Weighed in the Balance

Order of Service

• Call to Worship — Psalm 145:1-2, 3, 21
• Hymn — O Worship the King (#1)
• Prayer of Invocation
• Reading of the Law — Deuteronomy 5
• Corporate Confession of Sin
• Assurance of Pardon
• Confession of Faith — Apostles' Creed
• Pastoral Prayer
• Offering
• Hymn — All You Who Fear Jehovah's Name
• Sermon
• Prayer of Preparation
• Words of Institution — Luke 22:14-20
• Hymn — Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me (vv. 1–2)
• Lord's Supper
• Hymn — Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me (vv. 3–4)
• Benediction — Numbers 6:24-26
• Doxology

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Sermon Title: Weighed in the Balance — The Judgment of God

Scripture: Daniel 5:13-31

I. The Lord Judges How We Treat the People of God

A. Belshazzar's contempt for Daniel as a Judahite exile reveals his contempt for the people of God

1. He had not heard of Daniel despite all God had done through him under Nebuchadnezzar
2. His language toward Daniel is derogatory — "one of the exiles from Judah"
3. Dale Ralph Davis: Daniel is Belshazzar's only help, yet the king despises both Daniel and Daniel's God

B. A recurring biblical pattern: those who despise God's people are brought to ruin

1. Exodus 1:8 — a new Pharaoh who did not know Joseph oppressed Israel and was destroyed
2. Nineveh repented at Jonah's preaching, but a century later forgot the man of God and was destroyed (Nahum 2:10)
3. Matthew 25:41-45 — the condemned are those who failed to care for the least of Christ's people
4. The modern slogan "I love Jesus but hate the church" is swift for destruction

C. Scripture's witness on love for the people of God

1. Galatians 6 — do good to all, especially those of the household of faith
2. 1 John 2:10 — whoever hates his brother walks in darkness and does not know where he is going
3. How we treat the people of God will be weighed in the balance when we meet our Judge

II. The Lord Judges How We Treat the Works of God

A. Belshazzar knew and could not plead ignorance

1. Daniel rehearses Nebuchadnezzar's humbling in Daniel 4 — his madness, his restoration, and his confession of God's sovereignty (Daniel 4:34-35)
2. Daniel 5:22 — "you have not humbled your heart, though you knew all this"
3. Belshazzar commits blasphemy with full knowledge of what God has revealed

B. The natural man cannot receive the works of God

1. Israel saw the ten plagues and the parting of the sea, yet made a golden calf and grumbled for Egypt — knowledge alone does not produce submission
2. 1 Corinthians 2:14 — the natural person cannot accept the things of the Spirit; they are folly to him
3. Romans 8:7 — the mind set on the flesh is hostile to God and cannot submit to his law
4. Luke 16:31 — Abraham's word to the rich man: if they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead

C. Application and consolation

1. To profess Christ's resurrection while refusing his lordship is to be no different from wicked Belshazzar
2. Luke 11:13 — the Father gives the Holy Spirit to those who ask; pray that intellectual knowledge would become internal transformation
3. The answer is not self-improvement but prayer to the Father for the Holy Spirit, submitting to Christ as Lord and Master

III. The Lord Judges How We Treat the Hand of God

A. The hand of God is both the source of life and the hand of judgment

1. Daniel 5:23 — "the God in whose hand is your breath and whose are all your ways you have not honored"
2. Daniel 5:24 — from his presence the hand was sent and the writing was inscribed; the one who gives life is the one who judges
3. The very hand that forms us is the hand that holds the gavel

B. Three passages that together leave humanity without excuse

1. Genesis 2 — God forms man from dust and breathes life into him
2. Psalm 139:13 — "you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb"
3. Acts 17:28 — "in him we live and move and have our being"
4. These three passages alone demand absolute and total obedience and allegiance to God

C. The monstrous nature of sin seen against the Creator-creature distinction

1. God sustains his image bearers in existence; they use that existence to deny his existence
2. We walk through life as though existence is owed to us — no different from Belshazzar

D. No defense stands before the court of a holy God

1. "I'm not as bad as Belshazzar," or "my good deeds outweigh my bad" — none of these will work
2. Romans 3 — none does good, no, not one
3. David Dickson (1662) at his deathbed: "I have taken all my good deeds and all my bad deeds and cast them together in a heap before the Lord and have fled from them both to Jesus Christ. And in him I have sweet peace."

E. The gospel call

1. Christ lay naked before the wrath of God so that we would be clothed in nothing more than his righteousness
2. Count all things rubbish — good deeds and bad — for the sake of having Christ (Philippians 3)
3. Be justified before a holy God because of the righteousness of Christ imputed to your account
4. Come to the table of the righteous King in faith