Archives for 5 月 2021
Bible Verse–Psalm 30:2
O LORD my God, I cried to you, and you have healed me.
Bible Verse–Psalm 6:2
Have mercy on me, O LORD; for I am weak: O LORD, heal me; for my bones are vexed.
Bible Verse–Malachi 4:2
But to you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and you shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.
Bible Verse–Isaiah 57:18
I have seen his ways, and will heal him: I will lead him also, and restore comforts to him and to his mourners.
Bible Verse–Isaiah 53:5
But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was on him; and with his stripes we are healed.
Bible Verse–Hosea 14:4
I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for my anger is turned away from him.
By Truly Relying on the Lord, She Survived Leukemia
By Ruan Ling, United States
Ping was lying still on her sickbed, her face pale in the reflection of the lamplight.
Since she had leukemia, she had been very depressed. Seeing patients in the ward pass away one after another, she felt fearful and helpless, and asked in her heart time and again, “Who can save me? I want to live on!”
Ping used to work in a clinic. Every day she was busy seeing patients, writing prescriptions, giving them injections, or putting them on a drip, and even during her lunch hours she still had a lot of work to do. Because of her irregular diet and hours, her condition was getting worse and worse: At first, she often ran a temperature and her gums often bled; and later, she felt fatigued and chilly, her face completely bloodless. Not until her condition was in no shape to endure did she go to the hospital.
After the examination, she was diagnosed with leukemia—blood cancer. The doctor said, “You’re in serious condition. Fifty percent of your cells have turned into cancer cells. You’d better go to a large hospital for treatment quickly.” Hearing this, she felt as if the sky had fallen; unable to control her emotions, she burst out crying in the hall of the hospital despite the odd looks from people around.
Privately, the doctor told Ping’s husband, “Your wife can live eight months at most. You’d better prepare for the worst.” After learning about it, Ping’s mother and two brothers all wept disconsolately.
As a paramedic, Ping clearly knew that she was going to die. She thought, “I’m only 38 years old, too young to die. My daughter just attended junior high school and my mom is old; they all need my care. Besides, it has only been one year since my father passed away, and my family hasn’t been free from painful feelings; now I am going to die; can they bear it? …” She worried far too much and often lamented with sobs that her life was so short and miserable.
Right at this time when she was extremely distressed, she thought of the Lord Jesus and prayed to Him: “Oh merciful Jesus, Lord of salvation, each time I thought that I will never see my family, I would be so distressed. They all need me and I don’t want to leave them. Lord! What should I do? Please save me!” After praying, she felt a bit calmer. Then she remembered the Lord could cure all kinds of diseases, and how He resurrected Lazarus, who had been dead for four days, with just one line. At that time, she seemed to see a gleam of hope.
After that, she persevered in praying and reading the Bible every day and often came before the Lord. With the Lord as her ever-present reliance and help, she felt very relieved and peaceful within.
Chemotherapy is a tortured process. Besides suffering from the side effects such as nausea, dizziness, hair loss, and strength diminishment, every time she had chemotherapy, she needed to be on a drip from seven in the morning to two the next morning, during which her veins became so painful as if they would burst. In pain, she constantly prayed to the Lord, and after that she would be full of confidence in the Lord, become strong in spirit, and have the courage to fight the disease.
After the first course of treatment, Ping’s condition didn’t turn better, which made her whole family heavy-hearted. During that time, from downstairs often came cries over the dead. Every time hearing this, Ping would ask herself: Will I be the next? And then her face would be wet with tears. In distress, she told the Lord about the pain in her heart. The Lord seemed to hear her cry and arranged for a classmate of her, a director of Hematology in another hospital, to help her. He advised her to transfer to their hospital, and said he would first increase the dosage and then perform a bone marrow transplant on her. Ping and her family saw a turn for the better. After discussion, they took his advice.
After the transfer, Ping went into a new therapy. She was more at risk because the dosage was increased to kill cancer cells. Though the treatment was painful, she felt a great release in her heart and no longer existed in a constant state of fear, for she had the Lord as her reliance.
Thank the Lord for His protection! Five courses of treatments were finally done. The next step would be the bone marrow transplant. Just when Ping was very nervous and worried that she would die during the surgery, she saw a verse in the Bible, “A thousand shall fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand; but it shall not come near you” (Psalms 91:7). These words lit up her heart, “Yes! The Lord is mighty. Though I have leukemia, without His permission, death won’t come upon me. Whether I will live or die is in His hands.”
Then came the day of surgery. When she was wheeled into the operating room, she thought of the protection of the Lord all the way. Thinking that the surgery carried a risk, she prayed to the Lord and again had her life and death entrusted to Him. After praying, she felt peaceful in her heart as before.
One month after the surgery, the marrow produced new cells, which meant the marrow transplant was a success. After being hospitalized for ten months, Ping finally recovered and was discharged.
In the battle against leukemia, Ping experienced the Lord’s great power. She knew that if it were not for the Lord’s protection, she could have died at any time: Every time she had chemotherapy, if the dosage had been too low, the cancer cells wouldn’t have been killed and thus she would have died; if the dosage had been too high, she would have had no resistance and thus would have died of viral infection or bacterial infection; after the transplant surgery, if the transplanted cells had grown too slowly, she would have been addicted to pethidine, and couldn’t live a normal life even though she had survived. Thinking of this, she thanked God and praised His might and salvation.
Now, Ping is healthy and happy. Each time she told her colleagues and friends that she once had leukemia, they would say in surprise, “You don’t say! You don’t look like a person who once had a serious disease at all.” Hearing this, Ping would proudly bear witness to the wonderful deeds of the Lord.
Bible Verse–2 Corinthians 1:4
Who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted of God.
Bible Verse–Psalm 86:17
Show me a token for good; that they which hate me may see it, and be ashamed: because you, LORD, have helped me, and comforted me.
God’s Blessing and Wrath Upon Solomon
God was pleased with King Solomon and bestowed incomparable abundance upon him.
After Solomon was born, he received Jehovah God’s favor. Just as it is written in the Bible, “And He sent by the hand of Nathan the prophet; and He called his name Jedidiah, because of Jehovah” (2 Samuel 12:25). When he started to become the king of Israel, he didn’t ask God for wealth or a long life, but for wisdom so that he could rule his kingdom better. And moreover, he accomplished the lifelong desire of his father King David—building a temple for Jehovah God and leading the people of Israel to worship God there. Therefore, Jehovah God gave him great blessings. As a result, under his reign, Israel became incomparably powerful and prosperous. So, many kings of Gentile nations came to render plenty of treasure and rare wood to him and hear his words of wisdom, and thus he was admired as the wisest king. This is just as Jehovah God said to him: “And if you will walk before Me, as David your father walked, in integrity of heart, and in uprightness, to do according to all that I have commanded you, and will keep My statutes and My judgments: Then I will establish the throne of your kingdom on Israel for ever” (1 Kings 9:4–5).
God hated King Solomon, who worshiped idols, and so God rent the kingdom from him.
After then, Solomon married about 1,000 Gentile women as his concubines besides Pharaoh’s daughter. Jehovah God had said to the Israelites before, “You shall not go in to them, neither shall they come in to you: for surely they will turn away your heart after their gods” (1 Kings 11:2). Nevertheless, Solomon went against the words of Jehovah God. In addition, when he reached his old age, he even worshiped the false gods of his concubines, and he also built altars for them and personally sacrificed to them. His such actions were evil in the sight of Jehovah God. So, Jehovah God said to him, “For as much as this is done of you, and you have not kept My covenant and My statutes, which I have commanded you, I will surely rend the kingdom from you, and will give it to your servant” (1 Kings 11:11). As he strayed from God, who had appeared to him twice, and enraged God, in the end God gave Israel to his servant Jeroboam and left only one tribe for his son.
God’s attitude toward man depends on how man treats Him.
God’s words say, “God’s disposition is His own inherent substance. It does not change at all with the passage of time, nor does it change whenever the location changes. His inherent disposition is His intrinsic substance. Regardless of whom He carries out His work upon, His substance does not change, and neither does His righteous disposition. … He does not grow angry because of a change in His substance or because His disposition has produced different elements, but because man’s opposition against Him offends His disposition.” “God’s substance contains no darkness or evil. … When people commit wicked acts and offend God, He will bring His anger upon them. When people truly repent, God’s heart will change, and His anger will cease. When people continue to stubbornly oppose God, His rage will be unceasing; His wrath will press in on them bit by bit until they are destroyed. This is the substance of God’s disposition. Regardless of whether God is expressing wrath or mercy and lovingkindness, man’s conduct, behavior and attitude toward God in the depths of his heart dictate that which is expressed through the revelation of God’s disposition.”
These words give us a further understanding of God’s disposition. God is holy and righteous, and His substance does not change with time or geographical environments, nor does it change with the objects of His work. No matter who it is, even if he was previously liked by God, once he offends God’s disposition, God will never condone his transgressions or indulge him. We can see that God’s disposition is real and vivid, and that how God treats man is determined by his attitude to God. This fact can be clearly confirmed through the two different attitudes God took toward Solomon. When Solomon started to reign, he had a heart of seeking and reverence before God and wholeheartedly built the temple for God. At that time, God was pleased with him and gave him wisdom as well as glory and riches, and even promised him to let his sons and grandsons rule Israel for generations. But in his old age, he betrayed God and worshiped idols along with his concubines. This offended God, so God gave ten out of twelve tribes of Israel to his servant. From this, we can see that God treats people based on the path they walk. God’s disposition is not only merciful and compassionate, but also righteous and majestic. God doesn’t treat people based on emotions. That’s why God didn’t forgive Solomon’s sins in the face of his building the temple for Him. God’s wrath is not for venting His anger, but for driving out dark and evil things and bringing good and positive things to mankind so that man can live in the light and under God’s protection. Therefore, only when we know God’s righteous and majestic disposition will we beget a God-fearing heart, and only then will we not offend God and thus not receive His resentment and hatred. Just as the Bible says, “The fear of Jehovah is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the Holy is understanding” (Proverbs 9:10).
My Feelings
I have derived a lesson from the story of Solomon: We should adhere to God’s words and keep to the way of fearing God and shunning evil, and we must not act recklessly.
In the past, we always believed that God was a merciful God, and no matter what sins we committed, God would pardon us and forget our transgressions. But from God’s attitudes toward Solomon, we can see that our belief is too one-sided. God is righteous, so He doesn’t forgive us without limit. Just as the Bible says, “For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins” (Hebrews 10:26). We clearly know that the Lord Jesus’ teachings are truth. As long as we follow His words in our lives, such as striving to be the light and the salt of the earth, being honest people, loving the Lord with all our hearts and soul, and magnifying Him, then we will be able to obtain the Lord’s approval. But our failure to know God’s righteous disposition causes us to have no place for God in our hearts and have no reverence for God. As a result, we often go against the Lord’s teachings. Then how can we possibly gain God’s approval? For example, brothers and sisters are all clearly aware that, in belief in God, pursuing wealth, status and fame shouldn’t be taken as the life goal. But when facing the temptations of the evil worldly trends, some yield to them and begin to follow the evil trends, failing to attend meetings regularly. As another example, some have the honor to become preachers to lead brothers and sisters. They have made resolutions before God to be good, loyal stewards for the Lord and shepherd His flock well. But when doing preaching work, they never exalt or bear witness to the Lord. Instead, they talk endlessly about how much pain they have endured and how many churches they have built, to make brothers and sisters look up to and worship them. As a result, the believers are brought before themselves and have no place for God in their hearts. When encountering things, they don’t pray to seek the Lord’s will, but go to ask the preachers. They have replaced God in believers’ hearts. Isn’t this even more offending God’s disposition? … All this shows that we have no God-fearing heart and are unrepentant after betraying the Lord’s teachings. What’s the difference between us and Solomon?
Thereby, I began to reflect on the path I had taken. When I started to believe in the Lord, I enthusiastically spent my efforts for Him. Later, I became a preacher. At first, I thought my stature was small, so I would be cautious and pray to and depend on the Lord when doing things, and I would give all the glory to Him when my work bore fruit. Because of the Lord’s guidance, I had countless things to say when I preached. Gradually, I thought I was good enough, and that I had some capital. As a result, I no longer had God within my heart, and I began to go against His words. When I preached I didn’t testify to the Lord at all, but instead I lifted myself up and bore witness to how I loyally expended for Him and what kind of suffering I had undergone for Him so that I could have my brothers and sisters look up to me and vie with God for His position in their hearts. My actions and deeds brought God’s disgust, so I later felt dark in my spirit, had no words to say in my preaching, and lost His presence. This failure gave me a true experience of the fact that God is holy and His disposition is unoffendable. Therefore, I repented to God immediately. From then on, when preaching, I consciously exposed and dissected my corruption, and exalted God and witnessed for Him. By doing so, I felt at ease and joyful.
From all this it can be seen that, if we can live before God, obey His teachings, practice according to His words, and satisfy and love Him in everything we do, then we will gain His mercy and blessings. However, if we have no fear of God, violate His teachings, and satisfy our own selfish desires in all things, then we certainly will incur His hatred. We should take warning from Solomon’s failure.
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