Our fellowship just now mainly looked at why man must pursue the truth in terms of God’s management plan, from God’s perspective. As seen from the other side, it’s somewhat simpler. In terms of man themselves, from man’s perspective, why must man pursue the truth? Most simply, if man’s pursuit, were they to live under the law and not understand the truth, were no more than upholding the law, what would ultimately come of it? The only thing that could ultimately come of that would be man’s condemnation by the law, for their inability to uphold the law. And on from that to the Age of Grace: In that age, man did understand much, and they gained much new information from God about man—guidelines and commandments for human comportment. Man profited nicely, in terms of doctrine. However, man yet hoped they would be availed of more of God’s protection, favor, blessings, and grace, without having understood the truth; man’s viewpoint was still one of making requests of God, and as they made those requests, their pursuit was still aimed and directed toward the life of the flesh, and the comforts of the flesh, and better fleshly living. The aim of their pursuit was still in contradiction to the truth and ran against it. Man still fell short of being able to pursue the truth, and they couldn’t enter such a real life as that in which the truth stands as the ground for one’s existence. These are the realities of man’s life, as lived on a foundation of having understood all the laws or the commandments and strictures of the Age of Grace, on a foundation of not yet having understood the truth. When these are the realities of man’s life, they will often lose their direction without realizing it. It’s just as people say: “I’m confused and at a loss.” In such conditions of uninterrupted confusion, man will often sink into a void, their ends frayed, not knowing why man lives or what the future will be, much less how they should face the various people, events, and things that real life visits on them, or what the correct mode is that they should use to face them. There are even many followers of God, believers, who, even as they uphold the commandments and enjoy a great deal of God’s grace and blessings, pursue status, wealth, a promising future, distinction among their peers, rosy marriages, domestic fulfillment and fortune—and in today’s society, they pursue enjoyment of the flesh, and life, and ease; they pursue luxurious mansions and cars; they pursue global travel, probing the mysteries and future of mankind. Mankind, in their acceptance of the regulations and restrictions of a host of laws and behavioral criteria, remains unable to cast off their propensity to probe the future, and the mysteries of mankind, and every matter beyond mankind’s ken. And as people do so, they often feel emptied, depressed, aggrieved, annoyed, unsettled, and afraid, so much so that with many things that befall them, they are hard-pressed to control their hotheadedness and emotions. There are some people who lapse into low spirits, depression, repression, and so on, when they encounter any agitating conditions, such as rough conditions at work, or domestic rifts, domestic upsets, marital upsets, or society’s discrimination. There are even some people who plunge into extremities of feeling; there are even some who choose to end their own lives by extreme means. Of course, there are others who choose withdrawal and loneliness. And what has this given rise to in society? Recluses, male and female; clinical depression; and so on. There’s no lack of these phenomena in the lives of Christians, either; they happen often. When all is said and done, the cause of this, at its root, is that mankind doesn’t understand what the truth is, nor where man comes from and where they are going, nor why man is alive and how they ought to live. When facing any of the manifold sorts of people, events, and things they encounter, they don’t know how to handle, resolve, cast off, or see into and penetrate all these things, so that they can live happily and at ease, under the sovereignty and arrangements of the Creator. Mankind doesn’t have this ability. Without God’s expression of the truth, and without His having told man how they should view people and things, and comport themselves and act, humans rely on their own efforts, the knowledge they’ve acquired, and the life skills they’ve grasped, and those rules of the game they’ve understood, as well as rules for comportment or philosophies for living. They rely on their experience of human life and their exposure to it, and even on the things they’ve learned from books—but still, when faced with all the difficulties real life visits upon them, they’re impotent. For those who live their lives in such conditions, reading the Bible is of no avail. Even praying to the Lord Jesus is of no avail, much less praying to Jehovah. Reading what the prophets of old foretold can’t resolve any of their problems, either. So, some people travel the globe; they go exploring the moon and Mars, or they seek out prophets who can foretell the future and converse with them. But people’s hearts remain unsettled, joyless, and uncomforted once they’ve done these things. The direction and aim of their advancement still feel so elusive to them, and so empty. On the whole, mankind’s life remains so hollow. Because such is the status quo of mankind’s life, they invent many ways to entertain themselves: modern video games, for example, and bungee jumping, and the surfing, mountaineering, and skydiving that Westerners enjoy, and the various dramas, songs, and dances the Chinese like, and the ladyboy shows of Southeast Asia. People even watch things that satisfy their spiritual worlds and carnal lusts. Yet whatever their amusements, whatever they watch, people’s deepest hearts remain bewildered as to the future. However many times someone’s been around the world, or even if they’ve been to the moon and Mars, once they’re back and settled in a bit, they’re altogether enervated, quite as they were before. If anything, they’ll be even sadder and more unsettled for having gone than if they hadn’t. Mankind thinks the reason that they’re so hollow, so powerless, and so bewildered and shaken, that they’re desirous of exploring what’s to come and isn’t known, is that people don’t know how to entertain themselves, that they don’t know how to live. They think it’s because people don’t know how to enjoy life or enjoy the moment; their interests and hobbies are simplistic, they think—not expansive enough. Yet however many interests people foster, however many entertainments they’ve partaken in, however many places they’ve been around the world, mankind still feels that how they live and the direction and goal of their existence are not as they would wish. In brief, what people feel in general is hollowness and boredom. Some people wish to savor all the world’s gourmet delicacies because of this hollowness and boredom; wherever they go, they’re set on eating. Others are set on having fun wherever they go, and they have their fun, and eat, and amuse themselves, all to their heart’s content—yet once they’ve eaten and drunk and made merry, they’re emptier than before. What’s to be done about this? Why is this feeling impossible to shake off? When people are at an impasse, some of them start using drugs, consuming opium, taking ecstasy, and stimulating themselves with all sorts of material things. And what’s the result? Do any of these methods have any effect when it comes to resolving man’s hollowness? Can any of them resolve problems at their roots? (No.) Why is it that they can’t? It’s because humans live by their feelings. They don’t understand the truth or know what gives rise to mankind’s problems of hollowness, unease, bewilderment, and so forth, nor do they know by what means to resolve them. They think that if fleshly enjoyment is taken care of and the world of their carnal spirit has been sated and filled, the hollow feeling in their spirit will be gone. Is that how it works? The fact is that it’s not. If you come away from these sermons having accepted them as doctrine, but don’t pursue or practice them at all, and if you don’t take these words of God as the basis and criterion for your views on people and things, and for your comportment and actions, your mode of existence and view on life will never change. And if those things don’t change, it means that your life, its style, and value of its existence will never change. And what does it mean if the style and value of your life’s existence will never change? It means that one day, sooner or later, the doctrines you understand will seem to you as pillars of the spirit; sooner or later, they’ll be catchphrases and theories to you, things with which you’ll plug up that feeling of hollowness in your interior world, when the situation calls for it. If the direction and goal of your pursuit don’t change, you’ll be the same as those people who haven’t heard any of God’s words. The direction and goal of your pursuit will still be a search for entertainment, for fleshly solace. You’ll still try to resolve your hollowness and bewilderment by traveling the world and probing into mysteries. There’s no doubt that you’ll then be walking the same path as those people. They feel hollow after they’ve tasted the world’s delicacies and enjoyed its grand luxuries, and so will you. You may hold to the true way and God’s words, but if you don’t pursue or practice them, you’ll end up as they do, often feeling hollow, shaken, resentful, and repressed, without true happiness, without true joy, without true freedom, and more, without true peace. And then, in the end, your outcome will be the same as theirs.

What does God look at, when it comes to man’s outcome? He doesn’t look at how many of His words you’ve read or how many sermons you’ve listened to. God doesn’t look at these things. He looks at how many truths you’ve gained in your pursuit, at how many truths you can practice; He looks at whether you take His words as the basis and the truth as the criterion for your views on people and things, and for your comportment and actions, in your life—at whether you have such experience and testimony. If there is no such testimony in your day-to-day life and in the course of your following God, and none of these things are at all substantiated, then God will regard you the same as He does unbelievers. Is such regard from Him the end of the story? No; it’s far from the case that God would regard you as such and leave it at that. Instead, He will thereby decide your outcome. God sets your outcome by reason of the path you walk; He sets your outcome based on how you perform in the array of your pursuit and goal, your attitude toward the truth, and whether you have set foot on the path of pursuing the truth. Why is that how He sets it? When someone who simply doesn’t pursue the truth has read God’s words and heard a great many of them, yet still can’t take His words as the criterion for their views on people and things, as well as their comportment and actions, that person won’t just not be able to be saved in the end. Here’s the most important thing: What could become of such a person if they were to remain? Could they become a master of all things? Could they be a steward of all things in God’s stead? Are they worthy of commission? Of trust? If God handed all things over to you, would you do as mankind does now, indiscriminately killing the living beings God created, indiscriminately dissipating the myriad that God created, indiscriminately defiling the myriad that God has bestowed on mankind? Of course you would! So, if God were to hand this world and all things off to you, what would all things ultimately be faced with? They would have no true steward; they would be defiled and dissipated to nothing by Satan-corrupted mankind. Ultimately, all things, the living beings among all things, and Satan-corrupted mankind would meet the same fate: They would be destroyed by God. This is something God doesn’t hope to see. So, if such a person has heard many words of God and only understood a great many doctrines within His words, yet is still unable to take on the duty of a master of all things or to view people and things, and comport themselves and act, according to God’s words, God will certainly not entrust any affair to them, because they’re unfit. God doesn’t wish to see all things, which He painstakingly created, dissipated and defiled to nothing by Satan-corrupted mankind for a second time, nor does He wish to see the mankind He has managed for six thousand years destroyed at the hands of such humans. The only thing He wants to see is the continued existence of all the things of His painstaking creation under the stewardship of the group of people that gains His salvation, under God’s care, protection, and leadership, living on in accordance with the order of all things and with the laws that God commands. What sort of people are they, then, who can bear such a heavy onus? There’s only one sort, and that sort is they, whom I speak of, who pursue the truth, those being the sort of people who can view people and things, and comport themselves and act, in rigorous accordance with God’s words and with the truth as their criterion. Such people are worthy of trust. Their mode of existence has emerged entirely from the modes of the mankind that Satan has corrupted; in the goal and mode of their pursuit, in their views on people and things, and in their comportment and actions, they are able to accord wholly with God’s words, and wholly able to take the truth as their criterion. Such people are the ones who are truly fit to continue living on, and who are fit to have all things passed into their hands by God. It is these people who can bear so heavy an onus as God’s commission. God will assuredly not hand all things off to the sort of person that doesn’t pursue the truth. Assuredly, He won’t hand all things off to people who just don’t listen to His words, and He assuredly won’t entrust any task to such people. They can’t even perform their own duties well, much less God’s commission. If God were to entrust all things to them, they would have no loyalty at all, nor would they act according to His words. They’d work a bit when they were happy, and when they weren’t, they’d go off eating, drinking, and being merry. Often, they’d be hollow and uneasy and at loose ends at heart, without any loyalty to God’s commission. Such people are assuredly not those whom God wants. So, if you understand God’s will, and know the deficiencies of corrupt mankind, as well as what sort of path corrupt mankind should take, you should begin by pursuing the truth. Listen to God’s words, and start off in the direction of viewing people and things, and comporting yourself and acting, wholly according to God’s words, with the truth as your criterion. Orient yourself toward this goal, toward this direction, and the day will come, sooner or later, on which God remembers and accepts your expenditure and payment. Then, there will be value in your being alive; God will approve of you, and you will no longer be an ordinary person. You aren’t being asked to persist as long as Noah did in building the ark, but you must at least persist for this lifetime. Will you live to be one hundred and twenty years old? No one knows, but suffice it to say, that isn’t the lifespan of modern mankind. Pursuing the truth now is much easier than it was to build the ark. How difficult the ark was to build, and there were no modern tools then—it was done entirely with human strength, in an unfavorable environment, no less. It took a long time, with few to help. It is much easier for you to pursue the truth now than it was to build the ark. Your large-scale environment and the small-scale conditions of your life put you at such an advantage and grant you such convenience, as far as pursuing the truth is concerned.

Today’s fellowship on “Why Man Must Pursue the Truth” has mainly covered two aspects of the topic. One was simple fellowship from God’s perspective, about His management plan, His wishes, and His yearning; the other was an analysis of the problems in people themselves, from their own perspective, which served to explain the necessity and importance of pursuing the truth. In terms of either of those angles, pursuing the truth is of utmost importance for man, and of critical urgency. The pursuit of the truth, as seen from any vantage, is the path and goal in life that every follower of God, everyone who has heard His words, should choose. The pursuit of the truth should not be held as a sort of ideal or wish, nor should the statements made about it be taken as a sort of spiritual comfort; rather, one must take the words God speaks and His requirements for man and, quite pragmatically, turn them into the principles and basis for their practice in real life, so that the goal of their life and the mode of their existence may change, which, of course, also makes one’s life more worthwhile. In this way, as you pursue the truth, the road you walk and your choice will be right, on the smaller scale—and on the grand scale, you will ultimately be shed of your corrupt disposition because you pursue the truth, and you will be saved. Those who will be saved are not, as God sees them, merely the apples of His eye or treasures in His hand, and less still are they merely the simple mainstays of His kingdom. The blessing to come to you, a member of the future humanity, is great indeed, of a sort never seen before and never to be seen again; good things will come to you, one after the next, in a way your mind can’t conceive. In any case, what’s now to be done first is to establish the goal of pursuing the truth. Establishing this goal isn’t meant to resolve the hollowness of your spiritual world, nor is it meant to resolve the repression and indignation, or the uncertainty and bewilderment, in the pit of your heart. That’s not what it’s for. Instead, it’s meant to serve as a real and genuine goal toward which one may comport themselves and act. It’s as simple as that. That’s simple, don’t you think? You don’t dare say so, but the fact is, it’s quite simple—it comes down to whether a person has the resolve to pursue the truth. If you truly do have that resolve, what truth is there that has no specific path of practice? They all have paths, don’t they? (They do.) To have a specific basis for the practice of the truth, in any of its realms, and to have specific principles of practice for any project in the work—this end is achievable by those who truly have resolve. Some may say, “I still don’t know how to practice when I encounter issues.” That’s because you fail to seek. If you sought, you’d have a path. There’s a saying, isn’t there? It goes, “Seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7). Have you sought? Have you knocked? Have you contemplated the truth as you read God’s words? If you put effort into that contemplation, you’ll be able to understand all. All the truth is in God’s words; it just needs you to read it and contemplate it. Do not be idle; pay earnest attention. With problems you can’t resolve yourself, you must pray to God, and you’ll need to seek the truth for a while, and sometimes, you’ll need to be patient and wait for God, in His time. If God arranges an environment for you, and in it, He reveals all, and enlightens a passage of His words for you, bringing clarity to your heart, and you have specific principles for practice, will you not thus have understood? So, the pursuit of the truth isn’t such an abstract thing, nor is it so hard. Be it from your daily life, or from your duty, or from the work of the church, or from your interactions with others, as seen from any angle, you may seek the truth to point out the direction and criteria for practice. It’s not hard at all. It is much easier for man to believe in God now than it was in the past, because there are just so many words of God, and you listen to so many sermons, and there’s so much fellowship on every aspect of the truth. If someone has spiritual understanding and has caliber, they’ll have understood already. It’s only those who lack spiritual understanding and are of terrible caliber who always say they don’t understand this or that and can never see through things. They get befuddled as soon as something befalls them; fellowship on the truth clears it up, but a while later, they get befuddled again. This is all because they while their days away without a care in the world. They’re just too lazy, and they do not seek. Things will be easy to understand if you are to seek and read more of the pertinent words of God, as all those words are in common language that’s easily understood. Any normal person can understand them, save the mentally deficient. These words state many matters clearly and tell you everything. Unless you don’t see the pursuit of the truth as a big deal, if you truly long at heart to gain the truth and take its pursuit as the most important thing in life, then nothing can impede you or keep you from understanding and practicing the truth.

The simplest precept in pursuing the truth is that you must accept all things from God and submit in all things. That’s part of it. The other part is that with your duty and what’s yours to do, and bigger than that, with the commission given by God and your obligation, as well as important work that’s outside your duty but needs you to do it, work that’s arranged for you and that you are called by name to do—you should pay the price, however difficult it may be. Even if you need to apply yourself to the fullest, even if persecution should loom, and even if it should put your life at risk, you’re not to begrudge the cost, but to offer up your loyalty and obey unto death. This is how the pursuit of the truth manifests in reality, its real expenditure and its real practice. Is it hard? (No.) I like people who say it’s not hard, because they have hearts that long to pursue the truth, that are determined and faithful—there’s strength in their hearts, so nothing that befalls them is difficult. But if people lack confidence, if they doubt themselves, as people often say, then it’s all over for them. If a person is as useless as a pile of mud, unmotivated to do anything productive, but they liven up when it comes to eating, drinking, and making merry, and if they become negative when faced with difficulties, and they lack enthusiasm, without even a modicum of motivation, when it comes to fellowshiping about the truth, what sort of person are they? They’re someone who doesn’t love the truth. Had man been required to pursue the truth in the Age of Grace or the Age of Law, that would have been something of a challenge for them. It wouldn’t have been easy, because mankind’s conditions then were different, and so were the standards of God’s requirements of them. So, in ages past, there weren’t many people who were capable of heeding God’s words and submitting to Him, except for such prominent people as Noah, Abraham, Job, and Peter. But God didn’t blame the people of those two ages, because He hadn’t told people how to reach the standards of salvation. In this stage of the work in the last age, God clearly tells people every aspect of the truths they are to practice. If people still don’t practice them and still can’t meet God’s requirements, that’s not God’s fault; it’s an issue of man not loving the truth and being sick of it. So, to have people pursue the truth in this, the time of pursuing the truth, isn’t a challenge for them—indeed, it’s something they’re capable of. In one regard, this is because all is conducive to it; in another, it’s that people’s conditions and foundation are sufficient for them to pursue the truth. If someone fails to gain the truth in the end, it’s because their issues are just too severe. Such a person deserves whatever punishment they suffer, whatever outcome they get, whatever death they die. They merit no pity. To God, there are no such terms as pity or compassion for people. He determines the outcome someone should have based on His requirements of man, His dispositions, and the order and rules He has established; and as a given performance yields a given outcome, a person’s present life and life to come are thereby decided. It’s as simple as that. It doesn’t matter how many will survive in the end, or how many will be punished. God doesn’t care about that. What have you understood in these words? What information do they convey to you? Do you know? Let Me see whether you’re smart and resourceful enough to answer. If you can’t, I’d evaluate you with a single word—stupid. Why do I say you’re stupid? I’ll tell you. I said that God doesn’t care how many people will survive, or how many meet destruction and punishment in the end. What does this tell you? It tells you that God hasn’t ordained a set number of people. You can struggle for it, but whoever ultimately survives or is punished, be it you, another, or any group, isn’t part of a headcount that God has already set. God works and speaks as He does now. He treats every person fairly and gives every person ample opportunity. He gives you ample opportunity, and ample grace, and an ample measure of His words, and His work, and His mercy and tolerance. He is fair to every person. If you can pursue the truth, and are on the path of following God, and can accept the truth, however many hardships you endure or challenges you face, and if your corrupt disposition is cleansed, you will be saved. If you can bear witness for God and become a worthy created being, a worthy master of all things, you’ll survive. If you’ll survive, it won’t be because you have a good lot; rather, it will be on account of your own expenditures and efforts, and your own pursuit. It will be what you deserve and are entitled to. You won’t need God to give you anything extra. God doesn’t give you supplemental guidance and training; He doesn’t say supplemental words to you or do you special favors. He doesn’t do these things. It’s survival of the fittest, just as in nature. Each animal bears its offspring, in whatever number they’re born and die, according to the order and rules that God has set. Those that can survive, do, and those that can’t live, die, and then give birth anew. However many of them can survive after that, that’s how many there are. In a bad year, not a single one survives; in a good year, more do. All things maintain a balance, in the end. So, how does God treat mankind, which He created? God’s attitude is the same. He thus fairly gives every person their opportunity, and thus speaks to every person, publicly and uncompensated. He is gracious to every person, and lifts every person up; He leads, looks after, and guards every person. If in the end, you survive by pursuing the truth, and you meet the standards of God’s requirements, you will have succeeded. Yet if you’re always muddle-headedly whiling your days away, thinking yourself ill-fated, prone always to overreaching, not knowing what to do, living always by your feelings, without pursuing the truth or walking the correct way, you’ll gain nothing in the end. If you wish always to muddle through your days, ignoring the work God does in you, not caring in the least that He leads you, or that He gives you opportunities, and discipline, and enlightenment, and support, He’ll see that you’re a benumbed fool, and He’ll ignore you. God will work on you on the day when you pursue the truth. He doesn’t remember your transgressions. If you don’t pursue the truth, God won’t force you or drag you along. If you pursue, you will gain; if you don’t, you won’t. People can pursue the truth or not as they please. It’s theirs to decide. When God’s work comes to its end, He will ask for your answer sheet, and measure you with the standards of the truth. If you have no testimony at all, you must be cast out; you won’t be able to survive. You’ll say, “I’ve performed so many duties and done so much service. I’ve expended a lot, and paid a lot!” And God will say, “But did you pursue the truth?” You’ll think it over, and it will seem that in your twenty, thirty, forty, or fifty years of believing in God, you hadn’t pursued the truth. God will say, “You yourself say that you haven’t pursued the truth. Off with you, then. Go where you please.” You’ll say, “Doesn’t God think it’s a pity to have saved one fewer person than He should have, to be short of one master of all things?” At this point, would God still take pity? God has been patient long enough; He has waited long enough. His expectations for you will have run their course; He’ll have lost His hope in you, and will no longer pay you mind. He won’t shed a single tear for you, or have any more pain and suffering on your account. Why is that? Because the outcome of all things will have run its course, and God’s work will reach its end, and His management plan will come to its close, and He will rest. God will not be happy for any person, nor will He be pained, or weep, or cry for any person. Of course, neither will He rejoice and be glad that any person survives, or that any person is able to become a master of all things. Why is this? God has spent too much, for too long, on this humanity, and He needs to rest. He needs to close the book on the six thousand years of His management plan and will no longer pay it any mind, or plan anything, or say any words or do any work on man. He’ll hand over the future work and the days to come to the masters of the next age. What is it I’m telling you, then? It’s this: As you now know how many people will remain in the end and who will be able to, every one of you can strive toward that—and the only path for doing so is the pursuit of the truth. Don’t while your days away; it won’t do to be muddle-headed. If there comes a day when God no longer remembers anything you paid and no longer cares what path you walk, nor what your outcome will be, then on that day, your outcome will truly be set. What is it you must do now? You must take advantage of the present, while God’s heart still toils for mankind, while He’s still making plans for mankind, while He still sorrows and frets over every human movement and gesture. People must make their choice, as soon as possible. Establish the goal and direction of your pursuit; don’t wait until the days of God’s rest have come to make your plans. If you don’t feel true ruefulness, regret, grief, and lamentation until then, it will all have come too late. No one will be able to save you, nor will God. This is because when the time comes, the moment in which God’s plan truly ends, and He has made the last mark and is closing the book on His plan, He will work no longer. God needs rest; He needs to savor the fruits born of His six-thousand-year management plan and enjoy the stewardship of all things, for Him, of the humans who remain. What God wants to enjoy is the sight of the humans who remain managing all things according to the rules and regulations He has established, in meticulous accordance with the order He created for the seasons, and all things, and mankind, without violating anything He wills or anything He desires. God wants to enjoy His rest; He wants to enjoy His comfort, without further worry about mankind or work for their sake. Do you understand this? (Yes.) That day will soon be here. If we were talking about human longevity in the time of Adam and Eve, people might still have centuries left to them, and the remaining time would be quite long. Look at how long it took Noah to build the ark. I think there are just a scant few people today who will live to more than one hundred, and even if you do live to ninety or one hundred, how many decades are left to you? There aren’t many. Even if you’re twenty today and may live to be ninety, so you’ll live seventy more years, that’s still less time than it took Noah to build the ark. To God, six thousand years is a blink of an eye, and what to man is sixty years, eighty years, or a hundred years is, to God, a few seconds—a few minutes, at most; a blink of the eye. Even people who don’t walk the correct path or pursue the truth often say, “Life is short: In a blink of the eye, we’re old; in the blink of an eye, the house is filled with children and grandchildren; in the blink of an eye, our lives have run their course.” So what if you do pursue the truth? For you, time is even more pressing. People who don’t pursue the truth and live in a world of hollowness while their days away, and they all feel time goes by quite fast. What if you do pursue the truth? Any environment, any person, event, or thing of God’s arrangement is an adequate thing for you to experience for a while—and only after a long time will you gain just that little bit of knowledge, insight, and experience. It isn’t easy. When you truly do have that knowledge and experience, it will come to you: “Goodness! Man doesn’t gain much from a lifetime of pursuing the truth!” There are many people now writing essays of their experiential testimony, and I see that some who have believed in God for twenty or thirty years just write about their failures and falls from ten or twenty years ago. They wish to write about something recent and their present life entry, but have none. Their experience is pitifully scant. In writing essays of experiential testimony, some people must look back at their past failures and falls, and those with poor memories need others’ help to recall them. That little bit is all they’ve gained in their ten, twenty, even thirty years of belief in God, and it’s hard work to write it down. Some essays are even disjointed, their disjointed parts forced fancifully together. These don’t even count as life experience, in fact; they have nothing to do with life. That’s how pitiful man is, when he doesn’t pursue the truth. Isn’t that so? (It is.) That’s how it is. I hope that none of you get to that day when God’s work has ended, and you, penitent with Him, fall to your knees and say, “I know myself now! I know how to pursue the truth now!” Too late! God will pay you no mind; He won’t care any longer whether you’re someone who pursues the truth, or what sort of corrupt disposition you have, or what sort of attitude you have toward Him, nor will He care how deeply you’ve been corrupted by Satan or what sort of person you are. When that happens, won’t you be frozen to the core? (Yes.) Imagine it now: If that moment truly came, would you be sad? (Yes.) Why would you be sad? The implication is that you’d never get another chance. You’d never hear God’s words again, and God would never again fret over you; you’d never again be someone of concern to Him, or a being of His creation. You’d have no relationship at all with Him. How fearful to think of it. If you can picture that now, yet the day truly does come when you reach such a point, will you not be dumbstruck? It will be just as the Bible tells: When that time comes, people will pound their chests and backs, wailing, gnashing their teeth, with such crying as might be their death. And crying to death will be useless—it will all be too late! God will be your God no longer, and you will no longer be a being of God’s creation. You will have no relationship with Him; He will not want you. How you are will have nothing more to do with God. You will no longer be in His heart, and He won’t worry for you anymore. Will you not then have reached the end of your path of belief in God? (Yes.) That’s why, if you’re able to picture that there may be a time when God detests and rejects you, you should cherish the present. God may chastise you, or judge you, or prune you; He may even curse you and scold you roundly. All of this is worth cherishing: God at least still acknowledges you as a being of His creation, and at least still has expectations for you, and you’re at least still in His heart, and He is still willing to scold you and curse you, it means that in His heart, He still worries for you. This worry is not something someone can trade their life for. Now, don’t be stupid! Do you understand? (Yes.) If you do, you’re not truly stupid; you’re faking it, no? I do hope you’re not truly stupid. If you’ve understood these things, don’t while your days away. The pursuit of the truth is a great matter of human life. No other matter is as important as pursuing the truth, and no other matter surpasses gaining the truth in value. Has it been easy, to follow God up until today? Hurry, and make your pursuit of the truth a matter of import! This stage of work in the last days is the most important stage of work God does on people in His six-thousand-year management plan. The pursuit of the truth is the highest expectation God places on His chosen people. He hopes that people walk the correct path, which is the pursuit of the truth. Don’t let God down, don’t disappoint Him, and don’t make Him remove you from His heart when the final moment comes, and no longer worry for you. He wouldn’t even have hate for you. Don’t let it come to that. Do you understand? (Yes.)

What has been the topic of our fellowship today? (Why man must pursue the truth.) Why man must pursue the truth—it’s a bit of a heavy topic, isn’t it? Why is it heavy? Because it’s important. For every person’s future, for every person’s life, and for the way in which every person will exist in the next age, it’s of the utmost importance. So, I hope you’ll listen to today’s talk on the topic a couple times more, to deepen its impression on you a bit. Regardless of whether you pursued the truth in the past, and regardless of whether you’re willing to pursue the truth, strive, from today’s fellowship on the subject of “Why Man Must Pursue the Truth” and onward, to set your resolve and steel your will toward choosing to pursue the truth. It’s the best choice. Can you do that? (Yes.) Great. We fellowshiped today about why man must pursue the truth. Our next topic for fellowship is how to pursue the truth. Now that I’ve told you what it is, give it some contemplation and see what knowledge you have about the topic in your heart. Preview it a bit first. This concludes today’s fellowship.

September 3, 2022