新視域的力量
重大的心靈戰役

經文
詩篇六十九1-12
1(大衛的詩,交與伶長。調用百合花。)神啊,求你救我!因為眾水要淹沒我。
2我陷在深淤泥中,沒有立腳之地;我到了深水中,大水漫過我身。
3我因呼求困乏,喉嚨發乾;我因等候神,眼睛失明。
4無故恨我的,比我頭髮還多;無理與我為仇、要把我剪除的,甚為強盛。我沒有搶奪的,要叫我償還。
5神啊,我的愚昧,你原知道;我的罪愆不能隱瞞。
6萬軍的主─耶和華啊,求你叫那等候你的,不要因我蒙羞!以色列的神啊,求你叫那尋求你的,不要因我受辱!
7因我為你的緣故受了辱罵,滿面羞愧。
8我的弟兄看我為外路人;我的同胞看我為外邦人。
9因我為你的殿心裡焦急,如同火燒,並且辱罵你人的辱罵都落在我身上。
10我哭泣,以禁食刻苦我心;這倒算為我的羞辱。
11我拿麻布當衣裳,就成了他們的笑談。
12坐在城門口的談論我;酒徒也以我為歌曲。
信息分享
詩篇第七十三篇的詩人,與我們分享了神是良善這個信念後,接著便告訴我們是甚麼令他遠離信仰,以致他的心靈充滿這種不幸的疑惑:「至於我,我的腳幾乎失閃;我的腳險些滑跌。我見惡人和狂傲人享平安就心懷不平」(詩七十三2-3)。
這裡開始了資深傳道人司布真所說的「一場重大的心靈戰役,一場屬靈的馬拉松,一場艱難但打得好的仗,在其中幾乎被打敗的最終卻完全得勝。」詩人似乎因為他生命中的經驗與聖經的教導有明顯的矛盾而感到困擾。聖經教導說神善待那些清心的人。詩人說他妒忌那些狂傲的人,因為邪惡的人似乎比敬虔的人更富足,這令他十分難過。以前有人告訴他,如果你公義,神便會照顧你,令你富足。可是,詩人的事情卻似乎並不太順利,以致當他將自己的情況和那些似乎很富足但並不敬虔的人相比時,他幾乎想放棄自己的信仰。
你會不會正處於類似的境況中?你的信心是否正受到你身邊的事情所動搖,以致你甚至想要放棄?如果是,那麼主今天對你說的話是:要堅持下去。雖然你此刻身處一條黑暗的隧道,但神會帶領你經過,祂永不會失敗,永遠不會。
「要堅持下去……神永不會失敗」
進深研究
王上十九1-21;詩三十一10,四十二5-6、11
1 以利亞到了甚麼境況?
2 神怎樣對待他?
祈禱
天父,感謝您今天向我所說的話。求您幫助我不要以眼前的事物作結論,而要定睛仰望您,因為您是最終得勝的。我要懷著安靜的信心來等候您的話成就。阿們。
The Power of a New Perspective
"A great soul battle

Bible reading:
Psalm 69:1-12
1 Save me, O God, for the waters have come up to my neck.
2 I sink in the miry depths, where there is no foothold. I have come into the deep waters; the floods engulf me.
3 I am worn out calling for help; my throat is parched. My eyes fail, looking for my God.
4 Those who hate me without reason outnumber the hairs of my head; many are my enemies without cause, those who seek to destroy me. I am forced to restore what I did not steal.
5 You, God, know my folly; my guilt is not hidden from you.
6 Lord, the Lord Almighty, may those who hope in you not be disgraced because of me; God of Israel, may those who seek you not be put to shame because of me.
7 For I endure scorn for your sake, and shame covers my face.
8 I am a foreigner to my own family, a stranger to my own mother's children;
9 for zeal for your house consumes me, and the insults of those who insult you fall on me.
10 When I weep and fast, I must endure scorn;
11 when I put on sackcloth, people make sport of me.
12 Those who sit at the gate mock me, and I am the song of the drunkards.
Message
Having shared with us the conviction that God is good, the psalmist now proceeds to tell us what caused him to move away from that belief so that his soul became filled with such desolating doubt: "But as for me, my feet had almost slipped; I had nearly lost my foothold. For I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked" (Psa. 73:2-3).
Here begins what Spurgeon described as "a great soul battle, a spiritual marathon, a hard and well-fought fight in which the half-defeated became in the end wholly victorious". The psalmist seems bothered by the apparent contradiction between what he had been taught in the Scriptures - that God is good to those who are pure in heart - and his experience in life. He was envious, he says, of the arrogant and deeply upset over the fact that the wicked appeared to be more prosperous than the godly. He had been told that when you were righteous, then God would take care of you and prosper you. Obviously things had not been going too well for the psalmist and when he compared his situation with that of the ungodly who appeared to be so prosperous, he came close to giving up his faith.
Am I talking to someone who is in a similar situation at this moment? Is your faith so badly shaken by what you see around you that you are tempted to give up? Then this is the word of the Lord to you today: hold on. It is a dark tunnel you find yourself in at this moment, but God will bring you through. He never fails. Never.
"Hold on...God never fails"
Prayer
Father, thank You for speaking to me today. Help me not to form my conclusions from what I see around the immediate but from what I see above, in You, the Ultimate. I wait in quiet confidence for Your word to come to pass. Amen.
Further study
1 Kings 19:1-21
Psalm 31:10; 42:5-6, 11
1. What point did Elijah come to?
2. How did God deal with him?
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