Accepting the Gift

 “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies...”

~ Psalm 23:5a (NIV, 1984)

*****

There is a story in II Kings 4 about a wealthy woman to whom God gives a gift. But she doesn’t want it. You see, she was the kind of person that did lots of nice things for other people. But she didn’t do them to be noticed. And she definitely didn’t do them to get a gift back.

She asked her husband one day if they could build and furnish a little room on their roof for Elisha, the man of God who came by their house for a meal whenever he was in town. What a little thing, she probably thought. We have the space, and I’m sure he would so appreciate the chance to have his own place whenever he comes here. Her husband agreed. So they built the room and placed in it a bed, a table, a chair, and a lamp. And the man of God loved it. He was so grateful. A place to himself, away from the hustle and bustle of the town—and reserved just for him whenever he came to visit. 

And so he came often, whenever he was in town, and stayed with the woman and her husband. But one day, while he was in his little room and gazing at the kind gift he had been given, he found himself wondering, How can I give a gift to her in return?

He turned to his servant and gave him a message for the woman. “How can we bless you in return for all you’ve done for us?” the message said. “We have connections with the king, connections with the commander of the army. What can we do for you?”

But the woman didn’t need anything. She didn’t have any requests.

So the man of God wondered some more. He asked his servant, “Do you have any ideas?” The servant thought of one: “What about a son?”

A son...the man of God thought to himself. Of course! A son is an excellent idea. Her husband is old, and she has no children now. A son would mean her family line could live on, and someone would be there to take care of her if her husband passed away.

And so the man of God announced the news to the woman: “About this time next year, you will hold a son in your arms.”¹

But then he saw her look down. She bit her lip. “‘No, my lord,’ she objected. ‘Don’t mislead your servant, O man of God!’”²

But what happens when God’s prophets speak is what happened here: the word was fulfilled, and the woman gave birth to a son.

It could have been a great story just like that, and that’s probably all we’d typically want out of it. The woman gives generously to the man of God and is rewarded with a great gift in return, even though she didn’t believe at first that it would happen. 

But the story doesn’t end there. Spoiler alert: The child dies.

The woman puts her son in Elisha’s room, saddles a donkey, and takes a 25-mile trip to find the man of God. And when she finds him, she says just about exactly what we would have expected her to say: “Did I ask you for a son, my lord?...Didn’t I tell you, ‘Don’t raise my hopes’?”³

In other words: What’s this about? I told you I didn’t want a gift. I told you my heart couldn’t take the disappointment. I couldn’t take another chance to be fooled. Yet you went and did it anyway, and now I’m in more grief now than I had been before your so-called “blessing.”

Have you been there before? Have you hesitated to open your hands to a gift because you didn’t think you’d be able to bear it if it turned out to be a joke? Have you opened your hands anyway to receive it, desperately hoping your doubts are amiss and it’ll turn out to really be the blessing you secretly hope for...only to find that it’s not? ...only to find that it’s a slap in the face?

The woman was broken with grief—not just because her son died but because she felt like the whole thing was a cruel mockery of her heart. She didn’t want the blessing because she guessed the blessing would prove to be a joke. And it was strangely worse to find out that she was right, that it did.

But, thankfully, that’s not the end of the story either. The man of God returned with the woman to her house, and he prayed for her son, and her son was restored to life. When the woman saw it, she fell to the ground in humble thanks. It turns out the blessing wasn’t a joke. It felt like it. But in the end, God showed her that He really did intend to bless her, to pour good into her life—real, 100% good, not some shabby, piecemeal, half-good that would more appropriately be called a curse. His heart was not to tease or to mock. His heart was to teach her—in a way she would never forget—that He was out to work for her blessing.

As I read this story, I couldn’t help but think how often in my own life I distrust the idea of blessing. Even little blessings can be suspicious: Did that compliment mean they want something from me now? Do they enjoy spending time with me because they like who I am or because they like what I can do for them? It seems almost every time a “gift” comes my way, I find myself circling around it carefully before I dare open it, listening and looking with every nerve on edge to make sure it’s really a gift and not a bomb...because too many of them have been bombs, and I’m not interested in exploding again.

This woman probably felt the same way. There’s no way of knowing what happened in her life before this encounter that caused her to distrust the idea of a gift now. But clearly something did. Clearly something in her story taught her that gifts were not always good. And she turned out to be both right and wrong: What she thought was a curse turned out to be an even bigger blessing than she expected. Not only did she have the chance to witness God’s assurance that He really did want to give her this gift, but she also was further blessed years later when news of her son’s resurrection reached the king of Israel, whose excitement at the story led to more blessing for her and her family than she ever expected (II Kgs. 8:1-6).

When I look back at my own life, I realize that even those gifts that turned out to be bombs turned out to be gifts again in the end. Yes, they exploded, and explosions hurt...but they taught me how to trust God and gave me tools to help others caught in similar situations. They helped form who I am. They humbled me. They gave me opportunities to give a sacrifice of praise in the midst of the pain. And some of them became the beginnings of a road to what I’d consider now to be some of the coolest blessings in my life.

Psalm 23 gives an image of the Lord providing a “table” right smack in the middle of enemy territory. For some reason, every time I’ve pictured this verse, I see myself seated in a dark, cave-like space with enemies all around. But then the Lord would bring in a nice wooden table and put it right in front of me. I’ve had this image in my head for years, but I didn’t realize until quite recently that every time I pictured it, the table was empty.

What was I missing? That’s not the end of the story. That table’s not empty. The psalm isn’t talking about God following some IKEA instructions and managing to set a four-legged, wooden piece of furniture between us and our enemies. That’s ridiculous.

The expression in the psalm means a feast. The table’s already there. And the Lord is preparing on it a feast that fills it. He’s loading blessings into bowls and arranging them all over so that the table itself is barely part of the picture. When God says He’s preparing a table for us in the presence of our enemies, that means we get the chance to enjoy His rich goodness even as our enemies threaten us with their spears and arrows. And that goodness is full. It’s not a joke.

Pulling all of these strings together, I have a question for you: What do you think of when you think of God’s goodness? What do you think of when you hear that He has a gift in store for your life? Do you hear it as a joke? Are you about to say no because you’re afraid of disappointment?

I’m not very good at accepting gifts. I’m not one to easily think something good might come my way without a “catch” attached to it. 

But I see something in this story—and in all of Scripture, for that matter—that makes me think my suspicions are off-base. Maybe it’s time I doubt my doubts. How would life change if I decided to open my hands to God’s gifts without wondering if He was teasing me? How would life change if I decided to open my heart to God’s goodness without doubting its reality? What if I stopped imagining His table as empty?

Maybe this story—and my own story, when I let it play out—can remind my heart to sing that Danny Gokey song that describes it so well: 

Have you been praying and you still have no answers? 
Have you been pouring out your heart for so many years?
Have you been hoping that things would have changed by now?
Have you cried all the faith you have through so many tears? 

Don’t forget the things that He has done before
And remember He can do it all once more 

It’s like the brightest sunrise
Waiting on the other side of the darkest night
Don’t ever lose hope, hold on and believe
Maybe you just haven’t seen it, just haven’t seen it yet
You’re closer than you think you are
Only moments from the break of dawn
All His promises are just up ahead
Maybe you just haven’t seen it, just haven’t seen it yet⁴

God really is good. Will we give Him a chance to show us that? 

———————————————

¹ II Kings 4:16a, NIV (1984).

² II Kings 4:16b, ibid.

³ II Kings 4:28, ibid.

⁴ Danny Gokey, “Haven’t Seen It Yet” (2019).

The Circus King

There was a hush after he said it. Shouts and whispers stilled. The jaws of some clenched tightly with anger; others were silenced in awe. An explosion had become safe and sacred, and the meaning of it all was still falling into place. Every ear still echoed with his words, resounding so loudly that only a few noticed the lonely clink of one last coin, whose wobbly rolling came to a decided end in the corner of the room.

We felt as though we could hear him breathe. In, then out. The angry ones squinted fiercely, daggers in their eyes. In again, and then they fled. Swishing fabric, the muffled slap of sandals on bare floor, and a single thump as one of them dropped a bag of silver: they were gone.

He breathed in again, and then the silence began to bubble—not yet with words but with the quiet giggles of children, the exhale of the freed, and more swishing cloaks as the rest of those there gathered in.

The place still lay in shambles. Tables and benches were overturned. Coins had been spilled everywhere. Bits of parchment and broken wood were scattered clumsily over the floor, interrupted here and there by pieces of frayed rope, tufts of wool, soft feathers, and empty money bags.

But the crowd didn’t seem to care. For once in their lives, they weren’t here to observe the room’s starchy beauty or to ponder what it’d be like to be on the other side of those tables, wearing linen robes and making the rules since you, after all, were the only ones who could see God. They weren’t here to fear whether their measly sums would be enough to buy their own pardon, nor were they here to be told what other long list of infirmities kept them this time from being really clean.

No, they were here because the prophet from Nazareth let them in. 

“It is written,” he had said, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it a ‘den of robbers.’”¹ The surly, teeth-clenched moneychangers had to leave; and the blind, the lame, and the outcasts were welcomed in.

Pretty soon the children were singing. A once-lame beggar was running in circles with his hands in the air. A once-blind man was running his fingers over the holy curtains, wondering at the colors and textures that illuminated his eyes. It seemed like the sound of laughter changed the heavy smell of incense into a reminder not of boundaries but of praise.

They had the place as theirs for awhile, until the noses of the priests came poking their way in. Shuffling around the edges of the rabble, they inserted their questions with disdain. “Do you hear what these children are saying?² ‘Hosanna to the Son of David’? What is this?”

“Yes, I hear them,” he replied. He picked up one of the children at his feet and set him proudly on his lap, brushing back the thick mop of hair so he could peer into the little one’s eyes. “Have you never read, ‘From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise’?”³

Some more shuffling was paired with discontented grunts. They huddled together away from the troubling Rabbi, and the crowd filled in the place they left.

Pretty soon the work was done, and the Rabbi made his way out. The rabble followed. Silence filled the room again as the muttering priests and teachers realized their “problem” had walked out the door. Alone with the tables and piles of coins, they glared into the darkening night, watching him go. Beneath their furrowed brows, they wondered how much longer this insult would insist on overturning their world.

But the crowd that left with the Rabbi had the feeling that the world was meant to be that way. Their Teacher had said it himself: “‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”⁴

———————————

¹ Matthew 21:13 (NIV, 1984)

² Matthew 21:16a (ibid.)

³ Matthew 21:16b (ibid.)

⁴ Matthew 9:13 (ibid.)

Original Artwork by Miranda Dupree (2021). Artwork Quotations: Song lyrics from “The Greatest Show” (written by Ryan Lewis, Justin Paul, and Benj Pasek, 2017). Lyrics source: LyricFind.

A Call for a Different Flag

Salaman: “You’re either with us or against us!”
Philip: ”I’m not with you, neither am I against you!”
Salaman: “Can he do that?”
Jack Sparrow: “He’s religious. I believe it’s required.”
           —Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

*****

I can’t say I was the biggest fan of the fourth Pirates of the Caribbean movie, but I can say that this quote has stuck in my head for the last 9 years (since I first saw the film). Jack Sparrow has an unexpected knack for wisdom sometimes, and I believe this is one of those times.

As I expand, perhaps I should clarify up front that, in this post, I aim to speak to the Church, to my brothers and sisters in Christ. The rest of y’all, I love you—but this message is for those who, like me, have called Christ their Savior and Lord.

You’ve all, I’m sure, seen enough of the news and of social media to agree that the cacophony of voices sounds a lot like that first line quoted above. Everybody’s yelling, “You’re either with us or against us!” Opinions rise like forest fires, and it seems like every day we’re bombarded not just with opinions on one cause but by brand new causes (or old causes that somebody thought needed emphasis now). We started with opinions on COVID-19, then we got opinions about stay-at-home orders and masks and proper ways to clean things and who gets to work and what it all means. And then came the opinions about racism and protests and riots and police and social justice and all number of other things that one person or another has decided relates to any of these topics. Then we got opinions about politicians and voting and...the list goes on.

And I’m sick of it.

Hear me well: It’s not the mass bombardment of opinions that disturbs me. That’s been going on for years—decades, centuries...keep on counting.

What bothers me is this: The bombardment of opinions and the aggressive—even threatening—demand for alliance to cause after cause is coming not just from the world but from Christians.

Guys. We already have a flag. And in our pursuit of other banners to raise in the name of justice or safety or whatever else has become the catchphrase of the day, I believe we have been letting that flag drag in the dirt.

Look, the world is doing its best to advocate for what it thinks is right and good. But it’s lost; it’s screaming for causes because it doesn’t know what else to do.

Why are we listening? Why are we caving to the demands of a world that can’t even see the battle that we wage as Christians every day? Have we lost sight of the fact that the real battle is and always has been one “not against flesh and blood but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Eph. 6:12, NIV 1984)?

Don’t you see? The enemy is having a hey-day right now. He doesn’t care what cause you pick if it means he can get you to set down the banner of Christ in order to hold another flag. He doesn’t care what you fear as long as you fear something. He knows that every time we give into fear we’ve given him ground.

Every cause that’s being proclaimed right now has some element of good in it. But we know, don’t we, what happens when we make a good thing an ultimate thing? Any banner we choose to hold besides the banner of Christ is idolatry.

And I tell you as strongly as I know how: The banner of Christ doesn’t look like any of the causes that are being thrown around in this global tug-of-war.

What does our banner look like?

It’s a banner that says when we’re slapped in the face, we don’t go out and hold a protest. We turn our other cheek and let ourselves be slapped again.

It’s a banner that says we clothe our enemies with love.

It’s a banner that says we let people steal from us—no, more than that! We give them more than what they were trying to steal.

It’s a banner that never gives an ear to worry and never lets fear or concern for safety be a reason for any action.

It’s a banner that says righteousness is primary and that the humble get heaven.

It’s a banner that blesses the peacemakers and the ones who work out their salvation in their closets while still being lights to the world.

It’s a banner that says we don’t pay any attention when someone says, “Look, here is our salvation!” or, “No, salvation’s over there!” We know where our Messiah is, and we know that it’s the meek who get to see Him.

Ours is a banner that advocates death as the path to life.

Ours is a banner that advocates suffering as the path to virtue.

Ours is a banner that advocates the kind of love that the world will call pathological, self-sabotaging, and absolutely foolish.

Because it is foolish. It’s always been foolish. 

But I ask you—in tears—will you let that banner drop because the world says it is foolish? Will you let that banner drop because some other cause is ringing more loudly in your ears than your Master’s voice? Will you let that banner drop because you fear men who might kill or shame your body? Have you lost your fear of the One who holds your soul?

My challenge for you, my brothers and sisters—beloved ones who make up the Body of Christ, the Church—is this: Follow HIM. Please. I beg you. Look into His face. Listen to His voice. I guarantee you that His voice is not going to sound like any of the rampant, raging causes that are demanding your alliance. He is the whisper in the whirlwind. He’s the One who says there’s a lot more going on here than the world realizes, the One who’s asking us to pay attention to what He is up to, not to what the world is proffering on its idolatrous tables.

My call to you is, quite simply, what Peter says in II Peter 3:11-14:

Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. But in keeping with His promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness. So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with Him. (NIV 1984, emphasis added)

Friends, nothing else matters. Our mission is to point people to Jesus—our existence on this planet is for the sole cause of introducing people to Him, of bringing His Kingdom here, even as He did.

If you find any other flag in your hands, I suggest you drop it. Drop it, and start living in all things the sort of life that our Lord has called us to live: a life of humility, a life focused on righteousness and love, a life that reflects Him.

We’ve been given a Kingdom that heals sickness, casts out demons, dissipates social divides, and throws world systems on their heads through humility and forgiveness, not through uproar. We have nothing to fear. And, on top of that, we’ve got a world before us that is crying out in agony for help.

Let’s help it, then, not by abandoning our flag to take up its causes but by holding our flag up with more courage than we’ve had before. We help the world not by seeking its life but by calling for its death—by calling for repentance and surrender to the King and to the Kingdom that is truly life.

So let us look to Him, lay down all other flags, and hold up His. We are neither for the world nor against it. We are for Christ. And we’re religious, so yes, Jack: that’s required.

Belshazzar's Lesson

Clang! The brassy sound pierced my ears and caused quite an unfortunate jump in my poor arm, which had been up to that minute most expertly engaged in an elaborate pouring of wine into the three precariously-suspended goblets that swayed in the uplifted hands of my esteemed table guests. Fortunately, the nobleman whose lap I graced with a new splash of purple was already lost in such a wave of slovenly stupor that he didn't even seem to notice my addition to his wardrobe.

Deciding not to alert him of my mistake, I turned instead to see what had made the dreadful noise. It was easy enough to discover. The king had dropped his goblet. Another servant was already running over to amend the situation, but his efforts to restore the vessel to its master's hand were rejected by a loud hiccup and a drooling laugh. The king shoved the goblet away, and the servant's robe received a splash of purple nearly matching the one I had just given my guest. "Ahaha, not that one!" the king gurgled. "Leave it on the floor! I've got—hiccup—a better idea! Bring out the gold, the silver—all those fine goblets my dear ol' father stole from that blasted temple in Jerusalem! Ha! A toast to the fallen gods of Israel, let us say." He motioned carelessly to the servant still holding his old goblet. "Go, find them for me, will you? Bring 'em out, and we'll all have a toast!"

The servant hurried away. He was followed by four or five other servants who understood that the chore wasn't nearly something that could be handled with one set of hands. Not long after, they returned with the requested drinkware, and my ears received uncountable echoes of the first abhorrent clang as the king's thousand guests celebrated this new opportunity by throwing their own goblets onto the floor. Laughter and uproarious exclamations followed, each man trying to bend his drunken brain to yield some sort of eloquent monologue of support for the king's decision.

Trying my best to ignore the commotion—and to dodge the flying chalices—I focused my attention on gathering the old goblets and mopping up the puddles of wine that were most in the way of my fellow servants' frantic efforts to ensure the guests' new goblets were kept full through their series of toasts.

The king, now standing on his throne with two gold chalices raised in his hands (and wine tipping out of both of them), began a ceremonious soliloquy in salute of a long line of gods: gods of silver, gods of gold, gods of iron, gods of stone, gods of wood, gods of bronze...and some other suite of deities whose names were garbled in his slobbering speech.

Then suddenly his monologue was abruptly stopped—mid-word, I think (if the syllables he was saying at the time were actually going to become words at all). I looked up from my diligent wine-puddle mopping to see what had silenced him, and my heart froze. He looked as though he had seen a ghost. His whole body was stiff, unmoving. The blood had drained from his face, and even the drool that had been running down his cheeks seemed to halt in its tracks. His eyes were bulging out of his fat face, the lids growing wider and wider as he stared at something on the wall to my left.

I turned slowly to see what had summoned his terrified attention, and my own eyes widened in horror as I saw—on the wall right next to the lamp stand—a hand. A human hand, I mean—a hand unattached to any visible body—just a hand by itself, writing on the wall. I rubbed my eyes in disbelief. I hadn't so much as tasted a drop of the alcohol I had been serving, but part of me wished I had, if only to give myself an excuse for the vision I was witnessing. But the hand remained, and it wrote a message on the plaster of the wall that was as illegible to my eyes as my king's jumbled speech had been unintelligible to my ears moments before.

The hand vanished when its message was complete, but the writing remained. I turned my gaze back to the king. He was still standing, frozen, on his throne. His body was shaking now, and the drool on his lips had been wiped away. A glance at the rest of the room showed me that all the others had seen it too. All were silent, still, gripped by terror.

Then suddenly the king spoke up again, clearly this time: "The enchanters! Call them. Call them now. Get the astrologers and diviners—all the wise men of Babylon. I want all of them here now."¹ His gaze never left the writing on the wall as he spoke, but three servants dashed out of the room to fulfill his wish as the king muttered on, "Whoever reads this writing and tells me what it means will be clothed in purple and have a gold chain placed around his neck, and he will be made the third highest ruler in the kingdom."

The servants returned in record time with all the wise men they could find. Trembling with fear, these respected folk gathered around the writing on the wall, their eyes wide and their faces tense. After a few moments, I could hear them whispering, and soon they had to tell the bewildered king: Not one of them had the slightest clue what the writing said.

At this, the king sank into his throne. His whole body was shaking miserably, and his face became even whiter with worry. The thousand nobles around him were of no more help than the wise men. They stared at the wall, blinking in helplessness. The whole room was baffled.

Then, suddenly, a flash of bright movement caught my eye near the door where the wise men had just entered. If my eyes could have widened more than they already were, they certainly did. It was the queen. Her beauty on a normal day was striking, but in this terror-stricken scene, she seemed other-worldly. Her jet black hair and graceful manner sparked a strange hope in my soul even before her steady voice broke the silence of the room.

"O king, live forever!" she said. The king's gaze darted her way, and she strode up to him with poise, not flinching as the attention of the room shifted from the ghostly writing to her regal face. "Don't be alarmed!" she continued. "Don't look so pale! There is a man in your kingdom who has the spirit of the holy gods in him. In the time of your father he was found to have insight and intelligence and wisdom like that of the gods. King Nebuchadnezzar your father—your father the king, I say—appointed him chief of the magicians, enchanters, astrologers and diviners. This man Daniel, whom the king called Belteshazzar, was found to have a keen mind and knowledge and understanding, and also the ability to interpret dreams, explain riddles and solve difficult problems. Call for Daniel, and he will tell you what the writing means."

The king sat up. "Daniel? Yes—um, call for Daniel. You!"—he pointed at me—"Go and find this man."

Leaving my wine-soaked towels on the floor where I had been kneeling, I stumbled to my feet and darted out of the room. Daniel was not hard to find; his quarters were nearby, and he was there. To be honest, he half looked as if he had been expecting me. I had not looked very deeply into his face before, but in my desperation for an answer in this puzzling state of affairs, I found myself searching his features intently as I related to him the matter for which he was being called. His dark eyes were gentle; his face was worn and webbed with soft wrinkles which betrayed that his usual expression was a peaceful smile, though he certainly was not smiling now. No, now there was instead a grim resolve. His eyes reddened with tears, and his jaw set, but he did not cry. He merely placed a steady hand on my shoulder and quietly nodded, "Let us go."

I returned to the banquet hall to find the king attempting an air of nobility that, on any other occasion, would have looked perfectly comical. He had straightened his robes and given both of his gold goblets to a servant to hold. He was seated, half-reasonably, on his throne, but the peculiar tilt of his head and the white-knuckled grip of his hand on his scepter betrayed that he was still quite drunk and had not in the least gathered his wits.

Daniel entered the room gravely. He looked at the wall briefly, seeming unsurprised but not delighted at the writing he saw there. His gaze then settled on the king as he awaited the latter's permission to speak. His solemnity and submission to the king's authority—even his authority in that drunken state—struck me. How is it that an old Jewish exile—let alone an old Jewish exile who's spent years among ambitious magicians and conniving astrologers, serving under the whims of king after king—could look unrattled, noble, and even sane as he stood in the middle of a room in which the king's wisest wise men were huddled and unnerved in a corner, the king's most regarded friends were slobbering and hiccuping in wide-eyed and drunken terror, and the king himself was frumpishly seated on his throne, feigning the appearance of sobriety while drool began to trickle down his chin once again?

Yet there Daniel stood in perfect calm, awaiting the king. The king did not make him wait long. He sat up and leaned forward anxiously. "Are you Daniel?" he asked. "One of the exiles my father the king brought from Judah?" Daniel did not respond, but the king continued: "I have heard that the spirit of the gods is in you and that you have insight, intelligence and outstanding wisdom. The wise men and enchanters were brought before me to read this writing and tell me what it means, but they could not explain it. Now I have heard that you are able to give interpretations and to solve difficult problems. If you can read this writing and tell me what it means, you will be clothed in purple and have a gold chain placed around your neck, and you will be made the third highest ruler in the kingdom."

Daniel met the king's gaze and answered, "You may keep your gifts for yourself and give your rewards to someone else. Nevertheless, I will read the writing for the king and tell him what it means.

"O king, the Most High God gave your father Nebuchadnezzar sovereignty and greatness and glory and splendor. His high position made nations dread him and men fear him. He killed whomever he wished to be killed, spared whomever he deemed worth sparing. He promoted whomever he liked, humbled whomever he hated. But he was riddled with arrogance, hardened with pride. And don't you remember? He lost his throne because of this; his glory dissipated. He was driven away from people and given an animal's mind. His home was with the beasts, his body was soaked with dew, he went absolutely mad—and all this until he acknowledged that the Most High God is King. All this until he recognized that the Most High God is sovereign over the kingdoms of men and sets over them anyone He wishes.

"But you, Belshazzar his son—you knew all this, you surely remember it well. But you're walking the same line. You have not humbled yourself either. You've set yourself against the Lord of heaven. Those goblets you had brought in—those were from His temple. And you knew this. Yet you drank freely from them, and your nobles and wives and concubines all drank from them too. You used them to toast a long list of gods who are not gods, mere 'names' who neither see nor comprehend. But when it came to the Living God, the One who holds your life in His hands? You have not honored Him.

"Therefore, He sent the hand and had written this inscription: Mene, Mene, Tekel, Parsin.

"Here is what it means, O king:

Mene: God has numbered your days. Your reign is at its end.
Tekel: You've been weighed on His scale. You're wanting.
Parsin: Your kingdom is divided. It is given to the Medes and the Persians."

As Daniel finished his interpretation, the king's face was unchanged. The blood that had drained from it at the hand's appearance kept its distance still. His whole countenance was pale, expressionless. He made no reply to Daniel's words, yet he kept his promise and commanded that Daniel be clothed in purple, that a gold chain be placed around his neck, and that he be made the third highest ruler in the kingdom.

I was dismissed from the room at that point. We all were—I mean the servants, anyways. Apparently the wine spills could be cleaned up later. I don't know what happened in the room after we left, and I don't know what became of any of the drunken nobles or the drunken king for the rest of the day. But that night, Daniel's words came true. That very night, Belshazzar, king of the Babylonians, was slain. And that very night, we got a new king: Darius the Mede. The writing on the wall, in all its shock and all its splendor, rang true.

*****

In the face of crisis, it seems that there are always some whose mouths stay open, whose minds are clear, and whose actions are direct and weighty, as if they saw the storm coming and know exactly how to walk through it. I am grateful for those leaders, grateful for their willingness to step up and lean in, laying their own uncertainty and fear aside in their effort to make sure the rest of us—the stragglers—make it up the mountain, whether they know what's at the summit or not. They simply know we've got to keep going, and they give all they've got to get us there.

I'm grateful for them for many reasons. One of the biggest: A lot of times, I'm not that kind of leader. I want to be, of course. But that desire proves flimsy in the face of some waves. In the face of this wave—this crisis into which our nation and our world have been plunged the last few months as we wrestle between our fears of virus and death and our wild agonies at the thought of isolation and time—in the face of this wave, I have not been that kind of leader. I've felt more like one of those "splat" balls that you can win with arcade tickets or purchase at a kiosk in a mall—you know, the ones that fly with boundless energy into the air before colliding with a wall in an epic "splat" (hence the name) and stay there in all their sticky glory until gravity gradually peels them off the wall and sends them diving to the floor. This crisis froze me. I hit walls I never expected to exist and found myself flattened against them, stuck in goo while the rest of the world shifted and adapted and kept moving forward as best it could.

But the good news? I feel like I've finally peeled off the wall and made it to the floor—yes, admittedly, for another disgraceful "splat." But on the floor at last, I feel as though I'm rising again to my feet, and my tongue found words at last to ask the Lord, "What are you doing? What are you saying to your people?"

He gave me, in response, a verse and a story. The story you have read. The verse follows:

"...[I]f my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land." —II Chronicles 7:14 (NIV, 1984)

He gave this promise to Solomon long, long ago as He repeated the reality of His covenant with the people of Israel in response to Solomon's prayer of dedication for the temple he had built.

Our nation doesn't have that sort of covenant, but the principle, I think, stands as steadfastly as we could hope. Finding words at last to respond and to lead in the midst of this crisis, this is what is on my heart:

Belshazzar realized too late that every breath he had been given was a chance to honor the God who held his life in His hands. He ignored the knocks on his door until the writing on the wall declared his time was up. But we're still breathing.

Whatever this crisis is, whatever this time means, the fact that we're still alive means we've still got a chance. By God's grace, we've still got a chance to lay off our toasts to gods who are not gods. We've still got a chance to acknowledge that it really doesn't do for us to trample on the things that the Living God has called sacred. We've still got a chance to open the door, to heed the knock. We've still got a chance to ask with every breath, "Lord, how might I honor you today?"

I don't know where you're at right now in the flood of fears and dreams and confusing tensions. Maybe you feel like a "splat" ball too, or maybe you're the leader who still has words in your mouth that you're hanging onto as if your life depended on it.

Wherever you are, may the Lord touch you there. May He grant you the grace to look into His eyes, to set at His feet the load you've been carrying and the gods you've been toasting. May He set at rest your wild wishes to see the future and anchor you in the present, teaching your heart in each minute to keep asking, "Lord, how can I honor you now?"

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¹From this point forward, the quotations of the characters in the story are either copied or paraphrased from Daniel 5, NIV (1984).