By Xuesong

We are doomed to live through a mournful life from birth. Since we come crying into the world, we have been expressing in cries of anguish and sadness our whole life. What a sad representation it is!

When we learn to speak and walk, we have a short period of innocence, but this feeling of happiness is just a flash in the pan.

After we grow up, we have to choose the way of life. Maybe we are content with our current situation, and willing to be ordinary; maybe we choose to hold ourselves aloof from the world and live a quiet life; maybe we prefer to accomplish both success and fame and live in glory … However, no matter what way we choose, no one can escape the mournful destiny in the end. For example, Li Bai, the famous open-minded and unruly poet of the Tang Dynasty, who wrote the verse of “Drank wine at ten thousand coins a cask and laughed his fill,” couldn’t escape the abject condition that “Drink wine to drown your sorrow, it will heavier grow” when facing the open and secret struggle in the official circles. Su Dongpo, a poet of the Song Dynasty, was unrestrained and heroic. However, when he was frustrated, he also couldn’t help but lament that “People have sorrow or joy; they part and meet again. The moon dims and shines; it waxes and wanes.” Tao Yuanming, the well-known poet of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, chose a hermetic life in the mountains in his old age, and held himself aloof from the world. In fact, he was quite upset with the continual restraint that made it impossible for him to achieve his ambition with talents. It seemed that he lived a peaceful and quiet life, but in his heart, the anger toward the world was finding ways to break out. Du Fu, a poet of gloomy style, also sighed over the desolate world after experiencing the changing from flourish to decadence of the Tang Dynasty, and wrote down the narrative poems “Sanli” and “Sanbie” … The writers and poets even lamented for life so much, how could us ordinary people escape the sorrowful ending of life? We may live with our faces to the soil and our backs to the sky, or we may lead an idle life and are indifferent to everything, or we may even bury ourselves in work. But when we are in the old age, we can do nothing but leave the world in tears with regret and reluctance.

In all ages, we man’s mournful destiny has never been changed. We all have weddings and funerals, enjoy merrymaking, are busy laboring to earn money, suffer hardships, only to feel empty and helpless. The development of knowledge and science is awesome to us; the sheer cunning and falsehood in the workplace exhausted us mentally and physically; the indulgence and merrymaking after we are satiated with food and drink deprave us and lead us astray; the interests and the nepotism between people makes us frown and sigh. We inevitably reveal our helplessness and have questions about life, as well.

We all want to know: Why is life so mournful? Is this what life should be like? Isn’t there any way to change it?

Consult the Bible, and we can find the answer.

Actually, our anguish results from Satan’s temptation. When our ancestors, Adam and Eve, were living happily in the Garden of Eden, Satan arrived quietly with falsehood. Having forgotten God’s exhortation, they listened to Satan’s words and ate the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And then sin came into the world. Due to sin, they were driven away from Eden and had to support their family through hard labor; due to sin, we lost the direction and hope of our life. It is sin that makes us willful and unrestrained, self-important and conceited; it is sin that makes us lead a luxurious and dissipated life, and abandon ourselves to vice; it is sin that makes us selfish and intrigue against each other; it is sin that makes us seek fame and gain, and kill each other; it is sin that makes us depart from God …

It is said in Romans 6:23, “For the wages of sin is death.” Sin leads to death, not only of the flesh, but of the soul.

Hence, when we know the existence of sin, shall we do nothing but give free rein to the spread of it? Of course not! “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved” (John 3:16-17). The Lord Jesus came into the world as a man to be the sin offering, and bore our sins, so that we were not destroyed for sins. When we are at our wit’s end and feel empty and helpless, we have the Lord’s comfort and mercy, and His forgiveness. Isn’t this the greatest grace for us?

However, grace can’t resolve our sinful nature. The Lord Jesus’ sin offering only spared us from being put to death according to law for our sins, but it doesn’t mean our sinful nature within is purified. Our behavior and inner heart are still in bitterness and perplexity. Only God’s work of judgment in the last days can purify us truly. Hebrews 9:27-28, “And as it is appointed to men once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and to them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin to salvation.” 1 Peter 4:17, “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God.” And John 12:47-48, “And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. He that rejects me, and receives not my words, has one that judges him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.” Moreover, in the Revelation, John saw the vision of the last days, “And the voice which I heard from heaven spoke to me again, and said, Go and take the little book which is open in the hand of the angel which stands on the sea and on the earth. And I went to the angel, and said to him, Give me the little book. And he said to me, Take it, and eat it up; and it shall make your belly bitter, but it shall be in your mouth sweet as honey. And I took the little book out of the angel’s hand, and ate it up; and it was in my mouth sweet as honey: and as soon as I had eaten it, my belly was bitter” (Revelation 10:8-10).

From this, we understand that in order to completely resolve our sinful nature, God does the work of judgment beginning at the house of God on the basis of the Lord Jesus’ work of redemption. God’s work of judgment in the last days is to open the “little book” in Revelation to us mankind, and to bring us the way of eternal life by casting off our sinful nature and achieving purification and salvation.

Sin entered our hearts and brought us endless anguish from the moment our ancestors, Adam and Eve, were seduced and corrupted by Satan. To cast off the anguish and helplessness, we need to accept the Creator’s salvation of the last days. By the time we experience the judgment before the seat of Christ in the last days after the Lord’s redemption and completely cast off our sinful nature, it will fulfill the prophecy of the Revelation: “And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. And he that sat on the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said to me, Write: for these words are true and faithful” (Revelation 21:3-5). Those who experience the judgment and purification before the seat of Christ in the last days, and are saved and gained by God, will have no crying, no sadness, no pain, no sorrow and no tears. All sufferings and anguish will be removed because of God’s work of judgment and all sins will be ended and vanished. We will have eternal peace and joy, and live in the kingdom with God forever.

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