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「凡我所疼愛的，我就責備管教他。」（啟示錄三章 19 節）
受到最劇烈的痛苦的，常是最屬靈的信徒。恩典受得最多的人，也是受苦受得最多的人。苦難臨到信徒，沒有一次是偶然的，每一次都是受著父神的指揮的。父神決不會隨意冒險張弓發矢。祂的每一枝箭都是帶著一個特別的使命出去的。── 卡萊爾（Joseph Caryl）
最屬靈的基督徒都是曾經過烈火的。如果你要更認識基督，你不要驚異，祂必須帶你從你現在的環境中出來，引你經過荒野、爐火。
主啊，別的刑罰我都願意受，只求你不要拿去我的十字架；求你叫我能服從你的旨意，求你叫我能愛你所給我的十字架。求你給我那最能叫你滿足的恩賜，好叫你在我身上按照你自己的旨意榮耀你名。 ── 一個俘虜的禱告（A Captive's Prayer）
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“As many as I love I rebuke and chasten.” (Rev. 3:19.)
God takes the most eminent and choicest of His servants for the choicest and most eminent afflictions. They who have received most grace from God are able to bear most afflictions from God. Affliction does not hit the saint by chance, but by direction. God does not draw His bow at a venture. Every one of His arrows goes upon a special errand and touches no breast but his against whom it is sent. It is not only the grace, but the glory of a believer when we can stand and take affliction quietly. --- Joseph Caryl.
“The most deeply taught Christians are generally those who have been brought into the searching fires of deep soul-anguish. If you have been praying to know more of Christ, do not be surprised if He takes you aside into a desert place, or leads you into a furnace of pain.”
Do not punish me, Lord, by taking my cross from me, but comfort me by submitting me to Thy will, and by making me to love the cross. Give me that by which Thou shalt be best served…and let me hold it for the greatest of all Thy mercies, that Thou shouldst glorify Thy name in me, according to Thy will. --- A Captive’s Prayer.
If all my days were sunny, could I say,
“In His fair land He wipes all tears away”?
If I were never weary, could I keep Close to my heart, “He give His loved ones sleep”?
Were no graves mine, might I not come to deem The Life Eternal but a baseless dream?
My winter, and my tears, and weariness, Even my graves, may be His way to bless.
I call them ills; yet that can surely be Nothing but love that shown my Lord to me!
--- Selected.
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