The Church of Almighty God | God's will | Chapter 19. The Meaning of God’s Experiencing the Pain of the World
God is incarnated to suffer on man’s behalf, and in so doing will bring about the wonderful destination that will follow for mankind. That stage of work completed by
Jesus was only His becoming the likeness of sinful flesh and being crucified, His serving as a sin offering and redeeming all mankind, and this laid a foundation for mankind’s future entry into their wonderful destination. He took man’s sins upon Himself and became the likeness of sinful flesh and was crucified; He was crucified on behalf of all mankind, after which all of mankind was redeemed. He used His crucifixion and His precious blood to redeem mankind. His precious blood served as a sin offering, meaning that it served as a testimony that man may be without sin and may finally come before God: It was a counter move in the war against Satan. Now in this stage, God is to complete His work and bring the old age to a close. He will bring those of mankind who are left into their wonderful destination. So God has once again become flesh and, as well as conquering man, He has come to endure some suffering on man’s behalf so that their suffering will in the end be taken from them. All of man’s suffering will be removed from them by means of this testimony, this deed, which is God bearing witness for Himself and using this testimony and this bearing witness to defeat Satan, humiliate the devil, and bring about mankind’s wonderful destination. Some people say: “The work of the incarnation is still done by God Himself. It isn’t this flesh that does it, it is done under the control of the Spirit within.” Is it correct to say this? It is not correct. It has been said before that God incarnate’s work of conquest is done in normal humanity, that what you can see is normal humanity, when actually it is God Himself that is doing the work, and that the work this flesh does is being done by God Himself. This is how it was explained and fellowshiped. People often think that this flesh is just a tool or a shell. If God within Him speaks or controls Him, then this flesh speaks or acts, and doesn’t do anything without God’s control. If He is controlled to say something then He says something, otherwise He remains silent. Is this the situation? No, it isn’t. The most powerful explanation now is this: One aspect of God becoming flesh this time is that He has come to do the work of conquest and to bring this age to its end; another aspect is that the flesh’s experiencing the pain of the world is God Himself coming to experience the pain of the world—God’s flesh and God Himself are as one. This flesh is not a tool as people think Him to be, nor is He just a shell; neither is He a physical thing that can be controlled, as people think. This flesh is the embodiment of God Himself. People actually understand it too simply. If it is just fellowshiped in that way, then people will easily separate the flesh from the Spirit. Now people should understand another aspect: God incarnate has come to experience the pain of the world; all the tribulations and illnesses the incarnation suffers are things that He shouldn’t suffer. Some people think that, since He is an ordinary and normal flesh, then this suffering is unavoidable. They think: “People will have a headache and slight fever, and He will also have this. This is something that cannot be avoided, as He is an ordinary and normal flesh. He is not transcendent. He is an ordinary person and He should suffer whatever people suffer. He must feel heat as people do and be bitten by the cold, as people are; He must catch colds as people do….” If you think this, then you are only seeing the ordinariness and normality of the flesh. This normal flesh is just like man with no difference at all. In actual fact, all that He suffers has meaning. People will normally become ill, or suffer something else, and this is that which people ought to suffer. Corrupted people should suffer this way, and this is a normal law. Why does God incarnate endure this suffering? Should Jesus have been crucified? Jesus was a righteous man. According to the laws of that time and all the things He did, He shouldn’t have been crucified. So why was He? He was crucified so that all mankind could be redeemed. Has all the pain and all the persecution that the current incarnation has gone through happened by chance? Or has God arranged it all on purpose? It is neither that God has arranged it on purpose, nor has it happened by chance. It is that it has developed in accordance with normal laws. Why do I say this? It is because God has placed Himself in amongst man so that He can do His work freely. In the doing of His work He is just like man and suffers the same as man. If He were to arrange some pain intentionally, then He would suffer for a few days, but ordinarily He would not be distressed. That is to say that God does His work—His experiencing the pain of the world is not arranged on purpose, even less is it suffered unconsciously. It is that He has come to experience the pain of the world, to place Himself among man, to put Himself in the midst of man and endure the same pain as they do, to be treated equally, and not to be excepted from anything. Just as you have suffered persecution, does Christ not also suffer persecution? As you are hunted and pursued, is Christ not also hunted and pursued? People are afflicted by illnesses, so is His suffering then lessened? He is not excepted. Is this matter easy to understand? There are also some who think that God should endure this pain as He came to work in the nation of the great red dragon. Isn’t this also wrong? To God, there is no argument surrounding whether He should or shouldn’t suffer any pain; God said that He wished to experience the pain of the world and that, at the same time as suffering this pain, He would suffer it on man’s behalf. Then He would bring mankind into their wonderful destination, and Satan would be utterly convinced. To God, it is necessary for Him to endure this suffering. If He didn’t wish to suffer in this stage, if He just wanted to comprehend the pain of man and nothing more, then He could use a few people to do this in His stead. He could use a few apostles or the ones used by the
Holy Spirit to take His place and report back to Him on their pain. Or He could use some special people to bear witness, cause them to endure the worst pain in the world and, if they could endure it, they could then bear this witness and Satan would be utterly convinced, and a future where mankind suffers no more would be brought about. Could God do this? Yes, He could do this. But the work of God Himself can only be done by Him. Though man could bear witness well, their witness would not resound with Satan, and it would say: “Now that You have become flesh, why do You not experience the pain of the world Yourself? …” That is to say, if God didn’t do this work Himself, then that kind of witness would not have sufficient power. The work of God must be done by He Himself; this is the only practical way. It can also be seen from this stage of God’s work that everything God does has meaning, that all the pain that is endured by the incarnation has meaning. You can see that nothing God does is done at random or at will, and that God doesn’t do anything that is of no use. The incarnation has come to do His work and to experience the pain of the world. It matters that God does this work, and it is very essential, both for mankind and for mankind’s future destination. It is all for the salvation of man, for the obtaining of man—these deeds are done and this effort is expended for man’s wonderful destination.
