Episode Transcript
Daniel chapter 5 verses 1 and 2.
The title of the message is Vessels in the Wrong Hands.
Vessels in the Wrong Hands.
We reached a brand new chapter here in the study of Daniel.
The first four chapters of Daniel deal exclusively with the historical and prophetical accounts of King Nebuchadnezzar.
And boy, have I had a good time teaching these first four chapters.
Well, folks, it only gets better from here.
As we get deeper into Daniel, I mean the doctrine gets really, really deep.
And it will shortly.
Right now we have some historical matters to deal with today and some practical matters to deal with in the first two verses.
So we'll take it as God gives it and we'll cover them in the order that uh that He has revealed it to us.
Uh But uh we're dealing mainly so far with the historical and prophetical accounts of King Nebuchadnezzar. who conquered Jerusalem about 600 years before Jesus came.
This is real.
These are not fairy tales.
This is real history.
And uh and Nebuchadnezzar took captive prominent Jewish citizens, including the prophet Daniel.
And later known as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
And he also raided the temple of God.
He took the holy things from God's holy temple.
King Nebuchadnezzar reigned from approximately 605 B.
C. to 562 B.
C.
From my recollection, he was the longest reigning king in the empire of Babylon.
That doesn't happen real often.
You've got to be a strong fellow with a strong following to make it that long when you're ruling the world.
But our move into chapter 5 this morning moves us forward in time.
Passed the reign of King Nebuchadnezzar, past the reign of several other kings after him, to the reign of King Belshazzar. who began his reign in approximately 550 B.
C. when his father went into exile.
And he died in 539 BC when Babylon was conquered by Persia, which we'll get into later.
So by this time in our study of Daniel, King Nebuchadnezzar has already passed away.
Remember, he became a believer.
We celebrated his faith in God uh not long ago and we we we thank God for the testimony that King Nebuchadnezzar left behind.
And when King Nebuchadnezzar died, the Bible tells us his son evil Meradoch took the throne, and he reigned briefly from five sixty two to about five sixty BC, and then his brother-in-law, Nera Glissar, stole the throne and ruled from five sixty.
B.
C. to his death in 556 B.
C.
Did I pronounce that name right, Brother Doug?
Alright we go.
All right, make sure.
Brother Doug's our Hebrew scholar, so we'll pass it through him.
When Nabonidas took the throne, who eventually turned the kingdom over to his son, and the subject of our text this morning, Belshazzar, who was the great grandson of King Nebuchadnezzar.
Verse 1 introduces us to him as, if you look in your text now, Belshazzar the king.
Did you know that there were only two resources in the world, two known resources in the world, that ever mentioned Belshazzar?
That was the Bible and then one other book, secular book.
That was it.
And I'm sure people doubted that old Belshazzar ever even ruled as king.
But sure enough, they dug a little digging, and you know what happens?
They find this clay cuneiform, which was like symbolic writings they had back then.
And uh mentions old Belshazzar on it.
The Bible's always ahead of the scholars, no doubt about it.
And and and and by that, uh when we're looking at the name Belshazzar, that name Belshazzar means Prince of Baal.
Baelshazzar, Baal being the false god.
And since Belshazzar, Prince of Baal. was was named that, then we know that his parents did not receive the good news of God or pass the faith of Nebuchadnezzar down to their offspring.
Nebuchadnezzar testified of his faith in the one true God of Israel.
But had they believed in the one true God of Israel, they never would have named their child after the false God Baal.
Just a few generations back, this Belshazzar, King Belshazzar's great-grandfather said in Daniel 4.
37 Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven, all whose works are truth and his ways judgment, and those that walk in pride he is able to abase.
And this reminds us just how quickly the faith of God can vanish from generation to generation.
My wife and I watch old movies, I've told y'all before, because the new ones Uh any b basically anything past 1960 is going to have cursing and they just get dirty and we don't want that in our heads.
So We'll watch the older movies and and we watched one the other day and uh And this older man was taking a younger, younger boy into a church.
They wanted to make sure and pray.
Want to make sure and pray before they did something.
Pray about what they were going to do.
And this was a Disney movie.
And I thought, wow, how quick.
The movie was made during my lifetime.
And how quickly we go from Disney offering something to encourage people to pray To Disney getting just absolutely filthy and having two boys or two girls kissing each other to teach their children that garbage.
That's the way it was with Belshatzar.
You had a basically a revival under King Nebuchadnezzar King Nebuchadnezzar, he's telling everybody, don't you do anything against these Jews and their God.
I praise the God and King of heaven.
And anyone who doesn't, he's able to humble them real fast.
And so you had a time of revival, of renewal of the faith of God during that time.
And somewhat, we've had somewhat of that here lately in our time.
We've seen with Charlie Kirk's assassination and and my goodness a country singer named Jelly Roll of all things.
But they said whenever he professed his faith in Christ the other day publicly that the search engines where people search for things, the search engines suddenly had a huge surge in people searching about who Jesus was and about the Bible.
It's amazing.
And and but don't take any comfort in that.
All it takes is that quick.
One election change. one sway of public opinion.
All it takes is just one little thing.
One change of the kings like in Babylon.
All it takes is one little thing.
And everything can shift right back to where it was.
And then worse.
We see that throughout the Old Testament with the kings of Israel.
One king will do what's right in the sight of God.
You start to have a little revival.
The next king will do that which is evil in the sight of the Lord, and everything starts to fall apart.
And so the when we're seeing Belshazzar here, the the grandson or great-grandson of uh uh uh great-great grandson uh uh when when you see him being named after baal to give honor to bail This reminds us that children don't inherit our faith in God.
It is up to us to tell our children about the Lord and our grandchildren about the Lord.
And if you have grandchildren coming to visit you, And their parents don't have faith in God, you make sure and you share your faith in the Lord with them and you let them know about God.
Pass that down to them.
And then it's up to those children to decide.
Even if you pass it down, you can share the gospel with your kids, but many of us know by experience.
Believing the gospel, telling the gospel, doesn't mean other people are going to believe the gospel and take it on from there.
Children don't inherit our faith in God.
All it takes is for us to not share our faith and for them to not choose it.
And then multiple generations of unbelievers can then descend down from us.
Belshazzar had a godly grandfather.
But he himself was an ungodly man.
And because he was an ungodly man, the Bible says he, look back in your text, made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, and drank wine before the thousand.
Now the word Lords here is not talking about his false gods.
It's talking about those who ruled under him.
This was a religious festival.
And since there were a thousand of his top leaders at this feast, then it was a very large assembly, and I bet it was quite a spectacle to attend.
Belshazzar is leading the celebration because he drank wine before the thousand And the Bible says in verse 2, Belshazzar, whilst he tasted the wine, wine commanded to bring the golden and silver vessels.
While he's he's he's drinking the wine, and while he's drinking the wine at this feast, he commands to bring the silver and golden vessels.
So understand what's happening here.
Belshazzar is already having a pagan celebration.
Belshazzar is already tasting the wine.
Belshazzar already had all the vessels he needed.
He wasn't drinking the wine out of his hands.
He didn't need the vessels that he's about to receive for this pagan feast.
So the command to bring these vessels appeared to be a spur-of-the-moment idea from Belshazzar.
That while he's tasting the wine, it's like he drinks some of the wine and then thinks, hey, I know.
I know what we ought to do.
Somebody go get the golden and silver vessels that my great-grandfather Nebuchadnezzar took from the temple in Jerusalem.
Let's drink out of those.
For he tasted the wine and then commanded to bring the vessels, look back in your text, which his father Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the temple which was in Jerusalem.
Now, the word father here, because I've been telling you that he was his grandfather, the word father here, as we previously learned, it's It's a reference to Nebuchadnezzar being the great grandfather to Belshazzar.
And it means that Belshazzar was simply a descendant of Nebuchadnezzar.
So when it uses the word father, it doesn't mean his direct father.
See, when we say great Or when we say grandfather, the word grand, or if you're in Louisiana, they may say big mama, right, mama?
They say big mama.
But you know what?
It's still mama.
It's just an extra little adjective on top of that big mama, but still a mama.
Father, grandfather, it's just the little grand stuck on top of that.
Still a father, you see, it's still a descendant.
So don't get sidetracked by this and think that uh this is uh Belshazzar's direct father.
If you do, uh then you won't understand the scriptures and you will really be sideways with uh history.
All right?
You'll get history uh Messed up.
Micah chapter 7 verse 20.
Micah chapter 7 verse 20.
Same Hebrew word here.
Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob and the mercy to Abraham which thou hast sworn unto our fathers.
Watch this now.
From the days of what?
Old.
From the days of old.
That means a long time ago.
Our forefathers, four score and seven years ago, our Forefathers or our fathers set forth on this continent a new nation, as in a famous speech from Abraham Lincoln.
But when they're saying our fathers from the days of old, they're talking about their great, great grandfathers.
So instead of saying great, great, or grand, they just said fathers, days of old.
So Nebuchadnezzar was a father to Belshazzar in a previous generation.
Make sense?
Micah was referring here in Micah 7. 20 to a covenant that God made with the people of Israel long before his generation.
Nevertheless, they were still called their fathers.
So Belshazzar is commanding to bring the once holy vessels which were set apart for God's people in the temple, and to bring those vessels for them to drink from.
And I believe, and I believe that you can see where this would be a very blasphemous act that King Belshazzar is doing.
I believe it's an attempt to show great disrespect If you remember back when we first began this study, we learned that Nebuchadnezzar had not only taken these vessels from the temple, but He had taken them back to Babylon, took them from the temple of God in Jerusalem, took them back to Babylon, and then he put them in the temple of his false God.
As if to say, here, Baal, are the great treasures that you have won for us by your great power over the Jewish God?
And now by drinking from these vessels from God's temple as they worship their false gods, it's kind of like they're telling their false gods that they're stronger than the God of Israel. and in paying disrespect to these holy vessels.
For they took them, look back at your text, that the king and his princes, his wives and his concubines might drink therein.
They were going to use the vessels from God's temple to worship false gods.
Now you think about that just a moment.
Because this shows us how the devil operates.
Taking holy vessels from God's temple and using them In false worship of idols.
This is how the devil operates.
Satan loves to pervert and profane holy things in order to push his unholy agenda.
I'm going to repeat that again.
Satan loves to pervert and profane holy things in order to push his unholy agenda.
They were going to use God's vessels to further their ungodly agenda.
Have you ever noticed how Satan loves to use the so-called church to promote his vile and wicked things?
He loves it.
A few weeks ago I was watching a video of a Methodist church service.
Boy, I tell you, I wouldn't give a quarter for a Methodist church.
Not a quarter.
You couldn't pay me to belong to a Methodist church.
They were singing and praising in the church.
They were having a worship celebration in the Methodist church singing and praising homosexuality and other forms of gender perversion.
And why was so sad?
You saw all these silver-headed people out here.
I mean, it was a uh there there were some young folks, but it was a lot of it was older congregation They've been going to this church no telling how many years.
And they had the people up there, their little rainbows up here at the podium and everything, and they're dancing and singing, and then they all start marching and walking around the church as they're singing with their rainbows and there's all those other older people out there and they're just watching the show, you know.
Putting the money in the offering plate, you gotta keep supporting that stuff.
We've been going to this Methodist church for a long time.
Like the vessels in the temple.
God once used the Methodist Church to further his great commission.
But now, like the vessels in the temple, God is using the Methodist church, the devil is using the Methodist church. as his vessel to promote his unholy agenda.
The vessels of God are now in the wrong hands, you see.
And and and and the the the Presbyterian church next door to us, boy, have we had some We've had some good time talking about them.
Remember Sister Amy?
Sister Amy used to be their pastor.
Then one of the last pastors they had, he's now. uh uh overseeing a homosexual uh uh uh camp.
You can go camping with other homosexuals.
He oversees it.
The rainbow pastor And it's sad that the Presbyterian Church they used to they resist the Word of God now, but used to, and times gone by, God used the Presbyterian Church.
Perhaps the most famous Presbyterian minister is a man named Matthew Henry.
How many of y'all ever heard of Matthew Henry?
There's quite a few hands that have gone up.
He was from the 17th century.
Most famous for writing a commentary on the entire Bible.
You got to be smart to do that If you do a halfway good job, you gotta be very studious.
And he did a good job.
Things he's wrong on.
But he did a but he did a good job overall.
And many Baptist pastors consult to this day that old Presbyterian minister's commentary.
The Presbyterians also used to be vessels in the temple of God.
But these vessels have since fallen in the wrong hands.
Now each and every person that God creates is a vessel.
That's important for us to understand.
All of us are vessels.
We were meant to be vessels for the Master's use.
We were created to be used by God, but some people, some vessels, are evil and others are righteous.
So we are commanded by God to possess ourselves. our vessels, if you would, in such a way that God can use us for his glory.
1 Thessalonians chapter 4, verses 1 through 4.
1 Thessalonians 4, 1 through 4.
Furthermore, then we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk.
Or that is, behave, and to please God, so ye would abound more and more.
For ye know what commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus.
For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication.
Isn't that something abstain from fornication?
And here we are with our rainbow celebrating it.
He says, abstain from fornication, verse 4, that every one of you should know how to possess his vessel In sanctification and honor.
In other words, us as the vessels of God should be sanctified from this ungodly world that we might bring honor to God.
That God might use us in his hands, in his temple, as his vessels.
The vessels that had once been in the temple of God were now in Belshazzar's hands.
And that reminds us that just because people, the vessels of God, may have grown up in the house of God, Or maybe they once served as the vessels of God.
It doesn't mean that they can't one day be serving the enemies of God.
A lot of people have grown up in the church.
A lot of them were in the temple of God, so to speak.
Then they grow up, they depart from the faith, and they wind up in the enemy's hands. and become vessels of wrath, the Bible describes them.
Fit for destruction.
The reason Israel, how did how did Israel lose those vessels anyway?
How'd they get out of God's house?
And into the the house of Baal?
How'd they get out of the priest's hands into wicked Belshazzar's hands?
How did that happen?
How's that happened to people?
Little history lesson.
The reason Israel lost their vessels to Babylon is because they failed to possess those vessels in sanctification and honor.
They started taking False gods, false beliefs, and introducing them into the temple of God.
That's what happens when churches and pastors fail to be keepers of their doors.
To make sure that false doctrine, false ideas of this world, because believe me, the world would love to sway every one of our minds and have us teaching and following what they believe.
It's up to the pastors.
It's up to the people.
And I'll qualify that.
It's up to the pastors first and foremost. to guard the flock and make sure false doctrine in false, false ways do not get into the church.
It's up to the people because people have and people will continue to Get rid of good pastors in order to get bad pastors in that will tickle their ears and scratch their ears and give them things they want to hear.
They will.
They'll get rid of them.
That's why we try to be careful who we let in as members here.
We don't just let anyone walk in and say, I want to be.
Well, praise the Lord.
We got another member.
I tell you what, there's some church members I have rejoiced more seeing them leave than seeing them come in.
I have.
Say, Brother Richard, that's cruel.
No, Jesus said he's going to say, Depart from me, ye were that work of iniquity.
I never knew you.
When Jesus comes back, There's going to be the biggest church split you've ever seen.
Biggest church split you've ever seen.
False believers are going to go out into eternity Without God, true believers are going to be gathered in like wheat into his barn.
But they, the Israelites, they failed to ensure that they were devoted to God's purpose.
That's why they lost the vessels And they never would have lost those vessels to Babylon had they yielded those vessels to God instead of serving God in the temple.
The priests began serving false gods as well.
And And when Israel no longer placed those vessels in God's hands, God used Babylon to remove those vessels from Israel's hands.
Here's the kingdom truth for you this morning.
We can never keep what we take from God, and we can never lose what we give to God.
We can never keep what we take from God, and we can never lose what we give to God.
Notice the company at this religious feast.
The Bible says it included the king and his princes and his wives and his concubines.
Now, why is that important that he listed those out?
His princes, wives, and concubines.
The king was the authority The princes, wives, and concubines were all the people serving in different ways, but they were all under the king's authority And they were all drinking with the king unto their false gods.
I want you to notice then.
That they were feasting with the king they were serving.
There's a connection there.
They were feasting with the king they were serving.
Biblically speaking.
We feast with the king we serve.
Let me say that again.
Biblically speaking, we're seeing this biblical principle here in the book of Daniel.
We feast with the king that we serve.
Luke chapter 22, verses 29 through 30.
Luke 22, 29 through 30.
Jesus said, and I appoint unto you a kingdom.
Now Belshazzar was the king of a kingdom, was he not?
And in that kingdom they were serving and they were feasting with the king that they were under.
Now Jesus is telling. . .
His disciples, I appoint unto you a kingdom as my Father hath appointed unto me.
You see, in this church right now, the believers in Jesus Christ were not just a congregation.
We are a kingdom, and Jesus is our king.
And being our king, he has appointed unto us a kingdom.
Praise God.
The Bible says in the book of Ephesians, ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God.
We're no more strangers and foreigners.
That means we're not just walking around in this world with no kingdom and no king.
We're not just some wonders that don't belong to anything.
God appointed to Jesus a kingdom to rule over.
And because of our faith in Jesus, he's appointed that kingdom that God appointed him to us.
So by appointing us a kingdom, we have now become citizens, and now we have a king and a kingdom that we belong to.
And we have a king that we've been called to serve.
We have a king whose authority we've been placed under.
Why is that important?
Because we feast with the king we serve.
You can't serve a king without feasting with the king.
And we see that principle here in the book of Daniel.
His lords, his concubines, his wives, they were under his authority, and they were all drinking with the king, the false god.
They were feasting with the king, they were serving.
Jesus said, Luke 22, 29, and I uh appoint unto you a kingdom as my father hath appointed unto me, that ye listen now, why did he appoint us that kingdom?
That ye may eat and drink at my table.
Not that ye may rule But we do rule, but that's not what he's talking about.
Not that you'll serve me and have some king to serve, even though we do.
But he said, I appoint, in this particular lesson he's teaching, he said, I appoint unto you a kingdom that ye may eat and drink at my table.
In my kingdom.
And sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
Matthew 26, verses 27 through 29.
Says he that is Jesus, and he took the cup and gave thanks and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it.
What do you have there?
You have a king.
And you have people who who are feasting with the king they're serving.
He says, drink ye all of it.
Verse 28, for this is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.
But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, listen now, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom, whom he appointed Jesus head over.
So Jesus is telling us that because he's king and we're part of his kingdom, one day he's going to drink, he says, I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom.
You feast with the king you serve.
And why is that important for us to understand?
Because from the very beginning of creation.
What we eat has always been associated with who we serve.
You think back.
From the very beginning of creation, what we eat has always been associated with who we serve.
God allowed Adam to choose whom he would serve by choosing what he would eat.
And the effect the food has on our bodies symbolizes the effect our choice has on our souls.
The effect Adam ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because he chose to serve himself And the fruit of that choice caused him to die.
The effect it had on their bodies, death, was indicative of the effect it would have on our souls, eternal death.
We eat and drink, however, as the children of God, Jesus being our King, we eat and drink the Lamb of God.
This is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for you.
Take eat, this is my body, which is broken for you.
And the fruit of that choice causes us to live forever.
They could have chosen to serve God, eat from the tree of life And their choice would have been consummated by what they ate.
To this day, our choice is consummated by what we eat.
Jesus said He said, My flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.
He that eateth my flesh and drinketh of my blood have everlasting life.
And he says, If he doesn't eat my flesh and drink my blood, he has no life in him.
Our choice is consummated this day by what we eat.
One cannot supp without serving.
And one cannot serve without supping.
It's what we're seeing here in Daniel.
You can't serve the devil and eat at Jesus' table And you can't serve Jesus and eat at the devil's table, thank the Lord.
Be not deceived.
You cannot play the devil's games without receiving the devil's prizes.
They served the king, and they ate the king's meat.
We serve our king and we eat our king's meat.
And this is fascinating as we're looking at this here in Daniel 5 because The one thing Daniel and his fellow believers would not do when they were captured by Nebuchadnezzar before he became a believer.
You know what that one thing they wouldn't do?
They wouldn't eat the king's meat, brother.
That's right.
They wouldn't eat the king's meat.
Nope, not going to eat it.
One day as in closing, I gotta get y'all out of here before those nasty bells from that Presbyterian church start ringing.
I tell you what, I I want to take plugs and plug them up.
They're so loud when I'm out there.
But one day the Bible says, those who follow Christ, do you know what they're going to do?
When this world's over, says they're going to eat at the marriage supper of the Lamb.
There's going to be a feast.
We will be feasting with the king we serve.
On that great day, we will feast at the king's table like never before.
We'll raise our vessels of wine to the Lord.
And when we drink it, it'll still be the celebration of the New Testament of his blood.
But for now, we will continue to come to church each Lord's day to feast on his word and to drink in that living water Where Christians are feasting, they will be serving.
And where Christians are serving, they will be feasting.
You take either one of those out, you'll fail to have service.
Or you'll fail to have feasting.
That's why we want to serve you the Word of God.
Father, we thank you so much for your precious word.
Thank you, Father, for this inseparable connection between what we eat and who we serve.
We thank you, O Lord God, that we eat The bread of life, your son, therefore we serve the King who will one day come and reign over the world forever.
Thank you so much for appointing unto us a kingdom.
Help us to be vessels, Father, in the meantime, fit for our King's service, to possess them in sanctification and honor.
We ask it in Jesus' precious name.
We pray for each and every person who is here today.
Take them home safely and bring them back, Lord, next Lord's day.
In Jesus' name.
Amen.
