Praise God, almighty and wise, He has defeated Satan.
Praise God, His righteous disposition has been completely revealed.
All come to praise Almighty God, the lovely and practical God.
We praise God, humble and hidden, He is so lovely!
Praise You, Almighty God (praise God)! All come to praise You (praise You)!
Showing posts with label The Church of Almighty God. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Church of Almighty God. Show all posts
“This time, God comes to do work not in a spiritual body but in a very ordinary one. Not only is it the body of God’s second incarnation, but also the body in which God returns. … Did you not desire greatly to see the God in heaven? Did you not desire greatly to understand the God in heaven? Did you not desire greatly to see the destination of mankind? He will tell you all these secrets that no man has been able to tell you, and He will even tell you of the truths that you do not understand. He is your gate into the kingdom, and your guide into the new age” (The Word Appears in the Flesh). Hello, brothers and sisters! In today’s program we will introduce you to the appearance of Christ of the last days, the Savior. Please stay tuned!
If you want to know more about Almighty God’s work in the last days, please visit the official website of the Church of Almighty God.
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You said that for man to break free from sin and become holy, he must accept God’s judgment of the last days. Then how does God judge and purify man in the last days? For many years I’ve often wondered. What a joy to be without sin. Then life wouldn’t be painful!
π€ π Letter Replying:
Hello brother Jack,
Thank you for your kind attention to the Church of Almighty God. As to how Almighty God judges and purifies man in the last days, let’s read Almighty God’s word first! Almighty God says, “when God becomes flesh this time, His work is to express His disposition, primarily through chastisement and judgment. Using this as the foundation, He brings more truth to man, shows more ways of practice, and so achieves His objective of conquering man and saving man from his corrupt disposition. This is what lies behind the work of God in the Age of Kingdom” (Preface to The Word Appears in the Flesh).
“In the last days, Christ uses a variety of truths to teach man, reveal the essence of man, and dissect his words and deeds. These words comprise various truths, such as man’s duty, how man should obey God, how man should be loyal to God, how man ought to live out the normal humanity, as well as the wisdom and disposition of God, and so on. These words are all focused on the essence of man and his corrupt disposition. In particular, those words that reveal how man spurns God are spoken in regard to how man is an embodiment of Satan and an enemy force against God. When God does the work of judgment, He does not simply make clear the nature of man with just a few words, but carries out revelation, dealing, and pruning over the long term. Such manner of revelation, dealing, and pruning cannot be substituted with ordinary words but with the truth that man does not possess at all. Only such manner of work is deemed judgment; only through such judgment can man be persuaded, be thoroughly convinced into submission to God, and gain true knowledge of God. What the work of judgment brings about is man’s understanding of the true face of God and the truth about his rebelliousness. The work of judgment allows man to gain much understanding of the will of God, of the purpose of God’s work, and of the mysteries that could not be understood by man. It also allows man to recognize and know his corrupt substance and the roots of his corruption, as well as to discover the ugliness of man. These effects are all brought about by the work of judgment, for the substance of such work is actually the work of opening up the truth, way, and life of God to all those who have faith in Him. This work is the work of judgment done by God” (“Christ Does the Work of Judgment with the Truth” in The Word Appears in the Flesh).
“Through this work of judgment and chastisement, man will fully come to know the filthy and corrupt substance within him, and he will be able to completely change and become clean. Only in this way can man be worthy to return before the throne of God. All the work done this day is so that man can be made clean and be changed; through judgment and chastisement by the word, as well as refinement, man can cast away his corruption and be made pure. Rather than deeming this stage of work to be that of salvation, it would be more apt to say it is the work of purification” (“The Mystery of the Incarnation (4)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh).
“God does the work of judgment and chastisement so that man may know Him, and for the sake of His testimony. Without His judgment of man’s corrupt disposition, man would not know His righteous disposition that allows no offense, and could not turn his old knowledge of God into a new one. For the sake of His testimony, and for the sake of His management, He makes His entirety public, thus enabling man to achieve the knowledge of God, and change his disposition, and bear resounding testimony to God through God’s public appearance. Change is achieved in the disposition of man through different kinds of God’s work; without such changes in man’s disposition, man would be unable to bear testimony to God, and could not be after God’s heart. Changes in man’s disposition signify that man has freed himself from Satan’s bondage, has freed himself from the influence of darkness, and has truly become a model and specimen of God’s work, has truly become a witness of God and someone who is after God’s heart” (“Only Those Who Know God Can Bear Testimony to God” in The Word Appears in the Flesh).
From God’s word, we can see that in the last days, God expresses the truth to judge and chastise corrupt mankind. All the words God judges man with are the expression of His righteous disposition, what He has and what He is, and the words that can be man’s life. Therefore, they are all truths. For corrupt mankind, these words of truth are judgment themselves. They’re chastisement, condemnation, and searching, and purification. With the word of truth, God purifies the satanic disposition within corrupt mankind, and resolves their nature and substance of resisting God. This is the significance of God purifying, saving and perfecting man with judgment. In the judgment of the last days, Almighty God expresses truth and reveals all the mysteries of God’s six-thousand-year management plan, and reveals the purpose of God’s three-stage work of salvation and the substance of each stage of work. He especially points out the way for man’s disposition to become transformed and purified. Meanwhile, He thoroughly reveals man’s nature and substance which are corrupted by Satan, plus the truth of his corruption and the root of his sin. Then man can understand that his nature is the very nature of Satan, and sees that he is living in the likeness of Satan, the devil, so he truly repents, and willingly accepts God’s judgment, chastisement, trials and refinement, and is led by God’s word to pursue the truth and the transformation of his disposition. And he gradually breaks from the bondage of his satanic corrupt disposition, rebels against Satan, leaves the darkness and returns to God. And so, man’s sinful nature is radically resolved.
What’s more, by experiencing and practicing God’s word, man gradually learns many truths, such as what is salvation, what is full salvation, what is doing God’s will, what is following man’s own path, what is following God, what is following man, what are Pharisees, whom God saves, and whom God eliminates, and so on. Most importantly, in the judgment and chastisement of God’s word, man learns that God’s righteous disposition is not to be offended. Because of knowing God, man comes to fear God and shun evil and live by God’s word. As man understands the truth and knows God more deeply, he’s more obedient to God and has more reality of practicing the truth. So man unknowingly breaks away from sin and becomes holy. This result can never be achieved in the Lord’s believers who refuse to accept God’s work of the last days. So, only by accepting the judgment and chastisement of Almighty God’s word in the last days can man understand the truth and know God, break away from Satan’s influence, abolish his satanic disposition, and live by the truth and God’s word. This is the real meaning of being saved.
π¬ π Recommended: Where Does Eastern Lightning Come From? | Soul Searching | Gospel Movie "Stinging Memories"
Why are the “Eastern Lightning” opposed and condemned by the religious world?
God has become flesh twice to personally carry out His work on earth to save man, yet each time He meets with strong resistance and condemnation and frenzied persecution from the religious leaders. The facts are shocking and puzzling: Why is God treated this way whenever He carries out a new stage of work? Why are the most frenzied and rampant resisters of God the leaders who know the Bible well and who have served the Lord for years? Why do they, the most faithful and obedient ones to God in their own eyes, always carry out misdeeds and go contrary to God, unable to be compatible with Him? Could it be that God’s work is an error? Could it be that what God does is unsatisfactory? Absolutely not! The main reason all denominations and sects act out a role of resisting God and become God’s enemies is this: On the one hand, they have no truth and have no knowledge of the work of the Holy Spirit or knowledge of God, and they always use their limited theological theories and knowledge as well as their conceptions and imaginations to restrict God’s work that is always new and never old. On the other hand, men are so deeply corrupted by Satan that they are all arrogant and haughty by nature, are unsubmissive to the truth, and particularly value position. These two aspects together have led to the tragedy of the true way being rejected and condemned again and again in human history. Two thousand years ago, the Lord Jesus performed many miracles among the Jews, and He healed the sick, exorcised demons, spread the gospel of the kingdom of heaven, taught people to repent, and forgave them of their sins. There was no record of such work in the Old Testament, and it was the work that no one had ever done before. It was also of course the work none were capable of, for apart from God, no one had such great authority and power. What Jesus set out to accomplish at that time was to be crucified to bear man’s sins personally, bestow upon man an abundance of grace and peace and joy, and bring him out of the rules of the law through the work of the new age, so that he would no longer suffer punishment for failing to observe the law. Those under the law could receive God’s salvation and not perish only if they kept up with the work of Jesus. The chief priests, scribes, and Pharisees among the Jews, however, didn’t know the work of the Holy Spirit or what the work Jesus did was. In their conceptions, they believed that it was a betrayal of their God and purely the worst offense to not observe the law or pray in the name of Jehovah. Besides, as they considered that they were familiar with the Bible and had served Jehovah in the temple for many years, they believed what they held to was the truth, the most correct way; so, they regarded Jesus’ work a way outside the Bible, which ran counter to the Bible and the law. Hence, they would rather die than accept the message Jesus preached, and they even condemned Jesus’ work as heresy, a cult, and something deceiving people. Even though there was authority and wisdom to Jesus’ work and words and His miracles were unprecedented, and even though more and more people were testifying to Jesus’ deeds, they were still unwilling to investigate and seek this higher way. Rather, they were opinionated and stiff-necked and denied Jesus to be the Christ, the coming Messiah. Just as what Almighty God reveals: “Man is only able to accept one kind of work, or one way of practice. It is difficult for man to accept work, or ways of practice, that are at odds with them, or higher than them—but the Holy Spirit is always doing new work, and so there appear group after group of religious experts that oppose the new work of God. These people have become ‘experts’ precisely because man has no knowledge of how God is always new and never old, and has no knowledge of the principles of God’s work, and, what’s more, has no knowledge of the many ways in which God saves man. As such, man is utterly unable to tell if it is work that comes from the Holy Spirit, and if it is the work of God Himself. Many people cling to an attitude in which, if it corresponds with the words that came before, then they accept it, and if there are differences with the work of before, then they oppose and reject it.” (from “Knowing the Three Stages of God’s Work Is the Path to Knowing God” in The Word Appears in the Flesh) A believer in God should at least have a fear of God and hunger and thirst for righteousness. Only then can he receive the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit, come to know God’s new work, and follow God’s footsteps closely. The chief priests, scribes, and Pharisees of the Jews met Jesus many times, but instead of seeking the truth, they just tried every means to test Him and get something against Him. Nathanael and the Samaritan woman, as well as Jesus’ disciples and the other people didn’t have knowledge of God either and also had notions about God’s new work, but they could drop them and seek the truth. As a result, they recognized Jesus’ identity and God’s voice and obeyed and accepted the truth. Thus it can be seen that those religious elites were not only obstinate and hidebound but also arrogant and self-right, and they didn’t accept or submit to the truth at all.
As more and more Jewish people followed the Lord Jesus, the chief priests, scribes, and Pharisees became more fearful because they worried that their expectation of having people forever obey them would become a vain hope. The authority and power of Jesus’ words and work were unmatched by them, which made them feel inferior and ashamed of themselves. Thus, they had an ever increasing sense of crisis: If Jesus existed, the temple would become more and more desolate, and they could not continue enjoying a life of being supported, regarded as supreme, and sustained by others. So, they took Jesus as their irreconcilable foe. To preserve their position, they tried in every way to frame Jesus and blaspheme and condemn His work, spreading the slander that He cast out devils through Beezlebub the chief of the devils, and bearing false witness against Him, saying that He spoke words against the holy place and the law. (cf. Acts 6:10-14) They were dead set on removing Jesus from the Jewish people, and finally crucified Him. Even when Jesus had been resurrected from the dead and His disciples had more power and were accompanied with wonders in preaching the gospel, which sufficiently proved that the way they preached had the work of the Holy Spirit and was upheld by the Holy Spirit, those chief priests, scribes, and Pharisees still didn’t consider why Jesus’ gospel could be so prosperous. In fact, these “honorable” figures who were well versed in the Bible and wealthy in knowledge simply scorned to investigate and seek from those villagers, fishermen, and “ignorant” common people, who had no standing or knowledge. On the pretext of “defending the law and guarding the right way,” they continued to use power to collude with those in office and further restrict and oppress and even frenziedly kill those disciples and other Jewish followers of Jesus, exerting all their efforts to hinder people from following the Lord Jesus. And they forbade anyone to spread Jesus’ name…. Their evil deeds aroused God’s wrath, and the whole Jewish nation suffered unprecedented destruction. They paid a bitter price for resisting and condemning God.
Today, in the last days, God has prepared a greater salvation for those who have been redeemed by His precious blood—judging and purifying man with His word, which is a newer and higher stage of work. Through this stage of work, man will be completely freed of his corrupt satanic disposition, break free from the bondage of Satan’s dark influence, and become a holy man who knows God, is compatible with God, and truly belongs to God, thus being saved and perfected. This is the last stage of work in God’s six-thousand-year management plan. During God’s work of the last days, Christ incarnate has expressed many words of life supplying man with the truth, ridding him of his corruption, and disclosing various heavenly mysteries. And by virtue of His wisdom, great power, and authority, God has the gospel of the last days spread to thousands of families, all corners of the country. Millions of people who thirst and seek the truth have left their denominations or sects and returned before Almighty God, and the unprecedented scene of “the peoples streaming to this mountain” has appeared, and it is spreading to the entire universe. However, in the face of so many truths, such a great wonder, and such testimonies of the Holy Spirit’s work, the religious people pay no heed to them and are not touched in the slightest. They neither study them with care nor accept them with humility. Like the Pharisees, they don’t know that the work of the Holy Spirit always progresses forward, and that it is always new and never old, which is a principle by which the Holy Spirit works. They don’t have the slightest knowledge of Almighty God’s work of the last days, yet they believe confidently that they have already gained the truth and known God since they have enjoyed a way higher than that of the Age of Law of the Old Testament, and they are versed in the Old and New Testament, and have worked and preached for many years. They also stubbornly believe in this: All the Lord’s words are in the Bible. Any way that is outside of the work of Jesus and the Bible is not the true way. Departing from God’s requirements for man in the Age of Grace amounts to going beyond Christ’s teaching. Only what they have accepted, known, and held to is the true way. Anything other than that is heresy, a cult. They constrain God within the Bible and within their conceptions and imaginations. No matter how high the work brought by Almighty God is, how much work of the Holy Spirit it has, how many ways of practice it brings, and how many facts there are to verify it, they do not acknowledge that it is from God. So they all are hostile to Jesus’ return and deny it, and they even blaspheme God’s incarnate flesh, and slander and condemn the work and words of Christ of the last days. Aren’t they stubborn, hidebound, arrogant, self-right, defiant of the truth, and blasphemous of the Holy Spirit like the Pharisees of those days? As Almighty God says: “If you only come to know God from one stage of His work, then your knowledge is too, too little. Your knowledge is but a drop in the ocean. If not, why would many of the religious old guard nail God to the cross alive? Is it not because man confines God within certain parameters? Do many people not oppose God and obstruct the work of the Holy Spirit because they do not know the varied and diverse work of God, and, furthermore, because they possess but a smidgeon of knowledge and doctrine with which to measure the work of the Holy Spirit? Though the experiences of such people are superficial, they are arrogant and indulgent in nature, and they regard the work of the Holy Spirit with contempt, ignore the disciplines of the Holy Spirit and, moreover, use their trivial old arguments to ‘confirm’ the work of the Holy Spirit. They also put on an act, and are wholly convinced of their own learning and erudition, and that they are able to travel across the world. Are such people not those who are despised and rejected by the Holy Spirit, and will they not be eliminated by the new age? Are not those who come before God and openly oppose Him myopic little people, who are merely trying to show how clever they are? With but a meager knowledge of the Bible, they try to straddle the world’s ‘academia,’ with but a superficial doctrine to teach people, they try to reverse the work of the Holy Spirit, and attempt to make it revolve around their own thought process, and short-sighted as they are, they try to behold in one glance 6,000 years of God’s work. Do these people have any reason to speak of? In fact, the greater people’s knowledge of God, the slower they are to judge His work. Furthermore, they only talk a little of their knowledge of God’s work today, but they are not rash in their judgments. The less people know of God, the more arrogant and overconfident they are, and the more wantonly they proclaim God’s being—yet they only talk of theory, and offer no real evidence. Such people are of no value whatsoever. Those who see the work of the Holy Spirit as a game are frivolous! Those who are not cautious when they encounter the new work of the Holy Spirit, who run their mouths off, are quick to judge, who give free rein to their natural instinct to deny the rightness of the Holy Spirit’s work, and also insult and blaspheme it—are such disrespectful people not ignorant of the Holy Spirit’s work? Are they not, furthermore, the ones of arrogance, inherently proud and ungovernable?” (from “Knowing the Three Stages of God’s Work Is the Path to Knowing God” in The Word Appears in the Flesh)
As those true believers in the Lord return to God’s family by the thousands, the spread of God’s work in the last days has gradually reached its climax. However, the magnificence of the work of the Holy Spirit hasn’t made those religious experts—who have been accustomed to leading and commanding others in a lofty position—examine themselves and lower their proud heads to seek and investigate. Instead, finding that they are in an increasing danger of losing their positions, they begin to worry that people will all return to Almighty God and “snub” and reject them. So, to change the situation, the pastors, elders, leaders, co-workers of every denomination and sect, brandishing the banner of “watching the flock for the Lord,” begin to print and distribute adverse materials, spread rumors on the internet, and use many other ways to wantonly blaspheme and attack Almighty God. They spread the slander that Almighty God’s words are written by man, not God’s words, and that there is drug in the book, and whoever reads it will be brainwashed. And they distort the facts and call white black, falsely accusing the Church of Almighty God of being the “sect of Eastern Lightning,” an underworld organization. By so doing, they deceive and threaten the believers so that they dare not approach or come into contact with God’s gospel at all, and the denominations and sects are sealed impenetrable and watertight. These religious leaders forbid the believers to read the books of the Eastern Lightning, listen to the messages of the Eastern Lightning, and receive the preachers of God’s salvation of the last days or even any stranger, which completely goes contrary to the teaching of entertaining strangers, as required by God in the Age of Grace. The most shocking thing is that as believers in God, they even collude with the government to do the evil deeds of selling out the Lord and the friends. They track, watch, and report the brothers and sisters who preach the gospel of the last days, and even act as the hidden traitors to provide information for the secret arrest of them. It seems that they only wish to catch all those who testify God and eliminate God’s new work to slake their hatred. They clearly know that Almighty God’s followers are all kind-hearted true believers in God, and that these people don’t have any ill intention in preaching the salvation of the last days, yet they savagely and rudely insult, drive, and even beat these gospel preachers. It is plain to see that these religious people have long lost the work of the Holy Spirit, and the substance of their nature is one of refusing to accept the truth, being tired of the truth, and hating the truth. Outwardly they run and spend themselves doing the work, yet they harbor ambitions and disobedience. They are actually seeking positions and running for profits, exerting every effort to satisfy their selfish desires.
Thus it can be seen that both the religious world of Judaism of that time and the religious people of all denominations and sects today act against God, the truth, and the true way determinedly again and again without “fearing death,” essentially because they have no knowledge of God’s working principles and of God’s new work and they are stubborn, hidebound, arrogant, and self-right, and don’t seek the truth at all. Moreover, it is closely related to their great ambition for position and bad character. Now is the critical time of transition from the old age to the new age. The spiritual war has reached its peak. If one still believes those religious people’s rumors and false testimonies and is at their beck and call, disregards, scorns, and sneers at God’s such work and words, is irresponsible for his own life, still says what others say, follows the crowd and comments on the work of the Holy Spirit casually and indulgently, doesn’t have any will and courage to set his face toward justice and be freed from the bondage and hindrance of Satan’s influence, and only muddles along drifting with the tides, he will never be able to see the countenance of the Creator, forever lose the opportunity to know God, and only become a puppet of the history, a sacrificial object of Satan, and fall into darkness, weeping and gnashing his teeth, and perish. And the scriptures in Isaiah 9:14-16 will be fulfilled: “Therefore the LORD will cut off from Israel head and tail, branch and rush, in one day. The ancient and honorable, he is the head; and the prophet that teaches lies, he is the tail. For the leaders of this people cause them to err; and they that are led of them are destroyed.” We must know that God will not choose any base person who does not thirst for the truth, believes in God in a muddled way, has no definite views and ground of his own, adores the powers, and veers with the wind. On the contrary, He is looking for and perfecting a group of “chaste virgins” who hold God to be great, are of clear and sober mind, simple and obedient, and sincerely thirst for and seek God. This is an absolutely true fact! Isn’t the lesson of the Israelites paid for in blood enough to wake you up?
Every true believer in God is expectantly waiting for the return of the Savior Jesus. But faced with the confusion and the varied statements in the church, many of the brothers and sisters who truly love the Lord are in a tight corner and at a loss what course to take.
Ever since I have any memory, my parents have been doing odd jobs and worship in the temple. I once asked my mom, “What kind of god do you believe in?” She said, “I don’t know, yet I have to worship because this has been handed down through generations.” I thought: If she herself doesn’t know what she worships, what’s the meaning of her worship? Therefore, I think my mom is blindly worshiping. Afterward, I grew up gradually, and began to search for my own belief. At that time, I had a middle school classmate who was a Christian. After graduation from middle school, she invited me to attend a preaching meeting, and I accepted her invitation happily. At the preaching meeting, I heard the pastor read the following scripture: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” I was deeply touched, feeling God’s love is so great that He has bestowed mankind His Son in order that they could gain eternal life through Him. Therefore, after the preaching meeting, I asked the pastor to pray for me and decided to return to the Lord. After believing in the Lord, I was eager to read the Bible. Gradually, I understood some biblical knowledge, and began to serve in the English church service.
But later, I saw believers in the church paid too much attention to speaking in tongues, and they said I was not of their category because I couldn’t speak in tongues. However, I found what they pursued was not practicing the Lord’s words in the Bible. As a result, I left that church a year later. After experiencing a stroke, I went to a Baptist church, which providing Chinese and English services. After I attended meetings for a period of time, I found the believers there also didn’t keep the Lord’s teachings. The Lord demanded us to love each other, have humility and patience, be tolerant and merciful to others. However, what I saw was that the brothers and sisters in the English group were against those in the Chinese group, the co-workers of the two groups often had disputes while having meetings, and common believers would judge the upper leaders behind their backs, and many factions were formed in the church. I was greatly disappointed to see all of these things. Although people believe in God on the lips, they violate the Lord’s teachings, isn’t this exactly what the Lord says “This people … honors me with their lips; but their heart is far from me”? Are there any differences between such acts and those of the unbelievers? I didn’t feel the Lord’s presence there at all, therefore, after two years, I left there in hopelessness and sadness.
After leaving that church, I stayed at home for five years. During that period, I became cold in the faith, and was weak in the spirit, hardly praying or reading scriptures. Without any spiritual devotion, I was passive to the extreme, and the last hope was that I didn’t deny the Lord in my heart. Moreover, the saddest thing to me was that since I left the church, nobody, whether the leaders or the co-workers of the church, had ever visited me, and only one sister wrote a letter to me. The church should be home to believers, a place full of the Lord’s love, and the duty of the pastors and co-workers should be caring for and shepherding the believers to keep them from lost, and the brothers and sisters should show care and concern for each other. But I didn’t know why the church had become worse than the society and there was no love in it at all. I felt rather lonely in my heart.
One day in July, 2008, when I worked in the company, four robbers suddenly broke into my office, and they hit me on the hand and head fiercely with a wooden stick, and had robbed my belongings there. At that time, my head was broken, my arms were wounded, and the blood on the head just dropped on one of my favorite spiritual books named “God’s love.” After that, I lived in constant fear for half a year, the scenes when I was beaten often appeared in my mind. I thought: Is it because I didn’t go to church all the time that I don’t have the Lord’s keeping anymore? Therefore, I returned to that Baptist church while my arms were still banded with gauze. When I came into the church, the brothers and sisters were singing hymns, I heard one lyric from a song “I live on in Your grace….” At that moment, I cried and thought in my mind: Yes! O Lord, owing to Your grace, I’m still alive, I would like to return to the church. However, after returning to the church, I still felt disappointed. Except two sisters who had known me for a long time gave me greetings, nobody else, including leaders, co-workers, and other members, expressed their happiness for my returning to the church. But no matter how others treated me, I knew that I returned for following the Lord. In view of this, I decided to stay in the church, and later began to do the serving of collecting offerings, reading scriptures, and reception. I saw that many people served in the church, but only talked about the Lord’s teachings on the lips, nobody had put them into practice. Usually, while the pastor is preaching on the pulpit, people sitting in the congregation would just do their own things, such as sleeping, playing the cellphones, or chatting with others etc. I thought: Isn’t going to church for listening to the Lord’s words? How could things have become like this? As time passed, I also became cold in the heart. Each time I read scriptures on the pulpit, my heart wasn’t touched and couldn’t feel any light, as if I were reading a common book. I was very thirsty in spirit. In facing of the growing desolation of the church, I had no solution. In that period, I was robbed once on my way to the church service, and later I found that I had uterine fibroids and might get uterine cancer if things became worse. I often cried out to the Lord in those difficulties and pains, “Oh, Lord! Where are You?” But I couldn’t get the Lord’s response at all.
In July, 2016, I met Brother Bowman on Facebook, and he shared with me a gospel film named Awakening From the Dream. I knew from the film that the heroine was a church co-worker and she was determined to labor hard for the Lord from her childhood, waiting the Lord to rapture her into the heavenly home. Later, she met the brothers and sisters of the Church of Almighty God, heard the news that the Lord has already returned, and also learnt that God has done the work of judgment beginning with the house of God. At first, she held on to her own notions and didn’t accept it, and later, the witnesses read Almighty God’s words and fellowshiped with her their knowledge of God’s words. She finally found her notions and imaginations were wrong, and therefore she gave up her notions and accepted God’s end-time work. After seeing the film, I thought Almighty God’s words and the fellowship of the witnesses were both very practical, and I had a little knowledge of what the film testifies—Almighty God is the returned incarnate Lord Jesus. However, I was still not certain that the Lord Jesus has returned and done a stage of new work, for I was afraid of going astray and offending the Lord. In my hesitation, I saw another article shared by Brother Bowman, in which were listed some examples of ancient saints and prophets who forgot or gained God’s blessings. What most impressed me was the citation of Isaiah Chapter 43 Verses 18-19: Thus said the LORD … Remember you not the former things, neither consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall you not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert. When I read the Bible before, each time I read these verses, I would be attracted by them without knowing why. And I often thought: O Lord! What kind of new thing will You do on earth? But I didn’t find out the answer all the time. Now it seemed to be clear to me that this new thing is God’s judgment work in the last days, which is completely new, and has never been done by God before. I thought: Those unpleasant things happened to me have passed by, and I need to stand up again and investigate God’s new work. Reading the verse at the end of the article: “Forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth to those things which are before…” (Philippians 3:13), I was greatly moved, I said in my heart, “O Lord! You are right, I’m willing to forget the past and rouse myself again. If Almighty God is really Your second coming, I’m willing to be a person who can “follow the Lamb wherever he goes.”
The next day, I met Brother Yang on Facebook, we communicated the work God did before in the Age of Law and the Age of Grace, and talked about the desolate scenes in the church of the Age of Grace and my hard experiences these years. Brother Yang sent me a passage of Almighty God’s words: “Mankind, who left the supply of life from the Almighty, does not know why they exist, and yet fears death. There is no support, no help, but mankind is still reluctant to close their eyes, braving it all, drags out an ignoble existence in this world in bodies without the consciousness of souls. You live like such, with no hope; he exists like such, with no aim. There is only the Holy One in the legend who will come to save those who moan in suffering and long desperately for His arrival. This belief cannot be realized so far in the people who are unconscious. However, the people still yearn for it so. The Almighty has mercy on these people who suffer deeply. At the same time, He is fed up with these people who have no consciousness, because He has to wait too long for the answer from humans. He desires to seek, seek your heart and your spirit. He wants to bring you food and water and to awaken you, so you are no longer thirsty, no longer hungry. When you are weary and when you begin to feel the desolation of this world, do not be perplexed, do not cry. Almighty God, the Watcher, will embrace your arrival any time” (“The Sighing of the Almighty”). I was touched by God’s words. These words are like the calling of a gentle loving mother, who has been hoping I can understand God’s heart, and eagerly expecting me to truly rely on Him. At that moment, tears were filled with my eyes. I said in my heart: “O God! Without your leading, I can’t feel any support. Just like an orphan, I don’t know where the direction to proceed forward is. I’m more like a body without soul, living hopelessly in this world. O God! Looking back on these years, though I have been serving in the church, I only saw jealousy and strife, and couldn’t feel any love among believers, and neither could I feel Your presence! God! Only You know my inner hardship, and only You have mercy and love for people. I’d like to sincerely rely on You.” From that moment, I undoubtedly believe this is the voice of God, and am willing to know more about Almighty God.
In the following days, Brother Yang gradually sent me many words of Almighty God, including words about knowing God’s work, knowing God’s sovereignty and authority, revealing the actual fact of man’s corruption, and about the destination and outcome of mankind and so on. These various kinds of words are abundant, and they give my life unprecedented watering and supply, and I could heartily enjoy the richness from God just as if I came to the beautiful land of Canaan. When I have meetings with the brothers and sisters of the church of Almighty God, whether singing hymns, praying, reading God’s words or fellowshiping about the truth, I feel the presence of the work of the Holy Spirit; and no matter what difficulties I have, the brothers and sisters would help and support me with God’s words and their own experiences, which give me more faith to follow God.
One day, I read from Almighty God’s words: “but in fact, God’s work in them ceased long ago, and the work of the Holy Spirit is absent from them. The work of God was long since transferred to another group of people, a group on whom He intends to complete His new work. Because those in religion are incapable of accepting God’s new work, and only hold to the old work of the past, thus God has forsaken these people, and does His new work on the people who accept this new work. These are people who cooperate in His new work, and only in this way can His management be accomplished” (The Millennial Kingdom Has Arrived). “God will accomplish this fact: He will make all people throughout the universe come before Him, and worship the God on earth, and His work in other places will cease, and people will be forced to seek the true way. It will be like Joseph: Everyone came to him for food, and bowed down to him, for he had things to eat. In order to avoid famine people will be forced to seek the true way. The entire religious community is suffering severe famine, and only the God of today is the wellspring of living water, possessed of the ever-flowing wellspring provided for the enjoyment of man, and people will come and depend on Him” (“The Millennial Kingdom Has Arrived”). When I read these passages, I was suddenly enlightened, and couldn’t help recalling my experiences in the religious church: Co-workers raised jealousy and strife against each other, the believers judged each other, the preachers weren’t responsible for the flock’s life, the believers slept in meetings, and I didn’t feel a bit of fresh light even when reading scriptures. All of these are because God has stopped doing work in the church of the Age of Grace, He has started to do a stage of new work on earth, and the work of the Holy Spirit has moved. Thinking of the time I have spent together with brothers and sisters of the church of Almighty God, I see that my heart is often touched by God’s words, and the experiences of the brothers and sisters have also given me much encouragement and help. This makes me no longer feel thirsty in spirit and my heart no longer feel lonely and lost, all of which are the results achieved by the work of the Holy spirit! At this moment, I am further certain that Almighty God is the unique God Himself, and only when we return before Almighty God can we get satisfied in our life. Thinking about this, I strengthened my resolution to follow Almighty God.
When I went to attend the meeting in the religious church, I resigned from my serving position to the pastor. The moment I walked out of the church building, I really felt relaxed in my heart, for I knew there is no leading or working of the Holy Spirit there anymore. Only if we accept the end-time work of Almighty God and the watering and shepherding of God’s present words can we get full supply and have a more and more normal relationship with God. Looking back on the course of my growing up, I thank God! It is Almighty God that has led me to keep up with God’s new work. Like a lost sheep, I have returned to the side of the Shepherd and have been led by Him to the green pastures and the side of the stream. I feel unprecedentedly liberated in my spirit. All the glory and praise be to Almighty God!
When the Lord Jesus came to do His work, He preached the gospel of the heavenly kingdom everywhere on a grand scale, and it reverberated throughout the entire religious world and the Jewish nation. On the day that the Lord Jesus returns to do His work, it has shaken people from every sect and group, and caused a sensation across the entire world. Have you noticed the signs of the Lord's second coming? Have you welcomed His return?
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Storyline:
The judgment work of Almighty God in the last days has reverberated throughout every sect and group. Following the spreading of the kingdom gospel, Almighty God's words are accepted and spread by more and more people, true believers in God who thirst for Him to appear have been returning one by one before God's throne. In the meantime, the Chinese government and religious pastors and elders have ceaselessly repressed and persecuted the Church of Almighty God from start to finish. The heroine of this movie, Zheng Xinjie, is a member of the Church of Almighty God who spreads the gospel. She has faced the deranged oppression and attacks from the Chinese Communist government and religious leaders. Together with her brothers and sisters, relying on God, how will she triumph over these dark, satanic forces to sing a song of victory? …
Tang Jie served the Lord zealously for nearly forty years and expected the return of the Lord Jesus eagerly all the time. Having given up her family and her career, she established many house meeting places. As the work of the Holy Spirit shifted, the church became desolate gradually. She tried every possible way to revive it, but in vain. During this process, God’s gospel of the last days came upon her church. To “defend the Lord’s way,” she wrote a pamphlet to fabricate rumors against, slander, and attack Almighty God’s work of the last days, and sealed her church to hinder the believers from listening to the messages. However, increasingly more believers returned to Almighty God. At the end of her tether, Tang Jie fell into misery, confusion, and helplessness….
By chance, Tang Jie and two preachers of the Eastern Lightning had a fierce debate on the truth. After that, she not only understood the real reason for the desolation of the church, but also knew that God has already been incarnated and begun the judgment work of the last days. She realized that she was resisting the Lord Jesus she had been eagerly expecting for years, and was following in Pharisees’ footsteps of serving God yet resisting God. So she truly fell down before God and offered a “late” answer….
Many religious pastors and elders, because they have believed in God for many years, have always worked painstakingly hard for the Lord and have stayed watchful, waiting for the Lord's return, they believe that when the Lord comes He will certainly give them revelation. Does this view conform to the facts of God's work? Will God definitely give man revelation when He becomes flesh? Almighty God says, "Man neither studies the new work of God with care nor accepts it with humility; rather, man adopts an attitude of contempt, waiting for the revelations and guidance of God. Is this not the behavior of a man who rebels against and opposes God? How can such men gain the approval of God?" (The Word Appears in the Flesh).
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Storyline:
Lin Bo'en was an elder at a house church in China. During all his years as a believer, he felt honored to suffer for the Lord, and valued the knowledge and attainment of the Lord Jesus Christ above anything else in the world. One fateful day, he went out to preach and heard some shocking news: The Lord Jesus has returned in the flesh, and He is Christ of the last days—Almighty God! Lin Bo'en was puzzled. When the Lord returns, He is supposed to descend with the clouds, so why would He incarnate Himself and do His work in secret? What mysteries were hidden behind God's incarnation? If the Lord has truly returned, why haven't we been raptured? … An intense debate unfolds between Lin Bo'en and his co-workers and the preachers from the Church of Almighty God … Will they finally be able to understand that Almighty God is the return of the Lord Jesus, the appearance of God in the flesh?
One day, I watched a choir video of the Church of Almighty God on the timeline of a Facebook friend. I was attracted by the hymns, so I searched for some movies of your church to watch. And I found that the word expressed by Almighty God truly contains the truth. However, several days ago, my pastor saw I was browsing the website of the Church of Almighty God, then he told me that your church has been condemned and persecuted by the government of your country all the time, and he prevented me from investigating it. Faced with this matter, I feel slightly confused. I think we believe in God, so we should listen to God’s words instead of man’s. Otherwise, we are very easily to repeat the Pharisees’ mistakes of resisting the Lord Jesus. So after seeking in front of the Lord, I decided to write this letter to you, with the purpose of seeking the following questions: If what the Church of Almighty God preaches is the true way, why is the CCP government so against it? Why do religious leaders condemn it with such fervor? When treating the matter that the Church of Almighty God is openly testifying the return of the Lord, why would such servants of God have the same opinions and attitudes as those of the CCP government? What’s the reason behind this?
π Replying：
Hello Amanda, Thank you for your kind attention to the Church of Almighty God. The Lord Jesus said, “My sheep hear my voice,” and it is God’s uplifting that we can hear the voice of God and words of the Spirit to the churches in the last days. In view of this question, all those who know the history of God’s work throughout the ages know that, “Since ancient times, the true way has been persecuted.” There are always intense spiritual battles throughout God’s work.
π Investigating and communicating
The Bible says: “the whole world lies in wickedness” (1 John 5:19). The Lord Jesus also said, “This is an evil generation” (Luke 11:29). Then just what is the extent of this world’s darkness and evil? In the Age of Grace, for the sake of redeeming mankind, the Lord Jesus in the flesh was crucified by the religious circles and rulers of the time. In the last days, Almighty God who is expressing truths and judging mankind has also been met with the condemnation and resistance of religious circles and the CCP regime, and rejected by this generation. This fulfills the Lord Jesus’ words: “For as the lightning, that lightens out of the one part under heaven, shines to the other part under heaven; so shall also the Son of man be in his day. But first must he suffer many things, and be rejected of this generation” (Luke 17:24-25). This prophecy of the Lord Jesus has now finally been fulfilled. All those who hunger for God’s appearance should see clearly that the Lord has already arrived and is performing His judgment work of the last days. The prophecy of the Lord Jesus has already been fulfilled. Can people still not see this fact clearly? Atheist regimes and the majority of religious leaders are all satanic forces that hate God and the truth. This point can be confirmed through what happened with the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus. Therefore, as long as it is the true way, it will surely suffer the rejection and condemnation of atheist regimes and religious circles, and those who preach the true way and practice the truth will also surely be framed and persecuted. As the Lord Jesus said, “If the world hate you, you know that it hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love his own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:18-19). It is because of this that, throughout history, the only people among mankind who can accept the true way and follow the one true God are those very few who truly love and seek the truth, while most people will, because they follow satanic forces or because they fear persecution, be afraid to look into the true way, and lose the opportunity to be saved by God. Therefore, the Lord Jesus once warned man, “Enter you in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leads to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leads to life, and few there be that find it” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Han Lu is a leader of the Church of Almighty God in the Chinese mainland. She has believed in God for over a decade and has experienced the work of Almighty God in the last days. She understands some truths and knows that it is only through Christ of the last days, Almighty God, that man will be able to be freed from sin and live a significant life. She has cast away everything to follow Almighty God, and she has gone around and testified to God's appearance and work in the last days. However, in China where the atheist political party the CCP is in power, there is no freedom of religious belief whatsoever. The CCP government has issued secret documents completely banning all house churches, and they have frantically captured and persecuted Christians. Han Lu and others were monitored and tracked by the CCP police officers, which led to their capture. The CCP police officers have brutally tortured Han Lu to try to rob the church of its wealth and capture more church leaders, and they have also used rumors and fallacies to try to brainwash her, used her family to try and coerce her, and other despicable methods to try to threaten her in an attempt to compel her to deny God and betray God. … In her pain and weakness, Han Lu has relied on God and prayed to God, and under the guidance of the word of God, she has been able to see through all of Satan's tricks. She has made it through many interrogations under torture and has powerfully refuted the various rumors and fallacies of the CCP. Within the bitter environment of the CCP's persecution, a beautiful and resounding testimony has been made ...
“If I were not saved by God, I would still be drifting in this world,
struggling hard and painfully in sin; every day gets bleak and hopeless.
If I were not saved by God, I’d still be crushed below the devil’s feet,
snared in sin and its enjoyments, ignorant of what my life would be.
If I were not saved by God, I’d be without my blessings here today,
much less know why we should live on or the meaning of our lives.
If I were not saved by God, I’d still be confused about my faith,
still in empty space passing the days, unaware in whom to put my faith.
I have finally understood God’s loving hand holds mine as we go.
I would never go and lose my way ’cause I’m on this brilliant course to stay” (“If I Were Not Saved by God” in Follow the Lamb and Sing New Songs). Whenever I hear this hymn of experience, I am always deeply moved. If it weren’t for God saving me, as described in the hymn, I might still be wandering aimlessly in the world, tiring myself out chasing after money, even to the point that I would long since have lost my life and died abroad in a foreign land …
I’m a child of the eighties, and was born in an ordinary farmer household. My older brother was always unwell and sick since he was little. My father was wounded in an accident when I was 10; he was paralyzed two years after that. Our family’s financial situation was poor to begin with, and we went heavily into debt treating my father. Our friends and relatives were afraid that we would never be able to pay back the debt, and weren’t willing to loan us money. Helpless, I was forced to drop out of school at 16 to work away from home. In deep and quiet night, I would often think: When they were young, children the same age as me would play freely after school, while I would have to be in fields doing farming work; now they have grown up as me, and they are still going to school, acting like spoiled children with their parents, but I have to start working at an early age and suffer all kinds of hardships to support my family. … At that time, I complained to my parents about why they gave birth to me, and asked why it was that I came into this world just to suffer and toil. But there was nothing I could do about it, and I could only accept this reality. At the time, my greatest wish was to work hard, earn money, and allow my parents to live comfortably, and no longer be looked down on by others.
At first I worked in a private aluminum alloy factory. Since I was a child laborer, the boss always took good care of me with my food and housing. After one year, I felt that my wages were too low, and chose to go do the lacquer spraying work in a furniture factory that other people didn’t want to do. At that time, no matter what kind of work I was doing, as long as I didn’t break the law, I would go do it if I could make more money. My only goal was that I wanted to become a person with money, so I wouldn’t have to live the life of a poor person again. After that, my relatives introduced me to a company that offered me the opportunity to leave the country for work. I had never thought that after a few years I would go abroad.
In the Spring of 2012, I had my wish granted when I came to Japan and began my new life. I was involved in the shipbuilding industry, and through an apprenticeship I signed a three-year contract with the company. When I started work, I was exhausted and suffering. Because I didn’t know how to cook, I ate instant noodles for a month, until I couldn’t eat them with the feeling like I was going to throw up and was forced to learn to cook. I have no idea how many days I ate half-cooked rice. In Japan, we were foreigners, so it was hard for the company’s workers to keep from having an unfair treatment toward us. They made us do a lot of dirty, tiring, and dangerous tasks. When I was spraying lacquer, I was rather scared, because if the gas came into contact with fire it would ignite, and if I stopped paying attention for a moment it could endanger my life. But no matter if it was suffering in my life or danger in my work, as long as I thought of making more money to send back to my family, and being able to buy a car and a house after I returned home and elevate myself over others and no longer be poor, I felt that my suffering at the time actually wasn’t too bad. Three years of my life passed in the blink of an eye working there, and the time period on my visa was almost up. The company had a policy of renewing contracts, so in order to make more money, I chose to renew my contract and continue to work in Japan. What pleasantly surprised me was that not long after I renewed my contract, I encountered the gospel of the kingdom of Almighty God.
In September of 2015, a friend I had met in Japan told me about God’s work in the last days. When she was telling me about believing in God, I thought this was just a kind of belief, and didn’t think it was interesting. I felt that believing in God wouldn’t be able to change my destiny. Soon after that, I told my friend about my own way of thinking and the hardships I had endured, then asked her, “Can believing in God change my destiny? I’ve suffered so much, I’m just an ill-fated person. If I had money I wouldn’t be suffering, and right now the most real thing for me is to make money. For me, believing in God is something remote.” When my friend heard me speaking like this, she read to me a section of the word of God: “Where you will go every day, what you will do, who or what you will encounter, what you will say, what will happen to you—can any of this be predicted? People cannot foresee all these occurrences, much less control how they develop. In life, these unforeseeable events happen all the time, and they are an everyday occurrence. These daily vicissitudes and the ways they unfold, or the patterns by which they play out, are constant reminders to humanity that nothing happens at random, that these things’ ramifications, and their inevitability, cannot be shifted by human will. Every happening conveys an admonition from the Creator to mankind, and it also sends the message that human beings cannot control their own fates; at the same time every event is a rebuttal to humanity’s wild, futile ambition and desire to take its fate into its own hands. They are like powerful slaps about humanity’s ears one after another, forcing people to reconsider who, in the end, governs and controls their fate. And as their ambitions and desires are repeatedly thwarted and shattered, humans naturally arrive at an unconscious acceptance of what fate has in store, an acceptance of reality, of the will of Heaven and the Creator’s sovereignty. From these daily vicissitudes to the fates of entire human lives, there is nothing that does not reveal the Creator’s plans and His sovereignty; there is nothing that does not send the message that ‘the Creator’s authority cannot be exceeded,’ that does not convey the eternal truth that ‘the Creator’s authority is supreme’” (“God Himself, the Unique III” in Continuation of The Word Appears in the Flesh). After hearing this, I felt that these words made a lot of sense, and I couldn’t help but think that being able to renew my contract also seemed like something that had been arranged by God. It also made me think about the home I was born into and my life with my family were things I had no choice about. I had the feeling that somewhere out there is a Sovereign in control.
My friend also had me read this section of the word of God “‘God Himself, the Unique III’ in Continuation of The Word Appears in the Flesh” which talks about six junctures that a person must pass through in life: Birth: The First Juncture; Growing Up: The Second Juncture; Independence: The Third Juncture; Marriage: The Fourth Juncture; Progeny: The Fifth Juncture; Death: The Sixth Juncture. When I had read the word of God, I was amazed. I had never imagined that God had spoken so clearly about man’s destiny, and the facts are indeed as He described. According to ordinary circumstances, a person will experience these six junctures in his life. I thought of how many people there are on earth suffering, and how it wasn’t just me. If destiny were really up to a person’s choice and he were in control of it, then everyone would choose to live in a big, fancy house, and would there be anyone suffering from poverty and hardship? In fact, the family a person is born into is absolutely not up to them to choose, and they can’t choose what kind of parents they have. After they grow up, the kind of husband or wife they have is also not up to them. … The more I pondered them, the more I felt these words were practical, and I then began in my heart to believe what Almighty God had said. Fate is not something that can be changed by oneself. Since then, I began to get more and more interested in believing in God, and I believed that God exists, and believed that a person’s fate is not under his own control. But because I didn’t know much about God, I felt that God was very remote from me. However, in an experience not long after that, I genuinely felt: God is beside me, watching over and protecting me.
It was raining that day, and I got to work as usual, but I had absolutely no idea that there was a disaster sneaking up to strike me. Over 10:00 in the morning, I was at work on the jobsite, when I suddenly heard a “boom.” I didn’t know what it was that had smashed to the ground, and it gave me an icy shudder of terror. When I turned my head to look, I was stunned, and saw a 40 cm diameter and 4 m long iron pipe weighing about half a ton which had fallen from a crane. It smashed to the ground less than half a meter from where I was standing. I was so terrified in that moment that I was totally speechless, and it took a while for me to regain my composure from the shock. In my heart I was yelling nonstop: “Thank You God! Thank You God!” If God hadn’t been there watching over and protecting me, then the iron pipe would have smashed straight down onto me, and my insignificant life would have been over.
After I got off work, when I was talking with the brothers and sisters about what had happened that day, they fellowshiped to me that it had been God’s protection. They also read to me from the word of Almighty God: “Throughout your long lives, basically every individual has encountered many dangerous situations and undergone many temptations. This is because Satan is right there beside you, its eyes fixed on you constantly. It likes it when disaster strikes you, when calamities befall you, when nothing goes right for you, and likes it when you are caught in Satan’s net. As for God, He is protecting you constantly, keeping you from one misfortune after another and from one disaster after another. This is why I say that everything man has—peace and joy, blessings and personal safety—is in fact all under God’s control, and He guides and decides the life and fate of every individual” (“God Himself, the Unique III” in Continuation of The Word Appears in the Flesh). After reading the word of God I understood that people live every day in Satan’s net and that they are cruelly harmed. Without God watching over and guarding them, people would have long since been swallowed up by Satan. All these years, I don’t know how many times I enjoyed God watching over and protecting me, but all along I did not know God or worship Him; I truly had no conscience. Starting from that moment, I understood God’s grace of salvation better. That I was able to live up to the present is all thanks to God’s loving hand guarding me, and I thanked God from my heart. I also decided that in the future I would do all I can to follow God. In the days to come, I frequently attended gatherings with brothers and sisters, and went over into leading a regular church life, and there were slowly changes in my life. I no longer had the anxiety, suffering, and emptiness that I once had. We brothers and sisters were reading the word of God together, and fellowshiping about the word of God, singing hymns in praise of God, free and liberated in our hearts, helping each other and assisting one another in the spiritual life. Not one of them looked down on me, nor was there anyone who had disdain for the poor and fawned over the rich, and I felt I was able to live with dignity. Living among this big, warm, and blessed household of the Church of Almighty God, I felt much happier and fulfilled than in the past.
One day, something happened to a Japanese individual in our company. He was a longtime employee there and already had more than ten years of experience in the company. He was strong whether it was safety awareness or technology. That day, when he was at work, he was driving a lifting truck and was doing some work while lifted 20 meters in the air. In the course of operating it, from lack of attention he caused the truck’s liquified gas to leak onto him. There was another worker at the same time above him doing some welding, and suddenly a spark fell down and landed on his clothing. When the gas that had leaked out came into contact with the spark, it rapidly burst into flame, and a fire broke out. Many people just stared blankly at this old worker who was being engulfed in flames on the spot, but they were totally helpless and unable to do anything. It was already too late to go find someone to save him, and in a few minutes, he was burned to death. When we saw this tragedy occur, many people felt sorry for him, and couldn’t help but think about our own lives: What is it, after all, that people are living for? Because of something like this happening right next to me, I truly realized that if a person has departed from God and doesn’t have God watching over and protecting them, then their life is unprotected at all times. People are so insignificant in the face of calamities and can easily collapse, and no matter how high a person’s expertise is or how much more money a person has they are unable to save themselves.
Afterward, I read a passage of the word of God: “Because of the Creator’s sovereignty and predestination, a lonely soul that started out with nothing to its name gains parents and a family, the chance to become a member of the human race, the chance to experience human life and see the world; and it also gains the chance to experience the Creator’s sovereignty, to know the marvelousness of the creation by the Creator, and most of all, to know and become subject to the Creator’s authority. But most people do not really seize this rare and fleeting opportunity. One exhausts a lifetime’s worth of energy fighting against fate, spends all of one’s time bustling about trying to feed one’s family and shuttling back and forth between wealth and status. The things that people treasure are family, money, and fame; they view these as the most valuable things in life. All people complain about their fates, yet still they push to the back of their minds the questions that it is most imperative to examine and understand: why man is alive, how man should live, what the value and meaning of life is. All of their lives, however many years that may be, they just rush about seeking fame and fortune, until their youth has fled, until they become gray and wrinkled; until they see that fame and fortune cannot stop one’s slide toward senility, that money cannot fill the emptiness of the heart; until they understand that no one is exempt from the law of birth, aging, sickness, and death, that no one can escape what fate has in store. Only when they are forced to confront life’s final juncture do they truly grasp that even if one owns millions in property, even if one is privileged and of high rank, no one can escape death, every person will return to his or her original position: a solitary soul, with nothing to its name” (“God Himself, the Unique III” in Continuation of The Word Appears in the Flesh). After I finished reading the words of God, I was deeply stirred: People’s spirits come from God, and are destined by God to come among the world of men. But people still don’t want to believe in and worship God, and they don’t treasure the opportunity to experience the Creator’s authority, but only know to live for money, fame, and kinship. They are all busy rushing about strenuously trying to throw off the arrangement of their fate, but what can people obtain by seeking after these things? Has anyone ever thought which of these things—relatives, fame, or wealth—can save their lives when death is imminent? Look at my old coworker’s death—isn’t that the best demonstration of this fact? Thinking about the things I have sought in the past, isn’t it the same? When I went abroad to work, I would take on any filthy, tiring, or dangerous job, just to earn some more money, make people look highly upon me, and so I wouldn’t suffer the humiliation of poverty. Even though I went through every kind of suffering, I never thought to change this way of living. I just followed the same road all along. In my heart, I didn’t know if there is a God, nor did I know that man’s fate is in God’s hands. I relied on myself to change my destiny, and I strove to escape from God’s orchestration and arrangement destined in my life. Wasn’t it the road to ruin that I was following? If it weren’t for God’s salvation, or God watching over and protecting me, I’m afraid that my meager life would have long ago been snatched away by Satan. Even further, how could my life become fulfilled and meaningful as I am now? In that moment, I finally saw that the meaning of life isn’t to seek wealth or fame, it isn’t to seek to get ahead of others so they look highly upon you, but rather is to come into the presence of God, to worship God and receive His salvation, and to break free from Satan’s harm. The more I think like this, the more moved I am. I see that I am able to believe in God, and this is God treating me with a special grace. I don’t know how to express the feeling of gratitude toward God in my heart, and so I learned the hymn “If I Were Not Saved by God” to show my praise of God and to thank Almighty God for saving me!
