By Xu Zhen, China

My parents had always loved me dearly, ever since I was little, and they did hard physical labor to put my brother and me through school. Seeing them work so hard from dawn to dusk, I thought to myself, “When I grow up, I must earn lots of money so that I can provide a better life for my parents.” After I started working, I sent all the money I earned to my parents, hoping to improve their quality of life. Later, I came to accept God’s work of the last days and shared the gospel with my parents, but my father stopped believing because he was afraid of being persecuted by the great red dragon. My mother, however, continued to support me in my duty and helped take care of my child. I felt that my parents had done so much for me, and every time I went home to visit them, I tried to help them with chores as much as possible and show my filial piety, which made me feel more at ease. In June 2022, the police started to hunt me down because of my evangelism, and after that, I couldn’t return home to see my parents and child. I also worried that my parents were old and in poor health, and that if they fell ill, no one would be there to care for them. By reading God’s words, I understood that a person’s life is entirely arranged by God, and that God is sovereign over my parents’ fate, too, so I entrusted my parents to God, and my state was not greatly affected, allowing me to do my duty normally.

At the end of November 2022, I received a letter from a sister, saying that my mother was in the hospital and in critical condition. The letter didn’t specify what illness she had, and I was very worried, not knowing what illness my mother had or what her condition was. I really wanted to go back to visit my mother. But then I thought about how the police were still hunting me down, and just how busy I was handling the aftermath of multiple churches facing arrests, and how my leaving would delay the church’s work. I was very conflicted, so I prayed to God, entrusting my mother’s illness to Him. In mid-May 2023, I received a letter from home, saying that my mother had passed away from a stroke last year, and that my father had also died from an asthma attack a few days ago. This sudden news was just too much to take. When I thought about how quickly they had gone and about how I didn’t have parents anymore, a wave of pain washed over me and I just couldn’t stop crying. I thought about how I hadn’t been there to care for them when they were ill, and that I hadn’t seen them one last time before they passed away. I felt that they must have been very sad and disappointed in me as their daughter, and that my relatives must have been calling me an unfilial daughter or an ungrateful wretch. I felt so weak that all I could do was cry. When I went to my room and lay down, my head was filled with images of my parents. Their smiles, their kindness to me, and the scenes of our lives together replayed in my mind like a movie over and over again. I thought about how difficult it had been for my parents to raise me, how they did hard physical labor to put me through school, and how my mother helped take care of my child while I was doing my duties away from home. I felt that I owed them so much for every little thing they had done for me. I was in so much pain, and even thought that if I hadn’t performed my duty, and had instead worked to earn money, I could have helped them with their living expenses and provided money for their medical treatment when they were ill, and they might not have passed away so soon. When I thought about all the years I hadn’t been by their side to care for them, and how I hadn’t fulfilled my responsibilities as a daughter, I felt like a sinner and that I owed them so much! During those days, I was in a very despondent state, unable to eat or sleep, living in guilt and pain. Although I was still doing my duty, my heart was deeply disturbed. I also lacked the sense of burden to follow up on the gospel work I was responsible for, and my work was affected as well. In my pain, I prayed to God, “God, my parents have passed away, and I am in great pain and torment. Please help me and keep my heart from being disturbed.” After the prayer, I felt a little more at peace. I recalled God’s words on how to handle the death of one’s parents, so I searched for them to read.

Almighty God says: “When it comes to their parents passing away, people should also possess a correct and rational attitude. … Then, before this has happened, how should you resolve the unexpected blow that it will deal to you, so that it will not impact, interfere with, or affect your performance of your duty or the path that you walk? First, let’s look at what exactly death is all about, and what exactly passing away is all about—doesn’t it mean that a person is leaving this world? (Yes.) It means that the life a person possesses, which has a physical presence, is removed from the material world that humans can see, and disappears. That person then goes on to live in another world, in another form. The lives of your parents departing means that the relationship you have with them in this world has dissolved, disappeared, and ended. They are living in another world, in other forms. As for how their lives will go in that other world, whether they will return to this world, meet you again, or have any kind of fleshly relationship or emotional entanglements with you, this is ordained by God, and it has nothing to do with you. In sum, their passing away means that their missions in this world are over, and a full stop has been placed behind them. Their missions in this life and in this world have ended, so your relationship with them has also ended. As for whether they will be reincarnated in the future, or if they will meet with any kind of penalty and restriction, or any kind of handling and arrangements in the other world, does this have anything to do with you? Can you decide this? It has nothing to do with you, you cannot decide this, and you will not be able to obtain any news of this. Your relationship with them in this life comes to an end at that time. That is, the fate that bound you together as you lived alongside one another for 10, 20, 30, or 40 years comes to an end then. After that, they are them, you are you, and no relationship exists between you at all. Even if you all believe in God, they performed their own duties, and you perform yours; when they no longer live in the same spatial environment, there’s no longer any relationship between you. They have simply completed the missions that God entrusted to them already. So, when it comes to the responsibilities they fulfilled for you, those end the day that you begin existing independently from them—you have nothing to do with your parents anymore. If they pass away today, you will just be missing something on an emotional level, and have two less loved ones to yearn for. You will never see them again, and you will never be able to hear any news of them again. What happens to them afterward and their future has nothing to do with you, there will be no blood ties between you, you will not even be the same kind of being anymore. That’s how it is. Your parents passing away will just be the last news that you hear about them in this world, and the last of the hurdles that you see or hear about when it comes to their experiences of being born, growing old, getting sick, and dying in their lives, that is all. Their deaths won’t take anything away or give anything to you, they will have simply died, their journeys as people will have come to an end. So, when it comes to them passing away, it doesn’t matter whether these are accidental deaths, normal deaths, deaths from illness, and so on, in any case, if not for God’s sovereignty and arrangements, no person or force could take away their lives. Their passing away only means the end of their physical lives. If you miss them and yearn for them, or feel ashamed of yourself due to your feelings, you shouldn’t feel any of these things, and it is not necessary to feel them. They have departed from this world, so missing them is redundant, isn’t it? If you think: ‘Did my parents miss me over all those years? How much more did they suffer because I wasn’t by their side showing filial piety to them for so many years? Over all these years, I’ve always been wishing that I could spend a few days with them, I never expected that they’d pass away so soon. I feel sad and guilty.’ It is not necessary for you to think in this way, their deaths have nothing to do with you. Why do they have nothing to do with you? Because, even if you showed them filial piety or accompanied them, this is not the obligation or task that God has given you. God has ordained how much good fortune and how much suffering your parents will encounter from you—this has nothing at all to do with you. They will not live longer because you are with them, and they will not live shorter lives because you’re far from them and couldn’t be with them often. God has ordained how long they will live, and it has nothing to do with you. Therefore, if you hear news that your parents have passed away during your lifetime, you do not need to feel guilty. You should approach this matter in the correct way and accept it” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (17)). “If you hadn’t left your home to perform your duty elsewhere, and you had stayed by your parent’s side, could you have prevented them from getting sick? (No.) Can you control whether your parents live or die? Can you control whether they are rich or poor? (No.) Whatever illness your parents get, it won’t be because they were so exhausted from raising you, or because they missed you; they especially won’t contract any of those major, serious, and possibly fatal illnesses because of you. That is their fate, and it has nothing to do with you. No matter how filial you are, the most you can achieve is to reduce their fleshly suffering and burdens a little, but as for when they get sick, what illness they contract, when they die, and where they die—do these things have anything to do with you? No, they don’t. If you’re filial, if you’re not an uncaring ingrate, and you spend all day with them, watching over them, will they not get sick? Will they not die? If they’re going to get sick, won’t they get sick anyway? If they’re going to die, won’t they die anyway? Isn’t that right?” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (17)). After reading God’s words, I realized that when a person is born, when they die, and their lifespan, are all part of God’s sovereignty and predestination. When and how our parents die are also all arranged and ruled by God. I hadn’t been viewing things based on God’s words and I hadn’t recognized His sovereignty. I’d thought that if I hadn’t gone out to do my duty, I could have taken care of my parents, and that I could have provided them with medical treatment when they were ill, and that by doing this, they might have lived a few more years and not died so soon. My views on matters had been the same as those of a nonbeliever and identical to the views of a disbeliever. I remembered that when my parents were ill before, I went home to visit them, but all I could do was offer them some comforting words and advise them to take care, and give them the little money I had to buy medicine. But their illnesses didn’t improve, and I couldn’t alleviate their suffering. When I read these words of God in particular: “Whatever illness your parents get, it won’t be because they were so exhausted from raising you, or because they missed you; they especially won’t contract any of those major, serious, and possibly fatal illnesses because of you. That is their fate, and it has nothing to do with you,” I finally realized that my parents’ deaths had nothing to do with me and that when their lifespan was up, they were to leave this world at the time predestined by God. This was their fate. I remembered that my mother had said that my father had been sent to the hospital in critical condition for life-saving treatment on several occasions, and that everyone thought he was about to pass away, but he eventually survived. Many people stay by their parents’ side caring for them for years, but still can’t stop them from dying when they fall ill. No amount of money can save them. I saw that God is sovereign over everyone’s destiny, and that even if I had been by my parents’ side to take care of them, they would still have gotten the illnesses they were meant to get, and no matter how much money I would have spent on their treatment, it couldn’t have saved their lives. Besides, my parents were both over sixty years old and my father had been suffering from asthma for several years and relying on medication to get by every day, and he was in a lot of pain. Now that he had passed away, he was no longer suffering from illness, which was a form of relief for him. With these thoughts in mind, I felt somewhat relieved, my state improved a bit, and I began to do my duty normally.

One day, while I went out doing my duty, I saw an elderly couple on the bus who were about the same age as my parents, and I thought of them again, and about how they had passed away and were now no longer in the same world as me. Thinking about this, tears filled my eyes, and I fell into a really gloomy state. At New Year in particular, I thought of my parents again, and I felt unfilial for not being able to give them a comfortable life. This was a hurdle I just couldn’t get past and I felt so deeply indebted to them. I knew my state was wrong and prayed to God, “God, my parents have passed away and I know this is Your sovereignty and arrangement, but I still can’t let go, and find myself living in guilt and self-blame. Please help me resolve my state.”

After that, I read a passage of God’s words: “When it comes to handling parents’ expectations, is it clear what principles should be followed and what burdens should be let go? (Yes.) So, what exactly are the burdens that people carry here? They must listen to their parents and let their parents live a good life; everything their parents do is for their own good; and they must do what their parents say to be filial. Additionally, as adults, they must do things for their parents, repay their parents’ kindness, be filial to them, accompany them, not make them feel sad or disappointed, not let them down, and do everything they can to minimize their suffering or even eliminate it entirely. If you can’t achieve this, you are ungrateful, unfilial, you deserve to be struck down by thunder and spurned by others, and you are a bad person. Are these your burdens? (Yes.) Since these things are people’s burdens, people should accept the truth and properly face them. Only by accepting the truth can these burdens and wrong thoughts and views be let go of and changed. If you don’t accept the truth, is there another path for you to take? (No.) Thus, whether it’s letting go of burdens of the family or of the flesh, it all starts with accepting the correct thoughts and views and accepting the truth. As you start accepting the truth, these wrong thoughts and views within you will gradually be dismantled, discerned, and seen through, and then gradually they will be rejected. During the process of dismantling, discerning, and then letting go of and rejecting these wrong thoughts and views, you will gradually change your attitude and approach toward these matters. Those thoughts that come from your human conscience or feelings will gradually weaken; they will no longer trouble or bind you deep within your mind, control or influence your life, or interfere with your performance of duty. For example, if you have accepted the correct thoughts and views and accepted this aspect of the truth, when you hear the news of your parents’ death, you will merely shed tears for them without thinking about how during these years you haven’t repaid their kindness in raising you, how you made them suffer so much, how you didn’t recompense them in the slightest, or how you didn’t let them live a good life. You won’t blame yourself for these things anymore—rather, you will exhibit normal expressions stemming from the needs of normal human feelings; you will shed tears and then experience a bit of longing for them. Soon these things will become natural and normal, and you will quickly immerse yourself in a normal life and performing your duties; you will not be troubled by this matter. But if you don’t accept these truths, then when you hear the news of your parents’ passing, you will cry endlessly. You will feel pity for your parents, that for their whole lives they didn’t have it easy, and that they raised such an unfilial child as you; when they were sick, you didn’t wait on them at their bedside, and when they died, you didn’t wail at their funeral or go into mourning; you let them down, you disappointed them, and you didn’t let them live a good life. You will live with this sense of guilt for a long time, and whenever you think about it you will cry and feel a dull aching in your heart. Whenever you encounter related circumstances or people, events, and things, you will have an emotional reaction; this sense of guilt may accompany you for the rest of your life. What is the reason for this? It is that you never accepted the truth or the correct thoughts and views as your life; instead, your old thoughts and views have continued to hold sway over you, influencing your life. So, you will spend the remainder of your life in pain because of your parents’ passing. This continuous suffering will have consequences that go well beyond a little fleshly discomfort; it will affect your life, your attitude toward performing your duties, your attitude toward the work of the church, your attitude toward God, as well as your attitude toward any person or matter that touches your soul. You may also become disheartened and discouraged toward more matters, become despondent and passive, lose faith in life, lose enthusiasm and motivation for anything, and so on. In time, the impact will not be limited to your simple daily life; it will also affect your attitude toward performing your duties and the path you take in life. This is very dangerous. The consequence of this danger may be that you cannot perform your duties as a created being adequately, and you may even stop performing your duties halfway or harbor a resistant mood and attitude toward the duties you perform. In short, this kind of situation will inevitably worsen over time and cause your mood, emotions, and mentality to evolve in a malignant direction. Do you understand? (Yes.)” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (16)). After reading God’s words, I realized that I had been living in pain and guilt, because I had accepted Satan’s traditional ideas, such as “Filial piety is a virtue to be held above all else,” “You must care for your parents in their old age and see them through to the end of their life,” and “An unfilial person is lower than a beast.” I had believed that being filial to parents and providing for them in their old age and seeing them through to the end of their life was the mark of a person with conscience and humanity, and that if a person didn’t do these things, they were unconscionable and lacking in humanity, so my heart was filled with guilt, and I felt a sense of condemnation and unease in my conscience. Upon learning of both my parents’ deaths, I thought about how hard it had been for them to raise me and how much they had sacrificed for me. Yet I hadn’t made them comfortable in their old age or taken care of them when they were ill, and I hadn’t even seen them one last time before they passed away. I kept feeling unfilial and that I hadn’t fulfilled my responsibilities as a child, and that because of this, I would be condemned and spurned by others, and so I couldn’t forgive myself. I held ideas like “Filial piety is a virtue to be held above all else,” “You must care for your parents in their old age and see them through to the end of their life,” and “An unfilial person is lower than a beast” to be positive things, but I didn’t view matters according to God’s words. In reality, God judges whether a person has conscience and humanity based on whether they can fulfill their duty as a created being and satisfy Him. If a person can forsake everything to expend themselves for God and fulfill their duty as a created being, such a person is loyal to God and possesses great conscience and humanity. Conversely, if a person abandons their duty to be filial, even if they care for their parents very well and everyone praises them as a filial child, such a person is living for their fleshly feelings, and is selfish, despicable, and lacking in humanity. I thought about the saints throughout history who forsook their families and jobs to preach the Lord’s gospel. To bring people to God and let them obtain His salvation, they left their homeland and family. In people’s eyes, they seemed unfeeling for not taking care of their family or being filial to their parents, but in God’s eyes, they fulfilled their duties as created beings, and possessed conscience and humanity. Their deeds were commemorated by God. I was following the right path of faith in God, suffering persecution from the CCP and unable to return home. My inability to care for my parents was due to the circumstances, not my lack of filial piety or conscience. No matter how my family viewed me or how nonbelievers scolded me, the path I was on wasn’t wrong. How others view me is not important, what matters is whether I can gain God’s approval. This is what is most important. I was living in a state of indebtedness and guilt due to my parents’ deaths, harboring complaints and rebellion against God, and not being loyal in my duty. In what way did I have any humanity or conscience? God had given me life, watched over me and protected me, and provided for all my needs, yet I was still complaining about Him. I was truly incapable of telling right from wrong and beyond reason! Realizing these things, I prayed to God, “God, I don’t want to live in the pain of my parents’ passing, I wish to repent to You.”

Later, I read a passage of God’s words: “Let’s look at the matter of your parents giving birth to you. Who was it that chose for them to give birth to you: you or your parents? Who chose whom? If you look at this from God’s perspective, the answer is: neither of you. Neither you nor your parents chose for them to give birth to you. If you look at the root of this matter, this was ordained by God. We’ll put this topic to one side for now, as this matter is easy for people to understand. From your perspective, you were passively born to your parents, without having any choice in the matter. From the perspective of your parents, they gave birth to you through their own independent will, right? In other words, putting aside God’s ordination, when it comes to the matter of giving birth to you, it was your parents who had all the power. They chose to give birth to you, and they called all the shots. You did not choose for them to give birth to you, you were passively born to them, and you didn’t have any choice in the matter. So, since your parents had all the power, and they chose to give birth to you, they have an obligation and a responsibility to bring you up, to raise you into an adult, to supply you with an education, with food, clothes, and money—this is their responsibility and obligation, and it is what they ought to do. Whereas you were always passive during the period that they were raising you, you didn’t have the right to choose—you had to be raised by them. Because you were young, you didn’t have the capacity to raise yourself, you had no choice but to be passively brought up by your parents. You were raised in the way that your parents chose, if they gave you nice food and drinks, then you ate and drank nice food and drinks. If your parents provided you with a living environment where you survived off chaff and wild plants, then you survived off chaff and wild plants. In any case, when you were being raised, you were passive, and your parents were fulfilling their responsibility. It’s the same as your parents caring for a flower. Since they want to care for a flower, they should fertilize it, water it, and make sure that it gets sunlight. So, regarding people, no matter whether your parents looked after you meticulously or took great care of you, in any case, they were just fulfilling their responsibility and obligation. Regardless of the reason why they raised you, it was their responsibility—because they gave birth to you, they should take responsibility for you. Based on this, can everything that your parents did for you be considered kindness? It can’t, right? (That’s right.) Your parents fulfilling their responsibility to you doesn’t count as kindness, so if they fulfill their responsibility toward a flower or a plant, watering it and fertilizing it, does that count as kindness? (No.) That is even further from being kindness. Flowers and plants grow better outside—if they’re planted in the ground, with wind, sun, and rainwater, they thrive. They don’t grow as well when they’re planted in a pot indoors as they do outside, but wherever they are, they’re living, right? No matter where they are, it has been ordained by God. You are a living person, and God takes responsibility for every life, enabling it to survive, and to follow the law that all created beings abide by. But as a person, you live in the environment that your parents raise you in, so you should grow up and exist in that environment. You living in that environment is on a larger scale due to God’s ordination; on a smaller scale, it is due to your parents raising you, right? In any case, by raising you your parents are fulfilling a responsibility and an obligation. Raising you into an adult is their obligation and responsibility, and this cannot be called kindness. If it cannot be called kindness, then is it not something that you ought to enjoy? (It is.) This is a kind of right that you should enjoy. You should be raised by your parents, because before you reach adulthood, the role that you play is that of a child being brought up. Therefore, your parents are just fulfilling a kind of responsibility toward you, and you are just receiving it, but you are certainly not receiving grace or kindness from them. For any living creature, bearing and looking after children, reproducing, and raising the next generation is a kind of responsibility. For example, birds, cows, sheep, and even tigers have to take care of their offspring after they reproduce. There are no living creatures that do not raise their offspring. It’s possible that there are some exceptions, but there are not many of them. It’s a natural phenomenon in the existence of living creatures, it’s an instinct for living creatures, and it cannot be attributed to kindness. They are just abiding by a law that the Creator set out for animals and for mankind. Therefore, your parents raising you isn’t a kind of kindness. Based on this, it can be said that your parents are not your creditors. They are fulfilling their responsibility to you. No matter how much effort and money they spend on you, they should not ask you to recompense them, because this is their responsibility as parents. Since it is a responsibility and an obligation, it should be free, and they should not ask for compensation” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (17)). After reading God’s words, I realized that it had been their responsibility and obligation to raise me after they gave birth to me, and this couldn’t be considered kindness. I hadn’t understood the truth and regarded my parents’ care and upbringing as kindness, thinking that they had given so much for me and had been kind to me, so I should repay their kindness. When my parents were ill, I didn’t return to care for them, and when they passed away, I didn’t even see them one last time. I felt deeply indebted to my parents, but after reading God’s words, I realized that raising children to adulthood is what parents are supposed to do. It is their responsibility. Just as a person who looks after a potted plant has the responsibility to water and fertilize it, this is not considered kindness. The goodness of my parents and everything they did for me stemmed from God’s sovereignty and arrangement, and I should accept this as being from God. I didn’t owe my parents anything, nor did I need to repay or compensate for anything. After I understood this, the pain in my heart abated somewhat.

Regarding how to view my parents, I found a path in God’s words. I read these words of God: “Your parents are not your creditors—that is, you shouldn’t always ponder on how you must repay them just because they’ve spent so long raising you. If you are not able to repay them, if you do not have the chance or the right circumstances to repay them, you’ll always feel sad and guilty, to the extent that you will even feel sad whenever you see someone with, taking care of, or doing some things to show filial piety to their parents. God ordained that your parents would raise you, enabling you to grow into an adult, not so that you would spend your life repaying them. You have responsibilities and obligations that you must fulfill in this life, a path that you must take, and you have your own life. In this life, you should not put all of your energy into repaying your parents’ kindness. This is just something that accompanies you in your life and on your life path. In terms of humanity and emotional relationships, it is something that is unavoidable. But as for what kind of relationship you and your parents are fated to have, whether you will be able to live together for the rest of your life, or whether you will be separated, and are not linked together by fate, this depends on God’s orchestrations and arrangements. If God has orchestrated and arranged that you will be in a different place to your parents during this life, that you will be very far away from them, and unable to live together often, then fulfilling your responsibilities to them is, to you, just a kind of aspiration. If God has arranged for you to live very close to your parents in this life, and to be able to stay by their side, then fulfilling a bit of your responsibilities to your parents, and showing them some filial piety are things that you should do in this life—there is nothing that can be criticized about this. But if you are in a different place from your parents, and you do not have the chance or the right circumstances to show them filial piety, then you do not need to regard this as a shameful thing. You should not feel ashamed to face your parents because you are unable to show them filial piety, it is just that your circumstances don’t allow it. As a child, you should understand that your parents are not your creditors. There are many things that you must do in this life, and these are all things that a created being ought to do, that have been entrusted to you by the Lord of creation, and they have nothing to do with you repaying your parents’ kindness. Showing filial piety to your parents, repaying them, returning their kindness—these things have nothing to do with your mission in life. It can also be said that it is not necessary for you to show filial piety to your parents, to repay them, or to fulfill any of your responsibilities to them. To put it plainly, you can do a bit of this and fulfill a bit of your responsibilities when your circumstances allow; when they do not, you do not need to insist upon doing so. If you cannot fulfill your responsibility to show filial piety to your parents, this is not a terrible thing, it just goes against your conscience, human morality, and human notions a little. But at the very least, it does not go against the truth, and God will not condemn you for it. When you understand the truth, your conscience will not feel rebuked on account of this. Do your hearts not feel steady now that you have understood this aspect of the truth? (Yes.)” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (17)). After reading God’s words, I understood that my parents were not my creditors. God’s predestination for me to be born in the last days is not for me to repay my parents or be filial to them, but to fulfill the mission that I must complete, which is to do the duty of a created being, as is what I should do as a person. Filial piety should be based on one’s own conditions. If it doesn’t delay duty, one can visit their parents to fulfill the responsibilities of a child. But if, while out doing their duty, there is no opportunity to be by their parents’ side to care for them, there is no need for them to feel indebted or guilty. At crucial times, duties must take priority. This was especially apparent after reading God’s words saying: “As members of the human race and devout Christians, it is the responsibility and obligation of us all to offer up our minds and bodies for the fulfillment of God’s commission, for our entire being came from God, and it exists thanks to the sovereignty of God. If our minds and bodies are not dedicated to God’s commission and the just cause of mankind, then our souls will feel ashamed before those who were martyred for God’s commission, and much more ashamed before God, who has provided us with everything” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Appendix 2: God Presides Over the Fate of All Mankind). God is the source of human life. My life had been given by God and my being alive today is also due to God’s care and protection. Doing the duty of a created being today is my responsibility and obligation. Understanding this, I can view the passing of my parents correctly.

Although I still occasionally think of my parents, I am no longer constrained by this and am able to focus on my duties. It is God’s words that have guided me to understand how to correctly view the passing of my parents, and learn the principles of practice on how to view my parents. I have emerged from my pain. I give thanks for God’s salvation!