By Hu Ke, Shandong Province
Whenever I saw these words spoken by God, I felt anxious: “Every sentence I have spoken contains within it the disposition of God. You would do well to ponder My words carefully, and you will surely profit greatly from them” (“It Is Very Important to Understand God’s Disposition” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). I felt anxious because understanding God’s disposition is so important both to man’s understanding of God and their seeking to love and satisfy Him. But when reading the words of God, I always felt like God’s disposition was too abstract, and I didn’t know how to understand it. Afterward, through fellowship from my church leader, I came to know that I should understand what God likes and what He hates from His words, and thereby come to understand God’s disposition. I subsequently tried for a while to put this into practice and I saw some results. But I still felt at a loss regarding God’s words, “Every sentence I have spoken contains within it the disposition of God,” and had no idea how exactly to understand it.
One day, I read these words in a sermon: “God’s disposition contains many aspects. It contains what God has and is, His thoughts, His ideas, His thinking and wisdom. It contains God’s manner toward all kinds of people, such as His sentiments of mercy and care, and still more His wrath toward mankind’s rebellion and resistance. Because God’s every sentence contains His thinking, His wisdom and His ideas, because they all contain the background and source of His words, because they all naturally express God’s manner toward mankind, with not one sentence that is without foundation, it is a very natural thing for every sentence to contain God’s disposition. Every word human beings say expresses their life disposition, so won’t every word of God contain His disposition that much more? This is easy to comprehend, but how to discover it and know it is not as easy as people imagine. If, when reading God’s words, one does not try to figure them out enough, does not put in enough effort or has not enough experience, then God’s disposition will not be easy to perceive, much less understand. What is needed then is for man to quiet themselves before God and to wholly put their hearts into God’s words, and for their reading and trying to figure out God’s words to be done during prayer; then you will slowly come to discover the frame of mind behind God’s words. This is the beginning of entry” (The Fellowship From the Above). When I read this fellowship, it all clicked into place. As it turns out, none of the things God does or says are groundless. Instead they are the natural expressions of what God’s life is; they all contain God’s thinking and wisdom, they all contain the purpose of God’s speech and the result He wants to achieve, whilst at the same time they express God’s views on all manner of things, His attitude toward all manner of people, and every single one of these aspects is precisely the essence of God’s life and is an expression of God’s disposition. Therefore, if one wants to know God’s disposition, one has to, from within His words, seek to know what God has and is, God’s thoughts and ideas and God’s thinking and wisdom, as well as God’s attitude toward all kinds of people, and so on. My understanding of God’s disposition, on the other hand, was limited only to what God likes and what He hates. This kind of understanding was too one-sided. Therefore, my pray-reading and my contemplation of God’s words were without direction or purpose, and I didn’t know from what aspect I should try to know God’s disposition, and so the gains I made were naturally lessened. Besides this, I also understood that, if I wanted to understand God’s disposition from His every sentence, I needed to quiet myself before God and make a lot more effort to try to figure out God’s words. Furthermore, I needed to pray more and seek the enlightenment and illumination of the Holy Spirit, so that I could, from within God’s words, understand the truth and understand the frame of mind behind what God has spoken as well as the background and source behind God’s deeds, and so on.
I give thanks to God’s enlightenment and illumination that allowed me to realize these things, and then afterward I started to focus on practicing and entering into this aspect. One day, I read a passage of God’s words: “Whether or not this work is important is based on the needs of mankind, and the reality of mankind’s depravity, and the severity of Satan’s disobedience and its disturbance of the work. The right one who is up to the task is predicated upon the nature of his work, and the importance of the work. When it comes to the importance of this work, in terms of what method of work to adopt—work done directly by the Spirit, or work done by God incarnate, or work done through man—the first to be eliminated is work done through man, and, based on the nature of the work, and the nature of the Spirit’s work versus that of the flesh, it is ultimately decided that work done by the flesh is more beneficial for man than work done directly by the Spirit, and offers more advantages. This is God’s thought at the time to decide whether the work was done by the Spirit or by the flesh” (“Corrupt Mankind Is More in Need of the Salvation of God Become Flesh” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). When I tried carefully to figure out this passage, I felt like I’d uncovered a great bounty. God’s words show the development of God’s thinking at that time, thinking of what method to use for the work in the last days. The first thing God considers in the process of His thinking is what method to use to do this stage of work so as to better achieve the result of saving mankind and make Satan utterly convinced. Then, according to the method of work, God considers what object to choose to undertake this work and thereby to achieve a better result. During this entire thought process, God constantly considered man and never considered His own interests or safety. God clearly knew that His incarnation would suffer much hardship, but this was not a consideration when it came to saving mankind. Instead, He still chose, based on the needs of mankind and the reality of mankind’s depravity, the method of God become flesh to perform the work of the last days. Furthermore, God became flesh in China, this nation that is most backward, most dark and most resistant to God. God incarnate risks great danger to come to earth to work, He endures the frenzied persecution and pursuit of the CCP government, He endures the abuse and blasphemy of the various religions and denominations, and also endures the resistance, rebellion and misunderstanding of those of us who follow. The wounds and attacks inflicted on God’s heart and the humiliation that God endures really are things no one can comprehend. Everything God expresses and reveals is all that He is in life: His selfless dedication to mankind and His paying the price for them. God’s greatness and selflessness are revealed naturally in His work and His every sentence, and these also embody God’s great mercy and selfless love. God’s love for mankind is not just empty words, but is a deed done in reality, and a practical price that He pays. At that time, I got a vivid sense that God really is so great and so lovable, and even more I felt that God’s disposition is so good! Although I had read these words of God previously, I had never understood the background behind the words Christ spoke or all that they revealed, nor had I understood Christ’s love for mankind. Only now did I have some true understanding of these words of God: “Every sentence I have spoken contains within it the disposition of God.”
Before, as I had never quieted my heart to earnestly figure out God’s words, nor known from what aspect I should contemplate God’s words, I lost so many good opportunities to understand God, so much so that even believing in God for years, I still have many conceptions and misunderstandings about God, and am still estranged from Him. Only now do I understand that if I wish to understand God’s disposition, I must try earnestly to figure out and seek the truth within God’s every sentence. In this way, I will surely profit greatly. From today on, I wish to focus on putting much more effort into God’s words, and seek to soon become one who has some understanding of God.
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Spreading and testifying to Almighty God’s work of the last days—this is God’s commission to His chosen people, and the aims of The Church of Almighty God.
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