[分享]Streams In the Desert for Nov. 4

Li_ebo

 

Streams In the Desert for Nov. 4

Streams In the Desert for Nov. 4

“As I was among the captives by the river of Chebar, the heavens were opened and I saw visions of God…and the hand of the Lord was there upon me.” (Ezek. 1:1, 3.)

There is no commentator of the Scriptures half so valuable as a captivity. The old Psalms have quavered for us with a new pathos as we sat by our “Babel’s stream,” and have sounded for us with new joy as we found our captivity turned as the stream in the South.

The man who has seen much affliction will not readily part with his copy of the Word of God. Another book may seem to others to be identical with his own; but it is not the same to him, for over his old and tear-stained Bible he has written, in characters which are visible to no eyes but his own, the record of his experiences, and ever and anon he comes on Bethel pillars or Elim palms, which are to him the memorials of some critical chapter in his history.

If we are to receive benefit from our captivity we must accept the situation and turn it to the best possible account. Fretting over that from which we have been removed or which has been taken away from us, will not make things better, but it will prevent us from improving those which remain. The bond is only tightened by our stretching it to the uttermost.

The impatient horse which will not quietly endure his halter only strangles himself in his stall. The high-mettled animal that is restive in the yoke only galls his shoulders; and every one will understand the difference between the restless starling of which Sterne has written, breaking its wings against the bars of the cage, and crying, “I can’t get out, I can’t get out,” and the docile canary that sits upon its perch and sings as if it would outrival the lark soaring to heaven’s gate.

No calamity can be to us an unmixed evil if we carry it in direct and fervent prayer to God, for even as one in taking shelter from the rain beneath a tree may find on its branches fruit which he looked not for, so we in fleeing for refuge beneath the shadow of God’s wing, will always find more in God than we had seen or known before.

It is thus through our trials and afflictions that God gives us fresh revelations of Himself; and the Jabbok ford leads to Peniel, where, as the result of our wrestling, we “see God face to face,: and our lives are preserved. Take this to thyself, O captive, and He will give thee “songs in the night,” and turn for thee “the shadow of death into the morning.” --- William Taylor.

“Submission to the divine will is the sofest pillow on which to recline.”

“It filled the room, and it filled my life, With a glory of source unseen; It made me calm in the midst of strife, And in winter my heart was green. And the birds of promise sang on the tree When the storm was breaking on land and sea.”

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这么有才，感谢神．．．．．．．．．．．．．

Li_ebo

 

Streams In the Desert for Nov.6

Streams In the Desert for Nov.6

“As many as I love I rebuke and chasten.” (Rev. 3:19.)

God takes the most eminent and choicest of His servants for the choicest and most eminent afflictions. They who have received most grace from God are able to bear most afflictions from God. Affliction does not hit the saint by chance, but by direction. God does not draw His bow at a venture. Every one of His arrows goes upon a special errand and touches no breast but his against whom it is sent. It is not only the grace, but the glory of a believer when we can stand and take affliction quietly. --- Joseph Caryl.

If all my days were sunny, could I say, “In His fair land He wipes all tears away”?

If I were never weary, could I keep Close to my heart, “He give His loved ones sleep”?

Were no graves mine, might I not come to deem The Life Eternal but a baseless dream?

My winter, and my tears, and weariness, Even my graves, may be His way to bless.

I call them ills; yet that can surely be Nothing but love that shown my Lord to me!
--- Selected.

“The most deeply taught Christians are generally those who have been brought into the searching fires of deep soul-anguish. If you have been praying to know more of Christ, do not be surprised if He takes you aside into a desert place, or leads you into a furnace of pain.”

Do not punish me, Lord, by taking my cross from me, but comfort me by submitting me to Thy will, and by making me to love the cross. Give me that by which Thou shalt be best served…and let me hold it for the greatest of all Thy mercies, that Thou shouldst glorify Thy name in me, according to Thy will. --- A Captive’s Prayer.

Li_ebo

 

Streams In the Desert for Nov.7

Streams In the Desert for Nov.7

“But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ.” (Phil. 3:7.)

When they buried the blind preacher, George Matheson, they lined his grave with red roses in memory of his love-life of sacrifice. And it was this man, so beautifully and significantly honored, who wrote,

“O Love that wilt not let me go, I rest my weary soul in Thee, I give Thee back the life I owe, That in thine ocean depths its flow May richer, fuller be.

“O Light that followest all my way, I yield my flickering torch to Thee, My heart restores its borrowed ray, That in Thy sunshine’s blaze its day May brighter, fairer be.

“O Joy that seekest me through pain, I cannot close my heart to Thee, I trace the rainbow through the rain, And feel the promise is not vain, That morn shall tearless be.

“O Cross that liftest up my head, I dare not ask to fly from Thee, I lay in dust life’s glory dead, And from the ground there blossoms red, Live that shall endless be.”

There is a legend of an artist who had found the secret of a wonderful red which no other artist could imitate. The secret of his color died with him. But after his death an old wound was discovered over his heart. This revealed the source of the matchless hue in his pictures. The legend teaches that no great achievement can be made, no lofty attainment reached, nothing of much value to the world done, save at the cost of heart’s blood.