The discussion we just held about the evil of Satan makes everyone feel as though man lives amidst great unhappiness and that the life of man is beset with misfortune. But now when I am talking about the holiness of God and the work that He performs on man, how does that make you feel? (Very happy.) We can see now that everything God does, all that He painstakingly arranges for man, is immaculate. Everything God does is without error, meaning it is faultless, needing no one to correct, advise, or make any changes to it. All that God does for every individual is beyond doubt; He leads everyone by the hand, looks after you with every passing moment and has never once left your side. As people grow up in this kind of environment and with this kind of background, could we say that people in fact grow up in the palm of God’s hand? (Yes.) So now do you still feel a sense of loss? Does anyone still feel dispirited? Does anyone feel that God has forsaken mankind? (No.) So what exactly has God done then? (He has kept watch over mankind.) The great thought and care that God puts into everything He does is beyond question. What is more, in carrying out His work, He has always done so unconditionally. He has never required that any one of you know the price that He pays for you so as to make you feel deeply grateful to Him. Has God ever required this of you? (No.) In the long course of human life, almost every individual has encountered many dangerous situations and faced many temptations. This is because Satan is standing beside you, its eyes constantly fixed on you. When disaster strikes you, Satan revels in this; when calamities befall you, when nothing goes right for you, when you become entangled in Satan’s web, Satan takes great enjoyment from these things. As for what God is doing, He is protecting you with each passing moment, steering you away from one misfortune after another and from one disaster after another. This is why I say that everything man has—peace and joy, blessings and personal safety—is in fact all under God’s control; He guides and decides the fate of every individual. But does God have an inflated notion of His position, as some people say? Does God declare to you, “I am the greatest of all. It is I that take charge of you. You must beg Me for mercy, and disobedience will be punished by death”? Has God ever threatened mankind in this way? (No.) Has He ever said, “Mankind is corrupt, so it does not matter how I treat them, and they may be treated in any which way; I do not need to make sound arrangements for them”? Does God think in this way? Has God acted in this way? (No.) On the contrary, God’s treatment of each and every person is earnest and responsible. He treats you more responsibly even than you treat yourself. Is this not so? God does not speak idly, and neither does He flaunt His elevated position or flippantly deceive people. Instead He honestly and silently does the things He Himself needs to do. These things bring blessings, peace and joy to man. They bring man peacefully and happily into God’s sight and into His family; then they live before God and accept God’s salvation with the normal reason and thinking. So has God ever been duplicitous with man in His work? Has He ever made a false display of kindness, first fooling man with a few pleasantries and then turning His back? (No.) Has God ever said one thing and then done another? Has God ever made empty promises and boasted, telling people He can do this for them or help do that for them, but then vanished? (No.) There is no deceit in God, no falsity. God is faithful, and He is true in everything He does. He is the only One that people can count on; He is the God to whom people can entrust their lives and everything they have. Since there is no deceit in God, could we say that God is the most sincere? (Yes.) Of course we can! Though the word “sincere” is too feeble, too human when applied to God, what other word is there for us to use? Such are the limits of human language. Though it is somewhat unfitting to call God “sincere,” we will nonetheless use this word for the time being. God is faithful and sincere. So when we talk about these aspects, what are we referring to? Are we referring to the differences between God and man and the differences between God and Satan? Yes, we could say that. This is because man cannot see one trace of Satan’s corrupt disposition in God. Am I correct in saying this? Amen? (Amen!) We see none of Satan’s evil revealed in God. All that God does and reveals is wholly beneficial and helps man, is done wholly to provide for man, is full of life and gives man a road to follow and a direction to take. God is not corrupt and, furthermore, looking now at everything that God does, can we say that God is holy? (Yes.) Since God has none of the corruption of mankind nor any of the same corrupt disposition of mankind or the essence of Satan, and nothing about God bears any similarity to these things, from this point of view we can say that God is holy. God does not display any corruption, and the revelation of His own essence in His work is all the confirmation that God Himself is holy. Do you see this? To know God’s holy essence, let us look at these two aspects for now: 1) There is not a trace of corrupt disposition in God; 2) the essence of God’s work on man allows man to see God’s own essence, and this essence is entirely positive. For the things that every part of God’s work brings to man are all positive. Firstly, God requires man to be honest—is this not a positive thing? God gives man wisdom—is this not positive? God makes man able to discern between good and evil—is this not positive? He allows man to understand the meaning and value of human life—is this not positive? He allows man to see into the essence of people, events, and things in accordance with truth—is this not positive? (Yes, it is.) And the result of all of this is that man is no longer deceived by Satan, will no longer continue to be harmed or controlled by Satan. In other words, these things allow people to completely free themselves from the corruption of Satan, and therefore gradually walk the path of fearing God and shunning evil.

—The Word, Vol. 2. On Knowing God. God Himself, the Unique VI