Source: https://www.bertha-dudde.org/en/proclamation/2162

2162 Accepting the word of truth requires faith and labour of love....

November 23, 1941: Book 31

The spirit from God only gives truth and what it proclaims to man can be accepted as such without hesitation. However, only the believer will be able to judge whether and when the spirit from God is at work, for the unbeliever does not recognize such spiritual activity at all. The believer makes an effort to live in love and is therefore already able to recognize God where He expresses Himself. And the fact that so many people who want to be believers resist the divine word, which is the result of the working of the divine spirit in the human being, is indicative of the shallowness of their faith. They can certainly follow everything their church tells them to do, but if they do not have love, everything is just an empty form and they still walk in darkness of spirit. Then they also do not recognize the light that shines for them, for only love in a person's heart sharpens the power of knowledge. And where the will to do good and right before God is rooted in the heart, that is also where recognition will be, for the divine spiritual spark awakens to life in those people and drives them to love.... And this divine spiritual spark seeks connection with the spiritual power that flows to the human being through the imparted word of God. The spark in a person's heart must always be awakened in order to be able to recognize divine spiritual activity, and good will and loving activity are prerequisites for the awakening of the spirit. The human being will now unhesitatingly accept as truth what is now imparted to him. Where divine truth is resisted, the human being will still try to fathom spiritual knowledge with his intellect, and in this way he will never penetrate divine wisdom. And what the human being has acquired intellectually will not penetrate the human heart as strength either.... again, it will only be empty words that move a person's intellect, but not his heart. For what is to speak to the heart must be born of the spirit, it must be spiritual knowledge which is received directly from the spiritual kingdom and then passed on by a person of love and faith.... For this word will carry the strength within itself, it will touch the human heart and stimulate the human being's will into action; it will be effective because it is strength from God. Divine spiritual strength must be effective if the human being does not resist its effect through unbelief or lack of love. Man's faith and love inevitably attract God's love, and God's love expresses itself in strength, which now flows to man. Recognizing what is good and true, wanting what is good and true and also being able to carry it out, this is brought about by the power from God, which is imparted to people through the divine word....

Amen

Translated by Doris Boekers