What Is the Meaning of Christmas, and Are You Truly Worshiping the Lord Jesus?

What Is the Meaning of Christmas, and Are You Truly Worshiping the Lord Jesus?

December 8, 2018

By Siyuan

The Origins of Christmas

Every year, as Christmas approaches, shops on the street arrange a dazzling display of Christmas presents, with Santa Claus and Christmas trees, and so on. Festooned in trees and on buildings there are many-colored lights, and whole cities are decorated with lanterns and colored hangings, and everywhere there is joy and excitement. To Christianity, Christmas is a very special holiday, and several months before Christmas, many churches will begin to busy themselves preparing everything necessary for the Christmas holiday. On Christmas Day, the churches are filled, and brothers and sisters get involved in the celebrations, eating Christmas dinner, putting on performances and worshiping the Lord Jesus, and so on. Everyone’s face is flushed with happiness. However, when we get together in joyous gatherings to celebrate the Lord Jesus’ birth, do we understand the meaning of Christmas? Perhaps brothers and sisters will say, “The Lord Jesus was nailed upon the cross to redeem all mankind, and so as to remember and celebrate the Lord Jesus’ birth, Christians established Christmas. Though the specific day on which the Lord Jesus was born is not recorded in the Bible, Christmas gradually became a universal holiday in the wake of the expansion of Jesus Christ’s gospel.” We may have known this, but do we know God’s love and His will for us that was actually hidden behind the birth of the Lord Jesus? And how should we approach Christmas in a way that is after the Lord’s heart?

Christian Testimonies | The Power of Prayer—Witnessing a Miracle Amidst Despair

Christian Testimonies | The Power of Prayer—Witnessing a Miracle Amidst Despair

December 7, 2018

By Zhao Zhihan, China

As we journey through life, every one of us will experience some extraordinary events which become inscribed on our memory and will never be forgotten. The experience that has left me with the deepest impression was the time my husband was involved in a car accident, when no one knew whether he would pull through or not, and the days that followed, during which I felt at a complete loss and was at the end of my tether. But what was different for me was that, because God was with me and I had His guidance, I thus had a support, and through praying to God and relying on Him, I witnessed a miracle in the midst of my despair. During that disastrous time, what I gained more was understanding of God’s authority and sovereignty, and a true appreciation of God’s love …

Best Christian Movies | 2018 Comedy Skit | The Pastor's "Good" Intentions

Best Christian Movies | 2018 Comedy Skit | The Pastor's "Good" Intentions

     Yang Xiangming is a worker in a denomination, and once he determines Almighty God is the returned Lord Jesus in the last days, he guides some of his brothers and sisters to turn toward Almighty God. This makes his pastor uneasy, so his pastor uses status and money to tempt him, and also uses his son's wedding to threaten Yang Xiangming into abandoning the true way…. Faced with his pastor's "good" intentions, what will Yang Xiangming finally decide to do? At this critical moment when we ought to welcome the Lord's coming, why does this pastor prevent believers from investigating the true way? The skit The Pastor's "Good" Intentions helps you understand the truth of the matter.

Gospel Hymn "God's Deeds Fill the Vast Expanse of the Universe" | Praise the Return of the Lord

Gospel Hymn | "God's Deeds Fill the Vast Expanse of the Universe" | Praise the Return of the Lord 

     1. God looks down upon all things from on high, and dominates all things from on high. At the same time, God has sent His salvation over the earth. God is watching from His secret place all the time, man’s every move, everything they say and do. God knows man like the palm of His hand. The secret place is God’s abode, the firmament is the bed He lies on. Satan’s force cannot reach unto God, for He is full of majesty, righteousness, and judgment. 

Christian Testimonies | God’s Love Guided Me Through the Trial of Illness

Christian Testimonies 

God’s Love Guided Me Through the Trial of Illness

November 16, 2018

By Yiming, Hubei Province

I Rejoice to Be Reunited With the Lord

I’m 78 this year and I have always suffered from headaches and diabetes. After I began to believe in the Lord in 2005, the illnesses that had beset me for years were eased; I perceived God’s love and thanked the Lord from the bottom of my heart. Two years later, a relative preached God’s work of the last days to me and he said that the Lord Jesus had returned as the incarnated Almighty God. He said that Almighty God was now performing a newer, higher stage of work on the foundation of the Lord Jesus’ work of redemption, and that Almighty God was using the truth to judge and chastise man, to cleanse our corruption, and God would lead those who ultimately attained salvation into His kingdom. I was thrilled to hear this news, and I thought to myself, “I never imagined that I would actually be able to welcome the Lord in my lifetime. If in the future I could be led by God into His kingdom, that would be wonderful indeed!” Thinking this, my heart became filled with a joy I couldn’t express, and I thanked God’s love and salvation. After a period of seeking and investigating, I became certain from reading God’s words that Almighty God was indeed the Lord Jesus returned, and very soon after I was living the church life and doing all I could to perform my duty within the church.

Illness Strikes, and My Deplorable Motives Are Exposed

In the twelfth month of the lunar calendar, I was just doing my housework when suddenly I felt a pressure on my heart and found it difficult to breathe, and I had a feeling like I couldn’t catch my breath and was about to suffocate. My husband saw that I was in distress and he hurriedly called our daughter and her husband, and they took me to the municipal hospital.

After a comprehensive checkup, the attending doctor said with an imposing expression: “You have a very serious illness. It’s a problem with your heart that could cause you to die at any minute. You need to be admitted to the hospital for treatment straight away.” The doctor’s words were like a bolt from the blue and I immediately started to panic. I thought, “How come I’ve suddenly contracted such a serious illness? And I could die at any minute? Since I started believing in God, I’ve always faithfully fulfilled my duty. How could God not protect me? If I die, I won’t be able to see the spectacular event of the manifestation of the beautiful kingdom, and I won’t be able to live with my daughters and my husband again. Will I not be able to share in the eternal happiness of the heavenly kingdom?” The more I thought, the more grieved I was, and a feeling of desolation crept into my heart. In pain, all I could do was keep praying to God in my heart: “O God! Such a serious illness has now befallen me, and I feel helpless and weak. I don’t know what to do and I don’t understand Your will. But I believe that all this is happening by Your leave, and I ask You to lead me and guide me.” After I’d prayed, these words of God came to my mind: “Now you all know that man’s belief in God is not solely for salvation of the soul and welfare of the flesh, nor is it to enrich his life through love of God, and so on. As it stands, if you love God for the sake of welfare of the flesh or momentary pleasure, then even if, in the end, your love for God reaches its peak and you ask for nothing, this love you seek is still an impure love and not pleasing to God. … This kind of love can only maintain the status quo; it cannot attain eternal constancy, nor take root in man. This kind of love is that of a flower which bears no fruit after it has bloomed then withered. In other words, after you have loved God once in such a way and there is no one to lead you on the path ahead, then you will fall. … Those gained by God are those who rebel against Satan and escape from its domain. Such men will be officially numbered among the people of the kingdom. This is how the people of the kingdom come to be. Are you willing to be this kind of person? Are you willing to be gained by God?” (“What Viewpoint Believers Ought to Hold” in The Word Appears in the Flesh).

The revelations of God’s words made me ashamed, for only then did I realize that it was actually my views on my belief in God that were wrong. Thinking back, I only started believing in the Lord Jesus so that my illnesses could be cured, and afterward I heard that one could get into the heavenly kingdom and enjoy eternal bliss if one accepted Almighty God’s work of the last days, and so in order to attain this blessing, I accepted the gospel of the last days and actively fulfilled my duty, believing that the more I worked for God the greater my blessings would be in the future. But now a life-threatening illness had befallen me and my hopes to be blessed were just about to be dashed. So I began to blame and misunderstand God and reason with God, believing that I’d abandoned everything and expended myself for God, and suffered and paid a price for God, and that God should therefore bless me and not allow me to contract such a serious illness. Only then did I see that my belief in God and the fulfilling of my duties had not been sincere, much less was I performing the duty of a created being to repay God’s love. Instead, I had gone by my own personal motives and my purpose was to gain blessings from God and enjoy the grace and blessings of God. My expending myself had also been done in order to bargain with God and to obtain the bliss of the heavenly kingdom in return. With such a tainted belief in God, no matter how faithful I appeared on the outside, it could not stand up against the facts; when a slight storm came along, I fell easily, like a pretty flower that is tender and beautiful for a short time, but which bears no fruit. I thought about how everything I had had come from God, and how I should fulfill my duty well to repay God’s love, and that this was a heavenly law. And yet I had used my duty to make bargains with God, filled with my own extravagant desires—was I not rebelling against God and trying to cheat Him by performing my duty in this way? I had not a shred of conscience or reason! I then understood God’s will. God was using this illness to test me and to enable me to see clearly the wrong motives behind my belief in God. He was using this refinement to purify and change me, to make me let go of the unreasonable demands I was making to God, to make me recover my conscience and reason, and worship the Creator standing firmly in the place of a created being. Thinking this, everything suddenly clicked into place and I thanked God for His salvation. Were it not for the salvation of God, I’d still be pursuing along the wrong path with nothing as my reward at the end of it, and I could then only be abandoned and sifted out by God. Through this illness, I also came to see that, if one doesn’t know God’s work and doesn’t know how God purifies and saves man, one is then unable to revere and obey God, and when things happen that is not to one’s liking, one will become dispirited, and will even misunderstand and blame God; my stature really was so pitifully small. Thinking of these things, my heart was filled with self-reproach and a feeling of indebtedness to God.

After I was admitted to hospital, I kept God in my thoughts at every moment, and I felt that my heart and God had become even closer. I thought of God’s words that say: “Almighty God is an all-powerful physician! To dwell in sickness is to be sick, but to dwell in the spirit is to be well. If you have but one breath, God will not let you die” (“The Sixth Utterance” of Utterances and Testimonies of Christ in the Beginning in The Word Appears in the Flesh). From within God’s words, I saw God’s authority and love, and in my heart I then said a prayer to God: “O God! Although I feel a little fainthearted now that this illness has befallen me, yet I believe that You are the Ruler of all things and my illness is also in Your hands. I wish to entrust myself to You and I believe that You are my pillar. I ask that You give me faith and enable me to submit to Your orchestrations and arrangements.”

Death Approaches and God’s Words Strengthen My Faith

Over ten days later, my illness was still no better. One day, I suddenly went into shock and had to be resuscitated. My son-in-law, seeing my condition worsen, had me transferred to the provincial hospital. The specialist at the provincial hospital looked at my medical transfer papers and arranged for me to be in the intensive care unit, and he gave me oxygen. I heard another patient say that all the patients admitted to the intensive care unit were going to die soon. I felt terrified when I heard them say this, and I thought to myself, “Has the doctor arranged for me to be here because I’m going to die soon?” As I thought this, I felt death approaching, and in my heart I felt inexplicable panic and unrest. That afternoon, they wheeled a man into the ward and an hour later he was dead. In that instant as I watched him being wheeled away, I felt myself being enshrouded by death and I felt that the next death would be my own. The more I thought about it, the more afraid I became: “Could it be that I really am going to die? But I don’t want to die, I want to …” I was utterly helpless and terrified, and all I could do was to call on God silently in my heart, asking Him to protect my heart. Just then, these words of God came to mind: “When Job lost his livestock that filled the mountains and untold masses of wealth, and his body became covered in sore boils, it was because of his faith. When he could hear the voice of Me, Jehovah, and see the glory of Me, Jehovah, it was because of his faith. That Peter could follow Jesus Christ, it was by his faith. That he could be nailed to the cross for My sake and give glorious testimony, it was also by his faith. When John saw the glorious image of the Son of man, it was by his faith. When he saw the vision of the last days, it was all the more by his faith. The reason why the so-called multitudes of the Gentile nations have obtained My revelation, and came to know that I have returned in the flesh to do My work among man, it is also because of their faith. All those who are smitten by My harsh words and who are saved—have they not done so because of their faith? People have received a lot of things through faith. What they receive is not always blessing…. For example, in the case of Job, he received Jehovah’s blessing as well as a scourge through faith. Whether you receive a blessing or suffer a scourge, both are blessed events” (“The Inside Truth of the Conquering Work (1)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh).

God’s words ignited my hopes and gave me faith. I thought of all the saints throughout the ages, like Job and Peter. When they were undergoing all manner of trials, though they were grieved to the core and in extreme pain at the time, and they couldn’t understand God’s will, they still had true faith in God. No matter what God did, they didn’t complain, but instead they obeyed the Creator standing firmly in their place as created beings, and in the end they obtained God’s blessings and witnessed God’s great power and sovereignty. For example, when Satan’s attacks and temptations came upon Job, his property was all taken away, his children met with disaster, and his whole body was covered in sores, and he suffered such a great degree of pain. And yet he had a place for God in his heart, and he would rather have cursed the day he was born than speak sinfully, and in the end, he spoke these words: “Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” (Job 2:10). What he held onto was true faith in and reverence for God. He was willing to obey whether God gave or God took away, and in the end God appeared to him, and Job’s love and faith for God were heightened. Although there was no comparison between the saints of all the ages and myself, it was also by God’s leave that this illness had befallen me now, and even more so it was by God’s love. God wanted to give me true faith and compassion, to allow me to experience His authority, and to make true knowledge of God arise in me. My life and death were in God’s hands and God would have the final say. All my worries were unnecessary, and they were the result of not believing in the sovereignty of God and always wanting to rule and orchestrate things by relying on my own strength. Thinking this, my heart was much calmed.

I Entrust My Life and Death to God and I Witness God’s Deeds

A few days later, my family asked the hospital specialist and a professor to give me a thorough examination. After consulting together, the specialist and the professor said that my illness was a coronary occlusion caused by my diabetes, that three arteries were now blocked and that I had to undergo surgery right away, otherwise, they said, I could die at any minute. But they said that even if I did have the operation, they could not guarantee that I would be cured.

My family then had me transferred to a specialist heart hospital. After examining me, the doctor said that I had to have the operation right away, but that the risks were great. When operating on cardiac problems caused by diabetes, the incisions do not heal well, the doctor said, and if the opening did not heal, the result would be even worse than not having the operation at all. Because this operation had to be done by grafting blood vessels from my thighs to bypass the blocked coronary arteries around my heart, if the operation failed then I could be paralyzed for the rest of my life. Also, things could go wrong at any moment during the operation and there was a possibility that I could die on the operating table. The doctor said it was difficult to predict whether I would ever wake up again after the operation, and he asked my family to consider carefully whether or not they really wanted me to have the operation. After hearing the doctor out, my daughter and son-in-law were hesitant, afraid that a lot of money could be spent, and I may still not be better afterward, and then not only would they have no money left, but I’d still not be cured either. My husband was also a believer in God and he knew that our lives and deaths were in God’s hands, and that it wasn’t human beings who have the final say. And so he said to the doctor without any hesitation, “You just concentrate on performing the operation, and whether my wife survives or not has nothing to do with this hospital. I can bear anything that happens.” My husband then signed the consent forms, and the doctor began to prepare for the operation.

After everything was ready, I was wheeled into the operating room. As I lay on the operating table, I thought of what the doctor had said, and sorrow and distress once again filled my heart. I thought, “If I really do become paralyzed, won’t that be like a living death? With my husband so old now, won’t I be a burden on him? Though I have several daughters, they all now have their own lives and families, so who could look after me all year round? If that really does happen, then I’ll just have to think of a way to end it all!” But then I thought that I could possibly die alone on the operating table, and my heart became even more troubled. Just then, I realized that my state of mind was wrong, and I hurriedly called on God to protect my heart and make me able to submit to His orchestrations and arrangements. At that moment, a passage of God’s words came to mind: “Who of the whole of mankind is not cared for in the eyes of the Almighty? Who does not live in the midst of the Almighty’s predestination? Whose birth and death come from their own choices? Does man control his own fate? Many people cry out for death, yet it is far away from them; many people want to be those who are strong in life and fear death, yet unbeknownst to them, the day of their demise draws near, plunging them into the abyss of death; many people look to the skies and sigh deeply; many people cry great, wailing sobs; many people fall amidst trials; and many people become the prisoners of temptation” (“The Eleventh Utterance” of God’s Utterances to the Entire Universe in The Word Appears in the Flesh). Yes! The God I believe in controls all things and the fate of every human being is in His hands. The time when each person is born and the time when they die are predestined by God, so wasn’t my fate also orchestrated by God? I thought of how, although I was resolved to bear witness to God, when I was faced with a real test I began worrying about my own life, death and future; I was both afraid of dying and worried about being paralyzed and becoming a burden on others, and I was thinking about ending my own life. By doing this, was I not desiring to orchestrate my own fate? How was this submitting to God’s sovereignty and arrangements? Did this not show that I had no faith in God? God gave me my life and whether I lived or died was in God’s hands. I knew I should not be timid, not be afraid, and not live amidst the deceits of Satan, but instead I should have faith in God, look to God and entrust Him with my life, my death and my future. Thinking this, I prayed to God in my heart: “O God! I will soon be having an operation. Although I’m still worried, yet I believe that the success or failure of this operation is in Your hands. Whether I live or die, I wish to submit to Your orchestrations and arrangements.” After praying, I felt much calmer. The doctor anesthetized me, and soon after I knew nothing more.

After the operation, I was moved to the intensive care unit for observation. When I woke up, already two days had passed, and my family told me joyfully that the operation had been very successful and that all I had to do now was recover. When I heard this, I felt very moved and I kept thanking God for His love! I knew that having survived the operation and that the operation had been so successful was all down to God’s wondrous protection! I became convinced from the bottom of my heart that our lives and deaths are controlled and orchestrated by God, and that this is a manifestation of God’s authority.

As I recovered, I listened to the loud cries of pain coming from some of the patients in the same ward, and some of them groaned constantly, but I felt no pain whatsoever. I knew clearly in my heart that the lack of pain from my incisions was entirely the wondrous deed of God. I perceived God’s love, and thanks and praise for God flowed forth from my heart. In the afternoon, the doctor in charge of my case came and asked me, “Madam, do your incisions hurt at all? Do you feel any discomfort?” And I replied, “Thank you for your concern, but I feel no discomfort.” Three days later, the doctor saw that I was recovering very well and had me transferred to a normal ward. I saw that patients without diabetes needed four or five days to recover after an operation before they were transferred out of the intensive care unit, and yet, despite my advanced years and having diabetes—meaning that my incisions were arguably a lot harder to heal—I was able to eat solid food only three days after my operation. I was also recovering faster than other people, and this was indeed God’s great power and His great love for me.

Over the days that followed, my husband often read God’s words to me and I pondered them, contemplating the salvation work God was performing on me, and I truly felt how real God’s love was. Despite having been tormented by illness so that I had been hovering between life and death, God was with me always and never left my side: Each time I became negative and weak and I lost my faith, God’s words led and guided me, giving me faith and strength. With God as my staunch backup, I would no longer be fainthearted and afraid; when I sincerely relied on God and became willing to wholly entrust myself to God and submit to His orchestrations and arrangements, God not only enabled me to survive, but He eased my bodily pain. This allowed me to see God’s wondrous deeds and feel God’s love. Only through this experience did I come to realize that although this incarnation of God doesn’t display signs and wonders in His work, the power of God’s words far exceeds the power of showing signs and wonders; God’s words are indeed the truth, they can become people’s life and they are both the principles and the direction for our actions.

After some time, my incisions healed very well and, whereas patients who had had the same operation as me still couldn’t move, I was able to walk outside supported by my husband. The doctors and my fellow patients were all amazed to see this. I knew very clearly in my heart, that my body could recover so quickly was God’s deed, God’s blessing and God’s love, for only God could make such a miracle happen!

Two weeks later, when I was being discharged from the hospital, the doctor said to me, “There are seven other people in this hospital with the same illness as you, and only yours was caused by diabetes. Your condition was more serious than theirs, and yet you are the first to recover. It really boggles the mind! There is still a lump in your pericardium, however, which remains a danger. You must come back to the hospital in a month’s time for a checkup. If this lump is still getting bigger, then you will have to have another operation.” Hearing the doctor say this, I no longer felt afraid or worried, and I thought to myself: “I’ve undergone such a grave illness and God did not cause me to die. I have seen God’s authority, and I now have even greater faith to rely on God. I’ll entrust my illness into God’s hands and let Him take control.” Afterward, the doctor prescribed me some medicine and I returned home. After I got home, I spent every day reading God’s words and singing God’s praises with brothers and sisters, enjoying God’s love. I felt so liberated and free, and my illness completely slipped my mind.

When I returned to the hospital for my checkup a month later, every physical indicator showed normal and the lump in my pericardium had disappeared. Once again, this allowed me to see God’s wondrous deeds and His love for me.

After Undergoing This Baptism, I Faced the Future Stronger Than Before

While in the car on the way home, I watched the tall white poplar trees go by on either side and I thought: “They are all under God’s sovereignty. They accept the baptism of wind, frost, snow and rain all year round and the life within them becomes even stronger and indomitable. This serious illness I’ve had has been like going through a life baptism; not only has it purified my love for God, but it has increased my faith in God.” I then thought of God’s words that say: “God’s life force can prevail over any power; moreover, it exceeds any power. His life is eternal, His power extraordinary, and His life force not easily overwhelmed by any created being or enemy force. The life force of God exists, and shines its brilliant radiance, regardless of time or place. God’s life remains forever unchanged throughout the upheavals of heaven and earth. All things pass away, but God’s life still remains, for God is the source of the existence of all things, and the root of their existence. Man’s life originates from God, the existence of the heaven is because of God, and the existence of the earth stems from the power of God’s life. No object possessed of vitality can transcend the sovereignty of God, and no thing with vigor can break away from the ambit of God’s authority” (“Only Christ of the Last Days Can Give Man the Way of Eternal Life” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). I couldn’t help but sigh with emotion: The authority and power of God’s words really are so great! In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth and everything in them with words, and because of God’s words, all things live and multiply within the rules predestined by God, one generation after another. In the last days, God expresses the entire truth that purifies and saves man, and even more so God’s truth is the root of our survival and the direction in which we must follow. When my life and death were hanging in the balance, God’s words gave me faith and courage. They enabled me to learn how to rely on God and look to God during my illness, they guided me to break through my fear of death and overcome the constraints of death. I really gained so much during this experience.

I wish only to believe in God and perform my duty in earnest for the rest of my life, and to repay God’s love and salvation. Thank You God!

The Word of God Guides Me Through the Snares

The Word of God Guides Me Through the Snares

By Tian’na, Hong Kong

As I go through the passage of God’s words, “Do You Know? God Has Done a Great Thing Among Men,” I cannot help but recall my experience two years ago of breaking free from the binds of rumors and returning before God.

God’s Attitude Toward Sinners

God’s Attitude Toward Sinners

October 13, 2018

Wang Yan

The last days are here, the prophecies in the Bible have basically all been fulfilled, and brothers and sisters all look forward to the Lord coming to receive us into the kingdom of heaven. But many brothers and sisters in the Lord are asking: Although we go to church every week to give worship, and we often read the Bible and we expend ourselves and work for the Lord, we are always committing sins in the daytime and then confessing in the evening, living in this vicious spiral, and we can never free ourselves from the bonds of sin. If things carry on this way, will the Lord really forgive us, and receive us into the kingdom of heaven? How exactly does the Lord treat sinners?

When we talk about God’s attitude toward sinners, brothers and sisters all understand this subject differently. For example, some believe that when the Lord Jesus was crucified, He absolved us of all our sins. They believe that, whether they are previous sins or sins that we will commit in the future, they have all already been absolved, the Lord doesn’t see us as sinners anymore and we will surely enter into the kingdom of heaven; some brothers and sisters believe that if we believe in the Lord Jesus in our hearts and acknowledge Him with our mouths, then we have been justified by faith, and we are forever saved, and that when the Lord returns we will surely be raptured up into the kingdom of heaven; then there are those brothers and sisters who believe that the Lord is merciful and loving, and that no matter how great our sins, the Lord will forgive us and absolve us of them, that ultimately the Lord will surely lead us into the kingdom of heaven, and on that day we will enjoy the blessings of the heavenly kingdom together with the Lord. I also used to believe that the Lord had taken all our sins upon Himself, that we were no longer sinful, and that the Lord would absolve us of any sin we committed. Because I took this view, I didn’t think much of the sins I committed every day, to the point where I even indulged myself, and my sins grew apace. But when I saw God says, “You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy” (Lev 11:45), and these words in the Bible: “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord” (Heb 12:14), I felt very uneasy, and I thought: Yes, God is holy, and how can I, the sinner that I am, who commits sins every day and displeases the Lord, earn the Lord’s praise? How will the Lord treat such a sinner as me? Later, through an investigation of the Bible, I came to some new light which I’d like to share with you.

I saw that the Lord Jesus said: “Truly, truly, I say to you, Whoever commits sin is the servant of sin. And the servant stays not in the house for ever: but the Son stays ever” (Jhn 8:34-35). And Hebrews 10:26-27 says: “For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins, But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries.” When I read these verses of scripture, I then knew what God’s attitude toward sinners is. To God, whether people believe in Him or not, all who commit sin are the slaves of sin, they all belong to Satan and are the enemies of God, and people like this can never enter into the kingdom of heaven. Moreover, if someone intentionally commits sin after they’ve come to believe in God, there is no longer any sin offering they can make and their sins will not be absolved by God. People like this are not only unable to enter into the kingdom of heaven, but they will also be destroyed by God for their sins, and will suffer the appropriate punishment. This made me think of these words in Revelation: “He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still. And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be” (Rev 22:11-12). From these words, we can see that God determines people’s ends according to their deeds; those who do righteous deeds are rewarded, and those who do evil are punished. Thinking of how we believe in the Lord, although our sins were absolved, we still commit sins despite ourselves, we often lie and cheat for the sake of fame, fortune and status, we make excuses and quibble when we encounter issues and, so as to avoid taking responsibility, we can even frame others and shift the blame onto others; when we encounter natural or man-made disasters, trials and tribulations, we blame God and betray Him; in particular, when God’s work is at odds with our own conceptions, we deny God, condemn God and defy God; though we may nominally believe in God, we still worship and follow people; if we come to have status, then we exalt ourselves and bear witness to ourselves like the chief priests, scribes and Pharisees of old, and we take God’s place and make others worship us and look to us, we envy those who are good and able, and we act on our own personal preferences; some also covet the pleasures of sin and follow the evil trends of the world, and so on. We are still living out the image of a sinner, and we are still the servants of sin, so how can we possibly enter into the kingdom of heaven? Especially over the past few years, we are all able to perceive that the church has lost the work and guidance of the Holy Spirit, and our God-fearing hearts have become weaker and weaker. We can clearly feel that we are keeping the Lord Jesus’ words less and less, our dispositions are becoming increasingly arrogant and conceited, crooked and deceitful, selfish and greedy, haughty and capricious, we are unable to put the Lord’s teachings into practice, and we can’t even stop ourselves from doing things we know to be sinful. As we all know, God is holy and God’s disposition is righteous and unoffendable! The kingdom of heaven is the holy land that permits no filth or stain—this is determined by God’s disposition and essence! As for us, who are mired so deeply in sin that we cannot extricate ourselves, if we are incapable of casting off our corrupt dispositions and being cleansed, then how will we obtain God’s praise and be led into the kingdom of heaven? Isn’t that just a pipe dream? What’s more, the Lord Jesus never said that man could enter into the kingdom of heaven because their sins had been absolved and they had been justified by faith, but instead He demanded that we confess and repent, and take on the likeness of new people. Therefore, the God we believe in, who will forever pardon our sins, who will not remember any of our sins no matter how many we commit, and our belief that when the Lord returns we will be able to enter into the kingdom of heaven, are just our own conceptions and imagination, and simply do not tally with the Lord’s will.

Some brothers and sisters may raise questions, and will say: “We’ve believed in the Lord for many years and have worked very hard for Him. We can’t count how many churches we’ve established, and we’ve even been sent to prison. So even if we do commit sin, God will surely not abandon us!” If this was truly the case, then wouldn’t those Jewish Pharisees who traveled all over the lands and seas to spread the gospel, and yet defied and condemned the Lord Jesus, all have been able to enter into the kingdom of heaven? Why were they still condemned and cursed by the Lord Jesus? Wasn’t the Lord Jesus the loving and merciful God? How was He still able to condemn and curse them? Moreover, these people worked hard for God, so why didn’t the Lord Jesus pardon their sins? Regarding this question, these words of the Lord Jesus come to mind: “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. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name? and in your name have cast out devils? and in your name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess to them, I never knew you: depart from me, you that work iniquity” (Mat 7:21-23). And a book of truth also says: “Some people will end up saying, ‘I’ve done so much work for You, and though there may not have been celebrated achievements, still I have been diligent in my efforts. Can’t You just let me into heaven to eat the fruit of life?’ You must know what kind of people I desire; those who are impure are not permitted to enter into the kingdom, those who are impure are not permitted to besmirch the holy ground. Though you may have done much work, and have worked for many years, in the end if you are still deplorably filthy—it is intolerable to the law of Heaven that you wish to enter My kingdom!” (“Success or Failure Depends on the Path That Man Walks” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). Reading these words, I suddenly saw the light. It turns out that those who will enter the kingdom of heaven must indeed be those who cast off sin and are cleansed, who follow God’s way, and who obey God, worship God and love God. Those who spread the gospel and cast out demons in the Lord’s name but who don’t follow God’s way are evil-doers in the eyes of God. Just like those Jewish Pharisees—although they appeared pious on the outside, and they worked for God and suffered greatly all their lives, and paid much price, yet when the Lord Jesus incarnated to perform His work of redemption, they refused to accept it, much less submit to or practice the Lord Jesus’ words. Instead, they judged and condemned the Lord Jesus’ work, frantically resisted the Lord, and they even spread notions and rumors to deceive people and obstruct them from accepting the Lord Jesus’ work, and they nailed the Lord Jesus to the cross—by doing this, were they not openly opposing and contesting God? People like this, who simply will not repent, are truly Satan’s partners in crime and are Satan’s lackeys. They worm their way into the church especially to disrupt and demolish God’s work, and people like this have a God-defying essence, they are the enemies of God, and God will never allow hated enemies or the wicked to enter into His kingdom. From this, we are able to see that all who are incapable of practicing God’s words or of obeying God’s work are all unclean and unrighteous; if someone is unable to repent or to cast off their God-defying corrupt disposition, and they go on living in sin, then they are unclean, they are not a righteous person praised by God, but instead they are condemned. The kingdom of heaven is God’s kingdom, and God is holy, so if someone is unclean then how could they be qualified to enter into God’s kingdom and live together with Him? God is merciful and loving to man, but God is also righteous, and will never lead filthy and corrupt people into His kingdom. That is to say, whether or not we can enter into the kingdom of heaven in the end does not depend on how much work we do or how much we suffer, but most importantly it depends on whether or not our corrupt dispositions are changed and cleansed, whether or not we can practice God’s words, do God’s will, and whether or not we are people who love God, obey God and fear God. If we only rely on our own ardor to give things up, expend ourselves, spread the gospel, build churches and support other believers, but our own corrupt dispositions are not changed in the slightest, we still frequently commit sin, defy God and rebel against God, and we are unable to follow God’s way, then we will be evil-doers, and will be unable to enter into the kingdom of heaven.

Thinking more about it, although we run all around expending ourselves, and we suffer and give everything up so as to spread the Lord’s name, yet we still conceal our own ulterior motives within us, and we don’t do these things to satisfy God or out of consideration for God’s will, but rather we wish to exchange our hard work for a beautiful destination in the future, to enter into the kingdom of heaven and be rewarded and given crowns. This kind of expending carries with it a deceptive nature, and is entirely us making deals with the Lord; in God’s eyes, this is us doing evil, and however much we suffer, God will not commend it. Furthermore, we don’t know God, and we don’t have God-fearing hearts. When God’s work is at odds with our conceptions, we act like those Jewish Pharisees, we arbitrarily judge and condemn God’s work, and we stubbornly cling to our own notions, deny God’s work and defy God. It can therefore be seen that, if we do not resolve our sinful natures, then we will be capable of committing sin, and defying and betraying God at any time and in any place. Our deeds can then only be condemned by God, so how could we possibly then enter into the kingdom of heaven? Only those who love the truth and can pursue the truth, whose belief in God no longer relies on their satanic dispositions or on their conceptions and imaginations, who can seek the truth and practice in accordance with God’s words in all things, who have achieved true obedience to and love for God, and who truly know God, can earn the Lord’s praise and be led by God into the kingdom of heaven. For example, those whom we know well—Abraham, Job and Peter—who had true faith in God, who sought to love and satisfy God, and who submitted absolutely to God’s orchestrations and arrangements, even though trials and tribulations befell them, they still didn’t blame or betray God. Moreover, they sought God’s will and practiced in accordance with God’s words in all things, and they bore beautiful and resounding witness to God—they were the ones most in keeping with God’s will.

Now we know God’s attitude toward sinners, and therefore we also naturally come to know how God sees us. So from now on, we should pursue the truth, cast off our corrupt dispositions and be cleansed, for only then can we win God’s blessings and be led by Him into the kingdom of heaven. So how can we free ourselves from the bonds of sin? I recommend everyone watch the movie The Moment of Change, and you will be shown the way.

Unveiled: The True Meaning of “It Is Finished” Spoken by the Lord Jesus on the Cross

Unveiled: The True Meaning of “It Is Finished” Spoken by the Lord Jesus on the Cross

November 9, 2018

By Xiang’ai, Heilongjiang Province

Many brothers and sisters believe that what Jesus meant by saying “It is finished” when He was on the cross was that God’s work to save mankind was completed. But was this really the case? What exactly did He mean by saying “It is finished”? The following article will uncover the true meaning of the words “It is finished” that the Lord Jesus spoke upon the cross. Please read on …

At seven o’clock in the morning, Wang Xue was hurrying to her daughter Hui Min’s house. Half an hour before, Pastor Zhang had come to Wang Xue’s house to tell her that her daughter and son-in-law had accepted Eastern Lightning. This came as a great surprise to Wang Xue, and she thought to herself: “The members of Eastern Lightning testify that the Lord Jesus has returned and that He is expressing His words and performing a stage of work to judge and purify man. And yet the Lord Jesus clearly said ‘It is finished’ when He was upon the cross, and this shows that God’s work to save mankind has already finished. How can the Lord possibly return to do a new stage of work? My daughter and her husband are quite familiar with the Bible, and they pursue the truth quite diligently; they are thoughtful and insightful people, so they won’t have made this decision blindly. How could they have accepted Eastern Lightning? What’s going on here?” Wang Xue was extremely baffled and she wanted to understand the reasons behind this as soon as she could, and so she hurriedly set off for Hui Min’s house.

30 minutes later, Wang Xue arrived at her daughter’s home. As soon as she was inside, Wang Xue got straight to the point, and she said to her daughter, “Pastor Zhang came to find me at the crack of dawn this morning and said the two of you had accepted Eastern Lightning. Is this true?”

Li Jun, who had been reading in the study, overheard his mother-in-law and came out of the room. Hui Min saw her mother wearing a rather stern expression, so she took her mother’s hand and sat down. Smiling, she said, “Yes, mom, we’ve accepted Eastern Lightning. Lately, Li Jun and I have been reading the words of Almighty God and we’ve seen Almighty God’s words reveal all the truths and mysteries of God’s salvation of mankind, such as the mystery of God’s six-thousand-year management plan, the mystery of God’s incarnation, the mystery of God’s three stages of work, how God performs His work of judgment to purify and save man in the last days, and the end and final destination for mankind, and so on. The more we read Almighty God’s words, the more we feel that these words are the truth, that they have power and authority and that they are the voice of God! Mom, the Lord Jesus whom we’ve yearned for for so long really has returned as the incarnated Almighty God. Why don’t you investigate it yourself!”

Wang Xue listened to her daughter and her expression softened a little. She said, “Hui Min, our church is now desolate, so if you go looking for a church which has the work of the Holy Spirit, then I won’t stop you. But Eastern Lightning preaches that the Lord has returned and is performing a stage of work to judge and purify man. How is this possible? When He was on the cross, the Lord Jesus very clearly said ‘It is finished.’ This shows that God’s work to save mankind is over, and so long as we confess and repent to the Lord then our sins can be forgiven, and when the Lord returns, He will immediately raise us up into the heavenly kingdom. He won’t be performing any new work. This is often preached by pastors and elders, so how could you have forgotten it? How could you have accepted the way of Eastern Lightning?”

Li Jun smiled and said, “Mom, we’ve always followed the pastors and elders of the religious world, and believed that what the Lord Jesus meant by saying ‘It is finished’ when He was on the cross was that God’s work to save mankind was finished, and that when the Lord came again He would immediately raise us up into the heavenly kingdom and would not perform any new work. But does this view accord with the original meaning of the Lord’s words? Does it accord with the facts of God’s work? When the Lord Jesus was on the cross, He only said these three words, ‘It is finished.’ He did not say that God’s work to save mankind was totally finished, and yet pastors and elders just go by these words spoken by the Lord Jesus to decide that God’s work is now over and that when the Lord returns He will not perform any new work. By saying this, aren’t they making too much of a subjective assertion? Aren’t they just interpreting the Lord’s words by what they themselves wish? Mom, think about it. If the Lord Jesus saying ‘It is finished’ meant that God’s work to save mankind was over, then how would the Lord Jesus accomplish the work in fulfillment of His prophecy, that when He returned He would separate the goats from the sheep, the wheat from the tares, and the good servants from the wicked servants? The Lord Jesus also prophesied: ‘I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will show you things to come’ (John 16:12–13). ‘He that rejects me, and receives not my words, has one that judges him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day’ (John 12:48). And it is recorded in 1 Peter 4:17, ‘For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God.’ These words tell us clearly that when the Lord returns He will express the truth and perform His work of judgment. If we go by the understanding of the pastors and elders, that the Lord Jesus saying ‘It is finished’ on the cross meant that He had then completed His work to save mankind and that He had no need to perform any further work, then how would these prophecies ever be fulfilled? Wouldn’t the Lord’s prophecy that He would return to express the truth and perform His work of judgment then just come to nothing? Looking at it this way, wouldn’t it seem that the religious world’s interpretation is negating the Lord’s words and negating the Lord’s salvation in the last days? Therefore, we cannot determine that God’s work to save mankind is finished on the basis that the Lord Jesus said ‘It is finished’ when He was on the cross; this is our imaginations and it does not accord with what the Lord meant. If we delimit God’s work in accordance with our own wishes, then we will be apt to defy God!”

Wang Xue pondered the verses Li Jun had talked about, and she fell into deep thought: “Yes! All these years, I’ve listened only to what the pastors and elders have said, believing that what the Lord Jesus meant when He said ‘It is finished’ on the cross was that God’s work to save mankind was completed, and that He would never again perform any new work. But the prophecies of the Lord that my child and her husband have just mentioned do indeed say that when the Lord returns He will express the truth and perform His work of judgment. So what exactly did the Lord mean when He said ‘It is finished’ on the cross?” Thinking these thoughts, Wang Xue told them of her puzzlement.

Seeing Wang Xue begin to seek the truth, Hui Min and Li Jun smiled cheerfully, and Hui Min said patiently, “Mom, when the Lord Jesus said ‘It is finished’ on the cross, He was actually saying that His work of redemption in the Age of Grace was finished. As long as we accept the Lord Jesus’ work and confess and repent to the Lord, then our sins can be forgiven, and we are then qualified to pray to the Lord and enjoy the abundant grace and truth the Lord bestows on us—this is the result achieved by the Lord Jesus performing the work of redemption. But God’s work to save mankind did not come to an end because the Lord Jesus’ work of redemption was finished. Let’s read a couple of passages of Almighty God’s words together, and after we’ve read them, we will have a better understanding.” Saying this, Hui Min then brought from her bedroom a book entitled The Word Appears in The Flesh. Opening it, she read: “To man, God’s crucifixion concluded the work of God’s incarnation, redeemed all of mankind, and allowed Him to seize the key to Hades. Everyone thinks God’s work has been fully accomplished. In actuality, to God, only a small part of His work has been accomplished. He has only redeemed mankind; He has not conquered mankind, let alone changed the ugliness of Satan in man. That is why God says, ‘Although My incarnate flesh went through the pain of death, that was not the whole goal of My incarnation. Jesus is My beloved Son and was nailed to the cross for Me, but He did not fully conclude My work. He only did a portion of it’” (“Work and Entry (6)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). “For all that man may have been redeemed and forgiven of his sins, it can only be considered as God not remembering the transgressions of man and not treating man in accordance with his transgressions. However, when man, who lives in a body of flesh, has not been set free from sin, he can only continue to sin, endlessly revealing his corrupt satanic disposition. This is the life that man leads, an endless cycle of sinning and being forgiven. The majority of men sin in the day only to confess in the evening. This way, even if the sin offering is forever effective for man, it will not be able to save man from sin. Only half the work of salvation has been completed, for man still has a corrupt disposition” (“The Mystery of the Incarnation (4)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh).

When she’d finished reading, Hui Min gave fellowship, saying, “The words of Almighty God are very clear. The work of redemption performed by the Lord Jesus only completed one half of God’s work to save mankind. Although our sins were forgiven after undergoing the Lord Jesus’ redemption, we no longer committed obvious sins and we had some good external behaviors, we had not totally cast off the bonds of sin; we are dominated by corrupt dispositions such as being arrogant and conceited, selfish and contemptible, crooked and deceitful, and we often tell lies and cheat others for the sake of protecting our own interests and prestige. When we see someone who is better than us, we feel jealous and we don’t want to listen to them; if someone threatens our interests then we hate them, to the point of wanting to exact retribution on them; we also follow the evil trends of the world, we cling to wealth, covet vanity and we adore fame and fortune; when natural disasters or man-made calamities befall us, or if something unfortunate happens, we misunderstand and blame God, and we even judge and condemn God’s work based on our own conceptions and imaginings, and so on. Behaving in this way is enough to prove that only our sins are forgiven in our belief in the Lord, yet the satanic nature and corrupt dispositions within us remain deeply rooted. These are the root cause of us committing sins and defying God. If we do not solve our sinful nature, then we will be unable to control ourselves from sinning and defying God, or from betraying God and opposing God. God’s words in the Bible clearly state: ‘You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy’ (Leviticus 11:45). Also, chapter 12, verse 14 in Hebrews says ‘holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.’ God is holy, and the heavenly kingdom permits no stained human being to enter. So how could we who so often commit sins and defy God ever be worthy to see God’s face? How could we ever be worthy for God to lead us into the heavenly kingdom? Therefore, we still need God to return in the last days to perform a stage of new work and to solve the problem of the root cause of our sins. Only in this way will we be able to cast off our satanic and corrupt dispositions and attain God’s purification and salvation. This is also the fulfillment of the prophecy in the Bible that says, ‘Who are kept by the power of God through faith to salvation ready to be revealed in the last time’ (1 Peter 1:5).”

When she had spoken, Hui Min flipped to a page in The Word Appears in the Flesh and said to Wang Xue, “Mom, we will understand better once we’ve read two passages of Almighty God’s words. God’s words say: ‘A sinner such as you, who has just been redeemed, and has not been changed, or been perfected by God, can you be after God’s heart? For you, you who are still of your old self, it is true that you were saved by Jesus, and that you are not counted as a sinner because of the salvation of God, but this does not prove that you are not sinful, and are not impure. How can you be saintly if you have not been changed? Within, you are beset by impurity, selfish and mean, yet you still wish to descend with Jesus—you should be so lucky! You have missed a step in your belief in God: You have merely been redeemed, but have not been changed. For you to be after God’s heart, God must personally do the work of changing and cleansing you; if you are only redeemed, you will be incapable of attaining sanctity. In this way you will be unqualified to share in the good blessings of God, for you have missed out a step in God’s work of managing man, which is the key step of changing and perfecting. And so you, a sinner who has just been redeemed, are incapable of directly inheriting God’s inheritance’ (‘Concerning Appellations and Identity’ in The Word Appears in the Flesh). ‘Though Jesus did much work among man, He only completed the redemption of all mankind and became man’s sin offering, and did not rid man of all his corrupt disposition. Fully saving man from the influence of Satan not only required Jesus to take on the sins of man as the sin offering, but also required God to do greater work to completely rid man of his disposition, which has been corrupted by Satan. And so, after man was forgiven his sins, God has returned to flesh to lead man into the new age, and begun the work of chastisement and judgment, and this work has brought man into a higher realm. All those who submit under His dominion shall enjoy higher truth and receive greater blessings. They shall truly live in the light, and shall gain the truth, the way, and the life’” (Preface to The Word Appears in the Flesh).

Having listened to her daughter, Wang Xue unconsciously nodded her head and thought to herself: “These words possess authority! It turns out that the Lord Jesus only performed the work of redemption, and even though our sins were forgiven, our sinful nature was not purged, so no wonder we live in sin all day long. Even though we want to cast off the bonds of sin, we can’t do it no matter how much we pray or try to exercise self-restraint. It seems that if we want to cast off the bonds of sin, then we truly need God to perform another stage of work!”

Li Jun got up and poured Wang Xue some water, saying, “Mom, Almighty God’s words explain very clearly why God is to perform His work of judgment in the last days and the results achieved by this work. Having been through the Lord Jesus’ redemption, only our sins have been forgiven, and yet our satanic nature was still deeply rooted within us and we are not yet qualified to inherit God’s blessings. Therefore, according to our needs as corrupt humanity, God will perform in the last days a stage of work upon the foundation of the Lord Jesus’ work of redemption, whereby God uses words to judge and chastise man, so that our sinful nature can be resolved and so that we are utterly saved from sin. Only by accepting God’s work of judgment in the last days can we see clearly the truth about our corruption by Satan, know our own God-defying satanic nature, experience God’s righteous and inviolable disposition and generate a God-fearing heart. We can thereby prostrate ourselves before God, hate ourselves and become willing to forsake our flesh and practice the truth. In this way, we will gradually be able to cast off the bonds of our satanic dispositions, be cleansed and changed, attain salvation and perfection, and become people who truly obey God and love God. Only then will God’s management plan to save mankind be totally finished, and God’s great work shall be accomplished. This precisely fulfills the words in Revelation which say: ‘And he that sat on the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said to me, Write: for these words are true and faithful. And he said to me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give to him that is thirsty of the fountain of the water of life freely’ (Revelation 21:5–6).”

Li Jun and Hui Min’s fellowship surprised Wang Xue and sounded new and fresh to her ears. She thought: “What they are fellowshiping accords with the Bible and with the Lord’s words, and it sounds perfectly clear to me. It turns out that the Lord returning to express the truth and perform His work of judgment is precisely what we need, and it is done to save us utterly from sin, to enable us to attain God’s salvation and be perfected, and to become people who truly love and obey God …”

Hui Min saw her mother with her head lowered and not saying anything, and she gently shook her arm and asked, “What are you thinking, mom?”

Wang Xue relaxed her expression, raised her head and looked at Li Jun and Hui Min, and with a smile on her face she said, “Well, I never! You haven’t long accepted Almighty God’s work of the last days and you understand so many truths already. Listening to you both give fellowship today, I’ve come to understand a little too. The Lord Jesus only performed the work to redeem mankind, which was a part of God’s work to save mankind. By accepting the Lord Jesus’ work, we can only have our sins forgiven, but our sinful nature is not yet resolved, and we still cannot control ourselves from committing sins and defying God. We are simply unqualified to see God’s face or to be led by the Lord into the heavenly kingdom. If we want to cast off the bonds of sin, we still need God to come again and perform another stage of work, that of judgment and purification!”

Hui Min and Li Jun were thrilled to hear Wang Xue say this, and they kept thanking God!

Seeing her daughter and son-in-law’s happiness, Wang Xue spoke reproaching herself: “Ah, all these years I’ve listened to what the pastors and elders said, believing that what the Lord Jesus meant when He said ‘It is finished’ on the cross was that God’s work to save mankind was completed, and I’ve been longing with all my heart for the Lord to return and raise us up into the heavenly kingdom. In the end, I heard The Church of Almighty God testifying that the Lord had returned, but I didn’t seek or investigate it, and instead I clung to my own conceptions and imaginings, trying to advise you to keep to the Lord’s way, almost making a big mistake and losing God’s salvation of the last days. It seems that by understanding God’s words and approaching God’s work based on one’s own conceptions and imaginings, one is then capable of defying God at any moment and destroying one’s chances to attain God’s salvation! I now understand that if we want to be thoroughly cleansed and enter into the kingdom of heaven, then we must accept God’s work of judgment in the last days! But I’m not so clear on how God’s work of judgment in the last days purifies and changes people, so I want to keep seeking and investigating Almighty God’s work of the last days and read more of His words!”

“Thanks be to God! It just so happens that tomorrow the brothers and sisters of The Church of Almighty God are holding a gathering with us, so why don’t you come with us and hear them fellowship?” said Hui Min.

“OK.”

“Thanks be to God!”

The sun shone bright and beautiful outside and, from time to time, the joyful sound of Wang Xue’s family talking together drifted out through the window …

If I already have faith in the Lord Jesus, why do I have to have faith in Almighty God to achieve salvation?

The picture comes from  the Church of Almighty God

If I already have faith in the Lord Jesus, why do I have to have faith in Almighty God to achieve salvation?

The Answer from God’s Word:

Though Jesus did much work among man, He only completed the redemption of all mankind and became man’s sin offering, and did not rid man of all his corrupt disposition. Fully saving man from the influence of Satan not only required Jesus to take on the sins of man as the sin offering, but also required God to do greater work to completely rid man of his disposition, which has been corrupted by Satan. And so, after man was forgiven his sins, God has returned to flesh to lead man into the new age, and begun the work of chastisement and judgment, and this work has brought man into a higher realm. All those who submit under His dominion shall enjoy higher truth and receive greater blessings. They shall truly live in the light, and shall gain the truth, the way, and the life.

The Word of God | You Should Know How the Whole of Humanity Has Developed to the Present Day

The picture comes from  the Church of Almighty God

The Word of God | You Should Know How the Whole of Humanity Has Developed to the Present Day

The entirety of the work over the 6,000 years has gradually changed along with the times. The shifts in this work have occurred according to the entire world’s circumstances. God’s management work has only gradually transformed according to the developmental trends of humanity as a whole; it was not already planned at the beginning of creation. Before the world was created, or right after it was created, Jehovah had not yet planned the first stage of work, that of law; the second stage of work, that of grace; or the third stage of work, that of conquering, in which He would first work among a group of people—some of the descendants of Moab, and from this He would conquer the entire universe.

Christian Testimonies | The Secret Tip to Resolving Hatred

Christian Testimonies | The Secret Tip to Resolving Hatred

December 28, 2017

Xiao Wu

I was self-employed. Mainly I sold all kinds of textiles, and I also made clothes for my customers part-time. After a few years, my business became more and more popular, and people around me were all very envious. Later, a neighboring household opened the same kind of shop as mine and became my competitor. Naturally, the business in my shop was affected. The popular proverb says two of a trade never agree, but my peer was not just anyone, but my most trusted pupil, Xiaochen.

Not only did Xiaochen open the same store next to my house, she even waited outside of her shop to intentionally steal my business. Whenever she saw somebody pass by the shop, she approached them and greeted them enthusiastically, guiding them into the shop, and she even purposefully said awful things about me. Seeing Xiaochen do everything she could to steal my business, I regretted taking her as my pupil and started hating her from my heart. When I saw her, I was unwilling to approach or talk to her, and sometimes I would even say some bad things about her in front of customers, or I would intentionally give customers a discount to bring back repeat customers, so that I could reduce her clients. But because we were neighbors, we could not avoid running into each other. As time passed, I became more and more pained and repressed in my heart, and my hate for her became deeper and deeper. It reached the point that whenever I looked at her, my heart became awfully choked, and my whole mind was occupied with thoughts of how to deal with her. Even when I dreamed, I dreamed I was fighting her. I was living so painfully at that time!

In 2002, I heard my schoolmate say that believing in Jesus could bring peace and happiness, that it could broaden our hearts so that we no longer harbored hatred, so I believed in the Lord Jesus. I saw that the Lord Jesus said: “But I say to you which hear, Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you, Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which spitefully use you. And to him that smites you on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that takes away your cloak forbid not to take your coat also” (Luk 6:27-29). From the Lord’s words I saw that the Lord has an unlimited and boundless love for us. He has unlimited tolerance, patience, and forgiveness for us. Didn’t the Lord already practice out these things that He required us to do? The Lord’s love deeply encouraged me, so I wanted to follow the Lord’s teachings, and I tried to tolerate Xiaochen, and not to quarrel with her. But in real life, I still hated her uncontrollably, and I could not practice the Lord’s word at all. When I thought that the Bible said that hating somebody is like killing them, I felt even more pain. I thought: I want to forgive Xiaochen, but why is it that I simply could not do it? I believe in the Lord and I know His demands, but why can’t I put the Lord’s word into practice? I lived in pain, and I could not extricate myself.

Soon, in 2003, I had the fortune to accept God’s work in the last days. In a gathering, a sister read a part of God’s word directed toward my difficulty: “Man was only saved and forgiven his sins for his faith, but the sinful nature of man was not taken away and still remained within him. … This requires man to understand the path of growth in life, the way of life, and the way to change his disposition. It also needs man to act in accordance with this path so that the disposition of man can gradually be changed and he can live under the shining of the light, and that he can do all things in accord with the will of God, cast away the corrupt satanic disposition, and break free from Satan’s influence of darkness, thereby emerging fully from sin. Only then will man receive complete salvation” (“The Mystery of the Incarnation (4)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). She also fellowshiped to me: “During the Age of Grace, the Lord Jesus did a step of redemptive work. The sin of us humans was only forgiven, so that we were no longer sentenced by the laws. However, our sinful nature still remained, and it had not been resolved. It is like you living in hatred to Xiaochen, you can only control your external behavior to not insult her, but you have not resolved the source of hatred in your heart. We humans have been corrupted by Satan for thousands of years, and we have been completely taken over by all kinds of satanic poisons. Satanic philosophies and laws such as “Heaven destroys those who are not for themselves,” and “A man dies for money; a bird dies for food” have become our life and our nature. We uncontrollably rely on these things to live, so we have all become selfish, self-interested, and only interested in profit. We fight and argue over our own interests and become jealous and hateful, causing us to uncontrollably commit sins and oppose God. Although in our heart we want to practice the Lord’s word, because we are bound and limited by satanic nature, we cannot put them into practice and we live in unbearable pain. In the last days Almighty God comes to resolve the root problem of us corrupt humans committing sins, to completely rescue us from Satan’s domain. For this purpose, God speaks words to perform the work of judging and purifying man, so that, through the judgment and chastisement of God’s word, we recognize our own satanic nature, come to understand that God’s righteous disposition is beyond reproach, gradually come to revere God, no longer live by Satan’s poison, seek the truth in all things, live on God’s word, and replace our own corrupt disposition with practicing the truth. In this way, we can live out a normal humanity, we can know how to act and how to conduct ourselves in contact with others. When we have left the bondage of Satan’s authority and are no longer controlled by our corrupt disposition, then we are living in release and freedom. Sister, if you often read the word of the Almighty God, experience God’s judgment and chastisement, often pray to God, ask God to protect your heart, then you will surely be able to let go of the hatred in your heart, break away from Satan’s corrupt disposition, and live relaxed and free. So, you must have confidence in God….”

After listening to the sister’s fellowship, I understood that the reason I was never able to resolve the hatred in my heart while believing in the Lord Jesus is because the Lord Jesus only performed the work of redeeming sin, but not the work of casting away sin. This is why the satanic nature and corrupt disposition within me have not yet been removed. Only Almighty God’s work of judgment in the last days can fully cleanse and transform me, rescuing me from sin! Having understood this, I became confident again about how to resolve the hatred between Xiaochen and me, and I made up my mind to properly pursue the truth and shed the satanic corrupt disposition soon.

One day, I saw God’s word saying: “Cruel, brutal mankind! The conniving and intrigue, the jostling with each other, the scramble for reputation and fortune, the mutual slaughter—when will it ever end? … How many do not act for the sake of their own interests? How many do not oppress and discriminate against others for the sake of maintaining their own status” (“The Wicked Must Be Punished” in The Word Appears in the Flesh)? After reading God’s word, I began to self-reflect. Why is it that I keep living in hatred to Xiaochen? Isn’t it just because she stole my business and this affected my own interests? In order to get more money and have one less competitor, all I thought about was how to exclude her and resent her, and I even had dark thoughts about her. In the past, I thought that my hatred of her had a reason. She offended me first, so that’s why I hated her to this extent. Now, I know that this is caused by my own selfish nature. Having recognized these things, I quickly prayed to God: “God, only now do I know that I hate Xiaochen because I have a selfish nature within me. God, I am willing to rebel against myself, I am unwilling to live by my satanic nature. I hope that You can help me, so that I can let go of my hatred to Xiaochen and live out a normal humanity.”

In order to help me walk out of hatred, God arranged a situation for me. One day, Xiaochen was refurbishing her kitchen, and it took up the stairwell passageway shared between our two houses. Looking at this, I felt angry in my heart, that she was really pushing it too far. After stealing my business, now she was coming to take over my territory. This was really getting more and more out of hand! When I wanted to argue with her, I suddenly remembered that God said: “God is forever supreme and ever honorable, while man is forever base, forever worthless. This is because God is forever making sacrifices and devoting Himself to mankind; man, however, forever takes and strives only for himself. … for the effort of man is always for his own sake and not for others. Man is always selfish, while God is forever selfless. God is the source of all that is just, good, and beautiful, while man is he who succeeds to and makes manifest all ugliness and evil” (“It Is Very Important to Understand God’s Disposition” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). Yes, God’s love is too selfless. God is incarnated into flesh twice only to save us humans. God has paid the absolute price so that we can achieve salvation. In the past, He sacrificed Himself on the cross for the salvation of humanity, and now He is incarnated into flesh again, enduring people’s resistance, condemnation, persecution, and defamation to perform work and save people, all without complaints or regrets and never asking us to repay Him. God’s life substance is so beautiful, so lovable, so worthy of our admiration and worship! And I have been corrupted by Satan to be too selfish and despicable, too cunning and evil, and I lived by Satan’s poison, “Fight for every inch of land and seize every bit you can get.” As long as it relates to a bit of my profits, I would fight with others, haggle over every penny, and I cannot take any losses. I see what I live out is exactly the same as Satan’s, as if I am a living demon. Now, God has pointed out a path to changing my life disposition. I ought to practice it in accordance to God’s word, rebel against Satan, and no longer live by Satan’s poison. So, I prayed to God: “God, the matter that I encounter today is set up by You for me. I am willing to live out Your word, and no longer live by Satan’s poison. I hope that You will grant me confidence and strength, so I will no longer be fooled by Satan and let go of my hatred to Xiaochen in my heart.” After praying, my heart gradually became calmer, and I felt incomparably secure in my heart. At that moment, I felt for the first time that letting go of hatred could be so relaxing and releasing.

Having had this experience, I was more willing to live my life in accordance to God’s word, and I was no longer willing to be fooled or corrupted by Satan. One morning, Xiaochen’s shop hadn’t opened yet, and I heard somebody yelling outside, “Miss Tailor! Open the door quickly!” I opened it up and had a look, and it turned out to be Xiaochen’s customer coming to pick up clothes from her shop. The customer saw that I opened the door, asking me if Xiaochen was at home. At this moment, I remembered something that happened before: One day, I was cleaning upstairs, and a customer came to look for me downstairs. Even though he knew I was at home, Xiaochen’s husband didn’t tell the customer. Thinking of this, I felt angry, and I didn’t want to tell the customer about the fact that Xiaochen’s at home. Then I remembered God’s word said: “You ought to know that God likes an honest man. … To be honest is to refrain from impurity in your actions and words, and to deceive neither God nor man” (“Three Admonitions” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). “When you rebel against the flesh, there will inevitably be a battle within you. Satan will try and make you follow it, will try and make you follow the conceptions of the flesh and uphold the interests of the flesh—but God’s words will enlighten and illuminate you within, and at this time it is up to you whether you follow God or follow Satan” (“Only Loving God Is Truly Believing in God” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). The enlightenment of God’s word allowed me to see that what I had just thought was still living by Satan’s poison. I wanted to treat Xiaochen as an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. Isn’t this still living within Satan’s corrupt disposition? God asks us to be an honest person and not lie or deceive people, but Satan allows me to act in accordance to the corrupt disposition of the flesh. Should I follow Satan and satisfy the flesh, or should I rebel against Satan, practice the truth, and satisfy God? At this moment, I felt God observing my every word, every act, and each and every movement. No, I must rebel against the flesh and practice the truth to satisfy God. Thinking of this, I told the customer calmly, “If you’re looking for Miss Xiaochen, she’s at home, just wait for a bit and she’ll come out.” When I practiced this, I felt very secure in my heart.

Later, when repeat customers came to my house to make clothes but I was too busy and couldn’t manage it, I would introduce them to Xiaochen’s shop. When she found out later, she was also very touched. Finally, one day, when she saw me, she deliberated for a long time, and then called excitedly out, “Master!” This “Master” made me feel extremely warm inside. Ever since she opened her shop next to my house, she had never called me Master once. I knew at that moment that the reason we could resolve our hatred was because of the effect achieved by God’s word. Otherwise, the hatred between us could only get deeper and deeper. Thank God! All glory and praise unto Almighty God!