Prophetic Prospective Daily Devotional

In that night was Belshazzar the king of the Chaldeans slain. And Darius the Median took the kingdom, being about threescore and two years old.

This fifth chapter of Daniel's prophecy is not only a prophetic passage of great importance but also a chapter that has a very important historic significance as well.

The King of Babylon, at the time of Daniel 5, is Belshazzar who most likely was the grandson of Nebuchadnezzar. King Nebuchadnezzar had died and Belshazzar came to power over this world empire near the time of the end of this great Gentile world power.

The King had invited 1,000 of his "lords" to a banquet, which actually turned into the "last hoorah" for King Belshazzar.

Though the Medes and the Persians had been threatening to overthrow the Babylonians, the King felt secure inside the walls of this supposedly "impregnable city" with it's double high walls surrounding the city, a city that never had been defeated.

During the course of the evening the King called for the "Temple vessels" that his grandfather had brought out of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem to Babylon. The King had his servants fill these "special vessels" with wine and made these "special vessels" available to the King's guest. This was a very bad mistake, which I will discuss a bit later.

It was while the drunken party was going on that the Medes came from the North and the Persians from the South and damned up the water entering the city under it's Northern wall, and exiting under it's Southern wall.

That gave Babylon's enemies a dry tunnel under the walls to enter the city. This was the method by which the "impregnable city" was entered by its major enemies at that time. The Babylonian Empire was brought down by the Medo-Persian Empire, the second of the Gentile world powers to rule over Jerusalem and the Jewish people.

This passage, describing the fall of the Babylonian Empire, does not mention that the city of Babylon was destroyed, only the Empire. The truth be known, the city of Babylon has never been destroyed, as Bible prophecy says will happen in the last days.

Ancient Jewish Prophets say that Babylon must be destroyed, totally, and never be rebuilt. Isaiah 13 and 14, Jeremiah 50 and 51, Revelation 18 and Revelation 16:17-21 describe the total destruction of the city of Babylon.

Babylon the city was not destroyed, as described in Daniel 5. Other passages indicate that same truth as well. Seventy-five years after the fall of the Babylonian Empire, Ezra lived in Babylon, Ezra 7:6 and 9.

Secular history tells us that Alexander the Great ruled the world from his headquarters in Babylon, 200 years after the fall of the Babylonian Empire. Peter, the Apostle, started a church in Babylon, 500 years after the fall of the Empire, I Peter 5:13. Babylon, one day in the future, will be destroyed, as revealed in Revelation 16.

The other thought that I wanted to give you pertaining to the use of the "implements" from the Temple, Daniel 5:2-5, is that because the Babylonians desecrated the Temple and it's implements, God will bring eternal judgment on Babylon, Jeremiah 50:28 and Jeremiah 51:11.

Biblical Babylon is the modern-day state of Iraq, where the Antichrist will be headquartered and will rule over a "one world" political, governmental, economic system in the last days. The rebuilding of war-torn Iraq is setting the stage for Bible Prophecy to be fulfilled.

Keep looking up, because the Rapture happens before all of these prophecies are fulfilled. In reality, the Rapture could happen today, what a day it would be for all of us who know Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour.

PRAYER THOUGHT: Help me, Lord to discern the urgency of the moment in these days that seem to be the last days and help me to live in light of this knowledge.