马可福音13:32-37
耶稣说：「但那日子，那时辰，没有人知道，连天上的使者也不知道，子也不知道，惟有父知道。你们要谨慎，警醒祈祷，因为你们不晓得那日期几时来到。这事正如一个人离开本家，寄居外邦，把权柄交给仆人，分派各人当做的工，又吩咐看门的警醒。所以，你们要警醒；因为你们不知道家主甚么时候来，或晚上，或半夜，或鸡叫，或早晨；恐怕他忽然来到，看见你们睡着了。我对你们所说的话，也是对众人说：要警醒！」
垃圾时间(Garbage time)常用于有时间限制的多种体育赛事，通常在一场比赛中，双方队伍的得分分数差距太大，已经难以改变胜负结果，这时剩余的比赛时间就被称为垃圾时间。在垃圾时间，双方成员就不大会尽力投入比赛，大家准备搓掉时间而结束比赛。
也许我们会想：我已经信神，可以得永生了，那我剩余的人生呢？是不是就等于是体育赛事中的垃圾时间？
在一支队伍吞下11败后又即将接续吞下败仗时，教练准备放弃比赛，派出板凳球员上场来消磨垃圾时间；但这位在过去23场比赛只上场不到55分钟的球员，却为球队带来了最好的成绩。我们可以从林书豪的身上得到学习。
Hi GAMErs,
Today’s passage is 2 Kings 6:24-33. As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first. See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below. Let’s go!
2 Kings 6:24-30 (NIV)
24 Some time later, Ben-Hadad king of Aram mobilized his entire army and marched up and laid siege to Samaria.
25 There was a great famine in the city; the siege lasted so long that a donkey’s head sold for eighty shekels of silver, and a quarter of a cab of seed pods for five shekels.
26 As the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, a woman cried to him, “Help me, my lord the king!”
On verses 24-30: King Ben-Hadad of Aram has laid seige to Samaria, Israel’s capital city. Without access to food, Samaria suffers a severe famine. The Israelites in Samaria are so desperate that in verses 26-29 we read about two Israelite mothers who apparently agreed that they would eat their sons to survive. Now that one mother’s son has been eaten, the other mother refuses to let her own son suffer the same fate.
诗篇4:6 谁能指示我们甚么好处？耶和华啊，求祢仰起脸来，光照我们。
诗篇31:16 求祢使祢的脸光照仆人，凭祢的慈爱拯救我。
小兄弟俩人合住在小房间里，白天没有阳光，觉得非常阴暗。他们看见外面的阳光很是羡慕，两人就商量说，我们去把外面的阳光扫一点进来。
于是，兄弟俩拿着扫帚和畚箕，走到外面去扫阳光。扫的时候，畚箕里好像装满了阳光，等到他们把畚箕搬到房间里的时候，里面的阳光就不见了。这样一而再，再而三的扫了许多次，屋内还是一点阳光都没有。
母亲看见很讶异，问说：「你们作甚么？」他们回答说：「房间里太黑了，我们要扫一点阳光进来。」母亲说：「傻孩子，只要把窗户打开，阳光自然会进来，何必扫呢？」
诗篇4:6 谁能指示我们甚么好处？耶和华啊，求祢仰起脸来，光照我们。
诗篇31:16 求祢使祢的脸光照仆人，凭祢的慈爱拯救我。
小兄弟俩人合住在小房间里，白天没有阳光，觉得非常阴暗。他们看见外面的阳光很是羡慕，两人就商量说，我们去把外面的阳光扫一点进来。
于是，兄弟俩拿着扫帚和畚箕，走到外面去扫阳光。扫的时候，畚箕里好像装满了阳光，等到他们把畚箕搬到房间里的时候，里面的阳光就不见了。这样一而再，再而三的扫了许多次，屋内还是一点阳光都没有。
母亲看见很讶异，问说：「你们作甚么？」他们回答说：「房间里太黑了，我们要扫一点阳光进来。」母亲说：「傻孩子，只要把窗户打开，阳光自然会进来，何必扫呢？」
Hi GAMErs,
Today’s passage is 2 Kings 6:1-23. As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first. See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below. Let’s go!
2 Kings 6:1-6 (NIV)
1 The company of the prophets said to Elisha, “Look, the place where we meet with you is too small for us.
2 Let us go to the Jordan, where each of us can get a pole; and let us build a place there for us to live.” And he said, “Go.”
3 Then one of them said, “Won’t you please come with your servants?” “I will,” Elisha replied.
4 And he went with them. They went to the Jordan and began to cut down trees.
5 As one of them was cutting down a tree, the iron axhead fell into the water. “Oh, my lord,” he cried out, “it was borrowed!”
6 The man of God asked, “Where did it fall?” When he showed him the place, Elisha cut a stick and threw it there, and made the iron float.
On verses 1-6: The number of prophets Elisha is discipling is growing, so Elisha’s disciples propose that they build a new facility for them to meet near the Jordan River. They begin to cut down trees in the Jordan. While one of the young prophets is cutting, his ax head flies off its handle and falls into the water. The young prophet is distraught because the ax head was not his, but was borrowed.
Hi GAMErs,
Today’s passage is 2 Kings 5:13-27. As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first. See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below. Let’s go!
2 Kings 5:13-14 (NIV)
13 Naaman’s servants went to him and said, “My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more, then, when he tells you, ‘Wash and be cleansed’!”
14 So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy.
On verses 13-14: Elisha had told Naaman to wash himself seven times in the Jordan River and his leprosy would be cleansed. Naaman was outraged at how “unspiritual” Elisha’s advice was, believing Elisha’s advice to be purely practical and natural instead of supernatural (v11-12). Yet his servants advise Naaman to take Elisha’s advice seriously (v13). Naaman follows Elisha’s advice. When he dips himself 7 times in the Jordan River, his leprosy is cleansed and his skin is restored (v14).
11 到了一个地方，因为太阳落了，就在那里住宿，便拾起那地方的一块石头枕在头下，在那里躺卧睡了。 12 梦见一个梯子立在地上，梯子的头顶着天，有神的使者在梯子上上去下来。 13 耶和华站在梯子以上[a]，说：「我是耶和华你祖亚伯拉罕的神，也是以撒的神，我要将你现在所躺卧之地赐给你和你的后裔。 14 你的后裔必像地上的尘沙那样多，必向东西南北开展。地上万族必因你和你的后裔得福。 15 我也与你同在，你无论往哪里去，我必保佑你，领你归回这地，总不离弃你，直到我成全了向你所应许的。」
雅各的经历让我想起四十年前只身启程前往美国求学的旅程，印象虽有点模糊，但是那种不知未来的不安情绪却是无法遗忘。很感谢神，祂安排了一位老教授坐我邻座，因转机需在东京留宿一晚，我就跟着他后面出关、入关，一直平安到美国。那时候，我真实的领受到雅各单纯、平凡的祷告，「保佑我，给我吃，给我穿，使我平平安安地回家」，因为我需要。
现在的祷告内容多了许多，工作难题、人际关系、家人需要、服事代祷…，牧者还不断提醒我们要感谢，要赞美。是的！圣经教导我们在祷告中交托我们许许多多的生活需要，但是，有些时候我还是会渴慕像雅各那样单纯、平凡的祷告；因为我相信未祈求以先，天父已经知道我所需用的，而「有得吃，有得穿，享平安」就是我最平凡的需要。
马太福音7:1-2
你们不要论断人，免得你们被论断。因为你们怎样论断人，也必怎样被论断；你们用甚么量器量给人，也必用甚么量器量给你们。
网路一篇文章写着：有个人初到美国不久，某天早晨到公园散步，看到一些白人坐在草坪上聊天、晒太阳。他心想：「美国人生活真是悠闲，有钱又懂得享受生活。」
走了不久，又看到几个黑人也悠闲地坐在草坪的另一边，这位先生不禁想到：「唉！黑人失业的问题真严重，这些人大概都在领社会救济金过生活。」
一个人对同样悠闲地坐在草坪上的白人和黑人，从既有的印象或认知，竟然可以产生如此南辕北辙的主观想法。哈兹立特有句话：「偏见是无知的孩子。」说得一点都不错，「人」合「扁」为偏，人一旦有了偏见，就会把「人」看「扁」、看「偏」了。
Hi GAMErs,
Today’s passage is 2 Kings 5:1-12. As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first. See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below. Let’s go!
2 Kings 5:1-12 (NIV)
1 Now Naaman was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded, because through him the LORD had given victory to Aram. He was a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy.
2 Now bands from Aram had gone out and had taken captive a young girl from Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife.
3 She said to her mistress, “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.”
On verses 1-12: Naaman was a high-powered commander of Aram’s army, yet he had a disease that his influence, intelligence and experience could not solve. He had leprosy. So with the recommendation of an Israelite slave girl in his house, Naaman gets permission from the king of Aram to go to the king of Israel to see if Elisha the prophet can heal him. Naaman brings with him a huge amount of gold and silver.
Hi GAMErs,
Today’s passage is 2 Kings 4:18-44. As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first. See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below. Let’s go!
2 Kings 4:18-37 (NIV)
18 The child grew, and one day he went out to his father, who was with the reapers.
19 “My head! My head!” he said to his father. His father told a servant, “Carry him to his mother.”
20 After the servant had lifted him up and carried him to his mother, the boy sat on her lap until noon, and then he died.
21 She went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, then shut the door and went out.
On verses 18-37: Here God uses Elisha to raise a dead boy back to life. We’ll look at some of the lessons we can learn from this incredible miracle when we talk about verses 42-44.
But for now notice that the Shunammite woman was willing to pour out her heart in front of Elisha, but not in front of Elisha’s servant Gehazi.
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