How to Rely on God and Stand Testimony When Tempted by Satan (Part 2)

How to Rely on God and Stand Testimony When Tempted by Satan (Part 2)

By Hu Yang

The CCP’s Lies Are Revealed and I Steadfastly Follow the Path of Belief in God

Through reading God’s words and listening to Sister Feng’s fellowship, I came to have some discernment about the deceitful schemes of Satan that lurked behind my husband’s attempts to stop me from believing in God. Sister Feng then said to me, “Sister, although your husband has promised not to try to force you to give up your belief anymore, this does not mean that he won’t oppose your belief in God again in the future. Because he has no discernment of the essence of these lies, you must help him with love to discern them, make him see the malicious intent behind the CCP’s lies and enable him to see through Satan’s deceitful schemes!”

After some deep thought, I nodded, and said, “Sister, I’m so worried about this now! I know that it is only because God protected me this time that I was not deceived by the CCP’s lies and was not constrained by my husband. But I only know that what the CCP says, that ‘When someone starts believing in Almighty God, they then go out to preach the gospel, and they abandon their family’ is a lie, and I don’t know what truths to use to discern and refute this lie. Sister, can you give me fellowship about this lie and break it down for me?”

Sister Feng then said, “We are able to recognize that the statement, ‘When someone starts believing in Almighty God, they then go out to preach the gospel, and they abandon their family,’ is a lie spread by the CCP about The Church of Almighty God, and it is God who leads us and guides us to this understanding! Thanks be to God! At the same time, it is very important that we seek the truth so that we can see through these lies and understand thoroughly the motives and purposes behind the CCP fabricating these lies about The Church of Almighty God. For if we don’t understand the truth and cannot discern lies, we will be easily deceived, and may even lose our chance to attain God’s true salvation! So, if we want to understand this issue thoroughly, we must first understand that to spread the gospel and to bear testimony for God in our faith is a heavenly law and an earthly principle, and by doing these things we are accomplishing God’s commissions, and they are the most righteous things mankind can do.

“As we all know, in the Age of Grace, the Lord Jesus enjoined His disciples, saying: ‘Go you into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature’ (Mark 16:15). ‘So likewise, whoever he be of you that forsakes not all that he has, he cannot be My disciple’ (Luke 14:33). Christ of the last days, Almighty God also said, ‘As members of the human race and devout Christians, it is the responsibility and obligation of us all to offer up our mind and body for the fulfillment of God’s commission, for our entire being came from God, and it exists thanks to the sovereignty of God. If our minds and bodies are not for God’s commission and not for the righteous cause of mankind, then our souls will be unworthy of those who were martyred for God’s commission, much more unworthy of God, who has provided us with everything’ (‘God Presides Over the Fate of All Mankind’ in The Word Appears in the Flesh). From God’s words, we can see that God created the heavens and earth and all things, and that He created mankind. Even more so, He provides us with everything we need to live, and to believe in God and worship God is a heavenly law and an earthly principle. By spreading and testifying to God’s gospel, we lead more people before God to accept God’s salvation. This is our God-given commission, our bounden duty, the greatest act of goodness and righteousness, and it is most in line with God’s will. Take the disciples and apostles of the Lord Jesus, for example. In order to carry out God’s will, they spread the Lord Jesus’ gospel, they were willing to give up their families, marriages and physical pleasures, endure the slander and mockery of worldly people, and some even became martyrs for this end. But nobody vilified them or condemned them. On the contrary, they were praised and taken as examples to be emulated, and people said that what they did was the most righteous undertaking mankind could perform. Now, the Lord Jesus whom we have longed for for so long has finally returned as the incarnated Almighty God. In order to save us once and for all from the bonds of sin, Almighty God expresses His words and performs the work of judgment beginning in God’s house. He does all this to change and purify our corrupt dispositions, and ultimately to lead mankind into His kingdom. From God’s words, brothers and sisters can understand God’s urgent intention to save man, and we become willing to abandon physical pleasures, to face the danger of being caught and persecuted by the CCP, and to do our utmost to spread and testify to God’s kingdom gospel, so that even more people can accept God’s salvation of the last days and finally attain God’s true salvation and be left over. This is a righteous undertaking, and it is God’s will that is being carried out! The CCP, however, knows the difference between good and evil and yet they still do evil, and they stubbornly insist that Christians who spread the gospel and bear witness to God leave their homes and abandon their families. This is clearly a false account and a distortion of the facts, and it is the CCP spreading deceptive heresies and fallacies!”

As I listened to the sister’s fellowship, I pondered, and I thought of the foreign missionaries of the past. They left their families and gave up physical pleasures in order to preach the Lord Jesus’ gospel to us. If they hadn’t left their homes to preach the gospel in China, how else would we have been able to hear the Lord Jesus’ gospel? I then understood that, as a Christian, to be able to give everything up and to be willing to suffer to preach the gospel is a good deed—it is carrying out of God’s will, and it is something which both accords with God’s will and earns God’s blessing.

Just then, Sister Feng went on with her fellowship, saying, “Preaching the gospel has always been something praised and remembered by God, and it is the greatest act of goodness and righteousness one can do. And yet it incurs the condemnation and slander of the CCP. Why is that? As everyone knows, the CCP is an atheist revolutionary party, and it is a satanic regime that most hates and resists God. So how could it possibly allow the Chinese people to believe in God and follow the right way? Since the CCP took power, it has openly labeled Christianity and Catholicism as cults, it has called the Bible a cultist book, and has misappropriated many copies of the Bible and burned them. It has also labeled many house churches as cult organizations and has persecuted, suppressed and banned them. It has driven many foreign missionaries out of China, and it has wantonly arrested, imprisoned, forcibly reformed and harmed countless Christians and Catholics.

“Since Christ of the last days—Almighty God—appeared and began to perform His work in China in 1991, The Church of Almighty God has grown rapidly. Not only has The Church of Almighty God become established in every province in China, but Almighty God’s kingdom gospel has also spread rapidly overseas. More and more people who yearn for the appearance of God are investigating God’s work of the last days, and The Church of Almighty God is becoming established in many foreign countries, one nation at a time. The CCP, therefore, frantically suppresses and persecutes The Church of Almighty God. If any brother or sister on the Chinese mainland believes in God or preaches the gospel, then they are in danger of being arrested, persecuted and cruelly tortured by the CCP. To this end, many brothers and sisters in mainland China have been forced to flee their homes. Some who are arrested by the CCP are subjected to cruel tortures, some are sentenced and imprisoned, and some have even been crippled or killed as a result of their beatings. Tens of thousands of Christians cannot return home, and their families are scattered and brought to ruin. Not only that, but the CCP also recklessly fabricates rumors to foment discord between Christians and their families. The CCP even threatens and intimidates Christians’ family members and denies them their right to live in order to make them persecute the Christians in their families, and thus many families are destroyed. These facts show that the CCP is the evil ringleader that causes the destruction of Christians’ families!

“The CCP not only arrests and persecutes Christians, but it also uses the internet and media to spread all manner of lies to slander, vilify and besmirch The Church of Almighty God. And what is its aim and its intention for doing this? The CCP wishes to deceive the people of the world, to cheat and fool all who do not understand the truth into resisting, fearing and guarding against The Church of Almighty God in an attempt to stop people from investigating and accepting the true way, and so that people lose their chance to attain God’s true salvation! Moreover, the CCP knows that The Word Appears in the Flesh, expressed by Christ of the last days—Almighty God—contains the truth, and that if anyone reads the words of Almighty God, they will then come to have discernment of its God-resisting, truth-hating evil essence, and they will denounce and reject the CCP. And if that happens, then its wild ambition, its desire to deceive and fool the people of the world and control the whole world will be left in tatters. All the various evil deeds of the CCP show us that its essence is the very embodiment of Satan, and that it is the arch tyrant that sets itself against God and devours man, which precisely fulfills the prophecy in the Bible that says: ‘And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceives the whole world’ (Revelation 12:9). The Devil has spoken lies since the very beginning in order to deceive man and to make man betray God and follow it instead. We must have discernment of the CCP’s essence, for only then will we not be deceived by it!”

The sister’s fellowship allowed me to suddenly see the light. Christians don’t abandon their families after all. Instead, it is the CCP government’s frantic arrests and persecution of Christians that forces them to flee their homes, unable to return. It is the CCP that is the evil ringleader that destroys families, and yet it twists things around and says that it is the Christians who abandon their families. The CCP truly is so devious and evil! I also came to understand that the CCP not only obstructs and persecutes the brothers and sisters on the Chinese mainland for their belief in God and following of God, but it also uses the internet to wantonly disseminate rumors and all kinds of heresies and fallacies so that people in all nations across the world will be deceived, for then no one would dare to seek or investigate the true way. Family members who don’t understand the truth are also incited by the CCP to obstruct Christians from believing in God, and the CCP does this in an attempt to make them shun and betray God and lose their chance to attain God’s true salvation. Only then did I understand that the CCP is the stumbling block and the obstacle on our path of faith in God! I thought of the more than ten years of love and affection between my husband and me, and yet now, because he had been fooled by the CCP’s lies, he had tried to force me to give up my belief in God and had brought strife into our family. If I hadn’t been able to see through to the essence of those lies, then I would have ended up constrained by my husband and would have completely lost the salvation of God! Just then I made a resolution, that no matter how my husband may try to stop me from believing in God in the future, I would always believe in and follow God!

Temptation Comes Once Again and My Husband Threatens Divorce

Afterward, although my husband did not oppose my belief in Almighty God in any obvious way, every now and then he would rebuke me through insinuation. Whenever he saw me attending gatherings in particular, he would be unhappy with me and would give me the silent treatment. He would also find fault with things in order to quarrel with me, and he said that we were understanding each other less and less, and that we seemed increasingly to be speaking different languages. He even said that if I carried on believing in God, then he would divorce me. When I heard him say this, I became very upset. I thought of how our child was still so young, and how my parents were getting on in age and were not in the best of health. If my husband really did divorce me, how would I look after them all by myself? But if we didn’t divorce, then my husband would keep obstructing me and would not let me believe in God. I felt hemmed in on all sides, and my heart became both conflicted and weak.

I had no alternative but to pray to God once again: “O God! My husband now wants to divorce me because of my belief in You. I am of little faith and I am weak, yet I do not wish to do anything that may cause You grief. I ask that You help me, give me faith and strength, and lead me through this situation.” After praying, I thought of when Job encountered the temptations of Satan. All his family wealth and property was taken by thieves, his children’s lives were taken away, his whole body broke out in painful boils, and even his wife attacked him, saying, “Do you still retain your integrity? curse God, and die” (Job 2:9). When Job encountered the temptations of Satan, not only did he not fall foul of Satan’s deceitful schemes, but he also reprimanded his wife, saying, “You speak as one of the foolish women speaks. What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” (Job 2:10). Although Job lost everything, yet he believed that everything was in God’s hands, and no matter how God tested him, he always stood in the place of a created being and extolled the Creator. He did not lose his faith in God, but bore resounding and beautiful witness, thus causing Satan to be utterly shamed and defeated. The situation I was now in was also a temptation of Satan; Satan was using my husband to threaten me with divorce in order to compel me to give up the true way, and I had fallen into negativity and weakness—had I not precisely fallen foul of Satan’s deceitful schemes? Did I have no true faith in God whatsoever? “God is the Creator and I am a created being,” I thought. “To believe in God and worship God is a heavenly law and an earthly principle, and it is the right path in life. I will follow God no matter what happens!” Thinking this, I decided to emulate Job, and I resolved myself to satisfy God. I then thought of how God administers the heavens and earth and all things and how my entire being is in God’s hands, including my marriage. No matter what became of me in the end, I wished to submit to God’s sovereignty and arrangements, to not be duped by Satan, and to stand testimony for God!

I Resolve Myself to Satisfy God and I Witness God’s Deeds

Once I’d understood God’s will, I found the faith and the courage to stand testimony and satisfy God. If my husband was going to force me to choose between my family and my belief in God, then I would rather we divorced and I keep on following God. Later, I said calmly to my husband, “I love this family, but I cannot give up my faith in God. You want me to give it up, but I can’t do it. If you are determined to divorce me, then I consent to it. Although I really don’t want to divorce, you have been deceived by the CCP’s lies and you can’t tell what is true and what isn’t, and you’re using divorce to force my hand, so I have no choice.” After I’d finished speaking, I felt very calm and peaceful.

The next day, I filled in the divorce papers. To my surprise, my husband dropped his inflexible stance and spoke softly to me. “I never expected you to be so persistent in your faith in Almighty God, so now you’ve really convinced me. You can believe in Almighty God if you want, I won’t oppose you again.” Hearing him say this, I knew that this was God’s deed and I thanked God silently in my heart. I saw that, when I became willing to rely on God and stand testimony, Satan was shamed. And so, I once again testified to my husband of God’s intent to save mankind, and I gave him fellowship on the essence of the CCP’s rumormongering and the consequences of believing in such lies. Unexpectedly, this time my husband did not refute what I was saying, but just listened quietly. After that day, my husband never mentioned divorce to me again, and he no longer sought to quarrel with me when he saw me attending church gatherings.

One day, three months later, as my husband and I were discussing a matter of faith, he suddenly said to me, “Ever since you told me that the statement ‘People who believe in Almighty God abandon their families’ was a lie put about by the CCP, I have been observing your church and I’ve secretly been watching your church’s movies, especially the movies about how the CCP persecutes Christians. Only after I’d watched these movies did I finally understand that it’s not that you believers in Almighty God abandon your families, but is rather that the arrests and persecution the CCP inflicts upon you causes many people in your church to flee their homes in order to escape arrest. And in order to conceal its wicked deeds of persecuting religious belief and denying people their human rights, the CCP insists that it is believers in Almighty God who abandon their families. This is rumormongering and slander, pure and simple! I think I now understand that one simply cannot trust what the Chinese Communist Party says, and I’ve decided to go to The Church of Almighty God and investigate it for myself.” In my husband’s words, I once again witnessed the wondrous deeds of God. My heart was moved to such warmth by God’s love, and I had no words to express how wonderful I felt inside. Afterward, through a period of seeking and investigating, my husband also accepted God’s work of the last days, and he began to attend our gatherings.

Later, I read in the word of God: “In My plan, Satan has ever snapped at the heels of every step, and, as the foil of My wisdom, has always tried to find ways and means to disrupt My original plan. But could I succumb to its deceitful schemes? All in heaven and on earth serves Me—could the deceitful schemes of Satan be any different? This is precisely the intersection of My wisdom, it is precisely that which is wondrous about My deeds, and it is the principle by which My entire management plan is carried out. During the time of the building of the kingdom, still I do not avoid the deceitful schemes of Satan, but continue to do the work I must do. Among all things in the universe, I have chosen the deeds of Satan as My foil. Is this not My wisdom? Is this not precisely that which is wondrous about My work?” (“Chapter 8” of God’s Words to the Entire Universe in The Word Appears in the Flesh).

God’s words touched my heart once more, and they enabled me to understand that the wisdom of God is exercised based on the deceitful schemes of Satan. God uses Satan as a foil, and through the disruption caused by Satan, God enables us to develop discernment, as well as grow in our lives. Thinking back on that time, when my husband tried to stop me from believing in God because he had been deceived by the CCP’s lies, although I had suffered a little through that situation and had experienced weakness and negativity, through fellowshiping on God’s words with my sisters, I came to understand exactly the essence of the CCP; it is a stumbling block on the path we tread as we turn back to God, and even more so it is the fuse wire that ignites family strife, and I cannot help but feel hatred toward it. Throughout this spiritual battle, whenever I felt negative and weak, it was only by calling on God and by the enlightenment and guidance of God’s words that I was able to overcome the temptations of Satan and stand testimony for God. Having survived this battle, I came to appreciate the faithfulness of God, and I truly feel that God is by our side and is our support and backup at need. As long as we rely on and look to God in earnest, then God will be with us. My faith to follow God has thereby grown even greater, and I am even more willing to spend whatever time I have left in life pursuing the truth and following God to the very end! Thanks be to God!

from The Church of Almighty God

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How to Rely on God and Stand Testimony When Tempted by Satan (Part 1)

How to Rely on God and Stand Testimony When Tempted by Satan (Part 1)

By Hu Yang

In late May 2018, I was fortunate enough to hear the last days gospel of Almighty God. By reading Almighty God’s words and listening to fellowships given by the brothers and sisters, I became aware of the factual truth of mankind’s corruption by Satan, God’s six-thousand-year management plan to save mankind and the aim of God’s three stages of work. I also came to understand how one can enter into the heavenly kingdom and the future destination and end for mankind, as well as other truths. After a period of seeking and investigating, I became absolutely certain that Almighty God is the Lord Jesus returned, after which I actively attended our church gatherings. As I read more and more of God’s words, I came to some understanding of the painstaking efforts God goes to to save mankind, and I wanted to spread the gospel to my husband so that he too could soon receive God’s salvation of the last days. Unexpectedly, on the afternoon on which I had arranged with my church sisters to preach the gospel to my husband, something happened which I could never have foreseen …

My Husband Is Deceived by Lies and He Tries to Stop Me From Believing in God

On that afternoon, my husband was sitting on the couch watching a video on his phone as he usually did, when he suddenly came across a rumor that was being put about by the Chinese Communist government about The Church of Almighty God: “When someone starts believing in Almighty God, they then go out to preach the gospel, and they abandon their family….” Instantly, my husband became furious, and said that he wouldn’t allow me to believe in Almighty God any longer. I spoke patiently to him, saying, “These are just lies spread by the CCP. Brothers and sisters who preach the gospel and testify for God don’t abandon their families….” But my husband had already fallen for the lies and he simply wouldn’t listen. He said angrily, “I don’t care! You can believe in Jehovah God if you want, or you can believe in the Lord Jesus, and I’ll support you. So long as you don’t believe in Almighty God, I’ll do whatever you want!” I said patiently, “Although Jehovah God, the Lord Jesus and Almighty God have different names, They are all one God. They are just three different names taken by God in His work at different times. In order to save mankind, God performs three stages of work. The first stage was the work of the Age of Law performed by Jehovah God, the second stage was the work of the Age of Grace performed by the Lord Jesus, and the third stage is the work of the Age of Kingdom performed by Almighty God. After the Lord Jesus accomplished the second stage of work, that of the work of redemption, He prophesied, ‘I come quickly’ (Revelation 22:12). Now the Lord Jesus has returned as Almighty God, Christ of the last days. Almighty God has expressed millions of words and He performs the work of judgment beginning in God’s house in order to purify and change man, to save man utterly from the clutches of Satan and to ultimately lead man into His kingdom. Having been through a period of seeking and investigating, I see that the words expressed by Almighty God are the truth and that they reveal all the mysteries in the Bible. I am certain that Almighty God is the returned Lord Jesus, and my belief in Almighty God allows me to keep pace with the footsteps of the Lamb. You haven’t sought or investigated Almighty God’s work of the last days and you haven’t read the words expressed by Almighty God, so how can you so blindly believe in those lies and oppose my belief in God?”

My husband couldn’t argue with me and, in a rage, he threw his phone down onto the coffee table, stood, and bellowed at me, “Say what you want, but you do not have my permission to believe in Almighty God!” I was stunned to see my husband act this way. We’d been married for ten years and he’d always been good to me. He’d never once opposed anything I’d ever wanted or anything I’d ever wanted to do, much less had he ever been as angry as he was on this day. I never expected him to act so terribly toward me after being deceived by the CCP’s lies or that he would oppose my belief in God so much—I was beside myself. I thought of how my church sisters would soon be arriving at my home to preach the gospel to my husband. Now that my husband was so dead set against my belief in God, I had no choice but to quietly take my phone and message the two sisters, telling them not to come. No sooner had I finished sending the message to my church sisters than my husband suddenly snatched my phone away and deleted The Church of Almighty God app as well as the software I used to contact my church sisters, and he once again warned me not to believe in Almighty God anymore.

Seeing how deeply fooled my husband had been by the CCP’s lies, I felt very anxious. I had no idea what he would do next to try to force me to give up my belief, or whether I would be able to attend gatherings with my brothers and sisters ever again…. I felt so afraid and helpless, and all I could do was call on God over and over in my heart: “O Almighty God! I feel so weak right now and I don’t know what to do for the best. My stature is so small, and I understand too few truths. Please help me and open up a way for me. O God! No matter how my husband treats me, I will always believe in You and follow You. I will not betray You no matter what happens. I ask that You give me faith and strength. I will stand testimony for You. Please enlighten me and guide me so that I may understand Your will. Thank You God!” After praying, I instantly felt much more tranquil inside, and I no longer felt so afraid. I glanced at my husband who didn’t seem as ferocious as he had been before and, to my surprise, he just went off to bed. I knew then that God had heard my prayer. When I was at my most helpless, God had given me faith and courage and He had opened up a way for me. God truly is the real and living Almighty God, and in my heart, I offered up my thanks and praise to Him. My husband slept all that afternoon, but I still felt a little worried, worried that he would get angry at me again when he woke up, and so I prayed to God silently in my heart.

To my surprise, when my husband woke up, he saw that I was still sitting on the couch and, without me saying anything, he took the initiative and said, “I was wrong earlier. I’ve reinstalled that software onto your phone. You can believe in God if you want to. I won’t get in your way anymore.” I was so happy to hear him say this and I knew that all that had happened was by the arrangement of God. Only then did I truly come to appreciate God’s omnipotence and sovereignty, and I thought of God’s words which say: “Man’s heart and spirit are held in the hand of God, everything of his life is beheld in the eyes of God. Regardless of whether or not you believe this, any and all things, whether living or dead, will shift, change, renew, and disappear in accordance with God’s thoughts. Such is the way in which God presides over all things” (“God Is the Source of Man’s Life” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). “Yes,” I thought. “Whether living or dead, all things are held in God’s hands. Our every thought and idea changes under the sovereignty and orchestrations of God. It was God’s deed that transformed my husband’s attitude, and it was God listening to my prayers. God knows that I am of small stature and, when I was at my most helpless, He gave me faith and courage and He opened up a way for me.” I kept thanking Almighty God from the bottom of my heart.

All of This Turns Out to Be a Battle in the Spirit World

At a church gathering the next day, I told my brothers and sisters about what had happened. After listening to me speak, Sister Feng was filled with emotion and said, “Thanks be to God! What happened to you lets us see that God is by our side and that He is our support at need. As long as we call on Him in all sincerity, then He will listen to our prayers and will open up a way for us. At the same time, however, we should understand that when your husband tries to stop you from believing in God, though it may appear as your family member trying to disrupt you, in truth it is actually a spiritual battle that is raging! We can’t see and understand things with our physical eyes, but instead we must learn to see things from the perspective of God’s words and the truth!” I looked at Sister Feng in astonishment. “Spiritual battle?” I thought. “What could that mean?”

Just then, the sister read a passage of God’s words to me: “God works, God cares for a person, looks upon a person, and Satan dogs His every step. Whoever God favors, Satan also watches, trailing along behind. If God wants this person, Satan would do everything in its power to obstruct God, using various evil ways to tempt, harass and wreck the work God does in order to achieve its hidden objective. What is its objective? It does not want God to have anyone; it wants all those that God wants, to occupy them, control them, to take charge of them so they worship it, so they commit evil acts alongside it. Is this not Satan’s sinister motive? … Satan is at war with God, trailing along behind Him. Its objective is to demolish all the work God wants to do, to occupy and control those whom God wants, to completely extinguish those whom God wants. If they are not extinguished, then they come to Satan’s possession to be used by it—this is its objective” (“God Himself, the Unique IV” in The Word Appears in the Flesh).

The sister then gave fellowship, saying, “From God’s words, we are able to see the truth of the battle in the spirit world, and we are able to see Satan’s evil essence. God created mankind, and He hopes that we will be able to hear His words and obey Him. Ever since we were corrupted by Satan, however, we have grown distant from God and we have fallen under the dark influence of Satan; we are bound and enslaved by Satan, and we live lives of unbearable pain. God could not bear to see us ravaged and ruined by Satan, and so He began His six-thousand-year management plan to save mankind in order to take us back from Satan’s clutches, to enable us to cast off once and for all the bonds, the control and the harm of Satan, to attain God’s true salvation, to be led into God’s kingdom and to enjoy God’s blessings and promises. Satan, however, does not want us to attain God’s true salvation, and so it employs all manner of means and does its utmost to deceive and disturb us and to obstruct us from following God and worshiping God. It does all this in an attempt to make us become negative and weak and to make us lose our faith in God to the point where we shun God and betray Him, and we lose God’s salvation of the last days.

“For example, there are some brothers and sisters who, after they accept God’s work of the last days, encounter opposition to their belief in God from their family members because they have seen the rumors spread online by the CCP; when some brothers and sisters attend gatherings and read God’s words, they are half asleep and their hearts are in turmoil, and some brothers and sisters or their family members get sick. These are just a few examples of the despicable methods Satan customarily uses to disturb and tempt people. Hu Yang, you wanted to spread the gospel to your husband so that he too could attain God’s salvation, but just as you were about to do that, Satan used its lies to deceive your husband, to make him oppose God’s work of the last days and to set him on his guard. Not only would he then not seek or investigate the true way, but he also tried to stop you from believing in God. On the surface, it appeared as though your husband was trying to obstruct you, but behind all this, it was actually Satan putting its deceitful schemes into action. Satan uses all manner of lies to deceive those in our families who do not believe in God in order to make them obstruct us and coerce us, in an attempt to make us negative and weak and to make us give up the true way, so that we lose once and for all the salvation of God and end up devoured by Satan. Sister, when our family members try to obstruct us, we should see things from the perspective of the spirit world, for behind our family members’ actions lies hidden the despicable aims of Satan!”

After listening to the sister fellowship in this way, my heart suddenly filled with light. So, all along I’d been facing a battle that was raging in the spirit world! I thought of how my husband had begun to try to force me to give up my belief in God after he’d seen the CCP’s lies, and I knew that this had all been brought about by the deceptions of Satan. Satan truly is so despicable, so hateful!

from The Church of Almighty God

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Christian Testimonies | God Mended My Broken Marriage

Christian Testimonies | God Mended My Broken Marriage

By Li Zhen

Pictures of the Church of Almighty God

Ling Fan’s father had an affair when she was three years old; her mother divorced him in a fury and took Ling Fan along with her into her second marriage. But her stepfather never liked Ling Fan and would often beat her for no reason at all, terribly wounding little Ling Fan’s spirit. She thought every single day about how she could escape that home that brought her so much suffering while also looking forward to forming her own happy family after growing up. After getting married at 23 years old, she finally had her own home. She thought she’d be able to live in happiness, but reality didn’t turn out as she had imagined.

An Honest Husband Strays

Her husband was more than a decade older than Ling Fan; he was honest in his dealings with others and of good character, plus he was really caring and solicitous of her, always eager to help out with housework and other tasks. He didn’t have much money and they lived a frugal life, but Ling Fan didn’t care at all. She felt that as long as there’s love between a couple and they’re able to live together harmoniously and happily, she was content. Her husband ended up developing high blood pressure and couldn’t do physically taxing work and they needed to fund their children’s education, so the burden of the family fell on Ling Fan. In an effort to earn more money, she hired someone to look after their pig farm while she went out to work in a shoe factory. She worked late every day until eleven o’clock or midnight; her husband would often meet her at the factory to take her home. Even though Ling Fan worked hard and was exhausted for that period of time, she and her husband were there for each other and she felt happy.

But Ling Fan started to notice that her husband was gradually becoming less loving and attentive and he never met her at the factory anymore. On top of that, he frequently stayed out having fun until dawn. Sometimes she’d say something to reproach him, but then he’d pull a long face and ignore her for a month or two. She thought that he was probably treating her that way because he was depressed and anxious from his illness, but she was also really concerned that his feelings had changed. For the sake of maintaining family harmony and happiness she did her best to be forgiving and understanding of him and tried everything she could to have heart-to-hearts with him, but he remained constantly surly and unwilling to pay her any mind. Tolerating all of this for so long left Ling Fan incredibly depressed and in pain; she’d often hide, curled up in her blankets and quietly cry. She wanted to find somewhere she could openly, loudly cry it out, where she could unburden some of the pain in her heart. But shockingly, what she most feared came to pass.

One time Ling Fan needed something for work and made a trip back home after her shift had started. To her surprise, just as she was arriving she saw a woman who was often on very friendly terms with her husband leaving. She was stunned for a moment by what was in front of her eyes, but once she came to she became incensed and grabbed hold of that woman, saying, “So you’ve been the one seducing my husband and ruining our marriage!” She really wanted to give her a thrashing to take out her anger, but then it occurred to her that if she created a big scene everyone would find out about this, and it would end up making things difficult for their children. For their sake and to salvage their family, Ling Fan had to let go of her; she just warned that woman to leave her husband alone. But she responded very smugly, “Your husband has never loved you, he only loves me. It’s just that you don’t want to leave because you depend on him so much.” This made Ling Fan so angry that she started shaking from head to toe—she sank to the ground, unable to move. Inconsolable, tears flowed down her face nonstop. She hated that woman, and even more, hated her husband’s betrayal.

Ling Fan felt like her spirit was crushed. Shouldering the pain, she suggested divorce to her husband but unexpectedly, he didn’t want one. He also said, “All men are doing this kind of thing these days. Isn’t it perfectly normal?” Ling Fan was stunned. She had never imagined that her husband, once so honest, would ever say anything so shameless! In her anger, she sat frozen on the bed, thinking that both divorce and staying together would be unbearably painful. Even if they did get divorced she wouldn’t be able to remarry—where could she go with several children? She didn’t want them to have the same kind of childhood as she did. She thought and she thought, and ultimately decided against divorce, but from then on the two of them took their own separate paths.

Ling Fan remembered that during those several years she was constantly busy, exhausted both physically and mentally. She also developed all sorts of health problems like a lumbar disc herniation, lumbar muscle strain, a gastric disease, rheumatism, and myocardial ischemia. She was constantly getting injections and taking medicine and was unbearably tortured by her ailments. She had given absolutely everything she had for the family, shocked to get her husband’s betrayal in return. Her dream of happiness had been shattered; she was living in constant suffering and awash in her own tears. Originally weighing 140 pounds, she wasted away to about 100 pounds. She didn’t understand why things had to be that way. Her dad had betrayed her mom a long time ago, and now her husband was betraying her. Why didn’t they have any sense of responsibility in their marriages? Where could happiness really be found?

God’s Words Reveal the Root Cause of Affairs

Just as Ling Fan was lost in her suffering and had nowhere to go, her friend Chen Jing, who she had been close with for years, and her husband Lin Jun visited Ling Fan and her husband to share the gospel with them. Since they were still embroiled in a cold war, Chen Jing and Lin Jun spoke with them separately. Ling Fan shared her experience with her friend, who replied warmly, “Ling Fan, I understand how you feel right now. We all have our own individual pain—you know that my husband was once lured into doing drugs by a friend resulting in us going bankrupt. Everyone we were close to distanced themselves from us. I was in so much pain that I didn’t want to live anymore. But then God’s salvation of the last days came upon me and only through reading God’s words did I see that the darkness in the world and the evil in people’s hearts is all a result of being corrupted by Satan. We human beings were created by God, and only by coming before God and accepting His salvation can we be freed from our suffering, and gain spiritual peace and stability. After I accepted God’s work of the last days, by reading more and more of God’s words I started to have some insight into some things and I slowly left that suffering behind. Now I know that if it hadn’t been for encountering God’s salvation in time I probably would no longer be in this world. The fact that I’m standing here today is entirely because of God’s love and salvation! How about we read some of God’s words? They’re all the truth and they can resolve all of our problems. Once we’ve understood the truth we can handle these sorts of things properly, and then we won’t suffer so much.”

Saying this, she flipped through her book of God’s words and read aloud: “Man has walked through these periods together with God, yet he knows not that God rules the fate of all things and living beings, nor how God orchestrates and directs all things. This has eluded man from time immemorial to the present day. As for why, it is not because the deeds of God are too hidden, nor because the plan of God has yet to be realized, but because the heart and spirit of man are too distant from God, to the point where man remains in the service of Satan even as he follows God—and still doesn’t know it. No one actively seeks out God’s footsteps and the appearance of God, and no one is willing to exist in the care and keeping of God. Instead, they wish to rely on the corrosion of Satan, the evil one, in order to adapt to this world, and to the rules of existence that wicked mankind follows. At this point, the heart and spirit of man have become man’s tribute to Satan and become Satan’s foodstuff. Even more, the human heart and spirit have become a place in which Satan can reside and its fitting playground. Thus does man unknowingly lose his understanding of the principles of being human, and of the value and meaning of human existence” (“God Is the Source of Man’s Life”). “Born into such a filthy land, man has been severely blighted by society, he has been influenced by feudal ethics, and he has been taught at ‘institutes of higher learning.’ The backward thinking, corrupt morality, mean view on life, despicable philosophy, utterly worthless existence, and depraved lifestyle and customs—all of these things have severely intruded upon man’s heart, and severely undermined and attacked his conscience. As a result, man is ever more distant from God…. Instead, under the domain of Satan, man does nothing but pursue pleasure, giving himself over to the corruption of the flesh in the land of mud” (“To Have an Unchanged Disposition Is to Be in Enmity to God”).

Once she had finished reading, Chen Jing shared this in fellowship: “If we don’t have faith or read God’s words, we won’t know that the suffering in this world is all because of humanity’s corruption by Satan, that it’s all brought about by sinking into Satan’s domain. In the beginning, mankind as created by God had not been corrupted by Satan, so they were people who possessed both conscience and humanity. They were able to heed God’s words and live blissfully in the Garden of Eden. But ever since mankind was tempted and corrupted by Satan we have all become distant from God and betrayed Him, and we have fallen under Satan’s domain. For the last several millennia Satan has been instilling its logic, laws, worldly philosophies, and evil thinking into us nonstop through education, the influence of society, famous people’s words, and evil trends. This has caused us to become more and more arrogant, crooked, selfish, greedy, and evil. People cheat, exploit, and betray each other for their own selfish ends; they engage in intrigue and try to outwit others. Everyone has lost their humanity, morals, conscience, and reason, all living in unspeakable pain without any happiness to speak of. My husband used to live by the satanic philosophy of ‘One more friend means one more path; one more enemy means one more obstacle.’ He would flatter and ingratiate his friend at every turn hoping that someday he’d be able to do some business with him. But you can never know what’s really in someone else’s heart, and this friend lured him into doing drugs. We ended up going bankrupt. At the time I simply couldn’t accept this fact and suffered so much that I didn’t want to live anymore. It wasn’t until I gained faith in God that I came to understand the root of the darkness and evil in the world through reading God’s words; then I knew the truth of how Satan has corrupted us humans and realized that my husband was also a victim. He had also been living by Satan’s philosophy and laws. From then on I read God’s words to him every day. We prayed together and both leaned on God, and with God’s guidance he was able to totally give up his addiction to drugs. This showed me that only by worshiping God and relying on Him in our lives can we escape the harm Satan does and live under God’s care and protection. This is the only way to live in true happiness.”

Listening, Ling Fan nodded her head and felt in her heart that God really does love mankind and that His words contain great authority. Chen Jing’s husband being able to give up drugs really was God’s salvation!

Chen Jing went on in fellowship. “Ling Fan, modern society is like one big vat of dye that affects everyone. Everyone is pursuing money and fame and getting their enjoyment from eating, drinking, and making merry. They indulge the flesh and give free rein to their desires. On TV, on the Internet, and in daily life we’re flooded with evil, satanic thinking like ‘The red flag at home does not fall, the colored flags outside flutter in the breeze,’ ‘Seize the day for pleasure, for life is short,’ ‘It’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.’ After being steeped in and influenced by this kind of mindset for a long time people’s perspectives become skewed and both men and women see having an affair or finding a lover as something very normal. They don’t have any sense of shame about it and don’t even feel guilty when they’ve hurt someone. They’ve lost their humanity, morals, character, and dignity, becoming more and more evil and depraved. The rise of these evil trends has caused many once-loving partners to betray their spouse; parents and children in many formerly harmonious homes have scattered to the winds, with adults and children alike living in pain. All of this is the outcome of Satan using evil trends to corrupt and damage people. The truth is that your husband is also a victim. He’s not a believer, so he can’t see Satan’s tricks to corrupt people that’s behind the evil trends, so he sees having an affair as something perfectly okay. That’s the only reason he’s done something so contrary to humanity and morality. Through reading God’s words we also came to understand that if we don’t come before God and if we don’t understand the truth, then we won’t have any discernment over Satan’s evil discourse that it uses to corrupt people, but we’ll just be misled and toyed with by Satan, living in unspeakable suffering with no happiness to speak of.”

Through God’s words and Chen Jing’s fellowship Ling Fan realized that the root of her husband’s infidelity came from Satan’s corruption. She thought of how he had been so honest at first and had such a sense of responsibility for their family, but under the influence of evil trends he came to see taking a lover as an okay thing to do. That woman was also completely without shame; she was completely smug about ruining someone else’s family. She also thought about how her father had betrayed her mother just to satisfy his own carnal desires without remotely considering her and her mother’s feelings. It was clear to Ling Fan that when harmed by Satan’s evil line of thinking, people truly did lose the conscience and reason that a proper person should have and they would cast aside morals and ethics to gratify a momentary carnal desire. She saw how immensely damaging this is for their families. With the whole world so evil and corrupt, since her husband didn’t have faith in God and didn’t understand the truth, how could he not be impacted? Blaming her husband wouldn’t solve any problems, but would just bring her more and more suffering in life. She had always hoped for a happy, whole family, but how could there be any happiness to speak of in a dark society ruled by Satan?

After that Chen Jing continued to read a lot of God’s words to Ling Fan; the more she heard them the more she brightened up and she was able to start letting go of the hatred she held in her heart toward her husband.

From then on Ling Fan started taking time every day to read God’s words and she gradually started to understand some truths. She saw that this evil world is full of sin and only by having faith, reading God’s words, and understanding the truth can we see through the evil trends and distance ourselves from sin; God is our only pillar, and only God can save people from the corruption and harm of Satan. Ling Fan felt so fortunate that she had the opportunity to believe in and follow God! What was particularly surprising for her was that after Lin Jun shared the gospel with her husband and he listened to God’s words and had fellowship with Lin Jun, he also felt that God’s words can all allow people to live out proper humanity and that only having faith is the right path in life. He also wanted to become a person of faith. He stopped going out every night but stayed at home, diligently reading God’s words. Ling Fan was thrilled; she knew that being steeped in evil trends and making mistakes was inevitable, but what mattered most was that her husband still maintained a heart of seeking the light. She no longer bickered over things with her husband.

Reconciling With Her Husband

One evening after dinner, Ling Fan decided to go to her husband’s room where she saw him engrossed in reading God’s words. She pulled up a chair and sat beside him, then read along with him: “It seems like a world of gaiety and splendor, one that is becoming more and more so. People’s hearts are all drawn to it, and many people are entrapped and unable to extricate themselves from it; great numbers will be beguiled by those who engage in trickery and sorcery” (“Practice (2)”). “Man’s flesh is of Satan, it is full of disobedient dispositions, it is deplorably filthy, it is something unclean. People covet the enjoyment of the flesh too much and there are too many manifestations of the flesh; this is why God despises the flesh to a certain extent. When people cast off the filthy, corrupt things of Satan, they gain God’s salvation. But if they still do not divest themselves of filth and corruption, then they are still living under the domain of Satan. … When you have believed to a certain point and can divest yourself of the corruption of the flesh, and are no longer enshackled by this corruption, will you not have been saved? When you live under Satan’s domain you are incapable of manifesting God, you are something filthy, and cannot receive God’s inheritance. Once you have been cleansed and made perfect, you will be holy, you will be a proper person, and you will be blessed by God and delightful to God” (“Practice (2)”).

Her husband’s tears flowed as he read. Choked with emotion, he said, “God is so holy. He detests, He hates our evil and filth, but He still doesn’t condemn or punish us because of it. Instead He expresses truths to judge and purify our corrupt dispositions, plus He reveals Satan’s methods and tactics of misleading and corrupting mankind so that we can gain discernment. This also allows us to reflect on our own corruption, truly repent to God, escape from Satan’s shackles, and gain God’s salvation. This truly is God’s great love and mercy! When I think of what I did in the past, following evil trends and betraying you, living in sin all the while thinking it was a wonderful thing, I see that I really was so corrupted by Satan that I didn’t know good from evil. I completely lacked proper humanity. I give thanks to God that He still has mercy and salvation for me, that He’s given me this chance to repent. The truth is that I wanted to apologize to you a long time ago, but I was afraid you wouldn’t be able to forgive me. I’ve hurt you so much over the last few years; I’ve really let you down. I’ll absolutely never make that kind of mistake again!”

Hearing this from her husband, Ling Fan was so moved that tears ran down her face and she replied frankly, “Thanks be to God! I hated you before and felt like all my suffering was because of your betrayal, but since believing in God and reading His words I’ve come to understand that you’ve only been living in sin because you’ve been corrupted by evil, satanic trends. Now that we’re believers and we’ve understood some truth from God’s words, we have some discernment over Satan’s methods and tactics for corrupting people. Now we also recognize that God hates corruption and evil; we’ve gained reverence for God and are willing to repent to Him. All of this has been achieved through His words! It’s God that has saved us and awakened our souls. We cannot let down His earnest hard work, but from now on we must really seek the truth to cast off our corrupt dispositions, and live out a true human likeness to repay God’s love.” He nodded and responded happily, “I give thanks to God for saving our home that was on the brink of collapse.”

Sharing the Gospel Together to Repay God’s Love

In an effort to repay God’s love, Ling Fan and her husband joined the gospel team. Ling Fan shared the gospel and her experience of making her home whole again after her marriage had fallen apart with a former classmate. She was very moved and said, “It’s clear that your home was on the brink of ruin, but now your relationship is just as good as it ever was thanks to your faith. The God you believe in must be so capable—I should believe in Him, too!” After that their children as well as some relatives and friends all accepted God’s work of the last days. Ling Fan often read God’s words and sang hymns with other family members, and whenever someone revealed a corrupt disposition it was openly brought to light and resolved through fellowship on God’s words. Any issues that came up at home were discussed together and they found a path of practice in God’s words. There was family harmony and rapport—there was real happiness. On top of that, the health problems Ling Fan had experienced before believing in God gradually got better without taking medication or getting any injections. She knew deep within that this was God’s blessing and she just had to thank and praise God from her heart.

This is Ling Fan’s own reflection: I used to think that having a happy family would bring happiness. Little did I know that in this evil, corrupt world, everyone becomes corrupted and tempted by evil, satanic trends; they all seek evil. Having a happy, whole family is nothing but an extravagant wish. Only God is the source of happiness for us as human beings. God bestows the truth upon us and allows us to learn to discern between good and evil, between right and wrong. Our only true happiness is having faith, worshiping God, and understanding the truth so that our souls are at ease and we have something to lean on. I give thanks to God for His salvation of us—He saved me from a life of pain and He saved my husband from a life of depravity, allowing us to have a truly happy home!

from The Church of Almighty God

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Christian Testimonies-The Way to Avoid Being a Slave to Sin

2018年2月25日

By Christopher, Philippines

Pictures of the Church of Almighty God

My name is Christopher, and I’m a pastor of a house church in the Philippines. In 1987, I was baptized and returned to the Lord Jesus and then by the Lord’s grace, in 1996 I became a pastor in a local church. At that time, I was not only working and preaching in many places around the Philippines, but I was also preaching in places such as Hong Kong and Malaysia. Through the work and the guidance of the Holy Spirit, I felt that I had inexhaustible energy in my work for the Lord and endless inspiration for my sermons. I would often offer support to brothers and sisters who were feeling negative and weak. Sometimes when their nonbeliever family members were unfriendly toward me, I was still able to be tolerant and patient; I didn’t lose faith in the Lord and believed that the Lord could change them. So, I felt like I had changed a great deal since becoming a believer. However, starting in 2011, I was no longer able to feel the work of the Holy Spirit as strongly as before. I gradually lost new enlightenment for my sermons and lacked the strength to break free from living in sin. I could not help losing my temper with my wife and daughter when I saw them doing things I didn’t like and scolded them out of anger. I knew that this was not in keeping with the will of the Lord, but often I could not help myself. This was particularly distressing for me. In order to free myself from a life of sinning and then confessing, I put more effort into reading the Bible, fasting and praying, and looked everywhere for spiritual pastors so we could seek and explore this together. But all of my efforts came to naught; there was no change to my life of sin and the darkness within my soul.

Then one evening in spring 2016, my wife asked me, “Christopher, I’ve noticed you’ve been really troubled recently. What’s on your mind?” I told her what was troubling me, “I’ve been wondering these last few years why I can’t break free from living in sin despite being a pastor and having believed in the Lord for many years. I’m no longer able to feel the Lord—it’s as if He has forsaken me. Even though I go all over the place to preach, as soon as I have a moment to myself, especially in the dead of night, I always feel a kind of emptiness and anxiety, and this feeling is just growing. I think about how I’ve believed in the Lord all these years, I’ve read the Bible so much, I’ve listened to so many of the Lord’s sermons, and I’ve often resolved to bear the cross and conquer myself, but I’m always bound by sin. I’m capable of telling lies to protect my own interests and face, and I fail to live up to ‘And in their mouth was found no guile’ (Revelation 14:5). When facing hardships and refinement, although I know these happen with the Lord’s consent, I still cannot stop myself from complaining about the Lord and misunderstanding Him. I utterly fail at willing self-renunciation. I’m afraid that, living in sin this way, when the Lord comes, I won’t be able to enter the kingdom of heaven!”

Hearing this, my wife said, “Christopher, how can you think like this? You must have faith; you are a pastor! Although we live in sin and have not broken free from the binds of sin, the Bible says, ‘That if you shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you shall be saved’ (Romans 10:9). ‘For whoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved’ (Romans 10:13). As long as we keep reading the Bible, attending gatherings, praying to the Lord, and we bear the cross, unerringly following Him until the second coming of the Lord, we’ll be able to enter the kingdom of heaven and receive the Lord’s blessing.”

I then said to my wife, “I thought so before, but in 1 Peter 1:16 it says: ‘Because it is written, Be you holy; for I am holy.’ I have believed in the Lord for thirty years, yet I cannot keep to the Lord’s way and, living in sin, I am still capable of often resisting the Lord. I don’t remotely meet the Lord’s requirements. Ugh! How many times have I resolved to obey the teachings of the Lord, yet I haven’t been able to put His words into practice. How could I be worthy of entering the kingdom of heaven this way? The Lord Jesus said: ‘Not every one that said to Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that does the will of My Father which is in heaven’ (Matthew 7:21). According to the Lord’s words, entering the kingdom of heaven is not as simple as we think. The Lord is holy, so how can people who cannot practice His word and who frequently oppose Him be raptured into the kingdom of heaven? Only those who have transformed and who do God’s will can enter the kingdom of heaven!”

 

My wife thought for a moment and said, “What you’re saying makes sense. The Lord is holy and we are still sinful. We are not worthy of entering God’s kingdom. It’s just that … I suddenly remembered … didn’t Pastor Liu invite a Korean Pastor Kim to the church? How about we do some seeking on this issue?” I said: “Yeah, that’s a good idea. The Lord Jesus said: ‘Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you’ (Matthew 7:7). As long as we seek, I believe that the Lord will lead us. As a pastor, I have to consider the lives of our brothers and sisters. If I’m cavalier in my faith, I’ll be doing them as well as myself a disservice. Let’s wait until Pastor Kim comes and then seek from him on this issue.”

Since I was planning to seek out Pastor Kim, I wanted to know a little about his background. I went online to search for the Korean church he was with. On the pages that popped up, I saw the website https://www.holyspiritspeaks.org. Opening it, these words drew me in: “Man received much grace, such as the peace and happiness of the flesh, the faith of one member bringing blessing on an entire family, the healing of sickness, and so on. The rest were the good deeds of man and his godly appearance; if man could live on the basis of these, he was considered an acceptable believer. Only believers of this kind could enter heaven after death, which means that they were saved. But, in their lifetime, these people did not understand at all the way of life. All they did was to commit sins and then confess their sins in a constant cycle without making any path toward changing their disposition: Such was the condition of man in the Age of Grace. Has man received complete salvation? No!” (“The Mystery of the Incarnation (4)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). These were so well put that I absolutely had to keep reading: “Therefore, after that stage of work was finished, there still remained the work of judgment and chastisement. This stage is to make man pure by means of the word and thereby give him a path to follow. This stage would not be fruitful or meaningful if it continued with the casting out of demons, for it would fail to extirpate man’s sinful nature, and man would come to a standstill at the forgiveness of his sins. Through the sin offering, man has been forgiven his sins, for the work of the crucifixion has already come to an end and God has prevailed over Satan. But the corrupt disposition of man still remaining within him, man can still sin and resist God, and God has not gained mankind. That is why in this stage of work God uses the word to expose the corrupt disposition of man, causing him to practice in accordance with the right path. This stage is more meaningful than the previous one, as well as more fruitful, for now it is the word that directly supplies man’s life and enables the disposition of man to be completely renewed; it is a much more thorough stage of work” (“The Mystery of the Incarnation (4)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). Reading this was incredibly exciting for me. Although I couldn’t entirely understand it and some of it was even puzzling for me, these words allowed me to see some hope. I felt that within this I could find a path to purify and change myself. I thanked God from the bottom of my heart for hearing my prayer. As I went on reading, I felt that these really were wonderful words that watered and shepherded my thirsty soul. I saw this on the website: “If you can’t find the Gospel Hotline in your country or region, please leave us a message and we will contact you as soon as possible.” I took a quick look and didn’t see a hotline for the Philippines, so I immediately left a message, and wrote down my contact number and email address with no hesitation.

After I got home that evening, I told my wife about it and after hearing what I had to say, she was willing to seek as well. I really thank the Lord that they responded to my message the next day and arranged to connect with us online that very same afternoon. That afternoon, we spoke to Sister Liu and Sister Su. From that conversation, I felt that they spoke simply, deftly and with insight. My wife was even more anxious than me and said, “Do you mind if I ask a question?” They enthusiastically said, “Of course.” My wife replied, “On your church’s website it says, ‘God of the last days has done a stage of the work of judgment and chastisement.’ My husband and I know that no unholy person will see the Lord because He is holy, but in Romans it says, ‘That if you shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you shall be saved’ (Romans 10:9). ‘For whoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved’ (Romans 10:13). If we believe in the Lord Jesus then we are already saved and can enter the kingdom of heaven, so why is God of the last days doing a stage of the work of judgment and chastisement? I’m not really clear on this and I hope to hear your thoughts.”

Sister Liu replied, “Thanks be to God! Let’s fellowship together and let God guide us. Let’s first take a look at what ‘being saved’ means here. In the latter period of the Age of Law, people had all grown far from God and no longer had God-fearing hearts. They had become more and more sinful and went so far as to offer up blind, lame and diseased livestock and birds as sacrifices. The people of that time no longer upheld the law and they were all in danger of being condemned to death for violating the law. Given the situation, in order to save those living under the law from certain death, God Himself became flesh and undertook the work of redemption, and was ultimately crucified to redeem the whole of mankind from sin. People could be forgiven of their sins by believing in the Lord Jesus, thus becoming qualified to come before God in prayer and enjoy the blessings of God’s grace. This is the true meaning of ‘being saved’ in the Age of Grace. In other words, ‘being saved’ is nothing more than a person’s sins being forgiven. That is, God doesn’t regard people as being tainted by sin anymore, but that doesn’t mean that they’re not inherently sinful. Therefore, being saved does not mean that we are completely purified and have attained complete salvation. If we want to be purified, we have to accept God’s judgment work of the last days.”

from The Church of Almighty God

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