But then he goes on. But you have exalted yourself against the Lord of heaven and they have brought you vessels of his house before you, and you and your nobles, your wives and your concubines have been drinking wine from them. And you have praised the gods of silver and gold, of bronze, iron, wood and stone, which do not see, hear or understand, but the God in whose hand are your life, breath and all your ways you have not glorified. Now there's the rebuke, a powerful rebuke, a fearless rebuke. And he goes on to say then the hand was sent from him and this inscription was written out.

Speaker 2: 14:31

Now you have to understand that there is such a thing as a generational curse and a generational blessing. Is that not what Exodus, chapter 20, told us? That, when God admonished the people not to worship pagan idols, but he said that if they did that, the uniquity of the fathers would be visited on the children of the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but, on the other hand, he would show loving kindness to thousands, to those who love me and keep my commandments. God promised a generational blessing. He also promised a generational curse. Here we see the curse in action. The son of named Bel Shazar follows inevitably in the footsteps of his proud, arrogant father, making the same mistakes and suffering the same consequences.

Speaker 2: 15:37

We all know families where the children repeat the mistakes. They repeat the sins of the parents, sometimes for generations. But then there is that one child that breaks the cycle, that chooses Jesus, chooses righteousness, and so do their children and their grandchildren. Some of you listening to me right now feel like you're in bondage to a generational curse, feeling like you are bound to repeat the same mistakes and the same sins of your parents and your grandparents. Listen to me, dear listener, it is not so. By the grace of God and the power of Holy Spirit, you can choose to break the curse. You can choose to break the cycle. It may be hard, but it is not impossible. All things are possible with God. There is also a generational blessing. We all know families where the grandparents, the children and the grandchildren are all believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. They all attend church together, they're all gainfully employed and everyone is happily married. Why is that? It's because of the generational blessing of obedience to God, started by God fearing grandparents a generation ago.

Speaker 2: 17:19

Can there be a black sheep in a good family? Of course there can be. Just think about King Manessa, who was born to good King Hezekiah. He was one of the worst kings ever in the nation of Judah. He was an idol-worshipping king. He even erected idols on the rooftop of the temple to the sun gods. But his son was King Josiah, who broke the cycle, who rid the land of idols, who rebuilt the temple and reinstituted the Passover. Josiah broke the cycle in his family and so can you, dear listener. It's your choice. God's grace is sufficient and nothing is too difficult for God. You can be the originator of the generational blessing in your family. It's your choice. Next week we will discuss the message on the wall and its interpretation. We're not through with Daniel, chapter 5. We're not through with the message that was written on the wall. We're not through with Daniel and the interpretation of the message. You're listening to Devotions with Dr Papa. We'll be back next week and may the Lord bless you. Real good.

Speaker 1: 18:54

Thank you for listening to this edition of More Than Medicine. For more information about the Jackson Family Ministry, dr Jackson's books or to schedule a speaking engagement, go to their Facebook page, instagram or their webpage at JacksonFamilyMinistrycom. This podcast is produced by Bob Sloan Audio Production at bobsloancom.