Mene mene tekel u-pharsin
1) Around 550 B.C.: Today, there is a lot going on in the Babylonian royal court. The regent Belshazzar gives a guest performance and the banquet hall is filled to capacity. Exquisite food and the best wines are on the set tables. As the hour approaches, the alcohol level rises.
Belshazzar has the utensils brought from the Jerusalem temple. These are sacred vessels that had been used in the worship services there until the conquest of the Kingdom of Judah. Now he wants to drink from these goblets with his court and push the promille upwards.
The mood becomes more boisterous and the noise level louder. Half-naked dancers really heat up the horny show. Today they’re letting it all hang out. Ballermann and Layla. One orgy through the night.
Suddenly, a shivering breeze goes through the hall. The singing and shrieking comes to an abrupt end. In fact, a glowing hand has just appeared on the wall, writing with its finger: “Mene, mene tekel u-pharsin!” No one knows what these mysterious words mean, but a sense of foreboding looms that near disaster is on the horizon. – The prophet Daniel is called and interprets the Scripture: “God has numbered and ended your kingship. You were weighed and found to be too light. Your kingdom will be divided and given to the Medes and Persians!”
2) It’s been a good 50 years. I was sitting in the children’s service of a Wiesbaden church congregation. The leader G. Plass told what he had experienced at a company Christmas party. It had been a damp squib. Raunchy jokes and disinhibited laughter. Then it became blasphemous. “I was fighting with myself on the inside. Finally, I gave myself a jolt and stood up. “Dear colleagues,” I said, “I am a Christian and there are things that are sacred to me!”
Almost everything I learned in the children’s services back then has long been forgotten. But this scene is not. The courage of a man to stand up for his faith and not allow it to be dragged through the mud.
3) Friends of ours recently attended a play in the Rhine-Main area. A warm summer night. A full house. Of course openair. An expectant audience. We all know the play “Sister Act” from the movie. But the director had ridiculed everything that had to do with church, God and faith.
At Diospi Suyana, we work for the needy of Peruvian society because we believe in someone far above us. God. He is sacred to us. He gives us the strength to live and the hope for a future. Because he lives, we find the courage to meet the challenges of tomorrow. And that’s exactly what the West Coast Choir sings about. We recommend activating the English subtitles.
If nothing is sacred to us anymore, then the Holy One will not hold us in adversity either. Then only the abyss remains. /KDJ (Image above by Rembrandt circa 1635: The Banquet of Belshazzar).
