Words of Almighty God of the Last Days

Most people believe in God for the sake of peace and other benefits. Unless it is to your benefit, you do not believe in God, and if you cannot receive God’s graces, you fall into a sulk. How could what you have said be your true stature? When it comes to inevitable family incidents such as children falling ill, loved ones being hospitalized, poor crop yields, and persecution by family members, even these oft-occurring, quotidian matters are too much for you. When such things happen, you are thrown into a panic, you do not know what to do—and most of the time, you complain about God. You complain that God’s words tricked you, that God’s work made a mockery of you. Do you not have such thoughts? Do you think such things happen among you only rarely? You spend every day living amid such events. You do not give the slightest thought to the success of your faith in God, and how to satisfy God’s intentions. Your true stature is too small, even smaller than a little chick’s. When your family’s business loses money you complain about God, when you find yourself in an environment without God’s protection you still complain about God, and you complain even when one of your chicks dies or an old cow in the pen falls ill. You complain when it is time for your son to get married but your family does not have enough money; you want to perform the duty of hosting, but cannot afford it, and then you also complain. You are overflowing with complaints, and you sometimes do not attend gatherings or eat and drink the words of God because of this, sometimes becoming negative for a great length of time. Nothing that happens to you today bears any relation to your prospects or fate; these things would also happen even if you did not believe in God, yet today you pass responsibility for them to God, and insist on saying that God has eliminated you. What of your belief in God? Have you truly offered up your life? If you suffered the same trials as Job, none among you who follow God today would be able to stand firm, you would all fall down. And there is, quite simply, a world of difference between you and Job. Today, if half your assets were seized you would dare to deny the existence of God; if your son or daughter were taken from you, you would run the streets crying foul; if your only way to make a living reached a dead end, you would try and take it up with God; you would ask why I said so many words in the beginning to scare you. There is nothing you would not dare to do at such times. This shows that you have not gained any true insights, and have no true stature. Thus, the trials in you are too big, for you know too much, but what you truly understand is not even a thousandth of what you are aware of. Do not stop at mere understanding and comprehension; you had best see how much you can truly put into practice, how much of the enlightenment and illumination of the Holy Spirit was earned through the sweat of your own hard work, and in how many of your practices you have realized your own resolve. You should take your stature and practice seriously. In your belief in God, you should not try to merely go through the motions for anyone—whether or not you can ultimately gain the truth and life depends on your own pursuit.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Practice (3)

These days, most people are in this sort of state: In order to gain blessings, I must expend myself for God and pay a price for Him. In order to gain blessings, I must abandon everything for God; I must complete what He has entrusted me with, and I must perform my duty well. This state is dominated by the intention to gain blessings, which is an example of expending oneself for God entirely for the purpose of obtaining rewards from Him and gaining a crown. Such people do not have the truth in their hearts, and it is certain that their understanding merely consists of a few words and doctrines which they show off everywhere they go. Theirs is the path of Paul. The faith of such people is an act of constant toil, and deep down they feel that the more they do, the more it will prove their loyalty to God; that the more they do, the more He will certainly be satisfied; and that the more they do, the more they will deserve to be granted a crown before God, and the greater the blessings they gain will be. They think that if they can endure suffering, preach, and die for Christ, if they can sacrifice their own lives, and if they can complete all of the duties with which God has entrusted them, then they will be those who gain the greatest blessings, and they will be certain to be granted crowns. This is precisely what Paul imagined and what he sought. This is the exact path that he walked, and it was under the guidance of such thoughts that he worked to serve God. Do those thoughts and intentions not originate from a satanic nature? It is just like worldly humans, who believe that while on earth they must pursue knowledge, and that after obtaining it they can stand out from the crowd, become officials, and have status. They think that once they have status, they can realize their ambitions and bring their businesses and family practices up to a certain level of prosperity. Do not all nonbelievers walk this path? Those who are dominated by this satanic nature can only be like Paul in their faith. They think: “I must cast off everything to expend myself for God. I must be loyal before God, and eventually, I will receive great rewards and great crowns.” This is the same attitude as that of worldly people who pursue worldly things. They are no different at all, and they are subject to the same nature. When people have this sort of satanic nature, out in the world, they will seek to obtain knowledge, learning, status, and to stand out from the crowd. If they believe in God, they will seek to obtain great crowns and great blessings. If people do not pursue the truth when they believe in God, they are sure to take this path. This is an immutable fact, it is a natural law.

—The Word, Vol. 3. The Discourses of Christ of the Last Days. How to Walk the Path of Peter

Many who follow God are only concerned with how to gain blessings or stave off disaster. As soon as God’s work and management are mentioned, they fall silent and lose all interest. They think that understanding such tedious issues will not help their lives to grow or provide any benefit. Consequently, although they have heard about God’s management, they pay it little heed. They do not see it as something precious to be accepted, much less do they accept it by taking it as part of their lives. Such people only have one simple aim in following God, and that aim is to receive blessings. Such people cannot be bothered to pay heed to anything else that does not directly involve this aim. To them, there is no goal more legitimate than believing in God to receive blessings—it is the very value of their faith. If something does not contribute to this aim, they remain completely unmoved by it. This is the case with most people who believe in God today. Their aim and intention seem legitimate, because as they believe in God, they also expend for God, dedicate themselves to God, and perform their duty. They give up their youth, forsake family and career, and even spend years away from home busying themselves. For the sake of their ultimate goal, they change their own interests, their outlook on life, and even the direction they seek; yet they cannot change the aim of their belief in God. They run about for the management of their own ideals; no matter how far the road is, and no matter how many hardships and obstacles there are along the way, they remain persistent and unafraid of death. What power compels them to continue dedicating themselves in this way? Is it their conscience? Is it their great and noble character? Is it their determination to battle the forces of evil to the very end? Is it their faith to bear witness to God without seeking reward? Is it their loyalty in being willing to give up everything to fulfill God’s will? Or is it their spirit of devotion to always forgo extravagant personal demands? For someone who has never understood the work of God’s management to still give so much is, quite simply, a miracle! For the moment, let us not discuss how much these people have given. Their behavior, however, is highly worthy of our dissection. Apart from the benefits that are so closely associated with them, could there be any other reasons why people who never understand God would give so much for Him? In this, we discover a previously unidentified problem: Man’s relationship with God is merely one of naked self-interest. It is a relationship between a receiver and a giver of blessings. To put it plainly, it is akin to the relationship between employee and employer. The employee works only to receive the rewards bestowed by the employer. There is no affection in such a relationship, only transaction. There is no loving or being loved, only charity and mercy. There is no understanding, only suppressed indignation and deception. There is no intimacy, only an uncrossable chasm. Now that things have gotten to this point, who can reverse such a course? And how many people are capable of truly understanding how dire this relationship has become? I believe that when people immerse themselves in the joy of being blessed, none can imagine how embarrassing and unsightly such a relationship with God is.

The saddest thing about mankind’s belief in God is that man conducts his own management amidst the work of God and yet pays no heed to God’s management. Man’s biggest failure lies in how, at the same time as seeking to submit to God and worship Him, man is constructing his own ideal destination and plotting how to receive the greatest blessing and the best destination. Even if one understands how pitiable, detestable, and pathetic they are, how many can readily abandon their ideals and hopes? And who are able to halt their own steps and stop from thinking only of themselves? God needs those who will cooperate closely with Him to complete His management. He needs those who will submit to Him by devoting their entire mind and body to the work of His management. He does not need people who hold out their hands to beg from Him every day, much less those who give a little and then wait to be rewarded. God despises those who make a paltry contribution and then rest on their laurels. He hates those cold-blooded people who resent the work of His management and only want to talk about going to heaven and gaining blessings. He has an even greater loathing for those who take advantage of the opportunity presented by the work He does in saving mankind. That’s because these people have never cared about what God wishes to achieve and acquire through the work of His management. They are only concerned with how they can use the opportunity provided by the work of God to gain blessings. They care not about God’s heart, being wholly preoccupied with their own prospects and fate. Those who resent the work of God’s management and lack even the slightest interest in how God saves mankind and His intentions are only doing what pleases themselves in a way that is detached from the work of God’s management. Their behavior is neither remembered nor approved of by God—much less is it favorably looked upon by God.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Appendix 3: Man Can Only Be Saved Amidst God’s Management

In your seeking, you have too many individual notions, hopes, and futures. The current work is in order to prune your desire for status and your extravagant desires. Hopes, status, and notions are all classic representations of satanic disposition. The reason that these things exist in people’s hearts is entirely because Satan’s poison is always corroding people’s thoughts, and always people are unable to shake off these temptations of Satan. They are living in the midst of sin yet do not believe it to be sin, and still they think: “We believe in God, so He must bestow blessings on us and arrange everything for us appropriately. We believe in God, so we must be superior to others, and we must have more status and more of a future than anyone else. Since we believe in God, He must give us limitless blessings. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be called believing in God.” For many years, the thoughts that people have relied upon for their survival have been corroding their hearts to the point that they have become treacherous, cowardly, and despicable. Not only do they lack willpower and resolve, but they have also become greedy, arrogant, and willful. They are utterly lacking any resolve that transcends the self, and even more, they don’t have a bit of courage to shake off the strictures of these dark influences. People’s thoughts and lives are so rotten that their perspectives on believing in God are still unbearably hideous, and even when people speak of their perspectives on belief in God it is simply unbearable to hear. People are all cowardly, incompetent, despicable, and fragile. They do not feel disgust for the forces of darkness, and they do not feel love for the light and the truth; instead, they do their utmost to expel them. Are not your current thoughts and perspectives just like this? “Since I believe in God I should just be showered with blessings and it should be ensured that my status never slips and that it remains higher than that of nonbelievers.” You have not been harboring that kind of perspective within you for just one or two years, but for many years. Your transactional way of thinking is overdeveloped. Although you have arrived at this step today, you still have not let go of status but struggle constantly to inquire about it, and observe it daily, with a deep fear that one day your status will be lost and your name will be ruined. People have never put aside their desire for ease. … The more you seek in this way, the less you will reap. The greater a person’s desire for status, the more seriously they will have to be pruned and the more they will have to undergo great refinement. Such people are worthless! They must be pruned and judged adequately in order for them to thoroughly let go of these things. If you pursue this way until the end, you will reap nothing. Those who do not pursue life cannot be transformed, and those who do not thirst for the truth cannot gain the truth. You do not focus on pursuing personal transformation and entry, but focus instead on extravagant desires and things that constrain your love for God and prevent you from drawing close to Him. Can those things transform you? Can they bring you into the kingdom? If the object of your pursuit is not to seek the truth, then you may as well take advantage of this opportunity and return to the world to make a go of it. Wasting your time this way is really not worth it—why torture yourself? Is it not true that you could enjoy all sorts of things out in the beautiful world? Money, beautiful women, status, vanity, family, children, and so on—are these products of the world not the best things that you could enjoy? What use is it to wander around here looking for a place where you can be happy? The Son of man has nowhere to lay His head, so how could you have a place of ease? How could He create for you a beautiful place of ease? Is that possible? Aside from My judgment, today you can only receive teachings on the truth. You cannot gain comfort from Me and you cannot gain the bed of roses that you long for night and day. I will not bestow upon you the riches of the world. If you pursue genuinely, then I am willing to give you the way of life in its entirety, to have you be like a fish back in water. If you do not pursue genuinely, I will take it all back. I am not willing to give the words from My mouth to those who are greedy for comfort, who are just like pigs and dogs!

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Why Are You Unwilling to Be a Foil?

Whenever destination is mentioned, you treat it with special seriousness; it is, moreover, something that you are all particularly sensitive about. Some people cannot wait to knock their heads against the ground, kowtowing before God in order to obtain a good destination. I can identify with your eagerness, which does not need to be expressed in words. It is no more than that you do not want your flesh to fall into disaster, and still less do you wish to descend into everlasting punishment in the future. You only hope to allow yourselves to live a little more freely, a little more easily. And so you feel particularly agitated whenever destination is mentioned, deeply afraid that, if you are not attentive enough, you may offend God and thus be subject to the retribution you deserve. You have not hesitated to make compromises for the sake of your destination, and even the many of you who were once devious and flippant have suddenly become especially gentle and sincere; your appearance of sincerity chills people to the marrow. Nevertheless, you all have “honest” hearts, and you have consistently opened up to Me the secrets in your hearts without keeping anything back, whether it be grievance, deceit, or devotion. All in all, you have very candidly “confessed” to Me the substantive things that lie within the deepest recesses of your being. Of course, I have never skirted around such things, for to Me they have become all too familiar. You would rather enter the sea of fire for the sake of your final destination than lose a single strand of hair to gain God’s approval. It is not that I am being too dogmatic with you; it is that you are too lacking in a heart of devotion to come face to face with all that I do. You may not understand what I have just said, so let Me provide you with a simple explanation: What you need is not truth and life, nor the principles of how to conduct yourselves, much less My painstaking work. Rather, what you need is everything you possess in the flesh—wealth, status, family, marriage, and so on. You are utterly dismissive of My words and work, so I can sum up your faith in one word: perfunctory. You will go to any lengths to achieve the things to which you are absolutely devoted, but I have discovered that you would not do the same for the sake of matters concerning your belief in God. Rather, you are relatively devoted, and relatively earnest. That is why I say that those who lack a heart of utmost sincerity are failures in their belief in God. Think carefully—are there many failures among you?

You ought to know that success in belief in God is achieved as a result of people’s own actions; when people do not succeed but instead fail, that too is due to their own actions, and no role is played by any other factor. I believe that you would do anything it takes to achieve something that is more difficult and entails more suffering than believing in God, and that you would treat it very seriously, so much so that you would be unwilling to tolerate any errors; these are the kinds of unremitting efforts all of you put into your own lives. You are even capable of deceiving My flesh under circumstances in which you would not deceive any member of your own family. This is your consistent behavior and the principle by which you live. Are you not still projecting a false facade to deceive Me for the sake of your destination, so that your destination may be perfectly beautiful and all that you desire? I am aware that your devotion is but temporary, as is your sincerity. Are not your resolve and the price you pay only for the sake of the present moment and not the future? You want only to exert one final effort to strive to secure a beautiful destination, with the sole aim of making a trade. You do not make this effort to avoid becoming indebted to the truth, and less still for the sake of repaying Me for the price I have paid. In short, you are willing only to employ clever stratagems to get what you want, but not to do open battle for it. Is this not your heartfelt wish? You must not disguise yourselves, nor rack your brains over your destination to the point where you are unable to eat or sleep. Is it not true that your outcome will have already been determined in the end? You should each fulfill your own duty with open and honest hearts, and be willing to pay whatever price is necessary. As you have said, when the day comes, God will not be remiss toward anyone who has suffered or paid a price for Him. This kind of conviction is worth holding on to, and it is right that you should never forget it. Only in this way can I put My mind at ease about you. Otherwise, you will forever be people about whom I cannot put My mind at ease, and you will forever be the objects of My distaste. If all of you can follow your conscience and give your all for Me, sparing no effort for My work, and devoting the energy of a lifetime to My gospel work, then will My heart not often leap for joy on your account? This way, I will be able to put My mind entirely at ease regarding you, won’t I? It is a shame that what you can do is but a pitifully tiny part of what I expect. This being the case, how can you have the gall to seek from Me what you hope for?

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. On Destination

When some people are dismissed from their post as leader and they hear the Above saying that they won’t be cultivated or used again, they feel incredibly sad, and they cry bitterly, as if they were being eliminated—what problem is this? Does them not being cultivated or used again mean that they are being eliminated? Does it mean that they cannot then attain salvation? Are fame, gain, and status really so important to them? If they are someone who pursues the truth, then they should reflect on themselves when they lose their fame, gain, and status, and feel true remorse; they should choose the path of pursuing the truth, turn over a new leaf, and not get so upset or cry so much. If they know in their hearts that they’ve been dismissed by God’s house because they don’t do real work and don’t pursue the truth, and they hear God’s house saying that they won’t get promoted again, then they should feel ashamed, that they owe God, and that they’ve let God down; they should know that they don’t deserve to be used by God, and in this way they can be considered to have a modicum of reason. However, they become negative and upset when they hear that God’s house won’t cultivate them or use them again, and this shows that they’re pursuing fame, gain, and status, and that they are not someone who pursues the truth. Their desire for blessings is this strong, and they treasure status this much and don’t do actual work, so they ought to be dismissed, and they should reflect on and come to understand their own corrupt dispositions. They should know that the path they’re following is wrong, that they are walking the path of an antichrist by pursuing status, fame, and gain, that not only will God not approve of them, but they will also offend His disposition, and that if they commit all manner of evil, they will be punished by God as well. Don’t you have this problem, too? Wouldn’t you be unhappy if I said now that you have no spiritual understanding? (Yes.) When some people hear an upper-level leader say that they have no spiritual understanding, they feel that they aren’t capable of understanding the truth, that God surely doesn’t want them, that they have no hope of being blessed; yet despite the fact that they feel sad, they’re still able to do their duty as normal—such people have a bit of reason. When some people hear someone say they have no spiritual understanding, they become negative, and they no longer wish to do their duty. They think, “You say I have no spiritual understanding—doesn’t that mean I have no hope of being blessed? Since I won’t get any blessings in the future, what am I still believing for? I won’t accept being made to render service. Who would toil for you if they got nothing in return for it? I’m not that stupid!” Do such people possess conscience and reason? They enjoy so much grace from God and yet they don’t know to repay it, and they don’t even want to render service. People like this are finished. They can’t even render service till the end and they have no true faith in God; they are disbelievers. If they have a sincere heart for God and true faith in God, then no matter how they’re evaluated, this will only enable them to know themselves more truly and accurately—they should approach this matter correctly and not let it impact them following God or doing their duty. Even if they can’t receive blessings, they should still be willing to render service for God until the end, and be happy to do so, without complaints, and they should allow God to orchestrate them in all things—only then will they be someone with conscience and reason. Whether a person receives blessings or suffers catastrophe is in God’s hands, God is sovereign over this and arranges this, and it is not something that people can ask for or work toward. Instead, it depends on whether that person can obey God’s words, accept the truth, and do their duty well according to God’s requirements—God will repay each person according to their deeds. If someone has this bit of sincerity, and they devote all the strength that they can muster to the duty they should do, then that is enough, and they will earn God’s approval and blessing. Conversely, if someone does not do their duty adequately and even commits all manner of evil, and yet they still wish to receive blessings from God, then isn’t them acting this way so lacking in reason? If you feel that you haven’t done well enough, that you’ve expended a great deal of effort but still aren’t able to handle matters with principles, and you feel you owe God, yet He blesses you and shows you grace, doesn’t that mean that God is showing you favor? If God wishes to bless you, then that’s something no one can take away. You may think that you haven’t done very well, but in God’s evaluation, He says that you are sincere and have given it your all, and He wishes to show you grace and bless you. Nothing God does is wrong, and you must praise His righteousness. No matter what God does, it is always right, and even if you harbor notions about what God does, believing that what He does isn’t considerate of human feelings, that it’s not to your liking, you should still praise God. Why should you do this? You don’t know the reason why, right? This is actually very easy to explain: It’s because God is God and you are human; He is the Creator, you are a created being. You are not qualified to demand that God act in a certain way or that He treat you a certain way, whereas God is qualified to make demands of you. Blessings, grace, rewards, crowns—how all these things are given and to whom is up to God. Why is it up to God? These things belong to God; they are not assets owned jointly between man and God that can be equally distributed between them. They belong to God, and God bestows them upon those whom He promises to bestow them upon. If God doesn’t promise to bestow them upon you, you should still submit to Him. If you stop believing in God for this reason, what problems will that solve? Will you stop being a created being? Can you escape the sovereignty of God? God still holds sovereignty over all things, and this is an immutable fact. The identity, status, and essence of God can never be equated with the identity, status, and essence of man, nor will these things ever undergo any change—God will forever be God, and man will forever be man. If a person is able to understand this, what should they then do? They should submit to God’s sovereignty and arrangements—this is the most rational way to go about things, and besides this, there is no other path that can be chosen. If you don’t submit then you are rebellious, and if you are defiant and argue, then you are being outrageously rebellious, and you should be destroyed. Being able to submit to God’s sovereignty and arrangements shows that you have reason; this is the attitude people must have, and only this is the attitude created beings should have.

—The Word, Vol. 4. Exposing Antichrists. Item Twelve: They Want to Withdraw When They Have No Status and No Hope of Gaining Blessings

Antichrists never obey the arrangements of God’s house, and they always closely link their duty, fame, gain, and status with their hope of gaining blessings and their future destination, as if once their reputation and status are lost, they have no hope of gaining blessings and rewards, and this feels like losing their lives to them. They think, “I have to be careful, I mustn’t be careless! God’s house, the brothers and sisters, the leaders and workers, and even god can’t be relied upon. I can’t trust any of them. The person you can rely on most and who is most worthy of trust is yourself. If you’re not making plans for yourself, then who is going to care about you? Who is going to consider your future? Who is going to consider whether or not you’re going to receive blessings? Therefore, I have to make careful plans and calculations for my own sake. I can’t make mistakes or be even slightly careless, otherwise, what will I do if somebody tries to take advantage of me?” Therefore, they guard themselves against the leaders and workers of God’s house, fearing that somebody will discern or see through them, and that they’ll then be dismissed and their dream of blessings will be spoiled. They think they must maintain their reputation and status in order for them to have hope of gaining blessings. An antichrist sees being blessed as greater than the heavens, greater than life, more important than pursuing the truth, dispositional change, or personal salvation, and more important than doing their duty well, and being a created being that is up to standard. They think that being a created being that is up to standard, doing their duty well and being saved are all paltry things that are hardly worth mentioning or remarking on, while gaining blessings is the only thing in their entire life that can never be forgotten. In whatever they encounter, no matter how great or small, they relate it to being blessed, and are incredibly cautious and attentive, and they always leave a way out for themselves. So when their duty is adjusted, if it is a promotion, an antichrist will think they have hope of being blessed. If it is a demotion, from team leader to assistant team leader, or from assistant team leader to a regular group member, they predict this to be a major problem and they think their hope of gaining blessings is slim. What sort of outlook is it? Is it a proper outlook? Absolutely not. This view is absurd! Whether or not someone gains God’s approval is not based on what duty they do, but on whether they possess the truth, whether they genuinely submit to God, and whether they are loyal. These are the most important things.

—The Word, Vol. 4. Exposing Antichrists. Item Twelve: They Want to Withdraw When They Have No Status and No Hope of Gaining Blessings

In what way is treating the pursuit of blessings as an objective wrong? It flies completely in the face of the truth, and is not congruent with God’s intention to save people. Since being blessed is not an appropriate objective for people to pursue, what is an appropriate objective? The pursuit of the truth, the pursuit of changes in disposition, and being able to submit to all of God’s orchestrations and arrangements: these are the objectives that people should pursue. Say, for example, being pruned causes you to have notions and misunderstandings, and you become incapable of submission. Why can’t you submit? Because you feel that your destination or your dream of being blessed has been challenged. You become negative and upset, and try to get out of doing your duty. What is the reason for this? There is a problem with your pursuit. So how should this be solved? It is imperative that you immediately abandon these mistaken ideas, and that you immediately seek the truth to solve the problem of your corrupt disposition. You should say to yourself, “I must not quit, I must still do well the duty that a created being ought to, and put aside my desire to be blessed.” When you relinquish the desire to be blessed and you walk the path of pursuing the truth, a weight is lifted off your shoulders. And will you still be capable of negativity? Even though there are still times when you are negative, you don’t let this constrain you, and in your heart, you keep praying and fighting, changing the objective of your pursuit from the pursuit of being blessed and having a destination, to the pursuit of the truth, and you think to yourself, “The pursuit of the truth is the duty of a created being. To understand certain truths today—there is no greater harvest, this is the greatest blessing of all. Even if God does not want me, and I do not have a good destination, and my hopes of being blessed are shattered, I shall still do my duty properly, I am obligated to. Whatever the reason, it will not impact my performance of my duty, it will not affect my accomplishment of God’s commission; this is the principle by which I conduct myself.” And in this, have you not transcended the constraints of the flesh? Some may say, “Well, what if I’m still negative?” Then seek the truth again to resolve it. However many times you fall into negativity, if you just keep on seeking the truth to resolve it, and keep on striving for the truth, you will slowly emerge from your negativity. And one day, you will feel that you do not have the desire to gain blessings and are not constrained by your destination and outcome, and that you are easier and freer living without these things. You will feel that the life you had before, whose every day you lived for the purpose of gaining blessings and your destination, was exhausting. Every day, speaking, working, and racking your brains for the sake of gaining blessings—and what would that have gained you, in the end? What is the value of such a life? You did not pursue the truth, but wasted all your best days on insignificant things. In the end, you did not gain any truth, and you were unable to speak of any experiential testimony. You made a fool of yourself, utterly disgraced and failed. And what is the cause of this, really? It is that your intent to gain blessings was too strong, that your outcome and destination occupied your heart and bound you too tightly. Yet when the day comes on which you emerge from the bondage of your prospects and destiny, you will be able to leave everything behind and follow God. When will you be able to let go of those things completely? As your life entry ceaselessly deepens, you will achieve a change in your disposition, and that is when you will be able to let go of them completely.

—The Word, Vol. 3. The Discourses of Christ of the Last Days. Only in the Practice of the Truth Is There Life Entry

In their belief in God, what people seek is to obtain blessings for the future; this is their goal in their faith. All people have this intent and hope, but the corruption in their nature must be resolved through trials and refinement. In whichever aspects you are not purified and reveal corruption, these are the aspects in which you must be refined—this is God’s arrangement. God creates an environment for you, forcing you to be refined there so that you can know your own corruption. Ultimately, you reach a point at which you would rather die in order to give up your schemes and desires and to submit to God’s sovereignty and arrangement. Therefore, if people do not have several years of refinement, if they do not endure a certain amount of suffering, they will not be able to rid themselves of the constraints of corruption of the flesh in their thoughts and in their hearts. In whichever aspects people are still subject to the constraints of their satanic nature, and in whichever aspects they still have their own desires and their own demands, these are the aspects in which they should suffer. Only through suffering can lessons be learned, which means being able to gain truth, and understand God’s intentions. In fact, many truths are understood by experiencing painful trials. Nobody can understand God’s intentions, recognize God’s almightiness and wisdom, or appreciate God’s righteous disposition when in a comfortable and easy environment or when circumstances are favorable. That would be impossible!

—The Word, Vol. 3. The Discourses of Christ of the Last Days. Part Three

Experiencing God’s work is not about enjoying grace, but rather about suffering for your love of Him. Since you enjoy God’s grace, you must also enjoy His chastisement; you must experience all of this. You can experience God’s enlightenment in you, and you can also experience how He prunes you and judges you. In this way, your experience will be comprehensive. God has carried out His work of judgment and chastisement upon you. God’s word has pruned you, but not only that; it has also enlightened and illuminated you. When you are negative and weak, God worries for you. All of this work is to let you know that everything about man is within God’s orchestrations. You may think that believing in God is about suffering, or doing all manner of things for Him; you might think that the purpose of believing in God is so that your flesh may be at peace, or so that everything in your life runs smoothly, or so that you may be comfortable and at ease in all things. However, none of these are purposes that people should attach to their belief in God. If you believe for these purposes, then your perspective is incorrect, and it is simply impossible for you to be perfected. God’s actions, God’s righteous disposition, His wisdom, His words, and His wondrousness and unfathomableness are all things people ought to understand. Having this understanding, you should use it to rid your heart of all personal demands, hopes, and notions. Only by eliminating these things can you meet the conditions demanded by God, and it is only by doing this that you can have life and satisfy God. The purpose of believing in God is to satisfy Him and to live out the disposition He requires, so that His actions and glory may be manifested through this group of unworthy people. This is the correct perspective for believing in God, and this is also the goal that you should seek. You should have the right viewpoint about believing in God and you should seek to obtain God’s words. You need to eat and drink God’s words and you must be able to live out the truth, and in particular you must be able to see His practical deeds, His wonderful deeds throughout the entire universe, as well as the practical work He does in the flesh. People can, through their practical experiences, appreciate just how God does His work on them and what His intentions are toward them. The purpose of all of this is to eliminate people’s corrupt satanic disposition. Having cast out all the uncleanliness and unrighteousness inside you, and having cast off your wrong intentions, and having developed true faith in God—only with true faith can you truly love God. You can only genuinely love God on the foundation of your belief in Him. Can you achieve love for God without believing in Him? Since you believe in God, you cannot be muddleheaded about it. Some people become full of vigor as soon as they see that faith in God will bring them blessings, but then lose all energy as soon as they see that they have to suffer refinements. Is that believing in God? Ultimately, you must achieve complete and utter submission before God in your faith. You believe in God but still have demands of Him, have many religious notions you cannot put down, personal interests you cannot let go of, and still you seek blessings of the flesh and want God to rescue your flesh, to save your soul—these are all behaviors of people who have the wrong perspective. Even though people with religious beliefs have faith in God, they do not seek to change their dispositions and do not pursue knowledge of God, but rather seek only the interests of their flesh. Many among you have faiths that belong in the category of religious convictions; this is not true faith in God. To believe in God, people must possess a heart that is prepared to suffer for Him and the will to give themselves up. Unless people meet these two conditions, their faith in God is not valid, and they will not be able to achieve change in their disposition. Only people who genuinely pursue the truth, seek knowledge of God, and pursue life are those who truly believe in God.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Those Who Are to Be Made Perfect Must Undergo Refinement

There is no correlation between the duty of man and whether he is blessed or cursed. Duty is what man ought to fulfill; it is his heaven-sent vocation, and should not depend on recompense, conditions, or reasons. Only then is he doing his duty. To be blessed is when someone is made perfect and enjoys God’s blessings after experiencing judgment. To be cursed is when someone’s disposition does not change after they have experienced chastisement and judgment, it is when they do not experience being made perfect but are punished. But regardless of whether they are blessed or cursed, created beings should fulfill their duty, doing what they ought to do, and doing what they are able to do; this is the least that a person, a person who pursues God, should do. You should not do your duty only to be blessed, and you should not refuse to act for fear of being cursed. Let Me tell you this one thing: Man’s performance of his duty is what he ought to do, and if he is incapable of performing his duty, then this is his rebelliousness.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Difference Between the Ministry of God Incarnate and the Duty of Man

As a created being, man should seek to fulfill the duty of a created being, and seek to love God without making other choices, for God is worthy of man’s love. Those who seek to love God should not seek any personal benefits or seek that which they personally long for; this is the most correct means of pursuit. If what you seek is the truth, if what you put into practice is the truth, and if what you attain is a change in your disposition, then the path that you tread is the right one. If what you seek is the blessings of the flesh, and what you put into practice is the truth of your own notions, and if there is no change in your disposition, and you are not at all submissive to God in the flesh, and you still live in vagueness, then what you seek will surely take you to hell, for the path that you walk is the path of failure. Whether you will be made perfect or eliminated depends on your own pursuit, which is also to say that success or failure depends on the path that man walks.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Success or Failure Depends on the Path That Man Walks

Your destination and your fate are very important to you—they are of grave concern. You believe, if you do not do things with great care, it will mean that you cease to have a destination, that you have destroyed your own fate. But has it ever occurred to you that people who expend effort solely for the sake of their destination are toiling in vain? Such efforts are not genuine—they are fakery and deceit. If that is the case, then those who work only for the sake of their destination are on the threshold of their final defeat, for failure in one’s belief in God is caused by deceit. I have previously said that I do not like to be flattered or fawned on, or treated with enthusiasm. I like honest people to face up to My truth and My expectations. Even more, I like it when people are able to show the utmost care and consideration for My heart, and when they are even capable of giving up everything for My sake. Only in this way can My heart be comforted. Right now, how many things are there about you that I dislike? How many things are there about you that I like? Can it be that none of you has realized all the different manifestations of ugliness you have put forth for the sake of your destination?

In My heart, I do not wish to be hurtful to any heart that is positive and aspires upward, and still less do I wish to dampen the energy of anyone who is faithfully doing his duty. Nonetheless, I must remind each of you of your inadequacies and of the filthy soul that lies in the deepest recesses of your hearts. I do so in the hope that you will be able to offer up your true heart in coming face to face with My words, because what I hate most is people’s deceit toward Me. I only hope that, in the last stage of My work, you will be able to give your most outstanding performance, and that you will devote yourselves wholeheartedly, no longer half-hearted. Of course, I also hope that you can all have a good destination. Nevertheless, I still have My requirement, which is for you to make the best decision in offering up to Me your sole and final devotion. If someone does not have that sole devotion, then he is surely a treasured possession of Satan, and I will no longer keep him to use but send him home to be looked after by his parents. My work is a great help to you; what I hope to get from you is a heart that is honest and that aspires upward, but so far My hands remain empty. Think about it: If one day I am still so aggrieved, beyond the scope of words to tell, what will My attitude toward you be then? Will I be as amiable to you then as I am now? Will My heart be as serene then as it is now? Do you understand the feelings of a person who, having painstakingly tilled the field, has not harvested a single grain? Do you understand how greatly a person’s heart is injured when he has been dealt a great blow? Can you taste the bitterness of a person, once so full of hope, who has had to part on bad terms? Have you seen the wrath issuing forth from a person who has been provoked? Can you know the eagerness for revenge of a person who has been treated with enmity and deceit? If you understand the mentality of these people, then I think it should not be difficult for you to imagine the attitude God will have at the time of His retribution! Finally, I hope you all put in serious effort for the sake of your own destination, though you had better not employ deceitful means in your efforts, or else I will continue to be disappointed with you in My heart. And what does such disappointment lead to? Are you not fooling yourselves? Those who take thought for their destination yet ruin it are the people least able to be saved. Even if he were to become exasperated and enraged, who would take pity on such a person? In sum, I still wish for you to have a destination that is both suitable and good, and, even more, I hope that none of you will fall into disaster.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. On Destination

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