(Clearwisdom.net)
One day I received an unexpected phone call. The caller talked to me while crying the whole time. I was startled, and I told her that I would go to see her immediately. It was a fellow practitioner who had begun cultivation in 1996. She was 54 years old and was once my coworker. I saw her a few times not too long ago. Since her niece, who had lived with her since youth, was also a practitioner, I did not pay too much attention to her cultivation state. I only knew that she had never stopped studying the Fa and doing the exercises.
When I met with her this time, I was shocked by what I saw. She was extremely skinny. It took her a great deal of effort just to open up her eyes a little bit. Leaning back against a pile of folded quilts, she held my hand with great emotion and told me what had happened. She had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, and it had spread all over her body. While she spoke, she kept vomiting and stopping for air. In the end, she asked me, "It has been 10 years since I began my cultivation in 1996. I have not stopped studying the Fa and doing the exercises. Why does Teacher let me be this way?" I asked her, "Did you validate Dafa? Did you go and tell people the facts about Dafa? Did you correct those words in Dafa books?" She replied, "No, I only did the exercises at home behind closed doors. I did not correct a single word."
Hearing her cry and listening to her story, I felt bad and thought I was partially responsible. Unintentionally, I said to myself, "I came too late. It is my fault not to have contacted her more often." Then I said to her, "It is not that Teacher let you be this way. It is not that Teacher treated you unfairly. You know, Teacher said in the article ‘A Suggestion’ in Essentials for Further Advancement II:
‘These people who only want to take from Dafa and not give for Dafa are, in the eyes of Gods, the worst beings.’ The problem with you is that you only wanted to gain benefits and did not want to give for Dafa. You did not validate Dafa and did not tell people the facts about Dafa. Do you know what your purpose was when you came to this world? It was to help Teacher rectify the Fa. It was to save sentient beings. But you were only concerned with your physical health. You were only concerned about not being persecuted by the evil.
"Although you studied the Fa everyday, you were not in the Fa. You had surgery in 1996 for breast cancer. You were fine the past ten years because you learned Dafa. You should know that the past ten years of your life that Teacher extended for you was for your cultivation and for you to complete the promises you made in prehistoric times. But you did not do anything to save sentient beings and validate Dafa. All you cared about was your own comfort. Isn’t this going against the requirements of Dafa? How can you say that Teacher let you be this way?"
Hearing these words, she suddenly woke up and said eagerly, "Teacher, I was wrong. Please give me another chance. Let me stand up. I will go immediately to validate Dafa and tell people the facts about Dafa. Teacher, please save me. ...." She told me that she had been sending forth righteous thoughts while gritting her teeth to endure the pain.
When I was ready to leave, she held my hand and would not let go. She kept saying, "Don’t go. Please don't go." She then said, "Don't leave me behind. You have to come back." When two other practitioners and I went to see her again, she insisted on writing down what she had done wrong in the past and wanted me to publish it for her on the web. We helped her clear away the things related to the evil Party, but before I paid her a third visit, she had passed away under the persecution of the old forces.
Witnessing this, I do not want to focus on the fact that she tried to use Dafa as a form of medicine, but rather that I saw the fact that she wanted to come back. Teacher does not want to leave any practitioner behind. Teacher does not want to give up on even those who have gone down a crooked path and directly harmed Dafa and practitioners, and Teacher keeps giving them chances to recover. As a practitioner who is helping Teacher validate Dafa, what have we done? Exactly how well have we understood Teacher's Fa? Aren't we also partially responsible for all that has happened? I felt very sad and ashamed. The sad part is that, even after ten years of cultivation, we still do not know what cultivation truly is. We still do not know what a Fa-rectification period practitioner is. Isn’t it too late to regret it now? The part that I feel ashamed of is that, while we told other people the facts about Dafa and tried to save sentient beings everyday, how much did we care about our own fellow practitioners who had not come forward? How often did we think about them? Don't we feel that we did not do our job? Don’t we have some problems there? Don't we feel ashamed to face Teacher?
I suddenly realized that, while it is important to tell people the facts about Dafa, it is more important to wake up fellow practitioners, because they have obtained Dafa. They were the kings and lords of cosmic bodies. If they do not cultivate well, innumerable lives in different cosmoses will be destroyed. Teacher repeatedly urged us to improve as a group. From this experience I realized another, deeper meaning of "improving as a group." Teacher requires disciples to improve as a group as fast as they can and to reach the standards required by Teacher so that the Fa-rectification period can be completed. But fellow practitioners around us who have fallen behind are passing away one after another. The losses have been heavy. This is not what Teacher wanted. What I can do at this final phase of the Fa-rectification process is to do my best to wake up those practitioners who are still hesitating to come out, so that I can bring them back to the group and not let Teacher down.
I wrote this article to wake up those fellow practitioners who still have not stepped forward, and also to remind fellow practitioners who are validating Dafa to not forget our agreement before we came to this world. If you are a clear-minded immortal, you need to wake up any one of us who is lost in the delusion of this world. By all means you have to remember this. If we miss this opportunity, we will never have another chance to go home.
