Number 11: Innovative Ability

The eleventh standard for evaluating a person’s caliber is innovative ability. Innovative ability is the creative ability you possess based on the understanding you have after you know the fundamentals, principles, and laws of something. This creative ability refers to improving this thing on its original foundation, developing it, enlarging its scope of influence, or turning it into a new generation of a certain thing—this is called innovative ability. Specifically, it means that on the premise of accurately grasping the objective laws of a certain thing, you can apply them to real life, enlarge and broaden their scope of application, and allow these fundamentals and principles which conform to the developmental laws of things to serve more people, so that more people receive benefit and help from it. For one thing, you are sustaining these fundamentals and principles, constantly enlarging their scope of influence and their audience. Additionally, you are transforming them from a literal presentation into a tangible thing that people can gain real benefit from in a more practical manner and by going a step further. This is what it means to have innovative ability. If a person, on the foundation of the family environment and growth background they have, and the knowledge they acquire, can accurately grasp the fundamentals, principles, and developmental laws of something, know how to apply these fundamentals and principles, and how to turn these fundamentals and principles from theory into tangible things—not stopping at the level of words and doctrines, but applying them to real life, making them part of people’s lives and turning them into results that serve people, allowing people to gain benefit and help from them, and making people’s lives more facilitated and convenient—if one can achieve this level, they are a person with innovative ability and a person of good caliber. That is to say, if you can, on the basis of understanding the fundamentals of the developmental laws of things and the truth principles, realize the promotion, sustaining, expansion, or renewal of a thing—if you have this ability or can accomplish any one of these, and can allow the fundamentals and laws of a positive thing or the principles of the truth to be implemented, materialized, and expanded among people—then this proves that your caliber is good. Even if you cannot bring it to a deeper level, at the very least, if you can sustain, expand, and materialize it, and can enlarge its positive influence, then this proves that you are a person with innovative ability. If you do not possess this ability, and you only have the ability to comprehend the laws of positive things, but this comprehension ability only remains at the level of literal and theoretical comprehension, and you cannot implement or materialize them with people, nor can you make them serve people and benefit them, then you do not have innovative ability. You must be able to practically operate and apply the fundamentals, principles, laws, and rules—only then can you be said to have innovative ability. Only those who possess this ability are people of good caliber. For example, some leaders and workers or supervisors can implement the principles and provisions of God’s house right after they understand them. They implement the truth principles of each item of work with God’s chosen people, helping more people understand the truth and making it so the church’s work proceeds in an orderly manner—that is, so that it circulates positively within the scope of the principles, continually developing and advancing, without deviation. What result do people see from this? Everyone does what they should within the scope of this work, everyone understands the principles and acts according to the principles, the work has no deviations, and this work continually produces new results or new pieces of work. Even if special circumstances arise in the process, the supervisors will know how to handle them flexibly according to the fundamentals, provisions, and principles of the work. Under their leadership, this work continually proceeds in an orderly manner and basically does not stop. That is, no matter what situation may arise, no matter who may come to disturb or spread any fallacies, it will not affect the orderly progress of the work; the work continually moves forward. Can it be said that the fundamentals of this work and the truth principles in this regard are being continuously sustained? (Yes.) Through the implementation, sustaining, and advancement of the fundamentals and principles of this work, this work has not been interrupted; it is continually implemented and sustained in an orderly manner, and at the same time, good work results emerge in different periods. The influence of these work results is continuously enlarging, and more and more people are benefiting from them. Those who benefit are, in fact, benefiting from the various principles, fundamentals, and even rigid provisions of the work arrangements that these supervisors can comprehend and accept. This is what it means to have innovative ability. That is, a person of good caliber can continuously implement the work principles and the truth principles that they comprehend and accept into the work they are responsible for and implement them with everyone, enabling the work to proceed in an orderly manner or move forward. At the same time, work results will be produced periodically or irregularly; nonbelievers call this “producing works”—that is, work results will continuously appear, and the appearance of these work results will subsequently bring greater influence and reach more people. People who possess this ability can ultimately enlarge the results of the work continuously, so that more and more people benefit. Such people are those with good caliber. To evaluate your caliber by your innovative ability, it is necessary to look at how, after comprehending the work principles, work provisions, and truth principles, your ability to implement, advance, and expand them is; that is, how your ability to sustain this work is. Secondly, it is necessary to look at how many people are reached by the work you do, how large the scope of those reached is, how great the degree of influence is, and how the efficiency and results of your work are. If your work efficiency is high, your work results are good, and the scope of those reached continuously enlarges, then your caliber is good. If the number of people reached is small, work efficiency is low, results are poor, and there is constant rework, stoppage, and patching of loopholes, then your caliber is average. If a person comprehends the work principles, work arrangements, and other aspects quite well and quickly, but their progress in implementation is very slow and their efficiency is very low—under normal circumstances, results could be produced in one month, but they take three months or even six months, and the results produced are still very average, the number of people reached is small, and the benefit to people is not significant—such a person is of average caliber.

Some people, after understanding certain principles or fundamentals, only apprehend the literal meaning at the time and cannot relate it to the people, events, or things in their work that involve these principles or fundamentals whatsoever. They merely listen to the principles and fundamentals as regulations or doctrines, and after hearing them, they make no plans in their hearts and do not know how to implement them or how to apply the work arrangements and the fundamentals or principles they understand to real life. They fundamentally cannot draw any connections between real life and these fundamentals or principles. When it comes to real life or work, they set aside the principles, fundamentals, and the developmental laws of things, are unable to apply them, and simply do whatever they want to do. Let’s not talk for now about whether their humanity is good or bad, or how their character is, or whether they intentionally don’t do something, or whether they don’t want to do something—just in terms of caliber, such people have poor caliber. No matter where they go, they can speak a lot of doctrines, talk about some fundamentals, and discuss some so-called developmental laws of things with others. They seem to have quite a high level of thought and to have comprehension ability, and they appear to have some caliber. However, when they are assigned an item of work, one or two months pass with no results, and no updates are heard from them. At the time of expressing their resolve, they spoke very well, but when it comes to actually doing it, they don’t know what to do. “The Above explained the principles very clearly, so what should I do now? Who should I appoint as the supervisor, who as the preacher, and who should handle external affairs? I don’t know what to do! But I made bold claims and expressed my resolve, so I have to do it!” They are so anxious that they develop internal heat and get mouth sores, cannot eat or sleep, ending up disheveled and overwhelmed, yet they still don’t know what to do. These are the manifestations of people with poor caliber. Never mind how, when work is arranged for them, they make solemn vows and express their resolve, speaking bold and grand words with such spirit—you have to see whether they can do the work, whether they have steps and plans, and whether they understand how to implement the work arrangements and act according to the principles. If they do not understand or cannot do this, then they have poor caliber. If they only understand doctrines but cannot apply the principles, and just act blindly and recklessly, this also shows poor caliber. As long as you cannot implement the principles, fundamentals, or developmental laws of things effectively and in real life, then regardless of whether you are anxious and flustered or you commit reckless misdeeds, these are manifestations of poor caliber. Are these words accurate? (Yes.) Some people act blindly, while others do not know how to do it and do not dare to do it—they don’t even know where to start. The specific manifestations of people with poor caliber, in terms of their innovative ability, are that they do not know how to apply fundamentals and principles to specific, real work; they are only able to parrot words, learn doctrines, and memorize regulations. Merely memorizing doctrines and regulations is useless, and does not indicate you have innovative ability. Whether or not you have innovative ability is evident by whether you can implement these fundamentals, principles, and rules into real life, doing the work related to these fundamentals and principles well, so that these fundamentals and principles do not remain words and doctrines, regulations, and formulae, but are implemented in people’s lives and applied to people, allowing people to use them and derive benefit and assistance from them, making them become a path for practice in life, or a guide, direction, and goal for living. If a person lacks this innovative ability and knows only how to spout words and doctrines and shout slogans, and is unable to put these principles and fundamentals to use when it comes time to do their duty, those who follow such a leader or supervisor will not gain principles of practice in this aspect of the truth. Such leaders or supervisors are people of poor caliber, incapable of the work, and should be reported and removed once identified. To evaluate whether someone can shoulder an item of work, you must first see if, after they read the work arrangements and understand the truth principles, they can arrange and implement them and get the work going. Regardless of how many people are in a church, if they get all items of the church’s work going, and no matter how many people’s work they are responsible for—whether fifty or one hundred—they can make the work thrive, ensuring everyone has their own place and can work and do their duty according to the truth principles, then such a person can be considered for election as a leader or supervisor. Of course, you must also see what their character is like, whether they are a right person, and whether they are a person who pursues the truth—knowing these things is essential! A leader or worker must at the very least possess caliber and stature in these aspects in order to lead God’s chosen people into the truth reality, and so that everyone can work and do their duty according to the work arrangements or the truth principles—this way, God’s chosen people can benefit from them. If they do not possess this ability, then they cannot be chosen. If you choose such a person, although idling around not doing any work every day while you follow them may bring comfort to your flesh, would you feel fulfilled in your spirit? If you spend a few hours every day in gatherings listening to them preach doctrines but do no actual work, is this doing your duty? (No.) They preach doctrines to you every day, and while your ears may be enriched, you are not doing your duty and are merely following them in aimless muddling. In that case, you have been misled and hindered by them. If you keep listening to them speak those dry words and doctrines, and ultimately do not do your duty or show loyalty, and have no real experience in the truth, not offering loyalty in what God has entrusted to you, not getting the work going or achieving any results—so that when God asks people for results, you have nothing to present—won’t you have suffered a loss? Therefore, if you previously thought such people were candidates for leaders, now quickly change your viewpoint and strike such people from your list of candidates. They must not be chosen as leaders. Where do people with poor caliber and no innovative ability fall short? They fall short in that they only know how to act as armchair generals while never knowing how to apply their ideas to real-life work, and in that they cannot do actual work. What would be the consequences if such people became leaders? They would only make a complete mess of the work. If they served as a church leader in mainland China, they would lead the entire church to ruin. Not only would they fail to gain the truth themselves, but the life of those they led would suffer a loss. If you can promptly identify such people and remove them, some disasters will be prevented, and the church work will not have to suffer losses. But if you remain a follower under such people and accept their leadership, then your hope of attaining salvation may very well be ruined by them, and your opportunity for salvation will then be gone. Therefore, innovative ability is a crucial ability for a leader or worker or supervisor. If you lack the basic caliber and ability to do the work, you absolutely must be cautious and not just charge ahead out of enthusiasm, and you must not always want to stand out and always want to be a leader or supervisor. Doing so not only hinders yourself but also hinders others from attaining salvation. If you only hinder yourself, it’s just your own death you’ve caused, but if you hinder the brothers and sisters, aren’t you harming many people? You might not care about your own life, but others care about theirs. Moreover, hindering your own day-to-day life or financial success is not a big deal, but hindering the work of the church is no small matter. Can you bear such a responsibility? If you are truly someone with conscience and feel that this matter carries significant responsibility, that hindering the work of the church is not something you can bear responsibility for, then you absolutely must not resort to any means necessary to show off and vie for leadership. If you lack the caliber and stature, don’t always strive to stand out. Don’t hinder the work of the church or hinder God’s chosen people from entering into the truth and gaining a good destination just to satisfy your craving for authority—this is an iniquity! You should have some self-awareness. Do what you are capable of doing and don’t always aspire to be a leader. Besides being a leader, there are many other duties you can do. Being a leader is not your exclusive right, nor should it be your pursuit. If you have the caliber and stature to be a leader, and you also have a sense of burden, then it is better to let others elect you. This practice benefits the work of the church and everyone involved. If you lack the caliber to be a leader, you should demonstrate some kindness and take some responsibility for others’ futures. Do not always vie to be a leader and do not hinder others. Wanting to be a leader and take charge of the work of the church despite having poor caliber shows a lack of reason. If you lack the caliber and stature, just do your own duties well. Truly fulfilling your duties shows you have some reason. Do whatever work you can according to your ability; do not harbor ambitions and desires. Do not only seek to satisfy your personal desires while neglecting the work of the church—this harms both yourself and the church. This is the manifestation of people with poor caliber in terms of innovative ability.

People with poor caliber all fall short of having innovative ability—those without caliber, then, possess it even less. Such people cannot understand the fundamentals of things, the developmental laws of things, or the truth principles at all when they hear them. When reading God’s words, even if they can see that these are the truth principles, they cannot connect the principles to their scope of application or to the people and matters they involve. They even think, “This fellowship on the truth is too detailed, and there’s too much of it. Hearing these words, I can understand that they are principles, but I don’t know what the definition of the principles is or what scope the principles delimit.” If they don’t even know the definition of the principles, then they certainly don’t know how to implement or practice them. For example, when something happens that needs to be handled, others tell them: “You should practice according to the principles.” They say: “I don’t even know how to practice according to the principles. I don’t know which principle this matter relates to.” Even after others explain to them the principle they should practice in handling this matter, they still don’t know what to do. Such people have extremely poor caliber; they can’t even understand human language, and even more so are unfit for use. Doesn’t this show that such people are so incompetent as to be beyond help? People who are helplessly incompetent do not possess the thinking and the ability to understand things of normal humanity, let alone thinking logic. Therefore, people who understand the truth principles or various fundamentals and rules have no way of communicating with those who lack caliber; they cannot reach a consensus, and, of course, have no common language. Why can’t they communicate? There is one essential problem, which is that the abilities of these two types of people to be cognizant of, identify, judge, understand, and accept various things are not on the same level or the same track—they’re like two parallel lines that will never intersect. This is speaking in somewhat abstract terms. To put it more concretely, the caliber of these two types of people is worlds apart, and not on the same level. Therefore, they will never have the same ability to make judgments, ability to identify things, or cognitive ability regarding the same matter. That is, what people with good caliber or average caliber can recognize, those without caliber have no recognition of at all—they even more so fall short of this, and they will forever fall short, as if they lack that function. For example, when a hen matures, it naturally lays eggs. Even if its production is low, it will still lay eggs because it has that function. However, no matter how well a rooster is fed, it cannot lay eggs because it does not have that function. The rooster says: “Although I don’t have the function of laying eggs, I can crow in the morning!” No matter how many times you crow or how loud your voice is, it doesn’t mean you can lay eggs. While the hen doesn’t crow, it has the function of laying eggs. Why am I giving you this example? Because, people without caliber will speak such distorted, fallacious, illogical reasoning—this is called having no caliber. Therefore, when people with good caliber, average caliber, or even poor caliber communicate and discuss matters with people who have no caliber, it feels awkward. With people of poor caliber, you can still communicate on certain simple and easily understood matters. But with people who have no caliber, no one can communicate with them, because they have no comprehension ability and no thoughts or viewpoints about anything. This is the description or explanation of people without caliber. When you communicate something with them, even though you explain it thoroughly and clearly, and they may say they understand, nevertheless, when the same thing happens again, they still do not understand and will again speak distorted, fallacious reasoning. Tell Me, can such people understand the truth? (No.) They have no ability to identify or be cognizant of things—how could they understand the truth? Saying they can understand the truth would simply be nonsense. People without caliber lack innovative ability, so their manifestations in this regard are like this. Because they do not understand any fundamentals or principles, they have no planning in anything they do. Their minds have no plan or steps, and even more so they cannot implement any fundamentals or principles. Whatever they do is a complete mess, a total muddle. Such people can only exert physical effort and do manual tasks. They can barely manage a simple, singular job; after all, they are ordinary people, who can engage in a single task, but when the situation elevates to the level of taking on an item of work, they are no longer competent for it. Such people are incapable of doing any valuable or technically demanding work. They can only manage some small jobs like manual labor, farm work, or raising livestock, and even then, they need a supervisor around them to oversee and support them. Sometimes, when they are in a bad mood, someone needs to straighten them out; and when they sometimes get caught up in distortions or become negative, someone has to counsel them in their ways of thinking. Even for minor tasks, someone needs to vet what they do; otherwise, problems and mistakes will arise, and the work will have to be redone. If they’re not wasting materials, they’re wasting energy, or water, electricity, and gas. In Western countries, they are constantly reported by others and fined by the police. Without someone watching them, they cannot even do small jobs properly—they are just this problematic and pitiful. These are the manifestations of people without caliber. Aren’t such people just useless and fools? Can they still be used as humans? In fact, in God’s house, such people can only exert a bit of physical effort. When it comes to church work, they cannot do it; they are incapable of doing anything. Even with jobs that require physical effort, they cannot complete them independently and still need others to instruct, supervise, and vet what they do. But when they do tasks that require physical effort, they still feel it is beneath their talents, that they are overqualified, and they become defiant, even complaining: “Look at those people doing technical computer work, writing articles, singing and dancing, or acting—how glamorous they are! But I can only handle hosting and cooking, dealing with grease and smoke all day. In a few years, I’ll turn into a haggard woman. Look how pitiful I am!” They always feel quite pitiful doing this work, but they never stop to think about why they can only do this kind of work. They do not measure whether they are truly capable of handling other work. It’s because their caliber is poor that they always feel upset when doing some tasks that require physical effort. If their caliber were truly good, they wouldn’t feel upset. Their caliber is already so poor that they can only do physical tasks, yet they still feel it’s beneath their talents. Aren’t they fools? Such people are truly foolish. People of this sort can’t even do tasks that require physical effort properly. When cooking, they either make too much or too little, and no matter how long they cook for, they still don’t know what pattern they should follow in doing so. Even so, they still feel that such tasks are beneath their talents, that they are overqualified, and think they shouldn’t be doing tasks that require physical effort. They believe they should be working in an office as a secretary, shouldering some item of work in God’s house, or at least serving as a church leader. Isn’t this entirely lacking reason? Tell Me, what work are you competent for? If you aren’t competent for any kind of work, and you are given tasks that require physical effort to do while God’s house still provides for you, isn’t this an exaltation of you? And yet you remain dissatisfied. Isn’t your reason far too poor? (Yes.) Is there a relationship between reason and caliber? (Yes.) Not knowing oneself, not knowing what level one’s caliber is at, always thinking one’s caliber is high—aren’t these manifestations of poor caliber? (Yes.) People with good caliber will know how to evaluate themselves, and after evaluating, they will know the level of their caliber. Once they determine what their caliber is, they will be able to find their place in the church. They will feel at ease no matter what they do, and they will be able to rationally approach the duty they do. Even if they are assigned tasks that require physical effort, they will feel at peace and justified in doing so; they will submit and agree to it from deep within their hearts, accepting this job and this task. This is called having rationality. If someone is never at ease when doing their duty, always feeling aggrieved, and thinking that any task they’re asked to do is beneath their talents, don’t they lack reason? (Yes.)