【126-A-4】
There are some people who write false resumés in recommending leaders and workers, extolling a person to such an extent, but in the end God’s family finds, “This person isn’t doing real work, he or she doesn’t have a good disposition; how can there be such a difference from the resumé?” After investigation of the responsibility for this, several leaders and workers were dismissed, weeded out. To lie to God is a serious sin; wasn’t it exposed? At the time of writing the resumé they would have felt good: “I will write it a bit better for him or her, to make God’s family satisfied—look how good it is that we have proposed this person.” But do you think that writing this is the end of the matter? When the person gets here and can’t work, this goes back to your responsibility! Deliberately writing these things well is deception. Can the sin of deception be overlooked? To go into it, who wrote the resumé? Dispense with that person! They are not qualified as leaders or workers and should be eliminated completely. It’s time for retribution, isn’t it? To take the standpoint of the people of the world and lie to God, this just will not work. After this has been exposed, you’re finished. Things will have caught up with you. When you have just finished doing some things you may feel you’ve done very well, but there’s no rush, when the things are exposed one day see if the church can’t investigate you. So no good will come from doing evil, and if now you felt at ease lying to the church and to God, don’t worry, things have still not been resolved; one day you will give yourself away and you will be found to be responsible. Who can be popular in God’s house? Honest people, people who love God. Such people will become popular. God loves this kind of people and blesses them, and others love them too. Truth reigns in the house of God; it is God’s words and God that reign. What is the evidence for God’s reigning? First, the truth is in power; second, God’s word is in power. This means that God reigns. The authority of the Holy Spirit is the authority of the truth, the authority of the word of God. The truth, the Holy Spirit, the word of God, and God are as one—ultimately all these are the authority of God.
Reaching principled performance with completion of duties needs a process. It’s not a matter of solving a problem through truth after discovering it and ‘That’s that, you know it all, and anything can be done according to principles.’ Nothing that relates to truth will be partial, and any aspect will have various levels and issues of depth. So in carrying out duties when there are often difficult problems, it isn’t a matter of solving a few difficulties and then everything will be solved and people will be able to experience and practice; people can’t achieve that. Some people ask, “How many failures will it take to get through this, how many problems to solve, before I can do everything according to principles?” How to answer this question? We have talked about this previously, that there is no limit to the entry of truth, no limit to change in one’s disposition, no limit to the entry into life, no limit to knowing God…, so then is there a limit to the solution of problems? Well there is no limit to that either. Unbelievers have a saying, “Live and learn.” Do you understand this now? “How are there problems in carrying out my duties? At what point can I finish solving all these difficulties? How are there still difficulties?” How to solve this problem, how to understand it? Older people will say, “How come there are so many routine problems? How come there are always problems?” So because of the persistence of this practical problem, people conclude that we should “Live and learn.” Unbelievers have another saying, “Every family has its unique problems,” “Every family has its own special story.” Life is like that, and we can say that there are always difficulties. That’s life; can we say that? Some say, “We all know this. Please help solve it for us. Why are there always difficulties? Has God arranged them? Why does God always let us get into difficulty?” Shouldn’t we understand this? Tell me, are difficulties good for our life entry? They are good. What do you say they are good? When there is a difficulty it can make us go to seek the truth, and only after obtaining truth will there be no difficulty.
Having difficulty means that God is giving us a lesson, which is arranged by God that we should learn. Isn’t it good to learn something? The process of gaining truth is also the process of experiencing difficulty and seeking truth. If you have no difficulty you won’t seek the truth, and if you don’t have the truth you won’t be able to resolve difficulties. So it is that when these difficulties come they will make us go to seek truth, to use the truth to resolve them. And like this, we can finally gain the truth. What does difficulty reveal us? There is no truth. Without truth it will make us embarrassed, and without stature we will be unable to handle it. If our stature is inadequate, we will be blocked by difficulty, made to stumble. So we urgently need to seek the truth. Thus the more the difficulty rises the more we have the opportunity to seek the truth, and the more we will acquire the opportunity to be made perfect through experiencing the work of God. If there was no difficulty, there would be no chance to be made perfect by God; isn’t this right? Do the dead have difficulties? When someone dies, it is all over, right? Unbelievers say this. They believe that there is nothing after death. Actually nothing physical remains, they don’t need to seek a mate, have children, eat and dress, there’s nothing left. But the soul will receive punishment, it will be judged. This is inescapable. The big things are inevitable, it’s just the physical things that pass. When things happen to them, many people don’t take them seriously. Others take the difficulty as difficulty, but to them, the difficulty they are in is not a difficulty. They don’t think it through. So there are many people who never know how to learn a lesson. They don’t know how to seek the truth, they don’t know how to find a path to practice through experiencing God’s word. Are these people who pursue the truth? Others may feel it hard and even complain to heaven, but he doesn’t take it seriously and just let it go vaguely, like there is nothing happened. These are people who don’t pursue the truth. They don’t seek the truth. Aren’t people like this more or less the same as the dead? Those who do not pursue the truth are the living dead, dead but still breathing. People ask, “Do you have any difficulties in your belief in God?” “There’s nothing difficult, it is just going along in believing. I have not been arrested, and I have never been to jail. I have things to eat and things to wear, there’s nothing difficult about it.” People ask again, “Then is there something difficult about doing duties?” “There’s nothing difficult, just do what I’m asked to do, and let it work out whatever way it works out.” “Do you have to seek the truth?” “No, just do whatever I like, do whatever my mind tells me to do!” Does this kind of person live without pressure? They live with an easy life; is that right? There’s no difficulty at all. Finally one day it comes to the end and a difficulty arises, “Oh, I am really dying, it’s just a pity, it’s just a pity, I haven’t pursued the truth!” There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. This serves them right; it’s their fate. Who asked you never to seek the truth, not to practice the truth, and just keep on dealing with things in a slipshod way, feeling that there was no problem, until now finally it comes to this? The major issue has come, a calamity, and you wail. Is there this kind of person? Some people are serious with everything, but others are impatient: “What’s the use of being serious? Why is it that I don’t have so many things to worry about?” Other people pursue the truth, seek the truth, do things according to principles, believing that “These are all problems; all of them need to be solved, and the truth needs to be sought for all of them. I cannot carry out my duty properly without these problems solved.” These people apply themselves with great diligence. But if people are not diligent, they might say, “How come you have so many things to do? This is an issue, that is a problem. You go into everything, you ask about everything. Why is it that I don’t have so many things to worry about?” What sort of people are these? Are they people who pursue the truth? They never seek the truth, and when a problem comes up they just muddle it through, they don’t take things seriously, so careless. Some people are careless in fact, some people just don’t love the truth, don’t take it seriously. If they don’t take it seriously, nothing matters to them, and it only becomes an issue as death approaches, when there’s nothing to eat in dinner time. To be starving is an issue, getting ill is an issue; there’s nothing more than these things—isn’t this the dead? Carrying out duties and never taking them seriously. “What is doing things according to principles? What kind of carrying out duties is adequate carrying out of duties? What is the exact meaning of adequate carrying out of duties?” To continually ponder the word of God like this, you will always discover things; all this is the result of the work of the Holy Spirit. This kind of person is putting their heart into it. To put the heart into it means always pondering appropriate issues. This is the kind of person that can enter the truth: They are always earnest. I really like people who are always earnest. “You are earnest. This is good. I communicate with you. If you have a problem, I will help you to the best of my ability.” I know this kind of people are good. They have potential and they develop rapidly.
Who in fact does not have any difficulty in carrying out his or her duties? There are always difficulties. If people are asked to carry out their duty according to the result they should achieve, how many can be up to the standard? How many can achieve results? For example in preaching the gospel, the object of the gospel is suitable, an object to whom the gospel can be preached. But you fail to testify God’s work clearly and that person runs away. Isn’t this a failure? How come they run away? In which aspect has the truth not been clearly communicated? In which aspect has the person produced conceptions and misunderstandings? Can you find the root causes? If you can’t find the root cause, how many people can you gain by preaching the gospel in this way? If you convey the gospel to ten objects, and ten run away; can such people still carry out their duties? They should be weeded out, as not meeting the standard. How many days have you taken in carrying out this duty? In these days you have eaten for free in God’s house, and not come up with anything. Is this an indebtedness? Can your conscience rest easy? If you eat for free in God’s house, and you feel satisfied: “I’ve found an iron rice bowl!” is this a parasite? What is the difference from Judas? It’s just that you haven’t sold out, but if you meet someone who gives you money, you will sell out, and right away you will have become a Judas. Muddling through your duties and seeking to sponge, isn’t this like stealing the sacrifices yourself? To have no qualms about stealing the sacrifices, is this humanity? For those without humanity, aren’t they the objects to be eliminated by God? All these issues come out one after another. No matter what duties you are carrying out, you have to show finished product, because without finished product you aren’t carrying out your duties adequately. Some leaders and workers never know how to communicate the truth, they only use administrative commands to handle problems. Are such people doing real work? To be a leader or a worker, first of all, how many antichrists have you expelled and how many false leaders have you removed? When you do such things have you fellowshiped about the truth transparently? Do people all understand the truth and agree with what you are doing? Are they all able to see that this is the work of the Holy Spirit, that all has been accomplished by God? This is one aspect of work— expel antichrists and remove false leaders. In some pastoral areas or regions this sort of work has still not been carried out properly. They meet some leaders and workers they know, and they know that these people are antichrists, but they are unable to take action and don’t dare to offend them. They know that they are false leaders but are embarrassed to remove them—is this kind of person carrying out their duty adequately? Is this doing things according to principles? Do they achieve loyalty to God? No. These people are not carrying out their duties adequately. The first problem for leaders or workers is not thoroughly resolving antichrists and false leaders, only resolving a part of them that they don’t know themselves, or that they have no emotional bond with them; but concerning to those who they know or have emotional bond with, they don’t resolve. Such leaders do not have loyalty to God, and they do not handle things according to principles; they do not fulfil their duties adequately. This is a problem. Further, if you are a leader or worker you have to be able to solve the real problems faced by God’s chosen people in their life experience. When the above fellowship about whatever problems, you have to implement them below in the churches. The above cannot speak in too much detail and be too exhaustive. You should fill things out, to let the people understand. Whatever important problems that the above have to resolve, you should implement them and resolve them in the church. However the above arranges things, you implement them below and obey his arrangement. This is what makes a qualified leader or worker. Furthermore, to be qualified leaders and workers you must resolve some practical problems of the brothers and sisters or co-workers by your side, so that they can first understand the truth and enter into reality. If leaders or workers only perform administrative work, and do not resolve the real problems they meet in their life entering and practical experience, these are not qualified leaders and workers. Such people certainly do not have the reality of truth.
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