In the Bible, Paul says, “That if you shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved. For with the heart man believes to righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made to salvation” (Romans 10:9–10). Because of this, the religious world thinks that when the Lord returns, they will be raptured directly to the kingdom of heaven, so the Lord does not need to perform the work of judgment in the last days.

Words From the Bible

“Not every one that said to Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that follows the will of My Father which is in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, and in Your name have cast out devils, and in Your name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess to them, I never knew you: depart from Me, you that work iniquity” (Matthew 7:21–23).

“Truly, truly, I say to you, Whoever commits sin is the servant of sin. And the servant stays not in the house for ever: but the son stays ever” (John 8:34–35).

“For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries” (Hebrews 10:26–27).

“You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:45).

“Without holiness no man shall see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14).

“Blessed are they that wash their robes, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city” (Revelation 22:14).

“I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth” (John 16:12–13).

“For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God” (1 Peter 4:17).

“And if any man hears My words, and believes not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. He that rejects Me, and accepts not My words, has one that judges him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day” (John 12:47–48).

Words of Almighty God of the Last Days

At the time, Jesus’ work was the work to redeem all mankind. The sins of all who believed in Him were forgiven; as long as you believed in Him, He would redeem you; if you believed in Him, you were no longer of sin, you were relieved of your sins. This is what it meant to be saved, and to be justified by faith. Yet in those who believed, there remained that which was rebellious and opposed God, and which still had to be slowly removed. Salvation did not mean man had been completely gained by Jesus, but that man was no longer of sin, that he had been forgiven his sins. Provided you believed, you would never more be of sin.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Vision of God’s Work (2)

As man sees it, God’s crucifixion had already concluded the work of God’s incarnation, redeemed all of mankind, and allowed Him to seize the key to Hades. Everyone thinks God’s work has been fully accomplished. In fact, from God’s perspective, only a small part of His work had been accomplished. All He had done was to redeem mankind; He had not conquered mankind, let alone changed man’s satanic countenance. That is why God says, “Although My incarnate flesh went through the pain of death, that was not the whole goal of My incarnation. Jesus is My beloved Son and was nailed to the cross for Me, but He did not exhaustively conclude My work. He only did a portion of it.” Thus God initiated the second round of plans to continue the work of the incarnation. God’s ultimate intention was to perfect and to gain all of the people saved from Satan’s clutches, which was why God prepared, once again, to brave the danger of coming into the flesh.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Work and Entry (6)

You only know that Jesus shall descend in the last days, but how exactly will He descend? A sinner such as you, who has just been redeemed, and hasn’t undergone change or God’s perfection—can you be in line with God’s intentions? For you, you who are still of your old self, it is true that you were saved by Jesus, and you are not of sin because of the salvation of God, but this does not prove that you are without sin or impurity. How can you be sanctified if you have not undergone change? Within, you are full of impurities, and you are selfish and base, yet you still wish to descend with Jesus—you should be so lucky! You have missed a step in your belief in God; you have merely been redeemed, but you have not undergone change. For you to be in line with God’s intentions, God must personally do the work to change and cleanse you; otherwise you’ve only been redeemed and could not possibly become sanctified. In that case, you are unqualified to enjoy wonderful blessings together with God, for you have fallen a step behind in God’s work of managing man, which is the key step of changing and perfecting man. You, a sinner who has just been redeemed, are therefore incapable of directly receiving God’s inheritance.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Concerning Appellations and Identity

Though Jesus came among man and did much work, He only completed the work of redeeming all mankind and served as man’s sin offering; He did not rid man of all his corrupt disposition. Fully saving man from the influence of Satan not only required Jesus to become the sin offering and bear the sins of man, but it also required God to do even greater work to rid man completely of his Satan-corrupted disposition. And so, after man was forgiven of his sins, God returned to the flesh to lead man into the new age, and began the work of chastisement and judgment. This work has brought man into a higher realm. All those who submit under His dominion shall enjoy higher truth and receive greater blessings. They shall truly live in the light, and they shall gain the truth, the way, and the life.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Preface

Before man was redeemed, many of Satan’s poisons had already been planted within him and, after thousands of years of being corrupted by Satan, he has within him a nature that resists God. Therefore, when man was redeemed, it was nothing more than a case of redemption. That is, man was bought back at a high price, but the poisonous nature within him was not eliminated. Man that is so filthy must undergo a change before becoming worthy to serve God. By means of this work of judgment and chastisement, man will fully come to know the filthy and corrupt essence within his own self, and he will be able to change completely and become purified. Only in this way can man become worthy to return before the throne of God. All the current work is performed so that man can be purified and be changed; it is so that man can cast off his corruption and be purified through the judgment and chastisement of the word, and through refinement. Rather than deeming this stage of work to be that of salvation, it would be more apt to say it is the work of purification. In truth, this stage is also the work of conquest, as well as the second stage in the work of salvation. It is through judgment and chastisement by the word that man comes to be gained by God, and it is through refinement, judgment, and exposure by the word that all of the impurities, notions, motives, and personal hopes within man’s heart are completely revealed. Although man has been redeemed and forgiven of his sins, this can only be considered as God not remembering the transgressions of man and not treating man in accordance with his transgressions. However, man lives in the flesh without being set free from sin, and can only continue to sin, endlessly revealing his satanic corrupt dispositions. This is the life that man leads, an endless cycle of sinning and being forgiven. The majority of people sin by day and confess in the evenings. And so, even though the sin offering is forever effective for man, it cannot save man from sin. Only half the work of salvation has been completed, for man still has corrupt dispositions. … It is not easy for man to become aware of his sins, and he has no way of recognizing his own deeply rooted nature. It is only through the judgment of the word that this result can be achieved. Only thus can man gradually be changed from this point onward.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Mystery of the Incarnation (4)

Christ of the last days uses a variety of truths to teach man, to expose the substance of man, and to dissect the words and deeds of man. These words comprise various truths, such as man’s duty, how man should submit to God, how man should be loyal to God, how man ought to live out normal humanity, as well as the wisdom and the disposition of God. These words are all directed at the substance of man and his corrupt dispositions. In particular, the words that expose how man rejects God are even more so directed at how man is an embodiment of Satan, and an enemy force against God. In undertaking His work of judgment, God does not fully explain the nature of man in a few words; He exposes and prunes over the long term. All these different methods of exposure and pruning cannot be substituted with ordinary words; rather, the truth which man absolutely does not possess is used to carry out this work of exposure and pruning. Only methods such as these can be called judgment; only through judgment of this kind can man be subdued and thoroughly convinced about God, and moreover gain true knowledge of God. What the work of judgment brings about is man’s understanding of the true face of God and the truth about his own rebelliousness. The work of judgment has enabled man to gain much understanding of the intentions of God, of the purpose of God’s work, and of the mysteries that are incomprehensible to him. It has also enabled man to understand and know his corrupt essence and the root of his corruption, as well as to discover his ugly face. These effects are all brought about by the work of judgment, for the essence of this work is actually the work of opening up God’s truth, way, and life to all those who have faith in Him. This work is the work of judgment done by God.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Christ Does the Work of Judgment With the Truth

In essence, God does the work of chastisement and judgment to purify humanity, and for the sake of the ultimate day of rest; otherwise no members of humanity could be sorted according to their kind, or enter into rest. This work is humanity’s only path to enter into rest. Only God’s work of purification will cleanse humans of their unrighteousness, and only His work of chastisement and judgment will expose those rebellious elements of humanity, thereby distinguishing those who can be saved from those who cannot, and those who can remain from those who cannot. When this work ends, those people who can remain will all be purified and enter a higher realm of humanity in which they will enjoy a more wonderful second human life upon the earth; in other words, they will enter into humanity’s day of rest and live together with God. After those who cannot remain have been chastised and judged, their true colors will be entirely exposed, after which they will all be destroyed and, like Satan, will no longer be permitted to survive upon the earth. The humanity of the future will no longer include any of this type of people; such people are not fit to enter the land of the ultimate rest, nor are they fit to enter into the day of rest that God and humanity will share, for they are the targets of punishment, they are evil, and they are not righteous people. They were redeemed once, and they have also been judged and chastised; they also once labored for God. However, when the final day comes, they will still be eliminated and destroyed due to their evil and as a result of their rebelliousness and inability to be redeemed; they will never again come into being in the world of the future, and will no longer live among the human race of the future. Whether they are spirits of the dead or people still living in the flesh, all evildoers and all those who have not been saved will be destroyed once the sanctified among humanity enter into rest. As for these evildoing spirits and humans, or the spirits of righteous people and those who do righteousness, regardless of what era they are in, all those who are evil will ultimately be destroyed, and all those who are righteous will survive. Whether a person or spirit will receive salvation is not entirely decided on the basis of the work of the final age; rather, it is determined by whether or not they have resisted or rebelled against God. People in the previous era who committed evil and could not attain salvation will, undoubtedly, be targets for punishment, and those in the current era who commit evil and cannot be saved will surely be targets for punishment, too. Humans are categorized on the basis of good and evil, not by which epoch they live in. Once thus categorized, they will not be punished or rewarded immediately; rather, God will only carry out His work of punishing evil and rewarding good after He has finished carrying out His work of conquest in the last days. Actually, He has been separating humans into good and evil ever since He started doing His work of mankind’s salvation. It is just that He will reward the righteous and punish the evil only after His work has come to an end; it is not that He will separate them into categories upon the completion of His work and then immediately set about the task of punishing evil and rewarding good. Rather, this task will be done only when His work is wholly finished. The sole purpose behind God’s ultimate work of punishing evil and rewarding good is to thoroughly purify all humans so that He may bring a purely sanctified humanity into eternal rest. This stage of His work is the most crucial; it is the final stage of the whole of His work of management. If God did not destroy the evil, but instead allowed them to remain, then all of humanity would still be unable to enter into rest, and God would not be able to bring them into a better realm. Such work would not be completely finished. When His work is finished, the whole of humanity will be entirely sanctified; only in this way will God be able to live in rest peacefully.

—The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. God and Man Will Enter Into Rest Together

Related Movie Extracts

What Exactly Is the Relationship Between Being Saved and Entering the Kingdom of Heaven?

How Does God Do Judgment Work to Cleanse and Save Man in the Last Days?

Related Experiential Testimonies

This Is How I’ve Welcomed the Lord

Related Sermons

Does Salvation Through Faith Grant Entrance to God’s Kingdom?

Related Hymns

The Work of Judgment Is to Cleanse Man’s Corruption

God Judges and Cleanses Man With Words in the Last Days

Those Who Are Not Made Perfect Cannot Receive God’s Inheritance