第05章 自私和贪爱世界
§1
第05章 自私和贪爱世界
§2
Chap. 5 - Selfishness and World Loving
§3
亲爱的G弟兄和G姐妹：我定意要写信给你们已经有段时间了。当主赐给我的亮光清楚地来到我面前时，一些事有力地催促着我的心，当时我正站在某地的人们面前。我曾希望你们会留下来参加另一次聚会，在那里开始的工作原可以继续。但我遗憾地看到，当弟兄们参加大会时，他们一般没有感到先为聚会作预备的重要性。他们不但没有在来赴会之前把自己奉献给上帝，反而等着，直到参加聚会才在那里献身。他们带着家庭一起来，且把他们已丢在身后的事看得比为祂的降临预备心更重要、更有价值。因此，几乎所有人，走的时候都不比来的时候更好。参加这些聚会花费不菲，那些来赴会的人如果没有受益，对他们来说就是一个损失，而且使那些觉得对他们有作工负担之人的工作极其艰难。我们的人离开那次大会太早了。要是大家都留下来并且参加工作，我们原可见到一项特别的工作从上帝而来。【2T.55.1】[1]
§4
Dear Brother and Sister G: I have for some time designed to write to you. As the light which the Lord has given me came distinctly before me, some things pressed themselves forcibly upon my mind while standing before the people at -----. I had hoped that you would stay to another meeting, and that the labor there commenced could have been continued. But I am sorry to see that when our brethren attend a Conference, they do not generally feel the importance of first preparing for the meeting. Instead of consecrating themselves to God before they come, they wait till they get to the meeting to have the work done for them there. They bring home along with them, and the things that they have left behind are considered of more value and importance than a preparation of heart for His coming. Therefore nearly all leave no better than when they came. Such meetings are attended with great expense, and if those who come are not profited, there is a loss to them, and they make the labor exceedingly hard for those who feel the burden of the work upon them. Our people left that Conference too soon. We might have seen a more special work from God had all remained and engaged in the work. {2T 55.1}[1]
§5
G姐妹，我有一道信息给你。你离上帝的国太远了。你贪爱这个世界，而这已使你冷漠、自私、苛求而且吝啬。你主要感兴趣的就是大有效力的金钱。你对上帝怎样看待处在你这种状况的人知道得多么少啊。你处在一种可怕的欺骗之中。你效法这个世界，而不是心意更新而变化。你的生活在很大程度上表现出自私自利和专爱自己。你没有胜过自己品格中这个不幸的瑕疵。情况已经是这样了。那跟随你、笼罩你生活的乌云将越来越大、越来越黑，直到你头顶整个天空都被其遮盖。你转向右，没有光明；你转向左，也得不到一线亮光。【2T.56.1】[2]
§6
Sister G, I have a message to you. You are far from the kingdom. You love this world, and this love has made you cold, selfish, exacting, and penurious. The great object of interest with you is the powerful, mighty dollar. How little you know how God looks upon one in your condition. You are in a terrible deception. You are conformed to the world instead of being transformed by the renewing of your mind. Selfishness and self-love are exemplified in your life to a great degree. You have not overcome this unhappy defect in your character. If this is not remedied, you will lose heaven, and your happiness here will be greatly marred. This has been the case already. The dark cloud which has followed you, overshadowing your life, will grow larger and blacker until your whole sky is clouded. You may turn to the right, and there will be no light, and to the left, and you cannot discover a ray. {2T 56.1}[2]
§7
你是在庸人自扰，自寻烦恼，因为你不正。你没有献身。你那抱怨、吝啬的精神使你不幸，也使上帝不悦。你一生都在为自己考虑，力图使自己快乐。这样作多么可怜，多么不值得啊！你越努力专顾自己，损失就会越重。你越少侍奉自己，就会发现你得到的越多。你对公正无私的爱很陌生，你既看缺乏这种宝贵品质不是什么特别的罪，就不愿用功培养这种爱了。【2T.56.2】[3]
§8
You make trouble for yourself where there is no trouble, because you are not right. You are unconsecrated. Your complaining, penurious spirit makes you unhappy and displeases God. During your life you have been looking out for yourself, seeking to make yourself happy. It is poor work, unprofitable business. The more you invest here the heavier will be the loss. The less stock you take in this business of serving yourself the greater will be the saving on your part. You are a stranger to disinterested, unselfish love, and while you see no special sin in the absence of this precious trait you will not be diligent to cultivate it. {2T 56.2}[3]
§9
你爱你的丈夫并与之结合。你知道，当你嫁给他时，你也就立约作了他孩子们的母亲。但我看到你在这件事上有缺欠。你有可悲的缺陷。你不爱你丈夫的孩子，若没有完全的改变，你和你的管理方式若不彻底改革，这些珍宝就会毁了。你的管教里没有爱，没有慈爱的表现。我要告诉你真相从而变成你的敌人吗？你是太彻底地自私，以致不爱另一个人的孩子。我蒙指示看到，你婚姻的结果不会兴旺，蒙主惠赐力量、生命和健康，上帝的灵会撇下你，任凭你，除非你受到彻底的试验和证明，做好你非常欠缺的那些事。你的自私怎样使你周围幼小的心枯萎凋残，上帝的咒诅也要照样使你自私之爱和婚姻的誓言枯萎凋残。如果你继续走在自私的道路上，上帝就会更近地临到你，从你面前一个接一个地除掉你的偶像，直到你那骄傲、自私、未被征服的心在祂面前谦卑为止。【2T.56.3】[4]
§10
You loved your husband and married him. You knew that when you married him you covenanted to become a mother to his children. But I saw a lack in you in this matter. You are sadly deficient. You do not love the children of your husband, and unless there is an entire change, a thorough reformation in you, and in your manner of government, these precious jewels are ruined. Love, manifestation of affection, is not a part of your discipline. Shall I tell you the truth and become your enemy by so doing? You are too thoroughly selfish to love the children of another. I was shown that the fruit of your union would not be prospered and blessed with strength, life, and health, and Gods spirit would leave you to yourself, unless you are thoroughly proved and tested, and right up those things in which you are so deficient. As your selfishness withers and blights the young hearts around you, so will the curse of God wither and blight the pledges of your selfish love and union. And if you continue your selfish course, God will come still closer to you and remove your idols one after another from before your face until you shall humble your proud, selfish, unsubdued heart before Him. {2T 56.3}[4]
§11
我看到，在上帝的大日，你要因你未完成所托而向上帝作可怕的交代。你正在使那些可爱的孩子——尤其是女儿——的生活非常痛苦。你的慈爱、抚爱、忍耐包容在哪里呢？你未成圣的心中住着憎恨而非仁爱。你脱口而出的是责难而非称赞和鼓励。你的态度，你苛刻的作风，你不表同情的本性，于那敏感的女儿来说，就像荒凉的冰雹落在娇嫩的植物上一样；每次风暴来袭，都把它打弯，直至遍体鳞伤，生命压伤凋残。【2T.57.1】[5]
§12
I saw that you would have a fearful account to render in the day of God because of your unfulfilled trust. You are making the lives of those dear children very bitter, especially the daughters. Where is the affection, the loving caress, the patient forbearance? Hatred lives in your unsanctified heart more than love. Censure leaps from your lips more than praise and encouragement. Your manners, your harsh ways, your unsympathizing nature, are to that sensitive daughter like desolating hail upon a tender plant; it bends to every blast until its life is crushed out, and it lies bruised and broken. {2T 57.1}[5]
§13
你的管理正在使你孩子们心中仁爱、希望和喜乐的渠道干涸。你女儿的面容显出常存的悲哀表情，这非但没有唤醒你心中的温柔与同情，反倒激起的不耐烦和确实的嫌恶。如果你愿意，你就能把孩子的这种表情变成活泼快乐的。天使说：“上帝岂没有看见吗？祂岂不知道吗？”祂必报应这些事。你是自愿把这个责任担在自己肩上的，然而撒但已利用了你不快乐，不可爱，无爱心的性情，你的专爱自我，你的狭隘，你的自私，现在这些都原形毕露，未加管教，未被克服，象铁箍一样束缚着你。儿童懂得母亲的脸色；明白那表示的是喜爱还是厌恶。你不晓得自己在做什么。那悲伤的小脸，从一颗受压制、渴望关爱的心中发出的呻吟叹息，岂不唤醒人的同情吗？却没有唤起你的同情。这反倒使你与孩子更疏远，使你更讨厌她了。【2T.57.2】[6]
§14
Your administration is drying up the channel of love, hopefulness, and joy in your children. A settled sadness is expressed in the countenance of the girl, but, instead of awakening sympathy and tenderness in you, this arouses impatience and positive dislike. You can change this expression to animation and cheerfulness if you choose. Does not God see? Does He take no knowledge? were the words of the angel. He will visit for these things. You voluntarily took upon you this responsibility, but Satan has taken advantage of your unhappy, unlovable, and unloving disposition, your self-love, your closeness, your selfishness, and it now appears in all its deformity, uncorrected, unsubdued, girding you about as with iron bands. Children read the countenance of the mother; they understand whether love or dislike is there expressed. You know not the work you are doing. Does not the little sad face, the heaving sigh welling up from a pressed heart in its yearning call for love, awaken pity? No, not in you. It places the child at a still greater distance from you and increases your dislike. {2T 57.2}[6]
§15
我看到，作父亲的没有采取一位父亲应有的做法。上帝不喜悦这位父亲的立场。另一个人已经把父亲的心从他自己的亲生骨肉偷走了。G弟兄啊，你一直很缺乏辨识力。作为一家之首，你原应有自己的立场，不应允许事态任意发展。你已看出事态不对，有时感到担忧，但因怕你现在的妻子不悦，使你家中不快乐不一致，你便在该开口说话的时候保持沉默。你在这件事上是不清白的。你的孩子们没有母亲为他们辩护，用她明智的言语保护他们免受责难。【2T.58.1】[7]
§16
I saw that the father had not taken the course that a father should. God is not pleased with his position. Another has stolen the fathers heart from the blood of his blood and bone of his bone. Brother G, you have been very deficient in discernment. As the head of the house, you should have taken your position and not permitted things to go as they have gone. You have seen that things were not right and have sometimes felt anxious, but fear of displeasing your present wife and making unhappy discord in your family has led you to remain silent when you should have spoken. You are not clear in the matter. Your children have no mother to plead for them, to shelter them from censure by her judicious words. {2T 58.1}[7]
§17
你的孩子们，以及其他所有失去疼爱他们的亲生母亲的孩子，都遭遇了无法弥补的损失。但当一个人冒险处于母亲的位置，照顾受到打击的小羊时，便有双倍的操劳和负担落在她身上。如若可能，她要比孩子的亲生母亲更加慈爱，更能忍受责难和威胁，以此弥补那群小羊所遭受的损失。G弟兄，你一直象一个熟睡的人。要把孩子放在心上，用你保护的膀臂环绕他们，温柔地爱他们。你若不这样作，针对你的名字就会写下“显出亏欠。”【2T.58.2】[8]
§18
Your children, and all other children who have lost the one in whose breasts maternal love has flowed, have met with a loss that can never be supplied. But when one ventures to stand in the place of mother to the little stricken flock, a double care and burden rests upon her, to be even more loving if possible, more forbearing of censure and threatening than their own mother could have been, and in this way supply the loss which the little flock have sustained. You, Brother G, have been like a man asleep. Take your children to your heart, encircle them with your sheltering arms, love them tenderly. If you fail to do this, Found wanting will be written against you. {2T 58.2}[8]
§19
有一项工作是你们夫妻二人都要做的。永远停止你们的抱怨吧。G弟兄，不要再让你妻子小气、自私、吝啬的精神控制你的行动。你一直在沾染同样的精神，你们都抢夺了上帝。你辩解说自己贫穷，但上天知道那是谎话，然而你的谎话将要全部应验。你若照你素常所行的继续怀藏爱世界的心，就会一贫如洗。“人岂可夺取上帝之物呢？你们竟夺取我的供物。你们却说，我们在何事上夺取祢的供物呢？就是你们在当纳的十分之一和当献的供物上。因你们通国的人都夺取我的供物，咒诅就临到你们身上”（玛3:8-9）。要尽快除去这个咒诅。【2T.59.1】[9]
§20
There is a work for you both to do. Forever cease your murmurings. Brother G, suffer not the close, penurious, selfish spirit of your wife to control your actions. You have been drinking in the same spirit, and you have both robbed God. The plea of poverty is upon you lips, but Heaven knows it is false; yet your words will be all true; you will be poor indeed, if you continue to cherish the love of the world as you have done. Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed Me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee? In tithes and offerings. Ye are cursed with a curse. Wipe off this curse as fast as possible. {2T 59.1}[9]
§21
G弟兄，作为上帝的管家，你要注目于祂。你将来要对上帝交代你所经管的，而不是向你的妻子。你现在所经手的钱财都是上帝的。祂只是借给你一会儿，为要考察你，试验你，看你是否“在好事上富足，甘心施舍，乐意供给人”（提前6:18），为自己积成美好的根基，预备将来，叫你持定永生。上帝会要你连本带利地交回。愿祂帮助你为审判作准备。要把自我钉死，让圣灵宝贵的恩典住在你心中。转脸不看这世界及其腐败的私欲。“不要爱世界和世界上的事。人若爱世界，爱父的心就不在他里面了”（约壹2:15）。你的表白若象天一样高，可是你却是自私和贪爱世界的，你就不能与成圣、纯净、圣洁的人在那国度里一同有份。“因为你的财宝在哪里，你的心也在那里”（太6:21）。你的财宝若在天上，你的心也在那里。你会谈论天国、永生和不朽的冠冕。你若积攒财宝在地上，就会谈论属世的事情，患得患失。“人若赚得全世界，赔上自己的生命，有什么益处呢？人还能拿什么换生命呢”（太16:26）？【2T.59.2】[10]
§22
Brother G, as Gods steward, look to Him. It is He to whom you are to give account of your stewardship, not to your wife. It is Gods means that you are handling. He has only lent it you a little while to prove you, to try you, to see if you will be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate, laying up in store for yourselves a good foundation against the time to come, that ye may lay hold on eternal life. God will require His own with usury. May He help you to prepare for the judgment. Let self be crucified. Let the precious graces of the Spirit live in your hearts. Turn out the world with its corrupting lust. Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. If your profession is as high as heaven, and yet you are selfish and world-loving, you can have no part in the kingdom with the sanctified, the pure and holy. Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. If your treasure is in heaven, your heart will be there. You will talk of heaven, eternal life, the immortal crown. If you lay up your treasure on earth, you will be talking of earthly things, worrying about losses and gains. What shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? {2T 59.2}[10]
§23
光明与救恩都是给你的，只要你感到你必须拥有它，否则就必灭亡。耶稣必能拯救到底。但是，G姐妹，上帝既一直藉着我说话，你就要知道你在可怕地自欺，必须有彻底的转变，否则你决不能列身于那些从大患难中出来、曾用羔羊的血把衣裳洗白净了的人当中。【2T.60.1】[11]
§24
There is light and salvation for you if you will only feel that you must have it or perish. Jesus can save to the uttermost. But, Sister G, if God has ever spoken by me, you are terribly deceived in regard to yourself, and must have a thorough conversion, or you will never be one of that number who have come up through great tribulation, having washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.{2T 60.1}[11]