Today's Scripture Reading (June 4, 2023): Daniel 1
A friend of
mine's wife fell in the bathroom. Now, the floor was wet, and it was her fault;
she wanted to blame it on her husband, but she really couldn't. She fell on the
floor and said she didn't pass out, but she hit the floor with such force that
she saw a bright light in her head and was afraid that the light might be a
precursor to something terrible. So, she just yelled out, "Help me."
Her husband was
in the house and heard this loud "BANG" and then a softer "Help
me." And he comes running, heart beating out of control and not sure what
has happened. He reaches the bathroom door, and there is the woman he loves
lying on the floor, and there is blood all over the bathroom floor.
He panics. He
runs into the bedroom, grabs the cordless phone that sits next to the bed, and
then runs back to the bathroom and calls for help. I mean, what else do you do?
And so, he does what we all would in that situation. He takes the cordless
phone and dials 4-1-1. On the other end of the line, this lady comes on the
phone, and he blurts out everything that he knows. His wife is lying on the
floor in the bathroom, she is still conscious, but there is blood everywhere. He
needs someone to come and to come now. And he is getting frustrated because the
stupid woman on the other end of the line won't come. In fact, all she wants to
do is to pawn him off onto someone else and have him dial a second number.
Finally, he
hangs up and dials the second number, 9-1-1. And there, he finds someone who
dispatches an ambulance and asks him questions about his wife that the first
person had not asked.
What happened?
The problem was not with the operators who handled the call; it was the number
that my friend dialed. You don't dial 4-1-1 and expect an ambulance to be dispatched.
That is not what that operator can do, but at 9-1-1, that is precisely what
they do.
Nebuchadnezzar
had changed Daniel's name to Belteshazzar. Daniel means, "God is my Judge."
Specifically, it is "El Is my Judge," and El was one of the names
that Israel used to indicate their God, as in El-Shaddai, which means "God
Almighty." But Belteshazzar means "Bel Protect the king." Bel
was a Babylonian God. But as Daniel receives his new name, he knows a secret. Daniel
knew that Bel could not protect the King. Bel was the wrong number. And there
is absolutely nothing in this story that indicates that Daniel wanted harm to
come to King Nebuchadnezzar. Everything that we have says that Daniel wanted to
protect the King. But he knew that a different number had to be dialed. The
best way that he could defend the King was by dialing the correct number.
Daniel commits
to God, the one who was his judge, and God honors the commitment. And this is
the recurring theme of the Book of Daniel: Daniel makes his commitment to God,
and God honors that commitment.
Our struggle is
often that we want to honor too much. We put everything into their little boxes
and try to honor it all. We have our job in one box and give honor to it. We
have our spouses and our family in another box, and we give honor to them. We
have our free time and the things we like to do in another box, and we honor that.
And then we have our Sunday morning box, the box with God in it, and we honor
that box. But that is precisely what Daniel was refusing to do. I will not eat
from the King's table because that means I will have to honor him. If I am here
and the name that I have been given says that I am to protect the King, the only
way I can do that is to ensure that all of my honor goes to my God. I can only
protect the King if I remain, Daniel, even though you call me Belteshazzar.
The best way to
honor your spouse is to ensure that everything in your life honors God. The
best way to honor your kids is to ensure your life honors God. The best way to
honor your job and your employer is to make sure that your life honors God.
Daniel got
that. I need to honor God so that these other things can be honored. Daniel
honors God, and because of that, the very purpose that the King had given to
Daniel was fulfilled. The King intended that Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and
Azariah would be healthy. He intended that they would be educated, and he
intended them to be wise. And all of these things were fulfilled because they
insisted on honoring God first.
Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Daniel 2
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