九月七日

经文: 海上有忧愁，不得平静。（耶利米书四十九：23）

9月7日静夜亮光 9月7日静夜亮光

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我们不知道此刻在海上会有什么令人担忧的事情。我们安坐在自己的家中，在远处的大海上，现在可能正有一风暴残酷地袭击船只，要毁灭一些人的生命。请听在甲板上死亡的咆哮！当波涛好像破城槌般击打着船只，请看船身是如何战栗！可怜的、湿透的、疲乏的人啊，上帝能助你！我的祈祷上达于海洋陆地之主，祂将平静风浪，领你进入久盼的避风港！在祈祷以外，我应作更多的事。我应该为那些经常冒险的壮汉作些有益的事。那狂暴的海洋经常吞噬水手，海上死亡的忧愁在寡妇孤儿的哀泣中回荡着。许多母亲和妻子的眼中所流的是海洋的咸泪。毫无恻隐之心的巨浪啊，你已吞噬了妇人的爱和家庭的支柱。当海交出其中的死人，从地底深处复活的人是不计其数的！海上的忧愁将持续至那个时刻。好像对着地土的忧患表同情，海洋永远拍击着无际的海岸，像海鸟般悲鸣。她以烦躁空洞之响声轰隆着，以喧嚣之不满谵语着，以凶暴之怒气颠簸着，或与成万喃喃细语的卵石争闹着。这不是我们安息之处，汹涌澎湃的巨浪也如此告诉我们。有一地是没有海洋的，我们的脸坚定地朝向那地。我们要往主告诉我们的地方去。到那时，我们将忧伤交托给主，祂是那位行走在海面上的主。祂为自己的百姓在海洋深处开出一条路来。

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Evening, September 7

Scripture: “There is sorrow on the sea; it cannot be quiet.”(Jeremiah 49:23)

Little know we what sorrow may be upon the sea at this moment. We are safe in our quiet chamber, but far away on the salt sea the hurricane may be cruelly seeking for the lives of men. Hear how the death fiends howl among the cordage; how every timber starts as the waves beat like battering rams upon the vessel! God help you, poor drenched and wearied ones! My prayer goes up to the great Lord of sea and land, that he will make the storm a calm, and bring you to your desired haven! Nor ought I to offer prayer alone, I should try to benefit those hardy men who risk their lives so constantly. Have I ever done anything for them? What can I do? How often does the boisterous sea swallow up the mariner! Thousands of corpses lie where pearls lie deep. There is death-sorrow on the sea, which is echoed in the long wail of widows and orphans. The salt of the sea is in many eyes of mothers and wives. Remorseless billows, ye have devoured the love of women, and the stay of households. What a resurrection shall there be from the caverns of the deep when the sea gives up her dead! Till then there will be sorrow on the sea. As if in sympathy with the woes of earth, the sea is for ever fretting along a thousand shores, wailing with a sorrowful cry like her own birds, booming with a hollow crash of unrest, raving with uproarious discontent, chafing with hoarse wrath, or jangling with the voices of ten thousand murmuring pebbles. The roar of the sea may be joyous to a rejoicing spirit, but to the son of sorrow the wide, wide ocean is even more forlorn than the wide, wide world. This is not our rest, and the restless billows tell us so. There is a land where there is no more sea—our faces are steadfastly set towards it; we are going to the place of which the Lord hath spoken. Till then, we cast our sorrows on the Lord who trod the sea of old, and who maketh a way for his people through the depths thereof.