C. Improper Relationships of Vested Interests

Another type of improper relationship is that of vested interests. People do things like flattering, elevating, praising, and ingratiating themselves with each other for the sake of interests. Bringing such crooked conduct and a wicked atmosphere into church life severely impacts others quietly reading God’s words or listening to shared experiences. Once a relationship of vested interests is established, the individuals involved will often say or do things that go against their desires, for their own benefit. For example, if someone sees that another person could benefit their business or interests in some way, they might choose that person as a leader, nominate them for a specific duty, or agree with whatever that person says, claiming that it’s correct regardless of whether it aligns with the truth, to curry favor. In order to curry favor with them, they do many things that don’t align with principles and go against the truth, which disturb God’s chosen people in discerning people, events, and things and entering into the truth. They describe what is wrong and distorted as right, describe human notions and imaginings as being in line with God’s intentions, and so on, thus disturbing people’s thoughts and the correct direction and goal of their pursuit. All of these behaviors stem from their maintenance of a relationship of vested interests. To protect and maintain their own interests, they can speak against their conscience and act against principles. What they say and do causes disturbances and destruction to church life, eventually leading more people to be unable to fellowship God’s words, pray-read God’s words, or share personal experiences in a normal and orderly manner, resulting in losses to people’s life entry. When people fellowship their personal experiential understandings, they often encounter interference from people’s relationships of vested interests; some are verbal interferences, some are behavioral, and others pertain to goals and directions. People are often interrupted when fellowshipping the truth and pray-reading God’s words, frequently led off-topic, and are often affected to varying degrees. Therefore, those who engage in improper relationships of vested interests and related behaviors should be restricted. Church leaders faced with these issues should not turn a blind eye, and they certainly shouldn’t indulge such evildoing, condoning the occurrence of such matters within church life. Instead, they should be vigilant and perceptive, and promptly stop and restrict them.

Engaging in improper relationships of vested interests is a common occurrence in the church. For instance, if someone plans to run for election as the next church leader, they might draw in a group of people and divulge their ideas to them. These people aren’t foolish; they hint: “If we elect you, what benefits will you provide us?” Thus, a relationship based on vested interests is formed among them. To maintain their vested interests, they often take the same stance on issues during gatherings. Without others being aware or knowing the background, they always talk about how good one person is, how what another person does is permitted and blessed by God, who has made offerings and how much they offered, and who has made what contributions to God’s house, often singing each other’s praises and commending each other. In church life, they often release these things in the service of the consensus they reached earlier and to uphold their mutual interests. For example, someone might say, “If you elect me as the leader, once I claim my position, I’ll make you a group leader.” Aren’t they all looking for personal gain? To realize their interests, don’t they have to say certain things, or do certain actions? Thus, they display a variety of manifestations during gatherings, all aimed at upholding the consensus they reached earlier and the interests involved. Before achieving their goal, most of what they do is driven by interests. So, aren’t the intentions and purposes behind what they say and do quite improper? Isn’t the relationship established among them an improper one? Shouldn’t such improper relationships within the church be restricted? Some say, “How can we restrict it if it’s not discovered?” Such matters, unless not done at all, once undertaken, can be discovered and will be exposed. If people fellowship the truth and their personal understandings and experiences properly, without mixing in anything unrelated to the truth, everyone can perceive this. If there are adulterations, people can also discern this. Therefore, in the church, various transactional relationships that arise for the maintenance of mutual interests should also be restricted; at the very least, those involved should be warned and fellowshipped with, letting them recognize their own issues and understand the serious consequences of engaging in such activities, while also enabling the brothers and sisters to discern the nature of these matters. What impact does this kind of activity have on most people? It leads people to think that there’s not much difference between the church and society, both being places where everyone exploits each other and people engage in transactions for their own benefits. This behavior is not just a moderate disturbance but forms a serious disturbance to church life. Tell Me, is someone who constantly draws people in to win their votes for an election, using unusual means to manipulate the election and gain the position of a leader, a good person? Clearly, leaders elected this way are not good people. Can the brothers and sisters who have fallen into their hands expect any good? If someone becomes a leader through unusual means, rather than being elected based on principles, such a leader is definitely not a good person. If they are allowed to lead, that is equivalent to blatantly handing the brothers and sisters over to an evil person, to an antichrist, with most people effectively being delivered into Satan’s hands; in such a scenario, the fruits of their church life will be self-evident. This is a type of improper relationship tied to interests. Whether among groups or individuals, once relationships between people involve interests, they will lean more toward personal benefits in their actions rather than act according to principles to uphold the interests of God’s house. Such relationships are not founded on the conscience and reason of normal humanity but are contrary to both conscience and reason, and even more so to the truth principles. What they say, do, and demonstrate, along with their intentions, purposes, motivations, origins, and so on, are all driven by interests; thus, these relationships may be defined as improper. Because the formation of such relationships disturbs God’s chosen people in living church life, making it difficult for most people to read God’s words and fellowship the truth in quietude before God, such improper relationships should be restricted within the church. For cases that are severe and constitute the behavior of evil people, warnings should be issued, and if those involved do not repent no matter what, they should be cleared out of the church.

D. Hatred Between Individuals

Improper interpersonal relationships have various manifestations. Another one of them is personal hatred. For instance, friction or disputes may arise within families between mothers-in-law and daughters-in-law, between sisters-in-law, or between brothers, or they may arise between neighbors. Sometimes this even develops into hatred, and, like adversaries, these people are then not able to collaborate or work together, to the extent that they cannot even face each other, and argue and fight whenever they do. When they see each other at gatherings, their hearts are also filled with hatred, and they are unable to quiet themselves before God to enjoy God’s word and reflect on and come to know themselves, and they certainly aren’t able to let go of their prejudices and hatred to have a normal gathering. Instead, whenever they meet, they get into quarrels and skirmishes, they expose each other’s shortcomings and attack one another, and even swear at each other, having a profoundly negative impact on God’s chosen people. Such people are disbelievers, they are nonbelievers. For those who sincerely believe in God and love the truth, no matter what happens, or with whom they have disputes, or whom they harbor prejudices toward, they are able to seek the truth, reflect on and know themselves, and solve issues according to the truth principles. If they have done something wrong and owe someone, they can proactively apologize and admit their mistakes; they absolutely won’t resort to causing arguments or trouble at gatherings. It is entirely beneath the decorum of saints to engage in disputes and cause uproars in the church; such behavior severely disgraces God. People who act this way lack humanity, conscience, and reason to a large degree; they are absolutely not genuine believers in God. This issue is relatively more common among new believers. Because new believers do not understand the truth, and their corrupt dispositions have not been purified, it is easy for them to engage in disputes over many things, and to even let their hotheadedness burst forth and get themselves into fights. If these corrupt dispositions are not resolved, people will harbor hatred in their hearts, and even when living church life, they will still engage in endless disputes with this hotheadedness and hatred. This affects church life, impacting God’s chosen ones eating and drinking God’s word, praising God, and sharing their experiential understandings of God’s words. It also directly affects the life entry of God’s chosen people. Some new believers easily fall into disputes over disagreements on minor issues. For example, before a gathering starts, some may want to sing one hymn while others prefer a different one—even such a trivial matter can easily lead to disputes. Similarly, differing opinions on a matter can sometimes quickly turn into debates, and even offending someone due to a lack of consideration in speech can spark arguments. These kinds of incidents are common among new believers. When disputes arise during gatherings, they naturally disturb church life. Does this not also disturb God’s chosen people? Those prone to arguing and debating right from wrong are the ones who most easily disturb church life. They care only about satisfying their own vanity and face without considering the interests of God’s chosen people. By acting this way, do they not cause disturbances to church life? (Yes.) The church is a place where the brothers and sisters gather to eat, drink, and enjoy the words of God; it is a place for submitting to and worshiping God. It is absolutely not a place for venting personal grievances, and certainly not for quarreling or arguing over right and wrong. When such people cause disturbances in this way, what consequences does this lead to? It directly results in a lack of enjoyment during gatherings; it leads to God’s chosen people being unable to obtain life edification, and even leaves most people unable to find peace, suffering indescribably. Over time, some become passive and weak, even reluctant to attend gatherings. This situation is common in most churches and is something all of God’s chosen people have experienced. So how should the issue of frequent arguments and fights at gatherings be resolved? Several passages of God’s words that are relevant to the issue should be selected and read together multiple times during gatherings; then, everyone should fellowship on the truth, sharing their understanding. This approach can yield some results. Not only can those who are prone to arguing recognize their transgressions and feel remorse, but even onlookers can reflect on whether they have revealed their corrupt dispositions in similar situations and whether they are capable of arguing with others—in this way, the onlookers can also come to know themselves. Regardless of whether one gets involved in disputes or not, after reading several passages of God’s words several times, they can recognize their own corrupt dispositions and see that living by corrupt dispositions does indeed mean lacking conscience and reason, and not having the least bit of humanity. The effects of living church life this way aren’t bad, are they? Although there may be disputes at the start of a gathering, if afterward everyone can read God’s words, quiet themselves before God to reflect on themselves, solve problems with the truth, and truly repent—if these results can be achieved—then this is normal church life. Therefore, whatever happens during gatherings isn’t necessarily bad; as long as everyone comes together in heart and mind to seek the truth, and reads several relevant passages of God’s words together a few times, even if the problems can’t be completely resolved, people will be able to see through them somewhat and have some discernment—everyone will benefit from this. Would you say such a church life is hard to come by? This is turning a bad thing into a good one, it’s somewhat of a blessing in disguise. However, this should not lead people to advocate for the idea that disputes and debates are desirable in church life; this absolutely cannot be advocated for. Disputes and debates can easily lead to outbursts of hotheadedness and conflict, which is bad for everyone and causes personal distress for those involved. Therefore, seeking the truth to resolve issues is the best approach, and understanding the truth can effectively prevent similar incidents in the future. Wise individuals should adopt a patient and tolerant attitude when friction and clashes arise. Since they also have corrupt dispositions and can easily hurt others, when they reveal their corrupt dispositions, they should promptly pray to God and seek the truth to resolve issues. This way, by the time of gathering, personal resentment and hatred have all dissipated, leading to a sense of liberation in their hearts and making it easier to get along amicably with the brothers and sisters, thus fostering harmonious cooperation. Whenever anyone sees a brother or sister reveal their corrupt disposition, they should offer help with love, not judge, condemn, or reject them. It might happen that problems aren’t solved after one or two attempts at help, but patience and tolerance are still required. As long as they don’t disturb church life or deliberately commit evil, they should be treated with patience and tolerance to the end—there will come a day when they come to their senses. If someone is of evil humanity and refuses any help, not accepting the truth no matter how it’s fellowshipped, then they are not sincerely believing in God, and it’s necessary to keep a distance from such individuals. If they repeatedly disturb church life, they should be treated and handled according to principles. If they are not evil people but merely often reveal their corrupt disposition, hating themselves but feeling powerless to do otherwise in the moment, then such individuals should be assisted with love; help them understand the truth and discern and recognize their revelations of corruption—in this way, their revelations of corruption will gradually decrease. If the brothers and sisters are only occasionally affected by these people, they may be excused; as long as there are no major problems with their humanity, and they are not deceitful or evil people, then they should be supported and helped through fellowship of the truth. If they can accept the truth, they should be treated with love. However, if they refuse to repent and negatively impact church life for a long period of time, church leaders should issue warnings and impose restrictions. If they persistently refuse to accept the truth, such individuals are evil people. Evil people cannot get along with anyone, they are rotten apples and demons. Keeping them in the church will only cause disruptions and disturbances. Therefore, those who refuse to change despite repeated admonishments should be handled as evil people and cleared out from the church. Anyone who often disturbs church life and the life entry of God’s chosen people is a disbeliever and an evil person, and they must be cleared out from the church. Regardless of who the person is or how they have acted in the past, if they often disturb the work of the church and church life, refuse being pruned, and always defend themselves with flawed reasoning, they must be cleared out from the church. This approach is entirely for the sake of maintaining the normal progression of church work and protecting the interests of God’s chosen people, fully aligning with the truth principles and God’s intentions. The life entry of God’s chosen people and the work of the church should not be affected by the disputes and unreasonable troublemaking of a few evil individuals—it’s not worth it and is also unfair to God’s chosen people.

If evil people often cause disturbances in the church, leading to ineffective church life, the best solution is to categorize people and split up gatherings into different groups: Those who love the truth and sincerely do their duties gather together; those who want to pursue the truth but do not do their duties gather together; and those who love to cause disruptions and disturbances, gossip about others, and judge and condemn others gather together. This way, the church can be primarily split up into three groups of people—dividing everyone by kind, you could say—thus ensuring these groups do not interfere with each other during gatherings. People with bad humanity, no matter how recklessly they commit misdeeds, will not affect others but only harm themselves. Some people have a vicious disposition. If someone says something that hurts or offends them, they will hate that person, and think of ways to attack and retaliate against them. No matter how the truth is fellowshipped to them, or how they are pruned, they do not accept it. They would sooner die than repent, and continue to disturb church life. This proves that they are evil people. We cannot keep tolerating these sorts of evil people. They should be cleared out of the church according to the truth principles. This is the only way to thoroughly resolve this problem. No matter what mistakes they have made or bad things they have done, those people with vicious dispositions will not allow anyone to expose them or prune them. Should someone expose and offend them, they will become enraged, retaliate, and never let the issue drop. They have no patience and tolerance for other people, and do not exercise forbearance toward them. What principle is their conduct based on? “I would rather betray than be betrayed.” In other words, they do not tolerate being offended by anyone. Is this not the logic of evil people? This is exactly the logic of evil people. No one is allowed to offend them. To them, it is unacceptable for anyone to trigger them in even the slightest way, and they hate anyone who does so. They will keep going after that person and never let the matter go—that is how evil people are. You should isolate or clear out evil people as soon as you discover that they have the essence of evil people, before they can do any great evil. This will minimize the damage they do; it is the wise choice. If leaders and workers wait until an evil person causes some kind of disaster to handle them, they are being passive. That would prove that the leaders and workers are very foolish, and have no principles to their actions. There are some leaders and workers who are just this foolish and ignorant. They insist on waiting until they have conclusive evidence before handling evil people because they think that is the only way their minds will be at ease. But in fact, you do not need conclusive evidence to be sure someone is evil. You can tell by their everyday words and actions. Once you are sure they are evil, you can start by restricting or isolating them. This will ensure that neither the church’s work nor the life entry of God’s chosen people are harmed. Some leaders and workers cannot discern who is evil, nor can they handle evil people in a timely manner. As a result, the work of the church and church life are impacted, and the life entry of God’s chosen people is hindered. This is very foolish. This is how false leaders carry out work. For one thing, they lack discernment, and for another, they are people pleasers who fear offending others. When serving as leaders, such people, firstly, cannot do real work; and secondly, they harm God’s chosen people. They can’t even solve the problem of disturbances caused by evil people promptly, nor can they protect the brothers and sisters; such people are not fit to be leaders and workers. Tell Me, if a person is identified as evil, is there still a need to fellowship the truth to help them? (No.) There’s no need to give them a chance. Some people have too much “love,” always giving evil ones a chance to repent, but can this achieve any effect? Does this conform to the principles of God’s words? Have you seen any evil person who can truly repent? No one has ever seen that. Hoping for evil people to repent is like pitying poisonous snakes; it is to pity wild beasts. This is because based on the essence of evil people, it can be determined that evil people will never love positive things, will never accept the truth, and will never repent. You will not find the word “repentance” in their dictionary. No matter how you fellowship the truth to them, they will not put aside their own motives and interests, and will find various reasons and excuses to justify themselves, and no one can persuade them. If they suffer a loss, it’s unbearable for them, and they will endlessly pester others about it. How can such people, who are not willing to suffer any loss, truly repent? Extremely selfish people are those who prioritize their own interests above all; they are evil people, and they will never repent. If you have already thoroughly perceived that such a person is evil and you still give them a chance to repent, isn’t that foolish? This is equivalent to warming a frozen snake in your bosom, only to be bitten by it later. Only a fool would do such a stupid thing. In the church, God’s chosen ones hating evil people is a normal phenomenon, because evil people lack humanity and always do immoral things. Hating evil people is the correct mindset. It is part of what people should possess in their normal humanity.

Tell Me, what kind of person is someone who has no love at all for the brothers and sisters? Why do they not even have a bit of a normal interpersonal relationship with the brothers and sisters? This kind of person, no matter who they interact with, only links these interactions to interests and transactions; if there are no interests or transactions involved, they will not bother with people. Isn’t this kind of person evil? Some people do not pursue the truth and live only based on feelings; whoever treats them well, they draw close to, and whoever helps them, they think of as good. Such people also do not have normal interpersonal relationships. They live solely based on feelings, so can they treat the brothers and sisters fairly and justly? This is absolutely unattainable. Therefore, anyone who does not have a normal interpersonal relationship with the brothers and sisters, or with those who sincerely believe in God, is someone without conscience and reason, is someone without normal humanity, and is definitely not someone who loves the truth. These individuals are no different from the petty riffraff among the nonbelievers; they interact with whoever is beneficial to them and ignore those who are not. Moreover, when they see someone pursuing the truth or someone who can share experiential testimonies—someone whom everyone admires and likes—they become jealous and hateful and try everything to gather ammunition with which to judge and condemn these people who pursue the truth. Isn’t this what evil people do? Such people lack conscience and reason—they are worse than beasts. They cannot treat people correctly, cannot get along with others normally, cannot build normal interpersonal relationships with God’s chosen people, and can even hate those who pursue the truth. Such people must feel very solitary and lonely in their hearts, always blaming others and the world. What joy or meaning do they have in living? These people are vicious in disposition, and no matter who they interact with, they can develop hatred over trivial matters, condemning and retaliating against them, bringing disasters upon them. Such evil individuals are out-and-out devils, bringing disaster to the church with each day they remain. If they stay for a long time, the disasters will be unending. Only by clearing them out of the church can disasters be averted. Additionally, there are those who appear civilized on the outside but have a special fondness for benefits. Thus, their belief in God is also for the pursuit of benefits. If they haven’t taken some undue advantage in a while, their faces become clouded with gloom, as if someone owes them a great deal of money. Anyone who sees their resentful and despondent faces is immediately emotionally affected. What effect do you think such a face would bring if it appeared in church life? Most of God’s chosen people would definitely feel uncomfortable seeing it, and their reading of God’s words and fellowship of the truth would be disturbed and affected to varying degrees. Especially for those who have not rooted themselves in the true way, often seeing this perpetually gloomy face in church life would too easily affect them! The church should have more people with cheerful personalities, who speak simply and openly, and more people whose hearts are filled with peace and joy, and whose spirits are free and liberated. This would make church life enjoyable. Those sourpusses who are perpetually gloomy should pray to God at home and adjust their mindset before coming to gatherings. This way, they will be in a good mood, and they will gain something from the gathering. Additionally, this will also benefit others; at the very least, they won’t be disturbed. To ensure that God’s chosen people can live a normal church life, leaders and workers should learn to fellowship the truth to solve problems. If someone comes to a gathering with a gloomy face, the leaders and workers should step forward and ask, “Do you need help?” This is called proactively helping others out of love. If leaders and workers see someone with a problem and ignore it, avoiding and steering clear of those “sourpusses” without fellowshipping the truth to brighten their day, then they are not doing actual work. To do church work effectively, leaders and workers must first of all learn to be the confidants of God’s chosen people, akin to what nonbelievers would call a caring government official. Some people are unwilling to play such a role, always preferring to be a bystander—how can they lead God’s chosen people to live a good church life this way? In fact, whether someone has problems in their heart can to some extent be seen from their facial expression. If someone’s face is always gloomy, it surely means their heart is dark without a speck of light. If they’re immersed in disputes over right and wrong all day long, could their face still bear a smile? The faces of these people are always covered with dark clouds, without a moment of sunshine, and this also affects their performance of duty. If leaders and workers are slow to address and resolve this issue, causing the brothers and sisters to suffer constant disturbance and unspeakable misery, it proves that the leaders and workers are incapable of performing actual work, unable to solve problems with the truth, and are utterly worthless. If leaders and workers understand the truth and can identify problems of the brothers and sisters, and can provide timely support and help, not only being able to help solve people’s problems, but also being able to help people understand the truth principles and fulfill their duties, then their performance of duty and handling of matters will be efficient, and church work will not be affected. If leaders and workers cannot promptly identify and solve problems, this affects the church’s work. If leaders and workers cannot identify and handle problems, causing damage to the church’s work and hindering the life entry of God’s chosen people, haven’t they failed God and His chosen people? Don’t they lack principles in handling matters? Handling problems promptly and without hesitation after seeing through to their essence—this is called fulfilling responsibilities and being loyal, and this is doing one’s duty in a way that is up to standard.

The topic of today’s fellowship is the sixth issue—engaging in improper relationships. The problems of this type that emerge in church life are basically these: improper relationships between the sexes, same-sex relationships, relationships of vested interests, and hatred between individuals. Whether it’s relationships based on fleshly lust, fleshly interests, or sentimental entanglements of the flesh, they all fall within the category of improper relationships because they exceed the scope of conscience and reason of normal humanity. The existence of these improper relationships can perturb people to a certain degree. More seriously, they can disturb people’s life entry, their pursuit of the truth, and their pursuit of knowing God. These various kinds of improper relationships do not originate from conscience or reason, and they run counter to normal humanity. It is difficult for people to accept and practice the truth when they live within these abnormal relationships, and this also disturbs them in living the church life and pursuing life growth, as well as the order of church life. This is detrimental to the life entry of God’s chosen people and can also harm the work of the church. Because of all this, it is imperative for leaders and workers to promptly identify and handle these issues.

Regarding improper relationships, we have already enumerated different situations and categorized them. Can you provide some examples to practice discernment? What is the purpose of learning discernment? It is to enable you to discern and define the essence of people, events, and things, so as to make accurate judgments, and then treat them according to principles. This is the ultimate result. Has anyone said, “You talk all day about these matters of right and wrong, these everyday matters—we aren’t willing to listen to them anymore; we don’t even want to come to gatherings anymore. Shouldn’t You be fellowshipping on the truth? Why always talk about these situations”? Have you noticed such people? What kind of people are they? (People who lack spiritual understanding.) We fellowship in this way, and yet they still can’t understand the truth—they do not meet the intelligence of a normal person; such people are completely useless. Should someone whose intelligence doesn’t meet that of a human still be made to listen to sermons? Perhaps they would propose: “Gatherings are always about fellowshipping the truth, always talking about stuff like practicing the truth—I’m tired of listening to this. I’m not willing to come to gatherings anymore.” If they truly hold such a view, then they are someone who is averse to the truth. For such people, God’s house does not insist on their attendance; quickly send them away. If they themselves are unwilling to come to gatherings, and aren’t receptive to what is discussed at them, we do not insist—we aren’t looking to trouble them. People like this, even if they believe in God for a lifetime, will not understand the truth and will not enter into reality; it’s a waste of effort. If they like listening to theological knowledge, then let them go and study theological knowledge; one day, when they do not obtain the truth as life, they will regret it.

May 29, 2021