Can You Read? by Charles L. Taylor

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Jul 20, 1915

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 42, No. 28.

Can You Read?

By Charles L. Taylor

Messages That You Should Interpret and Appreciate

By CHARLES L. TAYLOR

WHEN the divine hand etched those burning characters upon the wall of Belshazzar’s banquet hall, the hour of Babylon’s final doom was at hand.

What a tremendously important event in the history of that mighty empire, was the “handwriting on the wall!” And yet that heaven-dictated message found not one soul, among all the great and wise and learned, who could discern even a part of its significance.

SELFISHNESS AND PASSION HAD BLINDED THEM

But how quickly God’s aged servant saw and understood and interpreted! Without hesitation, he said to the king, “I will read the writing.” With him dwelt “the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him,” and having the eye of faith which daily read the writing of providence, he found no difficulty in reading this.

To-day God is sending very specific and important personal messages to men, especially to His children,—messages of reproof, of instruction, of warning, and of promise. Few of them, however, are read, and for the simple reason that spiritual eyesight is impaired, and no Daniel can be found to give the wording and the interpretation.

God spoke to Babylon by the handwriting on the wall. To-day He flashes His messages of reproof, of correction, of instruction, of promise, and of hope, upon the screen of life’s circumstances. He writes to the mechanic upon and through the happenings of the shop; to the mother through those of the home; to the farmer through those of the farm. In every case, His handwriting is to be seen on the wall of the soul’s environment.

SAW AND READ ONLY THE MESSAGE

When Daniel read the message to Belshazzar, he offered no comment regarding the wall, nor that which wrote, nor many other things incident to the giving of the message. He had to do only with the message itself. He went directly to the heart of the matter, and made application of the truth revealed. When God writes to-day, He would have us forget the wall, the hand, the various things used of Him in revealing His will, and see only the meaning of the writing.

God’s daily providences! O, how wonderfully and how frequently and how perfectly they bear to God’s children the messages which are needed for present and future good!

NOT IN UNKNOWN TONGUE

And let it be remembered that our God is not speaking and writing in an unknown language. Like the simple, beautiful, helpful, and easily understood parables of Jesus, His present-day messages are dark and hidden to those only who have no eyes to see. The Daniels are still able to read, and every child of God is privileged to be a Daniel. Those who are struggling to know the will of the Master, are men and women “greatly beloved” (see Dan. 9:23), and to them the angels will and do come to give “skill and understanding.”

Daniel first understood for himself, and then for others. When light had come to his own soul, then he could speak and interpret for his neighbor’s good. How blessed is the experience of the present time, to be able to read not only the messages of God to one’s own soul, but those which trouble and perplex others, both in the church and in the world!

Can you read God’s messages? Are you able to read fluently? Or are you still a child, depending upon the reading of another?

Whether you read or not, you may thank God that He is writing for you—writing daily and hourly. All His messages breathe of love, of hope, of salvation. And He will teach you to read if you so desire.

Let us pray: Lord, give me the eyes to see, the mind to read, the heart to understand, the spirit to love all Thy messages to me.