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經文：「我所作的，你如今不知道，後來必明白。」（約13:7） 我們現在所看見的神的作為，只是一個局部、半完成、半發展的計劃；等到永生神的殿完成的時候，所有工程就要清清楚楚地顯現出來！ 讓我們上利巴嫩的山頂觀看，在那裡有高大的香柏樹，它是同類的光榮，是狂風的對手！夏天喜歡對著它微笑；夜晚喜歡用露珠鑲飾它的葉片；飛鳥喜歡築巢在它的枝幹；疲倦的旅客與流浪的牧童都喜歡在它的蔭下休息，好躲避炎熱的日曬與強風的豪雨；盡管如此，有一天，它卻被砍倒了；多年來在林中享有特權的香柏樹，竟然倒在樵夫手下！ 當斧頭砍下的時候，樹枝先從樹身紛紛掉落，緊接著高大的香柏樹就這麼應聲倒地。就在那一刻，我們忍不住像先知那般吶喊：「松樹阿，應當哀號，因為香柏樹傾倒了！」（亞11:2） 但是稍待片時，當我們跟著希蘭的工人將香柏樹運下山；再沿著藍色的地中海將樹漂運；請看，這樹最終竟成了聖殿中的棟樑；一根充滿榮耀光澤的高大棟樑。當你看見它的結局，竟是被安置在萬王之王的殿中，在聖殿的至聖所；還會為它曾經被砍倒而惋惜嗎？ 「這殿後來的榮耀，必大過先前的榮耀。」（該2:9） 許多時候，我們就像那香柏樹；被神的斧頭將我們修剪得一無所有。我們不明白為甚麼要受到如此深沉難測的對待，但是神有祂的目的；祂豫備使用我們來做天上的棟樑與屋椽；要使我們「在耶和華的手中作為華冠，在神的掌上作為冕旒」（賽62:3）。--馬克特夫 Macduff 新譯｜荒漠甘泉讀書會
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Scripture: "What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter" (John 13:7). We have only a partial view here of God's dealings, His half-completed, half-developed plan; but all will stand out in fair and graceful proportions in the great finished Temple of Eternity! Go, in the reign of Israel's greatest king, to the heights of Lebanon. See that noble cedar, the pride of its compeers, an old wrestler with northern blasts! Summer loves to smile upon it, night spangles its feathery foliage with dewdrops, the birds nestle on its branches, the weary pilgrim or wandering shepherd reposes under its shadows from the midday heat or from the furious storm; but all at once it is marked out to fall; The aged denizen of the forest is doomed to succumb to the woodman's stroke! As we see the axe making its first gash on its gnarled trunk, then the noble limbs stripped of their branches, and at last the "Tree of God," as was its distinctive epithet, coming with a crash to the ground, we exclaim against the wanton destruction, the demolition of this proud pillar in the temple of nature. We are tempted to cry with the prophet, as if inviting the sympathy of every lowlier stem--invoking inanimate things to resent the affront--"Howl, fir tree; for the cedar has fallen!" But wait a little. Follow that gigantic trunk as the workmen of Hiram launch it down the mountain side; thence conveyed in rafts along the blue waters of the Mediterranean; and last of all, behold it set a glorious polished beam in the Temple of God. As you see its destination, placed in the very Holy of Holies, in the diadem of the Great King--say, can you grudge that "the crown of Lebanon" was despoiled, in order that this jewel might have so noble a setting? That cedar stood as a stately prop in Nature's sanctuary, but "the glory of the latter house was greater than the glory of the former!" How many of our souls are like these cedars of old! God's axes of trial have stripped and bared them. We see no reason for dealings so dark and mysterious, but He has a noble end and object in view; to set them as everlasting pillars and rafters in His Heavenly Zion; to make them a "crown of glory in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of our God." --Macduff ｜ Mrs. Charles Cowman
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