【双语灵修】失去感激的心？LOSING GRATITUDE?
约翰福音 4:28-30
那妇人就留下水罐子，往城里去，对众人说：“你们来看！有一个人将我素来所行的一切事都给我说出来了，莫非这就是基督吗？”众人就出城，往耶稣那里去。
11月22日
失去感激的心？
“那妇人就留下水罐子，往城里去，对众人说：‘你们来看！有一个人将我素来所行的一切事都给我说出来了……’” - 约 4:28-29
“感激的心”是神在我们生命中作工的一个明显迹象。当人对神的恩典感到惊叹时，便会发觉自己心里充满令人震撼的感谢，这就是感激的心。感激的心促使这个被排斥的撒马利亚妇人跑回她的家乡，告诉所有人--当她遇见主时，发生在她身上的事。
遇见基督的人很自然会有感激的心。
可惜的是，随着时间的过去，我们这些耶稣的跟随者也很自然—甚至不自觉地—失去了感激的心。我们努力要循规蹈矩生活的决心，可能慢慢地取代了当初那种近乎可笑的喜悦。
我们的目标是要过荣耀神的生活，在某种程度上是成功的。更忠心事奉神带给我们满足感，开始使我们觉得，初信时感受到的惊喜是微不足道的。我们变得愈好，却变得愈不懂感恩。
但这是不好的。我们的“好”能够变为我们匿藏的地方，我们需要耶稣到那里来寻找我们。基督的门徒需要花时间与“撒玛利亚人”相处，还有另一个原因。当一个“撒玛利亚人”找到神的恩典时，便能帮助我们记起自己在神眼中，其实是怎样的—我们是被爱的。
祷告
神啊，求你在我里面裁种一颗感恩的心，帮助我每天去察觉你的恩典，又让感激塑造我怎样生活，以及怎样与人分享你的爱。阿们。
John 4:28-30
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 22
LOSING GRATITUDE?
Leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. . . .” —John 4:28-29
There is a telltale sign that God has been at work in our lives: gratitude. People who are amazed by God’s grace find themselves filled with a kind of dizzying thankfulness. That’s gratitude, and it can prompt a Samaritan outcast to run back to her town to tell everyone what happened to her when she encountered the Lord.
Gratitude is natural for people who have met Christ.
Unfortunately, it seems that it can also be natural for us as followers of Jesus to lose sight of that gratitude over time— perhaps without even realizing it. Our sense of absurd delight can slowly be replaced by a grim determination to get our act together.
We aim to live in a way that honors God, and to some extent we succeed. The satisfaction we can feel from serving God a bit more faithfully can begin to dwarf the amazement we had at the beginning of our faith journey. It can seem that the more we become good, the less we become thankful.
But that’s not good. Our “goodness” can become a hiding place from which Jesus needs to seek us.
This is one more reason why it’s important for disciples of Christ to spend time with “Samaritans.” When a “Samaritan” discovers God’s grace, that helps each one of us to remember who we really are in God’s eyes—beloved.
God, cultivate in me a heart of thankfulness. Help me to notice your grace each day, and to let gratitude shape how I live and share your love with others. Amen.