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經文：「我父所給我的那杯，我豈可不喝呢？」（約18:11） 親愛的讀者，你知道這句經文，比平靜風和海或使死人復活更偉大嗎？先知和使徒或許能行許多神蹟，卻不能凡事遵行與承受神的旨意。遵行與承受神的旨意是最高的信心，是基督徒所能作到的極致。 有時候你美好的希望遭到永遠的破滅；你每天所背負的重擔始終得不到減輕；當你盼望有充足的財力好讓親人過些幸福舒適的生活時，反而遭受貧窮拮据；或是因為身患重症被隔離束縛在病床；被孑然一身剝奪所有的人們，只剩下你一個人孤孤單單地抵擋一切外來的攻擊； 在這種種試煉之下，你是否依然能說：「我父所給我的那杯，我豈可不喝呢？」；這就是最高超的信心！與最高超的屬靈得勝！最大的信心不是在行為上表現出來的--巴赫司脫 Dr. Charles Parkhurst 要有一位同情的神，必須先有一位受苦的主；若是沒有受過同樣的苦，就無法對於他人產生眞實的同情。 我們若不出代價，就不能幫助他人；而我們所受的痛苦就是這代價，使我們日後能同情他人的困境。要成為幫助人的人，必須先做受苦的人， 要成為能救人的人，必須先受十字架的考驗；我們若不喝主的杯，受主的苦，就不能擁有救助人的那種人生的極致喜樂。 大衛的詩篇中最能安慰人的幾篇，乃是從苦難中壓出來的；保羅如果沒有一根刺加在肉體上，他所寫的書信一定少了許多溫柔！ 親愛的讀者，你現在受苦的環境，就是父神用來雕塑你最適合的工具。請不要拒絕推開，以免這一動就破壞了父神美好的工作呢！ 「能從苦難大學畢業的學生是少的。」--選 新譯｜荒漠甘泉讀書會
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Scripture: "The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" (John 18:11). This was a greater thing to say and do than to calm the seas or raise the dead. Prophets and apostles could work wondrous miracles, but they could not always do and suffer the will of God. To do and suffer God's will is still the highest form of faith, the most sublime Christian achievement. To have the bright aspirations of a young life forever blasted; to bear a daily burden never congenial and to see no relief; to be pinched by poverty when you only desire a competency for the good and comfort of loved ones; to be fettered by some incurable physical disability; to be stripped bare of loved ones until you stand alone to meet the shocks of life--to be able to say in such a school of discipline, "The cup which my Father has given me, shall I not drink it?'--this is faith at its highest and spiritual success at the crowning point. Great faith is exhibited not so much in ability to do as to suffer. --Dr. Charles Parkhurst To have a sympathizing God we must have a suffering Saviour, and there is no true fellow-feeling with another save in the heart of him who has been afflicted like him. We cannot do good to others save at a cost to ourselves, and our afflictions are the price we pay for our ability to sympathize. He who would be a helper, must first be a sufferer. He who would be a saviour must somewhere and somehow have been upon a cross; and we cannot have the highest happiness of life in succoring others without tasting the cup which Jesus drank, and submitting to the baptism wherewith He was baptized. The most comforting of David's psalms were pressed out by suffering; and if Paul had not had his thorn in the flesh we had missed much of that tenderness which quivers in so many of his letters. The present circumstance, which presses so hard against you (if surrendered to Christ), is the best shaped tool in the Father's hand to chisel you for eternity. Trust Him, then. Do not push away the instrument lest you lose its work." The school of suffering graduates rare scholars. ｜ Mrs. Charles Cowman
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