Only This Is a Truly Good Person
By Moran, Shandong Province
Since I was a child, I always attached a great deal of importance to how other people saw me and their assessment of me. Whenever things cropped up, I never offended anyone or argued with others so that others would have a positive impression of me. For that reason people praised me, saying I was a good person; I also believed myself to be a good person. The people around me therefore praised me as a good person, and I also believed that I was a good person. After I’d accepted God’s work in the last days, I continued in this way, carefully and scrupulously maintaining the good image that my brothers and sisters had of me. Some time ago, my leader said that my performance was like a “nice person,” and not the performance of someone who puts the truth into practice. I never took it to heart, instead feeling gratified that others saw me as a nice person. https://reurl.cc/R9gkg
One day, I read this paragraph: “If in your belief of God you do not pursue the truth, then even if you do not appear to be transgressing, you are still not a truly good person. Those who do not pursue the truth certainly have no sense of righteousness, nor can they love what God loves or hate what God hates. They absolutely cannot stand at God’s side, much less be compatible with God. How then can those without a sense of righteousness be called good people? Not only do those that are described by worldly people as ‘nice people’ have no sense of righteousness, they have no goals in life either. They are merely people who never want to offend anyone, so what are they worth? A truly good person indicates someone who loves positive things, someone who pursues the truth and yearns for the light, someone who can discern good from evil and who has the correct goals in life; only this kind of person does God love” (“To Serve God One Must Learn How to Discern All Kinds of People” in Selected Annals of the Work Arrangements of The Church of Almighty God). After reading these words, I suddenly saw the light. Now I saw that a truely good person is not someone who never offends others, who has friendly exchanges with others and doesn’t argue or quarrel with them, or someone who is able to give others a good impression and get a good assessment from them. Rather, a good person is someone who loves the truth, who loves positive things, who differentiates between love and hate, who has a sense of righteousness, who can love what God loves and hate what God hates, and who can truly love God and be loyal to God. As for my own actions, whenever I saw a brother or sister talk about how difficult spreading the gospel was, I couldn’t help feeling conflicted and starting to complain, feeling that spreading the gospel was not easy, that it really was too hard. Unknowingly I took the side of the flesh of man and no longer wanted to fellowship about the truth and remedy the wrong states of my brothers and sisters. When I saw someone spreading certain notions around, or saw things happen that were disruptive in the church, if they were serious, I would fellowship using tactful words to resolve the issue; if they were not serious, I would pass by the issue by turning a blind eye, fearing that the other person would have an opinion of me if I seriously exposed the essence of the issue. When I saw the sister I worked with doing some things that had nothing to do with the truth, I wanted to raise the issue with her, but then I thought that she might not accept it and it would harm our relationship. So I just thought I’d wait until next time and raise it then. I kept putting it off and putting it off, and the matter remained unsettled. https://reurl.cc/R9gkg
It was only then that I saw that my thoughts and actions were for the sake of protecting a personal relationship, and were based on the principle of avoiding hurting others’ feelings or damaging others’ interests. But I didn’t take to heart God’s requirements, my own responsibilities and my duty, or the work of the church. Even being clearly aware of the truth I still didn’t put it into practice. I was really so selfish and crafty! I saw others’ assessment and praise of me as more important than the truth. Could their praise of me be regarded as God’s praise of me? Could their positive assessment of me show that I had the truth and life? I couldn’t help but reflect on myself: Why do I have a conscience with other people, but not with God? Why do I love a person, but not God? What is the real problem? I thought of a passage of God’s words: “It may be that in all your years of faith in God, you have never cursed anyone or committed a bad deed, yet in your association with Christ, you cannot speak the truth, act honestly, or obey the word of Christ; in that case, I say that you are the most sinister and malicious person in the world. You may be exceptionally cordial and devoted to your relatives, friends, wife (or husband), sons and daughters, and parents, and never take advantage of others, but if you cannot be compatible and in harmony with Christ, then even if you expend your all in relief to your neighbors or take meticulous care of your father, mother, and household members, I would say that you are still wicked, and moreover one full of cunning tricks” (“Those Who Are Incompatible With Christ Are Surely Opponents of God” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). Wasn’t what God’s words revealed exactly my state? I always sought to be the “nice person” in other people’s eyes, to be friendly and easy to get along with, but I wasn’t able to put the truth into practice. I had no devotion to God. Wasn’t that just being a two-faced hypocrite? Now I saw clearly that what I always thought of as being a good person wasn’t that at all, but was being a slippery, deceitful person. Those whom God saves and perfects are those truly good people who pursue the truth and righteousness. They are not those unreasonable people who cannot tell good from evil, or who are unclear about what to love or hate and who have no sense of righteousness. If I continued to take what worldly people think of as a good person as the criteria for my own conduct, I would be doomed to be an object for God’s elimination and punishment.
I give thanks for God’s guidance and enlightenment that allowed me some knowledge of what it is to be a truly good person, and that furthermore allowed me to recognize my mistaken presumptions and ignorance and my rebellion and resistance. From today, I wish to take the phrase “pursue the truth and have a sense of righteousness” as the criterion for my conduct, to seek to enter deeper into the truth, to seek a change in my disposition and to strive to soon be a truly good person who is clear about what to love or hate and who has a sense of righteousness. https://reurl.cc/R9gkg
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🤔🤔 Question: What Is the Significance of Lord Jesus’ appearance to mankind after His resurrection? (III)
The Lord Jesus eating bread and explaining the scriptures after His resurrection, the disciples giving Him broiled fish to eat, what is the will of God hidden behind all this?
📚📚 Answer:
"And it came to pass, as He sat at meat with them, He took bread, and blessed it, and broke, and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew Him; and He vanished out of their sight. And they said one to another, Did not our heart burn within us, while He talked with us by the way, and while He opened to us the scriptures?" (Luke 24:30–32)
"And as they thus spoke, Jesus Himself stood in the middle of them, and said to them, Peace be to you. But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. And He said to them, Why are you troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself: handle Me, and see; for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see Me have. And when He had thus spoken, He showed them His hands and His feet. And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, He said to them, Have you here any meat? And they gave Him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb. And He took it, and did eat before them" (Luke 24:36–43).
"Next we’ll take a look at the passages of scripture above. The first passage is a recounting of the Lord Jesus eating bread and explaining the scriptures after His resurrection, and the second passage is a recounting of the Lord Jesus eating broiled fish. What kind of help do these two passages provide for knowing God’s disposition? Can you imagine the kind of picture you get from these descriptions of the Lord Jesus eating bread and then broiled fish? Can you imagine, if the Lord Jesus were standing in front of you eating bread, how you might feel? Or if He were eating with you at the same table, eating fish and bread with people, what kind of feeling you would have at the time? If you feel you would be very close to the Lord, that He is very intimate with you, then this feeling is right. This is exactly the fruit that the Lord Jesus wanted to bear from eating bread and fish in front of the multitude after His resurrection. If the Lord Jesus had only spoken with people after His resurrection, if they could not feel His flesh and bones, but felt He was an unreachable Spirit, how would they feel? Wouldn’t they be disappointed? When people were disappointed, wouldn’t they feel abandoned? Wouldn’t they feel a distance with the Lord Jesus Christ? What kind of negative impact would this distance create on people’s relationship with God? People would certainly feel afraid, that they didn’t dare come close to Him, and then they would have an attitude of keeping Him at a respectful distance. From then on, they would sever their intimate relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, and return to a relationship between mankind and God up in heaven, as it was before the Age of Grace. The spiritual body that people could not touch or feel would lead to the eradication of their intimacy with God, and it would also make that intimate relationship—established during the Lord Jesus Christ’s time in the flesh, with no distance between Him and humans—cease to exist. People’s feelings toward the spiritual body are only fear, avoidance, and a wordless gaze. They do not dare to get close or to have a dialogue with Him, let alone follow, trust, or have hope in Him. God was reluctant to see this type of feeling that humans had for Him. He did not want to see people avoiding Him or removing themselves from Him; He only wanted people to understand Him, come close to Him, and be His family. If your own family, your children saw you but did not recognize you, and did not dare to come close to you but always avoided you, if you could not gain their understanding for everything you had done for them, how would that make you feel? Wouldn’t it be painful? Wouldn’t you be heartbroken? That is precisely what God feels when people avoid Him. So, after His resurrection, the Lord Jesus still appeared to people in His form of flesh and blood, and ate and drank with them. God sees people as family and He also wants mankind to see Him that way; only in this way can God truly obtain people, and can people truly love and worship God. Now can you understand My intention in extracting these two passages of scripture where the Lord Jesus eats bread and explains the scriptures after His resurrection, and the disciples give Him broiled fish to eat?"
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