Some people have believed in God for over ten, twenty, or thirty years, yet only now realize that after all these years, they have merely changed somewhat in their outward behavior and experienced a slight awakening in their hearts, but there has not been a fundamental change in their corrupt dispositions. Some, seeing some behavioral changes in themselves, think that this is a change in life disposition and even boast to others, “Look, hasn’t my life disposition changed?” In reality, you have only changed in behavior; you don’t have the actual manifestations of dispositional change and have not lived out normal humanity. How, then, can one tell if there has been a change in your disposition? This is not face-reading; one can’t tell by looking at your outward appearance, nor by listening to what you say, much less by hearing you express your resolutions and wishes—resolutions and wishes are the hollowest things. How can one tell, then? One can tell by looking at whether, without anyone urging, supervising, or even supporting and helping you, you have the path and ability to view and handle every matter according to God’s words, and whether you have God’s words as your life within your heart to restrain you in everything you do. If you haven’t reached this level, then let’s talk about a lower one: whether you have the awareness to use God’s words as the principle for everything you do and say. If you cannot achieve this, then unfortunately, you do not have the truth as your life. Your corrupt dispositions are still your life; they can still control you anytime, anywhere, dominating your consciousness and your thoughts and views. Anytime, anywhere, you will treat and handle any person, event, or thing based on your own emotions, mood, wants, judgment, perspective, and preferences. You are still in great danger; you still cannot fulfill your duty independently, and you are not able to live independently—you always have to rely on others, and without others’ support, you will fall. This means your stature is too small; it proves you have not gained the truth as your life. What does it mean to have not gained the truth as life? It means you merely have one or two principles restraining you from doing bad things or making major mistakes. That is, when your rationality is normal, and no one is instigating you or egging you on, you absolutely will not intentionally blaspheme God, curse God, or disrupt and disturb the church’s work. However, the fact that you will not do so intentionally doesn’t mean you are incapable of doing so; you may not do it proactively, but you can still do it passively. What does passively refer to here? It means your corrupt dispositions can emerge at any time to control you and make you say and do anything, and cause you to view a person or matter with fallacious viewpoints at any time, and then to use your corrupt dispositions to handle a matter or deal with a type of person. For example, suppose you’ve done something wrong and think you cannot let the Above, the leaders, or anyone else know it. Regardless of the reason behind this, in any case, you have your own devilish ideas, so you conceal it and say nothing. Are your corrupt dispositions in charge here, or is the truth in charge? Clearly, your corrupt dispositions are in charge. Your corrupt dispositions dominate you, making you conceal it and say nothing, and you cannot break free. What does being unable to break free mean? It means that although you are willing to practice the truths you understand, you lack the strength to do so; you simply cannot overcome your corrupt dispositions. This means that you are in trouble; you cannot practice the truth. If you want to conceal things and deceive others, you absolutely are capable of committing acts of concealment and deception, especially toward the Above, reporting only good news but not bad, even deceiving those above and concealing things from those below. You say, “I really love the truth, and I am a person who practices the truth. I carefully take notes on, ponder, and summarize every truth God speaks, and then practice it in real life.” You think this way, you have this wish, but it doesn’t mean you have practiced the truth. Why? Because you have many fallacious thoughts and views within you that have already occupied your heart. Consequently, corrupt dispositions have become your life. Your corrupt dispositions are in charge, dominating your thoughts and actions. Even if you want to practice the truth, it’s useless; you can’t bring yourself to do it. Therefore, if your corrupt dispositions are not resolved, even if you are doing your duty, it’s impossible for you to come to act according to the principles—it’s already quite good if you can refrain from proactively and openly judging, resisting, or blaspheming God. However, with corrupt dispositions ruling in your heart, you can’t help but rebel against and resist God. Perhaps you think that you only try to deceive and hide things from the Above and deceive God in situations where you are passive or in moments of desperation, and that you only suppress people or reveal impetuousness in moments of desperation. Is it really because of temporary moments of desperation? No, it is the result of your deep-rooted corrupt dispositions being in charge. It is inevitable. Why is it inevitable? Because the truths you understand are merely a kind of willingness, a kind of belief to you; they have not yet become your life. Regardless of whether you have knowledge or whether your caliber is high or low, at the very least, the truth has not become your life. That is, the truth is not in charge within you; what is in charge within you are satanic dispositions and Satan’s philosophies. When you are dominated by satanic dispositions, you are living by satanic dispositions, and you are still living under Satan’s influence. When your interests and pride are not harmed, when your status, fame, and gain are not involved, you are willing to practice a bit of the truth. But as soon as your fame, gain, status, or destination are involved, your corrupt dispositions grip and control you firmly and tightly. You still have no true submission to God; you are still one hundred percent likely to betray God and the truth. Judging from these phenomena, have your corrupt dispositions been resolved? Have they been cast off? Has the truth become your life? When something happens, if the truths you understand cannot overcome your corrupt dispositions, cannot overcome your choices and wants, cannot overcome your desires, ambitions, status, and reputation, then the truths you understand are not your life. When the truth becomes your life, you can naturally overcome these corrupt dispositions. If you cannot overcome your corrupt dispositions, it shows that the truth is not yet in charge within you, and that it has not yet become your life. You say you love the truth, but this is just your yearning and your wish; it doesn’t represent your life. People with normal humanity all have positive yearnings. Does yearning to be a good person mean that you are a good person? (No.) Does loving the truth, fairness, and righteousness mean that you possess the truth, fairness, and righteousness? No—you don’t possess these things, you merely yearn for them. What does yearning refer to? (A person’s wonderful wish.) Right, it’s just a wish. It has nothing to do with how you actually conduct yourself, does it? (No.)

Do you now have the truth as your life? (No.) How can one tell if you have the truth as your life? One can tell by looking at whether the truths you understand can overcome your corrupt dispositions when your interests conflict with the truth, when your interests are about to suffer losses or be threatened. If they can, then you are a person who has the truth as your life. If they cannot, it proves your stature is very small. How small? You don’t have the truth as your life. This is the reality. Some people say, “If we don’t have the truth as our life, then why can we still forsake everything to do our duties in God’s house? Why can we still suffer and pay a price for God?” Some even say, “I already possess some devotion; I have already been made an overcomer.” Actually, such statements are adulterated with people’s notions and imaginings. It’s not wrong for people to have resolutions and aspirations. People’s yearning for the light, for justice, and also their yearning to pursue the truth, to attain salvation, and so on—these wonderful wishes can change some of their awareness, the direction of the path they walk, and of course, some of their behaviors, and outwardly, some aspects of their bearing and their way of living. What does change refer to here? For example, suppose that you currently have faith, your state is very good, you are not negative, and your duty is going particularly smoothly. Consequently, you feel that you are especially loyal, and that you have hope of realizing your wish to attain salvation, and you are fine with enduring any hardship. But good times don’t last. In the process of doing your duty, you encounter some setbacks and failures, get pruned, take many detours, and are even misled and suppressed by antichrists, suffering many grievances. You then feel discomfort in your heart. You don’t understand the truth, you don’t know why these things happened, and you don’t get any answers from praying to God, so you feel distressed. To a great extent, the occurrence of these things inflicts a certain blow and devastation upon your resolution of yearning for the truth and the light. After suffering this devastation, you no longer want to do your duty, feeling that it is pointless. What’s going on here? How did you change so rapidly? Why are you like a completely different person from before? If you had stature, and had the truth as your life, your devotion wouldn’t change. But because you don’t have the truth as your life, your inner state, mentality, and your drive to believe in God and expend yourself are always unstable and fluctuating between hot and cold. During periods when everything goes smoothly and you’re in a good mood, you have drive, you have a lot to say during prayer, are willing to read God’s words, you work very hard in your duty, and are fine with being busy or tired, and with enduring any hardship. But as soon as things become slightly unfavorable, you become negative and weak, losing the drive to do your duty. When you miss one meal or sleep a little less, you feel it’s an immense hardship, and complaints arise in your heart: “Why should I suffer? I don’t even earn money from doing my duty, it’s not worth it!” See, your mentality is completely different. Why has such a big change occurred? It’s because you don’t have the truth as your life, and your corrupt dispositions still exist within you. When people are enthusiastic, they feel they have no ambitions or desires, or demands of God. In reality, their corrupt dispositions are still in charge inside of them; these things remain unchanged. When people are positive, they are very enthusiastic and particularly driven, and no one can hold them back. When they are negative, they are like puddles of mush, unable to be pulled up by anyone. They always go to extremes, and they are completely unstable. This shows they lack something in their normal humanity. What do they lack? They lack the truth as their life—that’s what it is. Your state fluctuates between hot and cold, negative one moment and positive the next. What causes this? It’s your corrupt dispositions causing trouble. Today they make you think one thing, tomorrow another thing; in any case, these thoughts always align with your wants, your impetuousness, and your current state, mood, and emotions. But it’s different when people have the truth within them. If the truth becomes your life, it will always enable you to have an accurate and true definition of what you do, and this will never change. You won’t run hot and cold, and you won’t become negative and stuck in a slump due to one failure and fall, or due to a little pruning or a bit of a setback. Nor will you be so positive that you act like a zealous youth, staying awake for three days and nights. Instead, you will have normal rationality. Right? (Yes.) Once people understand the truth and the truth becomes their life, they become clear on visions. They know why they need to follow God, why they need to do their duty, what results they should achieve in the performance of their duty, and the purpose, significance, and value of enduring these hardships. They understand all these truth principles thoroughly in their hearts, without confusion or turbidity. And so, they suffer willingly and without complaint, they have rules and principles in everything they do, and they never lose faith in God; when they feel negative, they don’t complain about God or abandon Him, and when they feel positive, they have no extra demands of God, and their state is very normal. Are you like this now? (No.) What should be done then? (From now on, we should focus on pursuing the truth to resolve our corrupt dispositions; there is no other path.) There is no path other than pursuing the truth. Let Me tell you: If you do not pursue the truth, and corrupt dispositions always remain in charge as your life, then you will not have a good destination; at best, you will end up as a laborer. But if you pursue the truth, your hope of attaining salvation will be great, and the blessings you ultimately receive will also be great. If you pursue the truth, you will be free from the bondage of corrupt dispositions, corrupt dispositions will no longer be your life, and consequently you will truly see hope of attaining salvation. If you don’t pursue the truth, and your corrupt dispositions remain unresolved, and you want to rely solely on self-restraint and willpower to do good things and not commit evil, then it’s hard to say whether you can even make it to the end of the path. Understood? (Understood.) What is the greatest problem people need to resolve in believing in God? (Corrupt dispositions.) Resolving corrupt dispositions is the most crucial thing. Don’t think, “I’m now doing a duty full-time in God’s house, expending myself full-time, so I’m an overcomer!” God speaks of making a group of overcomers—what is meant by overcomers? “These are they which follow the Lamb wherever He goes” (Revelation 14:4). These are overcomers in the simple sense of the word. One cannot be satisfied with just being an overcomer. Being an overcomer in this simple sense doesn’t mean one’s corrupt dispositions have been cast off, and it doesn’t mean one has the truth as their life. Those who are ultimately saved are not just overcomers—it’s not as simple as that. Overcomers are merely those who overcome the secular world, Satan, evil trends, and evil regimes—this is what overcomers are. If you merely understand some truth principles, and you can temporarily overcome the flesh and feelings, or are not constrained by various baseless rumors, or are not disturbed by evil people or disbelievers, this still doesn’t fully meet the standard of an overcomer. Having only these few minor experiences is not of great value. What is valuable? Having the truth as one’s life is the most valuable thing. How can one make the truth their life? There is only one path: You must read God’s words more, and practice and experience God’s words more. Only in this way can you gain the truth from God’s words and come to have the truth as your life. If you use the truth to guide your whole life, your day-to-day, and the principles by which you act and conduct yourself—if you practice in this way—you will have the truth reality. When you possess the truth reality, your old satanic dispositions will be shunted aside. Before you decide how to act, first ponder, “What I think doesn’t represent the truth principles. I must see what God’s words say.” If you ponder this way every time, and if you speak and practice according to God’s words every time, won’t the truth come to enter your life little by little? Many little drops make an ocean. Let the truth enter your heart bit by bit to change your day-to-day, your views, your current status of existence, and your state. As your state gradually changes and develops in a good direction, the likelihood of you doing evil and causing disruptions and disturbances will keep decreasing, the likelihood of you showing off will keep decreasing, while your testimonies of practicing according to the truth principles will keep increasing. When critical matters of right and wrong arise, the truth principles overcome your satanic corrupt dispositions, and your personal wants, preferences, and plans. Only then will you be a true overcomer, someone who has the truth as their life, and someone who can attain salvation. Otherwise, if you merely act based on your preferences, thinking, “Acting this way is good, I do these things gladly and willingly and I have no complaints,” what use is that? You have no complaints, but what are the principles of your practice? Your practice comes entirely from the preferences of your corrupt dispositions, from erroneous thoughts and views, from selfish intentions, from ambitions and desires, from feelings, and from impetuousness—it is completely guided by your corrupt dispositions. This is a life that reveals corrupt dispositions, not a life that reveals the truth. God not only does not remember it, but He will also condemn it. You must try everything you can to make it so that what you live out, the words you speak and things you do, and the thoughts and views you reveal all conform to the truth; to make it so that those fallacious thoughts and views produced by corrupt dispositions become fewer and fewer in your heart; and to make it so that what you think in your heart and your views on matters are all related to the truth, and all conform to the truth. You must pursue and focus on this aspect, and then there will be more and more changes inside of you, and your state will get better and better. Nowadays, many people can speak words and doctrines, articulating them clearly and logically, but when it comes to speaking about the truth reality, they have nothing to say, and they are unable to express even a bit of practical understanding. What’s going on here? (We don’t have the truth.) Your life is still the life of corrupt dispositions, the life of Satan, and it is not the life of the truth.

Have you understood what we have just fellowshipped? If you truly recognize that your corrupt dispositions haven’t been cast off yet and that you still live by corrupt dispositions, will you become negative? (Just now, when I heard God say our corrupt dispositions haven’t changed, I felt a great disparity in my heart, thinking that I’ve been constantly eating and drinking God’s words all these years, and have focused on practicing the truth in particular situations—so how come my corrupt dispositions still haven’t changed? I felt a bit disappointed and negative. But through God providing guidance and fellowshipping bit by bit, I understood that I only exhibit some external good behaviors, but my corrupt dispositions are still in charge within me; there indeed hasn’t been any change. God said that when doing things, people must first ponder, and that no matter how good their ideas are, they don’t represent the truth principles, and that they must see what the truth in God’s words says, and train in seeking the truth and practicing according to God’s words every time they do something, and then slowly their state will change. After I heard God’s fellowship, I seemed to see hope again, and I felt there was a path, and was no longer negative.) Being negative is wrong; you should not be negative under any circumstances. Casting off corrupt dispositions is the great matter of attaining salvation. The more something is a corrupt disposition, the more you must focus on resolving it. You must go all out and devote your full attention to it. You cannot be negative, and you cannot give up. Although you are now beginning to focus on pursuing the truth, sometimes you still don’t know how to practice. Talking to you now about the path of practice is more beneficial for your life entry, and at the same time, it can cause a sense of crisis to arise in you, and enable you to focus on the truth, and to understand the truth and enter the truth reality as soon as possible. Don’t be complacent, and don’t be satisfied with your current situation. You have merely become obedient and well-behaved, and are a bit more sensible than before, but you are still far from casting off your corrupt dispositions! The facts are plain to see, so what use is there in being negative? Being negative cannot solve actual problems. You should find where the problem stems from and start trying to resolve it from there. It’s not too late to start now. When will it be too late? It will be too late when God’s work ends. Do you have the resolve to enter the truth reality and to come to gain the truth as your life? (We now have this resolve.) Actually, entering the truth reality is not difficult. Think about it, many words of fellowship on the truth have been spoken, and they are very detailed and specific. There seems to be a lot of content, but the principles do not change, and the path of practice does not change. When you reveal a corrupt disposition, consciously seize that idea or thought, and ponder in your heart, “This is a corrupt disposition, so how should I resolve it? I haven’t resolved it before. I’ve believed in God for so many years, but I’ve only focused on outward actions and on showing off, and I’ve never pondered on the fact that I still have corrupt dispositions. Today I suddenly discovered I have such a thought inside me. Where did this thought come from? From a corrupt disposition. Then how should this corrupt disposition be resolved?” Pray to God and seek the truth, and also ask people around you who’ve had experiences; they will lead you to seek the truth and resolve the problem. When everyone is together, you must support and help each other, and be understanding toward each other. Everyone’s stature is the same, and no one should look up to or down on anyone else. If everyone helps and supports each other like this, and everyone’s stature gradually grows, and in the end, you all attain salvation and enter the kingdom together, wouldn’t that be good? (Yeah.) Alright, let’s end our fellowship here for today. Goodbye!

September 9, 2023