神的异象
祂是至高
经文
诗篇九十二1-15
1(安息日的诗歌。)称谢耶和华!歌颂你至高者的名!
2 用十弦的乐器和瑟,用琴弹幽雅的声音,早晨传扬你的慈爱;每夜传扬你的信实。这本为美事。
3 、4 因你耶和华借着你的作为叫我高兴,我要因你手的工作欢呼。
5 耶和华啊,你的工作何其大!你的心思极其深!
6 畜类人不晓得;愚顽人也不明白。
7 恶人茂盛如草,一切作孽之人发旺的时候,正是他们要灭亡,直到永远。
8 惟你─耶和华是至高,直到永远。
9 耶和华啊,你的仇敌都要灭亡;一切作孽的也要离散。
10 你却高举了我的角,如野牛的角;我是被新油膏了的。
11 我眼睛看见仇敌遭报;我耳朵听见那些起来攻击我的恶人受罚。
12 义人要发旺如棕树,生长如利巴嫩的香柏树。
13 他们栽于耶和华的殿中,发旺在我们神的院里。
14 他们年老的时候仍要结果子,要满了汁浆而常发青,
15 好显明耶和华是正直的。他是我的磐石,在他毫无不义。
信息分享
现在让我们来把焦点放在以赛亚描述他所看到的异象的说话:「我见主坐在高高的宝座上」(赛六1)。这些话带我们超越神坐在宝座上这个事实,让我们看到祂的宝座远远高于时空的界限。「坐在……宝座上」这几个字让我们看到神的威严;「崇高的」(和合本译作「高高的」)这形容词让我们看到神的超越和尊崇。我们今天的教会多么需要新的异象,看到神的超越。
二十世纪初期,陶恕(A.W. Tozer)的话震动了当时的教会,他写道:「教会放弃了它过去对神的崇高信念,而以一个卑微、低等的观念来取代,这样的观念对一些有思想、愿意敬拜神的人来说是毫无意义的。教会虽然不是故意这样做,却是在不察觉的情况下逐渐演变出来,然而这种无意导致每况愈下。」陶恕进而指出,对神缺乏敬畏的态度是我们很多问题背后的原因。他说:「由于我们这样一个基本的错误,而引伸出一套基督徒生命的新哲学。」我很认同他的看法。
当我们失去对神超越的感觉时,里面便会生出千百种疾病。例如:失去对神超越的感觉,导致失去对崇拜意义的理解。要真正敬拜神,我们需要看到我们所敬拜的对象不单在我们之上,而是远远的超越了我们。神是创造宇宙的主,我们只不过是受造物。
「神不单在我们之上,祂是远远的超越了我们」
进深研究
出十五1-21;伯三十六22;赛三十三5-6;赛五16
1. 摩西之歌怎样开始、怎样结束?
2. 「可畏」这个词是甚么意思?
祈祷
天父,求您帮助我明白,虽然您比我呼吸的空气更接近我,但您也是高高在上的神。求您也帮助我明白,这两个真理不是互相矛盾,而是互相补足。奉主耶稣的名祈求。阿们。
The Vision of God
"He is exalted..."
Bible reading:
Psalm 92:1-15
1 It is good to praise the Lord and make music to your name, O Most High,
2 proclaiming your love in the morning and your faithfulness at night,
3 to the music of the ten-stringed lyre and the melody of the harp.
4 For you make me glad by your deeds, Lord; I sing for joy at what your hands have done.
5 How great are your works, Lord, how profound your thoughts!
6 Senseless people do not know, fools do not understand,
7 that though the wicked spring up like grass and all evildoers flourish, they will be destroyed forever.
8 But you, Lord, are forever exalted.
9 For surely your enemies, Lord, surely your enemies will perish; all evildoers will be scattered.
10 You have exalted my horn[b] like that of a wild ox; fine oils have been poured on me.
11 My eyes have seen the defeat of my adversaries; my ears have heard the rout of my wicked foes.
12 The righteous will flourish like a palm tree, they will grow like a cedar of Lebanon;
13 planted in the house of the Lord, they will flourish in the courts of our God.
14 They will still bear fruit in old age, they will stay fresh and green,
15 proclaiming, "The Lord is upright; he is my Rock, and there is no wickedness in him."
Message
We move on now to focus on a further phrase that Isaiah uses when describing his vision of God: "I saw the Lord...high and exalted" (Isa. 6:1). These words take us beyond the fact that God is seated on a throne and show us that His throne is situated far above the boundaries of space and time. The words "seated on a throne" introduce us to the majesty of God, the words "high and exalted" introduce us to the transcendence and loftiness of God. Oh how desperately we need a new vision of the transcendence of God in the Church today.
Earlier this century A.W Tozer shook the Church of his day when he wrote: "The Church has surrendered her once lofty concept of God and has substituted for it one so low, so ignoble, as to be utterly unworthy of thinking, worshipping men. This she has done not deliberately but little by little and without her knowledge, and her very unawareness only makes her situation all the more tragic." Tozer went on to point out that a low view of God is the underlying cause of many of our problems. He said: "A whole new philosophy of the Christian life has resulted from this one basic error of our thinking." I would have to agree.
When we lose our sense of God's transcendence then a hundred different ills arise within us. Take this for example: with the loss of the sense of God's transcendence comes the further loss of understanding the significance of worship. To truly worship God we need to see that we are worshipping Someone who is not only above us, but far above us. He is the Creator - we are merely creatures.
"God is not only above us, but far above us"
Prayer
Father, help me see that while You are nearer to me than the breath I breathe, You are also a God who is high and exalted. And help me understand that these two truths are not contradictory but complementary. In Jesus' Name I pray. Amen.
Further study
Exodus 15:1-21
Job 36:22
Isaiah 33:5-6; 5:16
1. What did the song of Moses begin and end with?
2. What does the word "awesome" mean?
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