Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 41 The results. Read Daniel 5:29. Daniel gave the king the message from the Lord. It wasn’t a happy message. It wasn’t something the king would get excited about. So what were the results of this message? The king gave Daniel the rewards that he promised. Daniel was given honors and accolades forecast for interpreting the message from the Lord. It’s interesting to note that there was one result that was missing. The king did not repent. Previously, when Daniel had brought these kinds of messages to King Nebuchadnezzar, the king would repent and would acknowledge the Lord. In this case, this king did not…

Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 40 Truth. Read Daniel 5:25-28. Telling the truth is not always as easy as it sounds. In fact, there are many times when it would have been so much easier to have either omitted the truth or just told somebody what they wanted to hear instead of the truth. Daniel faced this circumstance. The message he was giving to the King was not a good message. The king was not going to enjoy hearing this, and yet, Daniel walked through piece by piece explaining the message that God had given the king. This king’s rule was going to end. His kingdom was going to be…

Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 39 Therefore… Read Daniel 5:23-24. The way the English language is set up, anytime you see the word, “therefore,” you should always double check the information that was listed before it. All that information is tremendously relevant to whatever is going to come after the “therefore.” That information is the reason behind the word. When you look at these two verses, we see a huge list in verse 23 of all the things that the king was doing wrong. All of the sins that he was committing were listed out. Daniel explains that because of all of these sins, that is why God brought this…

Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 38 The history lesson. Read Daniel 5:18-22. There’s a saying that those who don’t know or study history are doomed to repeat it. This is a very appropriate saying for today’s reading. Daniel has to give the king a history lesson. We were just reading about this in Daniel chapter 4, so the lesson is very fresh for us, however, apparently the king’s son didn’t remember it. Now that the son is king, he’s doing all the things that his father was doing before God humbled him. Daniel doesn’t start off by reading the message from God. Instead, Daniel starts off by reminding the king…

Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 37 No reward. Read Daniel 5:17. The idea of giving someone a reward for doing what we want them to do is a pretty popular idea. We see often that people are willing to say “thank you” in a more tangible way by giving gifts or favors. Here the king was trying to do the same thing with Daniel. The king wanted the message interpreted, so he was promising gifts and favors to anyone who would be able to do it. Daniel knew that through God, he would be able to interpret the message that God had given the king. But, he didn’t want even…

Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 36 Résumé filler. Read Daniel 5:13-16. I work with several high school-age students in a number of different areas. In a conversation I was having with one of them recently, the topic of resume fillers came up. This young person was discussing how so many of his peers join or are part of organizations solely so they can put them on their resume to make them more desirable for scholarships or college applications. These people don’t really do anything with the organization or make a difference, they just want to be able to say they were part of it. This got me thinking about what…

Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 35 What is your reputation? Read Daniel 5:10-12. I’ve heard it said that you don’t get to create your reputation, you simply influence it. Reputation is what other people think about you. When your name comes up in conversations, what’s the impression of the people who hear it? What have they heard about you? What have they experienced regarding you? All of these factors come together to build your reputation. Even though this new King didn’t seem to know much of what his father had gone through or experienced, the Queen did. The Queen knew Daniel by reputation. She understood what he had been able…

Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 34 Déjà vu. Read Daniel 5:5-9. Reading these verses and looking back over the first few chapters of Daniel, it starts to read the same. It’s a very similar situation. God has moved in a divine way. The king is trying to make sense of it, but no one can understand. So often we find ourselves in situations that are repeats. If we’re not careful and don’t learn from the opportunities that God presents us, we will find ourselves repeating the same situation over and over and over again. God wants us to learn and to seek after him. Here we see the next generation…

Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 33 Praising the Creator or the creation? Read Daniel 5:1-4. It can be easy to get mixed up as leaders. We can get so focused on the things that we are doing that. We end up missing the focus and get focused on all the wrong things. Chronologically, Daniel chapter 5 takes place quite a bit after Daniel chapter 4. King Nebuchadnezzar’s son is now on the throne. We quickly see that he has inherited his father’s prideful attitude, but not his father’s acknowledgment of the one true God. This new king loves wealth and grandeur and parties, and at the start of chapter 5,…

Leading Through Challenging Circumstances, Day 32 The final message to the people. Read Daniel 4:36-37. This entire chapter has been a letter that king Nebuchadnezzar was writing to his entire kingdom. Most kings would not have wanted people to know what he went through, the humbling and humiliating experience that he had. But the king is broadcasting it to the entire kingdom for the express purpose of ensuring that they know and understand that God is God. When it comes to declaring the praise and wonder and glory of who God is, it’s not about our pride. It’s not about making ourselves look good. God is about God and him…