June 11, 2016

“Immediately the fingers of a human hand appeared and began writing on the plaster of the wall of the royal palace, next to the lampstand. The king was watching the hand as it wrote. 6 Then the king’s face turned pale, and his thoughts terrified him.” Daniel 5:5-6

“Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground.” John 8:6

In one of the bins of my dollar spot travels, I spotted some sidewalk chalk. Sidewalk chalk is one of the greatest inventions of all time. Forget the cotton gin invented by Whitney; forget the printing press invented by Gutenberg; sidewalk chalk has been one of the greatest tools for getting your children out of the house to spend some time outdoors using their creativity. Think about it, I have seen some great sidewalk chalk drawings. I have watched people walk around a sink hole that was drawn in chalk on the sidewalk.

In the bible, we have examples of things being written by either the hand of G-d or by Jesus himself. Sometimes we have no idea what is written, but it always plays a role in the story. For the king in the story of Daniel the handwriting on the wall spelled out doom and gloom, for the king Belshazzar. The story is that the king used the vessels of gold and silver taken from the Temple and drank wine to their gods of stone, wood, etc. Daniel was called in to interpret the writing, and here is the meaning:

“And this is the writing that was inscribed: mene, mene, tekel, and parsin. This is the interpretation of the matter: mene, God has numbered the days of your kingdom and brought it to an end; tekel, you have been weighed on the scales and found wanting; peres, your kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians.” Then Belshazzar gave the command, and Daniel was clothed in purple, a chain of gold was put around his neck, and a proclamation was made concerning him that he should rank third in the kingdom.” (Daniel 5:25-29).

Sometimes I wish I had a prognosticator who might be able to tell me how things are going to go in my life. But, I don’t. Nor do I really need one. I know that G-d has written for us the Ten Commandments to teach us how we should relate to G-d and to each other. I know G-d has promised that, through the cross of Jesus, those who have faith also have a place in G-d’s kingdom for eternity. It is as clear as the handwriting on the wall – as the nose on our faces – and as clear as new glass.

Pastor Dave