5. “At that time, the Jews all read the Old Testament, and they knew that Isaiah had prophesied that a baby boy would be born in a manger. Why did they still persecute Jesus although they clearly knew there was such a prophecy? Wasn’t it all because of their disobedient nature and because they did not know the work of the Holy Spirit? The Pharisees of that time thought that what Jesus did was different from what they knew about the baby boy in the prophecy. And people of today reject God because the incarnated God does not work according to the Bible. Isn’t their substance of disobeying God the same? Can you accept it as long as it is the work of the Holy Spirit? If it is the work of the Holy Spirit, it means that it is the right ‘stream,’ so you should accept it without any misgiving and should not accept it selectively. Isn’t it unnecessary for you to gain some insight from and exercise some caution against God? You should accept a work without looking for more biblical bases as long as it is the work of the Holy Spirit, because in believing in God, you are to follow God, and you should not investigate God. You should not look for more bases for me to prove that I am your God. You should be able to discern whether I am beneficial to you. This is most crucial. Even if you find more conclusive evidence in the Bible, it cannot bring you completely into my presence, and you are only a person living in the Bible but not a person living in my presence. The Bible cannot help you to know me or to have a deeper love for me. … God does the work of each age within very clear boundaries. He only does the work of that age and does not do the work of the next stage ahead of time. Only in this way can his representative work in each age be highlighted. At that time, Jesus only spoke about what the sign of the end time would be and about how people at that time should be patient, how they could be saved, and how they should repent, confess their sins, bear the cross, and endure sufferings, and he did not speak about what people in the end time should enter into and how they should pursue so that they can satisfy God’s heart’s desire. So, if you look for God’s end-time work in the Bible, aren’t you absurd? What can you find out by only holding the Bible? Could anyone, whether a Bible expositor or a preacher, see the work of today clearly beforehand?”
from “How Could Those Who Circumscribe God Within Their ‘Notions’ Receive God’s ‘Revelation’?”
in The Word Appears in the Flesh
6. “The Jewish Pharisees condemned Jesus by the law of Moses. They did not seek how to be compatible with the Jesus of their day but treated every word of the law seriously. As a result, they eventually nailed the sinless Jesus onto the cross on the charge that Jesus did not keep the law of the Old Testament and that Jesus was not the Messiah. What was their essence? Wasn’t it that they did not seek the way to be compatible with the truth? They only took heed of every word and letter of the ‘Scriptures,’ but paid no attention to my will and the steps and the ways of my working. They were not ones who sought the truth but ones who rigidly observed the letters. They were not ones who believed in God but ones who believed in the Bible. To put it incisively, they all were watchdogs of the Bible. In order to safeguard the interests of the Bible, to safeguard the dignity of the Bible, and to safeguard the prestige of the Bible, they even nailed the merciful Jesus onto the cross. They did so only in order to defend the Bible and to safeguard the position of every word and letter of the Bible in people’s heart. So, they would rather forfeit their future and receive no sin offering than not have Jesus executed who was incompatible with the rules in the Scriptures. Weren’t they all running dogs of every word of the Scriptures?
How about people of today? In order to go to heaven and to receive grace, they all would rather drive out of the world the Christ who has come and who releases the truth; in order to safeguard the interests of the Bible, they all would rather completely annul the coming of the truth; in order to maintain the eternal existence of the Bible, they all would rather again nail onto the cross the Christ who has returned in the flesh the second time. … People all seek to be compatible with the letters and with the Bible, but no one comes before me to seek the way to be compatible with the truth. People all look up to the me in heaven and all particularly care about the existence of the me in heaven, but no one cares about the me living in the flesh, because I who live among people am simply too small. Those who only seek to be compatible with the letters of the Bible and those who only seek to be compatible with the vague god are low in my sight, because what they worship is dead letters, is a god that can bestow vast wealth to man, and is a nonexistent god manipulated by man in any way. What can such people receive from me? People’s lowness is simply unspeakable. How could these people who are against me, who demand from me endlessly, who do not love the truth, and who disobey me, be compatible with me?”
from “You Should Seek the Way to Be Compatible with Christ” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
7. “They search for my footprints in the Bible every day. Randomly picking a ‘suitable’ passage, they read it endlessly and recite it as ‘scriptures.’ They do not know how to be compatible with me or what it means to be against me, but just blindly chant ‘scriptures.’ They circumscribe within the Bible the vague god, which they have never seen and which cannot be seen at all, and they pick it up and read it at their leisure. They believe in my existence within the bound of the Bible. They equate ‘me’ with the ‘Bible’: no ‘Bible,’ no ‘me,’ and no ‘me,’ no ‘Bible.’ They do not care about my existence or my deeds, but care much and particularly about every word of the Scriptures. More people even think that without the prophesying of the Scriptures, I should not do anything I wish to do. They consider the Scriptures to be too important, or rather, they consider the letters to be too important, so much so that they measure every word of mine by the verses of the Bible and condemn me by the verses of the Bible. What they seek is not the way to be compatible with me or the way to be compatible with the truth, but the way that can agree with the letters of the Bible. They think that any work that does not agree with the Bible is not my work. Aren’t all these people filial progeny of the Pharisees?”
from “You Should Seek the Way to Be Compatible with Christ” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
8. “Those who only care about the letters of the Bible but do not care about the truth or seeking my footsteps are all the ones who are against me, because they restrict me to the Bible and circumscribe me within the Bible. Their doing so is a very great blasphemy against me. How could such people come before me? What they pay attention to is not my deeds, not my will, and not the truth, but the letter, the letter that kills. How could such people be compatible with me?”
from “You Should Seek the Way to Be Compatible with Christ” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
9. “If you know the Bible and know the history but do not know what the Holy Spirit is doing now, this will not do! If you study the ‘history’ very well and are excellent in it, but you do not know anything about the work the Holy Spirit is doing now, aren’t you foolish? When others ask you, ‘What is God doing now? What to enter into now? How are you doing in pursuing life? Do you understand God’s will?’, you know nothing about these. ‘Then what do you know?’”
from “A Statement About the Bible (4)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
10. “because the Bible has been accompanying man for several thousand years of history, and people all treat it as God, and in the end time people even replace God’s place with the Bible, which is a thing greatly loathed by God. So, in his leisure time, God has to make clear both the inside truth and the origin of the Bible. If not, in man’s heart the Bible can still take the place of God, and people will still condemn and measure God’s doings with the letters of the Bible. By explaining the substance and structure of the Bible and the flaws in it, God is not denying the existence of the Bible or condemning the Bible, but giving a proper and appropriate statement about it and showing what the Bible really is, correcting people’s erroneous knowledge about the Bible, so that they all can have an accurate view about the Bible, no longer worship the Bible, and no longer lose the direction—considering blindly believing in the Bible as believing in God and worshiping God, and even daring not to face the true background of the Bible and the flaws in it. After people all have a pure knowledge of the Bible, they will cast it off without any misgiving and accept God’s new word boldly. … Here, the truth God wants to tell man is that no theory or fact can replace God’s practical work and word, and no thing can take the place of God. If one cannot break away from the trapping of the Bible, then he can never possibly come before God. If one wants to come before God, he needs to first sweep away all the things in his heart that can replace God. Thus God will be satisfied.”
from “A Brief Introduction” to the Third Part of The Word Appears in the Flesh
11. “The Bible is a record of the history of God’s work in Israel. It records many prophecies of the prophets of old and records some of the words Jehovah spoke when he worked at that time. So people all regard this book as ‘holy’ (because God is holy and great). Of course, this shows people’s fear of Jehovah and their adoration of God. People call this book this way simply because created beings are full of fear and adoration of the Creator. Some even call this book a ‘heavenly book.’ Actually, this book is only man’s record, and it was not named by Jehovah personally or written under his personal instruction. In other words, the author of this book is not ‘God’ but ‘man.’ It was called the ‘Holy’ Bible, which was only a respectful name man called it by. That was not decided by Jehovah and Jesus together after they had a discussion together; it was only man’s will. For this book was not written by Jehovah, much less by Jesus, but was written by many prophets of old, apostles, and foretellers and compiled by men later, which is an ancient book people regard as very holy; and in people’s eyes, it contains many unfathomable and profound mysteries, which remain to be unlocked by later generations.”
from “A Statement About the Bible (4)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
12. “Thus, what the Bible records is only the works in Israel at that time. The words spoken by the prophets, that is, the words spoken by Isaiah, Daniel, Jeremiah, Ezekiel…, prophesied other works on earth, the works Jehovah God himself would do, and they were completely from God and were the work of the Holy Spirit. Except for the books of the prophets, all the books are the records of people’s experience of Jehovah’s work at that time.”
from “A Statement About the Bible (1)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
13. “What the Bible records are those limited things, which cannot represent all God’s works. The four Gospels have no more than a hundred chapters altogether. They record nothing but the limited things, such as cursing the fig tree, Peter’s denying the Lord three times, Jesus’ appearing to his disciples after his crucifixion and resurrection, his teachings on fasting, on prayer, and on divorce, his birth, his genealogy, his appointing the disciples…, yet people take these things as treasures and even compare today’s work with them. And they even think that Jesus did no more than these works from his birth, as if God could only do these works and could do no more works. Isn’t this fallacious?”
from “The Mystery of Incarnation (1)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
