"And the rest, some on boards, some on broken pieces of the ship. And so it came to pass that they escaped all safe to land" (Acts 27:44)
The marvelous story of Paul's voyage to Rome, with its trials and triumphs, is a fine pattern of the lights and shades of the way of faith all through the story of human life. The remarkable feature of it is the hard and narrow places which we find intermingled with God's most extraordinary interpositions and providences.
It is the common idea that the pathway of faith is strewn with flowers, and that when God interposes in the life of His people, He does it on a scale so grand that He lifts us quite out of the plane of difficulties. The actual fact, however, is that the real experience is quite contrary. The story of the Bible is one of alternate trial and triumph in the case of everyone of the cloud of witnesses from Abel down to the latest martyr.
Paul, more than anyone else, was an example of how much a child of God can suffer without being crushed or broken in spirit. On account of his testifying in Damascus, he was hunted down by persecutors and obliged to fly for his life. but we behold no heavenly chariot transporting the holy apostle amid thunderbolts of flame from the reach of his foes, but "through a window in a basket,"(Act.9:25) was he let down over the walls of Damascus and so escaped their hands. In an old clothes basket, like a bundle of laundry, or groceries, the servant of Jesus Christ was dropped from the window and ignominiously fled from the hate of his foes.
Again we find him left for months in the lonely dungeons; we find him telling of his watchings, his fastings, and his desertion by friends, of his brutal and shameful beatings, and here even after God has promised to deliver him, we see him for days left to toss upon a stormy sea, obliged to stand guard over the treacherous seaman, and at last when the deliverance comes, there is no heavenly galley sailing from the skies to take off the noble prisoner; there is no angel form walking along the waters and stilling the raging breakers; there is no supernatural sign of the transcendent miracle that is being wrought; but one is compelled to seize a spar, another a floating plank, another to climb on a fragment of the wreck, another to strike out and swim for his life.
Here is God's pattern for our own lives. Here is a Gospel of help for people that have to live in this every day world with real and ordinary surroundings, and a thousand practical conditions which have to be met in a thoroughly practical way.
God's promises and God's providences do not lift us out of the plane of common sense and commonplace trial, but it is through these very things that faith is perfected, and that God loves to interweave the golden threads of His love along the warp and woof of our every day experience.--Hard Places in the Way of Faith
八月二十二日
「其余的人，可以用板子，或船上的零碎东西上岸。这样，众人都得了救上了岸。」（徒廿七44）
保罗上罗马去的那奇异的经历━所受试炼和所得的荣耀━眞是信徒走信心道路的一个好模型，其中最宝贵的教训乃是：在我们所到的一切困难狭窄的地方，都有神特殊的办法和预备的。
按照人们普通的眼光看来，信心的道路，一定是满撒着鲜花的；甚么时候神要拯救祂的子民脱离危险，神就立刻将他们从困难中提出来。事实却正相反。圣经上的故事告诉我们：每一个见证人━从埃布尔起，一直到最近殉道者━都是先受试炼，后得荣耀的。
保罗的经历告诉我们：一个神的孩子，无论受多少苦，仍能不在灵里受压。保罗因为在大马色宣传耶稣的缘故，犹太人商议要杀他，我们看见那时候天上并没有在火焰雷电中降下战车战马来把这位大使徒从仇敌的势力范围中护送出去，他是「用筐子….从城墙缒下去」的（徒九25）。你看被装在一只旧的衣筐里面！像一包送出去洗濯的衣服一般！耶稣基督的仆人竟这样坍台地从窗户口缒下去！
后来，我们又看见他被下在监里，我们看见他怎样被亲友遗弃，怎样受残酷可耻的鞭打；就是在神允许拯救他以后，我们还看见他被留在波涛汹涌的海中顚簸；最后，拯救来了，可是天上并没有大船飞下来把这位尊贵的囚犯接出去；也没有天使在水面上平静猖獗的怒涛；船上的人，必须有的抓住桅杆，有的抓住木板，有的攀住破船的碎片，有的跳下水去游泳，纔能得救上岸。这就是神对待我们的方法。
这是神给我们的生活模式；这种帮助人的福音,为要给予那些活在实际境遇中的人群。他们有数以千计的现实境遇,需要以切实可行的方来处理。
许多时候，神的允许并不是立刻将我们从试炼中提出来的，因为神知道经过试炼以后，我们的信心会变成精金。－－译自信心道路上的艰难