By Yang Cheng, China

My family’s finances were quite average: My parents didn’t have any trade skills and so they could only make a living from farming. There was a factory next to the village, where my father could also earn some money. Although their income was small, it was enough to support our family of five. However, when I had just turned twelve, I was not satisfied with this and especially envied the lives of rich people. I had a very good friend whose family owned a big truck. Their living standard was one of the best out of all the families in our village, and everyone envied them. People in my extended family often talked to this family when they had issues. I made a determination that when I grew up, I had to earn more money and live a life like their family did. This desire was deeply engraved in my heart. My grades were not good when I was in school, so I went to work on a construction site to earn money after graduating from elementary school. I started learning carpentry when I was seventeen. Gradually, under the conditioning influence of the social environment, “Money is first,” and “Money makes the world go round” became my mottos, and made my desire for money even stronger.

I worked for a carpenter for several years but didn’t make much money. I thought, “If I continue like this, when will I be able to live a life that will make people admire me?” So, I found a different path and became my own boss, doing interior renovation. In the beginning, in order to get more work, I kept my prices very low and bought the materials together with customers, working hard to get the job done well. When the materials delivered by the owner of a building materials store were of poor quality, I would ask him to exchange them for good materials. My customers were very grateful that I was so considerate of them. The quality of our work was good and my prices were low, which won praise from our customers, and gradually, we got more business. Later, the owner of a building materials store specifically invited me to dinner in order to secure more regular customers. He asked me, “How much of a kickback do the other bosses give you when you buy materials?” I asked in confusion, “What kickbacks? No one gives me anything.” The owner was surprised and said, “You’re too innocent. How much money can you make working like that? What era are we living in? You have to keep up with the times! As the saying goes, ‘No wealth is without wiliness.’ Kickbacks are common whatever industry you’re in. Generally, customers spend 10,000 to 20,000 yuan on materials when they renovate their house. You can get a kickback of one or two thousand out of that. Why not do it if you can get that without any effort, just by moving your mouth? How about this, you bring customers to me, and I promise to help you earn tens of thousands more a year.” When I first heard this, I thought it would indeed be a good way to make money, but then I thought, “Isn’t this cheating customers?” I felt that my conscience wouldn’t stand for it, so I said, “It won’t work. Most of my customers are introduced by acquaintances. If they found out that I was cheating them, this business would be over!” The boss said confidently, “I’ve been doing this for decades, and there have never been any customers who have come looking for me, so don’t worry! You have to change your approach, otherwise you won’t make any money. People often say, ‘Only a fool doesn’t take money at his fingertips.’ Think about it. Isn’t this true?” I thought that what he said made sense, and I could make a lot more money if I worked with him. Besides, if I continued to work honestly, when would I be able to achieve the enviable high-quality life that I pursued? Also, the other people in my line of work all drove to work, which looked very impressive, and the customers also admired them. On the other hand, I was still a boss no matter how minor my company, but I was riding a motorcycle. It was too degrading! When I thought about this, I agreed to his request. After a few days, my friend’s relative came to me because he needed to renovate his office, and asked me to buy the materials myself. The owner of the building materials store said to me, “This is a rare opportunity. If you add a little more to the price for him, your kickback will be higher.” I felt that my conscience wouldn’t stand for it. But, seeing that I couldn’t bear to do it, he said, “You are too honest; who takes conscience seriously nowadays? Even if you save the customer money, he won’t say anything good about you. Don’t worry, he won’t spot any problems from the purchase order.” But I still felt a little bit reluctant, so I just agreed to take a smaller kickback. Afterward, the owner of the materials store came to the company and handed the purchase order to my friend’s relative. I was worried that he would find out, and my heart was pounding like a rabbit was trapped inside. I thought, “My friend’s relative is a smart person. If he finds out there is something fishy going on, will I not utterly lose face?” Because I was nervous, I didn’t dare look my friend’s relative in the face. Just when I was feeling anxious, he asked me, “Have you checked over all the materials?” I thought, “Did he spot something wrong?” I felt a little scared, and said guiltily, “Yes, I have.” Unexpectedly, he just looked at the price and signed it, and directly asked the owner who had delivered the materials to go to the finance department to collect the money. At this time, I started to relax a little. I thought to myself, “It’s better not to do things like this that go against one’s conscience very often. If you do, your conscience will be uneasy!”

Afterward, the owner of the building materials store gave me a kickback of 2,800 yuan and also treated me to a meal. I looked at the easy money and thought to myself, “I earned this much money just by talking, without any effort. The saying that ‘No wealth is without wiliness’ really makes sense. This was just a small project. If I could take on a few big projects, how much more money would I make? If I continue doing this, my income will definitely be quite considerable. In a few years, I will be living the life of a wealthy person.” However, when I thought about how this was money I had earned from selling out my reputation, I still felt uneasy. On the other hand, if I just kept working honestly like before, I wouldn’t make big money at all. I was conflicted for several days, and finally, looking at the money just there for the taking, I ended up choosing profit. From then on, “No wealth is without wiliness” became my motto. In order to earn more money and live a life of luxury, I constantly played tricks on my customers and did things that went against my conscience.

One time, I bought a batch of boards of inferior quality and told the workers, “If the customer comes, don’t start work. Don’t let them see the materials you’re using.” But just when the works were in progress, the customer suddenly came in. My heart leaped into my throat and my palms were sweating; I was terrified that the customer would spot the flaws. If this had been discovered, not only would I have lost my wages, but I would also have lost the money I spent on the materials. Fortunately, the customer didn’t notice it at the time. When I got home after work, I was still worried, “Will the customer go to the site at night? What if they spot that there is a problem with the materials?” I was constantly uneasy, and I didn’t feel relaxed until I had finished the work and they paid the bill. Gradually, I made more and more money, and I not only bought a house and accumulated some savings, but also received envy and praise from my relatives and friends. In the past when I had no money, when I met people I knew, I would talk to them but they wouldn’t respond to me. Now, when they met me, they always greeted me first, and welcomed me with a smile. Sometimes I asked them for help, and most of them agreed readily. I felt like the sayings, “Money isn’t everything, but without it, you can do nothing,” and “Money makes the world go round,” were quite true. But sometimes I stopped and thought about how although I had made money and bought a car by going against my conscience over the past few years, I didn’t feel very happy. Instead, I lived amidst worries and misgivings all day long. If the customers found out that I had done these unethical things, they would definitely point at me and scold me. I couldn’t bear to imagine what that scene would be like. My customers and I were from the same county town, so we saw each other all the time, but sometimes when I ran into them, I wouldn’t dare lift my head and look them in the eyes. I couldn’t shake off the condemnation and accusations in my heart, and sometimes I even dreamed about customers coming to my door, waking myself up in fright. Sometimes I also thought, “Stop cheating people. It would be better to go back to how I did it before, doing the job honestly and well. It would be fine if I only earned a bit of money.” But then I thought about how my children would need money for all sorts of things when they grew up, and besides, without money, my material life would also decline. I felt a little unwilling and was caught in a dilemma. I often sighed, “Why is life so painful?”

In October 2013, I accepted God’s work of the last days and began to live a church life. At gatherings, I found that my brothers and sisters all spoke openly about what was in their hearts, and discussed the corruption they revealed in their lives. This is something you would never see in society. Once, at a gathering, a sister fellowshipped about her experience of being an honest person. When she talked about how she and her husband lied and cheated people to sell things, I said with empathy, “People in this world are getting worse and worse. It’s all about you cheating me, me cheating you. Just like me, if I just worked in construction honestly, I would never make any money. You have to play tricks and cheat to make more money.” My sister said, “This is all the result of Satan corrupting people. It makes us live in sin, lose any basic boundaries in our self-conduct, and leaves us barely able to feel our consciences.” At that time, we read a passage of God’s words: “What aspects of man does Satan use each of these trends to corrupt? Satan chiefly corrupts man’s conscience, sense, humanity, morals, and life perspectives. And do these social trends not gradually degrade and corrupt people? Satan uses these social trends to lure people step by step into a nest of devils, so that people unknowingly revere money, material desires, evil, and violence in social trends. Once these things have entered the heart of man, what then does man become? Man becomes a devil and Satan! Why? Because, what psychological inclination exists in the heart of man? What does man revere? Man begins to take pleasure in evil and violence, showing no love for beauty or goodness, much less peace. People are not willing to live a simple life in normal humanity, but instead wish to enjoy high status and great wealth, to revel in the pleasures of the flesh, sparing no effort to satisfy their own flesh, with no restrictions or bonds; in other words, doing whatever they desire. … There is no longer any affection between people, no longer any love between family members, no longer any understanding among relatives and friends; human relations have become characterized by violence. Each and every person seeks to use violent methods to live among their fellow man; they seize their daily bread using violence; they win their positions and obtain their profits using violence, and they use violent and wicked ways to do anything they want. Is this humanity not horrifying?” (The Word, Vol. 2. On Knowing God. God Himself, the Unique VI). From God’s words I understood that Satan uses fame, gain, and money to tempt us, and make us value money above all else. In order to get money and be admired by others, we are unscrupulous and cheat others against our own consciences. All family affection and friendship disappear, and all conscience and reason vanish. I thought back to how when I had just started doing business, I was still able to earn money honestly, but when I saw other people cheating and so earning large amounts of money, enjoying a good material life, and being admired, I started to drift with the current and betrayed my conscience, using various methods to cheat my customers. Not only did I take kickbacks, I also tampered with the materials. Although I made some money, that money was all obtained through cheating and trickery, and I didn’t feel happy in my heart at all. Instead, I was on tenterhooks all day long. It turned out that all this was the consequence of Satan’s corruption of mankind.

Later, I read more of God’s words: “You ought to know that God likes those who are honest. In essence, God is faithful, 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, being genuine with God in all things, being open with Him in all things, never hiding the facts, not trying to deceive those above and below you, and not doing things only 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” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Three Admonitions). From God’s words I understood that God is faithful and holy. God speaks with complete honesty, and is pure in His words, and He likes honest people. God hopes that we will always speak and act in accordance with His words, be frank and straightforward, not try to trick God nor people. Only in this way can we live out a human likeness and be approved of by God. Having understood God’s intention, I knew that I must accept God’s scrutiny when doing construction work and be honest with all my customers. I thought about how I had been lying and cheating all day long in order to make money over the past few years, and conducting myself in a way that betrayed my conscience. This incurred God’s loathing and hatred. Therefore, I first started to practice being an honest person on small projects by not overcharging customers or cutting corners. Working in this way made me feel a lot more relaxed, and I felt a little more peaceful and at ease.

However, after a while I realized that I simply couldn’t make any money this way. I thought about the fact that people in every industry play tricks and cheat, and I was very conflicted. I didn’t know how to practice. After some hesitation, I chose my personal interests again. I thought to myself, “Being an honest person takes time. It’s never too late to practice being an honest person in the future.” Once, I substituted lower-quality materials for good ones, using ordinary and imitation high-quality materials when I was doing renovations for a customer. Not long after, the customer accidentally soaked the area that had been renovated with water, and as a result, the quality problems became clear. The customer noticed that the materials I had used were not of good quality, so he insisted on deducting 10,000 yuan from the bill when he settled up. Even so, I still didn’t wake up. A while later, the owner of a clothing store asked me to decorate her storefront. In my experience, the storefront of a clothing store is something that gets changed fairly frequently. I thought to myself, “Even if I don’t give her good materials, she won’t be able to tell, and I can make more money from it. I can also use this project to make back the ten thousand yuan I lost previously.” Therefore, I used ordinary materials for her. During the works, a worker said, “Boss, you really know how to do business. The panels you’re using are not only aluminum-plastic composite panels, they’re also raw materials. You must be making a lot from this project, right?” I said angrily, “If I don’t do this, will you pay for my losses last time?” At that time, I was only thinking about making money, and my heart was numb. The project was completed quickly, but before the bill was paid, the customer called and said that a panel had fallen off and nearly hit someone. When I got there, the owner of the clothing store said angrily, “You used inferior materials in my job. So how are you going to settle the money?” I had no choice but to admit fault and apologize, “I’ll fix it for you right away. I’ll only charge you for the materials, not the labor.” The customer agreed. Afterward, I couldn’t help but wonder in confusion, “Why is it that things are always going wrong these days? I wanted to take this opportunity to recover some of my losses, but now the losses are getting bigger and bigger. Fortunately, no one was hit this time, otherwise I would have been in a lot of trouble.” During that time, I started to ponder, “I am well aware that God loves honest people, but when I carry out renovations I still insist on cheating people. What is the cause of this?”

Later, I read God’s words and my heart became somewhat brighter. Almighty God says: “Until people have experienced God’s work and understood the truth, it is Satan’s nature that takes charge and dominates them from within. What, specifically, does that nature entail? For example, why are you selfish? Why do you protect your own position? Why do you have such strong feelings? Why do you enjoy those unrighteous things? Why do you like those evils? What is the basis for your fondness for such things? Where do these things come from? Why are you so happy to accept them? By now, you have all come to understand that the main reason behind all these things is that Satan’s poison is within man. So what is Satan’s poison? How can it be expressed? For example, if you ask, ‘How should people live? What should people live for?’ people will answer, ‘Every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost.’ This single phrase expresses the very root of the problem. Satan’s philosophy and logic have become people’s lives. No matter what people pursue, they do so for themselves—and so they live only for themselves. ‘Every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost’—this is the life philosophy of man, and it also represents human nature. These words have already become the nature of corrupt mankind and they are the true portrait of corrupt mankind’s satanic nature. This satanic nature has already become the basis for corrupt mankind’s existence. For several thousand years, corrupt mankind has lived by this venom of Satan, right up to the present day” (The Word, Vol. 3. The Discourses of Christ of the Last Days. How to Walk the Path of Peter). From the exposure in God’s words, I understood that Satan uses various poisons such as “Every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost,” “Money is first,” and “No wealth is without wiliness” to tempt and corrupt people. When people live by these things, they become more and more selfish and despicable, and feel that profit comes first. From countries and nations to families and individuals, everyone is willing to pay any price for their own interests. They play tricks, cheat, and satisfy their own desires even at the expense of others’ interests. Their conscience is consumed and their humanity is lost. At first, I could still do renovations based on my conscience, and was willing to suffer more to do a good job for my customers. Although it was a bit tiring, my heart was peaceful and at ease. Later, I saw people in my industry all driving cars and earning over a hundred thousand yuan a year, and I got very envious. In order to win admiration from others and lead a high-quality life, I cheated and took kickbacks against my conscience. I used imitation high-quality materials to pass off inferior products as good ones, and I didn’t stop even after my customers found out; I did not give up my pursuit of money even though it went against my conscience. I saw that I had been completely swallowed up by the tide of evil. I abandoned the basic boundaries of my self-conduct for personal gain, unscrupulously cheated my customers, and became increasingly selfish and greedy, losing my integrity and dignity. Over those years, although I had made some money by cheating, my days were not spent happily. As soon as I thought about how I was cheating people, my heart felt tormented, and I didn’t dare face my friends. I constantly felt that my heart was ill-at-ease and my conscience was reproached. I couldn’t even sleep soundly at night, and sometimes I was startled awake by nightmares. After I started to believe in God, I was well aware that God loves honest people and that only honest people can be saved and enter the kingdom of God. However, it was like my heart had been possessed by a demon, and I was deceitful for profit, living amidst sin and unable to extricate myself. If it hadn’t been for the exposure of God’s words, I wouldn’t have understood the gravity of lying and cheating. I would have continued to sink deeper and deeper into the tide of evil, earning ill-gotten gains in defiance of my conscience. In the end, I would only be harmed by Satan, and descend to hell together with it to be punished. I thanked God from the bottom of my heart for His salvation, and secretly resolved not to deceive or cheat my customers anymore. I had to speak honestly, work honestly, and be a person with integrity and dignity.

After a while, temptation came upon me. Through an introduction, I took on a project worth 70,000 yuan. The client was in his twenties and knew nothing about decoration. I agreed with the client that he would not pay according to the company’s budget, but base the charge on the quantity of materials used in the project. Once we had agreed, we started work. The client rarely came to the site, and I thought to myself, “This is a great opportunity. By cutting corners I could save thousands of yuan to line my own pockets.” But then I thought, “I have to be an honest person and stop lying and cheating.” However, at heart I still couldn’t let go of this good opportunity to make money. “If I practice being an honest person, I will lose this money that was just there for the taking. Besides, such opportunities are rare, and if I let this one slip, I don’t know when the next one will come along.” Just when I didn’t know what to choose, I read God’s words and gained strength in my heart. God says: “That God asks for people to be honest proves that He truly loathes and dislikes deceitful people. God’s dislike of deceitful people is a dislike of their way of doing things, their dispositions, their intents and their methods of trickery; God dislikes all of these things. If deceitful people are able to accept the truth, admit to their deceitful dispositions, and are willing to accept God’s salvation, then they too have a hope of being saved—for God treats all people equally, as does the truth. And so, if we wish to become people who please God, the first thing we must do is change our principles of comportment. No longer can we live according to satanic philosophies, no longer can we get by on lies and trickery. We must cast off all our lies and become honest people. Then God’s view of us will change” (The Word, Vol. 3. The Discourses of Christ of the Last Days. The Most Fundamental Practice of Being an Honest Person). God loathes people being deceitful and cheating the most. God’s requirement of people is that they be honest. He requires that people be frank and straightforward in everything they say and do, with no deceit or cheating. I had to train myself to be an honest person, and had to stop being deceitful and cheating. Therefore, I calculated the materials needed honestly. When the project was almost finished, I calculated that it had only cost 57,000 yuan, and there was over 10,000 left. This was equivalent to one month’s wages for two employees. I was trying to work out if I should keep the remaining money or tell the truth to the customer, or maybe split it in two, keeping half each—this would have been reasonable. Because the materials I bought were cheap, there was no waste in the project, and I helped him save money. But when I made out the invoice, my heart felt uneasy. I realized that I was trying to cheat again, and I thought of God’s words: “God is right by your side, observing your every word and action, and watching everything you do and what changes take place in your thoughts—this is God’s work” (The Word, Vol. 2. On Knowing God. How to Know God’s Disposition and the Results His Work Shall Achieve). I couldn’t help feeling a little scared, as if God was standing by me and watching me. God’s words once again reminded me to be an honest person and not to lie or cheat for money. Therefore, I quickly charged the customer the actual amount. The customer said gratefully, “Thank you so much for this! You’ve saved me money. This time I asked the right person. If I had hired someone dishonest, I would have had to spend more money.” Hearing him say this, my heart felt really happy and at ease.

After that, sometimes when construction projects involved large potential profits, I still thought about being deceitful and playing tricks to make more money, but I prayed to God and practiced in accordance with God’s words, training myself to be an honest person. By practicing in this way, my heart felt very at ease, and I got more projects than before. 80% of these were the result of introductions from other customers. Our customers all praised us for being honest, doing a good job and using good materials. They didn’t need to constantly monitor us when we were at work, and were very confident in the work we did. I am grateful to God for extending His hand of salvation to me and saving me from the mire of sin. I thank God from the bottom of my heart!