你上到这里来,我要……指示你。(启四1)

一个人的品格要习于居高,不趋于卑下,才会产生崇高的情操。要是你外在的生活,真与你最崇高的标准相称,神就会对你说:“朋友,再高攀一点吧。”试探的金律是:“攀高一点。”当你升高了,就会碰见其他的试探,这在性质上与从前的不同。撒旦懂得用向上走的策略来试探人,神也是如此,不过效果却有不同。当魔鬼把你放在高位,是叫你对圣洁观念的标准,固定在人血肉之躯无法忍受的地位上。这就变成属灵的杂技表演,你只得立稳,却不敢移动。但当神用恩典把你提升到属天的境地,他不是找一个顶峰给你攀住,而是让你有更广阔的高原,可以任意驱驰。

试以这个礼拜的灵程与去年同一个礼拜作个比较,看看神怎样领你往高处行。我们都站过高处了望,但千万别让神给你一种你不能立即活出来的真理。得了真理,总要努力去实现,而且保持在真理的光中。在恩典中的长进,不是拿你有没有后退来衡量,而是对自己现今的属灵光景在哪里有准确的认知。你听见神对你说:“上来吧,登高一点!”这不是对你个人说,叫你得到更高的位置,乃是对你的品德说的,叫你在悟性上大大有长进。

“我要做的事岂可瞒着亚伯拉罕吗?”神往往要把他所做的向我们隐瞒,直到我们在性情品德上达到一个地步,然后他才向我们显明。

祈祷◆噢,主啊,赐我在你里面满有喜乐。求你为我清除所有的困惑、迷乱和烦扰,让我在今天以清楚的目光看见你的道路。

March 27: Vision By Personal Character

“Come up hither, and I will shew thee things.” Revelation 4:1

An elevated mood can only come out of an elevated habit of personal character. If in the externals of your life you live up to the highest you know, God will continually say – “Friend, go up higher.” The golden rule in temptation is – Go higher. When you get higher up, you face other temptations and characteristics. Satan uses the strategy of elevation in temptation, and God does the same, but the effect is different. When the devil puts you into an elevated place, he makes you screw your idea of holiness beyond what flesh and blood could ever hear, it is a spiritual acrobatic performance, you are just poised and dare not move; but when God elevates you by His grace into the heavenly places, instead of finding a pinnacle to cling to, you find a great table-land where it is easy to move.

Compare this week in your spiritual history with the same week last year and see how God has called you up higher. We have all been brought to see from a higher standpoint. Never let God give you one point of truth which you do not instantly live up to. Always work it out, keep in the light of it.

Growth in grace is measured not by the fact that you have not gone back, but that you have an insight into where you are spiritually; you have heard God say “Come up higher,” not to you personally, but to the insight of your character.

“Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do?” God has to hide from us what He does until by personal character we get to the place where He can reveal it.