0218 采取主动对抗绝望
起来，我们走吧。《马太福音26:46》
在客西马尼园里，门徒们在本该保持清醒的时候却睡着了，一旦他们意识到自己做了什么，那就生出绝望。意识到做了不可挽回的事，容易令我们绝望。我们说：「好了，现在一切都结束，也都毁了，再努力还有什么意义。」如果我们认为这种绝望是一种例外，我们就错了。这是人类非常普遍的经历，每当我们明了自己没有抓住一个绝佳的机会时，我们就很容易陷入绝望。但耶稣来了，慈爱地对我们说这句话，其精髓就是：「现在继续睡，这机会就永远失去了，你无法改变这一点。但，起来，我们继续做下一件事。」换句话说，让过去沉睡，但让它沉睡在基督甜蜜的怀抱中，让我们与祂一起走向不能征服的未来。
我们每个人的生活中都将有这样的经历。我们会有生活中真实事件所造成的绝望时刻，而我们无法摆脱它们。在这种情况下，门徒们做了一件完全无法想象的事情——他们去睡觉，并没有和耶稣一起守望。但我们的主来到他们身边，采取属灵的主动性来对抗他们的绝望，实际上祂是说：「起来，做下一件事。」如果我们受到神的激励，接下来的事是什么呢？就是绝对信靠祂，并根据祂的救赎来祷告。
永远不要让过去的失败感挫败你的下一步。
来自章伯斯的智慧
衡量我们为神而做的公开活动的价值，其标准是我们与祂私人的深交……我们必须把我们的帐篷搭在总是能与神一起安静灵修的地方，无论我们与世界在一起的时间有多么喧闹。《竭诚为主》，1月6日
0218 Taking the Initiative Against Despair
Rise, let us be going. —Matthew 26:46
In the Garden of Gethsemane, the disciples went to sleep when they should have stayed awake, and once they realized what they had done it produced despair. The sense of having done something irreversible tends to make us despair. We say, “Well, it’s all over and ruined now; what’s the point in trying anymore.” If we think this kind of despair is an exception, we are mistaken. It is a very ordinary human experience. Whenever we realize we have not taken advantage of a magnificent opportunity, we are apt to sink into despair. But Jesus comes and lovingly says to us, in essence, “Sleep on now. That opportunity is lost forever and you can’t change that. But get up, and let’s go on to the next thing.” In other words, let the past sleep, but let it sleep in the sweet embrace of Christ, and let us go on into the invincible future with Him.
There will be experiences like this in each of our lives. We will have times of despair caused by real events in our lives, and we will be unable to lift ourselves out of them. The disciples, in this instance, had done a downright unthinkable thing— they had gone to sleep instead of watching with Jesus. But our Lord came to them taking the spiritual initiative against their despair and said, in effect, “Get up, and do the next thing.” If we are inspired by God, what is the next thing? It is to trust Him absolutely and to pray on the basis of His redemption.
Never let the sense of past failure defeat your next step.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
The measure of the worth of our public activity for God is the private profound communion we have with Him.… We have to pitch our tents where we shall always have quiet times with God, however noisy our times with the world may be.– My Utmost for His Highest, January 6, 736 R