“At the same time my reason returned to me” (Daniel 4:36).
During moments of extreme stress and loneliness, people begin to question their sanity. Shahbaz Taseer was kidnapped, tortured, and placed in solitary confinement in 2011. His abductors were asking for the release of prisoners in exchange for their victim.
Although the kidnapping took place in Pakistan, the victim was able to keep part of his sanity by listening to soccer games from England on a small radio. Additionally, he tried to fight for his reasoning abilities by thinking of his friends one by one, praying, and visiting familiar places in his mind.
Nebuchadnezzar also went through social isolation. However, for this famous king of Babylon, the sanity he had enjoyed during his years of prosperity were already gone by the time “he was driven from men” (Daniel 4:33). Yet this punishment did not come from cruel kidnappers. Nebuchadnezzar himself ignored the warning that could have prevented the entire ordeal.
During his years of prosperity, the king was in danger of taking all credit for his success leading the powerful empire. The Lord sent him a dream to warn him of what would happen to him if he did not acknowledge the one and only God, the true Source of his success. It is important to remember that this dream came after Nebuchadnezzar’s first dream in chapter 2 and the deliverance of Daniel’s friends from the fiery furnace in chapter 3. By this point in his life, Nebuchadnezzar should have known about God’s involvement in history.
Yet Nebuchadnezzar did not take the warning to heart and continued to attribute his success to himself (Daniel 4:30). As a result, God took Nebuchadnezzar’s sanity for a while, and the king behaved as an animal. When his “reason returned” to him, he was rational through and through. Not only did he act as a person, but he also was sensible enough to recognize God’s work in his life.
Dear God, help me to avoid the insanity of ignoring You. I acknowledge You as the Source of all wisdom.
