(Minghui.org) As Dafa practitioners, we know that in order to help save sentient beings, Master has borne tremendous karma and suffered for us. We should treasure Master's sacrifice and cultivate diligently.
However, some practitioners have not understood how big our responsibilities are. They still seek ordinary comfortable lifestyles and waste the precious time provided by Master, who must have endured a lot for it. This includes myself. I have often wasted a lot of time due to my attachments to laziness and comfort.
Master said:
"You know that when Jesus entered among ordinary men to save people, he had to suffer for people, and he was eventually nailed to a cross. You don’t know what this means. You only know that Judaism did that terrible thing. Actually, it’s not that simple. There were other factors involved. If we’re to follow the logic that you just expressed, think about it: Since Jesus had such great abilities and his father was Lord of the Caucasians, couldn’t he do whatever he wanted? Why did he spend so much effort on Earth persuading people to do good, telling people principles of the truth, and suffering so much for human beings? And at that time he also had to endure suppression and sabotage from other religions. Why then bother to do things the way he did? It means that even though he had such great abilities, he still had to rectify the human heart in order to save a person. If any of you sitting here can’t cultivate your xinxing to the point of Consummation, then I can’t do anything about it either. I can teach you the principles of the Fa, I can help you evolve gong, I can eliminate a portion of your karma for you, I can protect you, and I can do a huge range of things for you that you don’t know about but that are necessary when you Consummate and afterwards. But if your heart doesn’t change and your mind doesn’t elevate, then all of that is in vain. That’s what I mean when I say that if a person’s heart doesn’t change, even a Buddha can’t help him." (Teaching the Fa at the Conference in Europe)
I believe Master wanted to encourage us to cultivate more diligently by showing us what he is bearing for us. But some practitioners have not understood Master's mercy. Upon seeing Master suffer, they doubted him instead of being grateful for what he has done for us. This gives the old forces more excuses to disturb Master and Fa-rectification.
Another issue I noticed is that many practitioners do not seem to realize that we have a duty to protect Dafa. When sending forth righteous thoughts, we include time to cleanse the interference affecting ourselves. However, have we taken time to consider the disturbances to Master? Some of us have taken it for granted that Master easily bears our karma.
Master said:
"You’ve all seen that many people have come to learn this Fa. In the future there will be even more. You know, for you to cultivate, those things need to be done by the master. But I’m different from them, for whether it be Jesus or Shakyamuni, they are, after all, enlightened beings of a small scale. I’m not inside the cosmos, so I can resolve problems of the lives at different levels and in different cosmic bodies of the cosmos. I said that saving human beings isn’t my true goal, but they are one level of beings that’s included—they are a level of life that I wish to save. In fact, I myself don’t have any ordeals, I’m not cultivating. The troubles I encounter rarely manifest here on the ordinary human side, but there are those that do manifest here, and most of them aren’t known to you. The reason I can free myself from this problem is that I’m not within it. I won’t be like them, unable to disentangle myself. I can disentangle myself, but the difficulty is extremely great, it’s something none of you beings can imagine. I can give up to the greatest extent possible everything of mine, and that is why I can resolve all of it. (Applause)
By the way, let me further emphasize something related to the question that was just raised. There are often some students who accompany me, by my side, and in each region there are some people in charge—center coordinators or others in charge. You need to understand something: Everything you run into is about dealing with hardships. Yet you cannot represent Master. When it comes to any matter in which you know I’ve participated, you have to consider the matter from my perspective. That’s something you’ve neglected before. Troubles created for me are damage directed at this Fa. So it’s completely different from your passing through your hardships. It’s definitely not that your master is cultivating or that your master is passing tests. It really is damage directed at the Fa and the cosmos, so they can’t be equated. Be clear on this. When I handle problems, I treat them as real demons, but you cannot! Everything you encounter is directly related to your cultivation. So you always need to treat it as cultivation and find reasons inside yourself. These are completely different." (Teaching the Fa at the Conference in Switzerland)
I enlightened that the old forces not only try to disturb Dafa practitioners and their Fa-validation projects, but also disrupt Master's Fa-rectification, such as interference with Shen Yun (which is led by Master). We practitioners must help eliminate these disturbances when sending righteous thoughts.
Master said:
"In order to lessen the persecution of Dafa and Dafa disciples, I have asked disciples to send forth righteous thoughts to clear away the damage these beings deliberately do to the Fa-rectification, thereby lessening what Dafa disciples should not endure during the persecution and, at the same time, saving all sentient beings and consummating Dafa disciples’ paradises." ("The Effect of Righteous Thoughts," Essentials for Further Advancement II)
The Minghui website published a sequence of Editorial Notices in 2001 that clearly specify this: "eradicating all of the evil within the three realms that damage Dafa."
("Editorial: Send Forth Righteous Thoughts") ("Editorial: Send Forth Righteous Thoughts Again") ("Editorial: Send Forth Righteous Thoughts at Set Times") ("Editorial: Regarding Sending Forth Righteous Thoughts")
I noticed that many practitioners have not paid attention to eliminating all the evil that damages Dafa. I found that I myself had a very hard time concentrating on the thought of "eradicating all of the evil within the three realms that damage Dafa" when I sent righteous thoughts.
I read a practitioner's experience-sharing article that included the following:
"One day Master's Fashen brought me to an ancient gate tower. On the top of the tower stood a gentleman. Countless people were at the bottom of the tower. All of them were holding bows and shooting arrows toward the man on the top, whose body was already full of arrows. I could not bear it and I ran to the man: "You are such a capable man, but why don't you hide from the arrows?" The man turned to face me. I saw it was Master!”
“'I can not hide,' said Master. 'I am paying the debt for all of you.'”
"I cried. I understood: Master was bearing all our crimes!"
When I read the article, my first thought was: No! We cannot allow them to shoot arrows at Master! If I were there, I would immediately run in front of Master and cover him with my own body!
After I had this thought, my legs hurt so badly during the sitting meditation I almost could not endure the pain. But I was very firm: I would not take my legs down!
I felt that a lot of my karma was eliminated. I knew Master was reinforcing me!
Later I realized that I should also send righteous thoughts and help eliminate the minions who shoot arrows at Master.Every life in this universe is created by Master. How dare anyone shoot at him!
According to my understanding, when we see that Master is bearing our karma, we should not take it for granted. We should repay his infinite mercy by looking inward, finding our shortcomings, and cultivate more diligently. Meanwhile, we should send righteous thoughts to eliminate all the evil factors that damage Master and Dafa.
The above is my personal understanding. Please point out anything that is incorrect.