Daily Devotion - Dec 22 - ¯îºz¥Ì¬u Streams in the Desert

荒漠甘泉 Streams in the Desert

精純的信心之夜

經文: 　　「忽然有驚人的大黑暗落在他身上。」（創十五12）

太陽西沈，夜自東方迅速展開，給大地遮上了一層黑暗的障幕。亞伯拉罕經過整天的內心爭鬥和努力，全神貫注的守候之後；已疲倦不堪，沈沈入睡了。就在那睡眠之中，他的靈魂被濃厚而可怖的黑暗所壓迫，幾乎使他窒息，象夢魘在他的心上。你認識這種黑暗驚人程度嗎？有時漆黑一團的悲哀，似乎與上帝的愛絕不調和，壓著你的靈魂，把上帝憐憫之心所給你的一切安息都擠壓淨盡，投入看不見一絲希望的海�；殘酷和不仁，嘲笑著那信靠的心，直到它發生懷疑：到底天上有沒有看見這一切的上帝？祂是否允許這驚人的大黑暗？人生的構成，就是交錯著光明與黑暗。陰影和太陽，層層烏雲之後，緊跟著燦爛的光輝，在上帝的一切義行之中，都有其預定的計劃，它的影響遍及於某些仿佛受有特殊教訓的個別靈魂，也及於其他的靈魂啊，你們看到了那種驚人的黑暗，因爲這是上帝爲人類所作的安排，應當學會信靠那絕無錯誤的智慧，這和永�之義是一體的兩面；你要知道那位大聲喊道：「我的神，我的神，爲甚麽離棄我！」（太廿七46）經過各各他可怖黑暗的主耶穌，祂一直準備著要陪你行過死蔭的幽谷，直到你們看見太陽在那一邊照耀。願我們憑著我們的先驅者，把我們的希望之錨，抛向前去，投入遮掩未來的陰暗中，安穩堅定，抓住不放，直到天光破曉，我們跟著它安全進港，這有上帝確定的指示給我們作過保證。——梅爾（F. B. Meyer）

門徒以爲那洶湧的海水，把他們和耶穌隔離了。不但如此，有幾位還作更壞的想法，以爲所遭遇的患難，象徵著耶穌已把他們整個忘懷，不再關心他們了。哦，親愛的朋友，這種時候，正是患難長了毒刺，正是魔鬼對你耳語：「上帝已經忘記你了；上帝已經棄絕你了。」也就是你不信上帝的心，像基甸那樣喊道：「耶和華若與我們同在，我們何至遭遇這一切事呢？」其實，你之遭遇患難，目的只是使你更親近主。患難不是來隔離你和主，而是來使你更加忠貞，不屈不撓，一心一意地依附祂。

唯有當我們覺得似乎上帝已棄絕了我們的時候，我們才把自己完全交托給上帝。願我們來享受上帝樂意賜給我們的亮光和安慰，但願我們所依戀的，不是祂的恩賜，乃是祂的自己，而當祂把我們投入精純的信心之夜時，我們仍要在痛苦的黑暗中努力前進。——選


Night of Pure Faith

Scripture: "Lo, a horror of great darkness fell upon him" (Gen. 15:12).

The sun at last went down, and the swift, eastern night cast its heavy veil over the scene. Worn out with the mental conflict, the watchings, and the exertions of the day, Abraham fell into a deep sleep, and in that sleep is soul was oppressed with a dense and dreadful darkness, such as almost stifled him, and lay like a nightmare upon his heart. Do you understand something of the horror of that darkness? When some terrible sorrow which seems so hard to reconcile with perfect love, crushes down upon the soul, wringing from it all its peaceful rest in the pitifulness of God, and launching it on a sea unlit by a ray of hope; when unkindness, and cruelty maltreat the trusting heart, till it begins to doubt whether there be a God overhead who can see and still permit--these know something of the "horror of great darkness." It is thus that human life is made up; brightness and gloom; shadow and sun; long tracks of cloud, succeeded by brilliant glints of light, and amid all Divine justice is working out its own schemes, affecting others equally with the individual soul which seems the subject of special discipline. O ye who are filled with the horror of great darkness because of God's dealings with mankind, learn to trust that infallible wisdom, which is co-assessor with immutable justice; and know that He who passed through the horror of the darkness of Calvary, with the cry of forsakenness, is ready to bear you company through the valley of the shadow of death till you see the sun shining upon its further side. Let us, by our Forerunner, send forward our anchor, Hope, within the veil that parts us from the unseen; where it will grapple in ground and will not yield, but hold until the day dawns, and we follow it into the haven guaranteed to us by God's immutable counsel. --F. B. Meyer

The disciples thought that that angry sea separated them from Jesus. Nay, some of them thought worse than that; they thought that the trouble that had come upon them was a sign that Jesus had forgotten all about them, and did not care for them. Oh, dear friend, that is when troubles have a sting, when the devil whispers, "God has forgotten you; God has forsaken you"; when your unbelieving heart cries as Gideon cried, "If the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us?" The evil has come upon you to bring the Lord nearer to you. The evil has not come upon you to separate you from Jesus, but to make you cling to Him more faithfully, more tenaciously, more simply. --F. S. Webster, M.A.

Never should we so abandon ourselves to God as when He seems to have abandoned us. Let us enjoy light and consolation when it is His pleasure to give it to us, but let us not attach ourselves to His gifts, but to Himself; and when He plunges us into the night of pure faith, let us still press on through the agonizing darkness.


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