7月21日 進天國的門

虛心的人有福了。（太五3）

當心不要把主教師的身分放在第一位。耶穌基督若光是一位教師，他所作的無非是設立了一些我無法達到的標準來戲弄我。若根本是無法達到的理想，介紹給我有何用？我不知道反更妙。要我清心，要我連非份內的事也作，要我完全歸向神，可是我卻無力達到，告訴我這些有何益處？若要基督的教訓對我真有意義，而不是引至絕望的空理想，我就必須以耶穌基督為救主。我在神的靈裡重生後，就曉得耶穌基督來不是單為教導；他更要使我成為他所教導的。救恩是主耶穌能夠把他的性情放進任何人裡面。而神所給的一切標準，都是根據主耶穌的性情而定。

對一個未有新生命的人，登山寶訓只會帶來絕望，這正是主耶穌的用意。因為我們若仍然自以為義，自高自傲，以為自己可以實踐主的教訓，神就會任由我們，讓難處揭露我們的無知，叫我們像叫化子一般來親就他，接受他的施予。“心靈貧乏的人有福了。”這是天國的第一原則。主耶穌國度的基石是貧窮，不是產業；不是決志接受耶穌基督，而是完全無能為力的：“我不知從何著手。”那時耶穌說：“你有福了。”這就是門，我們往往要花好長時間才相信自己真的貧窮！若知道自己貧窮，就是已經來到耶穌基督作工的道德前線。

July 21 The Gateway To The Kingdom

“Blessed are the poor in spirit.” Matthew 5:3

Beware of placing Our Lord as a Teacher first. If Jesus Christ is a Teacher only, then all He can do is to tantalize me by erecting a standard I can not attain. What is the use of presenting me with an ideal I cannot possibly come near? I am happier without knowing it. What is the good of telling me to be what I never can be – to be pure in heart, to do more than my duty, to be perfectly devoted to God? I must know Jesus Christ as Saviour before His teaching has any meaning for me other than that of an ideal which leads to despair. But when I am born again of the Spirit of God, I know that Jesus Christ did not come to teach only: He came to make me what He teaches I should be. The Redemption means that Jesus Christ can put into any man the disposition that ruled His own life, and all the standards God gives are based on that disposition.

The teaching of the Sermon on the Mount produces despair in the natural man – the very thing Jesus means it to do. As long as we have a self-righteous, conceited notion that we can carry out Our Lord's teaching, God will allow us to go on until we break our ignorance over some obstacle, then we are willing to come to Him as paupers and receive from Him. “Blessed are the paupers in spirit,” that is the first principle in the Kingdom of God. The bedrock in Jesus Christ's kingdom is poverty, not possession; not decisions for Jesus Christ, but a sense of absolute futility – I cannot begin to do it. Then Jesus says – Blessed are you. That is the entrance, and it does take us a long while to believe we are poor! The knowledge of our own poverty brings us to the moral frontier where Jesus Christ works.