Daily Words of God  Excerpt 99

The “incarnation” is God’s appearance in the flesh; God works among created mankind in the image of the flesh. So, as He is God incarnate, He must first be flesh, flesh with normal humanity; this is the most basic prerequisite. In fact, the implication of God’s incarnation is that God lives and works in the flesh, that God in His very essence becomes flesh, becomes a person. His incarnate life and work can be divided into two stages. First is the life He lives before performing His ministry. He lives in an ordinary human family, in utterly normal humanity, observing the normal ethics of human life and obeying the normal laws of human life, with normal human needs (food, clothing, sleep, shelter), normal human weaknesses, and normal human emotions. In other words, during this first stage He lives in non-divine, completely normal humanity, engaging in all the normal human activities. The second stage is the life He lives after beginning to perform His ministry. He still dwells in the ordinary humanity with a normal human shell, showing no outward sign of the supernatural. Yet He lives purely for the sake of His ministry, and during this time His normal humanity exists entirely in order to maintain the normal work of His divinity, for by then His normal humanity has matured to the point of being able to perform His ministry. So, the second stage of His life is to perform His ministry in His normal humanity, when it is a life both of normal humanity and complete divinity. The reason why, during the first stage of His life, He lives in completely ordinary humanity is that His humanity is not yet able to maintain the entirety of the divine work, is not yet mature; only after His humanity grows mature—that is, when it can shoulder His ministry—can He set about performing the ministry that He ought to perform. Since He is flesh, He needs to grow and mature. Therefore, the first stage of His life is that of normal humanity, whereas in the second stage, His humanity is capable of shouldering His work and performing His ministry, and so the life the incarnate God lives during His ministry is one of both humanity and complete divinity. If, from the moment of His birth, God’s incarnate flesh formally began His ministry, and all that He did involved performing supernatural signs and wonders, then He would have no corporeal essence. Therefore, His humanity exists for the sake of His corporeal essence; there can be no flesh without humanity, and a person without humanity is not a human being. In this way, the humanity of God’s flesh is an intrinsic attribute of God’s incarnate flesh. To say that “when God becomes flesh He only has divinity, and no humanity” is blasphemy, for this statement simply does not hold water, and violates the principle of incarnation. Even after He begins to perform His ministry, He still lives in His divinity with a human outer shell when He does His work; it is just that at this time, His humanity serves the sole purpose of allowing His divinity to perform the work in the normal flesh. So the agent of the work is the divinity inhabiting His humanity. His divinity, not His humanity, is at work, yet this divinity is hidden within His humanity; in essence, His work is still done by His complete divinity, not by His humanity. But the performer of the work is His flesh. One could say that He is a human being and also God, for God becomes a God living in the flesh; He has a human shell and a human essence, and even more so He has the essence of God. Because He is a human being with the essence of God, He is above all created humans, above any person who can perform God’s work. And so, among all those with a human shell like His, among all those who possess humanity, only He is the incarnate God Himself—all others are created humans. Though they all have humanity, created humans have nothing but humanity, while God incarnate is different: In His flesh He not only has humanity but, most importantly, divinity. His humanity can be seen in the outer appearance of His flesh and in His everyday life, but His divinity is difficult to perceive. Because His divinity is expressed only when He has humanity, and is not as supernatural as people imagine it to be, it is extremely difficult for people to see. Even today, people have the utmost difficulty fathoming exactly what the essence of the incarnate God is. Even after I have spoken so many words, I expect it is still a mystery to most of you. In fact, this issue is very simple: Since God becomes flesh, His essence is a combination of humanity and divinity. This combination is called God Himself, God Himself on earth.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of the Flesh Inhabited by God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 100

The life that Jesus lived on earth was a normal life of the flesh. He lived in the normal humanity of His flesh. His authority—to do His work and speak His word, or to heal the sick and cast out demons, to do such extraordinary things—basically did not manifest itself until He began His ministry. His life before age twenty-nine, before He performed His ministry, was proof enough that He was just a normal fleshly body. Because He was a normal fleshly body, and because He had not yet begun to perform His ministry, people saw nothing divine in Him, saw nothing more than a normal human being, an ordinary person—just as at that time, some people believed Him to be Joseph’s son. People thought that He was the son of an ordinary man, they had no way of telling that He was God’s incarnate flesh; even when, in the course of performing His ministry, He performed many signs, most people still said that He was Joseph’s son, for He was Christ with the outer shell of normal humanity. His normal humanity and His work both existed in order to fulfill the significance of the first incarnation, to prove that God had entirely come in the flesh, that He had become an utterly ordinary person. That He possessed normal humanity before He began His work was proof that He was an ordinary flesh; and that He worked afterward also proved that He was an ordinary flesh, for it was in the flesh of normal humanity that He performed signs and wonders, healed the sick, and cast out demons. The reason that He could work signs was that His flesh bore the authority of God, was the flesh in which God’s Spirit was clothed. He possessed this authority because of the Spirit of God, and it did not mean that He was not a flesh. Healing the sick and casting out demons was the work that He ought to perform in His ministry, it was an expression of His divinity hidden in His humanity, and no matter what signs He showed or how He demonstrated His authority, He still lived in normal humanity and was still a normal flesh. Up to the point that He rose from the dead after His crucifixion, He dwelt within normal flesh. Bestowing grace, healing the sick, and casting out demons were all part of His ministry, they were all work He performed in His normal flesh. Before He went to the cross, He never departed from His normal human flesh, regardless of what He was doing. He was God Himself, doing God’s own work, yet because He was the incarnate flesh of God, He ate food and wore clothing, had normal human needs, had normal human reason, and a normal human mind. All of this was proof that He was a normal person, which proved that God’s incarnate flesh was a flesh with normal humanity, and not supernatural. His job was to complete the work of God’s first incarnation, to fulfill the ministry that God in His first incarnation ought to perform. The significance of incarnation is that an ordinary, normal person performs the work of God Himself; that is, that God performs His divine work in humanity and thereby defeats Satan. Incarnation means that God’s Spirit becomes a flesh, that is, God becomes flesh; the work that the flesh does is the work of the Spirit, which is realized in the flesh, expressed by the flesh. No one except God’s flesh can fulfill the ministry of the incarnate God; that is, only God’s incarnate flesh, this normal human, can express the divine work. No human can take His place in this. If, during His first coming, God had not possessed normal humanity before the age of twenty-nine—if as soon as He was born He could perform signs and wonders, if as soon as He learned to speak He could speak the language of heaven, if from birth He could apprehend all worldly matters, see every person’s thoughts and what lies within their heart—such a person could not have been called a normal human being, and such flesh could not have been called human flesh. If this were the case with Christ, then the meaning and the essence of God’s incarnation would be lost. That He possesses normal humanity proves that He is God incarnated in the flesh; the fact that He undergoes a normal human growth process further demonstrates that He is a normal flesh; adding in His work on top of this, this is all enough to prove that He is God’s Word, God’s Spirit, become flesh. God becomes flesh because of the needs of His work; in other words, this stage of work must be done in the flesh, which is to say, it must be performed in normal humanity. This is the prerequisite for “the Way become flesh,” for “the Word’s appearance in the flesh,” and it is the real story of God’s two incarnations. People may believe that Jesus performed signs throughout His life, and that, right up until His work on earth ended, He showed no sign of normal humanity, did not have normal human needs or weaknesses or human emotions, did not require the basic necessities of life, and did not entertain normal human thoughts. They imagine Him to only have a superhuman mind, a transcendent humanity. They believe that since He is God, He should not think and live as normal humans do, that only a normal person, a bona fide human being, can think normal human thoughts and live a normal human life. These are all human ideas and human notions, and these notions run counter to the original intentions of God’s work. Normal human thinking sustains normal human reason and normal humanity; only normal humanity can sustain the normal functions of the flesh; and only the normal functions of the flesh can ensure that all parts of the life of the flesh are normal. Only by working in such flesh can God fulfill the purpose of His incarnation. If the incarnate God possessed only an outer shell of the flesh, but did not think normal human thoughts, then this flesh would not possess human reason, much less bona fide humanity. How could a flesh like this, without humanity, fulfill the ministry that the incarnate God ought to perform? A normal mind sustains all aspects of human life; without a normal mind, one would not be human. In other words, a person who does not think normal thoughts is mentally ill, and a Christ who has no humanity but only divinity cannot be said to be God’s incarnate flesh. So, how could God’s incarnate flesh have no normal humanity? Is it not blasphemy to say that Christ has no humanity? All activities that normal humans engage in rely on the functioning of a normal human mind. Without it, humans would go against the natural order; they would even be unable to tell the difference between black and white, good and evil; and they would have no human ethics and moral principles. Similarly, if the incarnate God did not think like a normal human, then He would not be a bona fide flesh, a normal flesh. Such non-thinking flesh would not be able to shoulder the divine work at all. He would not be able to normally engage in the activities of the normal flesh, much less live together with humans on earth. And so, the significance of God’s incarnation and the very essence of God’s coming in the flesh would have been lost. The humanity of God incarnate exists to maintain the normal divine work in the flesh; His normal human thinking sustains His normal humanity and supports all His normal corporeal activities. One could say that His normal human thinking exists in order to maintain all the work of God in the flesh. If this flesh did not possess a normal human mind, then God could not work in the flesh, and what He needs to do in the flesh could never be accomplished. Though the incarnate God possesses a normal human mind, His work is not adulterated by human thought; He undertakes the work in the humanity with a normal mind, under the precondition of possessing the humanity with a mind, not by the exercise of normal human thought. No matter how lofty the thoughts of His flesh are, His work is not tainted by logic or thinking. In other words, His work is not conceived by the mind of His flesh, but is a direct expression of the divine work in His humanity. All of His work is the ministry He must fulfill, and none of it is conceived by His brain. For example, healing the sick, casting out demons, and the crucifixion were not products of His human mind, and could not have been achieved by any man with a human mind. Likewise, today’s work of conquest is a ministry that must be performed by the incarnate God, but it is not the will of the person, it is the work His divinity should do, work of which no flesh-and-blood human is capable. So the incarnate God must possess a normal human mind, must possess normal humanity, because He must perform His work in the humanity with a normal mind. This is the essence of the work of the incarnate God, the very essence of the incarnate God.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of the Flesh Inhabited by God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 101

Before Jesus performed the work, He merely lived in His normal humanity. No one could tell that He was God, no one found out that He was the incarnate God; people just knew Him as a person of the utmost ordinariness. His normal humanity—which was as ordinary as could be—was proof that God was incarnated in the flesh, and that the Age of Grace was the age of the work of the incarnate God, not the age of the Spirit’s work. It was proof that the Spirit of God was realized completely in the flesh, that in the age of God’s incarnation His flesh would perform all the work of the Spirit. The Christ with normal humanity is a flesh in which the Spirit is realized, and is possessed of normal humanity, normal reason, and human thought. “Being realized” means God becoming man, the Spirit becoming flesh; to put it more plainly, it is when God Himself inhabits a flesh with normal humanity, and through it expresses His divine work—this is what it means to be realized, or incarnated. During His first incarnation, it was necessary for God to heal the sick and cast out demons, because His work was to redeem. In order to redeem the entire human race, He needed to be merciful and forbearing. The work that He did before He was crucified was healing the sick and casting out demons, which presaged His salvation of man from sin and filth. Because it was the Age of Grace, it was necessary for Him to heal the sick, thereby showing signs and wonders, which were representative of grace in that age—for the Age of Grace centered around the bestowal of grace; peace, joy, and material blessings were the tokens of the Age of Grace and of people’s faith in Jesus at that time. That is to say, healing the sick, casting out demons, and bestowing grace were instinctive abilities of Jesus’ flesh in the Age of Grace, they were the work the Spirit realized in the flesh. But while He was performing such work, He was living in the flesh, and did not transcend the flesh. No matter what acts of healing He performed, He still possessed normal humanity, still lived a normal human life. The reason I say that during the age of God’s incarnation the flesh performed all the work of the Spirit, is that no matter what work He did, He did it in the flesh. But because of His work, people did not regard His flesh as having a completely corporeal essence, for this flesh could work signs, and at certain special moments could do things that transcended the flesh. Of course, all these happenings occurred after He began His ministry, such as His being tempted for forty days or His transfiguration on the mountain. So with Jesus, the meaning of God’s incarnation was not completed, but only partially fulfilled. The life that He lived in the flesh before beginning His work was utterly normal in all respects. After He began the work, He retained only the outer shell of His flesh. Because His work was an expression of divinity, it exceeded the normal functions of the flesh. After all, God’s incarnate flesh was different from flesh-and-blood humans. Of course, in His daily life, He required food, clothing, sleep, and shelter. His daily necessities were normal in every regard, and He had the reason of a normal human being, and thought like a normal human being. People still held Him to be a normal person, except that the work He did was profoundly supernatural. Actually, no matter what He did, He lived in an ordinary and normal humanity, and the more that it was a time of Him performing the work, the more normal His reason was and the more lucid His thoughts were; His reason and thoughts surpassed those of any normal man. It was necessary for the incarnate God to have precisely this kind of thinking and reason, for the divine work needed to be expressed by a flesh whose reason was as normal as could be and whose thoughts were of the utmost lucidity—only in this way could His flesh express the divine work. Jesus lived on earth for thirty-three and a half years, all throughout which He retained His normal humanity, but because of His work during His three-and-a-half-year ministry, people thought that He was very transcendent, that He was much more supernatural than before. In actuality, Jesus’ normal humanity remained unchanged before and after He began His ministry; His humanity was the same throughout, but because of the difference before and after He began His ministry, two different views emerged concerning His flesh. No matter what people thought, God incarnate retained His original, normal humanity the entire time, for since God was incarnated, He lived in the flesh, the flesh that had normal humanity. Regardless of whether He was performing His ministry or not, the normal humanity of His flesh could not be erased, for humanity is the basic essence of flesh. Before Jesus performed His ministry, His flesh remained completely normal, engaging in all ordinary human activities; He did not appear in the least bit supernatural, did not show any signs. At that time, He was simply a very common person who worshiped God, though His pursuit was more honest, more sincere than anyone’s. This was how His humanity, which was as normal as could be, manifested itself. Because He did no work at all before assuming His ministry, no one was aware of His identity, no one could tell that His flesh was different from all the others, for He did not show even a single sign, did not perform one bit of God’s own work. However, after He began to perform His ministry, He retained the outer shell of normal humanity and still lived with normal human reason, but because He had begun to do the work of God Himself, assume the ministry of Christ, and do work that mortal beings, flesh-and-blood humans, were incapable of, people assumed that He did not have normal humanity and was not a completely normal flesh, but an incomplete flesh. Because of the work He performed, people said that He was a God in the flesh who did not have normal humanity. Such an understanding is fallacious, for people did not grasp the significance of God’s incarnation. This fallacious understanding arose from the fact that the work expressed by God in the flesh was the divine work, expressed in a flesh that had normal humanity. God was clothed in flesh, He dwelt within flesh, and His work in His humanity obscured the normality of His humanity. For this reason, people believed that God did not have humanity but only divinity.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of the Flesh Inhabited by God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 102

God in His first incarnation did not complete the work of the incarnation; He only completed the first step of the work that God in the flesh was supposed to perform. So, in order to complete the work of the incarnation, God has returned to the flesh once again, living out all the normality and practicality of the flesh, that is, making God’s Way manifest in a flesh which is as normal and ordinary as can be, thereby concluding the work that He has yet to complete in the flesh. The second incarnate flesh has the same essence as the first, but He is even more practical, even more normal than the first. As a consequence, the suffering the second incarnate flesh endures is greater than that of the first, but this suffering is a result of His ministry in the flesh, which is unlike the suffering of corrupted man. It also stems from the normality and practicality of His flesh. Because He performs His ministry in flesh which is of the utmost normality and practicality, the flesh must endure a great deal of suffering. The more normal and practical this flesh is, the more He will suffer in the performance of His ministry. God’s work is expressed in a very common flesh, without any supernaturalness at all. Because His flesh is normal and must also shoulder the work of saving man, He suffers in even greater measure than a supernatural flesh would—and all this suffering stems from the practicality and normality of His flesh. From the suffering that the two incarnate fleshes have undergone while performing Their ministries, one can see the essence of the incarnate flesh. The more normal the flesh, the greater the suffering He must endure while undertaking the work; the more practical the flesh that undertakes the work, the stronger people’s notions become, and the greater the risk He takes. And yet, the more practical the flesh is, and the more the flesh possesses the needs and complete reason of a normal human being, the more capable He is of shouldering God’s work in the flesh. Jesus was nailed to the cross by means of the flesh, and He served as a sin offering by means of the flesh, that is, it was through a flesh with normal humanity that He defeated Satan and completely saved man from the cross. It is by means of a complete flesh that the second God incarnate performs the work of conquest and defeats Satan. Only a flesh that is completely normal and practical can perform the work of conquest in its fullest sense and bear a powerful testimony. That is to say, the conquest of man achieves its effect through the practicality and normality of God in the flesh, not through supernatural miracles and revelations. The ministry performed by this incarnate God is to speak, and it is through speaking that He conquers and perfects man; in other words, the work of the Spirit realized in the flesh is to speak and the flesh’s job is to speak, thereby achieving the purpose of completely conquering, revealing, perfecting, and eliminating people. And so, it is in the work of conquest that God’s work in the flesh will be accomplished in full. The work of atoning for man’s sins that was performed the first time was only the beginning of the work of the incarnation; only the flesh that performs the work of conquest completes the entire work of the incarnation. In gender, one is male and the other female, so completing the significance of God’s incarnation, and dispelling man’s notions of God: God can become both male and female, and in essence, the incarnate God is genderless. He made both man and woman, and to Him, there is no division of gender. In this stage of the work, God does not perform signs and wonders, so that the work will achieve its results by means of words. The reason for this, moreover, is that the work of God incarnate this time is not to heal the sick and cast out demons, but to conquer man by speaking, which is to say that the instinctive abilities possessed by this incarnate flesh of God are to speak words and to conquer man, not to heal the sick and cast out demons. His work in normal humanity is not to perform signs, not to heal the sick and cast out demons, but to speak, and so the second incarnate flesh seems to people much more normal than the first. The way people see it, God has indeed become flesh. However, this incarnate God is different from Jesus incarnate, and though They are both God incarnate, They are not completely the same. Jesus possessed normal humanity, ordinary humanity, but He was accompanied by many signs and wonders. In this incarnate God, human eyes will see no signs or wonders, neither healing the sick nor driving out demons, nor walking on the sea, nor fasting for forty days…. He does not do the same work that Jesus did, not because, in essence, His flesh is any different from Jesus’, but because it is not His ministry to heal the sick and cast out demons. He does not tear down His own work, does not disturb His own work. Since He conquers man through His practical words, there is no need to subdue him with signs, and so this stage is to complete the work of the incarnation. The incarnate God you see today is entirely a flesh, and there is nothing supernatural about Him. He gets sick as others do, needs food and clothing just as others do; He is wholly a flesh. If, this time around, God incarnate performed supernatural signs and wonders, if He healed the sick, cast out demons, or could kill with one word, how could the work of conquest be carried out? How could the work be spread among the Gentile nations? Healing the sick and casting out demons was the work of the Age of Grace, it was the first step in the work of redemption, and now that God has saved man from the cross, He no longer performs that work. If, during the last days, a “God” the same as Jesus appeared, one who healed the sick, cast out demons, and was crucified for man, that “God,” though identical to the description of God in the Bible and easy for man to accept, would not, in its essence, be the flesh worn by the Spirit of God, but by an evil spirit. For it is the principle of God’s work never to repeat what He has already completed. And so, the work of God’s second incarnation is different from the work of the first. In the last days, God realizes the work of conquest in an ordinary, normal flesh; He does not heal the sick, will not be crucified for man, but simply speaks words in the flesh, and conquers man in the flesh. Only such flesh is God’s incarnate flesh; only such flesh can complete God’s work in the flesh.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of the Flesh Inhabited by God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 103

Whether in this stage God incarnate is enduring suffering or performing His ministry, He does so to complete the meaning of incarnation, for this is God’s last incarnation. God can only be incarnated twice. There cannot be a third time. The first God incarnate was male, the second female, and so the image of God’s flesh is completed in man’s mind; moreover, the two incarnations have already finished God’s work in the flesh. The first time, God incarnate possessed normal humanity in order to complete the meaning of incarnation. This time He also possesses normal humanity, but the meaning of this incarnation is different: It is deeper, and His work is of more profound significance. The reason God has become flesh once more is to complete the meaning of incarnation. When God has wholly ended this stage of His work, the entire meaning of incarnation, that is, God’s work in the flesh, will be complete, and there will be no more work to be done in the flesh. Which is to say, from now on God will never again come in the flesh to do His work. Only to save and perfect mankind does God do the work of incarnation. In other words, were it not for the sake of the work, God would absolutely not come in the flesh lightly. By coming in the flesh to work, He shows Satan that God is a flesh, a normal person, an ordinary person—and yet He can vanquish the world, vanquish Satan, redeem mankind, and conquer mankind! The goal of Satan’s work is to corrupt mankind, while the goal of God’s is to save mankind. Satan traps man in a bottomless pit, while God saves him from it. Satan makes all people worship it, while God makes them subject to His dominion, for He is the Creator. It is through God’s two incarnations that the results of all this work are achieved. In essence, His flesh is the union of humanity and divinity, and is possessed of normal humanity. So without God’s incarnate flesh, God’s work to save mankind could not achieve results, and without the normal humanity of His flesh, His work in the flesh still could not achieve these results. The essence of God incarnate is that He must possess normal humanity; if this were otherwise, that would run counter to God’s original intention in being incarnated.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of the Flesh Inhabited by God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 104

Why do I say that the meaning of incarnation was not completed in Jesus’ work? Because the Way did not entirely become flesh. What Jesus did was only one part of God’s work in the flesh; He only did the work of redemption, and did not do the work of completely gaining man. For this reason, God has become flesh once again in the last days. This stage of the work is also done in an ordinary flesh; it is performed by an utterly normal human being, one whose humanity is not in the least bit transcendent. In other words, God has become a complete human being; He is a person whose identity is that of God, a complete human being, a complete flesh, who is performing the work. Human eyes see a fleshly body that is not transcendent at all, a very ordinary person who can speak the language of heaven, who shows no signs, works no miracles, much less exposes the real story behind religion in great assembly halls. To people, the work of the second incarnate flesh seems utterly unlike that of the first, and the two even seem to have nothing in common—nothing of the first’s work can be seen this time. Though the work of the second incarnate flesh is different from the first, that does not prove that Their source is not one and the same. Whether Their source is the same depends on the nature of the work done by the fleshes, and not on Their outer shells. During the three stages of His work, God has been incarnated twice, and both times the work of God incarnate inaugurates a new age, ushers in a new work; the incarnations complement each other. It is impossible for human eyes to tell that the two fleshes actually come from the same source. Of course, this is beyond the capacity of the human eye or the human mind. But in Their essence, They are the same, for Their work originates from the same Spirit. Whether the two incarnate fleshes arise from the same source cannot be judged by the era and the place in which They were born, or other such factors, but by the divine work expressed by Them. The second incarnate flesh does not perform any of the work that Jesus did, for God’s work does not adhere to convention, but opens up a new path each time. The second incarnate flesh does not aim to deepen or solidify the impression of the first flesh in people’s minds, but to complement and improve on the image of the first flesh in their minds, to deepen man’s knowledge of God, to break all the regulations that exist in people’s hearts, and to wipe out the fallacious images of god in their hearts. It can be said that no individual stage of God’s own work can give man a complete knowledge of Him; each gives only a part, not the whole. Though God has expressed His disposition in full, because of man’s limited comprehension ability, his knowledge of God still remains incomplete. It is impossible, using human language, to fully explain the entirety of God’s disposition. How much less so, then, could a single stage of His work fully express God? He works in the flesh under the cover of His normal humanity, and one can only know Him by the expressions of His divinity, not by His bodily shell. God comes in the flesh to allow man to know Him by means of His various work, and no two stages of His work are alike. Only in this way can man have a full knowledge of God’s work in the flesh, and not delimit it to a certain scope. Though the work of the two incarnate fleshes is different, the essence of the fleshes, and the source of Their work, are identical; it is just that They exist to perform two different stages of the work, and arise in two different ages. No matter what, God’s incarnate fleshes share the same essence and the same origin—this is something that no one can deny.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of the Flesh Inhabited by God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 105

The incarnate God is called Christ, and Christ is the flesh clothed by the Spirit of God. This flesh is unlike any man that is of the flesh. This difference is because Christ is the incarnation of the Spirit, rather than being fleshly. He has both a normal humanity and a complete divinity. His divinity is not possessed by any man. His normal humanity is to sustain all His normal activities in the flesh, while His divinity carries out the work of God Himself. Be it His humanity or divinity, both submit to the will of the heavenly Father. The essence of Christ is the Spirit, that is, the divinity. Therefore, His essence is that of God Himself; this essence will not disrupt His own work, and He could not possibly do anything that destroys His own work, nor would He ever utter any words that go against His own will. Thus, the incarnate God would absolutely never do any work that disrupts His own management. This is what all people should understand. The essence of the work of the Holy Spirit is to save man, and is for the sake of God’s own management. Similarly, the work of Christ is also to save man, and is for the sake of God’s will. Given that God becomes flesh, He realizes His essence within His flesh, such that His flesh is sufficient to undertake His work. Therefore, all the work of God’s Spirit is replaced by the work of Christ during the time of incarnation, and at the core of all work throughout the time of incarnation is the work of Christ. It cannot be mixed with work from any other age. And since God becomes flesh, He works in the identity of His flesh; since He comes in the flesh, He then finishes in the flesh the work that He ought to do. Be it the Spirit of God or be it Christ, both are God Himself, and He does the work that He ought to do and performs the ministry that He ought to perform.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of Christ Is Submission to the Will of the Heavenly Father

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 106

The very essence of God itself carries authority, but He is able to submit to all the authority that comes from Him. Be it the work of the Spirit or the work of the flesh, neither conflicts with the other. The Spirit of God is the authority over all things. The flesh with the essence of God is also possessed of authority, but God in the flesh can do all the work that submits to the will of the heavenly Father. This cannot be attained or conceived by any one person. God Himself is authority, but His flesh can submit to His authority. This is the underlying meaning of “Christ submits to the will of God the Father.” God is a Spirit and can do the work of salvation, and so can God who has become human. At any rate, God Himself does His own work; He neither disrupts nor disturbs, much less does He carry out work that contradicts itself, for the essence of the work done by the Spirit and the flesh is alike. Be it the Spirit or the flesh, both work to fulfill one will and manage the same work. Though the Spirit and the flesh have two disparate attributes, their essences are the same; both have the essence of God Himself, and the identity of God Himself. God Himself possesses no elements of rebelliousness; His essence is good. He is the expression of all beauty and goodness, as well as all love. Even in the flesh, God does not do anything that rebels against God the Father. Even at the expense of sacrificing His life, He would be wholeheartedly willing to do so, and He would make no other choice. God possesses no elements of self-righteousness or self-importance, or those of conceit and arrogance; He possesses no elements of crookedness. Everything that rebels against God comes from Satan; Satan is the source of all ugliness and evil. The reason man has the same attributes as Satan is that man has been corrupted and processed by Satan. Christ has not been corrupted by Satan, hence He possesses only the attributes of God, and none of the attributes of Satan. No matter how arduous the work or weak the flesh, God, while He lives in the flesh, will never do anything that disrupts the work of God Himself, much less forsake the will of God the Father and rebel. He would rather suffer pains of the flesh than go against the will of God the Father; it is just as Jesus said in prayer, “Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me: nevertheless not as I will, but as You will.” People make their own choices, but Christ does not. Though He has the identity of God Himself, He still seeks the will of God the Father, and fulfills what is entrusted to Him by God the Father, from the perspective of the flesh. This is something that man cannot attain to. That which comes from Satan cannot have the essence of God; it can only have one that rebels against and resists God. It cannot fully submit to God, much less willingly submit to the will of God. All people apart from Christ may do that which resists God, and not a single person can directly undertake the work entrusted by God; not one is able to regard the management of God as their own duty to perform. The essence of Christ is submission to the will of God the Father; rebelliousness against God is the attribute of Satan. These two attributes are incompatible, and any who have the attributes of Satan cannot be called Christ. The reason man cannot do the work of God in His stead is that man does not have any of the essence of God. Man works for God for the sake of man’s personal interests and future prospects, but Christ works to follow the will of God the Father.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of Christ Is Submission to the Will of the Heavenly Father

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 107

The humanity of Christ is governed by His divinity. Though He is in the flesh, His humanity is not entirely like that of a man of the flesh. He has His own unique personality, and this too is governed by His divinity. His divinity has no weakness; the weakness of Christ refers to that of His humanity. To a certain degree, this weakness constrains His divinity, but such limits are within a certain scope and time, and are not boundless. When it comes time to carry out the work of His divinity, it is done regardless of His humanity. The humanity of Christ is directed entirely by His divinity. Aside from the normal life of His humanity, all other actions of His humanity are influenced, affected, and directed by His divinity. Though Christ has a humanity, it does not disturb the work of His divinity, and this is precisely because the humanity of Christ is directed by His divinity; though His humanity is not mature when it comes to worldly dealings, this does not affect the normal work of His divinity. When I say that His humanity has not been corrupted, I mean that the humanity of Christ can be immediately directed by His divinity, and is possessed of higher reason than that of the ordinary man. His humanity is most suited to being directed by the divinity in His work; His humanity is most able to express the work of the divinity, and most able to submit to such work. As God works in the flesh, He never neglects the duty that a person in the flesh ought to perform; He is able to worship God in heaven with a true heart. He has the essence of God, and His identity is that of God Himself. It is only that He has come to earth and become a created being, with the outer shell of a created being, and now possessed of a humanity that He did not have before. He is able to worship God in heaven; this is the being of God Himself and is inimitable to man. His identity is God Himself. It is from the perspective of the flesh that He worships God; therefore, the words “Christ worships God in heaven” are not wrong. What He asks of people is precisely His own being; He has already achieved all that He asks of people prior to asking such of them. He would never make demands of others while He Himself is free from them, for this all constitutes His being. Regardless of how He carries out His work, He would not act in a manner that rebels against God. No matter what He asks of man, no demand exceeds that which is attainable by man. All that He does is that which follows the will of God and is for the sake of His management. The divinity of Christ is above all people; therefore, He is the highest authority of all created beings. This authority is His divinity, that is, the disposition and being of God Himself, which determines His identity. Therefore, no matter how normal His humanity, it is undeniable that He has the identity of God Himself; no matter from which standpoint He speaks and howsoever He submits to the will of God, it cannot be said that He is not God Himself. Foolish and ignorant people often regard the normal humanity of Christ as a flaw. No matter how He expresses and reveals the being of His divinity, people are unable to acknowledge that He is Christ. And the more that Christ demonstrates His submission and humility, the more lightly foolish people regard Christ. There are even those who adopt toward Him an attitude of exclusion and contempt, yet place those “great figures” with lofty images upon the table to be worshiped. Man’s resistance to and rebellion against God come from the fact that the essence of the incarnate God is submission to the will of God, as well as from the normal humanity of Christ; this is the source of man’s resistance to and rebellion against God. If Christ had neither the guise of His humanity nor sought the will of God the Father from the perspective of a created being, but was instead possessed of a transcendent humanity, then there would most likely be no rebellion among man. The reason man is always willing to believe in an invisible God in heaven is that God in heaven has no humanity, nor does He possess even a single attribute of a created being. Therefore, man always regards Him with the greatest esteem, but holds an attitude of contempt toward Christ.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of Christ Is Submission to the Will of the Heavenly Father

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 108

Though Christ on earth is able to work on behalf of God Himself, He does not come with the intention of showing all people His image in the flesh. He does not come so that all people may behold Him; He comes to allow man to be led by His hand, and man thereby enters into the new age. The function of Christ’s flesh is for the work of God Himself, that is, for the work of God in the flesh, and not to enable man to fully understand the essence of His flesh. No matter how He works, nothing He does goes beyond that which is attainable by the flesh. No matter how He works, He does so in the flesh with a normal humanity, and does not fully reveal to man the true countenance of God. Additionally, His work in the flesh is never as supernatural or inestimable as man conceives. Even though Christ represents God Himself in the flesh and carries out in person the work that God Himself ought to do, He does not deny the existence of God in heaven, nor does He proclaim His own deeds with great fanfare. Rather, He remains hidden, humbly, within His flesh. Apart from Christ, those who falsely claim to be christ do not possess His attributes. When juxtaposed against the arrogant and self-exalting disposition of those false christs, it becomes apparent what manner of flesh is truly Christ. The more someone is a false christ, the more they will flaunt themselves, and the more capable they are of working signs and wonders to mislead man. False christs do not have the attributes of God; Christ is not tainted by any element belonging to false christs. God becomes flesh only to complete the work of the flesh, not to merely allow man to see Him. Rather, He lets His work affirm His identity, and lets that which He reveals attest to His essence. His essence is not baseless; His identity was not seized by His hand; it is determined by His work and His essence. Though He has the essence of God Himself and is capable of doing the work of God Himself, He is still, after all, flesh, unlike the Spirit. He is not God with the attributes of the Spirit; He is God with a shell of flesh. Therefore, no matter how normal and how weak He is, and howsoever He seeks the will of God the Father, His divinity is undeniable. Within the incarnate God exists not only a normal humanity and its weaknesses; even more does there exist the wonderfulness and unfathomableness of His divinity, as well as all His deeds in the flesh. Therefore, both humanity and divinity genuinely exist within Christ, and are not empty or supernatural in the least. He comes to earth with the primary objective of carrying out work; it is imperative to be possessed of a normal humanity to carry out work on earth; otherwise, however great the power of His divinity, its original function cannot be put to good use. Though His humanity is of great importance, it is not His essence. His essence is the divinity; therefore, the moment He begins to perform His ministry on earth is the moment He begins to express the being of His divinity. His humanity exists solely to sustain the normal life of His flesh so that His divinity can carry out work normally in the flesh; it is the divinity that directs His work entirely. When He completes His work, He will have fulfilled His ministry. What man ought to know is the entirety of His work, and it is through His work that He enables man to know Him. Over the course of His work, He takes the being of His divinity and expresses it quite fully—without the adulteration of a disposition of humanity, or the adulteration of thought and man-made being. When the time comes when all His ministry has come to an end, He will have already perfectly and fully expressed the disposition that He ought to express. His work is not guided by the instructions of any man; the expression of His disposition is also quite free, and is not controlled by the mind or processed by thought, but revealed naturally. This is something no man can achieve. Even if the surroundings are harsh or the conditions unfavorable, He is able to express His disposition at the appropriate time. One who is Christ expresses the being of Christ, while those who are not do not possess the disposition of Christ. Therefore, even though all resist Him or have notions of Him, none can deny on the basis of man’s notions that the disposition expressed by Christ is that of God. All those who pursue Christ with a true heart or seek God with intent will admit that He is Christ based on the expression of His divinity. They would never deny Christ on the basis of any aspect of Him that does not conform to man’s notions. Though man is very foolish, all know exactly what stems from the will of man and what originates from God. It is merely that many people deliberately resist Christ as a result of their intentions. If not for this, then not a single man would have reason to deny the existence of Christ, for the divinity expressed by Christ does indeed exist, and His work can be witnessed by the naked eye.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of Christ Is Submission to the Will of the Heavenly Father

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 109

The work and expression of Christ determines His essence. He is able to complete with a true heart that which has been entrusted to Him. He is able to worship God in heaven with a true heart, and with a true heart seek the will of God the Father. This is all determined by His essence. And so too is His natural revelation determined by His essence; the reason I call this His “natural revelation” is that His expression is not an imitation, or the result of education by man, or the result of many years of cultivation by man. He did not learn it or adorn Himself with it; rather, it is inherent within Him. Man may deny His work, His expression, His humanity, and the entire life of His normal humanity, but none can deny that He worships God in heaven with a true heart; none can deny that He has come to fulfill the will of the heavenly Father, and none can deny the earnestness with which He seeks God the Father. Though His image is not pleasing to the senses, His discourse not possessed of an extraordinary air, and His work not as earth-shattering or heaven-shaking as man imagines, He is indeed Christ, who fulfills the will of the heavenly Father with a true heart, completely submits to the heavenly Father, and is submissive unto death. This is because His essence is the essence of Christ. This truth is hard for man to believe, but it is a fact. When the ministry of Christ has been completely fulfilled, man will be able to see from His work that His disposition and His being represent the disposition and being of God in heaven. At that time, by summarizing all of His work, man can confirm that He is indeed the flesh which the Way becomes, and not the same as that of a flesh and blood man. Every step of Christ’s work on earth has its representative significance, but man who experiences the current work of each step is unable to see clearly the significance of His work. This is especially so for the several steps of work carried out by God in His second incarnation. Most of those who have only heard or seen Christ’s words yet who have never seen Him have no notions of His work; those who have seen Christ and heard His words, as well as experienced His work, find it difficult to accept His work. Is this not because the appearance and the normal humanity of Christ are not to the taste of man? Those who accept His work after Christ has gone away will not have such difficulties, for they merely accept His work and do not come into contact with Christ’s normal humanity. Man is unable to let go of his notions of God and instead scrutinizes Him intensely; this is due to the fact that man focuses only on His appearance and is unable to recognize His essence based on His work and His words. If man shuts his eyes to the appearance of Christ or avoids discussing the humanity of Christ, and speaks only of His divinity, whose work and words are unattainable by any man, then the notions of man will decrease by half, and man’s difficulties will even be fully resolved.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essence of Christ Is Submission to the Will of the Heavenly Father

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 110

He who is God incarnate possesses the essence of God, and He who is God incarnate possesses the expression of God. Since God has become flesh, He brings with Him the work He intends to do, and since He is God incarnate, He expresses what He is, and is able to bring the truth to man, bestow life upon him, and point the way for him. Flesh that does not have the essence of God is decidedly not the incarnate God; of this there is no doubt. If man intends to examine whether it is God’s incarnate flesh, then he must determine this from the disposition He expresses and the words He speaks. Which is to say, to determine whether or not it is God’s incarnate flesh, and whether or not it is the true way, one must discriminate on the basis of His essence. And so, the key to whether or not it is the flesh of God incarnate lies in His essence (His work, His words, His disposition, and many other aspects), rather than external appearance. If man examines only His external appearance, and as a result overlooks His essence, this shows that man is foolish and ignorant. External appearance cannot determine essence; what’s more, the work of God can never conform to the notions of man. Did not Jesus’ outward appearance run counter to the notions of man? Were not His countenance and dress unable to demonstrate His true identity? Did not the Pharisees back then oppose Jesus precisely because they merely looked at His external appearance, and did not conscientiously accept the words from His mouth? It is My hope that each and every brother and sister who seeks the appearance of God will not repeat the tragedy of history, and will not become a Pharisee of modern times and nail God to the cross again. You should carefully consider how to welcome the return of God, and you should have a clear mind regarding how to be someone who submits to the truth. This is the responsibility of everyone who is waiting for Jesus to return riding upon a cloud. We should clear our spiritual eyes, and not become mired in words of fantasy. We should think about the realistic work of God, and take a look at the practical aspect of God. Do not get carried away or lose yourselves in daydreams, always hoping that the Lord Jesus will suddenly descend among you on a cloud, and take you who have never known or seen Him, and who do not know how to follow His will. It is better to think about more realistic matters!

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

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 111

God become flesh only manifests Himself to a portion of the people who follow Him during this period when He personally carries out His work, and not to all created beings. He became flesh only to complete one stage of His work, and not for the sake of showing man His image. However, His work must be carried out by Himself, thus it is necessary for Him to do so in the flesh. When this work concludes, He will depart from the human world; He cannot remain for the long term among mankind lest this hinder the work to come. What He manifests to the myriad people is only His righteous disposition and all His deeds, and not the images of His two incarnations, for the image of God can only be revealed through His disposition, and cannot be replaced by the image of His incarnate flesh. The image of His flesh is revealed only to a limited number of people, only to those who follow Him as He works in the flesh. This is why the work being carried out now is done so in secret. In the same way, Jesus only revealed Himself to the Jews when He did His work, and never publicly revealed Himself to any other nation. Thus, once He had completed His work, He promptly departed from the human world and did not stay; afterward, it was not His image, the image of this person, that manifested itself to man, but the Holy Spirit who carried out the work directly. Once the work of God become flesh is completely finished, He will depart from the mortal world, and never again will He do any work similar to what He did when He was in flesh. After this, the work will all be done directly by the Holy Spirit. During this period, man will hardly be able to see the image of His fleshly body; He will not manifest Himself to man at all, but will remain forever hidden. The time for the work of God become flesh is limited. It is carried out in a specific age, period, country, and among specific people. This work represents only the work during the period of God’s incarnation. It is representative of an age, and it represents the work of the Spirit of God in one particular age, and not the entirety of the work of the Spirit of God. Therefore, the image of God become flesh will not be manifested to the myriad peoples. What is manifested to the myriad people is the righteousness of God and His disposition in its entirety, rather than His image when He twice became flesh. It is neither the one single image that is manifested to man, nor the two images combined. Therefore, it is imperative that God’s incarnate flesh should depart the earth upon completion of the work that He needs to do, for He comes only to complete the work He ought to do, and not to reveal His image to people. Even though the significance of the incarnation has already been fulfilled by God twice becoming flesh, still He will not openly manifest Himself to any nation that has never before seen Him. Jesus will never again manifest Himself to the Jews as the Sun of righteousness, nor will He stand atop the Mount of Olives and manifest Himself to the myriad peoples; all that the Jews have seen is the portrait of Jesus during His time in Judea. This is because the work of Jesus in His incarnation ended two thousand years ago; He will not return to Judea in the image of a Jew, much less manifest Himself in the image of a Jew to any of the Gentile nations, for the image of Jesus become flesh is merely the image of a Jew, and not the image of the Son of man that John saw. Even though Jesus promised His followers that He would come again, He will not manifest Himself in the image of a Jew to all those in Gentile nations. You ought to know that the work of God become flesh is to open up an age. This work is limited to a period of several years, and He cannot complete all the work of the Spirit of God, just as the image of Jesus as a Jew could represent only the image of God as He worked in Judea, and He could only do the work of crucifixion. During the period when Jesus was in the flesh, He could not do the work of bringing the age to an end or destroying mankind. Therefore, after He had been crucified and had concluded His work, He ascended to the highest height and forever concealed Himself from man. From then on, those loyal believers from the Gentile nations were unable to see the manifestation of the Lord Jesus, but only the portrait of Him that they had pasted on the wall. This portrait is but one drawn by man, and not the image of God as He manifests Himself to man. God will not openly manifest Himself to the myriad people in the images of His two incarnations. The work He does among mankind is to allow them to understand His disposition. All this is made manifest to man by means of the work of the different ages; it is accomplished through the disposition He has made known and the work that He has done, rather than through the manifestation of Jesus. That is to say, the image of God is made known to man not through the incarnate image, but rather through the work carried out by the incarnate God who has both image and form; and through His work, His image is revealed and His disposition is made known. This is the significance of the work He wishes to do in the flesh.

Once the work of God’s two incarnations comes to an end, He will begin to reveal His righteous disposition throughout all the Gentile nations, allowing the myriad people to see His image. He will reveal His disposition and by this means reveal the outcomes of the different categories of man, thereby bringing the entire old age to an end. The reason why His work in the flesh does not extend over a great expanse (just as Jesus worked only in Judea, and today I work only among you) is because His work in the flesh has boundaries and limits. He is merely carrying out a short period of work in the image of an ordinary and normal flesh; He is not using this incarnate flesh to do the work of eternity or the work of appearing to the myriad peoples of the Gentile nations. The work in the flesh can only be limited in scope (such as working only in Judea or only among you), and then, by means of the work carried out within these boundaries, its scope can then be expanded. Of course, the work of expansion is to be carried out directly by His Spirit and will then no longer be the work of His incarnate flesh. For the work in the flesh has boundaries and does not extend to all corners of the universe—this it cannot accomplish. Through the work in the flesh, His Spirit carries out the work that is to follow. Therefore, the work done in the flesh is of an inaugural nature that is carried out within certain boundaries; after this, it is His Spirit that carries on with this work, and He does so moreover in an expanded scope.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Mystery of the Incarnation (2)

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 112

God comes to work on earth only in order to guide the age; He means only to open up a new age and bring the old one to an end. He does not come to live out the course of a human’s life on earth, to experience for Himself the joys and sorrows of life of the human world, or to perfect a certain person by His hand or personally watch a certain person as they grow. This is not His work; His work is merely to begin the new age and bring an end to the old. That is, He will in person begin an age, in person bring the other to an end, and defeat Satan by carrying out His work in person. Each time He carries out His work in person, it is as if He is putting a foot onto the battleground. First, He vanquishes the world and prevails over Satan while in the flesh; He gains all glory and raises the curtain on the entirety of the work of the two thousand years, making it so that all people on earth have the right path to tread and a life of peace and joy to live. However, God cannot live with man on earth for long, for God is God, and unlike man after all. He cannot live the lifetime of a normal person, that is, He cannot reside on earth as a person who is nothing out of the ordinary, for He has only a minimal part of the normal humanity of a normal person to sustain His human life. In other words, how could God start a family, build a career, and have and raise children on earth? Would this not be a disgrace to Him? That He is endowed with normal humanity is only for the purpose of carrying out work in a normal manner, not to enable Him to have a family and career as a normal person would. His normal reason, normal mind, and the normal feeding and clothing of His flesh are sufficient to prove that He has a normal humanity; there is no need for Him to have a family or a career in order to prove that He is furnished with a normal humanity. This would be completely unnecessary! God’s coming to earth is the Way becoming flesh; He is simply allowing man to understand His Way and to see His Way, that is, allowing man to see the work carried out by the flesh. His intention is not for people to treat His flesh in a certain way, but only for man to be submissive to the end, that is, to submit to all words that issue forth from His mouth, and to submit to all the work that He does. He is merely working in the flesh; He is not intentionally asking for man to exalt the greatness and holiness of His flesh, but is instead showing man the wisdom of His work and all the authority He wields. Therefore, even though He has an outstanding humanity, He makes no announcements, and focuses only on the work that He should do. You should know why it is that God became flesh and yet never publicizes or testifies to His normal humanity, but instead simply carries out the work that He intends to do. Therefore, all that you can see from the incarnate God is what He divinely is; this is because He never proclaims what He humanly is for man to emulate. Only when man leads people does he speak of what he humanly is, the better to gain their admiration and conviction and thereby attain leadership of them. In contrast, God conquers man through His work alone (that is, work unattainable to man); it is immaterial whether He is admired by man or makes man adore Him. All He does is to instill in man a feeling of fear for Him or a sense of His unfathomability. God does not need to make man admire Him; all He needs is for man to fear Him after witnessing His disposition. The work God does is His own; it cannot be done by man in His stead, nor can it be attained by man. Only God Himself can do His own work and usher in a new age to lead man into a new life. The work He does is to enable man to come into possession of a new life and enter into a new age. The rest of the work is handed over to those with normal humanity who are admired by others. Therefore, in the Age of Grace, He completed the work of two thousand years in just three and a half years out of His thirty-three years in the flesh. When God comes to earth to carry out His work, He always completes the work of two thousand years or of an entire age within the shortest span of a few years. He does not tarry, and He does not delay; He simply condenses the work of many years so that it is completed within just a few short years. This is because the work He does in person is wholly for the sake of opening up a new way out and leading a new age.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Mystery of the Incarnation (2)

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 113

When God carries out His work, He comes not to engage in any building or movements, but to perform His ministry. Each time He becomes flesh, it is only to accomplish a stage of work and to launch a new age. Now the Age of Kingdom has arrived, as has the training of the kingdom. This stage of work is not the work of man, and it is not to work man to a particular degree, but is only to complete a portion of God’s work. What He does is not the work of man, it is not to achieve a certain result in working man before leaving earth; it is to fulfill His ministry and finish the work that He ought to do, which is to properly arrange His work on earth, after which He will gain glory. The work of the incarnate God is unlike that of the people used by the Holy Spirit. When God comes to do His work on earth, He is only concerned with performing His ministry. As for all other matters unrelated to His ministry, He takes almost no part, not even paying attention to such things. He simply carries out the work that He ought to do, and least of all is He concerned about the work that man ought to do. The work He does is solely that which pertains to the age He is in and to the ministry that He ought to perform, as if all other matters lie outside His purview. He does not furnish Himself with more basic knowledge about living as one among mankind, nor does He learn more social skills, nor equip Himself with anything else that man understands. All that man ought to possess concerns Him not at all and He simply does the work that is His duty. And so, as man sees it, the incarnate God is deficient in so much—He even pays no heed to many of the things that man ought to possess, and He has no understanding of such matters. Such things as common knowledge about life, as well as the principles of conducting oneself and dealing with the world, are all but totally unrelated to Him. But you simply cannot sense from the incarnate God the slightest hint of abnormality. That is to say, His humanity only maintains His normal human life and the normal reasoning of His brain, giving Him the ability to discern between right and wrong. However, He does not equip Himself with anything else, all of which is what man (created beings) alone should possess. God becomes flesh only to perform His own ministry. His work is directed at an entire age, not at any one person or place, but at the entire universe. This is the direction of His work and the principle by which He works. No one can alter this, and man has no way of becoming involved in it. Each time God becomes flesh, He brings with Him the work of that age, and has no intention of living alongside man for twenty, thirty, forty, or even seventy or eighty years in order that he may better understand and get to grips with Him. There is no need for that! To do so would in no way deepen the knowledge man has of God’s inherent disposition; instead, it would only add to his notions and cause his notions and thoughts to become fossilized. It therefore behooves you all to understand exactly what the work of the incarnate God is. Surely you cannot fail to have understood the words I spoke to you: “It was not to experience the life of a normal human that I have come”? Have you forgotten the words: “God comes to earth not to live the life of a normal human”? You do not understand God’s purpose in becoming flesh, nor do you know this: “How could God possibly come to earth with the intent of experiencing the life of a created being?” God comes to earth solely to complete His work, and so His work on earth is short-lived. He comes to earth not with the intent of causing the Spirit of God to cultivate His fleshly body into a superior human who will lead the church. When God comes to earth, it is the Way becoming flesh; man, however, does not know of His work and forcibly attributes things to Him. But you should all understand that God is the Way become flesh, not a fleshly body that has been cultivated by the Spirit of God to assume the role of God for the moment. God Himself is not the product of cultivation, but is the Way, the Word, become flesh, and today He officially carries out His work among you all. You all know, and acknowledge, that the incarnation of God is a factual truth, yet you act as though you understand it. From the work of the incarnate God to the significance and essence of His incarnation, you do not grasp these in the least and only follow others in glibly reciting words from memory. Do you believe the incarnate God to be as you imagine?

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Mystery of the Incarnation (3)

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 114

God becomes flesh solely to lead the age and set in motion new work. It is necessary for you to understand this point. This is much different from the function of man, and the two cannot be mentioned in the same breath. Man needs to be cultivated and perfected over a long period before he can be used to carry out work, and the kind of humanity that is needed is of an especially high order. Not only must man be able to sustain the reason of normal humanity, but he must further understand many of the principles and rules governing how he deals with the world, and, moreover, he must commit to studying even more about the wisdom and ethical knowledge of man. This is what man should be furnished with. However, this is not so for God become flesh, because His work neither represents man nor is the work of man, and is instead a direct expression of His being and the direct performance of the work that He ought to do. (Naturally, His work is carried out at the appropriate time, not casually or at random, and it is begun when it is time to perform His ministry.) He does not take part in the life of man or the work of man, that is, His humanity is not furnished with any of these (although this does not affect His work). He only performs His ministry when it is time for Him to do so; whatever His status, He simply focuses on doing the work that He ought to do. Whatever man knows of Him and whatever man’s opinion of Him, His work is wholly unaffected. For example, when Jesus carried out His work, no one knew exactly who He was, but He simply focused on doing His work. None of this hindered Him in carrying out the work that He ought to do. Therefore, He did not at first reveal or proclaim His own identity, and merely had man follow Him. Naturally this was not only the humility of God, but was also the way in which God worked in the flesh. He could only work in this way, for man had no way of recognizing Him with the naked eye. And even if man had recognized Him, this would not have helped His work. Furthermore, He did not become flesh in order to have man come to know His flesh; it was to carry out work and perform His ministry. For this reason, He placed no importance on making His identity public. When He had completed all the work that He ought to do, His entire identity and status naturally became clear to man. God become flesh keeps silent and never makes any proclamations. He pays mind neither to how man is nor to how man is getting along in following Him, but simply focuses on performing His ministry and carrying out the work that He ought to do. No one is able to stand in the way of His work. When the time comes for Him to conclude His work, it will without fail be concluded and brought to an end, and no one is able to dictate otherwise. Only after He departs from man on completing His work will man understand the work that He does, though still not entirely clearly. And it will take a long time for man to fully understand the intentions with which He first carried out His work. In other words, the work of the age of the incarnate God is divided into two parts. One part of the work is the incarnate flesh of God personally working and speaking. Once the ministry of His flesh is completely fulfilled, the other part of the work remains to be carried out by those who are used by the Holy Spirit. It is at this time that man should fulfill his function, for God has already opened up the way, and it needs to be walked by man himself. That is to say, God become flesh carries out one part of the work, and then the Holy Spirit and those used by the Holy Spirit will succeed to this work. Therefore, man should know what the work that is primarily carried out by God become flesh at this stage entails, and he must understand exactly what the significance of God becoming flesh is and what the work that He ought to do is, and not make demands of God according to the demands made upon man. Herein lie man’s mistake, his notion, and even more, his rebelliousness.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Mystery of the Incarnation (3)

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 115

God becomes flesh not with the intention of allowing man to know His flesh, or to allow man to distinguish the differences between the flesh of God incarnate and that of man; nor does God become flesh to train man’s powers of discernment, and still less does He do so with the intention of allowing man to worship the incarnate flesh of God, thereby gaining great glory. None of these things is the intention of God in becoming flesh. Nor does God become flesh in order to condemn man, nor deliberately to reveal man, nor to make things difficult for him. None of these things is the intention of God. Every time God becomes flesh, it is a form of work that is unavoidable. It is for the sake of His greater work and His greater management that He acts as He does—it’s not as man imagines it to be. God comes to earth only as His work requires, and only as necessary. He does not come to earth with the intention of simply looking around, but to carry out the work that He ought to do. Why else would He assume such a heavy burden and take such great risks to carry out this work? God becomes flesh only when He has to, and always with unique significance. If it were only for the sake of allowing people to have a look at Him and to broaden their horizons, then He would, with absolute certainty, never come among people so lightly. He comes to earth for the sake of His management and His greater work, and in order that He might gain more of mankind. He comes to represent the age, He comes to defeat Satan, and He clothes Himself in flesh in order to defeat Satan. Even more, He comes in order to guide the entire human race in living their lives. All of this concerns His management, and it concerns the work of the whole universe. If God became flesh merely to allow man to come to know His flesh and to open up people’s eyes, then why would He not travel to every nation? Would this not be an exceedingly easy matter? But He did not do so, instead choosing a suitable place in which to settle and begin the work that He ought to do. Just this flesh alone is of considerable significance. He represents an entire age, and also carries out the work of an entire age; He both brings the former age to an end and ushers in the new. All of this is an important matter that concerns God’s management, and all of this is the significance of one stage of work that God comes to earth to carry out.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Mystery of the Incarnation (3)

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 116

God’s saving of man is not done directly by means of the Spirit and with the identity of the Spirit, for His Spirit can neither be touched nor seen by man, nor can man draw near. If He tried to save man directly as the Spirit, man would be unable to receive His saving grace. If God did not put on the outer shell of a created human being, there would be no way for man to receive this saving grace. For man absolutely has no way of approaching Him, just as no one was able to go near the cloud of Jehovah. Only by becoming a created human being, that is, only by putting His Way into the flesh that He is about to become, can He personally work the Way into all who follow Him. Only then can man personally hear and see His Way, and also gain His Way, and by this means come to be fully saved. If God did not become flesh, no one of flesh and blood would be able to receive such great saving grace, nor would a single person be saved. If the Spirit of God worked directly in the midst of mankind, all humanity would be struck down, or, with no way of coming into contact with God, they would be completely taken captive by Satan. The first incarnation was to redeem man from sin, to redeem him by means of the fleshly body of Jesus, that is, He saved man from the cross, but the satanic corrupt dispositions still remained within man. The second incarnation is no longer to serve as a sin offering but rather to save fully those who were redeemed from sin. This is done so that those whose sins have been forgiven may be free from sin and fully purified, and attain dispositional change, and thus break free of Satan’s influence of darkness and return before the throne of God. Only in this way can man be fully sanctified. After the Age of Law had come to an end, and beginning with the Age of Grace, God commenced the work of salvation, which continues into the last days, when God performs the work of judging and chastising the human race for their rebelliousness, thereby completely purifying mankind. Only after this will God conclude His work of salvation and enter into rest. Therefore, in the three stages of work, only twice has God become flesh to carry out His work among man Himself. That is because only one in the three stages of work is to guide people in leading their lives, while the other two consist of the work of salvation. Only by becoming flesh can God live alongside man, experience the suffering of the world, and live in a normal body of flesh. Only in this way can He supply people with the practical Way that they need as created beings. It is through the incarnation of God that man receives the full saving grace from God, not directly from heaven through his own supplication. Man is of flesh and blood, he has no way of seeing the Spirit of God, much less of approaching His Spirit, so all that he can come into contact with is God’s incarnate flesh. Only by means of this is man able to grasp all of the Way and all the truths and receive the full saving grace. The second incarnation is sufficient to rid man of his sins and to fully purify him. Hence, with the second incarnation, the entirety of God’s work in the flesh will be brought to a close and the significance of God’s incarnation be made complete. Thenceforth, the work of God in the flesh will have entirely come to an end. After the second incarnation, He will not become flesh a third time for His work. For His entire management will have come to an end, the incarnation of the last days will have fully gained the people He has selected, and mankind in the last days will all have been sorted according to their kind. He will no longer do the work of salvation, nor will He return to the flesh to carry out any work.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Mystery of the Incarnation (4)

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 117

What man has achieved now—his present stature, knowledge, love, loyalty, submission, and insight—these are results attained through the judgment of the word. That you are able to have loyalty and to remain standing until this day is attained through the agency of the word. Now man sees that the work of God incarnate is indeed extraordinary, and there are many things in it that cannot be attained by man, and that are mysteries and wonders. Therefore, many have submitted. Some have never submitted to any man since the day of their birth, yet when they see the words of God this day, they fully submit without noticing they have done so, and they do not venture to scrutinize or say anything else. Humanity has fallen under the word and lies prostrate under the judgment of the word. If the Spirit of God spoke directly to man, mankind would all submit to the voice, prostrating themselves without God needing to expose man with His words, much in the way that Paul fell to the ground in the light on the road to Damascus. If God continued to work in this way, man would never be able to come to know his own corruption through the judgment of the word and thereby attain salvation. Only through becoming flesh can God personally deliver His words into the ears of each and every human being, so that all who have ears may hear His words and accept His work of judgment by the word. This is the true result achieved by His word, not the Spirit becoming manifest to overwhelm man with fear. It is only through this practical and yet extraordinary work that the old dispositions of man, hidden deep within for many years, can be fully exposed, so that man may recognize them and experience change. These things are all the practical work of God incarnate, in which He speaks and executes judgment in a wholly practical manner, and then achieves the results of judgment upon man by the word. This is the authority of God incarnate and the significance of God’s incarnation. It is done to reveal the authority of God incarnate, to reveal the results achieved by the work of the word, and to reveal that the Spirit has come in the flesh and demonstrates His authority through judging man by the word. Although His flesh is the outer shell of an ordinary, normal humanity, it is the results His words achieve that show to man He is full of authority, that He is God Himself, and that His words are the expression of God Himself. By this means all humanity is shown that He is God Himself, that He is God Himself who became flesh, that none may commit an offense against Him, and that no one can surpass His judgment by the word, and no force of darkness can prevail over His authority. Man’s submission to Him is all due to the flesh in which He is incarnated, it is all due to His authority, and due to His judgment by the word. The work brought by His incarnate flesh is the authority that He possesses. The reason why He becomes flesh is because the flesh can also possess authority, and He is capable of carrying out work in a practical manner among mankind, in such a way that it is visible and tangible to man. This work is much more practical than the work done directly by the Spirit of God, who possesses all authority, and its results are also apparent. This is because God’s incarnate flesh can speak and work in a practical way. The outer shell of His flesh holds no authority, and can be approached by man, whereas His essence does carry authority, but His authority is visible to none. When He speaks and works, man is unable to detect the existence of His authority; this facilitates Him in doing His practical work. All this practical work can achieve results. Even though no man realizes that He holds authority, or sees that no offense may be committed against Him, or sees His wrath, He achieves the intended results of His words through His veiled authority, His hidden wrath, and the words He openly speaks. In other words, through His tone of voice, the sternness of His speech, and all the wisdom of His words, man is utterly convinced. In this way, man submits to the word of God incarnate, who seemingly has no authority, thereby fulfilling God’s aim of saving man. This is another aspect of the significance of His incarnation: to speak in a more practical way, to allow the reality of His words to achieve its results in man, and to allow man to witness the might of the word of God. Therefore, were this work not done by means of the incarnation, it would not achieve the slightest results and would not be able to fully save sinful people. If God did not become flesh, He would remain the Spirit who is both invisible and inaccessible to man. Man being a creature of flesh, he and God belong to two different worlds and are possessed of different natures. The Spirit of God is incompatible with man, who is of flesh, and there is simply no way of establishing relations between them; man, meanwhile, is incapable of turning into a spirit. This being so, the Spirit of God must become a created being in order to do His original work. God can both ascend to the highest place and humble Himself to become a created human being, doing work among mankind and living in their midst, but man cannot ascend to the highest place and become a spirit, and even less can he descend to the lowest place. This is why God must become flesh to carry out His work. It is just as, during the first incarnation, only the flesh of God incarnate could redeem man through His crucifixion, whereas there would have been no way for the Spirit of God to be crucified as a sin offering for man. God could directly become flesh to serve as a sin offering for man, but man could not directly ascend to heaven to take the sin offering that God had prepared for him. This being so, all that is possible would be to ask God to run back and forth a few times between heaven and earth, not to have man ascend to heaven to take this saving grace, for man had fallen and, moreover, man simply could not ascend to heaven, much less obtain the sin offering. Therefore, it was necessary for Jesus to come among mankind and personally do the work that simply could not be accomplished by man. Every time God becomes flesh, it is out of absolute necessity. If any of the stages could have been carried out directly by the Spirit of God, He would not have submitted to the complaints and indignity that came with being incarnated.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Mystery of the Incarnation (4)

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 118

God became flesh because the object of His work is not the spirit of Satan, or anything that is not of the flesh, but man, who is of the flesh and has been corrupted by Satan. It is precisely because the flesh of man has been corrupted that God has made fleshly man the object of His work; even more so, it is because man is the object of corruption that God has chosen man as the only object of His work throughout all the stages of His salvation work. Man is a mortal being, is of flesh and blood, and God is the only One who can save man. Thus, God must become flesh that possesses the same attributes as man in order to do His work, so that His work might achieve better effects. God must become flesh to do His work precisely because man is of the flesh, and incapable of overcoming sin or divesting himself of the flesh. Though the essence and identity of God incarnate differ greatly from the essence and identity of man, yet His appearance is identical to that of man; He has the appearance of a normal person, and leads the life of a normal person, and those who see Him can discern no difference between Him and a normal person. This normal appearance and normal humanity are sufficient for Him to do His divine work in normal humanity. His flesh helps Him do His work in normal humanity, and His work among man, and His normal humanity even more so helps Him carry out the work of salvation among man. Although His normal humanity has caused much tumult among man, such tumult has not impacted the normal effects of His work. In short, the work of His normal flesh is of supreme benefit to man. Though most people cannot accept His normal humanity, His work can still achieve results, and these results are achieved thanks to His normal humanity. Of this there is no doubt. From His work in the flesh, man gains ten times or dozens of times more things than the notions that exist among man about His normal humanity, and such notions shall all ultimately be swallowed by His work. And the effect that His work has achieved, which is to say, the knowledge that man has of Him, far outweighs man’s notions about Him. There is no way to imagine or measure the work He does in the flesh, for His flesh is unlike that of any fleshly human being; although the outer shell is identical, the essence is not the same. His flesh engenders many notions among man about God, yet His flesh can also allow man to acquire much knowledge, and can even conquer any person possessed of a similar outer shell. For He is not merely human, but is God with the outer shell of a human, and none can completely fathom or understand Him. An invisible and intangible God is loved and welcomed by all. If God is just a Spirit that is invisible to man, it is so easy for man to believe in God. People can give free rein to their imaginations, can choose whatever image they like as God’s image to please themselves and make themselves feel happy. In this way, people may do whatever their own “God” most likes and wishes for them to do, without any scruples. What is more, people believe that no one is more loyal and devout than they toward “God,” and that all others are Gentile dogs, and disloyal to God. It can be said that this is how those whose belief in God is nebulous and based on doctrine pursue; it’s all much the same, with little variation. It is merely that the images of gods in their imaginings are different, yet their essence is actually the same.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 119

The incarnate God has come in the flesh entirely because of the needs of corrupt man. It is because of the needs of man, not of God, and all the prices He has paid and all His suffering are for the sake of mankind, and not for the benefit of God Himself. There are no gain and loss or rewards for God; what He obtains is not something that He reaps, but that which was originally owed to Him. The purpose behind all that He does for mankind and all the prices He has paid for mankind is not so that He might gain more rewards, but purely for the sake of mankind. Though God’s work in the flesh involves many unimaginable difficulties, the effects that it ultimately achieves far exceed those of the work done directly by the Spirit. The work of the flesh entails quite a large number of difficulties, and the flesh cannot possess the same great identity as the Spirit, He cannot carry out supernatural deeds like the Spirit, much less can He possess the same authority as the Spirit. Yet the essence of the work done by this unremarkable flesh is far superior to that of the work done directly by the Spirit, and this flesh Himself is what all people need. For those to be saved, the use value of the Spirit is far inferior to that of the flesh: The work of the Spirit is able to cover the entire universe, across all mountains, rivers, lakes, and oceans, yet the work of the flesh more effectively relates to every person with whom He comes into contact. What is more, God’s flesh with tangible form can better be understood and trusted by man, and can further deepen man’s knowledge of God, and can leave upon man a more profound impression of the practical deeds of God. The work of the Spirit is shrouded in mystery; it is difficult for mortal beings to predict, and even harder for them to see, and so they can only imagine things about it based on nothing. The work of the flesh, however, is normal and practical, and possessed of rich wisdom, and is a fact that can be personally seen by the eyes of mortal man; man can personally appreciate the wisdom of the work of God, and has no need to employ his bountiful imagination. This is the accuracy and practical value of the work of God in the flesh. The Spirit can only do things that are invisible to man and difficult for him to imagine, for example the enlightenment of the Spirit, the moving of the Spirit, and the guidance of the Spirit, but for man who has a mind, these cannot provide any clear meaning. They can only provide a moving, or a roughly similar meaning, and cannot give an instruction with words. The work of God in the flesh, however, is greatly different: It involves the accurate guidance of words, and there are clear intentions and clear required goals. And so man does not need to grope around, or employ his imagination, much less make guesses. This is the clarity of the work in the flesh, and His work is vastly different from that of the Spirit. The work of the Spirit is only suitable for a limited scope and cannot replace the work of the flesh. The precise goals required of man through the work of the flesh, and the practical value of the knowledge that man obtains through this work, far surpass the preciseness and practical value of the work of the Spirit. For corrupt people, only work that provides accurate words and clear goals to pursue, and is visible and tangible, is the most valuable kind of work. Only realistic work and timely guidance are suited to man’s tastes, and only practical work can save man from his corrupt and depraved disposition. This can only be achieved by the incarnate God; only the incarnate God can save man from his old corrupt and depraved disposition. Although the Spirit is the inherent essence of God, work such as this can only be done by His flesh. If the Spirit worked single-handedly, then it would not be possible for His work to be effective—this is a plain truth. Most people have become the enemies of God because of this flesh. However, when this flesh concludes His work, those who are against Him will not only cease to be His enemies, but on the contrary will become His witnesses. They will become the witnesses that have been conquered by Him, witnesses that are compatible with Him and inseparable from Him. He shall cause man to know the importance of the work of the flesh to man, and man shall know the importance of this flesh to the meaning of man’s existence, shall know His practical value as concerns the growth of man’s life, and, even more so, shall know that this flesh will unexpectedly become a living fountain of life from which man cannot bear to part. Though the incarnate flesh of God is far from matching God’s identity and status, and seems to man to be incompatible with His actual worth, this flesh, who does not possess the inherent image of God, or the inherent identity of God, can do the work that God’s Spirit is unable to do directly. Such is the inherent significance and value of God’s incarnation, and it is this significance and value which man is unable to comprehend and acknowledge. Though all mankind look up to God’s Spirit and look down on God’s flesh, irrespective of how they view or think, the practical significance and value of the flesh far exceed those of the Spirit. Of course, this is only with regard to corrupt mankind. For everyone who seeks the truth and longs for the appearance of God, the Spirit’s work can only provide moving or inspiration, and a sense of wonder that this work is marvelous, unfathomable, and unimaginable, and a sense that it is great, transcendent, and admirable, yet also unattainable and unreachable to all. Man and the Spirit of God can only look upon each other from afar, as if there were a great distance between them, and they can never be alike, as if man and God were separated by an invisible divide. In fact, this is an illusion given to man by the Spirit, which is because the Spirit and man are not of the same kind and shall never coexist in the same world, and because the Spirit possesses nothing of man. So man does not have need of the Spirit, for the Spirit cannot directly do the work most needed by man. The work of the flesh offers man practical objectives to pursue, explicit words, and a sense that He is practical and normal, that He is humble and ordinary. Although man may be afraid of Him, for most people He is quite approachable. Man can behold His face, and hear His voice, and he does not need to look upon Him from afar. This flesh feels near to man, not distant, or unfathomable, but visible and accessible, for this flesh is in the same world as man.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 120

For all of those who live in the flesh, pursuing dispositional change requires goals, and pursuing knowledge of God requires witnessing the practical deeds and the real face of God. Both can only be achieved by God’s incarnate flesh, and both can only be accomplished by the normal and practical flesh. This is why the incarnation is necessary—it is needed by all corrupt mankind. Since people are required to know God, the images of the nebulous and supernatural gods must be dispelled from their hearts, and since they are required to cast off their corrupt dispositions, they must first know their corrupt dispositions. If only man does the work to dispel the images of the nebulous gods from people’s hearts, then he will fail to achieve the intended effect. The images of the nebulous gods in people’s hearts cannot be exposed, cast off, or completely expelled by words alone. In doing so, ultimately it would still not be possible to dispel these deep-rooted things from people. Only by replacing these nebulous and supernatural things with the practical God and the inherent image of God, and making people gradually know them, can the due effect be achieved. Man recognizes that the god whom he pursued in times past is nebulous and supernatural. That which can achieve this effect is not the direct leadership of the Spirit, much less the teachings of a certain individual, but the incarnate God. Precisely because the normality and practicality of the incarnate God is the antithesis of the nebulous and supernatural gods in man’s imaginings, the notions of man are all laid bare when the incarnate God officially does His work. The original notions of man can only be revealed when contrasted against the incarnate God. Without the comparison to the incarnate God, the notions of man could not be revealed; in other words, without practicality as a foil, the nebulous things could not be revealed. No one is capable of using words to do this work, and no one is capable of articulating this work using words. God Himself can do His own work, and no one else can do this work on His behalf. No matter how rich the language of man is, he is incapable of articulating the practicality and normality of God. Man can only know God more practically, and can only see Him more clearly, if God personally works among man and completely shows forth His image and His being. This effect cannot be achieved by any human being of flesh. Of course, God’s Spirit is also incapable of achieving this effect. God can save corrupt man from the influence of Satan, but this work cannot be directly accomplished by the Spirit of God; rather, it can only be done by the flesh God’s Spirit wears, by God’s incarnate flesh. This flesh is a human being and also God; this flesh is a person possessed of normal humanity and also God possessed of full divinity. And so, even though this flesh is not the Spirit of God, and differs greatly from the Spirit, it is still the incarnate God Himself who saves man, who is the Spirit and also the flesh. No matter what He is called by, ultimately it is still God Himself who saves mankind. For the Spirit of God is indivisible from the flesh, and the work of the flesh is also the work of the Spirit of God; it is just that this work is not done using the identity of the Spirit, but is done using the identity of the flesh. Work that needs to be done directly by the Spirit does not require incarnation, and work that requires the flesh to do cannot be done directly by the Spirit, and can only be done by God incarnate. This is what is required for this work, and it is what is required by corrupt mankind. In the three stages of God’s work, only one stage was carried out directly by the Spirit, and the remaining two stages are carried out by the incarnate God, and not directly by the Spirit. The work of the Age of Law done by the Spirit did not involve changing the corrupt disposition of man, and neither did it bear any relation to man’s knowledge of God. The work of God’s flesh in the Age of Grace and the Age of Kingdom, however, involves man’s corrupt disposition and his knowledge of God, and is an important and crucial part of the work of salvation. Therefore, corrupt mankind is in greater need of the salvation of the incarnate God, and is in greater need of the direct work of the incarnate God. Mankind needs the incarnate God to shepherd him, support him, water him, feed him, judge and chastise him, and he needs more grace and greater redemption from the incarnate God. Only God in the flesh can be the confidant of man, the shepherd of man, the very present help of man, and all of this is the necessity of the incarnation both today and in times past.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 121

Man has been corrupted by Satan and is the highest of all God’s creatures, therefore man is in need of God’s salvation. The object of God’s salvation is man, not Satan, and that which shall be saved is the flesh of man, and the soul of man, and not devils. Satan is the object of God’s annihilation, man is the object of God’s salvation, and the flesh of man has been corrupted by Satan, so the first to be saved must be the flesh of man. The flesh of man has been most profoundly corrupted, and it has become something which opposes God, so much so that it even openly opposes and denies the existence of God. This corrupt flesh is simply too intractable, and nothing is more difficult to deal with or change than the corrupt disposition of the flesh. Satan comes into the flesh of man to stir up disturbances, and it uses the flesh of man to disturb the work of God and impair the plan of God, and thus man has become Satan, and become the enemy of God. For man to be saved, he must first be conquered. It is because of this that God rises to the challenge and comes in the flesh to do the work He intends to do, and to do battle with Satan. His aim is the salvation of man, who has been corrupted, and the defeat and annihilation of Satan, which rebels against Him. He defeats Satan through His work of conquering man, while at the same time He saves corrupt mankind. It is a work that achieves two aims at once. He works in the flesh, and speaks in the flesh, and undertakes all work in the flesh in order to better engage with man, and better conquer man. The last time that God becomes flesh, His work of the last days will be concluded in the flesh. He will sort all people according to their kind, conclude His entire management, and also conclude all His work in the flesh. After all His work on earth comes to an end, He will be completely victorious. Working in the flesh, God will have fully conquered mankind, and fully gained mankind. Does this not mean that His entire management will have come to an end? When God concludes His work in the flesh, as He has fully defeated Satan and has been victorious, Satan will have no further opportunity to corrupt man. The work of the first incarnation of God was redemption and the forgiveness of man’s sins. Now it is the work of conquering and fully gaining mankind, so that Satan will no longer have any way to do its work, and will have completely lost, and God will have been completely victorious. This is the work of the flesh, and is the work done by God Himself.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 122

The initial work of the three stages of God’s work was done directly by the Spirit, and not by the flesh. The final work of the three stages of God’s work, however, is done by the incarnate God, and not directly by the Spirit. The work of redemption of the intermediary stage was also done by God in the flesh. Throughout the entire management work, the most important work is to save man from the influence of Satan. The key work is to completely conquer the corrupted people so that the original God-fearing heart of those who have been conquered can be restored and they can achieve a normal human life, which is to say, the normal life of a created being. This work is crucial, and it is the core of the management work. In the three stages of the work of salvation, the first stage of the work of the Age of Law was far from the core of the management work; it only had the slight appearance of the work of salvation, and was not the beginning of God’s work of saving man from the power of Satan. The first stage of work was done directly by the Spirit because, under the law, man only knew to abide by the law, and man did not have more truth, and because the work in the Age of Law hardly involved changes in the disposition of man, much less was it concerned with the work of how to save man from the power of Satan. Thus the Spirit of God completed this supremely simple stage of work that did not concern the corrupt disposition of man. This stage of work bore little relation to the core of the management, and it had no great correlation to the official work of the salvation of man, and so it did not require God to become flesh to personally do His work. The work done by the Spirit is implicit and unfathomable, and it is deeply frightening and unapproachable to man; the Spirit is not suited to directly doing the work of salvation, and is not suited to directly providing life to man. Most suitable for man is to transform the work of the Spirit into an approach that is close to man, which is to say, what is most suitable for man is for God to become an ordinary, normal person to do His work. This requires God to be incarnated to take the place of the Spirit in His work, and for man, there is no more suitable way for God to work. Among these three stages of work, two stages are carried out by the flesh, and these two stages are the key phases of the management work. The two incarnations are mutually complementary and they complement each other perfectly. The first stage of God’s incarnation laid the foundation for the second stage, and it can be said that the two incarnations of God form one whole and are not incompatible with each other. These two stages of God’s work are carried out by God in His incarnate identity because they are so important to the entire management work. It could almost be said that, without the work of the two incarnations of God, the entire management work would have ground to a halt, and the work of saving mankind would be nothing but empty talk. Whether or not this work is important is based on the needs of mankind, on the reality of mankind’s depravity, and on the severity of Satan’s rebelliousness and its disturbance of the work. The right one who is up to the task is predicated upon the nature of the work performed by the worker, and the importance of the work. When it comes to the importance of this work, in terms of what method of work to adopt—work done directly by God’s Spirit, or work done by God incarnate, or work done through man—the first to be eliminated is work done through man, and, based on the nature of the work, and the nature of the Spirit’s work versus that of the flesh, it is ultimately decided that work done by the flesh is more beneficial for man than work done directly by the Spirit, and that it offers more advantages. This is God’s thought at the time when He decided whether the work was to be done by the Spirit or by the flesh. There is a significance and a basis to each stage of work. None of these stages of work are based on groundless imaginings, nor are they carried out arbitrarily; there is a certain wisdom to them. Such is the real story behind all of God’s work. In particular, such a great work as God incarnate personally working among man even more so contains God’s plan. Therefore, God’s wisdom and the entirety of His being are reflected in every action, thought, and idea in His work; this is the more concrete and systematic being of God. These subtle thoughts and ideas are difficult for man to imagine, and difficult for man to believe, and, moreover, difficult for man to know. Work done by man is done according to general principle, which, for man, is highly satisfactory. Yet compared to the work of God, there is simply too great a disparity. Although the deeds of God are great and the work of God is of a magnificent scale, behind them are many minute and precise plans and arrangements that are unimaginable to man. Each stage of His work is not only performed according to principle, but each stage also contains many things that cannot be articulated by human language, and these are the things that are invisible to man. Regardless of whether it is the work of the Spirit or the work of God incarnate, each contains the plans of His work. He does not work groundlessly, and He does not do meaningless work. When the Spirit works directly, it is with His goals, and when He becomes man (which is to say, when He transforms His outer shell) to work, this even more so has its significance. Why else would He readily change His identity? Why else would He readily become a person who is regarded as lowly and is persecuted?

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 123

His work in the flesh is of the utmost significance, which is spoken with regard to the work, and the One who ultimately concludes the work is the incarnate God, and not the Spirit. Some believe that God may at some unknown time come to earth and appear to man, whereupon He shall personally judge the whole of mankind, testing them one by one without anyone being left out. Those who think in this way do not know this stage of work of the incarnation. God does not judge people one after another, nor are they made to pass a test one by one; to do thus would not be the work of judgment. Is not the corruption of all mankind the same? Is not the essence of all mankind the same? What is judged is mankind’s corrupt essence, man’s essence corrupted by Satan, and all the sins of man. God does not judge the trifling and insignificant faults of man. The work of judgment is representative, and it is not carried out especially for a certain person. Rather, it is work in which a group of people are judged in order to represent the judgment of all of mankind. The work done by God in the flesh is to use His first-hand work on a group of people to represent the work of the whole of mankind, after which it is gradually spread. This is also how the work of judgment is. God does not judge a certain kind of person or a certain group of people, but instead judges the unrighteousness of the whole of mankind, such as man’s opposition to God, or man not fearing Him, or man’s disturbance of the work of God. What is judged is mankind’s essence of opposition to God, and this work of judgment is the work of conquest of the last days. The work and word of the incarnate God witnessed by man are the work of judgment before the great white throne during the last days, which man harbored in their notions during times past. The work that is currently being done by the incarnate God is exactly the judgment before the great white throne. The incarnate God of today is the God who judges the whole of mankind during the last days. This flesh and the work, word, and entire disposition of this flesh are the entirety of Him. Although the scope of the work of this flesh is limited, and does not directly involve the entire universe, the essence of the work of judgment is the direct judgment of all mankind—this work is not only for the sake of the chosen people of China, nor is it carried out for the sake of a small number of people. During the work of God in the flesh, although the scope of this work does not involve the entire universe, it represents the work of the entire universe, and after He concludes the work within the work scope of His flesh, He will immediately spread this work to every place within the universe, in the same way that the gospel of Jesus was spread following His resurrection and ascension. Regardless of whether it is the work of the Spirit or the work of the flesh, it is work that is carried out within a limited scope, but which represents the work of the entire universe. During the last days, God performs His work by appearing in His incarnate identity, and God in the flesh is the God who judges man before the great white throne. Regardless of whether He is the Spirit or the flesh, He who does the work of judgment is the God who judges mankind during the last days. This is determined by the work He does, not by His external appearance or several other factors. Although man harbors notions about these words, no one can deny the fact of the incarnate God’s judgment and conquest of all mankind. Regardless of what man thinks of it, facts are, after all, facts. No one can say that “The work is done by God, but the flesh is not God.” This is a fallacy, for this work can be done by no one except God in the flesh. Since this work has already been completed, following this work the work of God’s judgment of man shall not appear for a second time; God in His second incarnation has already concluded all of the work of the entire management, and there shall not be a fourth stage of God’s work. Because the one who is judged is man, man who is of the flesh and has been corrupted, and it is not the spirit of Satan that is judged directly, the work of judgment is therefore not carried out in the spiritual realm, but among man.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 124

No one is more suitable, and qualified, than God in the flesh for the work of judging the corruption of man’s flesh. If judgment were carried out directly by the Spirit of God, then it would not be all-embracing, and, moreover, man would have difficulty accepting this, for the Spirit is unable to come face-to-face with man. Just in light of this point, the effects would not be immediate, much less would man be able to behold with greater clarity the disposition of God which must not be offended. Satan can only be fully defeated if God in the flesh judges the corruption of mankind. God in the flesh is also a person with normal humanity, yet He can directly judge the unrighteousness of man; this is the mark of His innate holiness, and of His singularness. Only God is qualified to, and is in the position to, judge man, for He is possessed of the truth, and righteousness, and so He is able to judge man. Those who are without truth and righteousness are not fit to judge others. If this work were done by the Spirit of God, then it would not mean victory over Satan. The Spirit is inherently loftier than mortal beings, and the Spirit of God is inherently holy, and triumphant over the flesh. If the Spirit did this work directly, He would not be able to judge all of man’s rebelliousness and could not reveal all of man’s unrighteousness. For the work of judgment is also carried out through man’s notions about God, and man has never had any notions about the Spirit, and so the Spirit is incapable of better revealing the unrighteousness of man, much less of thoroughly exposing such unrighteousness. The incarnate God is the enemy of all those who do not know Him. Through judging man’s notions about Him and their opposition to Him, He exposes all the rebelliousness of mankind. The effects of His work in the flesh are more apparent than those of the work of the Spirit. And so, the judgment of all mankind is not carried out directly by the Spirit but is the work of the incarnate God. God in the flesh can be seen and touched by man, and God in the flesh can completely conquer man. Man progresses from opposing Him to submitting to Him, from persecuting Him to accepting Him, from having notions about Him to knowing Him, and from rejecting Him to loving Him—these are the effects of the work of the incarnate God. Man is only saved through the acceptance of His judgment, man only gradually comes to know Him through the words of His mouth, man is conquered by Him during his opposition to Him, and he receives the life supply from Him during the acceptance of His chastisement. All of this work is the work of God in the flesh, and not the work of God in His identity as the Spirit. The work done by God incarnate is the greatest work, and the most profound work, and the crucial part of the three stages of God’s work is the two stages of the work of incarnation. The obstacles facing the work of God incarnate are too great, because man is so deeply corrupted. In particular, the work carried out in the last days on these people is all the more fraught with difficulty—the environment is hostile, and the caliber of every kind of person is quite poor. Yet at the end of this work, it will still achieve the proper effect, without falling the slightest bit short; this is the effect of the work of the flesh, and this effect is more convincing than that of the work of the Spirit. The three stages of God’s work shall be concluded in the flesh, and they must be concluded by the incarnate God. The most important and most crucial work is done in the flesh, and the salvation of man must be personally carried out by God in the flesh. Even though all mankind feels that God in the flesh seems unrelated to man, in fact this flesh concerns the fate and existence of the whole of mankind.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 125

Every stage of God’s work is implemented for the sake of all mankind and is directed at the whole of mankind. Even though it is His work in the flesh, it is still directed at all mankind; He is the God of all mankind, and He is the God of all created and non-created beings. Although His work in the flesh is within a limited scope, and the object of this work is also limited, each time He becomes flesh to do His work He chooses an object of His work that is supremely representative. He does not select a group of simple and unremarkable people on which to work, but instead picks as the object of His work a group of people capable of being the representatives for His work in the flesh. This group of people is chosen because the scope of His work in the flesh is limited, and is prepared especially for His incarnate flesh, and is chosen especially for His work in the flesh. God’s selection of the objects of His work is not baseless, but is done according to principle: The object of the work must be of benefit to the work of God in the flesh, and must be able to represent the whole of mankind. For example, the Jews were able to represent the whole of mankind in accepting the personal redemption of Jesus, and the Chinese are able to represent the whole of mankind in accepting the personal conquest of the incarnate God. There is a basis to the Jews’ representation of the whole of mankind, and there is also a basis to Chinese people’s representation of the whole of mankind in accepting the personal conquest of God. Nothing demonstrates the significance of redemption more than the work of redemption done among the Jews, and nothing demonstrates the thoroughness and success of the work of conquest more than the work of conquest being done among Chinese people. The work and word of God incarnate appear to only be aimed at a small group of people, but in fact, He does the work of the entire universe, and speaks to all of mankind, within this small group. After His work in the flesh comes to an end, those who follow Him shall begin to spread the work He has done among them. The greatest strength of His work in the flesh is that He can leave accurate words and exhortations, and His precise intentions for mankind to those who follow Him, so that afterward His followers can more accurately and in more practical terms pass on all of His work in the flesh, and His intentions for the whole of mankind, to those who accept this way. Only God in the flesh working among man truly makes God’s being together and living together with man a reality, and fulfills man’s desire to behold the face of God, witness the work of God, and hear the personal word of God. The incarnate God brings to an end the age when only the back of Jehovah appeared to mankind, and He also concludes the age of mankind’s belief in the nebulous gods. In particular, the work of God’s last incarnation brings all mankind into an age that is more realistic, more practical, and more beautiful. This work not only concludes the age of law and regulations but, more importantly, it makes known to mankind the God who is practical and normal, who is righteous and holy, who unlocks the work of the management plan and who demonstrates the mysteries and destination of mankind, who created mankind and brings to an end the management work, and who has remained hidden for thousands of years. This work brings the age of nebulousness to a complete end, it concludes the age in which the whole of mankind wished to seek God’s face but was unable to, it ends the age in which the whole of mankind served Satan, and it leads the whole of mankind all the way into a completely new era. All this is the outcome of the work of God in the flesh in place of God’s Spirit. Only when God works in His flesh, do those who follow Him no longer seek and grope after those things which seem to both exist and not exist, and cease to guess at the intentions of the nebulous gods. When God spreads His work in the flesh, those who follow Him shall pass on the work that He has done in the flesh to all religions and denominations, and they shall disseminate all of His words to the ears of the whole of mankind. All that is heard by those who receive His gospel shall be the facts of His work, and shall be things personally seen and heard by man—it shall be facts and not hearsay. These facts are the evidence with which He spreads the work, and they are also the tools that He uses in spreading the work. Without the existence of facts, His gospel would not spread across all countries and to all places; without facts but only with man’s imaginings, He would never be able to do the work of conquering the entire universe. The Spirit is impalpable to man, and invisible to man, and the work of the Spirit is incapable of leaving for man any more evidence or any more facts of God’s work. Man would never behold the real face of God, he would always believe in a nebulous god that does not exist. Man would never behold the face of God, nor would man ever hear words personally spoken by God. Man’s imaginings are, after all, empty, and cannot replace the true face of God; the inherent disposition of God, and the work of God Himself, cannot be impersonated by man. The invisible God in heaven and His work can only be brought to earth by God becoming flesh and coming among man to personally do His work. This is the most ideal way for God to appear to man, and for man to see God and come to know the true face of God, and it cannot be achieved by a non-incarnate God. Having carried out His work to this stage, God’s work has already achieved the optimal effect, and has been a complete success. The personal work of God in the flesh has already completed ninety percent of His entire management work. This flesh has led all of His work into a better beginning, and this flesh has brought all of His work to a conclusion, has promulgated all of His work, and has made the last thorough replenishment to all of this work. Henceforth, there will not be another incarnate God to do the fourth stage of God’s work, and never will there be any wondrous work of a third incarnation of God.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 126

Each stage of work of God in the flesh represents His work of the entire age, and it does not represent a certain period, as does the work of man. And so the end of the work of His last incarnation does not mean that His work has come to a complete end, for His work in the flesh represents the entire age, and does not only represent the period in which He does His work in the flesh. It is just that He finishes His work of the entire age during the time that He is in the flesh, after which it spreads to all places. After the incarnate God fulfills His ministry, He will entrust His future work to those who follow Him. In this way, His work of the entire age will be carried on unbroken. The work of the entire age of incarnation shall only be considered complete once it has spread to every place within the universe. The work of God incarnate begins a new age, and those who continue His work are those who are used by Him. The work done by man is all within the ministry of God in the flesh, and it is incapable of going beyond this scope. If God incarnate had not come to do His work, man would not be able to bring the old age to an end and would not be able to usher in a new age. The work done by man is merely within the range of his duty that is humanly possible to do, and it does not represent the work of God. Only the incarnate God can come and complete the work that He should do and, besides Him, no one can do this work on His behalf. Of course, what I speak of is in regard to the work of incarnation. This incarnate God first carries out a step of work that does not conform to the notions of man, after which He does more work that does not conform to the notions of man. The aim of the work is the conquest of man. In one regard, God’s incarnation does not conform to the notions of man, in addition to which He does more work that does not conform to the notions of man, and so man develops even more critical views about Him. He just does the work of conquest among people who have myriad notions about Him. Regardless of how they treat Him, once He has fulfilled His ministry, all people will have become subject to His dominion. The fact of this work is not only reflected among Chinese people, but it also represents how the whole of mankind shall be conquered. The effects that are achieved on these people are a foretaste of the effects that shall be achieved on the whole of mankind, and the effects of the work that He does in the future shall increasingly exceed even the effects on these people. The work of God in the flesh does not involve great fanfare, nor is it wreathed in obscurity. It is real and actual, and it is work in which one is one and two is two. It is not hidden from anyone, nor does it deceive anyone. What people see are real and genuine things, and what man gains is practical knowledge and truth. When the work ends, man shall have a new knowledge of Him, and those who truly pursue shall no longer have any notions about Him. This is not just the effect of His work on Chinese people, but it also represents the effect of His work in conquering the whole of mankind, for nothing is more beneficial to the work of conquering the whole of mankind than this flesh, and the work of this flesh, and everything of this flesh. They are beneficial to His work today, and beneficial to His work in the future. This flesh shall conquer the whole of mankind and shall gain the whole of mankind. There is no better work for the whole of mankind to behold God, submit to God, and know God. The work done by man only represents a limited scope, and when God does His work He does not speak to a certain person, but speaks to the whole of mankind, and all those who accept His words. In proclaiming outcomes, God proclaims the outcomes of all people, not just the outcome of a certain person. He does not give anyone special treatment, nor does He make things difficult for anyone, and He works on, and speaks to, the whole of mankind. This incarnate God has therefore already sorted the whole of mankind according to their kind, has already judged the whole of mankind, and has arranged suitable destinations for the whole of mankind. Although God only does His work in China, in fact He has already handled the work of the entire universe. He cannot wait until His work has spread among the whole of mankind before making His utterances and arrangements step by step. Would that not be too late? Now He is fully able to complete the future work in advance. This is because the One who is working is God in the flesh; He is doing limitless work within a limited scope, and afterward He shall make man perform the duty that man should perform—this is the principle of His work. He can only live with man for a time and cannot accompany man until the work of the whole age is concluded. It is because He is God that He foretells His future work in advance. Afterward, He shall sort the whole of mankind according to their kind by His words, and mankind shall enter into His step-by-step work according to His words. None shall escape, and all must practice according to this. So, in the future the age shall be guided by His words, and not guided by the Spirit.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 127

The flesh of man has been corrupted by Satan, and it has been most deeply blinded, and profoundly harmed. The most fundamental reason why God works personally in the flesh is that the object of His salvation is man, who is of the flesh, and that Satan also uses the flesh of man to disturb the work of God. The battle with Satan is actually the work of conquering man, and at the same time, man is also the object of God’s salvation. Thus, God becoming flesh to do His work is of utmost necessity. Satan corrupted the flesh of man, and man became the embodiment of Satan, and became the object to be defeated by God. Therefore, the work of doing battle with Satan and saving mankind occurs on earth, and God must become human in order to do battle with Satan. This is work of the utmost practicality. When God is working in the flesh, He is actually doing battle with Satan in the flesh. When He works in the flesh, He is doing His work of the spiritual realm, and He makes the whole of His work in the spiritual realm real on earth. The one who is conquered is man, man who is rebellious to Him, and the one who is defeated is the embodiment of Satan (of course, this is also man), who is in enmity to Him, and the one who is ultimately saved is also man. Thus, it is even more necessary for God to become a human who has the outer shell of a created being, so that He is able to do actual battle with Satan, to conquer man, who is rebellious to Him and possessed of the same outer shell as Him, and to save man, who has the same outer shell as Him and has been harmed by Satan. His enemy is man, the object of His conquest is man, and the object of His salvation is man, who was created by Him. So He must become human, and in this way, His work becomes much easier—He is able to defeat Satan and conquer mankind, and even more so able to save mankind. Although this flesh is normal and practical, He is no common flesh: He is not flesh that only has humanity, but flesh that has both humanity and divinity. This is the difference between Him and man, and it is the mark of the identity of God. Only flesh such as this can do the work that He intends to do, and fulfill the ministry of God in the flesh, and fully complete His work among man. If it were not thus, His work among man would always be empty and flawed. Even though God can do battle with the spirit of Satan and emerge victorious, the old nature of corrupted man can never be resolved, and those who are rebellious to God and oppose Him can never truly become subject to His dominion, which is to say, He can never conquer mankind, and can never gain the whole of mankind. If His work on earth cannot be resolved, then His management shall never be brought to an end, and the whole of mankind will not be able to enter rest. If God cannot enter rest with all of His created beings, then there shall never be an outcome to such management work, and the glory of God shall consequently disappear. Although His flesh has no authority, the work He does will have achieved its effect. This is the inevitable direction of His work. Regardless of whether or not His flesh is possessed of authority, as long as He is capable of doing the work of God Himself, then He is God Himself. Regardless of how normal and ordinary this flesh is, He can do the work He should do, for this flesh is God and is not just a human. The reason this flesh can do the work that man cannot is that His inner essence is unlike that of any human, and the reason He can save man is that His identity is different from that of any human. This flesh is so important to mankind because He is man and, even more so, He is God, because He can do the work that no ordinary man of flesh can do, and because He can save corrupt man, who lives together with Him on earth. Though He is also human, the incarnate God is more important to mankind than any person of value, for He can do the work that cannot be done by the Spirit of God, is more able than the Spirit of God to bear testimony to God Himself, and is more able than the Spirit of God to fully gain mankind. As a result, although this flesh is normal and ordinary, in terms of His contribution to mankind and His significance to the existence of mankind, He is highly precious, and the actual value and significance of this flesh is immeasurable to any human. Although this flesh cannot directly destroy Satan, He can use His work to conquer mankind and defeat Satan, and make Satan fully yield to His dominion. It is because God is incarnated that He can defeat Satan and is able to save mankind. He does not directly destroy Satan, but instead becomes flesh to do the work to conquer mankind, who has been corrupted by Satan. In this way, He can better bear testimony to Himself among His created beings, and He can better save corrupted man. God incarnate’s defeat of Satan bears greater testimony, and is more convincing, than the direct destruction of Satan by the Spirit of God. God in the flesh is more beneficial for man knowing the Creator and is better able to bear testimony to Himself among His created beings.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Corrupt Mankind Is in Greater Need of the Salvation of the Incarnate God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 128

God has come to earth to do His work among man, to personally appear to man and allow man to behold Him; is this a small matter? It really is not simple! It is not as man imagines: that God has come so man may look upon Him, so that man may understand that God is practical and not nebulous or hollow, and that God is lofty but also humble. Could it be that simple? It is precisely because Satan has corrupted the flesh of man, and man is the one who God intends to save, that God must assume the flesh to do battle with Satan and to personally shepherd man. Only this is beneficial to His work. The two incarnate fleshes of God have existed in order to defeat Satan, and also in order to better save man. That is because the one doing the battle with Satan can only be God, whether it be the Spirit of God or the incarnate flesh of God. In short, it cannot be the angels who are doing battle with Satan, much less can it be man, who has been corrupted by Satan. The angels are powerless to fight this battle, and man has even less hope of getting involved. As such, if God wants to work the life of man, if He wants to personally come to earth to save man, then He must personally become flesh—that is, He must personally assume the flesh, and with His inherent identity and the work that He must do, come among man and personally save man. If not, if it were the Spirit of God or man that did this work, then nothing would ever come of this battle, and it would never end. Only when God becomes flesh to personally go to war against Satan among man does man have a chance of salvation. Furthermore, Satan is consequently shamed and left without any opportunities to exploit or any plots to carry out. The work done by God incarnate is unachievable by the Spirit of God, and it would be even more impossible for any man of flesh and blood to do it on God’s behalf, for the work that He does is all for the sake of the life of man, and in order to change the corrupt disposition of man. Were man to participate in this battle, he would only drop his weapons and flee in utter disgrace and disarray; he would simply be incapable of changing man’s corrupt disposition. He would be incapable of saving man from the cross, or of conquering all of rebellious mankind, but would only be able to do a little old work that does not go beyond principles, or else work that is unrelated to the defeat of Satan. So why bother? He wouldn’t be able to gain man, and much less could he perform the work of defeating Satan, so what would be the point? And so, the battle with Satan can only be carried out by God Himself, and it would simply be impossible for man to do it. Man’s duty is to submit and to follow, for man is wholly unable to do work akin to creating the heavens and earth, much less can he carry out the work of battling Satan. Man can only satisfy the Creator under the leadership of God Himself, through which Satan is defeated; this is the only thing that man can do. And so, every time a new battle commences, which is to say, every time the work of a new age begins, this work is personally done by God Himself, through which He leads the entire age and opens up a newer path for the whole of mankind. The dawn of each new age is a new start in the battle with Satan, through which man enters a newer, more beautiful realm, and a new age that is personally led by God Himself. Man is the master of all things, but those who have been gained will become the fruits of all battles with Satan. Satan is the corrupter of all things, it is the defeated at the end of all battles, and is also the one which will be punished following these battles. Among God, man, and Satan, only Satan is the one which will be spurned. Those who were gained by Satan but are not taken back by God, meanwhile, become the ones who will receive punishment on behalf of Satan. Of these three, only God should be worshiped by all things. Those who were corrupted by Satan but are taken back by God and who follow the way of God, meanwhile, become the ones who will receive God’s promise and judge the evil ones for God. God will surely be victorious and Satan will surely be defeated, but among man there are those who will win and those who will lose. Those who win will belong with the overcomers, and those who lose will belong with the losers; this is the sorting of each according to their kind, it is the final ending of all God’s work. It is also the purpose of all God’s work, and it will never change. The core of God’s management plan is primarily focused on the salvation of man, and God becomes flesh primarily for the sake of this core, for the sake of this work, and in order to defeat Satan. The first time God became flesh was also in order to defeat Satan. He personally became flesh, and was personally nailed to the cross, in order to complete the work of the first battle, which was the work of mankind’s redemption. Likewise, this stage of work is also personally done by God, who has become flesh to do His work among man, to personally speak His word and allow man to see these things. Of course, it is inevitable that He also does some other work along the way, but the main reason He personally carries out His work is in order to defeat Satan, to conquer the whole of mankind, and to gain these people. So, the work of God’s incarnation is not simple. If His purpose were only to show man that God is humble and hidden and that God is practical, if it were only for the sake of doing this work, then there would be no need to become flesh. Even if God did not become flesh, He could make a revelation of His humbleness and hiddenness, and His greatness and holiness, to man directly, but such things have nothing to do with the work of managing mankind. They are incapable of saving man or making him complete, much less can they defeat Satan. If the defeat of Satan only involved the Spirit doing battle against a spirit, then such work would have even less practical value; it would be incapable of gaining man and would ruin the fate and prospects of man. As such, God’s work today is of profound significance. It is not only so that man may see Him, or so that man’s horizons may be broadened, or in order to provide him with a little sense of feeling moved and encouraged; such work has no significance. If you can only speak of this kind of knowledge, then it proves that you still haven’t come to know the true significance of God’s incarnation.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Restoring the Normal Life of Man and Taking Him to a Wonderful Destination

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Each stage of work done by God has its own practical significance. Back then, when Jesus came, He came in male form, and when God comes this time, His form is female. From this, you can see that God’s creation of both men and women can serve His work, and with Him there is no distinction of gender. When His Spirit comes, He can take on any flesh He pleases, and that flesh can represent Him; whether male or female, it can represent God as long as it is His incarnate flesh. If Jesus had appeared as a female when He came, in other words, if an infant girl, and not a boy, had been conceived by the Holy Spirit, that stage of work would have been completed all the same. If that had been the case, then the present stage of work would have to be done by a male instead, but the work would be completed all the same. The work done in each stage has its significance; neither stage of work repeats the other, but they also do not conflict with each other. At the time, Jesus, in doing His work, was called the only Son, and “Son” implies the male gender. Why is the only Son not mentioned in this current stage? Because the requirements of the work have necessitated a change in gender from that of Jesus. With God there is no distinction of gender. He does His work as He wishes, and in doing His work He is not subject to any constraints, but is especially free. Yet every stage of work has its own practical significance. God became flesh twice, and it is self-evident that His incarnation during the last days is the final time. He has come to reveal all His deeds. If in this stage He did not become flesh and personally do work for man to witness, man would forever cling to the notion that God is only male, not female. Before this, all humanity believed that God could only be male and that a female could not be called God, for all humanity regarded men as having authority over women. They believed that no woman could take on authority, only men. What is more, they even said that man was the head of woman and that woman must obey man and could not surpass him. In times past, when it was said that man was woman’s head, this was directed at Adam and Eve, who had been beguiled by the serpent—not at man and woman as they had been created by Jehovah in the beginning. Of course, a woman must obey and love her husband, and a husband must learn to feed and support his family. These are the laws and statutes set forth by Jehovah that humankind must abide by in their lives on earth. Jehovah said to woman, “Your desire shall be to your husband, and he shall rule over you.” He spoke thus only so that humankind (that is, both man and woman) might live normal lives under the dominion of Jehovah, and so that the lives of humankind might have a structure, and not fall out of their proper order. Therefore, Jehovah made appropriate rules for how man and woman should act, though this was only in regard to all the created beings living on the earth, and bore no relation to God’s incarnate flesh. How could God be the same as His created beings? His words were directed only toward the humankind of His creation; it was in order for humankind to live normal lives that He established rules for man and woman. In the beginning, when Jehovah created humankind, He made two kinds of human beings, both male and female; and so there is the division of male and female in His incarnate fleshes. He did not determine His work based on the words He spoke to Adam and Eve. The two times He has become flesh have been determined entirely according to His thinking at the time He first created humankind; that is, He has completed the work of His two incarnations based on the male and the female before they were corrupted. If humanity took the words spoken by Jehovah to Adam and Eve who had been beguiled by the serpent, and applied them to the work of God’s incarnation, would not Jesus also have to love His wife as He ought? This way, would God still be God? And this being so, would He still be able to complete His work? If it be wrong for God’s incarnate flesh to be female, then would it not also have been an error of the greatest magnitude for God to have created woman? If people still believe that it would be wrong for God to be incarnated as female, then would not Jesus, who did not get married or love His wife, be as much in error as the present incarnation? Since you use the words spoken to Eve by Jehovah to measure the truth of God’s incarnation in the present day, then you must use Jehovah’s words to Adam to judge the Lord Jesus who became flesh in the Age of Grace. Are these not one and the same? Since you take the measure of the Lord Jesus according to the male who had not been beguiled by the serpent, then you may not judge the truth of today’s incarnation according to the female who had been beguiled by the serpent. This would be unfair! Measuring God in this way proves that you have no reason. When Jehovah twice became flesh, the gender of His flesh was related to the male and the female who had not been beguiled by the serpent; it was in accordance with the male and the female who had not been beguiled by the serpent that He twice became flesh. Do not think that the maleness of Jesus was the same as that of Adam, who was beguiled by the serpent. The two are completely unrelated, they are males of two different natures. Surely it cannot be that the maleness of Jesus proves He is the head of all women but not of all men? Is He not the King of all the Jews (including both men and women)? He is God Himself, not just the head of woman but the head of man as well. He is the Lord of all created beings and the head of all created beings. How could you determine the maleness of Jesus to be the symbol of the head of woman? Would this not be blasphemy? Jesus is a male who has not been corrupted. He is God; He is Christ; He is the Lord. How could He be a male like Adam who was corrupted? Jesus is the flesh worn by the most holy Spirit of God. How could you say He is a God who possesses the maleness of Adam? In that case, would not all of God’s work have been wrong? Would Jehovah have incorporated within Jesus the maleness of Adam who was beguiled by the serpent? Is not the incarnation of the present time another instance of the work of God incarnate, who is different in gender from Jesus but the same as Him in nature? Do you still dare say that God incarnate could not be female, because woman was the first to be beguiled by the serpent? Do you still dare say that, as woman is the most filthy and the source of the corruption of humankind, God could not possibly become flesh as a female? Do you dare to persist in saying that “woman shall always obey man and may never manifest or directly represent God”? You did not understand in the past, but can you now go on blaspheming the work of God, especially the incarnate flesh of God? If this is not clear to you, best mind your tongue, lest your foolishness and ignorance be revealed and your ugliness exposed. Do not think that you understand everything. I tell you that all you have seen and experienced is insufficient for you to understand even a thousandth of My management plan. So why then do you act so haughty? That little bit of talent and tiny bit of knowledge you have are insufficient for Jesus to use in even a single second of His work! How much experience do you actually possess? What you have seen and all that you have heard in your lifetime and what you have imagined are less than the work I do in a single moment! You had best not nitpick and find fault. No matter how arrogant you are, you are nothing more than a created being that is not even the equal of an ant! All that you hold within you is less than what is in an ant! Do not think, just because you have experienced many things and have seniority, that this entitles you to gesticulate wildly and talk big. Do you not have this experience and seniority due to the words I have uttered? Do you believe that they were earned through your own labor and toil? Today, you see that I have become flesh, and on this account alone there is in you a glut of concepts, and no end of notions therefrom. If not for My incarnation, even if you were possessed of extraordinary talents, you would not have so many concepts; and is it not from these that your notions arise? If Jesus had not become flesh that first time, would you even know of the incarnation? Is it not because you learned of God becoming flesh from the first incarnation that you have the impudence to try to judge the second incarnation? Why, instead of being a submissive follower, are you subjecting it to scrutiny? When you have entered into this stream and come before the incarnate God, would He allow you to scrutinize Him? You can scrutinize your own family history, but if you try to scrutinize the “family history” of God, would the God of today allow you to do so? Are you not blind? Do you not bring contempt upon yourself?

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Two Incarnations Complete the Significance of the Incarnation

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Jesus and I come from one Spirit. Even though We are unrelated in Our fleshes, Our Spirits are one; even though the content of what We do and the work that We take on are not the same, Our essence is the same; Our fleshes take different forms, but this is due to the change in age and the differing requirements of Our work; Our ministries are not alike, so the work We bring forth and the dispositions We reveal to man are also different. That is why what man sees and understands this day is unlike in the past, which is because of the change in age. For all that They are different in the gender and the form of Their fleshes, and that They were not born of the same family, still less in the same time period, Their Spirits are nonetheless one. For all that Their fleshes share neither blood nor physical kinship of any kind, it cannot be denied that They are the incarnate fleshes of God in two different time periods. That They are the incarnate fleshes of God is an irrefutable truth. However, They are not of the same bloodline and do not share a common human language. (One was a male who spoke the language of the Jews, and the other is a female who only speaks Chinese.) It is for these reasons that They have lived in different countries to do the work that it behooves each one to do, and in different time periods too. Despite the fact that They are of the same Spirit—that is, possessed of the same essence—there are no absolute similarities between the outer shells of Their fleshes. All They share is the same humanity, but as far as the external appearance of Their fleshes and the circumstances of Their birth are concerned, They are not alike. These things have no impact on Their respective work or on man’s knowledge of Them, for, in the final analysis, They are of the same Spirit and none can separate Them. Even though They are not related by blood, Their entire beings are in the charge of Their Spirits, which enables Them to bear different work in different time periods, and Their fleshes are of different bloodlines. For example, the Spirit of Jehovah is not the father of the Spirit of Jesus, and the Spirit of Jesus is not the son of the Spirit of Jehovah: They are of one and the same Spirit. Similarly, the incarnate God of today and Jesus are not related by blood, but They are one—this is because Their Spirits are one. God can do the work of mercy and lovingkindness, as well as that of the righteous judgment and of chastisement of man, and that of calling down curses on man; and in the end, He can do the work of destroying the world and punishing the evil. Does He not do all of this Himself? Is this not the almightiness of God?

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Two Incarnations Complete the Significance of the Incarnation

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God being the greatest throughout the universe and in the realm above, could He fully explain Himself using the image of a flesh? God clothes Himself in this flesh in order to do one stage of His work. There is no particular significance to this image of the flesh, it bears no relation to the passing of ages, nor does it have anything to do with God’s disposition. Why did Jesus not allow the image of Him to remain? Why did He not let man paint His image so that it could be passed on to later generations? Why did He not allow people to acknowledge that His image was the image of God? Although the image of man was created in the image of God, would it have been possible for the appearance of man to represent the lofty image of God? When God becomes flesh, He merely descends from heaven into a particular flesh. It is His Spirit that descends into a flesh, through which He does the work of the Spirit. It is the Spirit that is expressed in the flesh, and it is the Spirit who does His work in the flesh. The work done in the flesh fully represents the Spirit, and the flesh is for the sake of the work, but that does not mean that the image of the flesh is a substitute for the true image of God Himself; this is not the purpose or the significance of God becoming flesh. He becomes flesh only so that the Spirit may find a place to reside that suits His working, so that He may achieve His work in the flesh, and so that people can see His deeds, understand His disposition, hear His words, and know the wonder of His work. His name represents His disposition, His work represents His identity, but He has never said that His appearance in the flesh represents His image; that is merely a notion of man. And so, the crucial aspects of the incarnation of God are His name, His work, His disposition, and His gender. These are used to represent His management in this age. His appearance in the flesh bears no relation to His management, being merely for the sake of His work at the time. Yet it is impossible for God incarnate to have no particular appearance, and so He chooses the appropriate family to determine His appearance. If the appearance of God were to have representative significance, then all those who possess regular facial features similar to His would also represent God. Would that not be an egregious mistake? The portrait of Jesus was painted by man in order that man might worship Him. At the time, the Holy Spirit gave no special instructions, and so man passed that imagined portrait on until today. In truth, according to God’s original intention, man should not have done this. It is only the zeal of man that has caused the portrait of Jesus to remain until this day. God is Spirit, and man will never be capable of summarizing His exact image. His image can only be represented by His disposition. As for the appearance of His nose, of His mouth, of His eyes, and of His hair, these are things you cannot summarize. When revelation came to John, he beheld the image of the Son of man: Out of His mouth was a sharp double-edged sword, His eyes were like flames of fire, His head and hair were white like wool, His feet were like polished bronze, and there was a golden sash around His chest. Although his words were extremely vivid, the image of God he described was not the image of a created being. What he saw was only a vision, and not the image of a person from the material world. John had seen a vision, but he had not seen how God actually looked. The image of God’s incarnate flesh, being the image of a created being, is incapable of representing God’s disposition in its entirety. When Jehovah created mankind, He said He did so in His own image and created male and female. At that time, He said He made male and female in the image of God. Although the image of man resembles the image of God, this cannot be construed as meaning that the appearance of man is the image of God. Nor can you use the language of mankind to fully encapsulate the image of God, for God is so lofty, so great, so wondrous and unfathomable!

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Vision of God’s Work (3)

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This time, God comes to do work not in a spiritual body, but in a very ordinary one. Moreover, it is the body of God’s second incarnation, and it is also the body through which God returns to the flesh. It is a very ordinary flesh. Looking at Him, you cannot see anything that makes Him stand out from others, but you can gain from Him previously unheard-of truths. Just this insignificant flesh is the embodiment of all God’s words of truth, the bearer of God’s work in the last days, and the expression by which man understands God’s whole disposition. Do you not desire greatly to see the God in heaven? Do you not desire greatly to understand the God in heaven? Do you not desire greatly to see the destination of mankind? He will tell you all these secrets—secrets that no man has ever been able to tell you—and He will also tell you the truths that you do not understand. He is your gate to the kingdom, and your guide into the new age. This ordinary flesh holds many mysteries unfathomable to man. His deeds are inscrutable to you, but the entire goal of the work He does is sufficient to enable you to see that He is not, as people believe, a simple flesh, because He represents God’s intentions in the last days, and God’s care for mankind in the last days. Though you cannot hear His words seeming to shake the heavens and earth, though you cannot see His eyes as a flame of fire, and though you cannot receive the discipline of His iron rod, nevertheless you can hear from His words that God is angry and know that God is showing mercy to mankind, and see the righteous disposition of God and His wisdom, and, even more so, appreciate God’s solicitude for all mankind. The work of God in the last days is to allow man to see on earth the God in heaven living among man, and to enable man to know, submit to, fear, and love God. This is why He has returned to the flesh for a second time. Though what man sees this day is a God that is the same as man, a God with a nose and two eyes, and a very unremarkable God, in the end, God will show you that if this person did not exist, the heavens and earth would undergo a tremendous change; if this person did not exist, the heavens would grow dim, the earth would be plunged into chaos, and all mankind would live amid famine and plagues. He will show you that if God incarnate of the last days did not come to save you, then God would have long ago destroyed all mankind in hell; if this flesh did not exist, then you would forever be arch-sinners, and you would be corpses evermore. You should know that if this flesh did not exist, it would be impossible for all mankind to escape a great calamity, and impossible for it to escape the even more severe punishment that God metes out to mankind in the last days. Had this ordinary flesh not been born, you would all be in a state where you beg for life without being able to live and beg for death without being able to die; if this flesh did not exist, then you would not be able to gain the truth and come before the throne of God today, but rather, you would be punished by God because of your grievous sins. Did you know that were it not for the return of God to the flesh, none would have a chance at salvation; and were it not for the coming of this flesh, God would have long ago put an end to the age of old? This being so, will you still reject the second incarnation of God? Since you can derive such great benefits from this ordinary person, why would you not gladly accept Him?

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Did You Know? God Has Done a Great Thing Among Man

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The work of God is something that you cannot comprehend. If you can neither fully grasp whether your choice is correct, nor can you know whether the work of God can succeed, then why not try your luck and see whether this ordinary person may be of great help to you, and whether God has indeed done great work? However, I must tell you that in the time of Noah, man had been eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage to such an extent that it was unbearable for God to witness, so He sent down a great flood to destroy mankind, sparing only Noah’s family of eight and all kinds of birds and beasts. In the last days, however, those spared by God are all those who have been loyal to Him until the end. Though both ages are times of great corruption unbearable for God to witness, and mankind in both ages is so corrupt and denies that God is their Lord, God destroyed only the people in the time of Noah. Mankind in both ages causes God great distress, yet God has remained patient with the people of the last days until now. Why is this? Have you never wondered why? If you truly do not know, then let Me tell you. The reason that God is able to accord grace to people in the last days is not that they are less corrupt than people in the time of Noah, or that they have the intention to repent to God, much less is it that technology in the last days is so advanced that God cannot bring Himself to destroy them. Rather, it is that God has work to do upon a group of people in the last days, and that God intends to do this work Himself in His incarnation. Furthermore, God intends to choose a part of this group to become the objects of His salvation and the fruit of His management plan, and bring these people into the next age. Therefore, no matter what, this price paid by God is entirely in preparation for the work His incarnated flesh does in the last days. The fact that you have arrived at today is thanks to this flesh. It is because God lives in the flesh that you have the chance to survive. All these blessings have been gained on account of this ordinary person. Not only this, but in the end, the myriad nations shall worship this ordinary person, as well as give thanks to and submit to this insignificant person, because it is the truth, the life, and the way He brought that has saved all mankind, eased the conflict between man and God, shortened the distance between them, and opened up a connection between the thoughts of God and man. It is also He who has obtained even greater glory for God. Is such an ordinary person unworthy of your trust and adoration? Is such an ordinary flesh unfit to be called Christ? Can such an ordinary person not become the expression of God among man? Does such a person, who has spared mankind from disaster, not deserve your love and your desire to hold on to Him? If you reject the truths expressed from His mouth and detest His existence among you, then what will become of you in the end?

All of God’s work in the last days is done through this ordinary person. He will bestow everything upon you, and what is more, He is able to decide everything relating to you. Can such a person be as you believe Him to be: a person so simple as to be unworthy of mention? Is His truth not enough to utterly convince you? Is seeing His deeds with your own eyes unable to convince you? Or is it that the path He leads people along is unworthy of being walked upon by you? When all is said and done, what is it that causes you to feel antipathy toward Him and to reject Him and give Him a wide berth? It is this person who expresses the truth, it is this person who provides the truth, and it is this person who gives you a path to follow. Could it be that you are still unable to find the traces of God’s work within these truths? Without the work of Jesus, mankind could not have come down from the cross, but without the incarnate God of today, those who come down from the cross could never gain God’s approval or enter into the new age. Without the coming of this ordinary person, you would never have the opportunity to see the true countenance of God, nor would you be qualified to, for you are all objects that should have long ago perished. Because of the coming of the second incarnation of God, God has forgiven you and shown you mercy. Regardless, the words I must leave you with in the end are still these: This ordinary person, who is God incarnate, is of vital importance to you. This is the great thing that God has already done among man.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Did You Know? God Has Done a Great Thing Among Man

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What should you know about the practical God? The Spirit, the Person, and the Word make up the practical God Himself, and this is the true meaning of the practical God Himself. If you only know the Person—if you know His daily habits and personality—but do not know the work of the Spirit, or what the Spirit does in the flesh, and if you only pay attention to the Spirit, and the Word, and only pray before the Spirit, but do not know the work of God’s Spirit in the practical God, then this yet proves that you do not know the practical God. Knowledge of the practical God includes knowing and experiencing His words, and grasping the rules and principles of the work of the Holy Spirit and how the Spirit of God works in the flesh. It also includes knowing that every action of God in the flesh is directed by the Spirit, and that the words He speaks are the direct expression of the Spirit. Thus, to know the practical God, it is paramount to know how God works in humanity and in divinity; this, in turn, concerns the expressions of the Spirit, with which all people engage.

What are the aspects of the expressions of the Spirit? Sometimes God works in humanity, and sometimes in divinity—but in both cases the Spirit is in command. The external expression of the Person depends on the Spirit within Him. The Spirit works normally, but there are two parts to His direction by the Spirit: One part is His work in humanity, and the other is His work through divinity. You should know this clearly. The Spirit’s work varies according to circumstances: When His humanity is required to work, the Spirit directs this humanity to do this work, and when His divinity is required to work, the divinity comes forward directly to carry it out. Because God works in the flesh and appears in the flesh, He works both in humanity and in divinity. His work in humanity is directed by the Spirit and done in order to satisfy people’s fleshly needs, to facilitate their engagement with Him, to allow them to behold the practicality and normality of God, and to allow them to see that the Spirit of God has come in the flesh and is among man, lives together with man, and engages with man. His work in divinity is done in order to provide for people’s lives and to guide people in everything from the positive side, changing people’s dispositions and allowing them truly to behold the Spirit’s appearance in the flesh. In the main, the growth in man’s life is directly achieved through God’s work and words in divinity. Only if people accept God’s work in divinity can they achieve changes in their disposition, and only then can they be sated in their spirit; only if, added to this, there is the work in humanity—God’s shepherding, support, and provision in humanity—can the results of God’s work be achieved fully. The practical God Himself who is spoken of today works both in humanity and in divinity. Through the appearance of the practical God, His normal human work and life and His work of complete divinity are achieved. His humanity and divinity are combined as one, and the work of both is accomplished through words; whether in humanity or divinity, He utters words. When God works in humanity, He speaks the language of humanity, so that people may engage and understand more easily. His words are spoken plainly and are easy to understand, such that they can be provided to all people; regardless of whether people are possessed of knowledge or poorly educated, they can all receive God’s words. God’s work in divinity is also carried out through words, but it is full of provision, it is full of life, it is untainted by human ideas, it does not involve human preferences, and it is not subject to the limitations of humanity, it is free from any constraints of normal humanity; it is also carried out in the flesh, but it is the direct expression of the Spirit. If people only accept God’s work in humanity, then they will confine themselves to a certain scope, and so will require perennial pruning and discipline in order for there to be even a slight change in them. Without the work or presence of the Holy Spirit, though, they will always resort to their old ways. It is through the work of divinity that this drawback and deficiency is compensated for, and people made complete. Instead of sustained pruning, what is required is positive provision, using words to make up for all deficiencies, using words to expose people’s every state, using words to direct their lives, their every utterance, their every action, to lay bare their intentions and motivations. This is the practical work of the practical God. Thus, in your attitude to the practical God, you should submit before His humanity, recognizing and acknowledging Him, and all the more so you should accept and submit to His work and words in divinity. God’s appearance in the flesh means that all of the work and words of the Spirit of God are done through His normal humanity and through His incarnate flesh. In other words, God’s Spirit at once directs His humanity to perform work, and carries out the work of divinity in the flesh, and in God incarnate you can see both God’s work in humanity and His work in complete divinity. This is the actual significance of the practical God’s appearance in the flesh. If you can see this clearly, you will be able to connect all the different parts of God; you will cease to attach undue importance to His work in divinity, and you will cease to view His work in humanity with undue dismissiveness, and you will not go to extremes, nor take any detours. Overall, the meaning of the practical God is that the work of His humanity and of His divinity, as directed by the Spirit, is expressed through His flesh, so that people can see that He is vital and alive, real and true.

The work of God’s Spirit in humanity has a transitional phase. By perfecting humanity, He enables His humanity to receive the direction of the Spirit, after which His humanity is able to provide for and shepherd the churches. This is one expression of God’s normal work. Thus, if you can see clearly the principles of God’s work in humanity, then you will be unlikely to harbor notions about God’s work in humanity. Regardless of anything else, the Spirit of God cannot be wrong. He is right and without error; He does not do anything incorrectly. Work in divinity is the direct expression of the intentions of God, without the disturbance of humanity. It does not undergo perfection, but comes directly from the Spirit. However, even when He works in divinity, it is also due to His normal humanity; it is not in the least supernatural, and it seems to be carried out by a normal person. God came from heaven to earth primarily in order to express the words of God through the flesh—to complete the work of the Spirit of God by means of the flesh.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. You Should Know That the Practical God Is God Himself

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 135

Today, people’s knowledge of the practical God remains too one-sided, and their understanding of the significance of the incarnation is still too meager. In regard to God’s flesh, people see through His work and words that God’s Spirit includes so much and is so abundant. Yet no matter what, God’s testimony ultimately comes from the Spirit of God: what God does in the flesh, which principles He works by, what He does in humanity, and what He does in divinity. People must have knowledge of this. Today, you are able to worship this Person, while in essence you are worshiping the Spirit, and that is the very least that people should achieve in their knowledge of God incarnate. By means of the flesh, people come to know the essence of the Spirit, to know the Spirit’s divine work in the flesh and human work in the flesh, to accept all the Spirit’s words and utterances in the flesh, and to see how the Spirit of God directs the flesh and reveals His great power in the flesh. This is to say that man comes to know the Spirit in heaven through the flesh; the appearance of the practical God Himself among man has dispelled the nebulous god of people’s notions. People’s worship of the practical God Himself has increased their submission to God, and, through the Spirit of God’s divine work in the flesh and His human work in the flesh, man receives revelation and is shepherded, and changes are achieved in man’s life disposition. This is the actual meaning of the Spirit’s arrival in the flesh, the primary purpose of which is that people may engage with God, rely on God, and arrive at knowledge of God.

In the main, what attitude do people have toward the practical God? What do you know of the incarnation, of the Word’s appearance in the flesh, of God’s appearance in the flesh, of the deeds of the practical God? What are the main topics of discussion today? The incarnation, the Word’s arrival in the flesh, and God’s appearance in the flesh are all issues that must be understood. You must come gradually to understand these issues and to have a clear knowledge of them in your life experience, based on your stature and based on the era. The process of people experiencing God’s words is the process of them coming to know the appearance of God’s words in the flesh. The more people experience God’s words, the more they know the Spirit of God; through experiencing God’s words, people grasp the principles of the Spirit’s work and come to know the practical God Himself. In fact, when God makes people perfect and gains them, He is letting them know the deeds of the practical God; He is using the work of the practical God to show people the actual significance of the incarnation, to show them that the Spirit of God has actually appeared before man. When people are gained and made perfect by God, this means that the expressions of the practical God have conquered them, and that—by means of the words of the practical God—they have been transformed, and His life has been wrought into them, filling them with what He is (whether it be what He is in His humanity or what He is in His divinity), filling them with the essence of His words, and making people live out His words. When God gains people, He does so primarily by using the words and utterances of the practical God as a way to prune people’s inadequacies and to judge and expose their rebellious disposition, causing them to gain what they need and showing them that God has come among man. Most important of all, the work done by the practical God is that of saving every person from the influence of Satan, extricating them from the land of filth, and rooting out their corrupt dispositions. The most profound significance of being gained by the practical God is being able to live out normal humanity with the practical God as an exemplar and a model, and being able to practice according to the words and requirements of the practical God without the slightest deviation or departure, practicing according to whatever He says, and being able to achieve whatever He asks. In this way, you will have been gained by God. When you are gained by God, you do not only possess the work of the Holy Spirit; principally, you are able to live out the requirements of the practical God. Merely having the work of the Holy Spirit does not mean you have life. The crux is whether you are able to act according to the practical God’s requirements of you, which relates to whether you are able to be gained by God. This is the greatest meaning of the practical God’s work in the flesh. This is to say, God really and actually appears in the flesh—vital and alive—letting people see Him, and performs in a practical manner the work of the Spirit in the flesh, and acts as an exemplar for people in the flesh, by which He gains a group of people. God’s arrival in the flesh is primarily meant to enable people to see the practical deeds of God, and to materialize the formless Spirit in the flesh so that people can see and touch Him. Only in this way will those who are made complete by Him live out what He lives out, be gained by Him, and be in accordance with His intentions. If God only spoke in heaven and had not actually come onto the earth, then people would yet be incapable of knowing God; they would only be able to preach God’s deeds using empty theory and would not have God’s words as reality. God’s purpose in coming to the earth is primarily to establish Himself as an exemplar and a model for those whom He is to gain; only thus can people actually know God, touch God, and see Him, and only then can they truly be gained by God.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. You Should Know That the Practical God Is God Himself

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 136

The work of God incarnate includes two parts. When He became flesh for the first time, people did not believe in Him or know Him, and they nailed Jesus to the cross. Then, when He became flesh for the second time, people still did not believe in Him, much less know Him, and once again they nailed Christ to the cross. Is man not the enemy of God? If man does not know Him, how could man be the intimate of God? How could he be qualified to be a witness to God? Are man’s claims of loving God, serving God, and glorifying God not all deceitful lies? If you give your life to pursuing these unrealistic, impractical things, do you not labor in vain? How could you be God’s intimate when you do not even know who God is? Is such a pursuit not nebulous? Is it not deceitful? How should one go about being an intimate of God? What is the practical significance of being an intimate of God? Can you be an intimate of God’s Spirit? Can you see how big and tall the Spirit is? To be the intimate of an invisible, intangible God—is that not nebulous? What is the practical significance of such a pursuit? Is it not all a deceitful lie? What you pursue is to become God’s intimate, yet in fact you are Satan’s lapdog, for you do not know God, and you pursue the non-existent “God amid all things,” which is invisible, intangible, and contained in your own notions. To put it in nebulous terms, such a “God” is Satan, and to put it in practical terms, it is you yourself. You seek to be your own intimate, yet still say you seek to become the intimate of God—is that not blasphemy? What is the value of such a pursuit? If the Spirit of God does not become flesh, then the essence of God is merely an invisible, intangible Spirit of life, formless and imageless, of the nonmaterial kind, unapproachable and incomprehensible to man. How could man be the intimate of an incorporeal, wondrous, unfathomable Spirit such as this? Is this not a joke? It is absurd reasoning that’s invalid and even more so unrealistic. Created man is of an inherently different kind from the Spirit of God, so how could the two of them be intimates? If the Spirit of God were not realized in the flesh—that is, if God did not become flesh, did not humble Himself and become a created being, then created man would be both unqualified and unable to be His intimate, and apart from those devout believers who may have the chance to be God’s intimates after their souls have entered into heaven, most people would be unable to become the intimates of God’s Spirit. And if people wish to become the intimates of God in heaven under the guidance of God incarnate, are they not astonishingly foolish non-humans? People merely pursue “being devoted” to an invisible God, and pay not the slightest attention to the God that can be seen, for it is so easy to pursue an invisible God. People may do this however they like, but the pursuit of the visible God is not so easy. The person that pursues a nebulous god is absolutely unable to gain God, for things that are nebulous are all imagined by man, and incapable of being gained by man. If the God that came among you were a great and lofty God who was inaccessible to you, then how could you grasp His intentions? And how could you know and understand Him? If He only did His work, and had no normal contact with man, or was possessed of no normal humanity and unapproachable to mortals, then, even if He did much work on you but you had no contact with Him, and were unable to see Him, how could you know Him? If it were not for this flesh possessed of normal humanity, man would have no way of knowing God; it is only because of God’s incarnation that man is qualified to be the intimate of God in the flesh. People become God’s intimates because they come into contact with Him, and because they gradually come to know Him through living together with Him and interacting with Him. If it were not thus, would man’s pursuit not be in vain? That is to say, it is not all because of God’s work that man is able to be God’s intimate, but because of the practicality and normality of God incarnate. It is only because God becomes flesh that people have the chance to perform their duty, and the chance to worship the true God. Is this not the most realistic and practical truth? Now, do you still wish to be the intimate of God in heaven? Only when God humbles Himself to a certain point, which is to say, only when God becomes flesh, can man be His intimate and confidant. God is the Spirit, He is so great and lofty, and so unfathomable—how are people qualified to be His intimates? Only when the Spirit of God descends into the flesh, and becomes a created being with the same outer shell as man, can people understand His intentions and be gained by Him in a practical way. He speaks and works in the flesh, shares in the joys, sorrows, and tribulations of humankind, lives in the same world as humankind, protects humankind, guides them, and enables them to be cleansed and to gain His salvation and His blessing. Only when people have gained these things and truly understood God’s intentions can they be the intimates of God. Only this is practical. If God were invisible and intangible to people, how then could they be His intimates? Is this not empty doctrine?

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Only Those Who Know God and His Work Are the Ones Who Satisfy God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 137

When God comes to the earth, He does only His work within divinity, which is what the heavenly Spirit has entrusted to the incarnate God. When He comes, He but speaks across the land, to give voice to His utterances by different means and from different perspectives. He chiefly takes supplying man and teaching man as His goals and working principle, and does not concern Himself with such things as interpersonal relationships or the details of people’s lives. His main ministry is to speak on behalf of the Spirit. That is, when God’s Spirit appears tangibly in the flesh, He only provides for man’s life and releases the truth. He does not involve Himself in man’s work, which is to say, He does not partake in the work of humanity. Humans cannot do divine work, and God does not partake in human work. In all the years since God came to this earth to perform His work, He has always done it through people. These people, however, cannot be considered God incarnate—only those who are used by God. The God of today, meanwhile, can speak directly from the perspective of divinity, expressing the Spirit’s voice and working on behalf of the Spirit. All those whom God has used throughout the ages and generations are, likewise, instances of God’s Spirit working within a fleshly body—so why can’t they be called God? But today’s God is also God’s Spirit working directly in the flesh, and Jesus too was God’s Spirit working in the flesh; both of Them are called God. So what’s the difference? The people that God has used throughout the ages have all been capable of normal thought and reason. They have all understood the principles of conducting themselves and handling matters. They have had normal human notions, and have been possessed of all the things that normal people should possess. Most of them have had exceptional talent and innate intelligence. In working upon these people, God’s Spirit harnesses their talents, which are their gifts. God’s Spirit brings their talents into play, using their strengths in God’s service. Yet the essence of God is without notions or thoughts, unadulterated with human ideas, and even lacks what normal humans possess. Which is to say, He is not even conversant with the principles of conducting oneself and handling matters. This is how it is when today’s God comes to the earth. His work and His words are unadulterated with human ideas or human thoughts, but they are a direct manifestation of the ideas of the Spirit, and He works directly on God’s behalf. This means that the Spirit directly speaks, that is, the divinity directly does the work, without mixing in even one bit of man’s ideas. In other words, the incarnate God embodies divinity directly, is without human thoughts or notions, and has no understanding of people’s principles for dealing with the world. If only divinity were at work (meaning if only God Himself were at work), there would be no way for God’s work to be carried out on earth. So when God comes to earth, He must have a small number of people He uses to work within humanity in cooperation with the work that God does in divinity. In other words, He uses human work to uphold His divine work. If not, there would be no way for man to directly engage with the divine work. This is how it was with Jesus and His disciples. During His time in the world, Jesus abolished the old laws and established new commandments. He also spoke many words. All this work was done in divinity. The others, such as Peter, Paul, and John, all rested their subsequent work on the foundation of Jesus’ words. Which is to say, God did His initial work in that age, guiding the beginning of the Age of Grace; that is, He guided a new era, abolishing the old, and also fulfilling the words: “God is the Beginning and the End.” In other words, man must perform human work upon the foundation of divine work. Once Jesus had said all He needed to say and finished His work on earth, He left man. After this, all people, in working, did so according to the principles expressed in His words, and practiced according to the truths of which He spoke. All of these people worked for Jesus. If it had been Jesus alone doing the work, no matter how many words He spoke, people would have had no means of engaging with His words, because He was working in divinity and could only speak words of divinity, and He could not have explained things to people and gotten normal people to understand His words. And so He had to have the apostles and prophets who came after Him supplement His work. This is the principle of how God incarnate does His work—using the incarnate flesh to speak and to work so as to complete the work of divinity, and then using a few, or perhaps more, people who are in accordance with God’s intentions to supplement His work. That is, God uses people who are in accordance with His intentions to do the work of shepherding and watering in humanity so that God’s chosen people may enter the truth reality.

If, when He came in the flesh, God only did the work of divinity, and there were no people who accord with His intentions to cooperate with Him, then man would be incapable of understanding God’s intentions or engaging with God. God must use normal people who are in accordance with His intentions to complete this work, to watch over and shepherd the churches, so that the level that man’s cognitive processes, his brain, are capable of imagining can be achieved. In other words, God uses a small number of people who accord with His intentions to “translate” the work that He does within His divinity, so that it can be opened up—to transform divine language into human language, so that people can comprehend and understand it. If God did not do so, no one would understand God’s divine language, because the people who are in accordance with God’s intentions are, after all, a small minority, and man’s comprehension ability is weak. That is why God chooses this method when working in the incarnate flesh. If there were only divine work, there would be no way for man to know or engage with God, because man does not understand God’s language. Man is able to understand this language only through the agency of the people who accord with God’s intentions, who clarify His words. However, if there were only such people working within humanity, that could only maintain man’s normal life; it could not transform man’s disposition. God’s work could not have a new starting point; there would only be the same old songs, the same old platitudes. Only through the agency of the incarnate God, who says all that needs to be said and does all that needs to be done during the period of His incarnation, after which people work and experience according to His words, only thus will their life disposition be able to change, and only thus will they be able to flow with the age. He who works within divinity represents God, while those who work within humanity are people used by God. Which is to say, the incarnate God is essentially different from the people used by God. The incarnate God is able to do the work of divinity, whereas the people used by God are not. At the beginning of each age, God’s Spirit speaks personally and launches the new age to bring man into a new beginning. When He has finished speaking, this signifies that God’s work within His divinity is done. Thereafter, people all follow the lead of those used by God to enter into their life experience. By the same token, this is also the stage in which God brings man into the new age and gives people a new starting point—at which time God’s work in the flesh concludes.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essential Difference Between the Incarnate God and the People Used by God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 138

God does not come to the earth to perfect His normal humanity. He does not come to perform the work of normal humanity; He comes only to do the work of divinity in normal humanity. What God speaks of normal humanity is not as people imagine. Man defines “normal humanity” as having a wife, or a husband, and sons and daughters, which are proof that one is a normal person; God, however, does not see it this way. He sees normal humanity as having normal human thoughts, normal human lives, and being born of normal people. But His normality does not include having a wife, or a husband, and children in the way that man speaks about normality. That is, to man, the normal humanity that God speaks of is what man would consider the absence of humanity, almost lacking in feelings and seemingly devoid of fleshly needs, just like Jesus, who had only the outer shell of a normal person and took on the appearance of a normal person, but in essence did not entirely possess all that a normal person should possess. From this it can be seen that the incarnate God’s essence does not encompass the entirety of normal humanity, but only a portion of the things which people should possess, in order to support the routines of normal human life and sustain normal human reason. But these things have nothing to do with what man considers normal humanity. They are what God incarnate should possess. There are those who maintain, however, that God incarnate can be said to possess normal humanity only if He has a wife, sons and daughters, a family; without these things, they say, He is not a normal person. I ask you then, “Does God have a wife? Is it possible for God to have a husband? Can God have children?” Are these not fallacies? Yet the incarnate God cannot spring from a crack between rocks or fall down from the sky. He can only be born into a normal human family. That is why He has parents and sisters. These are the things that the normal humanity of the incarnate God should have. Such was the case with Jesus; Jesus had a father and mother, sisters and brothers, and all this was normal. But if He had had a wife and sons and daughters, then His would not have been the normal humanity that God intended for the God incarnate to possess. If this were the case, He would not have been able to work on behalf of divinity. It was precisely because He did not have a wife or children, and yet was born of normal people into a normal family, that He was able to do the work of divinity. To clarify this further, what God considers a normal person is a person born into a normal family. Only such a person is qualified to do divine work. If, on the other hand, the person had a wife, children, or a husband, that person would not be able to do divine work, because they would possess only the normal humanity that humans require but not the normal humanity that God requires. That which is deemed by God, and what people understand, are often hugely different, leagues apart. In this stage of God’s work there is much that runs counter to and vastly differs from people’s notions. One could say that this stage of God’s work consists entirely of divinity working hands-on, with humanity playing a supporting role. Because God comes to the earth to perform His work Himself, rather than allowing man to put his hand to it, He incarnates Himself in the flesh (in an incomplete, normal person) to do His work. He uses the opportunity presented by this incarnation to bring before mankind a new age, to tell mankind of the next step in His work, and to ask people to practice in accordance with the path described in His words. Thus is God’s work in the flesh concluded; He is about to leave man and part with man, no longer residing in the flesh of normal humanity, but rather moving away from man to proceed upon another part of His work. Then, using people who are in accordance with His intentions, He continues His work on earth among this group of people, but in their humanity.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essential Difference Between the Incarnate God and the People Used by God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 139

The incarnate God cannot stay with man forever because God has a lot more other work to do. He cannot be bound to the flesh; He has to shed the flesh to do the work He must do, even though He does that work in the image of the flesh. When God comes to the earth, He does not wait until He has reached the form that a normal person ought to attain before dying and leaving mankind. No matter how old His flesh is, when His work is finished, He goes and leaves man. There is no such thing as age for Him, He does not count His days according to the human lifespan; instead, He ends His life in the flesh in accordance with the steps of His work. There may be those who feel that God, in coming in the flesh, must age to a certain extent, must grow into an adult, reach old age, and leave only when that body fails. This is man’s imagination; God does not work thus. He comes in the flesh only to do the work He is supposed to do, and not to live a normal person’s life of being born to parents, growing up, forming a family and starting a career, having and raising children, or weathering life’s storms—all the activities of normal people. When God comes to earth, this is God’s Spirit putting on the flesh, coming in the flesh, but God does not live the life of a normal person. He only comes to accomplish one part in His management plan. After that He will leave mankind. When He comes in the flesh, God’s Spirit does not perfect the normal humanity of the flesh. Rather, at a time that God has predestined, the divinity goes to work directly. Then, after doing all that He needs to do and fully completing His ministry, the work of God’s Spirit in this stage is done, at which point the life of the incarnate God also ends, regardless of whether His fleshly body has lived out its span of longevity. That is to say, what stage of life the fleshly body reaches, and how long it lives on earth, are both decided by the work of the Spirit, and have nothing to do with what man considers to be normal humanity. Take Jesus as an example. He lived in the flesh for thirty-three and a half years. In terms of the lifespan of a human body, He should not have died at that age, and He should not have left. But this was of no concern to God’s Spirit. His work being finished, at that point the body was taken away, disappearing along with the Spirit. This is the principle by which God works in the flesh. And so, strictly speaking, the humanity of God incarnate is not of primary importance. It still comes back to that same point: He comes to the earth not to live the life of a normal human being. He does not first establish a normal human life and then begin working. Rather, as long as He is born into a normal human family, He is able to do divine work, work that is unblemished by man’s ideas, that is not fleshly, that certainly does not adopt the ways of society or involve man’s thoughts or notions, and, moreover, that does not involve man’s philosophies for worldly dealings. This is the work that God incarnate intends to do, and it is also the practical significance of His incarnation. God comes in the flesh primarily to do a stage of the work that needs to be done in the flesh, without undergoing other trivial processes, and, as for the experiences of a normal human, He does not have them. The work that God’s incarnate flesh needs to do does not include normal human experiences. So God comes in the flesh for the sake of accomplishing the work He needs to accomplish in the flesh. The rest has nothing to do with Him; He does not go through so many trivial processes. Once His work is done, the significance of His incarnation also ends. Finishing this stage means the work that He needs to do in the flesh has concluded, and the ministry of His flesh is complete. But He cannot keep working in the flesh indefinitely. He has to move on to another place to work, and leave the flesh. Only thus can His work be performed fully, and advance more effectively. God works according to His original plan. What work He needs to do and what work He has concluded, He knows as clearly as the palm of His hand. God leads every individual to walk a path that He has already predestined. No one can escape this. Only those who follow the guidance of God’s Spirit will be able to enter into rest. It may be that, in later work, it will not be God speaking in the flesh to guide man, but a Spirit with tangible form guiding man’s life. Only in this way will man be able concretely to touch God, look upon God, and better enter into the reality God requires, so as to become perfected by the practical God. This is the work that God intends to accomplish, and what He planned long ago. From this, you should all see the path you should take!

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Essential Difference Between the Incarnate God and the People Used by God

Daily Words of God  Excerpt 140

God become flesh is called Christ, and so calling the Christ who can bestow the truth upon people God is not excessive at all. This is because He possesses the essence of God, and He possesses God’s disposition, and the wisdom of God’s work, which are unattainable by man. Those who call themselves christs, yet cannot do the work of God, are frauds. Christ is not merely the manifestation of God on earth, but also the particular flesh assumed by God as He carries out His work on earth and completes His work among man. This flesh cannot be supplanted by just any man, but is a flesh that can adequately bear God’s work on earth, that can express the disposition of God, that can adequately represent God, and that can provide man with life. Sooner or later, those who impersonate Christ will all fall, for although they claim to be christ, they possess none of the essence of Christ. And so I say that the authenticity of Christ cannot be determined by man, but is answered and decided by God Himself. In this way, if you truly wish to search for the way of life, you must first acknowledge it is among man that God comes to perform the work of bestowing the way of life upon man, and you must acknowledge it is during the last days that He comes among man to bestow the way of life upon man—not in the past, but today.

Christ of the last days brings life, and brings the enduring and everlasting way of truth. This truth is the path by which man gains life, and it is the only path by which man shall know God and be approved of by God. If you do not seek the way of life provided by Christ of the last days, then you shall never gain the approval of Jesus, and shall never be qualified to enter the gate of the kingdom of heaven, for you are both a puppet and prisoner of history. Those who are controlled by regulations, by words, and by the shackles of history will never be able to gain life nor gain the perpetual way of life. This is because all they gain is turbid water which has been clung to for thousands of years instead of the water of life that flows from the throne. Those who are not supplied with the water of life will forever remain corpses, playthings of Satan, and sons of hell. How, then, can they behold God? You only seek to hold on to the past, to stand still and keep things as they are, and do not seek to change the status quo and discard history, so will you not always be antagonistic toward God? The steps of God’s work are overwhelming and mighty, like surging waves and rolling thunders—yet you sit passively awaiting destruction, clinging to that which is old and waiting for things to fall into your lap. In this way, how can you be considered someone who follows the footsteps of the Lamb? How can this demonstrate that the God you hold on to is the God who is always new and never old? And how can the words of your yellowed books carry you across into a new age? How can they lead you to search for the steps of God’s work? And how can they take you up to heaven? What you hold in your hands are mere words that can provide but temporary solace, not truths that are capable of giving you life. The words of Scriptures you read can only enrich your tongue; they are not words of wisdom that can help you know human life, much less are they the path that can lead you to perfection. Does this discrepancy not give you cause for reflection? Does it not give you insight into the mysteries contained within? Are you capable of delivering yourself to heaven to meet God on your own? Without the coming of God, can you take yourself into heaven to enjoy family happiness with God? Are you still dreaming now? I exhort you, then, to stop dreaming and to look at who is working now—look to see who is now carrying out the work of saving man during the last days. If you do not, you shall never gain the truth, and shall never gain life.

Those who wish to gain life without relying on the truth spoken by Christ are the most ridiculous people on earth, and those who do not accept the way of life brought by Christ are lost in fantasy. And so I say that those who do not accept Christ of the last days shall forever be loathed by God. Christ is man’s gateway to the kingdom in the last days, and there are none who can bypass Him. None may be perfected by God except through Christ. You believe in God, and so you must accept His words and submit to His way. Do not only think of gaining blessings while being unable to accept the truth and the provision of life. Christ comes in the last days so that He may provide all those who sincerely believe in Him with life. This work exists for the sake of concluding the old age and entering the new one, and this work is the path that must be taken by all those who would enter the new age. If you do not acknowledge Christ, and moreover condemn, blaspheme, or persecute Him, then you are bound to burn for eternity and shall never enter the kingdom of God. This is because this Christ is Himself the expression of the Holy Spirit, the expression of God, the One whom God has entrusted to do His work on earth, and so I say that if you cannot accept all that is done by Christ of the last days, then you blaspheme the Holy Spirit. The due retribution for those who blaspheme the Holy Spirit is self-evident to all. I also tell you this: If you resist Christ of the last days, if you reject Christ of the last days, then no one else can bear the consequences for this on your behalf. Furthermore, from that point onward you will never have the chance to gain the approval of God; even if you wish to redeem yourself, you won’t be able to behold the face of God again. This is because what you are resisting is not a human being, what you are rejecting is not some insignificant person, but Christ. Do you know what the consequences of this are? You are not making a small mistake, but committing a heinous sin. And so I advise every person to not bare your fangs and brandish your claws or make arbitrary comments before the truth, for only the truth can bring you life, and nothing except the truth can enable you to be reborn and behold the face of God again.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Only Christ of the Last Days Can Give Man the Way of Eternal Life