Believers in God must grasp some key things. At minimum, they must know in their heart what it means to believe in God; which truths believers in God should understand; how one should practice submitting to God; as well as, in submitting to God, which truths and which of His words one should understand, and which realities one should possess, in order to satisfy Him. If you have this faith and this resolve, then even if you sometimes have a few notions or harbor certain intentions, it will be easy to let go of them. Those who do not have this faith will always be choosy in their submission, and sometimes they will also nitpick, be contentious, harbor resentment, grumble complaints…. All sorts of rebellious behaviors will occur from time to time! It’s not just an occasional one or two instances, nor is it a fleeting thought, but rather the ability to speak rebellious words and do rebellious things. This indicates a particularly severe rebellious disposition. People have corrupt dispositions, and even if they have the resolve to submit to God, their submission is limited; it is relative, and it is also occasional, fleeting, and conditional. It is not absolute. With a corrupt disposition, their rebelliousness is particularly great. They acknowledge God but cannot submit to Him, and they are willing to listen to His words but cannot submit to them. They know that God is good, and they want to love Him but cannot. They cannot listen to God completely, cannot let Him orchestrate everything, and they still have their own choices, harbor their own intentions and motives, and have their own schemes, ideas, and their way of doing things. Having their own way of doing things, their own methods, means there is no way they can submit to God. They can only act according to their own ideas and rebel against God. This is how rebellious people are! So, man’s nature is not only simple corrupt dispositions like superficial self-righteousness, self-importance, and pride, or occasional lies and deceit toward God; instead, man’s essence has already become the essence of Satan. How did the archangel betray God back then? And what about people nowadays? To be frank, whether or not you can accept it, people nowadays are not only completely betraying God like Satan did, but are also directly hostile to God in their hearts, their thinking, and their ideologies. This is Satan’s corruption of humankind into devils; humans have truly become the spawn of Satan. Perhaps you will say: “We are not hostile to God. We listen to whatever God says.” That’s superficial; it seems as if you listen to whatever God says. In fact, when I am formally fellowshipping and speaking, most people do not have notions and are well-behaved and obedient, but when I am speaking and doing things in normal humanity, or living and acting in normal humanity, their notions arise. Despite wanting to make room for Me in their hearts, they cannot accommodate Me, and no matter how the truth is fellowshipped, they cannot let go of their notions. This shows that man can only submit to God relatively, not absolutely. You know He is God, and you know that God incarnate must have normal humanity, so why can you not submit to God absolutely? God become flesh is Christ, the Son of man; He has both divinity and normal humanity. Outwardly, He has normal humanity, but His divinity lives and works within this normal humanity. Now, God has become flesh as Christ, possessing divinity and humanity. Yet some people can only submit to some of His divine words and work, only taking His divine words and profound language as God’s words, while they disregard some of His words and work in normal humanity. Some people even have some ideas and notions in their hearts, believing that only His divine language is the word of God and that His human language is not. Can such people accept all of the truths that God expresses? Can they be purified and made perfect by God? They cannot, because such people comprehend in an absurd manner and cannot obtain the truth. In short, man’s inner world is extremely complex, and these rebellious matters are especially complicated—there is no need to elaborate on this. People are able to submit to God’s divinity, but cannot submit to some of the work and words of His normal humanity, which shows that they have not truly submitted to God. People’s submission to God is always conditional; they listen to whatever they believe is correct and reasonable, and are unwilling to listen to what they believe is incorrect and unreasonable. They do not submit to what they are unwilling to listen to or what they are unable to do. Can this be called true submission? Absolutely not. This shows that people’s dispositions are not good, that their dispositions are especially vile and bad—this is crucial! That is to say, even when people do submit a little bit to God, it is always selective and conditional submission, and never absolute submission to God. If it is said that a person listens and submits, this is just relatively speaking, because you have not touched upon their interests or truly pruned them, you have not bluntly and directly pruned them. Once you truly prune them, they will set themselves against you and wear a gloomy face all day. If you ask them something they will not respond, and if you tell them to do something then they will not be willing to do it. When you tell them to do something they are unwilling to do, they will begin to break things and be stubborn with you. How bad can a person’s disposition get! Knowing that He is God, why do you treat Him like that? This is no different than the Pharisees and Paul back then. Did Paul know that Jesus is God? Why did he persecute Jesus’ disciples? Why did he arrest so many of them? In the end, Jesus saw that Paul had gone too far in his persecution, and on the road to Damascus, He struck Paul down. A light shone around him, and Paul fell to the ground. After falling, he asked Jesus: “Who are You, Lord?” Jesus told him: “I am Jesus whom you persecute” (Acts 9:5). From then on, Paul was much more subdued. If Jesus had not “illuminated” and struck him down, Paul would not have accepted Jesus, let alone preach for Him. What does this prove? It proves that people’s natures are as bad as can be.

People often say: “We humans all have corrupt dispositions; none of us can satisfy God,” and, “Humans are so self-righteous and self-important. They always believe they are good, that they are better than others!” Actually, this is the most cursory of understandings; this is only a small aspect of a corrupt disposition. Why do you not discuss those thoughts and intentions of rebelling against and resisting God in your own nature? God demands that you do something one way, and you have to do it another way. God works in one way, and you have to demand that He work another way. Isn’t this contending with God? Everyone has this kind of disposition; no one can escape it. Perhaps some people will say: “This doesn’t apply to me, I didn’t know!” That is because you have not come into contact with God. Once you do, and after a week of gradually getting to know Him, you’re guaranteed to change and reveal your true self. This is not an overstatement, nor is it underestimating you. Nowadays, people do not only have corrupt dispositions; their natures have been corrupted too. Their normal humanity has already been so corrupted that it is tattered and utterly lost; that is, people no longer have normal humanity. God incarnate has normal humanity, but people all have corrupt dispositions, and do not have much in the way of normal humanity, making it impossible for them to be in harmony with God. They will certainly have differences and disputes with God on many matters, even going so far as to be hostile toward Him. This is because people do not have God-fearing hearts or hearts of submission to God. One cannot demand of people, “Since you acknowledge that He is God, you must submit to Him no matter what He says,” much less demand that they yield to God in every matter. This is not a matter of yielding; people are created beings, and after all, God is God and man is man—there must be a boundary between them. How did Abraham’s servant pray to Jehovah God in the Age of Law? “O Jehovah God of my master Abraham” (Genesis 24:12). He made distinctions of rank very clear, whereas people nowadays believe: “God is not so different from us. He also has normal humanity, and has the needs, the full range of emotions, the life, and the activities of normal humanity. Although He does divine work, His normal humanity is indispensable!” As soon as people have this rough idea of “normal humanity” inside them, they will be prone to prescribing God’s work, His words, and His disposition as man’s normal humanity, denying His divine essence. This is an enormous mistake; this makes it impossible to know God, doesn’t it? You have not come into contact with God; which of you dares to say, “If I were to be in contact with God for one year, I guarantee I would not be at all rebellious”? No one can be so certain. Most people have believed in God for more than 10 or 20 years, yet no one can achieve true submission to Him. This is enough to show that people have been deeply corrupted by Satan, and that Satan’s disposition has already become entrenched in people’s hearts; there are some corrupt things that you cannot even dig up on your own. I have spoken so many words, expressed so many truths, yet hardly anyone really understands the truth. People now are obstinately wrongheaded; they are numb and dull-witted to a certain degree. It’s not that they are only a little ignorant—their rebellious natures have already taken shape, but you have still not seen this clearly.

Some people, upon encountering Christ for one or two days, find Him unfamiliar and feel somewhat restrained: “This is God here!” They have this thought in their hearts, but after 10 days or two weeks of contact with Him, as little by little they become more familiar with and increasingly close to Him, they become unrestrained in their hearts and they no longer differentiate between their status and His. It is as if there is total equality, without any hierarchy; they think it is proper for God to share life and joy with them. Sometimes I ponder, how could these people be like this? If I were to always prune them and lecture them, they would certainly be well-behaved and submissive. Sometimes when I talk with someone as equals, they think: “Hmm, look how good God is to me!” Being good to you does not prove that you do not have a rebellious disposition or that your nature essence is good. Isn’t this so? With some people, when I treat them a little better and give them a little smile, they forget their place in the universe, forgetting where they came from and what their identity and essence is—they forget all of this. People’s natures are truly as bad as it gets; they do not have any reason whatsoever! If some people believe they are quite good, then go ahead and interact with God for a period of time and see how all that rebelliousness and resistance inside you gets exposed. Engage with God for a period of time—I will not remind you, reprimand you, or prune you, and nobody will fellowship with you; you will experience on your own, and we will see to what extent you can experience. Without obtaining the truth, you will certainly fail miserably, the consequences will be unthinkable. People’s rebellious dispositions are too severe; their hearts cannot accommodate others! Your rebellious disposition, satanic nature, and arrogant heart cannot accommodate other people. Perhaps some people, after interacting with Me for a period of time, develop some incorrect thoughts; if these are not resolved, once they become notions or judgments, they will find themselves in danger. Some people say: “That’s because You’re too ordinary and normal. I’m not like this with my belief in the Lord Jesus.” It is the same with your belief in Jesus. If you were placed in Jesus’ era, you would do no better than the Pharisees, your minds would be full of notions. Do not think that you would be better than Judas. He could betray the Lord and could steal His money for his own use; you might not betray Him or spend the church’s money recklessly, but would not be someone who submitted to the Lord, and you would certainly be full of notions, rebelliousness, and resistance. The words and the work of the Lord Jesus are the appearance and work of God. Why did Judas oppose the Lord? His nature was too bad; he could not accommodate Christ and insisted on being hostile to Him. Did Peter not also suffer a lot back then? In the end, because his humanity was comparatively a bit better than others at that time, and because he was able to pursue loving God, he was ultimately made perfect. Back then, he also had some notions and opinions about Jesus, but because he was able to pursue loving the Lord, he gained some knowledge of the Lord Jesus in the end. So, do not boast; do not guarantee you can succeed and achieve a perfect score in something you have not experienced. This is not true or realistic. You must experience this first; only then will the knowledge and insights you share be practical. Do not say: “God, come to my house, I promise that I won’t make You angry like others do. I promise I won’t be as inhumane as the others.” This is not for certain, because the elements of normal humanity inside people have already been destroyed; their normal humanity is gone, as are their conscience and reason—the common sense of normal humanity, speaking simply and honestly, and being able to listen and be submissive, all of these positive things, are already gone from within people. So, people’s principles for living and their goals in life have already changed; they all adhere to satanic philosophy and are dominated by Satan’s nature. Their speech is sly and deceitful, they go whichever way the wind blows, and they excel at saying pleasant-sounding things—they believe that living like this is great. Why is it said that humans are deeply corrupted? Being so deeply corrupted, do people still have any normal humanity? You believe that you have a corrupt disposition, which you believe is just being somewhat arrogant, self-righteous and prideful, being somewhat deceitful in speech, or being somewhat perfunctory in the performance of your duties—that is all. But this knowledge is too shallow; it’s just scratching the surface. The key is that man is evil by nature, people all revere evil and are denying and resisting God, and their normal humanity has already vanished from the face of the earth. Isn’t this how it is? So, what should people do to meet the standard of being a created being? The key is to find a path of practice, a suitable method of practice, from within God’s words. You all know that there are no exceptionally good people among humankind, so why is it said now that some people have humanity while other people do not? Can people who have humanity really put these truths into practice? They also cannot put them into practice; it’s just that relatively speaking they are a little bit kinder and gentler in their hearts, and are a little more responsible in their work—but this is all relative, not absolute. If you evaluate someone and say that this person is absolutely good and does not have any faults or rebelliousness, that they are completely compliant and submissive, and are not at all perfunctory in performing their duties, would this not be an exaggeration? Is it in accordance with the facts? Is there really a person like this? If this is how you comprehend things, that is distorted. But if you believe, “We humans are done for. Not one of us is any good, so what’s the use of believing in God? I’ll simply stop believing and await my death!” this is also absurd. You always go to the extremes, as if you do not understand plain speech; you’re always either leaning one way or the other. If I speak more softly and gently, you will fail to know yourselves, but if I speak too sternly and harshly, you will hang your heads, become negative, and even give up on yourselves. When some people hear God’s words of judgment and condemnation, they immediately become paralyzed and believe that they are done for, that they have no hope of being saved. These people are exactly the ones who are hardest to save, because they do not understand plain speech! Now, when God speaks and exposes people, it is to make them understand the root of man’s corrupt nature and understand why man is able to rebel against God. Exposing these things is beneficial to people. If these things are not exposed, you would believe until the end without ever knowing yourself, always saying the archangel is full of itself, or saying that this person is arrogant and that person is rebellious. What about yourself? There are also people who always say, “We are indeed rebellious toward God,” but still do not know the root of their rebelliousness and do not see through to or understand the essence of those states. This means they cannot change and cannot be saved. Are you able to comprehend these words? (Yes.)

There are two primary aspects to what I have just fellowshipped. One aspect is that, in believing in God, one should achieve true submission, completely meeting the standard of a created being. The other is that exposing the rebelliousness inside people and exposing their nature allows them to know themselves. If they are not exposed like this and made to know themselves, then everyone will say they are good and better than others. For example, some people say, “I am also so deeply corrupted,” but when they interact with others for a period of time, they believe that they are still better than others, thinking: “I’m not any good; I see you’re no better, and actually even worse than me!” Do not think that you are better than others. You are not better than others by any stretch of the imagination; people’s rebellious natures are all the same. Is this all clear? Now that we have finished fellowshipping this, what do you all think? Are you thinking: “I’ve believed in God for so many years, and I thought I was someone who submitted to God. Today, now that God has finished fellowshipping, I finally realize that I do not have true submission to God, and I still do not treat Him as God. I can’t even manage to submit to God—I am totally without reason and my faith is so confused!” If you truly have this kind of knowledge, then there is hope for you to enter onto the right track of believing in God and become someone who submits to Him; only then can you attain salvation.