Nebuchadnezzar Recovering His Reason. Etched by Robert Blyth, 1782.
I woke up this morning angry. I wasn’t really angry at anyone or anything. I hadn’t had a fight with my wife the night before. But I was still angry. It was kind of like that feeling you get when you know you’re getting sick, but you’re not quite sick yet — like that nauseous sensation in the pit of your stomach when you sense you might hurl but still have enough control to consciously process the fact that you really don’t want to and intentionally try to hold it back. Yeah, I know: that’s gross.
I felt pretty gross.
What’s more, I realized it had been creeping up on me. As I looked back on the last several days, I recognized that I had been becoming increasingly edgy. Little things — things that in the grand scheme of life don’t matter — were setting me off. I had been less productive at work, even though I had been logging more hours than usual (which is saying something for a workaholic). Sure, I was tired — exhausted, really — but this was more than just being tired.
My quality was slipping, too. That was probably the part that irritated me the most. I was seriously off my game, and I was making rookie mistakes. People had been calling me out on stuff that I typically don’t miss. Work life, personal life, church life — it was all slipping out of control, and I could feel it in my nerves. I realized that I had been trying to pull it together, but it seemed recently like the harder I tried, the more mistakes I made, and it was embarrassing. I began to see that my soul was drying up, and that I was quickly getting to the point where, like arid tinder, the slightest abrasion risked causing me to erupt into a full-blown wildfire.
I panicked (something else I don’t generally do). I cried out to God, “What is going on with me? It’s one thing for jerks and morons to rub me the wrong way with their stupidity, but no one has done anything to me today yet — I just woke up!” He didn’t say anything in reply.
When I went upstairs to get the kids out of bed, I discovered that one of my sons hadn’t completed a chore that he claimed he had when I had explicitly asked him about it the night before. Poof. I exploded like a Roman candle. Lying is one of the worst things you can possibly do in our household, but even I recognized that my reaction was excessive. This was really bad.
I returned downstairs and got in the shower. Showers seem to have a calming effect on me — there’s something about the water beating down on my head that helps me think better, more clearly. Today I was hoping that the water on my head might also quench the flames in my heart.
Again I cried out to God. “What is wrong with me? Why am I reacting to everything like this? I don’t want to be this way. This is wrong — I really don’t want to be this way!” Still He said nothing. As I stood there, all I could think of was all the people I had sinned against in the past week, some overtly, all of them in my heart. I writhed at the thought of the horrible testimony and example I had lived in front of my unbelieving colleagues, some of whom had been much more level-headed than I, and some whom I had falsely accused when the mistake was actually mine. I felt like a heel, like I should go out and eat dirt. Remarkably, the more I thought about all the people I had wronged and the ways in which I had wronged them, the less brightly the fire burned in my belly.
“OK, Lord, I get it. I am here of my own choosing and my own doing. But I don’t recall intentionally setting out to go down this path. Where did I go wrong? What am I missing?” As I dried off, I could feel that confession had once again done its work, and the burden of my sin seemed to symbolically fall away with each stroke of the towel. “Wow,” I mused to myself. “I really don’t like being humbled. Man humiliates, but God humbles.”
As I started to reflect on the difference between humiliation and humbling, I must have also finally been ready to listen, because God finally spoke up. He said only two words.
“I, Nebuchadnezzar.”
He didn’t say any more, because none were needed. I knew what He meant.
Those two words come from Daniel 4:4, and begin a speech by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon recounting some events that have happened to hm. He tells of a dream, which was interpreted by Daniel, in which he was warned by God that if he did not repent of his ways he would be reduced to eating grass like cattle. A year later, the vision came true.
The king reflected and said, “Is this not Babylon the great, which I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?” While the word was in the king’s mouth, a voice came from heaven, saying, “King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is declared: sovereignty has been removed from you, and you will be driven away from mankind, and your dwelling place will be with the beasts of the field. You will be given grass to eat like cattle, and seven periods of time will pass over you until you recognize that the Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whomever He wishes.” Immediately the word concerning Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled; and he was driven away from mankind and began eating grass like cattle, and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair had grown like eagles’ feathers and his nails like birds’ claws. (Daniel 4:30-33)
For seven years Nebuchadnezzar lived in the fields like an animal because of his pride. Now that his senses had been restored to him, he was finally acknowledging God and giving Him the honor He deserved. In closing, Nebuchadnezzar says,
Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise, exalt and honor the King of heaven, for all His works are true and His ways just, and He is able to humble those who walk in pride. (Daniel 4:37)
I instantly understood the horror of my ways. I was Nebuchadnezzar, guilty of his same sin: pride. I remembered several recent instances in which people had not heeded my advice and I was subsequently proven to be right. Instead of humbly letting it go, I had chosen to gloat and boast about it, in some cases to other people, but mostly to myself. Just like Nebuchadnezzar, I had reflected to myself how great I was, and how foolish other people were for not listening to me. “When will they learn,” I had declared sanctimoniously, “that I know what I’m talking about, and start listening to me?” Suddenly I realized that my rash of uncharacteristic mistakes had started when I stopped keeping my ego in check. When confronted by my own errors, instead of repenting and learning, I chose to get offended and angry. It was my arrogance that had been eating me alive. I quickly examined my hands, anxious to see if my hair and nails had started to grow.
Truthfully, I knew I was wrong when I started putting others down so that I could lift myself up. I knew I was justifying myself by highlighting the failures of others. It was sin, and I knew it, and I did it anyway. So I’m glad the Bible has more to say about humility, like James 4:6 “But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, ‘God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.'” I need that grace. He showed me that grace in spite of my arrogance, because He could have made me spend seven years in the fields like a wild animal like He did Nebuchadnezzar, but instead only made me stew in my own juices for two weeks. I not only need grace and forgiveness for my own pride, but also need to show that same grace to others, because it is the only thing that will save me from being destroyed by my own pride and anger.
Now I, Sam Wegner, praise, exalt and honor the King of Heaven, for all His works are true, and His ways are just, and He is able to humble those who walk in pride.
