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經文：「我想起我夜間的歌曲。」（詩77:6） 有一種歌鳥，在明亮的環境中不會鳴唱。雖然主人竭力引牠出聲，但牠總是靜默，除了偶爾發出短促的一聲，卻不足以展現牠的美聲。然而有一個方法，那就是將籠子罩上一層密不透光的黑布後，就可以使牠唱出最美麗的鳴聲來。 同樣地有許多人也是在夜幕降臨之後才發出歌唱，就像傳說中夜鶯是在被荊棘扎胸時發出鳴啼。夜間聽見的天使頌歌，是在最黑暗的時刻報出；那是大喜的信息說：＂新郎已到，快快出來迎接＂（太25:6）。對於人們何嘗不是？當天色尚未黑暗，心靈依然安逸時，是否能夠真正領悟神愛的豐富與甘甜？還是唯有在最黑暗的處境中才能真實流露。 ＂光明是從黑暗中生出，早晨亦自夜晚中滋長。＂ 詹姆斯克理曼 James Creelman 在走訪巴爾幹諸國，尋找塞維亞流亡女王娜塔麗 Natalie 的記錄信件中說： 「在那值得紀念的旅程中，我第一次知道市面的玫瑰精油原料産自巴爾幹山中。令我感興趣的是：玫瑰必須在黑暗的夜晚方可摘採，採擷工作就在這短短的一二小時內完成。」；「起初我以為這種採集方式是一種古代迷信的遺傳，等到深入調查後，終於知道連科學家的實驗也證明，玫瑰花若在日光中摘採，將損失其香味的百分之四十。」 對於人類的生活和文化，這的確是一個事實，並非兒戲般的想像。--馬克李德 Malcolm J. McLeod 新譯｜荒漠甘泉讀書會 |
◇◇◇ Scripture: "I call to remembrance my song in the night" (Psalm 77:6). I have read somewhere of a little bird that will never sing the melody his master wishes while his cage is full of light. He learns a snatch of this, a bar of that, but never an entire song of its own until the cage is covered and the morning beams shut out. A good many people never learn to sing until the darkling shadows fall. The fabled nightingale carols with his breast against a thorn. It was in the night that the song of the angels was heard. It was at midnight that the cry came, "Behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him." Indeed it is extremely doubtful if a soul can really know the love of God in its richness and in its comforting, satisfying completeness until the skies are black and lowering. Light comes out of darkness, morning out of the womb of the night. James Creelman, in one of his letters, describes his trip through the Balkan States in search of Natalie, the exiled Queen of Serbia. "In that memorable journey," he says, "I learned for the first time that the world's supply of attar of roses comes from the Balkan Mountains. And the thing that interested me most," he goes on, "is that the roses must be gathered in the darkest hours. The pickers start out at one o'clock and finish picking them at two. "At first it seemed to me a relic of superstition; but I investigated the picturesque mystery, and learned that actual scientific tests had proven that fully forty per cent of the fragrance of roses disappeared in the light of day." And in human life and human culture that is not a playful, fanciful conceit; it is a real veritable fact. -Malcolm J. McLeod ｜ Mrs. Charles Cowman |