384. You ought to know that God likes those who are honest. God has an essence of faithfulness, and so His words can always be trusted; His actions, furthermore, are faultless and unquestionable, which is why God likes those who are absolutely honest with Him. Honesty means giving your heart to God, not being false toward God in anything, being open with Him in all things, never hiding the facts, not trying to deceive those above and below you, and not doing things that are merely attempts to curry favor with God. In short, to be honest is to be pure in your actions and words, and to deceive neither God nor man. What I say is very simple, but to you it is doubly arduous. Many people would rather be condemned to hell than speak and act honestly. Little wonder that I have other treatment in store for those who are dishonest. Of course, I know full well how difficult it is for you to be honest people. Because you are all so “clever,” so good at measuring the hearts of noble people based on your own mean mindset, this makes My work much simpler. And since you each hug your secrets to your bosom, well then, I shall send you, one by one, into disaster to be “schooled” by fire, so that thereafter you may become dead set on your belief in My words. Ultimately, I shall wrest from your mouth the words “God is a faithful God,” whereupon you shall beat upon your breast and lament, “The heart of man is so deceitful!” What will be your state of mind at this time? Surely you won’t be as carried away with pride as you are now! And much less will you be as “profound and abstruse” as you are now. In the presence of God, some people are all prim and proper, and especially “well-behaved,” yet they bare their fangs and brandish their claws in the presence of the Spirit. Would you number such people among the ranks of the honest? If you are a hypocrite, someone who is skilled in “interpersonal relations,” then I say that you are definitely someone who tries to trifle with God. If your words are riddled with excuses and valueless justifications, then I say that you are someone who is loath to put the truth into practice. If you have many private matters that are difficult to speak of, if you are highly averse to laying bare your secrets—your difficulties—before others to seek the way of the light, then I say that you are someone who will have great difficulty attaining salvation, and who will have difficulty emerging from the darkness. If you really enjoy seeking the way of the truth, then you are someone who dwells always in the light. If you are very glad to be a service-doer in the house of God, working diligently and conscientiously in obscurity, always giving and never taking, then I say that you are a loyal saint, because you seek no reward and are simply being an honest person. If you are willing to be candid, if you are willing to expend your all, if you are able to sacrifice your life for God and stand firm in your testimony, if you are honest to the point where you know only to satisfy God and not to consider yourself or take for yourself, then I say that such people are those who are nourished in the light and who shall live forever in the kingdom.

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

385. I take pleasure in those who are not suspicious of others, and I like those who readily accept the truth; toward these two kinds of people I show great care, for in My eyes they are honest people. If you are deceitful, then you will be guarded and suspicious toward all people and matters, and thus your faith in Me will be built upon a foundation of suspicion. I could never acknowledge such faith. Lacking true faith, you are even more devoid of true love. And if you are liable to doubt God and speculate about Him at will, then you are, without question, the most deceitful of all people. You speculate whether God can be like man: unpardonably sinful, of petty character, devoid of fairness and reason, lacking a sense of justice, given to vicious tactics, treacherous and cunning, pleased by evil and darkness, and so on. Is not the reason that people have such thoughts because they lack the slightest knowledge of God? Such faith is nothing short of sin! There are even some who believe that the ones who please Me are precisely those who flatter and bootlick, and that those lacking in such skills will be unwelcome in the house of God and will lose their place there. Is this the only knowledge you have acquired after all these years? Is this what you have gained? And your knowledge of Me does not stop at these misunderstandings; even worse is your blasphemy against God’s Spirit and vilification of Heaven. This is why I say that such faith as yours will only cause you to stray further from Me and be in greater opposition against Me.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. How to Know the God on Earth

386. Today, most people are too afraid to bring their actions before God; while you may deceive His flesh, you cannot deceive His Spirit. Any matter that cannot withstand God’s scrutiny is at odds with the truth, and should be cast aside; to do otherwise is to commit a sin against God. So, you must lay your heart before God at all times, when you pray, when you speak and fellowship with your brothers and sisters, and when you perform your duty and go about your business. When you fulfill your function, God is with you, and so long as your intent is correct and is for the work of God’s house, He will accept all that you do; you should sincerely devote yourself to fulfilling your function. When you pray, if you have a God-loving heart and seek God’s care, protection and scrutiny, if these things are your intent, your prayers will be effective. For example, when you pray at meetings, if you open your heart and pray to God and tell Him what is in your heart without speaking falsehoods, then your prayers will surely be effective. …

As a believer in God, you must be able to bring all your deeds and actions before Him and accept His scrutiny. If what you do can be brought before God’s Spirit but not before God’s flesh, this shows that you have not come under scrutiny by His Spirit. Who is the Spirit of God? Who is the person to whom God testifies? Are They not one and the same? Most see Them as two separate beings, believing God’s Spirit is God’s Spirit, and the person to whom God testifies is merely a human. But are you not mistaken? On whose behalf does this person work? Those who do not know God incarnate do not have spiritual understanding. God’s Spirit and His incarnate flesh are one, because God’s Spirit is materialized in the flesh. If this person is unkind to you, will God’s Spirit be kind? Are you not confused? Today, all who cannot accept God’s scrutiny cannot receive His approval, and those who do not know God incarnate cannot be perfected. Look at all that you do, and see if it can be brought before God. If you cannot bring all that you do before God, this shows that you are an evildoer. Can evildoers be perfected? All that you do, every action, every intention, and every reaction should be brought before God. Even your daily spiritual life—your prayers, your closeness to God, your eating and drinking of God’s words, your fellowship with your brothers and sisters, and your life within the church—and even your service in cooperation should be brought before God for His scrutiny. It is such practice that will help you achieve growth in life. The process of accepting God’s scrutiny is the process of purification. The more you can accept God’s scrutiny, the more you are purified and the more you are in accord with God’s intentions, so that you won’t fall into dissoluteness, and your heart will be able to live in His presence. The more you accept His scrutiny, the greater are Satan’s humiliation and your ability to rebel against the flesh. So, the acceptance of God’s scrutiny is a path of practice people should follow. No matter what you do, even when fellowshipping with your brothers and sisters, you can bring your acts before God and seek His scrutiny, and you can purposefully submit to God Himself; this will make your practice much more accurate. Only if you bring all you do before God and accept God’s scrutiny can you be someone who lives in the presence of God.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. God Perfects Those Who Accord With His Intentions

387. When some people hear that, to be an honest person, one must tell the truth and speak from the heart, and if they lie or deceive they must open up, lay themselves bare, and admit their mistakes, they say: “It’s hard being an honest person. Do I have to say everything I think to others? Isn’t it enough to fellowship the positive things? I don’t need to tell others of my dark or corrupt side, do I?” If you do not lay yourself bare to others, and do not dissect yourself, then you will never know yourself. You will never recognize what kind of thing you are, and other people will never be able to trust you. This is a fact. If you wish for others to trust you, first you must be an honest person. To be an honest person, you must first lay your heart bare so that everyone can look into it, see all that you are thinking, and look upon your true face. You must not try to disguise yourself, or cover yourself up. Only then will others trust you and consider you to be an honest person. This is the most fundamental practice, and a prerequisite to being an honest person. If you are always pretending, always feigning holiness, nobility, greatness, and high character; if you do not let people see your corruption and your flaws; if you present a false image to people so that they believe you have integrity, that you’re great, self-denying, just, and selfless—is this not deceitfulness and falsity? Will people not be able to see through you, given time? So, do not put on a disguise or cover yourself up. Instead, lay yourself and your heart bare for others to see. If you can lay your heart bare for others to see, if you can lay bare all your thoughts and plans—both positive and negative—isn’t that honesty? If you can lay yourself bare for others to see, then God, too, will see you. He will say: “If you have laid yourself bare for others to see, then you are surely honest before Me.” But if you only lay yourself bare to God when out of view of other people, and always pretend to be great and noble or selfless when in their company, then what will God think of you? What will He say? He will say: “You are a thoroughly deceitful person. You are thoroughly hypocritical and vile, and you are not an honest person.” God will thus condemn you. If you wish to be an honest person, then regardless of whether you are before God or other people, you should be able to provide a pure and open account of your inner state and the words in your heart. Is this easy to achieve? It requires a period of training, as well as frequent prayer and reliance on God. You must train yourself to speak the words in your heart simply and openly on all matters. With this kind of training, you can make progress. If you encounter a major difficulty, you must pray to God and seek the truth; you need to fight in your heart and overcome the flesh, until you can practice the truth. In training yourself this way, little by little, your heart will gradually open up. You will become more and more pure, and the effects of your words and actions will be different than before. Your lies and tricks will become fewer and fewer, and you will be able to live before God. You will then, essentially, have become an honest person.

—The Word, Vol. 3. The Discourses of Christ of the Last Days. The Most Fundamental Practice of Being an Honest Person

388. Your destination and your fate are very important to you—they have a major bearing on you. You believe, if you do not do things with great care, it will mean that you cease to have a destination, that you have destroyed your own fate. But has it ever occurred to you that people who expend effort solely for the sake of their destination are toiling in vain? Such efforts are not genuine—they are fakery and deceit. If that is the case, then those who expend effort only for the sake of their destination are on the threshold of their final defeat, for failure in one’s belief in God is caused by deceit. I have previously said that I do not like to be flattered or fawned on, or treated with enthusiasm. I like honest people to face up to My truth and My expectations. Even more, I like it when people are able to show the utmost consideration for My heart, and when they are even capable of expending everything for My sake. Only in this way can My heart be comforted.

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

389. To pursue the truth, one must focus on practicing the truth, but where should one begin to practice the truth? There are no regulations for this. You should practice whichever aspects of the truth you understand. If you have started a duty, then you should start practicing the truth in the performance of your duty. In the performance of your duty, there are many aspects of the truth to practice, and you should practice whichever aspects of the truth you understand. For example, you can start by being an honest person, by speaking honestly, and by opening your heart. If there is something about which you are too embarrassed to speak with your brothers and sisters, then you should kneel down and tell it to God through prayer. What should you say to God? Tell God what is in your heart; do not give empty pleasantries or attempt to deceive Him. Start with being honest. If you have been weak, then say you have been weak; if you have been wicked, then say you have been wicked; if you have been deceitful, then say you have been deceitful; if you have had malicious and insidious thoughts, tell God about them. If you are always competing for status, tell Him this, too. Let God discipline you; let Him set up environments for you. Allow God to help you get through all your difficulties and resolve all your problems. You should open up your heart to God; do not keep it shut. Even if you shut Him out, He can still scrutinize you. However, if you open up your heart to Him, you can gain the truth. So which path should you choose? You should open up your heart and tell God what is in your heart. By no means should you say anything false or disguise yourself. You should start by being an honest person. For years, we have been fellowshipping on the truth concerning being an honest person, and yet today there are still many people who remain indifferent, who speak and act only according to their own intents, desires, and aims, and to whom it has never occurred to repent. This is not the attitude of people who are honest. Why does God ask people to be honest? Is it to make it easier to get a handle on people? Certainly not. God requires people to be honest because God loves and blesses honest people. Being an honest person means being a person with conscience and reason. It means being someone who is trustworthy, someone whom God loves, and someone who can practice the truth and love God. Being an honest person is the most fundamental manifestation of possessing normal humanity and living out a true human likeness. If someone has never been honest, or considered being honest, then they cannot understand the truth, much less can they gain the truth. If you don’t believe Me, go and see for yourself, or go and experience this for yourself. Only by being an honest person can your heart be open to God, can you accept the truth, can the truth become your life within your heart, and can you understand and gain the truth. If your heart is always closed, if you don’t open up or say what is in your heart to anyone, such that no one can understand you, then you are too cunning and inscrutable, and you are the most deceitful of people. If you believe in God yet cannot purely open yourself up to God, if you can lie to God or exaggerate to deceive God, if you are incapable of opening your heart to God, and can still speak in circles and hide your intentions, then you will only harm yourself, and God will ignore you and not work in you. You won’t understand any of the truth, and you won’t gain any of the truth. Now can you see the importance of pursuing and gaining the truth? What is the first thing you should do to pursue the truth? You should be an honest person. Only if people seek to be honest can they know how deeply corrupted they are, whether or not they really have any human likeness, and clearly take their own measure or see their deficiencies. Only when they are practicing honesty can they become aware of how many lies they tell and how deeply hidden their deceit and dishonesty are. Only while having the experience of practicing being honest can people gradually come to know the truth of their own corruption and know their own nature essence, and only then will their corrupt dispositions be constantly purified. Only in the course of their corrupt dispositions being constantly purified will people be able to gain the truth. Take your time experiencing these words. God does not perfect those who are deceitful. If your heart is not honest—if you do not try to be an honest person—then you will not be gained by God. Likewise, you will not gain the truth, and will also be incapable of gaining God. What does it mean if you do not gain God? If you do not gain God and you have not understood the truth, then you will not know God, and so there will be no way you can be compatible with God, in which case you are the enemy of God. If you are incompatible with God, God is not your God; and if God is not your God, you cannot be saved. If you do not seek to attain salvation, why do you believe in God? If you cannot attain salvation, you will forever be a bitter enemy of God, and your outcome will be set. Thus, if people wish to be saved, then they must start by being honest. In the end, those who are gained by God are marked with a sign. Do you know what it is? It is written in Revelation, in the Bible: “And in their mouth was found no lie; they are without blemish” (Revelation 14:5). Who are “they”? They are those who are saved, perfected and gained by God. How does God describe these people? What are the characteristics and expressions of their self-conduct? They are without blemish. They speak no lies. You can probably all understand and grasp what speaking no lies means: It means being honest. What does “without blemish” refer to? It means doing no evil. And what foundation is doing no evil built on? Without any doubt, it is built upon the foundation of fearing God. To be unblemished, therefore, means to fear God and shun evil. How does God define someone without blemish? In God’s eyes, only those who fear God and shun evil are perfect; thus, people who are unblemished are those who fear God and shun evil, and only those who are perfect are unblemished. This is totally correct.

—The Word, Vol. 3. The Discourses of Christ of the Last Days. Six Indicators of Life Growth

390. You should know whether there is true faith and true loyalty within you, whether you have a record of suffering for God, and whether you have absolute submission to God. If you do not possess these, then there remains within you rebelliousness, deceit, greed, and complaint. As your heart is not honest, you have never been appreciated by God and never lived in the light. How one’s fate will work out in the end hinges upon whether they have an honest and blood-red heart, and whether they have a pure soul. If you are someone who is very dishonest, someone with a heart of great malice, someone with an unclean soul, then you are sure to end up in the place where man is punished, as is written in the record of your fate. If you claim to be very honest, and yet never manage to act in accordance with the truth or to speak a word of truth, then are you still waiting for God to reward you? Do you still hope for God to regard you as the apple of His eye? Is such thinking not preposterous? You deceive God in all things; how could the house of God accommodate one such as you, whose hands are unclean?

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