Society in Babylon and the characteristics of that last night of Belshazzar and of the kingdom of Babylon, are representative of society and its practices in the last days. This would be plain, if from nothing else, from the fact that the term "Babylon" is used to describe the society and the practices of the last days. And the practices of Babylonian society that night were feasting, and drunkenness, and loose relations between the sexes.
And such is precisely the description which Jesus gives of things in the last days. He says they will be "eating and drinking, ... [and] eating and drinking with the drunken;" (Matthew 24:38,49) there will be "surfeiting and drunkenness;" (Luke 21:34) and like as it was in the day when Lot went out of Sodom, "Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed." (Luke 17:30)
If these things were only confined to the confessedly wicked world, it would all be bad enough; but the faithful Word certifies that these things are practiced by, and among, those who profess to be the servants and people of God. "In the last days ... [men will have] a form of godliness, but will deny the power thereof: ... [and will be] lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God." (2 Timothy 3:1,5,4)
It is even these who will be surfeiting and drinking. It is even the professed servant of the Lord, though an "evil servant, [who says] in his heart, My Lord delays His coming; And [begins] to smite his fellow-servants, and to eat and drink with the drunken." (Matthew 24:48-49)
It is even professed churches, "mother" and daughters, that are designated in the Scriptures as "Babylon." And today it is sorrowfully a matter of serious consideration with the most spiritually minded in the churches, how much further the churches can go in their feasting and festivity; their fish-ponds, grab-bags, and kissing-bees; their auction sales--at "foot socials" and "ankle auctions"--of the young women of the congregation, the price invited by sensual suggestion,--before they arrive at the point where, like Babylon indeed, they, too, shall be weighed in the balances, and, because utterly wanton, found utterly wanting.
Such proceedings cannot possibly have any other effect than to destroy in men that properly chivalrous and manly respect for women, and for themselves with women, that is the honor of a man; and to break down in woman that womanly modesty and reserve that everywhere are the perfect defense of a woman; and so to produce a looseness of relations between the sexes such as characterized Babylon itself.
Such is the inevitable tendency in society today, both in the church and in the world,--altogether toward Babylon, as portrayed in the book of Daniel the night of her dreadful fall. In that ancient Babylon, people were scattered whom God recognized as His, and to whom, just before her destruction, He called: "My people, go out of the midst of her, and deliver every man his soul from the fierce anger of the Lord." (Jeremiah 51:45)
So now, in these last days, there are people scattered in this Babylon whom God recognizes as His, and to whom, just before her destruction, He calls: "Come out of her, my people, that you be not partakers of her sins, and that you receive not of her plagues." (Revelation 18:4)
And now God sends forth that call. Those by whose voices it is sounded forth must go everywhere, among all people, to find them, so that they can hear the "voice from heaven," (Revelation 18:4) ringing with the sweet tones of the voice of the Good Shepherd. These messengers must go into the very streets and alleys of the "high viced cities," into the highways and hedges of the country places,--everywhere,--to save people, "with fear, pulling them out of the fire." (Jude 23)
And of all things, those who go thus everywhere among Babylonian evils, must themselves be spiritual, must themselves be pure, must themselves be strong. They must so truly know the way of true holiness that, while loving the lost sinner overwhelmed in the lusts of the flesh, and in compassion pulling him out of the fire, they will so hate sin as to hate "even the garment spotted by the flesh." (Jude 23) "Be clean, you that bear the vessels of the Lord." (Isaiah 52:11)
All this can be done. In Christ, men can find perfect temperance; that perfect purity that will enable them to walk in white wherever they may go; and that manly integrity that will protect every woman in the world,-protect her even from herself, if need be. In Christ every woman can find perfect temperance, and also can find and preserve that genuine womanly modesty that is her full protection and sure defense everywhere she may be called to go.
And thus Christian men and Christian women can live as did Daniel and his companions, not as Belshazzar and his crowd, and can and will preserve propriety of personal conduct and the proper relations between the sexes, wherever they may be called of Christ to go, even amid the corruptions of this last-day Babylon, and even to her last day of grace. "Come out of her, my people." (Revelation 18:4) "Be clean, you that bear the vessels of the Lord." (Isaiah 52:11)
Dare to be a Daniel.--Advent Review, May 3, 1898.