Into the Fire | Week 5 | Sermon

when back when I was in college, I I took a history class class and I loved history. I actually minored in it. And it's weird because I love history, I had this class. It was a survey of like the year zero to like December.

But it was a big survey class, like 300 people in the class. And I go the first day and they the teacher introduces this grad student. He goes, he'll be taking notes and they'll be typed up and if you miss a class you can go buy them for a dollar in the bookstore because we didn't have technology back then. He's down there with cuneiform tablets making the notes. And so it was supposed to be helpful, but he did say, but there's no announcements on that. In other words, what he's trying to do is to dissuade people from doing what I proceeded to do. And that is I went first class, I went and I had to miss the next class. I got the notes. I looked at them. I go, This guy takes really good notes.

And since I love history and I like it, I would

get busy and I go, You know what? I got things to do. Even though I like history, I'm not gonna go to class today. I go by the notes and I just stick them in a binder. Go, yeah I'll study them. I could do that. And then I got so distracted that even though I love history I just continued to not go to class and just buy the notes thinking I'll study them before the test because there's basically three tests. That's your whole grade in this class was three tests. And kept doing it kept getting the notes put in the binder get the notes put in not look at them not look at them not look at them and then finally one week I realized

in one of my other classes they go hey next week is the midterm so I go okay next week's midterms all my classes I should probably go to the history class this week to find out which day the midterm is next week and and so I show up as a few minutes late like most of you at church and And as I've walked in,

it was absolutely quiet. All I saw was people. And then I read the handwriting on the wall. And it was up on the board. It says, Midterm, you have this much time. Put your tests in this basket. Good luck. And you know, luck was like, Good job. Good luck. I read it that way because in my situation was, Good luck.

Because I had to sit down and go, I guess I'm going to find out how much world history I know from the year zero to 1,500 off the top of my head. It's like a pretest. How much did I already know? Not as much as I thought I did. So I just blew 33% of this class all at once. And I had a choice to make.

I could try to drop it. I could get angry. I could just be frustrated. I could avoid. I could make excuses, or I could be humble. And that's what I chose to do. I went up to the professor. I apologized.

I told him how disrespectful I was. I even said I love history. Why wouldn't I come to the class? Why did I let myself get so distracted? And I said, Is there any extra credit thing I can do to make up? And he said, No. And then I thought, Great. He goes, But here's what you can do.

Be here every time. You'll be surprised to know that we do a lot of discussion. If I know that you're reading the extra materials and taking it serious and you're involved in the discussion, I'll see that you are really

taking this serious. And then do the if you get really good grades on the next test and they improve and you go great, I do have the grace that I take that all into account when I give the grade. Meaning you might get a higher grade than what your test score shows because of his grace. All I had to do was trust.

So I did. And he literally gave me a higher grade at the next at the end than what my technical number accounted. But I had to not be prideful,

Not just think I could just come and go come and go and do what I wanted to do. I needed to be humble in that moment. That's what we're gonna see today in Daniel chapter five is we have a choice to make. If we choose pride, we're gonna be in trouble. If we choose humility, we can have victory because of God's grace.

And so as we're in Daniel chapter five, what we're gonna see kind of the theme for the whole chapter is a continuing what's been happening in this whole book, but it comes really from Proverbs. There's a verse in Proverbs. This is really what we're gonna see in the story today. Pride goes before destruction and haughtiness before a fall.

Haughtiness isn't wow, that's a hottie. It's this this kind of Hottiness. Although if you are a hottiness, you probably have pride too. But anyways, I don't know why I say stupid things in the service, but I do. It's talking about guys pride will always end poorly.

And and what we're gonna see today is is in the life of this new King Daniel chapter five takes place a little over twenty years after chapter four and and Nebuchadnezzar is now dead and gone. Daniel's kind of semi retired. There's a new king. Daniel's actually about 80 years old now. And

this new king acts with great pride. And what happens is he's partying and this party's having is in celebration and it's actually their version of worship of their gods, which is funny about a lot of this idol worship. It's the God wants you to do all the fun stuff you want to do and it's an orgy basically. Drunken orgy.

Their words of their God. But he's also partying at the same time while the Medo Persian Empire, which we learned from the dream that Nebuchadnezzar had was going to come. God had already called out is gonna replace them. They've already surrounded the city of Babylon. They're outside digging

and for some reason they just he's pridefully thinking they ain't getting in. And so they're having this this party and then God shows up and that's he writes up a hand appears

and writes on the wall just like I saw the handwriting on the wall. You ever heard that? I just use that in this kind of handwriting on wall. We've all heard that phrase before. This is where it comes from is in this story. And we are gonna see from what happens with the life of this King Belshazzar.

There's four things as I just read through the story. We're just gonna talk to the story. There's four things that in the pride that he does. That even though he's a king from thousands of years ago and we're just people coming to church right now, we do the same things

when we follow pride and we don't humble ourselves before the Lord. So here we go. First one. First few verses here.

It says this, Many years later, King Belshazzar gave a great feast for thousands of his nobles and he drank wine with them. While Belshazzar was drinking wine, he gave orders to bring the gold and silver cups that his predecessor Nebuchadnezzar had taken from the temple in Jerusalem.

So these are the the items that God said set these apart for worship of me in the temple. They're supposed to be used for the worship of God. He brings them into this false worship and his party. He wanted to drink from them with his nobles, his wives, and his concubines.

So they brought these gold cups taken from the temple, the house of God in Jerusalem. And the king and his nobles, his wives, and concubines drank from them. While they drank from them, they praised their idols made of gold, silver, bronze, iron, and wood and stone.

So they're celebrating and they're worshiping. They're giving credit to their false God. They're pridefully like, look, we got these things. We're about the Medo Persians are out there. We know later on he knows the history. He knows about Nebuchadnezzar.

We're gonna see there at the end. And he brings in the instruments that God said, Set these apart to only be used in worship of me. And he mockingly takes them and uses them for his own pleasure in his own party. He makes about himself.

And so what basically he's doing in this moment is the first point of what pride will make us do. Pride will cause us to find worth in the wrong things. We will find worth in the right. That's what he's doing. He's finding worth in these other things.

In these idols of stone, wood, and all that because he has these false gods and these other gods. It's interesting.

Idols are really about us because these idols are we worship these gods we can be in control of. We talked about that last week. And it's interesting about these idols took you down the road of the things you wanted. Pleasure, power, prestige.

It's all about them. And he takes these instruments, these things that God said, set this apart only to worship me in the temple. And he uses it for his own pleasure. And we're like, okay,

what's that all about? What does that have to do with me? How am I doing that? How do we do that? How do we find one? You realize the word worship means worth ship.

That's what it means. Worship means worth ship. Meaning what do you find your worth in? And what you find your worth in is what you're worshiping. And so anything we chase after, anything we'll sacrifice, anything we do. So when he was worth shipping, basically these idols were stoned. They physical

things and they're all about him. And we still do that today. We come to church and we say, hey, I believe in God. I believe in Jesus. But we actually might be worth shipping something else. We find our value, the worth. We find worth in other things. And how do we do that?

By not worshiping God the way he's asked to be worshipped. See, there's things God's asked us to set aside in worship dim because back then they had a temple. They had to go to the temple to worship God. If you know anything about the New Testament

and you've become a Christian, we now have the Holy Spirit residing in us rather than God just residing in this temple. Guess who the temple is now? We are. This isn't a temple.

People are like, hey, why don't you do this in there? Why do you do there? They act like this is a church. This is a church. No, this is a meeting place. We're the church. We're the temple of the Holy Spirit. And so in the New Testament, God says, if you're gonna worship me, if I reside in you,

he says, you worship me by being a living sacrifice. So there are things that God has asked us when we know his love and we understand how much he's loved us. He goes, I want you to set aside some things in worship of me. And the question is, are you?

Are you setting aside what God has asked you to set aside in worship of him to live the life he's asked us to live in order to be a part of the mission he's given us, which by the way is really for us not from us. God can do anything he wants without us. But he asks us to sacrifice

and be a living sacrifice in trusting him. And Jesus said, if you love me, you'll do what I say. Worship. Worth ship. Well, what does he ask us? I mean, our life, what are those utensils? What is the things he's asked us to set aside? Well, it's part of our life.

And two of the primary things he's asked us to set aside is time and money.

Now you're getting the point, aren't you? How many of us that come here that you say I'm a Christian, you're partying with the time and the money that God is saying, I want you to set aside a portion of it in worship with me. But you don't do it. We're just like these kings.

God has asked us to set aside a portion, a priority. He asked us to give first, not from our leftovers. Why? It's not just something he wants from us. It's because of his love. He wants it for us. When we give first,

we prove that God is the one we trust that takes care of us. And when you don't die and you realize guess what happens? God gives you the gift of stop worrying about money. Stop worrying if you're gonna lose your job. Stop worrying because it's not that that provides for you. It's God. Same with our time. When we give our time we stop making it all about us. We stop worrying. We get unselfish. And when we pour in and use our gifts to serve the kingdom and share our faith with others, God uses us

to watch lives change for all of eternity. And that's the and when you get to be a part of that, you end up becoming thankful to God for it instead of looking at it as a scary obligation. The pride will keep you from realizing that.

We'll never engage in worship the way we should because you're never going to truly trust. And some of go, I'm not prideful. I'm just afraid. I can't do it. What about where I'm at? I'm not living like a king. These guys are living like kings. I'm struggling. And fear is a form of pride. Pride

is really, I'm going to trust something other than God. So why trust your fear?

That's the whole point of why God asked us to give and ask us to serve. He wants something for us. But do you realize it? We have pride. But here's where the heart of that pride comes from for the most of us, especially a lot of you guys in the room. Because I understand guys because I is one.

And that is, well, it's my time and it's my money. I worked hard for it. Why should I give it to a church? I don't trust this church. Churches are dumb. You're taking the exceptions. There are organizations and churches that are just trying to take money from people.

But do you think just because some people do something wrong, it gives you the right to not do what's right? Or what God's asked? The reality is if you really don't want to give to church because you don't trust the money, you should go to a different church if you don't trust us. Why do you stay here?

Because it's an excuse to not give. Because of pride. And the real pride comes in our view of ownership. The reason I make a big point on this is he comes back to this at the end.

And he comes back. This is the big deal. Like you were not worshiping me. You're not humble. You're prideful and you're missing it. And you resist and you resist and you resist. And he says, who gave you the life and the breath in your body?

So I say, I did the job. I did that. But who gave you life? Who gave you the gift to do the job? Who gave you the job? In other words, pride comes from when we think we own our stuff. Humility says it ain't mine in the first place. I'm a steward and that's what God says.

And God says seek ye first the kingdom and I'll take care of you. But if we say it's mine, that's you're never going to get what it means to truly follow Christ and experience the joy of it. If you keep thinking that God is taking something from you. You are offering back a portion of what He's given you.

I taught my kids this faith of a child. Kids are smarter than us sometimes. Sometimes. I taught all three of them about giving and I said the same thing with time. But I took them when they're little and I said I'm gonna give you a dollar. And back then you go to the dollar store and you're like, Ah!

I'm like and I and how I give it to them is I sat 10 dimes in front of them. I did this with all three of them when they got old enough. And I sat in front of them and I said, Okay, I'm gonna give you 10 dimes.

I suggest you save a dime. Don't just spend it all. And then they go, Okay, they're all excited. Then as I give it to them, go, But hey, as your your father who gave you the whole dollar, can I have a dime back? You know what all three of them did? Sure.

And you know what all three of them did? Dad, gave me you can have two. They gave me 20% back. They had no problem giving me more back why because right then and there they understood that their father gave them the whole dollar Many of you struggle with giving because you think it's yours. That's pride. God says,

I possess everything.

And I want you in love to trust me because when you trust me, money will stop being an idol. You will stop stressing. You'll stop getting in debt running after worthless things. You'll stop trying to have prestige. You'll start looking. You'll stop being about just your comfort. You're stopping to pee about this. You'll stop fighting with your spouse about it all the time because you're doing what's right with it. And you'll see that God actually takes care of you.

But you never will with time or money if you think it's yours. And the second thing with that is we also like try to justify like, well, of course, this is a king from 2000. He lived like a king. I'm just struggling. I'm barely making it. Can I tell you something? We live in greater luxury than any one of these kings.

Every one of us. You live in an apartment right now and I guarantee you a King from these days would trade homes with you in an instant. We want to we've been saving money because we really want to remodel one of our bathrooms. It really needs some work.

Notice I said one of our bathrooms, I would guess everyone in this unless you're young and have a one bedroom place. We have more than one bathroom. Guess what those Kings had? One bathroom.

And if I went to a designer and they said, know what design you should go with in your bathroom? You should go with Davidic era Palace bathroom style. I would say hard pass because I've seen King David. They've done earth. I've been in the Palace Of King David. And I have a picture here of his bathroom.

I like the natural rock, the moss and the toilet not so much. You might not see where the toilet is. I have a zoom in picture. That must have been comfortable. How many ladies are gonna go into that bathroom? Guys will pretty much go anywhere. So the point is lost on us. That's their bathroom.

We've got to be humble enough to realize we act humble when we say, I don't have enough, when actually that's pride. We have more than they had. Every one of us. And that's a smokescreen. If you know the love of Jesus and how much he sacrificed for us, it should be easy to trust him with your time and money.

The problem is you have an idol and you're finding worth in the wrong thing. And humility is the only answer. And God's trying to give you a gift because as long as you hold on to that idol, you will never feel the real joy of the love of Christ

because you won't trust him to the point to see that, wow, he really does take care of me.

And as long as you hold on to that, every time something starts to go screw in your finest, every time the economy goes weird, every time you see the paper, every time you hear about layoffs, every time you hear about that, every time your spouse wants something that you don't want and you you look at your credit card bill, every time, you are gonna have nothing but intense

frustration, fear, and just anxiety. And even when you are doing well, you're going to worry about losing it. It's a gift. But pride will make you miss that.

Pride will make you miss that. Let's go look at what happens next thing. Because when you have that kind of pride and you find worth in the wrong things, you will then lead to this. Verse five says, suddenly they

saw the fingers of a human hand writing on the plaster wall of the King's palace near the lampstand. The king himself saw the hand as it wrote, and his face turned pale with fright, his knees knocked together in fear, and his legs gave way beneath him. The king shouted for the enchanters, astrologers, and fortune tellers to be brought before him. He said to these wise men of Babylon, who can read this writing and tell me what it means,

will be dressed in purple robes of royal honor and will have a gold chain placed around his neck. He's gonna make you look like Burger King from the commercials. And he will become the third highest ruler in all the kingdom.

And so he's gonna promote you. He's gonna offer you all these things. Well, goes with the intent. We know the story. How many of these kings keep running back to these other so called wise guys?

We do the same thing. When we're prideful and we find worth in the wrong things, guess what we tend to do when we look for wisdom? We then find wisdom in the wrong place. We find wisdom in the wrong place. You know what we do?

When it comes to church and listening to the Word of God and having the wisdom, we go to culture or we'll mix culture and word because we don't really know the word. What we're really doing is we end up doing what I did with my class when it comes to Gathering as the Body. We're like, I don't really need to come to church. It's really I just need God and me. I don't need an organization.

I don't that's a lie from the pit of hell because we're called to be a body and you kind of body parts need to be together for it to work, doesn't it? I mean if you go hiking, la la la la and you come like, oh, there's a hand. There's an arm. There's a torso, there's a head. What have you walked across? A murder scene.

We are called the body of Christ. A body only works in life when it's together.

We are called to be together. We are called to come. But what we do is when we find worth in other things we will then start getting distracted. We'll go, I got the notes. I can listen to a podcast. I can do that. I can just watch online. The problem with that is you're not here consistently. You're not worshiping.

You're not truly coming together. You're not serving. You're not doing this. What you tend to do is I'm gonna go up to the mountains in the cabin I bought with the Lord's money. I'm gonna go to the lake with the boat I bought with the Lord's money. I'm gonna go spend my time on time that God said, I want that time in service of me because I wanna use you to reach the world.

And then when you hear that and then I preach something like this, some of you are getting really mad at me and you're like, that's what the church only cares about, mommy. No, it's your problem.

And our answer for wisdom is so many we mix this this we mix culture with Christ. And that's when you mix culture with Christ, guess what you're actually following? Culture. When you mix the world with the Word, you know what you're actually following? The world.

And it doesn't take much. If I handed you your favorite drink, said, you know, I'm gonna get the best drink that you like from the coffee shop for free. And I brought it in here and I said, but just wait. And I went, are you gonna drink it? It's only one little loogie. I got you the largest drink. What's your problem?

That's what happens when you take the Word of God and makes one little loogie of the world. And then you drink it and you say, Yum good. It doesn't work that way. And that's why a lot of us seek wisdom from the wrong place just like he did.

Because wisdom can make you feel good. Matter of fact, it's weird. He sought that wisdom because he was terrified. He knew there was something wrong with what he's doing. A lot of us sit in here and we come to church and what happens when we find worth in the wrong things and seek wisdom in the wrong place?

Even as Christians, we'll do this thing. We'll come in here. We'll get scared. You're like a lot of you feel what I'm saying. The Holy Spirit's talking to you. You know that you know Jesus, but you will not tithe. You will not serve. You just won't do it. And you actually feel convicted about it. And you will pray and

confess that. You'll feel like you're confessing it. And then you're gonna walk out there and ignore it and not do anything about it. Because that's what happens here. We confuse confession

with repentance. We confuse just yet you're right. And now I feel better because I at least admitted it. Knowing's half the battle as we said last week.

And and that's what our faith is. We come in here. I'm so bad. I'm sorry. I did this sin again. I did this sin and we just keep doing it. We just keep doing it. We just keep doing it. We keep doing it.

And then we come in here like the class we've studied. We have the notes, but we don't come very often. Then we go do our other things and then the test comes and we're freaking out. And so we listen to culture. We listen to this mix. We listen to what little Bible we know be here. And then we start asking questions.

Like, you know what? I've heard you talk about giving. I need to go pray about that. No, you don't. The words really clear what God's asked us to do. Or you're living with your boyfriend or girlfriend because you don't wanna be alone. You're like, ah, I need to pray about what I should do about that. No. No. You don't.

Why do you want to pray about something that God says this isn't good for you? Because you got the loogie in your drink.

And you're thinking, I just want him to stop saying that. I want you guys to stop drinking it, and so does God.

What are you doing? Where are you seeking your wisdom? So then what happens next? He seeks wisdom from the wrong place. These guys can't give any answers.

So then here we go. Verse 10.

But when the Queen Mother heard what was happening, she hurried to the banquet hall. She said to Belshazzar, Long live the king, don't be so pale and frightened. There is a man in your kingdom who is within him the spirit of the holy gods. During Nebuchadnezzar's

reign, this man was found to have insight, understanding, and wisdom like that of the gods. Your predecessor, the king, your predecessor, King Nebuchadnezzar

made him chief over all the magicians, enchanters, astrologers, and fortune tellers of Babylon. This man Daniel, the king named Belshazzar has exceptional ability and is filled with divine knowledge and understanding. He can interpret dreams, explain riddles and solve difficult problems.

Call for Daniel and he will tell you what the writing means. So he does it. So Daniel was brought in before the king. The king asked him, are you Daniel one of the exiles brought from Judah by my predecessor King Nebuchadnezzar?

I've heard that you have the spirit of the gods within you and that you are filled with insight, understanding and wisdom. My wise men and enchanters have tried to read the words on the wall and tell me what their meaning is, but they cannot do it. I am told that you can give interpretation, solve difficult

problems. If you can read those words and tell me their meaning, you will be clothed in purple robes, royal honor, and you will have a gold chain placed around your neck. You will be the Burger King. You will become the third highest ruler in all the kingdom.

Daniel answered to the king, keep your gifts or give them to someone else. But I will tell you what the writing means. Your Majesty, the Most High God gave sovereignty, majesty, glory, and honor to your predecessor Nebuchadnezzar.

He made him so great that people of all races and nations and language trembled before him in fear. He killed those who he wanted to kill and spared those he wanted to spare. He honored those who he wanted to honor and disgraced those who he wanted to disgrace. But when his heart and mind were puffed up with arrogance,

he was brought down from his royal throne and stripped of his glory.

He was driven from human society. He was given the mind of a wild animal. He lived among the wild donkeys. He ate grass like a cow and he was drenched with dew of heaven until he learned that the Most High God rules over the kingdoms of the world and appoints anyone he desires to rule over them.

You are his successor, Obel Shazar. And here's the key thing. You need to remember this. And you knew all of this.

Remember what's about to happen to him isn't like, wow, God, that was sudden. No. He's had warnings. He knew this. He knew the story. Dan was saying you already know all this, but

you have not humbled yourself.

Some of you what I'm talking about, what God's asking us to do, you've been in church for a million years. You love Lord and you know it. You know it. You know it. You know it. And you just won't do it. This is a warning. He says, For you have proudly defied the Lord of heaven and look what he comes back to.

And have had these cups from this temple, his temple brought before you and you and your nobles and your wives and concubines have been drinking wine from them while praising gods of silver, gold, bronze, iron, wood and stone. Gods that neither see nor hear nor know anything at all.

But you have not honored the God who gives you the breath of life and controls your destiny. So God has sent his hand to write this message. This is the message that was written. Meni, Meni, Tekel, Parson. And this is what these words mean. Meni means numbered.

God has numbered the days of your reign and has brought it to an end. Tekel means weighed. You have been weighed on the balances and have not measured up. Parsan means divided. Your kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians. Time's up. You're done.

So what does Belshazzar do? Verse 29. Then at Belshazzar's command, Daniel was dressed in the purple robes. A gold chain was hung around his neck, and he's proclaimed the third highest ruler in the kingdom.

So he hears this message. You knew the story of it. You knew how he humbled himself for God. You know all the things that happened, the mighty things that God did. You've ignored it. And now you're ignoring it again. And here's what God's saying. You're done. And you know what he does?

Give him the cash and prizes, dress him up like the Burger King. And here's why Daniel didn't want it. He knew what the story meant. He goes, this is gonna be the shortest lived promotion in the history of all promotions.

Then he goes, make him the king. Thanks for telling me the truth. And he went, Hey, hit it. I don't know how they danced back then. Swimming like, That's dancing? That was worse than the Lugie illustration. It's more disturbing. He just keeps going. Why?

Because here's the problem when we live in pride guys. And here's what it's trying to say. Here's kind of this warning. Here's here's kind of this this this idea here is that that that we

get to this point that our heart is conditioned by it now. That even though we can know the stories, even though we can come to church, even though we can be sitting, you get to a point that you've conditioned your heart so much you're not gonna turn back.

Because you know what you start to do? When you find worth in the wrong things and then you find wisdom in the wrong place? You will then trust in walls, not God's Word.

You trust in your life where it is. Meaning, well most time the people that have the hardest time trusting God is in those moments when he's given you the most. When you've been blessed the most. How did Nebuchadnezzar fall in his head? He said he gave him all this glory, him all this responsibility, him all and he took it in and he says, I'm good. I'm good. And then God had to humble him. And now you're sitting here taking it all in, taking on. You knew the stories. You wouldn't humble yourself. Many of us sit here and you don't want to change. You don't want to actually give, serve, do what God's asked you to do because you like your life right now.

I'm good. Everything's going great. And what he's warning us is that is going to end because the truth is all of us stand before God. We

all stand. We've all been judged. We've all been weighed and we all come up short and our own personal kingdoms will never make it. Pride will always come before the fall. The only thing we can embrace is the grace of God by humbling accepting His love. And then once you accept his love and you really know it,

we should be by the power of the Holy Spirit able to then by faith embrace the life he's asked for us to live because now we know how much He loves us. So if you're not embracing the life He said, Live from my love this way, there is something wrong with your understanding of His love for you. Or

you might not even be a Christian. If you continuously, I don't care how many times I hear this message. I am not gonna do that. And you're gonna listen to wisdom other than God's word to justify your absolute disobedience to what God's died to give us the mission, you're going to end up like this king.

And you're going to run out of time. Because the truth is, this is the big idea for today. Saved it for now because it's kind of throat punchy, but you need to hear all this first. God is patient until he's not.

And many of us are sitting here and you are confusing his patience with you with his acceptance of the way you're worshiping him.

Do not confuse his patience with his acceptance. He blessed these ungodly kings and they had all that world's wealth and all that power and they never understood that it all came from God. Some of you in here have the pride of you will not do what God asked and you say you love Jesus,

but you won't do what he's asked you to do because you think it's working for you right now, and it will work. Another way to say it is it'll work until it doesn't work. Another way that's popular out there is play stupid games, win stupid prizes. Eventually, there will be a fault.

And that's all that's left. And that's what happens. You see God warns us severely. And I'm just Daniel. I'm just telling you what the handwriting of the wall says. Because I love you. Because God gives us these scary warnings. He warns us so severely because he loves us so deeply.

It's like when your kid goes to run into the street. Normally, you can be really calm when you're correcting your kid. You should stay really calm. But when you are can't grab them and they're waddling towards the street and a car is about to come,

you have to startle them. Have you ever noticed that? Because if you just go, hey,

And then you can get to them. That's one of these moments. Some of you are heading right towards the street and the preacher, I gotta say this message. You need to be warned and you need to be startled because of his love.

This isn't a threat. God's saying you will never experience what I have for you as long as you resist this. Do you understand my love for you? The warning is harsh because the love is so deep. Because if you don't accept that, if you don't trust that, all you're left with is verse thirty and thirty one.

All you're left with is a verdict instead of a victory.

Some of you, you don't know when the game's over.

But if I don't turn to Christ, the only thing I'm gonna be left with is a verdict and not the victory. I'm going to keep going down this road. I'm going go down this road. And I'm going miss the love. I'm going to miss the purpose. I'm going miss all the good things on the other side of it. I'm going to struggle with that.

And you're going to miss out on it. And you know what's interesting is the way they missed out. He's partying and thinking he's fine. Because you know what he assumed the Medo Persians were doing out there when they're digging?

It was what everybody else tried to do in that day. You would dig up dirt and you try to form a ramp that would go up a wall so you can get closer. But the walls of Babylon were like in some spots over 300 feet tall and over a 100 feet thick.

You couldn't do that. It would take you forever and as you get up, they could just throw stuff shoot at you. They could they could pick you up. You can't get it built fast enough to not get wiped out. Everyone had tried to do that and failed. So he's sitting there confident. Then you say, well, why don't they siege them and starve them out? That's the other thing about Babylon. They had over their river. Their main river went right through the center of their city and they had these giant iron gates of walls where you couldn't get through them. So the water came in so they had plenty of fresh water

and they had stored twenty years worth of food. So Babylon can outlast they could do a twenty year siege. The people outside the walls, they're not farmers. They're not getting there. They will die before they will win the siege.

So he confidently is trusting in the walls. He's trusting in the walls. He's trusting in the life he has. He likes that and he's not gonna listen to God because it feels if I give God what he wants, which many of us do, I don't get to have the party. I'm gonna miss out. I won't enjoy this. Somehow you don't think if you trust God with your time and money like I'll never be happy. I'll never enjoy. How am I gonna survive? That's the whole point.

Is you really will find joy on the other side of that. You'll find purpose on the other side. You'll find meaning on the other side and you'll find that you don't have to worry as much anymore. But he wouldn't. And so he

arrogantly said, I'm gonna stay behind my walls. It's pretty good. But you know what they were digging up out there? They were digging diversion trenches and they diverted the river.

And they brought the water level down where they could walk in the lowest part of those gates down in the depths of it was big enough that their army could go right under it. And then they snuck in and while everyone was partying and drunk, they killed everybody. But you know who they didn't kill?

Anyone who was at their home.

Daniel wasn't in the party because he wasn't going to be a part of that party. He wasn't going to celebrate the gods of the world. He wasn't going to celebrate the zone platter. He wasn't going to go after false gods and worth ship the wrong thing.

And neither of were any of the faithful remnant the Jews who God had sent them into exile to humble them and they had humbled themselves and they trusted the Lord and he took care of them.

And he promised I just read in Jeremiah this whole passage. He predict that a guy named Cyrus who Darius was the sub king, he was the general for Cyrus, was going to come and take out the Babylonians for enslaving them and taking them and doing that. And since they stayed away from the party and didn't integrate with the party, they lived and then Cyrus is the one that declared they could go home after seventy years captivity. They won.

How about you? Some of us you are holding on to simple things and I know I sound like a broken record, but Christians need to act like Christians if our culture is going to change. One of the false wisdom we go to and false gods we go to is, you think as Christians we need to take back our country through elections.

A lot of pastors say that. No. Take back what? In election, what are we taking back? Laws? Legislation? We're gonna force our ways on people? How did we lose the culture in the first place?

We say the legalistic things. We don't want that. We want that. We want a government like that. We've actually turned some of our values into theology

and made it this is God wants it this way. And we lean that way and we think that's gonna win. We're gonna take back the country. You know what we're supposed to do? We're supposed to point people to Jesus by loving them like Jesus. And when people come to know Jesus and they start to have the relationship with God and understand, guess what happens? Their values change. Our cultural values change. Laws take care of themselves.

You do not legislate people into change. You love.

And they said the world will know we are Christians by our love. How do we love them? We need to serve. We need to give. The money we give God says, I don't need it but I want to use your money and your time to reach people for Jesus and our problem is too many churches too many people sit too many people are sitting in here right now

and you've been in this church a long time and you do neither. Why? Yet you're spouting about politics. We ought to take our country back. How about you let God take your heart back and you start trusting him? Otherwise, verdict not victory.

And that's what happened to them. The Jews who looked like they stayed humble, they won. And you know what reminds me of? Football

games. You're about to watch the final game of the season next year and hopefully Brock Purdy is holding up a Super Bowl trophy. Now for those of you that wonder, I'm a Cardinals fan. So I say go Brock Purdy. I'm okay if you take your team with you, but

Brock Purdy grew up in the church. Family comes to the church. Naturally, they were just here for a baptism for his sister's boyfriend who got baptized this morning. So yeah. So he's he's a rock pointer. Rock pointer's very own. Loves the Lord. Go listen to his press conferences.

But I'm thinking about how games end in football because I played baseball yet so many out you're done. There was no clock. It was like when you ran out out you're done. Was pretty you know. They have a clock and what makes that awkward

is there's a lot of games where a team gets so far behind like Belshazzar did. His heart got so solid. He's so far behind he ain't turning back.

You get so far behind you can't win. Like look at the Ravens had that. They were sitting there and they should have. They were touted they're gonna win everything. They're the greatest and then they didn't. They got really mad. They got frustrated. They got flustered.

And they they get they got more penalties. They set those those behind. And it ended really sad for them. You know why? Because they knew when that clock ticks down, the season's over. There's no next game.

There's no need to do garbage time yardage. Like in a lot of games during regular season, you see guys get garbage because there's a rookie. I gotta earn a spot. So I wanna get a touchdown even though it's the garbage time. I wanna do that. But in the playoffs, it's just wow.

You sit there watching the clock tick down and you know it's over. There's no coming back.

Some of you are pretty dangerously close to that.

But what does a winning team do when the clock's going down? It's interesting to me how a football game ends like what Brock did last when they finally they were behind, but they came back at the right time. Is at the very end, what do they do? They gather around, quarterback hikes the ball,

steps back, and then what does he do? Takes a knee.

The winning team is the one that takes the knee as the time goes out. That's what this is all about.

These Jews were carried off into exile because they wouldn't humble themselves and listen to God. And God humbled them, and they listened. Daniel is the leader of that. And even though they lived in the land, they didn't have to take back the Babylonian country. God took it over because God's in control.

What they need to do is take a knee and celebrate the victory that God gives. That's what this is about. Where do you need to take a knee? God is saying, serve me, worship me right, be a part of the mission I died to give you. I've already made the victory. I want you to take my will, take a knee in obedience.

Take a knee in trust because taking the knee is where the victory lies. That's how much God loves you. So don't take this as you better or else. It is a warning. God is patient till he's not. But the reason he's not is because if you stay prideful and won't humbly accept his love

and then after you accept his love, really understand that love that you will humbly accept his will in your life and accept the mission he's given us and stop putting worth in. God, I know you say this, but I really want this. You're gonna miss the victory. The victory only comes when you take the knee. So I wanna pray.

And I think there's two things. Some of you in this room need to pray, so start praying on your own. Which part of what we talked about, you feel that conviction that I need to take a knee on this? I need to literally worship God the way he's asked to be worshiped. I need to be the living sacrifice.

And I'm gonna ask you to do pray and say, give me the courage despite the fear to take the knee and do it. If it's giving, give for the first time. If it's serving, we have a a sneak peek tour coming up in a few weeks. You saw it in the videos. You can you can sign up and go find a place to serve.

If it's loving your family different, do that too.

But for some of you, you don't know the Lord. You never taken a knee and accepted his love. So I do not want you to hear the wrong thing. This whole message is not about you better do this or God won't love you. It's I get to do this once I know how much God loves me. You need to take the knee at the cross

and just turn from sin and say, can't do this. My own Glory can't do this. I need to trust in the love of Jesus who died for me. That's what baptism is all about. You're going out there and identifying with Christ and his death burial and resurrection. Jesus took a knee for us. God became a man humbled himself

to to come down here, live that perfect life in absolute obedience to the father, even though he was equal with the father, and then died a death that he didn't deserve in our place, And then rose from the dead to life so that we can live even though we are deserving of death. And I need to take a knee to that.

So I'm gonna pray with some of you and some of you've never done that. You can put your faith in Christ right now. And then I'm gonna challenge you to go get baptized right after we're done. And I'm also gonna challenge some of you. You've known Christ for a long time and you won't get baptized.

How are you gonna trust him if everything myself if you won't even do the first act of obedience? It's usually pride. You don't wanna get baptized because you're afraid. Well, that means I gotta live better. That means I got that tells me there's a resistance there.

All you're accepting out there when you get baptized is I can't do this on my own is because of God's love. So go declare it. That'll help you. Because when you take a knee is when you find the victory. Any other thing is pride and it will lead to a fault. And I love you enough to warn you. You don't have to trust me.

But I know what my heart's intentions are for us. And I know that I have to be faithful to say what God wants me to say. And I trust the Holy Spirit is talking to many in this room because God wanted me to say what he wanted to say because you needed to hear it. So let's pray.

If you're in this room and you've never taken a knee with Christ, just pray with me something like this, but make it your own words. Just pray, Jesus, thank you. Thank you that you brought these warnings.

Thank you that you you throat punched me. You slapped me upside the head. You wanted my attention because I was heading into that street.

So right now I turn from myself and I turn to you. I confess I am a sinner, but I profess that you are a savior. And that you died on the cross for me. You came back to life for me and I put my faith in that that alone. Help me to accept that love. Help me to understand that love and the depth of what that love means.

So then I can go from here and as I understand and embrace that, I will joyously trust you in my life with that love. Thank you. And I pray this in the mighty holy name of Jesus. Amen. Amen.

Thanks for joining us online this weekend. Let us know if we can help you in any way. Yeah. And make sure to follow us on social media and connect with us on the we are Rock Point app for prayer and everything happening here at Rock Point.