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Series Code: TIJ
Program Code: TIJ003101S
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00:25 In 2003, Greg Lesvada drove a black Lamborghini Diablo rubbed 00:31 shoulders with high-powered people such as U.S. President 00:35 Bill Clinton, lived between multimillion penthouses and 00:39 bought racehorses just for fun. His world was one of extreme 00:45 extravagance and self-obsession. During the 1990s Lesvada went 00:50 from being a university student dropout to Australia's number 00:55 one adult website tycoon. Money was pouring into his bank 00:59 accounts and he was suddenly a multimillionaire. He was living 01:05 living the dream. He'd sleep in, get up, have brunch, buy a new 01:09 car and then head to the air port and be in another country 01:14 by the close of the day. His whole world revolved around 01:18 himself and with the world at his feet he lived a life of an 01:23 international playboy. Lesvada hosted weekend long parties in 01:28 Las Vegas for friends and web masters who had developed his 01:33 many adult websites. But bills for those parties often exceeded 01:37 $100,000 which at the time seemed like nothing to him. His 01:44 extravagance was limitless. It was all about status. He just 01:49 craved the excessive admiration and attention of his friends and 01:55 colleagues. Over the next few years Lesvada plowed his cash 02:00 into stocks and property. At its peak his property portfolio was 02:06 worth 30 million dollars. Now while he also bought racehorses 02:11 just for the fun of it, his real passion was fast cars. He owned 02:18 four Lamborghini's and seven BMWs But this extravagant lifestyle 02:23 and poor business management sent him on a downward spiral to 02:29 a broken marriage, heroine addiction and finally bankruptcy 02:35 By 2008 Lesvada was back where it all began living with mom and 02:41 dad. His sole asset was a rusty old beaut. He lived in his 02:46 parents' spare bedroom and spent most weekends helping mom 02:51 with the housework. All that glittered gold and grandiosity 02:57 had turned to ash. But Greg Lesvada is not alone in his 03:02 pride, greed, and craving for excessive admiration and 03:07 attention. Although an extreme example, in a way he typifies 03:12 our growing self-obsession. That's the trend in our society. 03:18 From attention-seeking celebrities to digital over 03:23 sharing, the obsession of presenting the right image on 03:27 Facebook to preoccupation with selfies and the boom in cosmetic 03:33 surgery, narcissistic behavior is all around us. It's as if 03:39 we're living through a narcissism epidemic. It's all 03:42 "look at me, look at me. " Tell me, how worried should we be 03:48 about our growing self-obsession I mean, why are we becoming so 03:53 narcissistic? And what, if anything, can we do about it? 03:58 Well we can learn a lot from an ancient king with a very 04:03 modern problem. Nebuchadnezzar was the greatest king on earth 04:09 and he had every reason to be proud of his achievements. From 04:13 his luxurious palaces in the most beautiful city in the world 04:18 Babylon, he ruled over the biggest empire that the world 04:23 had ever seen. And he had built it all himself. Back then, 04:28 because there was so much confusion about what to believe 04:32 in, he ended up essentially just believing in himself. It was all 04:38 me, me, me. This is the story of his struggle to accept that 04:45 he wasn't the center of the universe. It climaxes with the 04:50 king in a field eating grass like a cow, completely mad. 04:56 But it has a good ending. So join me on a visit to ancient 05:01 Babylon to see what we modern people could learn from a great 05:05 self-obsessed warrior king. 05:08 ♪ ♪ 05:28 Between 1870 and 1930 a seismic shift took place across 05:33 the western world. Since the fall of the Roman empire the 05:38 world view which had dominated the societies and cultures of 05:41 the west had been essentially Christian, but now it was 05:47 replaced by a different world view, that of secular humanism. 05:51 Now secular humanism is the belief that the only things that 05:55 the only things that can exist and have importance are those 05:59 that can be measured and observed by people. 06:03 The Christian God, therefore, does not and cannot exist 06:06 according to this philosophy. Secular humanism is at the very 06:11 heart of the movement of our society's move towards atheism. 06:16 The philosophical roots of secular humanism were 06:21 established by thinkers in the mid-19th century. The very 06:25 foundations of our society were shaken in the years from 1914 06:29 with the outbreak of World War One and it's horrors and then 06:34 instead of ushering in a global era of prosperity, the world was 06:39 plunged into the Great Depression in 1929 and into the 06:43 1930s. At the same time, through science and education humanity 06:49 was succeeding in transforming the lives of millions. For many 06:54 people science and man-made inventions were humanity's hope 07:00 for the future. So that's where they put their faith. For many 07:05 people the old ways of understanding the world 07:09 didn't seem to work anymore. So what do you do when there is so 07:13 much confusion around you and you don't know what to believe? 07:16 You believe in yourself. Whatever you say goes. 07:21 You become the center of the universe. You're all that 07:25 matters. After all the essence of secular humanism is that man 07:30 is the measure of all things. This is the background to our 07:34 mounting epidemic of self- obsession. What's the solution 07:39 to this narcissistic attitude that's permeating our society? 07:44 Can anything be done about it? Well we can learn a lot from an 07:48 ancient king, Nebuchadnezzar, who struggled with this very 07:54 modern problem. In the first part of the sixth century B.C. 08:00 King Nebuchadnezzar ruled over the greatest empire on earth. It 08:05 stretched from the borders of Egypt across to the Gulf of 08:08 Persia. His armies had marched victorious across the then-known 08:13 world. He had built the greatest city on earth, the city 08:18 of Babylon. He had every reason to be proud of himself. The 08:23 religion of Babylon was polytheistic, which means that 08:27 they worshiped many gods. We know that they worshiped at 08:30 least 2400 different gods and that is just what we know about. 08:35 There were probably many more. But during his conquest, 08:41 Nebuchadnezzar had come across this very unusual God, the God 08:45 of the people of Judah. This was a strange God because he claimed 08:50 that he was the only true God, that basically no other gods 08:55 existed apart from him. This was something unheard of back in 08:59 Nebuchadnezzar's day. And there was something else. 09:03 Nebuchadnezzar had completely conquered Judah in his third and 09:09 final raid in 586 B.C. That year after besieging the capital 09:15 Jerusalem he had broken through and destroyed the city and its 09:20 temple. There was utter chaos as his soldiers ransacked and luted 09:24 the city. They captured most of the inhabitants and carried them 09:29 off as slaves. The common belief back then was that if your 09:34 nation defeated another nation, it meant that your gods were 09:38 stronger than the gods of the defeated nation. So how dare 09:43 Judah's God claim that he was the only one and that Babylon's 09:47 gods didn't even exist. But Nebuchadnezzar has actually 09:52 learned quite a lot about the God of Judah in the last 35 09:57 years or so. You see he'd become friends with one of the slaves 10:01 that he had captured and taken from Judah during his first 10:05 campaign in 605 B.C. The slave's name was Daniel. Nebuchadnezzar 10:11 liked Daniel. He made him one of his chief advisors. But Daniel 10:16 kept confusing and challenging him. Not only did he refuse to 10:21 conform and worship the gods of Babylon, but he stubbornly 10:26 kept telling him about the one true God. Nebuchadnezzar 10:31 recognized and acknowledged this true God, but after a while he 10:36 fell back into his old ways of pride and self-obsession. 10:41 Nebuchadnezzar decided that he would build a gigantic statue of 10:46 himself for everyone to worship. But even then, the great God of 10:50 Daniel found a way to remind him that he was much more powerful 10:55 and bigger than the king. It wasn't so easy to ignore 10:59 Daniel's God. Now in 569 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar had been king for 11:06 35 years and now he has another dream. You can find it recorded 11:12 in the fourth chapter of the Bible book of Daniel. In fact, 11:17 this chapter could be one of the most fascinating in all the 11:21 Bible because it wasn't written by a prophet or anything like 11:26 that, rather the whole chapter was actually written by 11:30 Nebuchadnezzar, king of the Babylonian empire himself. This 11:34 is the message that the king wanted to share with everyone 11:38 in his empire including Daniel and his scribe. 12:03 What's especially interesting about this is that he's echoing 12:08 the words of the prophet Daniel when he had interpreted the 12:13 dream of the great metal statue years before. The whole point of 12:18 that dream had been that Nebuchadnezzar had to accept 12:22 that the most high God ruled over the affairs of men and that 12:27 Nebuchadnezzar's kingdom would not last forever, because in the 12:32 end only God's kingdom would rule. It's taken him a long time 12:37 but something has happened that has finally brought 12:40 Nebuchadnezzar to accept it and he's going to tell us all about 12:44 it. He continues... 13:20 Just like as it happened with his first dream of the statue 13:26 all the king's wise men were unable to interpret the meaning 13:31 of the dream until Daniel comes in. The king then describes the 13:37 dream to Daniel. Here it is in his own words. 14:49 When the king had finished telling Daniel this dream he saw 14:55 the look on Daniel's face and it wasn't good news. He told Daniel 15:01 to pull no punches, to be completely honest with him about 15:05 the meaning of the dream. And so the king said, Belteshazzar, do 15:11 not let the dream or it's meaning alarm you and so Daniel 15:15 began to explain the dream to the king. 16:24 Nebuchadnezzar seems to have taken this dream seriously. He 16:30 must have thought carefully about his life, his self 16:32 obsession and his pride because the events the dream foretold 16:37 did not happen until a year later and those 12 months were 16:41 also a time of great achievement for the king. For in them he 16:45 finally managed to conquer Egypt the old enemy from his youth. 16:52 Finally Nebuchadnezzar was king over the empire that he'd always 16:56 dreamt of. And not only was the king over the biggest empire 17:01 the world had ever seen but he also ruled over the biggest 17:06 and greatest city in the entire world, the city of Babylon. 17:12 His father had started its rebuilding but King 17:15 Nebuchadnezzar had made it three times larger than it had been 17:19 before. Within the city he had reached the Euphrates river and 17:23 surrounded the city with double walls and even triple walls in 17:28 some places. He had built not one, but three, palaces for 17:32 himself, one of which contained the hanging gardens, one of the 17:37 seven wonders of the ancient world. Not only was it a mighty 17:42 city but it was also the most beautiful city in all the world. 17:47 It's outer walls were yellow and its gates were glazed with blue. 17:52 His palaces were faced with rose-colored tiles and its many 17:57 temples gleamed in dazzling white. At the Pergamum museum 18:02 in Berlin you can see the only part of ancient Babylon that's 18:06 still standing. You can see the main gate. It's called the 18:11 Ishtar gate named after the goddess of love and it was 18:15 actually built by King Nebuchadnezzar. 18:20 Nebuchadnezzar was incredibly proud of what he'd accomplished. 18:24 He thought that it was due to his strength and to his 18:28 intelligence. In fact, the king was so proud that he even 18:32 stamped the bricks of his new buildings with his name and 18:37 boastful claims about himself. You see, Nebuchadnezzar wanted 18:41 to make sure that he would never be erased from history 18:45 like other mighty kings of the ancient world and all of this 18:49 fits perfectly with the picture that we get from the Bible 18:53 about what King Nebuchadnezzar was actually like; totally self 18:58 obsessed and filled with pride. Because of his pride the book 19:02 of Daniel goes on to say that everything that the dream 19:06 described happened to King Nebuchadnezzar. One day he was 19:10 walking on the roof of one of his palaces admiring the city 19:14 and feeling pleased with himself and this is what he said: 19:26 And immediately he heard a voice come from heaven that said to 19:30 him... 19:56 And from that moment Nebuchadnezzar went mad. 20:01 Yes he went stark raving mad. He had to be driven away from the 20:07 city and he started living like a wild animal. He lived outdoors 20:11 His hair and nails 20:12 grew long and he ate grass like a cow. Now it's absolutely 20:17 fascinating that a rare find in a British museum corroborates 20:22 the Biblical account of the madness of King Nebuchadnezzar: 20:26 The tablet is broken so the text is incomplete, however, the 20:31 tablet plainly 20:32 refers to King Nebuchadnezzar and it says that his life 20:36 appears to be of no value to him, that his orders are 20:40 contradictory, that he doesn't listen to his advisors. He is 20:44 neglecting his family and he isn't performing his duties as 20:49 king. Something is seriously wrong with the king and no one 20:54 seems to be able to help him. Now you don't need much of an 20:59 imagination to see how this fits perfectly with what events are 21:03 described in the Bible book of Daniel. So let's go back to the 21:08 story. After the seven years that had been prophesied in the 21:12 dream notice what Nebuchadnezzar says: 21:28 The king only lived for two more years after the events of his 21:31 dream were all fulfilled. He never left strong heirs to rule 21:35 his kingdom. His rule was succeeded by a series of 21:39 incompetent leaders as his only son had been assassinated. His 21:45 kingdom never did last forever. And I guess there's a lesson 21:51 here about how God is in control and how God's kingdom will last 21:56 forever. And that's a good lesson. It's one of the lessons 22:00 that God wanted Nebuchadnezzar to learn. But there's another 22:04 lesson here for us today. Nebuchadnezzar had a problem 22:09 with pride. He was self-obsessed He was a narcissist. Now he had 22:14 every reason to be proud by the standards of the world. Look at 22:18 all his conquests. Look at all his wealth. And he was sure that 22:23 he was right about everything. He was the center of his 22:28 universe. But the astonishing thing to us is how much God 22:32 still loved Nebuchadnezzar. Yes even though he didn't believe in 22:38 God and was a cruel ruler by our standards and, yes, he was self 22:43 obsessed, but the God of heaven loved him and patiently revealed 22:48 himself to King Nebuchadnezzar. He did it through Daniel and his 22:53 friends. He sent him dreams and troubled his conscience and when 22:57 it became necessary he allowed misfortune to come into his life 23:02 and shake him up and change his world view. For most people 23:07 seeing the truth about life is a process and sometimes a long 23:12 one and so it was with king Nebuchadnezzar. He struggled to 23:16 accept the existence of God and become a believer in the one 23:21 true God of heaven. However, we do know, as the king wrote 23:25 himself, that he came to recognize God and acknowledge 23:29 his existence and power. But merely believing that God exists 23:34 is not enough. You have to trust him enough to invite him into 23:39 your life. You have to come to the point where you accept that 23:45 without him in your life it's hopeless, but with him 23:49 everything is possible. And this is the answer to our modern 23:54 problem of self-obsession and pride. We've got to recognize 23:59 that there is an almighty God who is the center of the 24:03 universe and he's the God who accepts us and loves us just 24:08 as we are. We don't have to prove ourselves or make 24:12 ourselves look important. We already are important because he 24:17 loves us and thinks we're important enough to sacrifice 24:21 everything for us, even his only Son Jesus. Now we don't know 24:27 whether King Nebuchadnezzar came to that point. But I'm not 24:33 thinking only about Nebuchadnezzar now. 24:36 I'm thinking about you. How has the God of heaven been working 24:42 in your life? How far along have you come? Pride is a tough thing 24:47 to break through and changing a world view can be incredibly 24:51 difficult because we depend on it for everything. But look how 24:56 loving and patient God was with Nebuchadnezzar. Look at how 25:01 loving and patient he's been with you. God leads each one of 25:06 us in different ways. If you were to ask God to continue to 25:10 lead you, if you want to know him better, why don't you invite 25:14 him into your life right now as we pray: 25:18 Dear heavenly Father, as we look back on our lives, we recognize 25:23 that we haven't been alone and that although we haven't always 25:28 acknowledged you you've always been there with us. Thank you 25:33 for patiently leading us through the circumstances of our lives. 25:38 Thank you for gently revealing yourself to us. Help us to grow 25:42 from where we are today to know you more fully and to have your 25:47 joy and peace in our lives. And we are confident that at the end 25:52 of our incredible journey in this world that you will bring 25:56 us with joy into your everlasting kingdom. 25:59 In Jesus' name we pray, Amen. 26:06 King Nebuchadnezzar's problem is a very modern problem. There 26:11 are many people today who are confused about life and who 26:15 don't know what to believe in or who to trust. If you've 26:19 enjoyed our program today, I'd like to offer you the free gift 26:23 we have for all our viewers today. It's a booklet called 26:28 The Secrets of True Greatness. Through this free book you'll be 26:33 able to learn more about Nebuchadnezzar's journey 26:36 and discover more of the important lessons of life from 26:40 God for your journey today. So Don't miss this wonderful 26:45 opportunity to receive the gift we have for you today. It's 26:50 totally free and without any obligation. Here's the 26:54 information you need: Phone or text us at 27:00 0436333555 in Australia or 0204222042 in New Zealand. 27:08 or visit our website TiJ.tv to request today's free offer and 27:15 we'll send it to you totally free of charge and with no 27:18 obligation. Write to us at: 27:32 Don't delay. Call or text us now 27:36 If you've enjoyed today's journey through the experience 27:40 of the great Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar and how God 27:44 revealed himself to him throughout his life, be sure 27:47 to join us again next week when we will share another of life's 27:51 journeys together. Until then remember the ultimate 27:56 destination of life's journey. Now I saw a new heaven and a new 28:00 earth and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. 28:04 There shall be no more death nor sorrow nor crying. There shall 28:08 be no more pain for the former things have passed away. 28:13 ♪ ♪ |
Revised 2020-06-25