Do You Enjoy Yourself?

An exposition of Daniel 5

What do you enjoy? Movies, sports, music, eating, socializing, reading, being in nature? Do you enjoy God?

You can enjoy God through His “ordinances” — like reading the Bible, going to church, hearing preaching, taking the sacraments, prayer — and through his natural gifts, like movies, sports, music, eating, socializing, reading, being in nature. But if you do it without God, you’ve profaned His gifts.

To hear how to enjoy God, listen:

Belshazzar’s Feast (5:1-9)

Belshazzar hosts a great feast, for the in-crowd. Nebuchadnezzar had taken the gold and silverware used for the sacrifices in the temple in Jerusalem. Belshazzar thought to use them to praise the idols of Babylon, like Marduk and Bel, idols of gold, silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone (5:4), like people today use the church to praise patriotism or the family.

Profanity is taking something that is holy and using it in a common way. Holy things given by God, like His Name, prayer, His Word, baptism, the Lord’s Supper are not to be treated as play-things for other purposes.

To hear more about true profanity, click on the YouTube link above.

They’re enjoying themselves until God shows up in the form of fingers writing on the wall. Belshazzar is terrified! He calls on the traditional religions to solve the puzzle. Superstition, or magic, exists to help you enjoy yourself.

The “the enchanters, the Chaldeans, and the astrologers,” couldn’t figure out what the handwriting on the wall meant. It’s the same today, the superstitions, charms, the ancestor veneration (filial piety), Buddhism, that seemed like it’s working, even like it’s fun, when the party is cranking, show themselves to be empty when the handwriting on the wall shows up. When the party this world tries to distract you with is crashed by God, those who have spent their life enjoying themselves will be left pale and perplexed.

Belshazzar’s Forgotten Prophet (5:10-16)

When Belshazzar’s wise men can’t figure out the hand-writing on the wall, they don’t know where to turn. The queen reminds Belshazzar about Daniel. Daniel has been forgotten because unlike the enchanters and psychics and astrologers, Daniel tells people to honor the Most High God.

People who learned the Bible and the gospel when they were young, often forget about it so they can have a “good time” but they’ll look again when they see the hand-writing on the wall.

To hear more about how people forget God while enjoying themselves, click on the YouTube link above.

Belshazzar’s Failure (5:17-23)

The moment-by-moment continuation of your respiration, even while you enjoy yourself in your profanity, is a gift from God.

You may have heard of what God has done. Maybe you were raised in church and Sunday School, and you know some Bible stories; you’ve heard that there is a Most High God and that you have sins that offend Him and there is a coming judgment. But right now, you’re too busy enjoying yourself to remember all that stuff. You’re too busy making money, or going to school, or dating or marriage or family or career or just having a good time. When the party comes crashing down, you’ll desperately need to know what to do now, what is happening now. You’ll need to hear again what you failed to remember.

The moment-by-moment continuation of your respiration is in God’s hand. 

The problem wasn’t that he has pleasure. His problem was what he had pleasure for: himself. Your problem is not that you enjoy things. It’s that you enjoy yourself without God.

Belshazzar Is Finished (5:24-31)

Mene, Mene: numbered (x2), God has put an end to his party-lifestyle.

Tekel: “weighed”. An empty life, given over to merely pursuing pleasure, profane and honoring only what helps us enjoy ourselves is weightless.

Parsin: “divided.” It sounds like the Aramaic word for “Persia”. That night Belshazzar was killed and the Persians took over.

To hear more about the meaning of the handwriting on the wall, click on the YouTube link above.

Belshazzar’s feast is set before us every day. Many people live every day for that feast, at the edge of the grave, desperate to enjoy themselves. A life lived for enjoying ourselves is an empty life that will be weighed in the end and found wanting. It is finished. Our chief end is to honor God and enjoy Him forever. Two feasts are before you now: Belshazzar’s, tempting you to forget God and enjoy yourself; the other the great feast, the marriage supper of the Lamb. Remember Jesus.

To hear more about Daniel 5, click on the YouTube link above.

Covenant Reformed Baptist Church is Caswell County’s and Danville’s Reformed Church.