profaned

I've never been a fan of shock anything, whether it's radio, theater or language. I know, people say it grabs attention and makes a point, but I think there's a lot of danger. Those words, ideas or images shock usually because they tread on treasured, or even holy, icons. Standing on the flag, photographing a cross in a beaker of urine, dropping the f-bomb several times in a sentence - these feel calculated to offend more than to make a point.

The danger is this: sometimes the one you offend has the power to do something about it. Just ask King Belshazzar. He was partying with a few close friends when a spooky hand wrote his death message on the wall.

Here's a little more context from Daniel 5:1-2 "King Belshazzar gave a great banquet for a thousand of his nobles and drank wine with them. While Belshazzar was drinking his wine, he gave orders to bring in the gold and silver goblets that Nebuchadnezzar his father had taken from the temple in Jerusalem, so that the king and his nobles, his wives and his concubines might drink from them."

Belshazzar thought it would be funny, maybe edgy, to use God's holy objects at his pagan party. He didn't know it, but he put on a horrifying anti-sacrament that offers a depraved parody of a sacred moment Jesus would share with his disciples in an upper room. God was not amused, and for this and other offenses, Belshazzar died.

There's a word we don't use much anymore: profane. We know it in the context of language, where it describes words that are offensive. But it really applies to any inappropriate use of what God made as good and holy.

For that reason, the story of Belshazzar scares me. Think of the horrible things I've thought with this amazing brain God urges me to renew as part of my transformation. Think of the sins I've committed with the hands and feet God means to be used in the service of Jesus. Think of the vile jokes and demeaning rumors I've spread with a mouth meant to sing His praises.

Too often, the word profane describes me, even though I want to think of myself as a holy man. A fair God would strike me down, but thank Jesus, when God looks at my profanity he sees a purity made possible only by the blood of the cross. Amazing grace! How dare I cheapen it by profaning God's good things?