Source: https://www.bertha-dudde.org/en/proclamation/2886

2886 Christ's teaching on love.... right representatives.... fight of faith....

September 18, 1943: Book 37

Words of faith and love have to be offered by those who have knowledge themselves if they are to be effective for their fellow human beings, otherwise they will be without strength and fall flat on their ears. And that is why the gospel can only be offered by those, for they alone are able to give the words power because they themselves have become recipients of power through the knowledge imparted to them. And this is the characteristic of a true representative of Christ on earth, that he can clearly explain all correlations as soon as people desire an explanation, that he can substantiate everything and that his explanations radiate wisdom, whereas the false representatives of Christ, who are not in truth themselves, only adhere to book knowledge which, however, mostly lacks context. However, as soon as they themselves are imbued with the truth of what they preach, the words of faith and love will also fall on fertile ground, if love for one's neighbor determines a person to proclaim Christ's teaching of love. It is not so much a matter of outward appearances as of educating people to love, for only through loving actions does a person attain faith, truth and therefore also knowledge, provided he does not resist the latter by tenaciously clinging to a false teaching despite an inner urge to reject it. The gospel should be proclaimed to people, Christ's pure teaching of love should be made accessible to them.... yet what is currently being offered to them is indisputably no longer the simple, clear and understandable teaching which Jesus Christ Himself gave to people on earth, but everything bears the stamp of earthly thinking. The divine has been interspersed with human accessories, the spiritual has been combined with earthly goals, and thus a church has been formed which has little claim to having been founded by Jesus Christ. And the battle will constantly be fought against the additional human work, whereas Christ's teaching of love is the legacy of Christ to every denomination, which will always and forever be acknowledged and therefore also promoted. Whoever sees an organization in the church of Christ is not yet in the right knowledge, but he can nevertheless be a true representative of His teaching of love and work for the blessing of mankind, only he himself cannot mature in knowledge and therefore also not impart the right knowledge to his fellow human beings. He cannot answer the many questions which a person who seriously struggles for God and the truth will ask when the difficult time of the battle of faith has begun, which demands a clear attitude from people but which he can only gain through knowledge which corresponds to the truth. The knowledgeable person who can offer his fellow human beings truthful enlightenment in an understandable way will be far more successful, he will be more likely to find faith, a faith that is convinced and will survive the difficult turmoil in the battle of faith. For only a firm conviction gives a person the strength to persevere to the end. And conviction can only be gained through the pure truth, but never through teachings permeated by error, even if they are offered by believers, i.e. by people who strive towards God, i.e. who are of a will turned towards God. Error will always have a corrosive effect, whereas truth has a unifying, complementary and thus knowledge-increasing effect. And increased knowledge gives the human being spiritual freedom, it gives him strength in the face of the world and ensures his ascent, it ensures a state of maturity which can never be achieved by those who are not in truth, i.e. in the right knowledge. They lack strength and their struggle is much more difficult if they have to prove themselves, if they are to stand up for their faith before the world....

amen

Translated by Doris Boekers