(Clearwisdom.net) The rapid progress and the grand power of Fa-rectification have brought about many manifestations in human society--unusual phenomena, admonishing signs. Master's words in recent lectures have become stronger and stronger. The Fa principles and concepts such as "putting down human mentalities," "righteous thoughts" and "Fa rectifying the human realm is imminent" have an ever more important bearing on and are an increasingly clearer message for every Falun Dafa practitioner. We all feel it is of extraordinary importance to shoulder the responsibility to help Master to save sentient beings during the Fa-rectification. Moreover, we feel the urgency to offer salvation to sentient beings.
After Master's new article "My Version of a ''Stick Wake-up'" was published on Clearwisdom, practitioners in our region repeatedly studied the lecture, shared our understandings and looked into ourselves in retrospect. I would like to share our understanding and discussion with all fellow practitioners.
1. Recently, when practitioners in various regions go all out to offer salvation to living beings, have Falun Dafa truth clarification materials production sites everywhere and do the three things Master taught us to do [study the Fa, explain the facts and send righteous thoughts], the major difficulty we are facing is the shortage of funds. This is because the old forces desperately interfere with Fa-rectification by blocking the sources of funds.
It has been a common problem in China. One of the policies in the evil persecution is "destroy them financially." Practitioners' financial status in various regions in China differs quite a bit. It made me realize that our financial trouble was a result of not having studied the Fa well enough. We admitted to such interference and had endured it passively.
Secondly, we failed to exert the power of a whole body. Several practitioners involved in preparing Dafa materials and coordination encountered tremendous pressure; they often ran into the situation where other practitioners were in urgent need of materials for truth clarification but they were short of funds for equipment and supplies. I would like to share with all fellow practitioners what we didn't do well and where we fell short and thus encountered severe interference. I hope to be able to "encourage each other, and progress together with diligence," as Master requires of us.
2. Most practitioners involved in material preparation in our region and vicinity are practitioners released from forced labor camps in various locales or those who had gone into exile because of the persecution. A few years ago we published a statement on the Minghui/Clearwisdom website to express our determination to deny the persecution, to do even better to retrieve the loss and diligently follow Master in Fa-rectification. Soon after that, the first materials production site was established. It was with Master's compassionate protection and care that we were able to set up the materials production site.
At that time, many of us had just been released from forced labor camps. We were having great financial difficulty because we had paid fines or deposits to the labor camps and we were unemployed for years. Several women practitioners in their sixties or seventies suddenly came out of nowhere and gave me a pack of money worth 2,000 to 3,000 Yuan. They told me, "It's our savings from the money our children gave us. Maybe you can put it to good use and let us know if it's enough. If not, we'll think of other ways to help raise more money." In the past two years, we have bought an all-in-one printer, notebook computer, a copier and as of now, we have a digital all-in-one printer, capable of printing a box of material in two hours. Countless materials and Master's new articles have been printed and distributed from our site. We have cut truth clarification VCDs amounting to 50,000-60,000 copies. The cost was several dozen thousand yuan.
Every time we have Fa conference, it is a great encouragement for everyone. We have run into several occasions when we had to wait for additional funds and our site was about to be shut down. Every one of us was able to take the Fa as our teacher. We asked Master to help strengthen our capabilities and deny the old forces' interference and persecution with righteous thoughts. For example, once a practitioner from another region whom we never met before heard that we were producing truth materials. She asked another practitioner to bring us 70,000 Yuan cash in several deliveries. Later, we found that VCDs were most effective in truth-clarification. A seventy-year-old practitioner whom we just got to know gave us a total of 90,000 Yuan over several deliveries. Every time I accepted the money I would say, "Thank you! You have already given us a lot." He always replied with an encouraging but slightly "unhappy" tone, "You should not put it this way. Who are you working for, then?" I knew that he meant to say, "For the living beings."
In reality, we didn't do much. It was all through Master's compassionate help and protection. We always feel Master is looking at us with a compassionate smile, encouraging us to put money to good use. Whenever we buy equipment, we are always able to get it at the lowest available price.
In summer when we are thirsty, we go to the restroom to drink water from the tap. Sometimes we kept being busy until' dark without eating anything. Several times we had instant noodles at two o'clock in the morning after a day's work.
When I look back on such experiences, I can hardly hold my tears. A common person is unable to believe or understand our experiences. But we have no regrets, no grievance. We are very clear about what Master is teaching us and what we should do.
(A) When I was able to recite verses from Hongyin II, "As soon as your thought is righteous, the evil will be destroyed," and "When disciples' righteous thoughts are strong, Teacher's mighty power can help them do everything" (Provisional translation of 'The Kindness of Master and Disciples' from Hongyin II, a collection of Teacher's poems). I felt extremely confident and I was filled with tremendous power. What is "Teacher's mighty power can help them do everything?" That is truly "the Boundless Buddha Law!" Master has said so. "Buddha law has no boundary." We have such a great Master! We are cultivating the fundamental Great Fa of the universe. We are undertaking the greatest responsibility and greatest endeavor to offer salvation to sentient beings, an opportunity Master endowed us with, which no one else has ever had since the creation of heaven and earth. We are so fortunate!
In "Teaching the Fa at the Meeting with Asia-Pacific Students," Master said,
"As a Dafa disciple you should just pitch in what you can--be it money, effort, or whatnot."
In "Teaching the Fa at the Washington, D.C. Fa Conference" Master taught us,
"Each of you Dafa disciples should truly recognize who you are and walk your path well. You really are that magnificent, so you have to rationally and seriously do well the things you're supposed to do today. Now when we clarify the truth to others you all feel that we should treat sentient beings with compassion; then all the more so should you be compassionate among our Dafa disciples. You're all disciples in the same practice, and you're giving your all for the cosmos' Fa-rectification, so you should cooperate well with one another. Don't approach things with too many human attachments, and don't cause unnecessary conflicts and arguments by interacting with each other with human attachments. In these situations your conduct should always show Dafa disciples' tolerance, kindness, and niceness. The next person's things are your things, and your things are his things. We don't talk about the "unity" everyday people do, which is a forced, superficial thing. You are cultivators, and your realms are higher."
(B) Here, I'd like to share with everyone my understanding of the true origin and true identity of we Dafa disciples. I didn't realize this before. It was only from recent Fa study that I came to have this understanding of the origins and the identities of Dafa disciples in this Fa-rectification period. Master said,
"The new cosmos is incomparably wonderful and infinitely massive amidst the Fa-rectification, because the entire colossal firmament is made up of tens of millions of incomparably massive cosmic systems, and the great majority of the enormous cosmic systems that have been rectified by the Fa have already entered the new history."
("The Effects of Righteous Thoughts," Essential for Further Advancement II)
Master also said,
"In the time to come, you will be able to reach a very high level---one which is so high that it is beyond your imagination. As long as you practice cultivation, it will not be a problem for you to achieve the Right Fruit in cultivation."
(Lecture 3, Zhuan Falun)
In the past, I always thought that at most we would be several levels higher than a Tathagata, with more Wan symbols. One day when I was reading one of Teacher's articles published during the Fa-rectification period, I felt as if something exploded in my head. In essence, [as I understand it] the "tens of millions of cosmic systems" Master mentioned exist in this small planet Earth, not anywhere else. When manifest in the human realm, isn't it the tens of millions of Falun Dafa practitioners who are diligently cultivating themselves during the Fa-rectification period? Master said,
"This is magnificent--truly magnificent. Without the Fa-rectification, Fa-rectification period Dafa disciples' magnificence wouldn't be shown so prominently. Dafa disciples: the things you are faced with are magnificent, your responsibilities are major, and then there's your origin, of course--it's taking all these things into consideration that I say you're magnificent."
(Teaching the Fa at the 2002 Fa Conference in Boston)
"When you've succeeded in cultivation the beings of the future will know about your infinite Buddha's grace."
(Teaching the Fa at the Conference in Vancouver, Canada, in 2003)
In "My Version of a ''Stick Wake-Up'" Master said,
"...to put it plainly, [think about] what kind of a being is worthy of salvation by the Great Law of the cosmos? For a being who is saved, could it just be about personal Consummation?
It turns out our origin is so remote, so sacred. The gods of the immense cosmic systems are not someone else. They are you, they are he/she and they are me [as I understand it at my present level]! Now that we have a clear understanding on who we are, we should live up to Master's expectations and what Master has trustingly put before us. We shall never disappoint those living beings who have great hopes and expectations in us.
(C) When sharing with fellow practitioners, I noticed that some practitioners had misunderstandings about the Clearwisdom notice "Collecting Funds Among Dafa Disciples Is an Act of Undermining the Fa." They jumped to conclusions upon reading the words "It has never been permitted to collect funds, and this act that severely violates the principles of cultivation will not be allowed in the future." This has also caused interference and a negative impact on the upright cooperation between Falun Dafa practitioners. Let's review what Master taught us,
"With that said, I'm telling you that you still can't collect money from students who depend on their salaries to get by. The principle is that we can't collect money from students, and I've said this long ago. Among Dafa disciples there are those who run their own businesses and who have a little more money, and if they would like to contribute money to do some things, that's alright, but be careful with how far it goes. When our ordinary students use their own incomes to do things while validating the Fa, that's no problem in principle, and there's nothing wrong with it, because using your own income to validate the Fa and save sentient beings is your mighty virtue. When Dafa disciples do some things together in special situations, like for example, say some of you want to start a media company or what not, and you pool some money together to do that, there's nothing wrong with that in principle, either, because it's not Dafa that is doing something, it's Dafa disciples on their own who are starting a company in society, and that's a type of work in society; it's Dafa disciples who are initiating things themselves and organizing to do it, and it's not Dafa itself that's doing that. Of course, Dafa disciples are creating favorable conditions for clarifying the facts. But even so, I'm telling you, you can't just arbitrarily collect money from our typical students. That's set in stone. Then as for the cases where somebody who's more affluent and whose daily life won't be affected contributes some money to do Dafa things, that's excluded from the situation I talked about since those are isolated cases, after all. I've never told you to collect some "membership dues" or to beg for alms like religions do. You can't do any of those things."
("Teaching and Explaining the Fa at the Metropolitan New York Fa Conference")
(To be continued)
October 28, 2004
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