Item Eight: Promptly Report and Seek How to Resolve Confusions and Difficulties Encountered in the Work (Part Two)

Last time, we fellowshipped on item eight of the responsibilities of leaders and workers: “Promptly report and seek how to resolve confusions and difficulties encountered in the work.” Although item eight is just one line long, and it basically just requires one thing of leaders and workers in terms of their responsibilities, which is very simple, we spent a gathering fellowshipping on this topic. What aspects of this topic did we fellowship on specifically last time? What are the main responsibilities of leaders and workers that it touches on? (That they should gather together and fellowship when they encounter confusions and difficulties, and promptly seek how to resolve them and report them to the Above if they are unable to gain clarity on them through fellowship.) The main responsibilities of leaders and workers that this item touches on are participating in work, and immersing oneself in various items of real work, so that one may discover various problems that are encountered in the work, and solve them in a timely manner. If various methods have been tried, and the problems still cannot be entirely solved, and they still exist and become confusions and difficulties, then leaders and workers should not let those confusions and difficulties accumulate or put them aside and ignore them, but instead must promptly think of a way to solve them. The best way to solve them is, of course, to seek and fellowship with brothers and sisters as well as with leaders and workers at different levels to reach the resolution of these problems. If the problems cannot be solved, then leaders and workers should not try to make major issues seem like small ones, and then make those small issues seem unproblematic, or simply set them aside and ignore them, but instead must promptly report them to the Above and seek solutions from the Above so that they can be resolved. In this way, the work will progress smoothly, without difficulties and without obstacles.

Leaders and Workers Should Promptly Report and Resolve Confusions and Difficulties Encountered in the Work

I. The Definition of “Prompt”

Item eight of the responsibilities of leaders and workers mentions the prompt reporting of confusions and difficulties encountered in the work—this is very important. If a problem is discovered today, but the resolution of that problem is delayed for eight or ten days, or even for six months or a year, then can that be called “prompt”? (No, it can’t.) So, what does “prompt” mean? (It means handling the problem immediately, straight away, and instantly.) Is that not a little stringent? If we use vocabulary relating to time to explain it, solving the problem immediately, straight away, and right now is what “prompt” means, but looking at the literal meaning of these words, this is not easy for people to achieve, and it’s not realistic. So, how should we define the word “prompt” in order to do so accurately? If the problem is not a big one but it still poses an obstacle to the work, and if it can be solved within a few hours, then it should be solved within a few hours—can this be considered prompt? (Yes.) Suppose that the problem is a little complicated and difficult, and it can be solved within two or three days, but people make an effort to seek the truth, look up information more, and strive to resolve it in a single day—wouldn’t that be more beneficial to the work? Say that there’s a problem that can’t be seen through right now, and it requires investigation and research, which takes some time. This particular problem will take three days at most to be solved. If it takes longer than three days, then suspicion will arise that its resolution is being intentionally delayed, and it means time is being wasted. So, the problem should be reported, sought on, and resolved within three days. This is what “prompt” means. If resolving the problem requires level after level of communication and investigation, as well as collecting information level by level, and so forth—if the various processes are very complex—it still should not drag on for a month. Say that the problem can be resolved within a week if leaders and workers make haste, work faster, and select and use a few suitable people, then in this situation, “prompt” means limiting the resolution of the problem to one week. Taking more than a week to resolve the problem is inappropriate—that is not prompt. This is the time limit for handling such relatively complex matters. What is this timescale based on? It’s determined based on the size of the matter and its level of difficulty. Most things, however, such as problems related to professional skills or issues of the principles being unclear to people, can be resolved with a few sentences—what length of time should the resolution of these problems be limited to so that it can be considered “prompt”? If we define “prompt” based on the size of a matter and its level of difficulty, then most matters can be resolved in less than half a day, with a minority of them requiring perhaps a week to resolve at most; if a new problem arises, then that’s another matter. Therefore, if we define “prompt” as immediate, straight away, and right now, then this seems like a stringent demand to make of people judging by the literal meaning of these words, but looking at the time limit, the majority of matters can be resolved in half a day or a day at most if people promptly report and seek how to resolve them. Can this be considered difficult in terms of time? (No.) And since it is not difficult in terms of time, it should be an easy requirement to meet for leaders and workers to promptly report and seek how to resolve confusions and difficulties encountered in the work, and these confusions and difficulties should not be continually present and unresolved, and much less should they be left to accumulate in the work over the long term. You should now all know the time concept of “prompt”—this is the issue of how leaders and workers are to gauge timescales when handling confusions and difficulties encountered in the work. In short, the most accurate definition of “prompt” is to act as quickly as possible—that is, if a problem can be reported, sought on, and resolved within half a day, it should be, and if it can be resolved within a day, it should be—and to strive to not cause any delays and to not allow the work to be impacted. This is the responsibility of leaders and workers. When problems are encountered and discovered in the work, leaders and workers should promptly fellowship on and resolve them. If they can’t resolve them, then they should report them and seek how to resolve them from the Above as quickly as possible, instead of putting them to one side, ignoring them, and not taking them seriously. When problems arise, leaders and workers should promptly resolve them, rather than dragging their heels, waiting, or relying on others—leaders and workers shouldn’t display these manifestations.

II. The Consequences of Not Promptly Resolving Problems

The main principle for resolving problems is that it must be done promptly. Why must it be done promptly? If many problems arise and then can’t be promptly resolved, in one respect people will be stuck in a confused state and won’t know how to act, and in another respect, if people keep moving forward based on an incorrect method, and later have to redo and correct the work they’ve done, what will the consequences be then? A large amount of manpower, financial resources, and material resources will be wasted and consumed—this is a loss. If problems arise in the work, and leaders and workers are blind and unable to discover and resolve these problems promptly, many people will keep on working based on an incorrect method. When people do discover these problems and want to resolve and correct them, these issues will have already caused losses to the church work. Won’t all that manpower and those financial resources and material resources have been wasted then? Is there a relationship between such losses being caused and leaders and workers not promptly resolving problems? (Yes.) If leaders and workers can follow up on, supervise, inspect, and provide instructions for work, then they will absolutely be able to discover and resolve problems promptly. If leaders and workers are perfunctory, and they don’t follow up on, supervise, inspect, and provide instructions for work, if they are very passive in this respect, and they wait for there to be so many problems that the issues get totally out of hand before they think of resolving them, before they think of reporting them to the Above and seeking solutions from the Above, then have such leaders and workers fulfilled their responsibilities? (No.) This is a serious dereliction of duty; not only have such leaders and workers not resolved the problems, but they have instead caused losses to the manpower and material resources of God’s house, as well as creating a tremendous obstacle to the church work. Because of the leaders’ and workers’ dereliction of duty, their negligence, numbness, and dull-wittedness, and because they aren’t able to promptly discover and resolve many problems that arise in work, and can’t even promptly report them to the Above and seek solutions from the Above, many tasks have to be redone and, after they’ve been redone, more problems arise due to an inability to find the principles. As things go on like this, the work completion date becomes greatly delayed, and a job that should have taken a month takes three months to complete, and a job that should have taken three months takes eight or nine months to complete—this is directly related to leaders and workers not doing real work. Because leaders and workers don’t take responsibility for their work—that is, they aren’t able to promptly find and correct problems when they arise—various items of work keep failing to achieve results and remain in a state of paralysis. And who is directly responsible for this problem? (The leaders and workers.) Therefore, it’s very important for leaders and workers to do real work, and it is also very important for them to discover problems while they do real work. Sometimes leaders and workers will discover problems but not know how to resolve them, and yet they’re able to promptly report them to the Above and seek solutions from the Above to resolve them, which is even more important. Many leaders and workers think, “We have our own ways of working. The Above just needs to tell us the principles and we’ll do the remaining real work ourselves. If we encounter any difficulties, it’s enough for us just to fellowship and pray together below.” As for the strength of the problem-solving, or whether their solutions are thorough or effective, they uniformly don’t care at all or ask about these things. This is the sort of irresponsible attitude they harbor when they work, and eventually this means that all the items of work in the church cannot progress smoothly, and contain serious problems that do not get resolved. This is the consequence brought about by leaders’ and workers’ caliber being too poor, or else by them not taking responsibility and not doing real work.

Dissecting a Few Kinds of False Leaders Based on the Eighth Responsibility

I. False Leaders Who Are Pseudo-spiritual

Last time, we fellowshipped on what confusions and difficulties are, and defined certain problems that must be promptly reported and for which solutions must be promptly sought. Basically, there are two main types of problems. One type is problems in the work that people are unsure about or can’t see through. When it comes to these problems, people find it very difficult to grasp the principles. Although they may understand the principles in doctrinal terms, they don’t know how to practice or apply them. These problems relate to confusions. The other type is real difficulties and problems which people don’t know how to resolve. This type is somewhat more serious compared to confusions, and they are problems which leaders and workers should also report and seek solutions for. Last time, we mainly fellowshipped that it is the responsibility of leaders and workers to report and seek how to resolve problems encountered in the work, and we fellowshipped from a positive perspective on certain things leaders and workers should do and pay attention to. Today, we’ll dissect what manifestations false leaders possess with regard to item eight, and whether or not they do the work leaders should do and fulfill the responsibilities leaders should fulfill. When it comes to resolving problems encountered in the work, false leaders are certainly not competent in this regard; they fail to do this aspect of the work and they fail to fulfill this responsibility. There is a type of false leader who harbors a notion when working, thinking, “I don’t engage in those formalities when I work, nor do I pay attention to anything like knowledge, learning, skills, or dogma. I just make sure that I fellowship the truth of God’s words clearly at gatherings, and that’s enough. Every week I hold two gatherings for small groups, every two weeks I hold one gathering for leaders and workers, and every month I hold a big gathering for all the brothers and sisters. It’s enough that I organize all these kinds of gatherings well.” This is their basis and method for doing work. This type of leader and worker just continually trains in preaching sermons, and they put a lot of effort into equipping themselves with words and doctrines—they prepare outlines, content, examples, and truths to fellowship on for each gathering, and they also prepare some plans for resolving certain people’s states and problems. They think that as a leader or a worker, they just have to preach well, and then they have fulfilled their responsibilities. They think that they don’t need to concern themselves with other things, such as whether the way the gospel is being preached is appropriate or not, or how church personnel are assigned, or whether the personnel who perform various kinds of professional work are competent and up to standard—they believe that it’s enough to just let the supervisors handle these things. Therefore, no matter where this type of person goes, they focus on gatherings and preaching sermons, and no matter what kind of gathering is being held, they always preach a sermon. Outwardly, they lead people in reading God’s words and in learning to sing hymns, and occasionally they talk about the work. This type of person knows about the problems that are often fellowshipped about, such as which of God’s words should be used to compare against the problems encountered by various kinds of people, as well as why people feel weak and what states have arisen in them, and which truths of God’s words should be fellowshipped on to solve these things. In sum, their sermons and fellowships touch on many aspects of the truth and practice; some relate to pruning, some relate to trials and refinement, some relate to pray-reading God’s words, some relate to how to experience judgment and chastisement, and so on—they can fellowship a bit on various aspects of the truth. When they meet with new believers, they preach sermons for new believers, and when they meet with people who’ve believed in God for many years, they can preach some sermons on life entry. But when it comes to work involving any professional skill, they never inquire about the work or study things related to it, much less do they follow up on, participate in, or delve into any item of work to resolve problems. In their eyes, by preaching sermons, reading God’s words, and learning hymns, they are doing work, and these are the responsibilities of leaders and workers; besides this, all other work is inconsequential, it is other people’s business, and it has nothing to do with them, and so long as they can preach sermons well, they can rest easy. What does “rest easy” mean? It means that finishing a gathering is the same as them finishing their work, and when it’s time to rest, they rest. No matter what problems arise in the church work, they ignore them, and when people look for them to resolve a problem, they’re very difficult to find. No matter how busy the work gets, they must have their afternoon nap, and they indulge in comfort while other people can endure suffering and pay a price. They think, “I’ve finished preaching, the gathering is over, and I’ve said everything I was supposed to say to you. What else do you want me to say? My work is done. The rest is your job. I’ve told you God’s words, so just act according to the principles. As for any problems that arise, that’s your business, and it has nothing to do with me. You should go before God yourselves and pray, gather, and fellowship to resolve problems. Don’t come looking for me.” When a gathering is over, they never get anyone to ask questions, they never want to resolve problems, much less are they ever able to discover a problem. After the gathering, they consider their work done, and they sleep, eat, and engage in recreation at regular times. Aren’t they false leaders who do no real work at all? (They are.)

There are some cases where a leader or a worker has been in their post for six months, and apart from those closer to them, who can see them often, most brothers and sisters aren’t able to see them. They just often hear them giving sermons online, yet when there’s a problem, the leader or worker doesn’t resolve it. Some brothers and sisters encounter difficulties in their duties which they don’t know how to resolve, and they get so anxious that they can’t sit still, and when they go looking for their leader, they can’t find them. Can this kind of leader do a good job? The brothers and sisters have no idea what’s keeping their leader so busy every day, there’s a big backlog of problems and difficulties, and they don’t know when their leader will come to resolve them. Everyone eagerly looks forward to the leader coming to help, and yet no matter how long they wait, the leader never shows. Such leaders and workers are very elusive, and they’re good at keeping themselves hidden! They deliver sermons very well and, after giving a sermon, they get all nicely dressed up and do no work, secreting themselves away somewhere where they can indulge in comfort. And despite all this, they still think that they are working very well and properly. They think that they aren’t slacking off, that they’ve given their sermons, held their gatherings, said everything they’re supposed to say, and explained everything they’re supposed to explain. They never want to engage deeply with the brothers and sisters to follow up on and participate in work, help them by carrying out vetting, and help them handle and resolve problems promptly. If they come across a problem they can’t resolve, they don’t know to report it to the Above and seek a solution from the Above, either. They also do not ponder in their minds, “Can the brothers and sisters keep to the principles after hearing them in fellowship? And when they encounter difficulties and confusions in the work again, will they be able to hold to the truth and handle matters according to the principles? Furthermore, who is playing a positive role in the work? And which people are playing a negative role? And are there any people who cause disruptions and disturbances, or any people who ruin things, or any absurd people who are always coming up with bad ideas? How has the work been progressing lately?” They uniformly do not concern themselves with or inquire about such issues. People like this appear on the surface to be doing work—they give sermons, hold gatherings, prepare draft sermons and outlines, and even write work reports. Some leaders also frequently write sermons on their life experiences; they stay inside their rooms and write for three or five days straight and even need someone to specially pour them water and bring them food, and no one else is able to see them. If you say that they’re not doing real work, they feel wronged: “How am I not doing real work? I live with the brothers and sisters and I’m always holding gatherings and giving sermons. I preach sermons until my mouth goes bone dry, and sometimes I even stay up late.” They appear from the outside to be really busy and to not be idle—they give a lot of sermons, and expend a great deal of effort on speaking and writing, they regularly convey messages and letters, and convey the principles required by the Above, and they also earnestly and patiently fellowship and highlight content during gatherings—they do speak a great deal indeed, but they never participate in specific work, they never follow up on work, and they never face any problems together with the brothers and sisters. If you ask them about how such-and-such item of work is progressing or what the results of the work are like, they don’t know and have to go ask someone first. If you ask them whether the problems from last time have been resolved, they say they’ve held a gathering and fellowshipped on the principles. Suppose that you then ask them, “Did the brothers and sisters truly understand after you’d fellowshipped on the truth principles? Is it still possible for them to go astray? Who among them has a comparatively better understanding of the principles, who is more proficient with professional skills, and who has a better caliber and is worth cultivating?” They don’t know the answers to any of these questions; they know nothing about any of it. Whenever you ask them about the status of the work, they say, “I’ve fellowshipped on the principles, I just finished holding a gathering, and I just pruned them. They’ve expressed their commitment, and they are resolved to do this work well.” But when it comes to how the subsequent work is progressing, they have no idea. Can they be considered up-to-standard leaders and workers? (No.) The way this type of leader and worker works is to just read God’s words and preach some words and doctrines to people, yet they pay no attention to resolving real problems and even more so are afraid of reporting them to the Above and seeking solutions from the Above—they are very afraid that the Above will find out what their actual situation is. What is the nature of such actions? What kind of person are they in terms of their essence? To be precise, such people are standard Pharisees. The manifestations of Pharisees are as follows: They engage in dignified external actions, they speak and behave in an elegant manner, they base all their words and actions on the Bible, and when they meet and talk to people, they recite words from the Bible, and they can repeat so many lines of the Bible from memory. False leaders are just the same as Pharisees—from the outside, you can’t find any fault with them, and they look particularly spiritual. You can’t detect any issues in them from their external speech, actions, and behavior, yet they are unable to resolve many of the problems that exist in the church work. So what then does this “spiritual” mean? In strict terms, it is pseudo-spirituality. Pseudo-spiritual people like this keep themselves so busy every day, flitting between groups large and small, preaching God’s words everywhere they go. On the outside they appear as though they love God’s words more than anyone else, that they make more effort with God’s words than anyone else, that they are more knowledgeable about God’s words than anyone else, and they can say the page number of any essential passage of God’s words off the top of their heads. If someone encounters a problem, they give them the page number of a related passage of God’s words and tell them to go read it. From the outside, they appear to take God’s words as their criterion in everything, to bear witness to God’s words when things befall them, and there seem to not be any problems with them. But when you look closely at the work they do, are they able to discover and resolve problems while they’re preaching these words and doctrines? If, through fellowshipping on the truth, they find a problem that hadn’t been discovered before in an item of work, and resolve problems that others couldn’t, then this shows that they understand God’s words and fellowship clearly on the truth. Pseudo-spiritual people are the exact opposite of this. They commit God’s words to memory and preach them everywhere, and their minds and hearts are filled with God’s words. However, no matter whether a big problem or a small problem arises in the work, they can’t see it or discover it. At the end of gatherings, what they fear most is someone raising a real issue and asking them to resolve it, and that’s why they leave immediately when gatherings are over, thinking, “If someone asks me a question and I can’t answer it, then that will be so awkward and embarrassing!” This is their real stature and true state.

Think about which leaders and workers around you are good at fellowshipping on the truth to resolve problems, and are able to integrate with the brothers and sisters and get the work going together with them when doing their duties—these leaders and workers are able to fulfill their responsibilities. Think about which leaders and workers around you are good at discovering and resolving problems, and focus most on doing real work and get the most results in their work—these leaders and workers are loyal people who are very responsible and conscientious. Conversely, if a leader is excellent at preaching words and doctrines, and preaches in a logical and organized manner, with a central point and content, and in a structured way, and people are enthusiastic about their sermons, yet they’re always avoiding the brothers and sisters, always afraid that the brothers and sisters will ask questions, and afraid to resolve and handle problems together with the brothers and sisters, then that leader is pseudo-spiritual, and they are a false leader. What kinds of people are the leaders and supervisors around you? Ordinarily, besides attending gatherings and giving sermons, do they follow up on and participate in work, are they able to frequently discover and resolve problems in the work, or do they just disappear after making an appearance at gatherings? Pseudo-spiritual false leaders are always afraid of having nothing to preach, and of having nothing to say when they meet the brothers and sisters, and so they practice memorizing God’s words and how to give sermons in their rooms. They believe that preaching sermons is something that can be learned and something that can be achieved through memorization, like acquiring knowledge or attending university, and that they must embody a spirit of studying tirelessly and painstakingly. Isn’t this comprehension that these false leaders harbor distorted? (Yes, it is.) People like this preach doctrines from their high station, and concern themselves with some irrelevant matters, and then they think they’re doing their job as a leader. They never go to the work site to direct the work or resolve problems, but instead often sit in their rooms, “cloistering themselves away to focus on their self-cultivation,” equipping themselves with God’s words—is this necessary? In what circumstances can leaders and workers put the church work and the brothers and sisters temporarily to one side and go equip themselves with the truth? When the work isn’t busy, and all problems that should be resolved have been resolved, and all the matters requiring attention and principles that should be explained have been explained, and the brothers and sisters don’t have any questions or difficulties, and no one is causing disturbances and disruptions, and the work can progress smoothly, and there are no more obstacles, then leaders and workers can read God’s words and equip themselves with the truth—only this is doing real work. False leaders don’t work like this; they always focus on putting themselves in the spotlight, and they just do some highly visible work that others can see to show off. If they can find some new light when reading God’s words or listening to a sermon, they feel that they’ve gained something, that they have the truth reality, and then they hurriedly look for an opportunity to preach a sermon to others. They preach doctrines in a systematic, logical, and well-organized manner, with a central point and content, and in a way that is more powerful and profound than a speech from a celebrity or an academic lecture, and they feel quite satisfied with this. And yet they ponder to themselves, “What will I preach next time after I finish this sermon? I don’t have anything else.” And so they hurry off and “cloister themselves away to focus on their self-cultivation” again, looking for profound doctrines. They are never seen at the site of church work, and when people have difficulties and are waiting for them to be resolved, these false leaders are nowhere to be found. Don’t false leaders feel diffident and uneasy? They can’t resolve real problems and yet they still want to preach lofty sermons to show off. These people are dead to shame.

All false leaders can preach words and doctrines, they are all pseudo-spiritual, they can’t do any real work, and they don’t understand the truth despite having believed in God for many years—it can be said that they have no spiritual understanding. They think that being a church leader means that they just need to preach some words and doctrines, shout some slogans, and explain God’s words a little, and then people will understand the truth. They don’t know what it means to do work, they don’t know what exactly the responsibilities of leaders and workers are, and they don’t know why exactly God’s house selects someone to be a leader or worker, or what problems exactly this is intended to resolve. So, no matter how God’s house fellowships that leaders and workers must follow up on work, inspect work, and supervise work, that they must promptly discover and resolve problems in the work, and so on, they don’t take any of this in and they don’t understand it. They aren’t able to reach or achieve the requirements God’s house has for leaders and workers, and they can’t understand problems related to professional skills involved in the performance of duties, as well as the issue of principle for selecting supervisors, and so forth, and even if they know about these problems, they still aren’t able to handle them. Therefore, under the leadership of such false leaders, all kinds of problems that arise in the church’s work cannot be resolved. Not just the problems related to professional skills that God’s chosen people encounter when doing their duties, but also difficulties in the life entry of God’s chosen people, go unresolved for a prolonged period of time, and when some leaders and workers or supervisors of various items of work aren’t able to do real work, they aren’t promptly dismissed or reassigned, and so on. None of these problems are resolved in a prompt manner, and consequently the efficiency of various items of work in the church continually diminishes, and work effectiveness gets poorer and poorer. In terms of personnel, those who are somewhat gifted and good at speaking become leaders and workers, whereas those who love the truth, who can bury themselves in hard work, and work tirelessly without complaint, don’t get promoted and cultivated, and are treated like laborers, and various technical personnel who have certain strengths don’t get put to reasonable use. Also, some people who do their duty sincerely don’t receive life provision, and so they sink into negativity and weakness. What’s more, no matter how much evil antichrists and evil people do, it’s like false leaders haven’t seen it. If someone exposes an evil person or an antichrist, false leaders will even tell them they should treat that person with love and give them a chance to repent. In doing so, they allow evil people and antichrists to do evil and cause disturbances in the church, and this leads to long delays in these evil people, disbelievers, and antichrists being cleared out or expelled, and they get to continue doing evil in the church and disturbing the church’s work. False leaders are not capable of handling and resolving any of these problems; they are not capable of treating people fairly or of arranging work in a reasonable way, but instead they act recklessly and only do some useless work, resulting in them making a mess and chaos of the church’s work. No matter how God’s house fellowships on the truth or how it stresses the principles that should be adhered to when carrying out the work of the church—restricting those who ought to be restricted and clearing out those who ought to be cleared out of the different kinds of evildoers and disbelievers, and promoting and cultivating people with good caliber and comprehension ability, and people who can pursue the truth, who ought to be promoted and cultivated—though these things are fellowshipped countless times, false leaders don’t understand or comprehend them and just continually hold fast to their pseudo-spiritual views and “loving” approaches. False leaders believe that, under their earnest and patient instruction, all types of people perform their own roles in an orderly manner, without chaos, and everyone has quite a lot of faith, is willing to do their duties, is unafraid of going to prison and of facing danger, and every person has the determination to endure suffering and is unwilling to be a Judas. They believe that having a good atmosphere in the church life means that they have done a good job. Regardless of whether instances of evil people causing disturbances or disbelievers spreading heresies and fallacies occur in the church, they don’t consider these things to be problems, and they feel no need to resolve them. When it comes to a person they’ve entrusted work to acting recklessly based on their own will and disturbing the gospel work, false leaders are even more blind. They say, “I’ve explained the work principles I’m supposed to explain, and I’ve told them what to do again and again. If any problems come up, it has nothing to do with me.” However, they don’t know if that person is a right person, they don’t concern themselves with that, and they do not know whether what they said when they were explaining and telling that person what to do can achieve positive results, or what consequences it will bring about. Whenever false leaders hold a gathering, they speak an endless stream of words and doctrines, but it turns out that they aren’t able to resolve any problems. And yet they still believe they’re doing great work, they still feel pleased with themselves and think that they’re amazing. In fact, the words and doctrines they speak can only fob off those muddled people, stupid people, and foolish people, who are ignorant and of poor caliber. After these people hear these words, they are confused and believe that what the false leaders said is so right, that nothing they said is wrong. False leaders can only satisfy these confused people and are fundamentally incapable of resolving real problems. Of course, false leaders are even less capable of dealing with problems related to professional skills and knowledge—they are totally powerless when it comes to these things. Take the text-based work of God’s house, for example. This is the work that causes false leaders the most headaches. They can’t identify exactly which people have spiritual understanding, good caliber, and are suited to doing text-based work, and they regard anyone with glasses and a high level of education as having good caliber and spiritual understanding, and so they arrange for those people to do it, telling them, “You are all talented at doing text-based work. I don’t understand this work, so it all rests on your shoulders. God’s house requires nothing else of you, only that you put your strengths to use, hold nothing back, and contribute everything you’ve learned. You must know to be grateful and thank God for raising you up.” After the false leaders say a bunch of ineffective and superficial words, they feel that the work has been arranged, and that they’ve then done everything they need to do. They don’t know whether the people they’ve arranged to do this work are suitable or not, nor do they know what these people’s shortcomings are in terms of professional knowledge, or how they should make up for them. They don’t know how to view and discern people, they don’t understand professional problems, nor do they understand knowledge related to writing—they are utterly ignorant of these things. They say they don’t understand or comprehend these things, but in their hearts, they think, “Aren’t you just a bit more educated and knowledgeable than I am? Even though I can’t guide you in this work, I’m more spiritual than you are, I’m better at giving sermons than you are, and I understand God’s words better than you do. I’m the one leading you, I’m your superior. I must be in charge of you, and you have to do what I say.” False leaders regard themselves as superior, yet they can’t come up with any worthwhile suggestions regarding any kind of work related to professional skills, and they aren’t able to give any guidance either. At the very most, they can arrange personnel well; they can’t do any of the subsequent work. They don’t try to gain professional knowledge, and they don’t follow up on the work. All false leaders are pseudo-spiritual; all they can do is preach some words and doctrines and then they think they understand the truth and constantly show off before God’s chosen people. At every gathering, they preach for several hours, and yet it turns out that they can’t resolve any problems at all. They are entirely ignorant when it comes to problems related to professional knowledge in people’s duties; they’re clearly laymen, yet they pretend to be spiritual, directing the work of the professionals—how can they do the work well like this? False leaders not trying to learn professional knowledge and not being able to do any real work already disgusts people, and on top of this, they pretend to be spiritual people and flaunt their spiritual words, which is so lacking in reason! This is no different from the Pharisees. Where the Pharisees were the most lacking in reason was that God detested them, and yet they were totally unaware of it and still considered themselves to be pretty good and very spiritual. False leaders are this lacking in self-awareness; they clearly can’t do any real work and yet they pretend to be spiritual, they become hypocritical Pharisees. They are exactly those whom God spurns and eliminates.