我有兩個嗜好：
第一是追溯屬靈偉人的成長過程，
第二就是追蹤他們的終局。
我深信一個人能夠偉大，背後一定有一段很精彩漫長的成長歷程，
讓他從平凡當中被塑造、改變，高昇，至終擁有偉大的特質。
就如大衛，我很想、很想知道，
在他還是一個牧童、獨自在曠野牧羊的時候，
他是一個怎樣的少年人，以至祂會被神選上呢？
當他被掃羅追殺，四處流浪，妻兒擄去、眾叛親離的一刻，
他作出甚麼決定？
當先知拿單指出他的罪行，當神擊打他和拔士巴所生的嬰孩，
大衛在神面前第一個反應是甚麼？
當四境平靜，安坐在香柏木所造的皇宮中，
大衛心裡渴求的是甚麼？
- Oct 09 Fri 2009 12:33
異象與呼召（十九）接棒
- Oct 09 Fri 2009 02:01
異象與角色（二十）信仰終局
(續 「接棒」．．．）
追溯屬靈領袖的成長過程，常常讓我從別人的成功中，尋找到信仰的路徑；
遺憾的是，當我追蹤歷史上許多屬靈領袖的終局，
很多時，我只能從別人的失敗中，為未來作出警剔和步署。
很多次，當我發現一些很有恩膏、很有感力的經典詩歌，
我都會忍不住追查：這首歌是誰創作的呢？！
如此有生命力的詩歌，背後一定有一個感人的生命故事！
在我所追蹤的這些，舉世一時無兩的敬拜讚美領袖中，
他們的事奉壽命，絕大部份只能維持十年。
即使按著年齡計算，他們今天不過處於中年，和日華牧師、展鳴校長年紀相若
但他們的事奉，早已末入黃昏，他們年青時的熱心，也無人再提。
所以，我相信像日華牧師、展鳴校長那樣，
在事奉十年、二十年以後，不但沒有任何走下坡的現象，
反而持續增長、擴展，承傳，已經是在改寫歷史了。
．～．～．～．～．～．～．～．～．～．
- Oct 03 Sat 2009 10:53
The real Oskar Schindler
http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/Holocaust/steinhouse.html It is at this point that the real legend begins. For the next two years, Oskar Schindler's ever-present obsession was how to save the greatest number of Jews from the Auschwitz gas chamber only sixty kilometres from Cracow. His first ambitious move was to attempt to help the starving, fearful prisoners at Plaszow. Schindler requested that those Jews who continued to work in his factory be moved into their own sub-camp near the plant "to save time in getting to the job,". From then on, Schindler found that be could have food and medicine smuggled into the barracks with little danger. The guards, of course, were bribed, and Goeth (the German commander) never was to discover the true motives in Schindler's request. Schindler began to take bigger risks. Interceding for Jews who were denounced for one "crime" or another was a dangerous habit in fascist eyes, but Schindler now started to do this almost regularly. "Stop killing my good workers," was his usual technique. "We've got a war to win. These things can always be settled later." The ruse succeeded often enough to save dozens of lives. By the spring of 1944, the German retreat on the Eastern Front was on in earnest. Plaszow and all its sub-camps were ordered emptied. Schindler and his workers had no illusions about what a move to another concentration camp implied. The time had come for Oskar Schindler to play his trump card, a daring gamble that he had devised beforehand. He went to work on all his drinking companions, on his connections in military and industrial circles in Cracow and in Warsaw. He bribed, cajoled, pleaded, working desperately against time and fighting what everyone assured him was a lost cause. He persisted until someone, somewhere in the hierarchy, perhaps impatient to end the seemingly trifling business, finally gave him the authorization to move a force of 700 men and 300 women from the Plaszow camp into a factory at Brnenec in his native Sudetenland. Most of the other 25,000 men, women, and children at Plaszow were sent to Auschwitz, there to find the same end that several million other Jews had already discovered. But out of the vast calamity, and through the stubborn efforts of one man, a thousand Jews were saved temporarily. One thousand half-starved, sick, and almost broken human beings had had a death sentence commuted by a miraculous reprieve. The Schindlerjuden by now depended on him completely and were fearful in his absence. His compassion and sacrifice were unstinting. He spent every bit of money still left in his possession, and traded his wife's jewellery as well, for food, clothing, and medicine, and for schnapps with which to bribe the many SS investigators. He furnished a secret hospital with stolen and black-market medical equipment, fought epidemics, and once made a 300-mile trip himself carrying two enormous flasks filled with Polish vodka and bringing them back full of desperately needed medicine. His wife, Emilie, cooked and cared for the sick and earned her own reputation and praise. |
