Every true Christian became that Christian at some particular point in time – in a moment of time. The Bible teaches an instantaneous salvation from sin. The conversion of Saul of Tarsus into the Apostle Paul, the saint of God, is a perfect example. In attempt to put an end to the advancement of Christianity, Saul was traveling to Damascus, Syria. Then in an act of grace, Christ Jesus stepped in and gave that man a new heart – he was born again. One morning, he woke up in a roadside inn as a disciple of Satan, but he arose the next morning, after a night without any sleep, a completely new man – a child of God – a disciple of Christ. Becoming a Christian is not a long, drawn-out process, with a dozen, required, intermediary steps. Having said that, very often there is a process, which brings a person to that moment of crisis a conversion. Sometimes that journey toward salvation is long and arduous, but for some people it is much quicker. And it is even possible that for some people, the moment of their salvation is difficult for them to pinpoint. Even though evangelists often tell people that unless they can mark on a calendar the day of their conversion, then they are not Christians – that is not necessarily true. What I would like to hear from people as the testimony of their salvation, is that today, at this moment, they are trusting Christ Jesus and his shed blood as the covering for their sins. I want to hear that they are living right now in repentance, hating sin and in love with God & His Word. I want to hear that they have no other hope for eternity but in the finished work of the Lord Jesus. Yes, to know a day when that began – some moment of spectacular conversion – that would be nice. But for some true saints of God, that part of their testimony is missing.
And there have been thousands of people, who at one point in their lives made a profession of salvation, but they were not yet converted to Christ.. Some of them were raised in Gospel-preaching churches, & these people intellectually believed the gospel. Some of them were moved by the excitement of a revival or a children’s camp, and they followed the crowd to the swimming pool to be baptized. Some of them feared Hell and longed for Heaven, focusing their attentions on these things rather than the Saviour. There could be a hundred different scenarios, all of which gave them a fleshly confidence of salvation, but without the real substance. And – then years later – the Lord came along in grace, breaking through the facade of their Christianity. We have some of these very people here this morning, and you know what I am talking about.
It could very well be that when we get to Heaven, we will find Nebuchadnezzar awaiting us. Over the next couple of chapters, there seems to be some evidence that this man became a true worshiper of Jehovah – the God whom Daniel served. It seems that after Nebuchadnezzar’s period of madness in Daniel 4 – an insanity which came as a result of the command of the Lord – he may have emerged with a new heart before God. It is impossible to be dogmatic about this point, but it seems to be likely. Having said that, it must be said that the man was NOT a saint of God in Daniel 3 or at the beginning of chapter 4. It appears that there was an arduous journey to bring this grossly idolatrous and self-absorbed man, to the point of repentance before God and to faith in Him. It may have started during his wars, and his visit to Jerusalem, before he actually became king. Then later the Lord put Daniel and a few other believers into Nebuchadnezzar’s circle of life. Patiently God may have used these acquaintances and other events to bring the biggest man in the world down to his knees in repentance.
But here in chapter 2, I believe that we have an illustration here of a false conversion. There are things in these verses which might suggest to some people that Nebuchadnezzar had become a child of God, but that is not the case. There is a picture here of a man who says the right things, and who could have joined many a church based on this confession, but there are key elements missing. And as a result there is an extremely important lesson here for all of us.
A false conversion begins with something other than CONVICTION FOR SIN.
What was it which brought Nebuchadnezzar to the confession of verse 47? He had a very disturbing dream, which, to his superstitious mind, must have come from one of the gods. Ah, but his theologians, spirit mediums & liberal pastors could not tell him about that dream or its meaning. Then, along came Daniel, who guaranteed that he would get that information from the true God of Heaven. Daniel and his three friends, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, prayed about the matter, and the Lord indeed gave to Daniel the dream and its meaning. This so impressed the idolatrous king that he declared, “Of a truth it is, that your God is a God of gods, and a Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets, seeing thou couldest reveal this secret.”
We could build a message from this testimony alone, and every point would be true and appropriate. Even though what is said is very important, and I’ll come back to it in a moment, perhaps what is not said is even more important. I don’t see Nebuchadnezzar falling on this face before the God of Daniel. I don’t hear him confessing his sins before this God of gods & promising to live a holy life in God’s sight. I don’t hear him ordering the destruction of all this idols and the tearing down of the temples, ziggurats, and chapels dedicated to idolatry. I don’t hear him crying out, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” When a sinner is converted, there are at least two things which can be clearly seen in that person. There will be a repentance – a change of heart and mind about that man’s relationship with God. Repentance involves a recognition of sin, righteousness and judgment. These things are not to be found in the king of Babylon right here. The other primary evidence of salvation, is an in-depth, soul-dependent, faith in this God, followed by an heart-felt love for him. If you can see these things here in this chapter, please point them out to me, because I can’t see them. There is a vast difference between a theological understanding about God, and a humble, repentant faith in that God. And this leads to my second point…
A false conversion may involve a GOOD and PROPER OPINION about GOD.
Nebuchadnezzar was right, “Jehovah,” Daniel’s “God of Heaven,” is the only true God. But what is the definition of “God”? There are several definitions – and the first in my dictionary is – “A being conceived as the perfect, omnipotent, omniscient originator and ruler of the universe, the principal object of faith and worship in monotheistic religions.” Personally, I think that is a much more complicated definition than is necessary. God is the One who is sovereign over all things – the absolute Ruler over all things. That is because He created all things. Of course it means that He is all-powerful (omnipotent) and all-knowing (omniscient), and so on. It means that there is nothing greater, higher, stronger, wiser or more in charge than He is. And so to say that Jehovah is the God of GODS, borders on the silly, because there can be only one God. But laying aside Nebuchadnezzar’s superstitious acceptance of more than one god, what he said is true. Jehovah is the god of Gods.
As such, it goes without saying, if He is God, then He is Ruler over even the most powerful men in His creation. There is no king, no president, no prime minister, whom Jehovah has not put on the throne or permitted to remain on the throne – and that includes Barak Obama. Daniel’s God is the Lord over all kings – including the king of Babylon.
And as Nebuchadnezzar says, Jehovah is the Revealer of secrets. He might have been thinking of future events as the secrets of God, and surely these are things only known to the governor and guarantor of the future and of those events. But the theologian knows that there are secrets in the heart of God, such as salvation, which this man couldn’t even begin to imagine. And what about Heaven and eternity, which these prophecies don’t begin to address. That Jehovah is the Revealer of secrets is proof of his deity, as Isaiah pointed out on many occasions. A moment ago we read from Isaiah 41, where the Lord uses this argument to prove Himself. And how about Isaiah 45:20-22 – “Assemble yourselves and come; draw near together, ye that are escaped of the nations: they have no knowledge that set up the wood of their graven image, and pray unto a god that cannot save. Tell ye, and bring them near; yea, let them take counsel together: who hath declared this from ancient time? who hath told it from that time? have not I the LORD? and there is no God else beside me; a just God and a Saviour; there is none beside me. Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.”
We could spend 40 minutes easily, thinking about the three points which Nebuchadnezzar raises in this verse. These are things which every true child of God knows to be true. It might be said that all three points are mysteries and secrets, but the saints of God, over time, grow stronger and stronger in their knowledge of them, and in their faith in such a God as this. And yet, the unbeliever can affirm them to be true as well. But this is not enough to prove to me that Nebuchadnezzar is a child of God.
False conversions often involve GREAT RESPECT FOR THE EVANGELIST.
“Then the king Nebuchadnezzar fell upon his face, and worshipped Daniel, and commanded that they should offer an oblation and sweet odours unto him. Then the king made Daniel a great man, and gave him many great gifts, and made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon, and chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon.”
Many Christians can remember who it was that carried the gospel on that day when they were converted. I am one of those joyful people who can remember when and where I was born again. Unfortunately, I do not know the name of the man who brought to me the gospel. It was in a Baptist church that I never visited again, but even if I had it wouldn’t have mattered, because I don’t think that he was the pastor. It may be impossible for me, this side of Heaven, to know who the evangelist was that night. I will have to trust the Lord to honor him and reward him for his faithful ministry that evening back in 1964. But I can assure you, that if I knew his name, and I could look him up, I would be happy to shake his hand. I could not give to him the honors which Nebuchadnezzar bestowed upon Daniel, but if I could, I would. “As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country.” And there is never more refreshing water than the good news of Christ Jesus. There is no farther country from the sinner’s soul than the Lord’s Heaven of Heavens. “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver.” There is nothing more beautiful or valuable than the true story of Jesus, and His death, burial and resurrection for our sins. So the speaker of that word, and the carrier of that good news is a precious, precious person.
However, sometimes, God’s evangelist is given more honour than he really deserves. There has never yet been an evangelist who was anything more than a sinner saved by grace. As Daniel tells Nebuchadnezzar, this information wasn’t given to him because he was smarter, holier, or more obedient than any other servant of God? He didn’t deserve the honors which the king was giving him, simply because he voiced God’s revelation. Nebuchadnezzar was giving more honor to Daniel than he was to the Lord Himself. This sometimes happens, and no servant of God worth his salt should stand for it. I will come back to this, but I think that there is a gap between verses 46 and 47 and in that gap Daniel risked his life by forbidding the king to honor him above the Lord.
But getting back to my point….. It is possible for people to hear the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, and only intellectually accept it. They may believe all the principle points to the gospel – their sinfulness, God’s righteousness, that Christ died on the cross to pay for sin. They may believe the principles of the gospel, without actually putting their faith in the Lord as personally and directly dying for their sins. And then they may join the church which first gave them the good news. They may honor the pastor of that church with their love and support, and it still has nothing to do with their salvation from sin. In fact the honor they give to their evangelist may further intrench them in their unsaved condition. It might create a situation which they would be too ashamed to deny later – condemning their souls.
False conversions sometimes are QUITE CONVINCING.
There are things about this chapter which are quite outstanding. Remember first that Nebuchadnezzar was a complete and absolute autocrat – an absolute dictator. He wasn’t accountable to the Senate, to the Constitution, to the Supreme Court or to the electorate. Humanly speaking, he could do absolutely anything that he wanted without anyone to stop him. And here comes Daniel giving him information which was probably not what he wanted to hear. Oh, he was excited that Daniel could recount the dream and give him a reasonable explanation. But there was no prophecy of a long term dynasty, of an even wider world domination, about even more wealth and prosperity. “Thou art this head of gold. And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee, and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth.” There were a few Judean and Israelite kings, who when they heard prophecies which didn’t exactly suit them, they turned their vengeance on God’s messenger. That could have been the end with Nebuchadnezzar, but such was not the case. It appeared that God had turned the heart of this man, and that might be considered evidence of salvation.
And look at him bow before Daniel, as many others had done toward himself. There are a lot of people who do not like being told that they are sinners and that when sinners die, they are cast into Hell and into the Lake of Fire. I have been ordered out of people’s houses for telling them such things. There have been dozens and dozens of people in our church services who have never returned because they heard messages similar to that. Again, it was clearly the Word of God, but they were not interested in the truth, so they mentally executed the gospel preacher. But this was not the case with Nebuchadnezzar. Both the absence of a negative reaction, and inclusion of a positive reaction, might have convinced a shallow on-looker that the king really had been converted to the Lord.
However, false conversions often PROVE THEMSELVES in a short period of time.
The next chapter finds Nebuchadnezzar building a 60 foot image not far from Babylon. “Then an herald cried aloud, To you it is commanded, O people, nations, and languages, That at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, dulcimer, and all kinds of musick, ye fall down and worship the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the king hath set up: And whoso falleth not down and worshippeth shall the same hour be cast into the midst of a burning fiery furnace.”
There is a sense in which most sin boils down to one form of idolatry or another. Usually the idol involved is the sinner himself. He thinks of himself as greater than the Lord, and that his own opinions are greater than God’s revelations. Or perhaps he thinks that more people ought to worship him. I suppose that even Christians can become idolatrous like this. But there is a point – and I’m not going to try to draw it for you – there is some point which proves that this professing Christian is not a Christian at all, but an overt, out-and-out idolater.
Such was the case with Nebuchadnezzar – so far. There is no way to look upon the foolishness of the next chapter without concluding that the man was just as idolatrous as he had ever been. Perhaps, he wasn’t praying to Baal, or Bel, as he had, but we can’t even prove that. Nevertheless, this image was indeed an idol and the face upon that image was the king’s. It is incorrect to say that this wicked man had become a worshiper of Jehovah – that he had been converted. This was just the first of several things which he did, giving evidence of his true unsaved nature.
Why did I initially say that the last verses of Daniel 2 bring us an important lesson? It’s because there are people in, and members of, God’s churches which have testimonies similar to Nebuchadnezzar’s. It doesn’t matter how large or small, doctrinal or practical, deep or shallow a church might be, there are often people in those churches who have had a false conversion and who have a false confession of faith. They need to be awakened; they need to be challenged; they need to come under the conviction of the Holy Spirit. Look to your own confession; to your own professed conversion, and then to your current life. Are there idols in your life, which testify to the type of conversion that you’ve had? Are you absolutely sure that you love the God of gods? Is He the Lord of your life? Is your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, not only to save you, but is He the love of your soul and the God of your life? Have you truly been converted, or are you only living in a mental acknowledgment of God?