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經文：「過了些日子，溪水就乾了。」（王上17:7） 如果我們不知道：損失是祝福，失敗是成功，空虛是禮物，那麼我們所受的信心教育就仍不完全。物質的缺乏常常有助於屬靈能力的建造；以利亞坐在基立溪旁眼看那日漸乾涸的溪水，就好像我們生活的寫照。「過了些日子，溪水就乾了。」；就如我們昨天的歷史，明天的豫言。 我們總有一天會知道信靠恩賜，和信靠賜恩者有甚麼不同。恩賜也許一時好用，可是賜恩者才是永遠的愛。 以利亞在未到撒勒法之前，基立對於他是一個難題。等他到了撒勒法之後，他就完全明白了。神的嚴厲對付並不是最後的難題；生活中的災禍、沙漠、眼淚，也都是一些間奏，並不是精彩的大結局。 如果以利亞不經過基立，直接由基列前往撒勒法的話，他必定會失去許多的助益；那些他在基立才能經歷的信心生活。同樣，在我們的生活中，甚麼時候地上的泉源乾涸，屬人的方法用盡時，就該知道我們的盼望和幫助是在乎創造天地的神。--梅爾 F.B.Meyer 新譯｜荒漠甘泉讀書會
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Scripture: "It came to pass . . . that the brook dried up" (1 Kings 17:7). The education of our faith is incomplete if we have not learned that there is a providence of loss, a ministry of failing and of fading things, a gift of emptiness. The material insecurities of life make for its spiritual establishment. The dwindling stream by which Elijah sat and mused is a true picture of the life of each of us. "It came to pass . . . that the brook dried up"--that is the history of our yesterday, and a prophecy of our morrows. In some way or other we will have to learn the difference between trusting in the gift and trusting in the Giver. The gift may be good for a while, but the Giver is the Eternal Love. Cherith was a difficult problem to Elijah until he got to Zarephath, and then it was all as clear as daylight. God's hard words are never His last words. The woe and the waste and the tears of life belong to the interlude and not to the finale. Had Elijah been led straight to Zarephath he would have missed something that helped to make him a wiser prophet and a better man. He lived by faith at Cherith. And whensoever in your life and mine some spring of earthly and outward resource has dried up, it has been that we might learn that our hope and help are in God who made Heaven and earth. --F. B. Meyer ｜ Mrs. Charles Cowman
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