(Clearwisdom.net) Ms. Lin is a diligent Falun Dafa practitioner in her late 60s. In the late 1990s, she had cancer. Because of her strong righteous thoughts based on her faith in Master and in the Fa, she recovered merely 40 days after she began cultivating. For about ten years, her health was excellent, and she had done the three things well. In recent years, however, she appeared to have "sickness karma" once in a while, and recovered usually within three to five days. She thought this was arranged by Master to help her improve, so she endured it. However, every time the "sickness karma" struck, the symptoms became more serious, and it was happening more and more frequently. Recently for four days straight she had diarrhea and was vomiting continuously. She couldn't eat or drink anything and almost died. She thought this was a test of life and death arranged by Master, so she endured it and wanted to do well.
A few practitioners and I shared our understandings with Ms. Lin. We thought this was a test arranged by the old forces, not by Master; we needed to negate it completely. In "Explaining the Fa During the 2003 Lantern Festival at the U.S. West Fa Conference," Master said,
"Except for newer students, from July 20 of 1999 on, Master hasn't created any personal cultivation tests for you, and that's because overall your personal cultivation has changed in every respect so that it's in the direction of saving sentient beings and validating Dafa."
Lin's "sickness karma" was actually a manifestation of the persecution by the rotten ghosts taking advantage of our gaps. It was absolutely not a test arranged by Master. Currently during the Fa rectification period, everything is done to validate Fa and save sentient beings. On the other hand, the evil's persecution seeks to destroy sentient beings. The tests arranged by Master were set up according to our xinxing and ability to bear. As long as we elevate our xinxing, we should be able to pass them. They should not prevent us from doing the three things. Tribulations and difficulties that far exceed the practitioners' xinxing and ability to bear, and problems that should not happen at this time, are all interference and persecution arranged by the old forces. The old forces want to use these extreme hardships to destroy practitioners. We need to recognize them and completely negate them.
In "The Closer to the End, the More Diligent You Should Be," Master said,
"Going through hardship and suffering is an outstanding opportunity to remove karma, be cleansed of sin, purify the body, elevate your plane of thought, and rise in level--it's an extraordinarily good thing. This is a correct and upright Fa-truth."
Based on this, some practitioners passively endure all serious physical "sickness karma." When they can't pass tests, they even hear Master's voice in the ears, telling them that this is a test for them. (This is because the practitioners believe that this is arranged by Master, so the old forces took advantage of this thought to try to destroy them.) Actually, at present, all serious "sickness karma"are evil tribulations. This is completely different from the "going through hardship and suffering" Master talked about. Of course, be it evil tribulation or "going through hardship and suffering," we all need to look inward, improve ourselves, and elevate our xinxing through the difficulties. The difference is that if it is indeed a tribulation arranged by the old forces, we need to completely negate their arrangement and end the persecution through our thoughts and actions. Although this may mean more hardship, or even severe suffering, this is walking well our paths while negating the old forces' arrangement. We are walking the paths arranged by Master. In contrast, passively enduring such tribulations is just following the old forces' arrangement.
In "To the Chicago Fa Conference," Master said,
"Whatever you experience during your cultivation--whether good or bad--is good, for it comes about only because you are cultivating."
Some practitioners think that because of this, bad things such as serious "sickness karma" are good things too, and therefore should be passively endured. These and other kinds of tribulations are all related to our xinxing and shortcomings on which we need to improve. It's good for us to look inward, cultivate ourselves, improve xinxing, and at the same time completely negate the old forces' arrangement. If we stray from the Fa, we would unwittingly accept the old forces' arrangement, passively endure tribulations, and our xinxing would drop as well.
We shared our thoughts with Lin and all of us improved our understandings. Her health also improved.
