0616 你愿意舍弃自己的生命吗？
人为朋友舍命，人的爱心没有比这个大的…我乃称你们为朋友…《 约翰福音 15:13, 15》
耶稣并不要求我为祂死，但要我为祂舍弃生命。彼得对主说：「主啊，我为什么现在不能跟你去？我愿意为你舍命。」 他是认真的（约翰福音 13:37）。他有一种伟大的英雄感。对于我们来说，无法像彼得那样做出同样的声明是不好的——我们的责任感只有通过我们的英雄主义意识才能充分实现。主是否曾问过你：「你愿意为我舍命吗？」(约翰福音 13:38)。死亡比每天进进出出怀着神崇高呼召的意识而舍命，是要容易多了。我们受造不是为生命中辉煌时刻而被造，但我们必须在在日常生活方式中行走在其光中。耶稣的生命中只有一次辉煌的时刻，那就是在变像山上；正是在那里，祂第二次倒空了自己的荣耀，然后下到被鬼附的山谷（见马可福音9:1-29）。三十三年来，耶稣舍了祂的生命去遵行天父的旨意。「主为我们舍命，我们从此就知道何为爱，我们也当为弟兄舍命。」(约翰一书 3:16)。然而，那是与我们人性相反的。
如果我是耶稣的朋友，我必须刻意并谨慎地为祂舍命。那是很难做到的一件事，感谢神，它是一件困难的事；救恩对我们来说是容易的，因为神付出了昂贵的代价。但在我的生命中展示救恩是很困难的。神拯救一个人，以圣灵充满他，然后实际上说：「现在你在你的生活中要做出来，并对我忠诚，即使你周围每件事物的本质要使你不忠诚。」耶稣对我们说，「…我称你们为朋友…」，要保持对你的朋友忠诚，并记得祂的尊荣在你的肉身生活是有风险的。
来自章伯斯的智慧
炽热的熔炉是在神的直接许可下而存在的。认为无论我们的环境如何，我们都会得到发展成长，这是一种误导。我们因它们而发展成长。在环境中的掌握，是需要的，而不是对环境的掌握。《神的爱——无敌安慰的信息》
0616 Will You Lay Down Your Life
Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends….I have called you friends… —John 15:13, 15
Jesus does not ask me to die for Him, but to lay down my life for Him. Peter said to the Lord, “I will lay down my life for Your sake,” and he meant it (John 13:37). He had a magnificent sense of the heroic. For us to be incapable of making this same statement Peter made would be a bad thing— our sense of duty is only fully realized through our sense of heroism. Has the Lord ever asked you, “Will you lay down your life for My sake?” (John 13:38). It is much easier to die than to lay down your life day in and day out with the sense of the high calling of God. We are not made for the bright-shining moments of life, but we have to walk in the light of them in our everyday ways. There was only one bright-shining moment in the life of Jesus, and that was on the Mount of Transfiguration. It was there that He emptied Himself of His glory for the second time, and then came down into the demon-possessed valley (see Mark 9:1-29). For thirty-three years Jesus laid down His life to do the will of His Father. “By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16). Yet it is contrary to our human nature to do so.
If I am a friend of Jesus, I must deliberately and carefully lay down my life for Him. It is a difficult thing to do, and thank God that it is. Salvation is easy for us, because it cost God so much. But the exhibiting of salvation in my life is difficult. God saves a person, fills him with the Holy Spirit, and then says, in effect, “Now you work it out in your life, and be faithful to Me, even though the nature of everything around you is to cause you to be unfaithful.” And Jesus says to us, “…I have called you friends….” Remain faithful to your Friend, and remember that His honor is at stake in your bodily life.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
The fiery furnaces are there by God’s direct permission. It is misleading to imagine that we are developed in spite of our circumstances; we are developed because of them. It is mastery in circumstances that is needed, not mastery over them. –The Love of God—The Message of Invincible Consolation, 674 R