Does God have grandchildren? ∙∙
For you are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus. – Galatians 3:26
Daniel 5:18-22
18 Your Majesty, the Most High God, gave sovereignty, majesty, glory, and honor to your predecessor, Nebuchadnezzar.
20 But when his heart and mind were puffed up with arrogance, he was brought down from his royal throne and stripped of his glory.
21 He was driven from human society. He was given the mind of a wild animal, and he lived among the wild donkeys. He ate grass like a cow, and he was drenched with the dew of heaven until he learned that the Most High God rules over the kingdoms of the world and appoints anyone he desires to rule over them.
22 You are his successor, O Belshazzar, and you knew all this, yet you have not humbled yourself.
What is a grandparent? Even without formal training in biology, the concept of grandparents is broadly understood. Grandparents are the biological parents of an individual’s mother or father. Children have direct relationships with their parents, who gave birth to them. Although children are biologically connected to their grandparents, their grandparents did not directly bring them into the world. As a result, grandchildren have an indirect familial bond with their grandparents.
In contrast, there are no intermediaries between Father God and His children. Every child of the King has a direct, personal relationship with their heavenly Father. Each child of the King made an individual, personal decision to believe in and accept the Lord Jesus Christ. By doing so, we become the Father’s children and enter into a personal relationship with Him.
John 1:12 But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God.
When we accept the Lord Jesus Christ as our savior, we are spiritually born again as children of God. This new birth is not a physical one but a transformation of our inner being. It is a spiritual awakening that occurs when we believe in Jesus Christ, leading to a profound spiritual awakening within us. This rebirth is not of the flesh; that is, it is not a physical one, but it is of the spirit, and it signifies our new identity as children of the King.
John 1:13 [We] are reborn – not with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God.
John 3:3-8
3 Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, unless you are born again, you cannot see the Kingdom of God.”
5 Jesus replied, “I assure you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.”
6 “Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life.”
7 “So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You must be born again.’”
8 “The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.”
REFLECT & PRAY
1 Peter 2:2 Like newborn babies, you must crave pure spiritual milk of the word so that you will grow into a full experience of salvation.
Father, thank You for making us Your children. You adopted us into Your Forever Family when You caused us to be born of the Spirit.
INSIGHT
Does the Father have grandchildren? No, absolutely not! The Father only has children. Faith is a personal decision that everyone must make for themselves. It is not like a human trait or inheritance passed from generation to generation. Each child of the King is responsible for providing biblical teaching, guiding, and leading by example to allow their children to come to faith in the Father and His word for themselves.
This is perfectly illustrated in Daniel 2-5. The Father reached out to Nebuchadnezzar in a unique way through Daniel and his three Jewish friends: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. In Daniel 2, Daniel is given supernatural wisdom to interpret dreams.
Nebuchadnezzar was suffering from a recurring nightmare. Daniel was summoned to not only interpret it but to tell Nebuchadnezzar what he had dreamed.
Daniel was not some shadowy soothsayer. He was a kingdom man empowered by the Father, the living God. The Father revealed to Daniel what Nebuchadnezzar had dreamed and its meaning and interpretation. When Daniel shared what God had provided, Nebuchadnezzar was not only impressed but amazed. Consequently, Nebuchadnezzar believed in the supernatural power of the God of Israel.
Daniel 2:47-49
47 The king said to Daniel, “Truly, your God is the greatest of gods, the Lord over kings, a revealer of mysteries, for you have been able to reveal this secret.”
48 Then the king appointed Daniel to a high position and gave him many valuable gifts. He made Daniel ruler over the whole province of Babylon, as well as chief over all his wise men.
49 At Daniel’s request, the king appointed Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to manage all the affairs of the province of Babylon while Daniel remained in the king’s court.
Next, Daniel’s three friends refused to obey the king’s command to bow down and worship Nebuchadnezzar’s golden image, considering it an act of idolatry. As a result, they were thrown into the fiery furnace. The Father sent an angel to miraculously protect them. Nebuchadnezzar could not believe his eyes and came to believe in the extraordinary power, reality, and existence of the Father. He realized that the God of Israel was at work in the space-time continuum.
Daniel 3:28-30
28 “Praise to the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego! He sent his angel to rescue his servants who trusted in him. They defied the king’s command and were willing to die rather than serve or worship any god except their own God.
29 . . . There is no other god who can rescue like this!”
30 Then, the king promoted Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to even higher positions in the province of Babylon.
Nebuchadnezzar had faith in the Father but not the kind of faith that would make him a child of the King. He was not far from the Kingdom of God (Mark 12:34).
Because Nebuchadnezzar was proud and braggadocios, the Father struck him with a rare form of mental illness called boanthropy. When he finally recovered and came to his senses, he finally accepted the Father as his God (Daniel 4). He was in the kingdom of God (Luke 14:15).
Daniel 4:34-37
34 “After this time had passed, I, Nebuchadnezzar, looked up to heaven. My sanity returned, and I praised and worshiped the Most High and honored the one who lives forever. His rule is everlasting, and his kingdom is eternal.
35 All the people of the earth are nothing compared to him. He does as he pleases among the angels of heaven and among the people of the earth. No one can stop him or say to him, ‘What do you mean by doing these things?’
36 “When my sanity returned to me, so did my honor and glory and kingdom. My advisers and nobles sought me out, and I was restored as head of my kingdom, with even more incredible honor than before.
37 “Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise, glorify, and honor the King of heaven. All his acts are just and true, and he is able to humble the proud.”
Nebuchadnezzar, the pagan king of Babylon, had become a believer in Israel’s true and living God. He had become a child of the King. However, he failed to pass on his faith to his family and descendants. The handwriting on the wall was a message to his grandson, Belshazzar.
Sadly, Belshazzar was unaware of Daniel and the God of Israel. He did not know what Nebuchadnezzar believed. He threw a great feast and, in so doing, mocked the God of Israel. A hand appeared, and a message was written on the wall: MENE, MENE, TEKEL, and PARSIN (Daniel 5:25).
Belshazzar was terrified. He was told about Daniel, who had the wisdom, insight, and understanding of the gods. He summoned Daniel to provide the meaning of the words (Daniel 5:11-12).
Daniel 5:17-22
17 Daniel answered the king, Keep your gifts or give them to someone else, but I will tell you what the writing means.
18 Your Majesty, the Most High God, gave sovereignty, majesty, glory, and honor to your predecessor, Nebuchadnezzar.
20 But when his heart and mind were puffed up with arrogance, he was brought down from his royal throne and stripped of his glory.
21 He was driven from human society. He was given the mind of a wild animal, and he lived among the wild donkeys. He ate grass like a cow, and he was drenched with the dew of heaven until he learned that the Most High God rules over the kingdoms of the world and appoints anyone he desires to rule over them.
22 You are his successor, O Belshazzar, and you knew all this, yet you have not humbled yourself.
The Father only has children, not grandchildren!
Daniel 5:23-24
23 For you have proudly defied the Lord of heaven and have had these cups from his Temple brought before you. You and your nobles and your wives and concubines have been drinking wine from them while praising gods of silver, gold, bronze, iron, wood, and stone – gods that neither see nor hear nor know anything. But you have not honored the God who gives you the breath of life and controls your destiny!
24 So God has sent this hand to write this message.
Daniel 5:30 That very night, Belshazzar, the Babylonian king, was killed.
Because of his pride, defiance, and refusal to believe in the true God, the God of Israel, Belshazzar was doomed.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯6-15-3
© Dr. H 2024
Dr H Reflections 