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撒旦的工具
经文: 「我们……就当放下各样的重担，脱去容易缠累我们的罪，存心忍耐，奔那摆在
我们前头的路程。」（来十二1）
有许多重担它们的本身并不是罪，但是会叫基督人分心，变成他们长进的障碍
。其中最有害的是灰心。灰心实在是一个曳我们往下的重担。
以色列人不得进入应许之地的原因就是发怨言；民数记十四章二十九、三十节
明明告诉我们：「凡….向我发怨言的，必不得进我起誓应许叫你们住的那地。」一点
点鸣不平的欲望，一点点不知足的欲望，常会造成叛逆大罪。所以我们永远不当让我们
自己有一点点自由来疑惑上帝在凡事上对我们的慈爱和信实。
我们怎样抵挡别的罪，也当照样抵挡疑惑；当我们坚拒疑惑的时候，圣灵会来
帮助我们，赐给我们得胜的信心。
我们顶容易流入疑惑，怀抱不平，猜想上帝已经弃绝我们，我们的盼望行将破
产….让我们拒绝这一切思想，因为它们的目的是要叫我们失望。让我们拒绝一切叫我
们不快乐的思想。我们不能感觉喜乐的时候，让我们「以为….喜乐」（雅一2），凭信
心来喜乐；这样，上帝必叫我们的「以为」变成事实。 ──选
魔鬼有两个最大的诡计。一个就是叫我们失望；一个就是叫我们疑惑──斩断
我们与父上帝中间的信心连索。当心啊！不要被它的诡计欺骗了。 ──G.. E. M.
喜乐！一个喜乐的灵能使我们的心合调，使撒但不敢前来弹奏──因为心弦太
热的时候，充满了属天的电力的时候，会使撒但的手指烫痛。
应当尽力远避忧郁，好像远避撒但一样；但是多少时候，我们在大道上，遇见
了它，它便钉住我们，直钉得我们的心变色。
忧郁会叫凡事变色；它会使一切东西变得「不可爱」；它会使未来的希望沦入
黑暗；它会剥夺人们一切的热望，锁住人们一切的能力，给人一个精神上的麻痹。
一个经历很深的信徒告诉我们说：「喜乐能使工作顺利；当我们戴上喜乐的翅
膀时，我们的工作也会做得迅速了；忧郁是剪去这种翅膀的；换言之，忧郁能挪去我们
工作的车轮，使我们的车轮像埃及人的车轮一样，脱落难行。」──选
Satan's Tools
Scripture: "Let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily
beset us, and, let us run with patience the race that is set before us" (Heb
. 12:1).
There are weights which are not sins in themselves, but which become
distractions and stumbling blocks in our Christian progress. One of the
worst of these is despondency. The heavy heart is indeed a weight that will
surely drag us down in our holiness and usefulness.
The failure of Israel to enter the land of promise began in
murmuring, or, as the text in Numbers literally puts it, "as it were
murmured." Just a faint desire to complain and be discontented. This led on
until it blossomed and ripened into rebellion and ruin. Let us give
ourselves no liberty ever to doubt God or His love and faithfulness to us in
everything and forever.
We can set our will against doubt just as we do against any other
sin; and as we stand firm and refuse to doubt, the Holy Spirit will come to
our aid and give us the faith of God and crown us with victory.
It is very easy to fall into the habit of doubting, fretting, and
wondering if God has forsaken us and if after all our hopes are to end in
failure. Let us refuse to be discouraged. Let us refuse to be unhappy. Let
us "count it all joy" when we cannot feel one emotion of happiness. Let us
rejoice by faith, by resolution, by reckoning, and we shall surely find that
God will make the reckoning real.--Selected
The devil has two master tricks. One is to get us discouraged; then
for a time at least we can be of no service to others, and so are defeated.
The other is to make us doubt, thus breaking the faith link by which we are
bound to our Father. Lookout! Do not be tricked either way.--G.E.M.
Gladness! I like to cultivate the spirit of gladness! It puts the
soul so in tune again, and keeps it in tune, so that Satan is shy of
touching it--the chords of the soul become too warm, or too full of heavenly
electricity, for his infernal fingers, and he goes off somewhere else!
Satan is always very shy of meddling with me when my heart is full of
gladness and joy in the Holy Ghost.
My plan is to shun the spirit of sadness as I would Satan; but, alas
! I am not always successful. Like the devil himself it meets me on the
highway of usefulness, looks me so fully in my face, till my poor soul
changes color!
Sadness discolors everything; it leaves all objects charmless; it involves
future prospects in darkness; it deprives the soul of all its aspirations,
enchains all its powers, and produces a mental paralysis!
An old believer remarked, that cheerfulness in religion makes all
its services come off with delight; and that we are never carried forward so
swiftly in the ways of duty as when borne on the wings of delight; adding,
that Melancholy clips such wings; or, to alter the figure, takes off our
chariot wheels in duty, and makes them, like those of the Egyptians, drag
heavily. |
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