Time to ChangeSample

Belshazzar  

One day king Belshazzar made a great feast for a thousand of his princes, and they drank wine and enjoyed themselves. At one point, the king asked for the gold and silver cups that his father Nebuchadnezzar had brought from the temple in Jerusalem. Then everyone drank from the sacred cups and praised the gods of gold and silver, of iron, wood and bronze. I imagine the king must've been too drunk to take what he was doing so lightly. 

In that same hour, fingers appeared on the wall and wrote the following words: MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPARSIN. Belshazzar paled and summoned all the wise men, magicians and sorcerers of the kingdom, but no one could interpret those words. It was then that the queen remembered Daniel, who at the time of Nebuchadnezzar had revealed his dream. So Daniel was called and God revealed to him the meaning of those words:

"God hath numbered thy kingdom, and set an end to it.

Thou wast weighed in the balance, and wast found wanting. 

Your kingdom has been broken, and given to the Medes and the Persians."

That same night King Belshazzar was killed and his kingdom taken by Darius. 

What does this have to do with changing? Well, King Belshazzar thought that it would be just another day of his life. Like many of us, he made his plans thinking that tomorrow he could ask for forgiveness and leave it behind. He played with the things of God, decided to put his desires above the Divine's and did as he pleased. Belshazzar would never have thought that day would be his last and that chance his final.

It also happens in our lives; we leave God for later, repentance for later. We believe that we have time to "enjoy life" and then come to God with the leftovers, not knowing if this will be our last chance, if tomorrow there will no longer be time to change. 

The day to improve, to repent and to change our actions is today. Tomorrow isn't promised to anyone. Life is too fragile and God too sacred to play with it. If you have received this opportunity today, don’t let it go. Belshazzar saw his father punished for not humbling himself before God, and yet he followed the same steps. 

We can choose another road and give our lives to God, and when we do, we are weighed in the balance and we are found innocent.

Leslie Ramírez