Daniel (Sections 97-98)

Section 97 "His thoughts troubled him."—Daniel 5:6 To many men thinking is an unusual employment.

Yet it is a distinction of man that he can think. No wonder that when thought is forced on some men they are troubled. This trouble from thought is salutary: by it conviction and conversion may come; and, in any case, troubled thought is as the sounding of the tocsin, arousing the mind, and warning the soul.

Let us think of Belshazzar, and of ourselves. Of us, too, it may have been said, "His thoughts troubled him." We must be in a bad way if we dare not face our own thoughts about ourselves. What must God's thoughts of us be?

I. It did not appear likely that his thoughts would trouble him.

1. He was an irresponsible and reckless monarch. He came of a fierce nation, and was born of a father who had been punished for his haughty spirit.

2. He had hardened his heart with pride (verses 22 and 23). Daniel said, "Thou hast lifted up thyself against the Lord of heaven."

3. He was drinking wine, and it had worked upon him (verse 2).

4. He was rioting in gay company: "his princes, his wives, and his concubines." Such comrades as these usually chase all thought away, and help their leader in his recklessness.

5. He was venturing far in profanity (verse 3), daring to abuse the sacred vessels in his banquets as an expression of his contempt for Israel's God, whom he despised in contrast with his "gods of gold, and of sliver, of brass, of iron, of wood, and of stone." Perhaps he had mentioned these in detail as the gods who had triumphed; at any rate, the prophet brings them forward with detestation in verse 4. No man is rendered wise or thoughtful by the wine-cup. No man is out of the reach of the arrows of God. No conscience is so dead that he cannot arouse it.

Many other men in far lower positions exhibit equal pride of station and success; this is stimulated in much the same manner, and exhibited with much the same contempt for the things of God. A parallel is easily drawn between Belshazzar and other proud ones.

II. Yet well might his thoughts trouble him.

1. For what he saw was appalling: "fingers of a man's hand over the candlestick" (verse 5).

God sometimes gives men warnings which they must notice.

2. For what he could not see was suggestive. Where was the hand? Where was the writer? What had he written? What did it mean? A terrible mystery was involved in his vision.

God gives men hints of something behind, which is yet to appear.

3. For what he had done was alarming. His own past flashed before him. His cruel wars, oppressions, blasphemies and vices.

What he knew of his father's career increased his terror.

What he had himself failed to do came before him: "The God in whose hand thy breath is, and whose are all thy ways, hast thou not glorified" (verse 23).

What he was then in the act of doing startled him. He was wantonly defying Jehovah, the God of Israel.

See him trembling before whom all trembled.

He has drunk a strange draught out of those holy cups.

III. And might not your thoughts trouble some of you?

1. You are careless, riotous, fond of feasts, given to much wine. Does wantonness ever end well?

2. You are prosperous. Are not beasts fattened for the slaughter?

3. You are trifling with holy things. You neglect, or ridicule, or use without seriousness the things of God. Will this be endured? Will not the Lord be provoked to avenge this contempt?

4. You mix with the impure. Will you not perish with them?

5. Your father's history might instruct you, or at least trouble you.

6. The sacred writing "over against the candle stick" is against you. Read the Holy Scripture, and see for yourself.

7. Specially, you have been weighed in the balances, and found wanting. Conscience beholds the scales in the hand of the infallible Judge.

Take heed that you do not fall into Belshazzar's condition, to whom Daniel gave no counsel, but simply interpreted the sentences which sealed his doom. As yet we dare preach the gospel to you, and we do. God's thoughts are above your thoughts. He bids you repent of sin, and believe in his Son Jesus; and then your thoughts will cease to trouble you.

Thoughts and Facts

Conscience, from inaction, is like a withered arm in the souls of many; but the Lord of conscience will one day say to it, "Be thou stretched forth, and do thine appointed work."

Such mystery of iniquity, within, That we must loathe our very thoughts, but for the cure He hath devised,—the blessed Tree The Lord hath shown us, that, cast in, can heal The fountain whence the bitter waters flow.

Divinest remedy Whose power we feel, Whose grace we comprehend not, but we know.

—Miss Havergal As the ant-hill, when stirred, sets in motion its living insects in every direction, so the conscience of the sinner, disturbed by the Spirit, or judgments of God, calls up before its vision thousands of deeds which fill the soul with agony and woe.—McCosh. The Duke of Wellington once said that he could have saved the lives of a thousand men a year, had he had chaplains, or any religious ministers. The uneasiness of their minds reacted on their bodies, and kept up continual fever, once it seized upon their frames. It is our blessed office to tell of One who can "minister to a mind diseased," whose grace can deliver from "an evil conscience," and through whom all inward fear and trouble are removed.

Charles IX of France, in his youth, had humane and tender sensibilities. The fiend who had tempted him was the mother who had nursed him. When she first proposed to him the massacre of the Huguenots, he shrunk from it with horror: "No, no, madam! They are my loving subjects." Then was the critical hour of his life. Had he cherished that natural sensitiveness to bloodshed, St. Bartholomew's Eve would never have disgraced the history of his kingdom, and he himself would have escaped the fearful remorse which crazed him on his death-bed. To his physician he said in his last hours, "Asleep or awake, I see the mangled forms of the Huguenots passing before me. They drip with blood. They make hideous faces at me. They point to their open wounds and mock me. Oh, that I had spared at least the little infants at the breast!" Then he broke out in agonizing cries and screams. Bloody sweat oozed from the pores of his skin. He was one of the very few cases in history which confirm the possibility of the phenomenon which attended our Lord's anguish in Gethsemane. That was the fruit of resisting, years before, the recoil of his youthful conscience from the extreme of guilt.—Austin Phelps.

Section 98

"Now therefore, O our God, hear the prayer of thy servant, and his supplications,
and cause thy face to shine upon thy sanctuary that is desolate, for the Lord's sake."—Daniel 9:17 This true-hearted man lived not for himself.

Daniel was a fervent lover of his country.

He had been personally faithful, and in consequence he had been honored, but he did not rest content with personal ease.

He had visions of God, but he was not visionary.

He had searched and studied, but now he prayed. Supplication should ever be the outcome of our meditation. His prayer is instructive to us.

It suggests our fervent entreaties for the church of God in these days.

I. The Holy Place.

"Thy sanctuary." The temple was typical, and for our edification we shall read the text as if the spiritual house had been meant. There are many points in the type worthy of notice, but these may suffice:—

1. The temple was unique; and as there could only be one temple for Jehovah, so there is but one church.

2. The temple was "exceeding magnifical"; and in the eyes of God, and of holy beings, the church is the house of God's glory.

3. The temple was the fabric of wisdom. King Solomon built it; and of the church we may say, "a greater than Solomon is here."

4. The temple was the result of great cost and vast labor: so was the church builded by the Lord Jesus at a cost which can never be estimated.

5. The temple was the shrine of God's indwelling.

6. The temple was the place of his worship.

7. The temple was the throne of his power: his word went forth from Jerusalem; there he ruled his people, and routed his foes. The church of Jesus Christ in the latter day shall be more accurately the anti-type of the temple, as the present church is of the tabernacle in the wilderness.

II. The earnest prayer.

"Cause thy face to shine upon thy sanctuary that is desolate."

1. It rose above all selfishness. This was his one prayer, the center of all his prayers.

2. It was the child of thought (verse 2).

He had thought over the sins, calamities, prospects of his people.

Such prayers show the way in which a man's mind is running, and are more full of force than unprepared expressions.

3. It cast itself upon God. "O our God."

4. It was a confession that he could do nothing of himself. Honest men do not ask God to do what they can do themselves.

5. It asked a comprehensive boon. "Cause thy face to shine." This would mean many things which we also implore for the church of God.

(1.) Walls rebuilt and securely standing.

(2.) Ministers in their places, faithful in their service.

(3.) Worship presented with acceptance.

(4.) Truth proclaimed in its clearness. God's face cannot shine upon falsehood or equivocation.

(5.) Holiness displayed in its beauty. Where the Holy God is smiling, his servants are holy.

(6.) Delight in fellowship: the saints walking with God.

(7.) Power in testimony. When God is pleased, his word is mighty, and all holy endeavors are prospered.

6. It asked needful things. For the church; unity, life, purity, power, joy, etc. For the world; enlightenment and conversion. A desolate church is a defeated church. For ourselves; edification. We cannot prosper in soul when Zion languishes. For our children; salvation. Our sons and daughters are not likely to be saved in a desolate church.

7. It asked with a mighty plea: "For the Lord's sake."

III. The consistent conduct. This is suggested by such a prayer.

1. Let us consider the state of Zion (verse 23). Let us form a careful estimate of the condition of true religion.

2. Let us lay it earnestly to heart. Whether for joy or sorrow, let the condition of the church concern us deeply.

3. Let us do all we can for her, or our prayer will be a mockery.

4. Let us do nothing to grieve the Lord; for all depends upon his smile. "Cause thy face to shine."

5. Let us pray much more than we have done. Let each one of us be a Daniel.

Incitements

During the troublous times of Scotland, when the Popish court and aristocracy were arming themselves to suppress the Reformation in that land, and the cause of Protestant Christianity was in imminent peril, late on a certain night John Knox was seen to leave his study, and to pass from the house down into an enclosure to the rear of it. He was followed by a friend, when, after a few moments of silence, his voice was heard as if in prayer. In another moment the accents deepened into intelligible words, and the earnest petition went up from his struggling soul to heaven, "O Lord, give me Scotland, or I die!" Then a pause of hushed stillness, when again the petition broke forth, "O Lord, give me Scotland, or I die!" Once more all was voiceless and noiseless, when, with a yet intenser pathos the thrice-repeated intercession struggled forth, "Oh Lord, give me Scotland, or I die!" And God gave him Scotland, in spite of Mary and her Cardinal Beatoun; a land and a church of noble loyalty to Christ and his crown.

"At the time the Diet of Nuremburg was held," says Tholuck, "Luther was earnestly praying in his own dwelling; and at the very hour when the edict, granting full toleration to all Protestants, was issued, he ran out of his house, crying out, 'We have gained the victory.' " The church may be sick, yet not die. Die it cannot, for the blood of an eternal King bought it, the power of an eternal Spirit preserves it, and the mercy of an eternal God shall crown it.—Thomas A dams.

Prayer was a universal habit among the heathen people of Samoa, and they manifested considerable intelligence in their conception of prayer. For example, when on their boat-journeys, those who were sitting as passengers in the boat were expected to pray for those who were plying the paddles. The passengers would repeatedly thank the rowers in these words: "Thanks for your strong strokes"; to which the rowers immediately made answer, "Thanks for your intercessory prayers," recognizing, it will be seen, the principle that their power to ply the paddles was dependent upon the prayers of the passengers.—The Congregationalist.