It Is Almighty God Who Saved Me | Ironclad Proofs of God’s Words Conquering Denominations’ and Sects’ Leaders

It Is Almighty God Who Saved Me

Li Tianhong

Lingbao City, Henan Province

I believe that every brother and sister in the Lord is expecting the Lord’s coming and is expecting the Lord to take us to heaven and into the glorious and beautiful home soon. Like you all, I also expected that all along. I remember that as early as March 1999, I had heard that there were a group of people of “the Eastern Lightning” preaching that the Lord had already returned, yet our leader said that that band of people were wrong and were cultists and antichrists…. He did not allow us to contact them lest we be deceived. So I, as an instructor of the Praise Church, actively cooperated with the leader and spread his words wherever I went. Moreover, I kept myself on full alert, always afraid that the brothers and sisters would be deceived by them.

One day in July 1999, several people of our village came to preach God’s end-time gospel to me. They told me that the Lord had already returned to do the work of judgment and chastisement and of unifying all denominations into one. As soon as I heard it, I shouted at them, “I won’t listen! Our leader has said that God hasn’t returned yet! Besides, you’re almost illiterate, yet you even come to preach to me? I teach the Bible every day. Don’t I know more than you? If God had come back, he would surely let me know first. Is it necessary for you to tell me? Go away now! I won’t listen!” As I said that, I drove them out. That night, I went to the church and told the brothers and sisters about how I had driven away those who preached the end-time gospel. I also told them to keep a strict guard and never let people of “the Eastern Lightning” take a “sheep” away from us!

In October of the same year, my leader assigned me to make rounds among the churches in a certain region. Once, I met several strangers in a host home. They said, “Do you know? God has returned and done a new work….” Before they had finished their words, I retorted immediately, “You are of ‘the Eastern Lightning.’ You are preachers of a false way. It’s a deceitful trick!” Then I said to the host family, “We can’t listen to them. Drive them away!” Later, I announced in the church seriously, “From now on, without my permission, no one is allowed to contact people of ‘the Eastern Lightning.’ Whoever disobeys will be expelled!” So, I made those rules wherever I went so as to seal the churches.

In May 2000, six or seven people of a church accepted “the Eastern Lightning.” After I learned it, I immediately went to disturb them with a co-worker. I said to them, “That band of people of ‘the Lightning’ use various means and tricks to deceive people. You have been fooled! You are small in stature and know little about the Bible, so you don’t have discernment. But as long as you confess your wrong and try hard to do good deeds to atone for your sins, you can come back. Never ever contact them again….” Then, the co-worker who came with me added, “People of ‘the Lightning’ are extremely brutal. It’s said that once you accept, they will take you out and force you to do this and that. If you don’t obey, they will gouge out your eyes, cut off your ears, break your legs, or use a knife to force you to commit adultery. …” At these words, they turned pale with fear and all stated that they would never contact people of “the Lightning” again. To further insure that the brothers and sisters would not contact “the Eastern Lightning,” I spent all my time bustling about among the churches everywhere, so much so as to neglect my meals and sleep. Sometimes, I even prayed all night long to curse people of “the Lightning.” Besides, every time I made rounds among the churches, I would tell with embellishment the rumors I had heard about “the Lightning” to the brothers and sisters so that they would stay away from “the Eastern Lightning.”

Because of the “price” I had paid, my leader thought more highly of me. But somehow the churches’ condition got worse and worse. The co-workers formed factions, had jealousy and strife, and scrambled for power and profit among themselves. The lectern became an emplacement, and the Bible became a weapon to attack each other. Whoever occupied the lectern had the opportunity to attack others, and even prayer became a way to dig at or fight against each other. In the churches the previous vigor had been completely lost, and even more, the love among the brothers and sisters had disappeared. The attendance at the meetings kept on dropping, and a meeting which had sixty or seventy people had now only four or five left. What puzzled me more was: There was a brother Fu in our church. He was only 42 years old and had been zealous in expending himself for the Lord all the year round. Now instead of receiving peace, he got cardia cancer. A good many people fasted and prayed for him, but it did not help. The brothers and sisters felt very puzzled, and I was also downhearted, not knowing why all these happened. However, I still forced myself to go on. On the one hand, I was afraid of being deceived; on the other hand, I was afraid of losing the position of “instructor.” I thought to myself, “It’s really not easy for me to get the position of instructor. I must ‘cherish’ it!” So, in order to preserve my position, I ingratiated myself with my leader and did the work of resisting God over and over again to gain his trust and favor.

One day in early June of 2001, I went to Yima City of my native province. There I gave a message about discernment to the brothers and sisters. Unexpectedly, a relative of the host family came. Through the introductions, I knew that he was also a believer in Jesus. So, we began to fellowship together. During the fellowship, I found that the light the brother had received was much higher than mine and that he had unique views on the Bible. I admired him from the bottom of my heart, but, as an instructor, how could I bow my head before him? Later, when we spoke of Paul, the brother said, “Paul is one we imitate. He suffered many hardships and ran around much for the Lord. His thirteen letters are very beneficial to the brothers’ and sisters’ experience of life. However, in his letters, there are also some things which are not after the Lord’s heart. For example, ‘I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: From now on there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness….’ (2 Timothy 4:7-8). These words revealed his intent and purpose in working for the Lord. The efforts he expended were to make a deal with God. Such a viewpoint of pursuit and such knowledge are not after God’s heart….” Before he had finished his words, I retorted immediately, “How dare you belittle Paul? If it had not been for Paul’s preaching, how could we have our today? Paul is one for us to imitate and is a model for us to follow in preaching the gospel. If people believe in Jesus not to gain anything, is there any meaning in such belief? Who will ever believe?” Then I pointed my finger at him and said, “You dare condemn Paul. Aren’t you arrogant? Paul suffered so many hardships and received so many lashes for the Lord! Have you suffered any? Paul could say those words boldly, can you?” I got so emotional that even my complexion changed, and I glowered at him, as if in a quarrel. But that brother did not get angry at all. He said gently, “Sister, don’t be angry. Let’s take our time talking about it. Here! Have a glass of water.” I did not even give him a look, but he did not mind at all. He continued, “Even though Paul suffered a lot for the Lord, as a created being he should…” I interrupted him again, “As the instructor of the Praise Church in Lingbao City, I know much more than you. I read The Bible for Intensive Study, The Bible With Commentaries, and Jia Yuming’s Essentials every day. Is there anything that I don’t know? Just drop it!” “Yes, what I know is very limited, but I’m willing to discuss this subject with brothers and sisters,” he said, still gently. At that time, I thought, “I treat him in such a way, yet he doesn’t get angry at all. Instead, he is so gentle, humble, sober, and natural. He is a preacher; am I not a preacher as well? But I get so impatient as to forget myself when encountering things. Why is that? …” “Sister, why are you silent? What are you thinking?” asked the brother. I hesitated a moment and then said, “Nothing, you may go on.” Afterward, through the brother’s dissection of the viewpoint of Paul’s pursuit, I understood a truth: It is only right and proper for a created being to worship God. He should not harbor his own intent and purpose, and even less should he use his suffering as the capital for receiving blessings to make a deal with God. That was what I had never heard before. I felt his fellowship was so good and so high.

Following that, the brother fellowshipped with me about many more verses of the Bible, and I felt that everything he said was very good and clear. However, when speaking of God’s work, he said, “The Old Testament records the work of the Age of the Law: God led people in the form of the Spirit and was called Jehovah. He worked in Israel, issuing the laws to make people conscious of sin. The disposition he expressed was righteousness, burning, and curse. The New Testament records the work of the Age of the Grace: God was incarnated to be man’s sin offering and was called Jesus. He worked in Judea, and the disposition he expressed was love, mercy, forbearance, and patience. Revelation prophesied that God would do a work of judgment and purification in the end time, that is, the work of the Age of the Kingdom. Since the age has changed and the work has become different, his disposition and name as well as the place he works in, and so on have changed accordingly. The disposition he expresses is no longer love and mercy but righteousness, majesty, and judgment. God is no longer called Jesus but the Almighty as prophesied in Revelation….” Hearing that, I could no longer hold myself back. “Our senior leader Qiao says that now there are a band of people preaching Almighty God. The one they believe in is a false christ and a deceiver. He also says that if we refuse to accept their way after listening to it, they will gouge out our eyes, cut off our ears, break our legs, or force us to commit sexual immorality. I think you are with them, aren’t you? I won’t be taken in by you….” As I said that, I got up to go. “Sister, from these days of contact, do you think I’m like what your leader says? Why do we not respect the fact but trust only one side?” “Right!” I thought to myself, “Through these days of contact with the brother, I have seen that he is very humble and gentle, and there is nothing in him like what our leader says. But I shouldn’t disobey my leader’s words. He can’t cheat me, and he can’t be wrong. Besides, what if my leader finds out that I have contacted them? Won’t I lose the position of instructor? Then won’t my years of pursuit be all in vain? I must go!” As I thought of this, I said to them firmly, “I have been out so long. I have to go back….”

The brothers and sisters saw me out reluctantly. All the way I kept thinking, “When I get back, I’ll tell my leaders in detail about how I debated with the people of ‘the Lightning’ and how I fought for the truth. They are bound to give me some credit.” When I got back to Lingbao, it was already past 8 o’clock at night. Immediately after I got off the train, I saw Brother Zhao and Brother Guo of my church. I greeted them joyfully, but they ignored me. Just when I felt puzzled, I saw my leader, Brother Li, who was not far away. He was staring at me and looked extremely displeased and fierce. As I saw this, my heart pounded as if I had done something to be ashamed of. A three-wheeler took us to a host home, and not long after we entered the room, they began to question me, “What did you do in Yima?” “How did you preach? Could it take such a long time?” “Did you actually preach? You didn’t commit sins, did you?” “Did they beat you? Did they force you to do anything? Have you contacted them? You have accepted, haven’t you?” “Never mind, all you have to do is to admit your mistake and speak out the inside story….” They bombarded me with questions, so that I lost my bearings. Their questioning in such a way hurt my self-respect terribly, and I felt as if my heart would break. “How come these people all become like this? …” That night, I could not fall into sleep. I wept and thought, feeling extremely wronged.

After a few days, I still could not get the better of it. The expressions shown that night by the leaders I looked up to and admired all along, and their questioning tones and cold words kept appearing in my mind and ringing in my ears. I felt wave after wave of grief piercing my heart, extremely distressed. At that time, I thought, “This time they will expel me. What will they say about me? What will the brothers and sisters think of me? …” In despair, I constantly reflected on the scenes in Yima. Not only was the way that the brother preached higher than ours, but he also behaved calmly and naturally, spoke gently, and was easy to approach. He was very pious during the fellowship and always treated others sincerely. Our leaders, however, were all full of arrogance and appeared superior and domineering. Even more, our co-workers had no love for one another but all supplanted each other and scrambled for fame and gain. Thinking of that, I did not feel like seeing them anymore, disgusted with their words and deeds. Those whom they called the people of “the Lightning,” however, constantly appeared in my mind. Their living out roused my admiration and respect. I remembered that at the time when I lost my temper and accused them of being wrong, evil, and false, that brother remained amiable, still treated me sincerely, and fellowshipped with me in a patient and painstaking way. I was simply filled with admiration for their magnanimity and love. I really could not figure out what kind of power was driving them to live out completely differently from us. Then I thought, “At that time, I didn’t accept their way after listening to their fellowship. Didn’t they still treat me sincerely? And isn’t it that my nose and eyes are intact and not a single hair of my head has lost? Doesn’t this even more prove that those words our leader says are purely lies?” Thinking of that, I could not help shuddering. I felt that it was not the people of “the Lightning” who were to be dreaded, but the leaders whom I looked up to and admired! They had the audacity to give false testimonies. It was really unbelievable! So, I decided to go to the people of “the Lightning” alone for a good talk without letting anyone know.

On June 19, I set out on my journey to Yima again. On the train, I felt it was so slow, and I wished I could fly to that unforgettable place instantly. At that time, I really felt that when the mind was bent on returning, it was like a flying arrow. After I got off the train, I headed straight to that host home. When I walked in the door, the brothers and sisters were all taken by surprise. They were stunned for quite a while and then said excitedly, “You are back. How surprising! Great! Great!” “Thank God! It’s God’s moving that causes me to come back here,” I also said excitedly, holding the sister’s hands tightly. … The next day, the brother fellowshipped with me again in detail about God’s three stages of works and God’s eager intention to save man. He also read me several passages of God’s word: “He has already descended, but people do not recognize him, nor do they know it, and they are just waiting for him aimlessly. Little do they know that he has already descended on the white cloud (the white cloud refers to his Spirit, his word, and all his disposition and being) among a group of overcomers he will make in the end time! How could people know: Although the holy Savior Jesus is full of lovingkindness and full of love for man, how could he work in the ‘temples’ that are full of filthiness and inhabited by swarms of unclean spirits? Although people are all waiting for his descent, how could he appear to those who eat the flesh of the unrighteous, drink the blood of the unrighteous, and wear the clothes of the unrighteous, and who believe in him but do not know him and yet keep extorting from him? People only know that the Savior Jesus is full of lovingkindness and full of mercy and that he is the sin offering full of redemption, but they do not know that he is God Godself who is laden with righteousness, majesty, wrath, and judgment and who is with authority and full of dignity. So, even though people all eagerly expect and thirst for the return of the Redeemer and their prayers have even moved ‘Heaven,’ the Savior Jesus does not appear to them who believe in him but do not know him.” “If people always call me Jesus Christ and yet do not know that I have opened a new age again and carried out a newer work in the end time but keep waiting for the descent of the Savior Jesus infatuatedly, I call all such people ones who do not believe in me, ones who do not know me, and ones who pretend to believe in me.” “Maybe many people do not pay attention to what I am saying. But I still want to tell every so-called saint who follows Jesus: When you see with your own physical eyes Jesus descending from heaven on a white cloud, it will already be the time the Sun of righteousness appears publicly. At that time, you may be beside yourself with excitement. But have you ever known this: When you see Jesus descending from heaven, it will be the very time you go to hell to receive punishment. That will already be the time God’s management plan is declared concluded and the time God rewards the good and punishes the evil. This is because God’s judgment has ended at the time when people have not seen miraculous signs but only the truth is expressed.” Hearing that, I felt much clear and regretted my past deeds very much. So, I came before God and prayed to God, “O Lord! Almighty God! Thank you for saving me so that I can have the honor of hearing your voice and seeing your work. In the past, because I was blind and ignorant and didn’t know you and blindly listened to my leaders’ words without seeking or investigating, I was deceived by the lies. Moreover, I slandered and blasphemed your work, and spread the rumors and sealed the churches everywhere. This has blinded many brothers’ and sisters’ eyes and closed many brothers’ and sisters’ hearts, so that they are now still unwilling to accept your end-time salvation and thus live in darkness. O God! I am indeed sinful and evil to the uttermost. Please give me an opportunity to repent. I’m willing to expose my evil deeds to the light so that those innocent brothers and sisters who are still being deceived by the rumors can see the truth of the matter and return to your family. O Almighty God! It is because of your moving and your revealing that I, a foolish, ignorant, numb, and obtuse person, begin to wake up. Now, I’m convinced that you are the One whom I have been expecting. I resolve to follow you and expend myself for you in all my life so as to repay your grace of salvation and repay your great love!”

Dear brothers and sisters, this is my personal experience. I wonder if it can give you some warnings. Now, are you still being deceived by rumors? Are you also looking up to your leaders? If so, then I advise you to drop the place for any man in your heart right now, for only the One who rules over everything can save us! May brothers and sisters see through satan’s schemes and not be deceived by lies or restrained by evil leaders anymore. Step forward boldly and take the initiative to seek. I believe God will surely make a way out for you and bestow to you abundantly! Amen!

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Only the Word of Almighty God Can Save Me | Ironclad Proofs of God’s Words Conquering Denominations’ and Sects’ Leaders

 Only the Word of Almighty God Can Save Me

Shi Lianjun

Huai’an City, Jiangsu Province

I joined the Joseph Church in 1997. In 1999, I was appointed as the district leader of the church in Shuyang County. At that time, the kingdom gospel of Almighty God had spread to our county. I remember that one day in August of that year, someone in our church told me that a person who preached the gospel of the last days was in the home of a believer in Huji Township. After I heard it, I immediately called in four young brothers, and we impersonated the local village cadres and headed swiftly toward the house of that believer on our motorcycles. When we were about 200 meters away from his house, we switched off the engines, and walked up to the house quietly. Peeking through a crack in the door, I saw a stranger in the room reading something aloud from a book in his hands. Furious, I kicked the door open with violence. At the sight of my sudden action, the man hastily put the book into his pocket. I lunged forward, and tore his pocket and snatched the book from him, which I found was a copy of The Truth That One Must Be Equipped With. I leafed through a few pages and flung it onto the desk, and then I grabbed him by the coat front with my left hand, and poking his forehead with my right hand, I asked him with a ferocious tone, “Where did you get this book? Where do you come from?” As I said this, I gave him a violent push that sent him reeling against the door. Before he realized what had happened, I grabbed the book on the desk and tore it in half fiercely. Then I ripped several pages from it and tore them to pieces, and after balling them up, I threw it at his face while blaspheming loudly, “This is purely from the devil, Satan, from an evil spirit, a deceiver!” When he saw I had torn his book, he immediately fell on his knees to pick up the torn book and the balled-up pieces of paper with his hands, and said in tears, “O God, how hard is Your work on earth!” Seeing him so grieved, I was not moved at all, and instead I shouted with glaring eyes, “Get out quickly! If you come again, I’ll send you to the police station!” In this way, I drove him out.

Later, many people came to testify about Almighty God’s work of the last days to me; but for fear of being deceived, I always drove them out before they could speak. Sometimes when they came, I was at home, but I had locked the door from the outside, or I gave them a cold shoulder by pretending to have work to do somewhere. I cannot remember how many times I had done such things.

Although I was so malicious, disobedient, and resistant, Almighty God’s great love did not leave me. On the afternoon of February 13, 2002 (the second day of the Chinese New Year), it was raining outside. Two sisters, pushing their bicycles with the wheels covered with mud and gravel, trudged into my house. When I saw it was the same two persons who had visited my house a few days before, my anger rose. I hurried to push them outward and slammed the door before they were completely out. “Ow!” I heard a cry. The fingers of a sister were shut in the door. But I shouted abuse at her: “You deserve it! Cheek!” Then I went in to watch TV.

The rain continued, but two sisters still stood outside. About half an hour later, my wife noticed that there was blood-stained rainwater flowing down the threshold of our house into the yard. Looking through the crack in the door, she saw one sister was wrapping up her injured fingers with tissues, and there were many blood-stained tissues on the ground. So my wife opened the door and let them in without my permission. At that time, I sat on a chair, legs crossed and back toward them, watching TV, with a teacup in one hand and some sunflower seeds in the other. I cast a sidelong glance at them and saw their rain-drenched hair clinging to their foreheads, their clothes dripping water, and their cotton-padded shoes saturated with muddy water. But I did not speak to them nor ask them to sit down. However, they greeted me warmly. I just took my time sipping tea and eating sunflower seeds. One hour passed, and one episode of the serial was over. Only then did I take a look at them. I thought, “Are people like you qualified to talk about belief in God with me, a dignified district leader of the Joseph Church? I have read through the Bible over a hundred times and deliberated over every word and every sentence in it, and I know which chapter and verse any sentence is in. I have preached countless sermons, sustained countless people, and trained countless workers. I usually only ‘feed’ those senior leaders and knowledgeable preachers, and the junior workers of the house of Joseph can hardly have a chance to meet me.” At this thought, I said to them with arrogance, “Ask your ‘leader’ to come and discuss the Bible with me. I’ll surely defeat him!” Hearing my words, they smiled, and one of them said to me, “Brother, it is true we don’t know much about the Bible. Please give us some instruction.” At this, I said proudly, “Genesis 28:14 says that all peoples on earth will be blessed through Jacob and his offspring. Joseph was the eleventh son of Jacob, and in Genesis 49:25-26, Jacob blessed Joseph, saying, ‘Even by the God of your father, who shall help you; and by the Almighty, who shall bless you with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lies under, blessings of the breasts, and of the womb: The blessings of your father have prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors to the utmost bound of the everlasting hills: they shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him that was separate from his brothers.’ You see, we, the house of Joseph, were blessed with so many blessings, and we are Jacob’s offspring, so all peoples on earth will be blessed through our Joseph Church. Besides, Genesis 37:9 says that Joseph saw in the dream that the sun, moon, and eleven stars bowed down to him. These verses are enough to prove that we people of the house of Joseph are the most blessed, and that all denominations will be ruled by our Joseph Church in the future, and the head of our Joseph Church will lead us to judge all peoples on earth! The Ephraimites of our Joseph Church will reign for hundreds of thousands of years!” After I finished these words, the sister smiled again and said, “Brother, since you know the Bible very well, you surely won’t forget what Psalms 78:67 says: ‘Moreover he refused the tabernacle of Joseph, and chose not the tribe of Ephraim.’ Doesn’t this verse plainly say that God had already rejected Joseph? In fact, the Scripture only records the work God did before. It’s true that Joseph was blessed, but have you ever thought that it was not God Himself but his father Jacob who blessed him? Jacob was only a created being in God’s hand. He could not represent God, nor could his blessing of Joseph fully represent God’s will. Brother, you should also know that Genesis 50:22-26 says that Joseph did not come out of Egypt in the end, but died in Egypt, a land cursed by God. Finally, it was through Moses that God brought the Israelites out of Egypt and into the good land of Canaan, the very land blessed by God. But Joseph did not enter into it, much less enjoy it. Brother, why do you still cling tightly to ‘Joseph’?” At her fellowship, I found nothing to answer, for what she said was fully scriptural and all true. However, I was unable to lay aside my vanity and face, and so I turned the pages of the yellowed Bible in my hand and said loudly, “Acts 4:12 says that salvation is found in no one else but Jesus, and Hebrews 1:3 says that Jesus is the exact representation of God’s being. These verses plainly say that Jesus is God, but why do you preach Almighty God today?” The other sister answered me calmly, “Brother, please look at Revelation 1:8, 4:8, 15:3… These verses say that the Lord God is the Almighty who is, and who was, and who is to come. From these prophecies, we can see that the entire work of managing mankind from the creation of the world to the conclusion of the age in the end is done by Almighty God Himself. Let’s also look at Genesis 17:1, 28:3, 35:11… These verses all say that God’s name is Almighty God, for His substance is almighty. Just now you mentioned that Jacob blessed Joseph; wasn’t it also done in the name of the Almighty? Isaiah 10:21 says, ‘The remnant shall return, even the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God.’” And then she fellowshipped with me about the three stages of God’s work: The name “Jehovah” represents the Age of Law, the name “Jesus” represents the Age of Grace, and “Almighty God” represents the final Age of Kingdom. God takes different names in different ages, and each name has its meaning.

After hearing this, I asked another question: “In John 5:39 the Lord said: ‘and [the Scriptures] are they which testify of me.’ Why then have you forsaken the Bible today?” The sister answered me with a smile, “Brother, we believe in God to gain life, and not to keep obstinately to the Bible. Before and after the sentence you just mentioned, there are other words which you have ignored. Jesus said: ‘Search the scriptures; for in them you think you have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. And you will not come to me, that you might have life.’ Just consider this: The Lord clearly said here that we human beings ‘think’ that in the Scriptures we have eternal life. It is true that the Scriptures are God’s testimony, but if we want to receive life, we must go to God, must follow God’s footsteps. Furthermore, Revelation 2:17 prophesies, ‘… To him that overcomes will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knows saving he that receives it.’ The hidden manna mentioned here refers to the words in the little scroll prophesied in Revelation, which are the utterances of God Himself in the Age of Kingdom. Brother, please think about this: Of Jesus’ disciples at that time, who had seen or got the white stone? Who had eaten the hidden manna? They will only be given to people when the Lord comes the second time. Just as the Lord said in John 16:12-13: ‘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: … and he will show you things to come.’” The two sisters’ fellowship left me at a loss what to say or do. But I really could not put aside my pride, so I said shamelessly, “The Lord Jesus was able to raise the dead at that time. Now there’s a brother in our church who has terminal esophageal cancer. You can go to preach the gospel of the last days to him. If he gets healed, I will acknowledge that the way you preach is the true way and the one you believe in is the true God.” One sister said to me, “Brother, as a believer in Jesus, why don’t you obey the word of the Lord? In Matthew16:4, the Lord said to those who tested Him: ‘A wicked and adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas.’” I was dumb again. And then they read me these words of Almighty God: “Do you believe in signs and wonders, or do you believe in God Himself? Jesus did not display signs and wonders when He was derided by others; was He not God? Do you believe in signs and wonders, or do you believe in the substance of God? Man’s views about belief in God are wrong! Jehovah spoke many words during the Age of Law, but even today some of them have yet to be fulfilled. Can you say that Jehovah was not God?

Today, it should be clear to all of you that, in the last days, it is principally the fact of ‘the Word becomes flesh’ that is accomplished by God. Through His actual work on earth, He causes man to know Him, and to engage with Him, and to see His actual deeds. He causes man to clearly see that He is able to display signs and wonders and there are also times when He is unable to do so, and this is dependent on the age. From this you can see that God is not incapable of displaying signs and wonders, but instead changes His working according to His work, and according to the age. In the current stage of work, He does not show signs and wonders; that He showed some signs and wonders in the age of Jesus was because His work in that age was different. God does not do that work today, and some people believe Him incapable of displaying signs and wonders, or else they think that if He does not display signs and wonders, then He is not God. Is that not a fallacy? God is able to display signs and wonders, but the work of this age is different, and so He does not do such work. Because this is a different age, and because this is a different stage of God’s work, the deeds made plain by God are also different. Man’s belief in God is not the belief in signs and wonders, nor the belief in miracles, but the belief in His real work during the new age.” At these words, I woke up somewhat, and came to realize that my former viewpoint of believing in God was wrong. I thought, “I have only sought signs and wonders but not sought God’s will, and I have believed that whether a way is the true way should be judged by whether its followers’ prayers can be fulfilled and whether they can heal the sick and drive out demons. I have determined the true way and false ways based on this without knowing that God’s work is always progressing forward.” But as my heart was too hardened, I still had my back to them. Then they turned on their recorder and played the tape of God’s word for me: “Religious heads are merely the leaders of a particular religion, and cannot represent God, or the One who created the heavens and earth and all things. Religious heads can lead all those within the entire religion, but cannot command all creatures beneath the heavens—this is a universally acknowledged fact. Religious heads are mere leaders, and cannot stand equal to God (the Creator). All things are in the hands of the Creator, and in the end they will all return to the hands of the Creator. Mankind was originally made by God, and regardless of the religion, every person will return under the dominion of God—this is inevitable. Only God is the Most High among all things, and the highest ruler among all creatures must also return under His dominion. No matter how high the status of man, he cannot take man to a suitable destination, and no one is able to class all things according to kind. Jehovah Himself created mankind and classed each according to kind, and when the end time arrives He will still do His own work Himself, classing all things according to kind—and this cannot be done by any apart from God.” When I heard this, I suddenly saw the light. “Yes, aren’t Jacob, Joseph, and the head of our Joseph Church all men, the creatures of God? Since they are creatures, they cannot be called God, much less represent God, nor can they speak in the place of God. A religious head can only lead all those within his own denomination but cannot command the people in all the other denominations. Thus, how can the people of all the other denominations turn to our Joseph Church? Only the Creator is able to do the work of unifying all denominations into one.”

Then I heard the following words: “Although Jehovah, Jesus, and the Messiah all represent My Spirit, these names only denote the different ages in My management plan, and do not represent Me in My entirety. The names by which people on earth call Me cannot articulate My entire disposition and all that I am. They are merely different names by which I am called during different ages. And so, when the final age—the age of the last days—arrives, My name shall change again. I shall not be called Jehovah, or Jesus, much less the Messiah, but shall be called the powerful Almighty God Himself, and under this name I shall bring the entire age to an end.” My heart was shocked by these words, and I thought, “Why do these words carry authority, power, and majesty? Apart from God, who else dared to speak in such a position?” Then I truly realized that all my doings were exactly the same as the Pharisees’ sinful deeds of resisting Jesus in the Old Testament age. “Have I not become a Pharisee of the new age? I have only believed in God’s name, but not His substance, and I have even regarded God’s new work in the last days as the deception of an evil spirit. Haven’t I committed the sin of blaspheming the Holy Spirit?” At that moment, I felt as if awakening from a dream. I dared not be heart-hardened anymore. So I hastily put down my crossed legs, and turned and looked at the sisters, who had stood for several hours. When I gave my chair to them and invited them to sit down, they wept…

Thank God for His great salvation for me. It was God’s word that conquered me, so that I gave up my five years of vague belief in the Joseph Church, and turned to Almighty God—Christ of the last days, and began to walk upon the right track of believing in God and pursuing to know God. Afterward, I read these words of God: “… those who believe in God because of the signs are surely the category that shall suffer destruction. Those who are incapable of accepting the words of Jesus who has returned to flesh are surely the progeny of hell, the descendants of the archangel, the category that shall be subjected to everlasting destruction.” “Those who only care about the words of the Bible, but who are unconcerned about the truth or seeking My footsteps—they are against Me, for they limit Me according to the Bible, and constrain Me within the Bible, and so are blasphemous in the extreme towards Me. How could such people come before Me? They pay no heed to My deeds, or My will, or the truth, but instead obsess over words, words that kill. How could such people be compatible with Me?” These words of God made me tremble with fear, and moreover, made me regret my past deeds: “I not only resisted God, but also hurt so many brothers and sisters who preached the gospel of the last days and hindered so many brothers and sisters from turning to Almighty God. I was really guilty of the most heinous sin! I believed in God and longed for Him, but I didn’t know Him and even opposed Him, the returned true God. I hate myself for turning away my ears from the truth and refusing God’s salvation so many times. The brothers and sisters came time and again with smiling faces, but I always threw them out with a horrible face. I was really inhuman! No matter how high the message they preached, I always closed my ears to it, and I blasphemed that it was of an evil spirit coming to deceive people. I even thought that only I was God’s intimate and that only the God I believed in was the true God, while the God others believed in was a false god. Little did I know that what I did was opposed to the new work of Almighty God, and I was an antichrist. It is too late for me to regret…” Thinking of this, I prayed, “O Almighty God! Thank You for giving me another opportunity to be saved. It is Your word that has woken me up and enabled me to receive Your great salvation. According to what I have done, I should have been cursed by You. However, You remembered no transgressions of mine and still melt me with a tender motherly love and enlightened me with Your words, so that I could accept Your work of the last days, the work of purifying people with the word. O God! How great Your love is! You have expended too much care and thought on me, and I will not let You down. I will do all I can in these last days to cooperate with You and bring to You those who truly believe in You but are still groping in darkness, so that they will understand Your intention and stop resisting You, and so that Your heart will be consoled.”

Here I sincerely advise the brothers and sisters in the House of Joseph and all the other denominations and sects who have not turned to Almighty God: Never follow in my footsteps! Wake up and quickly turn to Almighty God! For Almighty God is precisely the returned Jesus! There is not much time left for Him to select people in a hidden way. I hope that the brothers and sisters will not miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Otherwise, when God appears publicly, it will be too late for you to do anything. Just as Almighty God says: “… when you see Jesus descend from the heaven upon a white cloud with your own eyes, this will be the public appearance of the Sun of righteousness. Perhaps that will be a time of great excitement for you, yet you should know that the time when you witness Jesus descend from the heaven is also the time when you go down to hell to be punished. It will herald the end of God’s management plan, and will be when God rewards the good and punishes the wicked. For the judgment of God will have ended before man sees signs, when there is only the expression of truth.”

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I Have Received Almighty God’s Great Salvation | Ironclad Proofs of God’s Words Conquering Denominations’ and Sects’ Leaders

 I Have Received Almighty God’s Great Salvation

Xie Qiang

Shangqiu City, Henan Province

I was formerly the president of a mission of the “China Gospel Fellowship” in the Pentecostal Church. Since 1997, there had been people preaching Almighty God’s work of the last days to me many times, but I always stopped them before they finished their words and said, “I may receive you when you come to preach a male Christ. But if you still preach that your God is a female, then don’t come! You say God has come, but how come I haven’t seen Him? Have you seen Him?” Every time I met the brothers and sisters who testified God’s work of the last days, I always rebuffed them with these words. Then, I went around “guarding the church” to prevent those “heretics” from disturbing our churches. I treated Almighty God, the “Eastern Lightning,” as “a cult.” And I, together with my upper leaders, collected the rumors that resisted and slandered Almighty God from various denominations and sects, and with my imaginations added, we printed them into booklets, The Sound of the Trumpet in the Church and Resist the Heresy—the Eastern Lightning, and then distributed them to all the churches in my charge. And I said to the brothers and sisters wherever I went, “The ‘Eastern Lightning’ is a cult. If you read their books or fellowship with them, you will be deceived. You must stay away from them. Don’t fellowship with them. They are of an underworld organization which is against the Communist Party. Their key persons even have guns. And they seduced people with beautiful men and women. If you join them, you cannot drop out. If you try to do so, they will gouge out your eyes or cut off your nose, or even your whole family will be in danger!” I wantonly sealed off the churches in such a way at that time, yet I regarded myself as faithful to the Lord, responsible for the churches, and a guard for the churches. Little did I realize that I had become an antichrist. Now, I regret it very bitterly.

In 1999, one of my co-workers received a book of Almighty God’s word and showed it to me. I flipped through it critically. When I read God’s stern words of judgment, I felt a great aversion to it. In order to keep the brothers and sisters from reading this book, I even tore it up and threw it into the excrement of the outhouse. Afterward, the brothers and sisters who preached the gospel of the last days preached to me many times, but every time I refused them coldly. Nevertheless, through contact with them many times, I found such a fact: No matter how I treated them and no matter in what way I spoke to them, they all had a common manifestation, that is, they had love, were patient, never lost temper and persuaded me with kind words. That was what I couldn’t find in the believers of our denomination. To be frank, such a living out as theirs really made me admire, but as I was deceived by the rumors and always considered that anything apart from the Bible was a heresy, a cult, I dared not accept it all along.

One day in mid-April 2002, I received a call from my upper leader, and he invited me to Qingdao for a theological training. On the third day of the training, I realized that they were the preachers of Almighty God, the “Eastern Lightning” sect, as I considered. “I’m deceived. I’m finished!” I thought to myself, “If I refuse to accept their way, they will gouge out my eyes or cut off my nose, or even my life will be in danger.” So, I made up my mind inwardly, “This time I’d rather lay down my life for the ‘true way’ than accept it. I’ll set an example for the believers even if I may be martyred for the Lord. Since I can’t leave anyway, I’ll stick your preaching out. As long as what you preach doesn’t agree with the Bible, I won’t believe it. In the past I didn’t give you a chance to preach. Now you have it.” They fellowshipped with me about the Bible for thirteen days, mainly centering on the direction and several key principles of the Holy Spirit’s work: First, God’s work is always progressing forward; second, God’s work is always new and never old and is never repeated; third, God does His work by ages, stages, and steps; fourth, God’s work counters man’s notions. And they especially fellowshipped with me about the root of the Pharisees’ resisting Jesus, the difference between the substance of the work of the New Testament and the work of the Old Testament, the relationship between the Old Testament and Jesus, and so on. As I listened to their fellowship, I didn’t find anything wrong or misinterpretation in it. It was all based on the proper meaning of the scriptures and was what I had never heard before. But later, when they fellowshipped about the difference between the Age of Law and the Age of Grace and the Pharisees’ resistance against God because of their sticking to old things when the Age of Law turned into the Age of Grace, I felt an aversion to it. I shouted at them, “Stop beating about the bush. Do you think that I don’t know what you’ve got in your sleeves? If you want to talk about the third stage of work, just say it!” Seeing that I was in a great rage, they took out two books Follow the Lamb and Sing New Songs and The Word Appears in the Flesh, and some tapes of God’s word. Then they began to read God’s word to me, but as I resisted it strongly in my heart, I didn’t take anything in. It was really true that “where there is God’s work, there is Satan’s disturbance.” At that time, I felt very bad in my heart, my head was dizzy, and I even wanted to throw up. So I stopped them and said, “It’s merely a recount of the Bible in vernacular Chinese. Could this be God’s word?” I was really so arrogant that I lost my sense. After that, whenever they read God’s word, I recited the scriptures aloud to interrupt them purposely. Whenever they played the tapes of hymns or God’s word, I pretended to be asleep. And sometimes, I even spoke offensive words to mock or dig at them. Like this, in the whole three days, regardless of how I treated them or what I said to them, they never lost their temper or contradicted me with words but fellowshipped with me patiently. That was just the opposite of my original thought that if I didn’t accept their way, I would be in danger, my eyes would be gouged out, my nose would be cut off, and so on. Then, I observed them secretly and found that their daily prayer before God was sincere, either in the presence of people or behind their backs, which was far more than I could do. They were not like those of an underworld organization at all. Although I didn’t listen attentively to their new songs, honestly speaking, both the words and tunes of the songs were very touching. Furthermore, though I was so unfriendly and arrogant, the host entertained me with warm hospitality all the time. In addition, during the more-than-ten-day stay with them, I found that they were steady and decent and that they kept a very clear distance from the opposite sex and behaved properly in having meals, fellowshipping, and accommodating. There was not at all the “sexual seduction” as I had fabricated. So, my misunderstanding about the people in this stream gradually disappeared and my resistance against them was also removed, and I said to the one who gave the testimony, “I ask you three typical questions. If you can make them clear to me and show me biblical proofs, I will believe. Otherwise, I’d rather die than believe.”

“First, I don’t believe that God will be incarnated in the flesh again, because the Scripture says that Jesus will come with the glorious resurrected body on the white cloud. Second, I cannot accept that God is female, because I believe that God will never change. Third, I don’t believe that God will be incarnated in China, because the Scripture says that He will stand on the Mount of Olives and appear to the entire universe.”

With regard to my first question, they fellowshipped about Luke 17:24-25, which says, “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.” Actually, they were the scriptures I had recited and expounded often in the past. I had thought that they referred to the fact that Jesus suffered and was rejected when He was incarnated the first time. But at that time when I read them carefully, I realized that they were a prophecy about the Son of man’s second coming. Furthermore, the whole passage from verse 22 to verse 37 in Luke 17 was prophesying signs of the Son of man’s second coming, and the Lord said that first He must suffer many things, and be rejected by this generation the second time. Since it was a prophecy, it clearly refers to things about the second incarnation. Moreover, if Jesus came on the white cloud with a spiritual body, how could He suffer? Who would not bow his knees and worship Him? Who would dare to resist Him? Hebrews 1:6 says, “And again, when he brings in the first-begotten into the world, he said, And let all the angels of God worship him.” Since it says that God “again” brings in the first-begotten into the world, it proves that Jesus was the first incarnation into the world and the incarnate flesh this time is “the second incarnation” into the world, which refers to God’s returning in the flesh. They also read me the piece of God’s word “Corrupt Mankind Is More in Need of the Salvation of God Incarnated in the ‘Flesh,’” which made me utterly convinced. God says: “The only reason that the incarnate God has come into the flesh is because of the needs of corrupt man. It is because of the needs of man but not of God, and all His sacrifices and sufferings are for the sake of mankind, and not for the benefit of God Himself. There are no pros and cons or rewards for God; He shall not reap some future harvest, but that which was originally owed to Him. All that He does and sacrifices for mankind is not so that He might gain great rewards, but purely for the sake of mankind. Though God’s work in the flesh involves many unimaginable difficulties, the effects that it ultimately achieves far exceed those of the work done directly by the Spirit. The work of the flesh entails much hardship, and the flesh cannot possess the same great identity as the Spirit, cannot carry out the same supernatural deeds as the Spirit, much less can He possess the same authority as the Spirit. Yet the substance of the work done by this unremarkable flesh is far superior to that of the work done directly by the Spirit, and this flesh Himself is the answer to all of man’s needs. For those to be saved, the use value of the Spirit is far inferior to that of the flesh: The work of the Spirit is able to cover the entire universe, across all mountains, rivers, lakes, and oceans, yet the work of the flesh more effectively relates to every person with whom He has contact. What’s more, God’s flesh with tangible form can better be understood and trusted by man, and can further deepen man’s knowledge of God, and can leave upon man a more profound impression of the actual deeds of God. The work of the Spirit is shrouded in mystery, it is difficult for mortal beings to fathom, and even harder for them to see, and so they can only rely on hollow imaginings. The work of the flesh, however, is normal, and based on reality, and possessed of rich wisdom, and is a fact that can be beheld by the physical eye of man; man can personally experience the wisdom of the work of God, and has no need to employ his bountiful imagination. This is the accuracy and real value of the work of God in the flesh. The Spirit can only do things that are invisible to man and difficult for him to imagine, for example the enlightenment of the Spirit, the moving of the Spirit, and the guidance of the Spirit, but for man who has a mind, these do not provide any clear meaning. They only provide a moving, or a broad meaning, and cannot give an instruction with words. The work of God in the flesh, however, is greatly different: It has accurate guidance of words, has clear will, and has clear required goals. And so man does not need to grope around, or employ his imagination, much less make guesses. This is the clarity of the work in the flesh, and its great difference from the work of the Spirit. The work of the Spirit is only suitable in a limited scope, and cannot replace the work of the flesh. The work of the flesh gives man far more exact and necessary goals and far more real, valuable knowledge than the work of the Spirit. … The best thing about His work in the flesh is that He can leave accurate words and exhortations, and His accurate will for mankind to those who follow Him, so that afterwards His followers can more accurately and more concretely pass on all of His work in the flesh and His will for the whole of mankind to those who accept this way. Only the work of God in the flesh among man truly accomplishes the fact of God’s being and living together with man. Only this work fulfills man’s desire to behold the face of God, witness the work of God, and hear the personal word of God.”

After they fellowshipped about the first question, though I considered it a satisfactory answer and felt much better, I still had doubts. Then, they fellowshipped with me about the second question, “In Genesis 1:27, it says, ‘So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.’ This verse proves that man and woman both have God’s image. So who can conclude that God is male or female? Man was created in God’s image, so was woman. Therefore, it exactly proves that God is Spirit and has no gender and that God can do His redemptive work in an image of male and can also complete His work of conquering and saving men in an image of female.” Then we ate and drank the piece of God’s word “The Two Incarnations Complete the Significance of the Incarnation,” in which God says: “Each stage of work done by God has a real significance. When Jesus arrived, He was male, and this time He is female. From this, you can see that God created both male and female for His work and with Him there is no distinction of gender. When His Spirit arrives, He can take on any flesh at will and the flesh represents Him. Be it male or female, both represent God as long as it is His incarnate flesh. … With God there is no distinction of gender. His work is done as He wishes and is not subject to any restrictions, particularly free, but every stage has a real significance. God became flesh twice, and it goes without saying that His incarnation in the last days is the last time. He has come to reveal all His deeds. If in this stage He did not become flesh to personally do work for man to witness, man would forever hold on to the notion that God is only male, not female.” Faced with these words of the truth, I had to be convinced, “Can I, a little created being, interfere with the Creator’s freedom? Can I direct God how to do His work? Isn’t it that I’m blaspheming the Holy Spirit if I circumscribe God’s gender?” Thinking back to my circumscribing and judging and resisting God’s work in the past, I felt extremely ashamed and guilty.

In regard to God’s being incarnated in China, they fellowshipped with me about Matthew 24:27-28, which says, “For as the lightning comes out of the east, and shines even to the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For wherever the carcass is, there will the eagles be gathered together.” Here, “the east” refers to the east of the world—China, and “the west” refers to the western countries. And then we read Malachi 1:11, “For from the rising of the sun even to the going down of the same my name shall be great among the Gentiles; … said the LORD of hosts.” They said, “The ‘rising of the sun’ also refers to China, because China’s Mount Tai is the place where the sunrise can be seen first in the world. And this is known to all. Moreover, it is an acknowledged fact that China is in the east of the world. As to the word ‘my name shall be great among the Gentiles,’ we see from God’s work that God did the first two stages of His work in Israel and all the countries outside Israel are called Gentile nations. Over two thousand years, the gospel has spread out from Jerusalem, from the west to the east, and China is the last to receive Jesus, so it is called a Gentile nation. If this stage of work were still started from Israel, how could God be great among the Gentiles? How could this verse be fulfilled?” One brother read the following God’s words to me: “The purpose of conquering you today is to have you acknowledge that God is your God, and the other’s God, and most importantly the God of all who love Him, and the God of all creation. He is the God of Israelites and the God of the people of Egypt. He is the God of the British and the God of Americans. He is not just the God of Adam and Eve, but also the God of all descendants of Adam and Eve. He is the God of everything in the heavens and everything on earth. The Israelite family and all Gentile families alike are in the hands of one God. Not only did He work in Israel for several thousand years and was once born in Judea, but today He is descending in China, this place where the great red dragon lies coiled. If being born in Judea makes Him the King of the Jews, then does not descending among all of you today make Him the God of you?” “In the final era, I will have My name magnified among the Gentile nations, make My deeds seen by the Gentiles so they will call Me the Almighty, causing My words to soon come to pass. I will make all people know that I am not only the God of the Israelites, but the God of all Gentile nations, even of the nations I have cursed. I will let all people see that I am the God of all creation. This is My greatest work, the purpose of My work plan for the last days, and My only work to be fulfilled in the last days.” Hearing these words of God, I was very enlightened in my heart. “Yes! The God I have been expecting has now descended among us, yet I do not dare to believe. Then what have I been expecting? God has come to China to do His work, and this is a super great blessing coming upon us. What reason do I have to refuse it? How can I, a little created being, fathom God’s deeds? Thank God’s enlightenment! So that I can understand that God is the God of all created beings in the world, not belonging to any country or race. Since God has done His work in China in the last days, we should unconditionally obey it, because in everything God does there is God’s good purpose, and it is all for saving corrupt mankind.” Just like this, I was utterly convinced. It was God’s wonderful work and word that conquered me, and so I knew that I was arrogant, ignorant, blind, and foolish. At that moment, I had enjoyment in my heart, and my misunderstandings and notions about God disappeared, and the barrier against the brothers and sisters was removed. We talked and laughed heartily…

Later, I ate and drank God’s word with a seeking heart, and the Holy Spirit enlightened me greatly. I felt that every piece of God’s word was particularly sweet, not as shallow and common as I thought before, that every word of God was with authority and power, and that it was truly God’s own utterance and was the irrefutable truth! I regretted very much that I was so arrogant and self-right in the past that I understood the words out of context while ignoring the background and the inner meaning of God’s words and thus committed the monstrous sins of blaspheming the Holy Spirit and tearing up what the Holy Spirit said to the churches. At that time I even more hated myself, so I knelt down before God and prayed, “O the only true almighty God! I deserve to die ten thousand times. I’m not worthy to come before You. For so many years, I have been judging and slandering You and greatly sealing off the churches. This has seriously hindered the spreading of Your gospel of the last days, and thus many brothers and sisters have been locked in the darkness, unable to come before You. O God! I’m a sheer, real antichrist, and should have been cursed and cast into hell. I’m unpardonably sinful. Yet, You didn’t treat me according to my evil deeds or punish me, but have been sparing no efforts to save me, waiting for me to turn back. O God! Your love is so great that it makes me feel terribly ashamed. Thank You for giving me the opportunity to start a new life. I’m willing to mend my ways sincerely, spread Your gospel widely for the rest of my life, testify Your wonderful deeds, and bring more deceived brothers and sisters before You, so as to make up for my indebtedness to You and repay Your great love!”

Since I followed Almighty God, I have truly enjoyed the sweetness and abundance of God’s words. I deeply feel myself unworthy. At the same time, I have also tasted the hardships of God’s working on earth. Seeing that God has expended great effort and price for mankind, I felt ashamed all the more. Especially when I saw that God says the word “This means I will have to trouble you to make the choice once more…,” I couldn’t control myself anymore and was moved to tears, feeling that God loves man so much and God is so great! At that moment, I couldn’t tell clearly whether it was regret, enjoyment, moving, or comfort. All sorts of feelings welled up in my heart. The supreme God has to “trouble” me, a sinner, to choose once again, and this really makes me extremely ashamed. God’s heart is as boundless as the sea and sky! His desire for mankind is that all men can be saved and none will perish or be destroyed!

Under the illumination of God’s words, my former imaginations, notions, and misunderstandings have been thoroughly dispelled by God’s words, God’s work, and the facts. I have understood what theory is, what reality is, what notion is, what truth is, what imagination is, and what fact is. In the past, I was self-right, self-important, arrogant, and self-conceited, and didn’t seek or investigate God’s new work but only blindly condemned God and sealed off the churches according to my imaginations and notions, playing the role of Satan. Today I have realized it, yet it is too late to regret! Dear brothers and sisters, I hope that you can take warning from me. Don’t be stiff-necked to resist God anymore. Seek immediately! Now, God’s gospel work is about to be concluded and the disasters have been poured down one after the other. Just as God says: “… the repeated reminders and exhortations of God are because in His hand is prepared an unprecedented disaster, one that will be unbearable for the flesh and spirit of man. This disaster is not merely a punishment of the flesh but of the spirit as well. You must know this: when the plan of God is made void and when His reminders and exhortations beget no response, what anger will He unleash? This will be like nothing that has heretofore been experienced or heard by any creation. And so I say, this disaster is unprecedented and it will never be repeated. This is because only one creation and one salvation are within the plan of God. This is the first time and also the last.”

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Almighty God’s Word Made Me Become Subject Before God | Ironclad Proofs of God’s Words Conquering Denominations’ and Sects’ Leaders

Almighty God’s Word Made Me Become Subject Before God

Zhang Mingqi

Nanyang City, Henan Province

I was formerly a mid-level leader of the Stream of Recovery. Since I was called in the Lord in 1985, I had been in the stream of the Lord’s recovery. I always believed that the Bible was a book of life, in which every word was breathed by God, and that God’s good and kind intention for mankind over six thousand years had been fully revealed to us in it. So, I regarded the Bible as my lifeblood and very much adored Brother Lee who had brought us the “higher vision.” I always believed that God had already unlocked all the mysteries in the sixty-six books of the Bible through Brother Lee and that all the mysteries and the essence of the Bible had already been revealed to us. When the antichrists would make the covenant, when the temple would be rebuilt, when the Lord would return, and where and when the Lord would take us up, all these had been told to us. So we only needed to attend meetings, be obedient, and wait to be taken up to reign and rule when the revelations were fulfilled. Therefore, I paid much attention to reading Brother Lee’s messages. I also shepherded the brothers and sisters in the area where I ministered according to the methods of Brother Lee. Honestly speaking, at that time, I only wished that I could be full of the words from the messages of Brother Lee either when I preached or when I fellowshipped, for Brother Lee once said that he was the Lord’s recorder and that we should all become his recorders. It could be said that the brothers and sisters under me and I worshipped Brother Lee’s messages as we worshipped God. We read his messages at usual times, shared his messages at the meetings, and followed the prescribed routine in his messages waiting for God’s return. I condemned anything different from the “vision revealed” by Brother Lee as a “heresy” and would not accept it at all.

At the end of the fall of 1994, a brother came to preach Almighty God’s work of the last days to me, saying that the seven seals had been broken. I immediately contradicted him with the scriptures and drove him away without giving him any chance to explain. In 1996, two former co-workers of mine came to visit me and fellowshipped with me about Almighty God’s work of the last days. As I found that what they fellowshipped did not tally with Brother Lee’s exposition of the Bible, I judged arbitrarily that they had been “deceived” and had joined the “heresy.” So I forcibly drove them away. After that, I felt a great repugnance and resistance to the people who came to preach the gospel of the last days. I went around sealing off the churches, not allowing the brothers and sisters under me to have contact with those who preached the gospel of the last days. And I said, “Those people are sheer antichrists, the deceitful false prophets, a kind of people to be cursed by God, and they are like the grasshoppers in late autumn whose days are numbered…” During that period of time, there were continually people coming to preach the gospel of the last days to me, but I refused them all.

That lasted until March 5, 2002. On that morning, a brother of our denomination, who had accepted Almighty God, called me and invited me to his home. I was unwilling to go there. But as he invited me repeatedly, I felt embarrassed to turn him down. I thought to myself, “I’m just going to meet a friend. I won’t be afraid if he talks about the work of the last days. I have Bible knowledge, and I am clear about the vision. Why not go?” When I arrived there, I saw another brother with him. I gave that brother a glance and thought scornfully, “Is this what you call the master-hand? What can such a person preach?” The brother said to me smilingly, “Brother, let’s have a fellowship. We can fellowship about what we know.” I thought to myself, “Don’t you just want to talk about the three-stage work? What else can you say? You will only repeat those few words you have been specially trained to preach. The same old story, I’ve heard too much of it! Today, I will stump you with hard questions and put you on the spot!” So, I said, “Today when we fellowship, we shall interpret whatever verse in the Bible according to its proper meaning. If we depart from the Bible, then there is no need to fellowship. We shall fellowship in the way that I ask questions and you answer them.” “OK! Let’s do what you say,” replied the brother readily.

So, I said loudly, “Can you tell me what ‘lightning’ means? You have to find this word from the Bible. I’ll believe in your God if your answer convinces me.” The brother smiled. He opened the Bible, turned to Psalms 97:4, and read, “His lightning enlightened the world: the earth saw, and trembled.” At this, my heart skipped a beat. “Oh, my! He answers so quickly and correctly. This is far beyond my expectation.” Seeing that my countenance suddenly changed, he said with a smile, “Brother, this one scripture does not prove anything. Let’s keep seeking. The Lord is really mystery. As long as we seek with a humble heart, He will unlock His mysteries to us.” Then, he opened the Bible again and found out many other verses: Psalms 18:13-14, Zechariah 9:14, Matthew 24:27, Luke 17:24, Revelation 4:5, and so on. Only then did I find that I, who had regarded myself as being “endowed with great talents” and “rich in knowledge,” was actually so superficial and ignorant. So I dropped myself and listened to the brother’s fellowship with a seeking heart. Enlightened and guided by the Holy Spirit, I felt as if awakening from a dream. “Actually, the one I have been resisting for so many years is not a human but the Savior Jesus whom I have been earnestly expecting for a long time. Almighty God is precisely the returned Jesus!” I really hated myself for being so blind and foolish that I believed in God yet did not know God. I echoed what others said, neither investigating nor seeking, and I showed myself off with the very little Bible knowledge that I had. I thought that I had known everything after reading and wearing out several Bibles, and I did not seek God’s intention. I was really so arrogant and ignorant.

Then, I fellowshipped with the brother about Brother Lee’s exposition of the Bible. The brother said, “Matthew 10:24 says, ‘The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his lord.’ This shows that although Brother Lee had done much work, he was only a man, and could not replace God Himself, and we shouldn’t regard his messages as God’s words. Revelation 5:3-5 says, ‘And no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon. … the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the Root of David, has prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof.’ This shows that no one is worthy to open the scroll, and only God Himself is able to open the little scroll.” Having said that, he took out a book and said, “This is Almighty God’s personal utterance—the little scroll.” Then, he read me a passage of God’s word in “The Mystery of the Incarnation (1),” which says: “Even a man who is used by the Holy Spirit cannot represent God Himself. And not only can this man not represent God, but his work cannot directly represent God. That is to say, the experience of man cannot be placed directly within the management of God, and it cannot represent the management of God. All the work that God Himself does is the work He intends to do in His own management plan and relates to the great management. The work done by man (man used by the Holy Spirit) supplies his individual experience. He finds a new path of experience from that walked by those before him and leads his brothers and sisters under guidance of the Holy Spirit. What these men supply is their individual experience or spiritual writings of spiritual men. Though they are used by the Holy Spirit, the work of such men is unrelated to the great management work in the six-thousand-year plan. They are merely raised up by the Holy Spirit in different periods to lead people in the stream of the Holy Spirit until they have fulfilled their function or their lives come to an end. The work they do is only to prepare an appropriate way for God Himself or to continue one item in the management of God Himself on earth. Such men are unable to do the greater work in His management, and they cannot open up new ways out, much less conclude all the work of God from the former age. Therefore, the work they do represents only a created being performing his function and cannot represent God Himself performing His ministry. This is because the work they do is unlike that done by God Himself. The work of ushering in a new age cannot be done by man in God’s place. It cannot be done by any other than God Himself. All the work done by man is performing his duty as one of creation and is done when moved or enlightened by the Holy Spirit. The guidance that such men provide is how to practice in man’s daily life and how man should act to the will of God. The work of man neither involves the management of God nor represents the work of the Spirit. As an example, the work of Witness Lee and Watchman Nee was to lead the way. Be the way new or old, the work was done on the basis of not exceeding the principles of the Bible. Whether the local churches were restored or built, their work was to establish churches. The work they did carried on the work that Jesus and His apostles had not finished or further developed in the Age of Grace.” After listening to this passage of God’s word, I understood that Brother Lee was only a man. Neither he himself nor the work he did could represent God. All he did was to lead other brothers and sisters according to the principles in the Bible. He could not go beyond the Bible and beyond the Age of Grace to do a new work. Although Brother Lee could explain the Bible and preach about some biblical knowledge and theological theories, he knew nothing about the Lord’s coming again and the details about how the Lord’s work in the new age would be done. So we could not measure God’s new work or draw any conclusion about God’s work according to Brother Lee’s exposition of the Bible.

Then, the brother read me a passage of God’s word in “Concerning the Bible (1),” which says: “You all need to understand the Bible—it is very necessary that you do so. … The Bible is a history book. If during the Age of Grace you were to eat and drink the Old Testament, practicing the requirements of the Old Testament age, then Jesus would forsake you, condemn you. If you had tried to impose the Old Testament on Jesus’ work, you would have been called a Pharisee. And so today, if you eat and drink and practice the Old and New Testaments, then the God of today will condemn you; you cannot keep pace with the work of the Holy Spirit today. If you eat the Old and New Testaments, then you are one outside the stream of the Holy Spirit. In Jesus’ day, He led the Jews and all those who followed Him according to the work of the Holy Spirit in Him. He did not look to the Bible for evidence, but spoke as His work dictated. He did not concern Himself with what the Bible said, did not lead His followers down a path found in the Bible. From the very beginning, He preached the way of repentance, and the word ‘repentance’ was not mentioned at all in all the prophecies in the Old Testament. Not only did He not follow the Bible, He brought forth a new path and did a new work. He did not make reference to the Bible when He preached, and the miracles He worked—healing the sick, casting out demons—had never been performed by men during the Age of Law. No one in the Age of Law did the work He did, taught those lessons, had that authority. He simply did His new work, though many people condemned Him, even crucified Him, by using the Bible. His work went beyond the Old Testament; if that had not been the case, why would they have nailed Him to the cross? Was it not because His teachings, His power to cure the sick and cast out demons, had never been recorded in the Old Testament? The work of Jesus was to bring forth a new path; He did not deliberately set out to ‘wage war’ against the Bible or abolish the Old Testament, but simply performed His ministry, bringing the new work to those who thirsted for Him and sought Him out. He was not trying to explain the Old Testament or defend its work. Carrying on the Age of Law was not His goal, for He did not care in the least whether His work was grounded in the Bible, but simply did the job that He needed to do. So He did not attempt to explain the Old Testament prophecies, did not base His work on words spoken in the Old Testament Age of Law. He did not concern Himself with what the Old Testament said, whether it accorded with His own work, did not care how other people saw His work or condemned His work. He simply kept on doing the job He needed to do, though many people condemned Him, invoking the words of the Old Testament prophets. In people’s eyes His work was not based on a shred of evidence, and in many ways it ran counter to what was recorded in the Bible. Were they not grossly in the wrong? Must God’s work obey any rules? Does He need to follow the words of prophets? Which is greater, the Bible or God? Why must God’s work be in line with the Bible? Is it really not within His right to stand above the Bible? Can He not depart from it and do other work? Why did Jesus and His disciples not observe the Sabbath? If He was to observe the Sabbath, to practice the commandments of the Old Testament, then why, after His coming, did He not observe the Sabbath, but washed others’ feet and covered His head, broke bread and drank wine? Were these commandments mentioned in the Old Testament? If Jesus was to adhere to the Old Testament, why did He break these rules? You must know which came first, God, or the Bible? As He is the Lord of the Sabbath, can’t He also be the Lord of the Bible?” I listened quietly. Every word of God was so practical and so sincere that I felt bright in my heart and everything became clear in my eyes. I came to know that God’s work always progresses forward and is always new, and that God does not work according to the prophecies of the Bible, but does the newest and most realistic work according to His plan and man’s need. After hearing this passage of God’s word and thinking back to what the brother had fellowshipped with me about this stage of God’s work in the last days, I realized that God is so wonderful and so unfathomable. The new work done by God incarnate this time is to continue the work that God had not yet finished in the Age of Law and in the Age of Grace and is a newer and higher work. The Bible is only a record of the history of the first two stages of the work and the prophecies concerning the work of the last days, but it does not contain all God’s work and words, and not every word of the Bible is the word of God. But this time, God has returned to personally utter His voice and do the work of judging and purifying man with the word, and it is the last stage of the work in God’s six-thousand-year management plan. Such work of God has brought people into a brand new age and brought them the practices of the new age… Through this fellowship and eating and drinking God’s word, I, enlightened by God, understood many truths and realized that this was indeed the work done by God.

The more I read God’s word, the more I became certain about this way, because apart from Almighty God, no one else could change the age or unlock mysteries, and even less could anyone purify man and bring man into the kingdom. At that time, I felt ashamed and disgraced, wishing I could sink through the ground. Ay! I really hated myself deeply and felt bitterly regretful. I had no discernment yet I slandered others. I refused to accept the true way and I also sealed off the churches and hindered the brothers and sisters from accepting it. I, such an arrogant, self-right, disobedient, and resistant person who was extremely corrupt and worse than beasts, had resisted God for eight years. I really deserved the retribution of being put into the lake of fire to suffer the eternal punishment. However, Almighty God did not treat me according to my evil deeds; instead, He tried every means to save me from the jaws of death so that I could have a part in His kingdom training. This was indeed God’s favor and uplifting! The day for God to reward good and punish evil is close at hand. Now most of the brothers and sisters who had been bound by me have returned to God’s family with me, but there are still some brothers and sisters who have been deceived continuing to resist. So, I’m willing to do my utmost to cooperate with God and bring more brothers and sisters before God, so as to make up for my past transgressions and indebtedness to God and repay Almighty God who loves man as His own flesh and blood. This is my biggest wish and is even more the bounden duty of a created being. Dear brothers and sisters, wake up quickly! This is the work of the true God! No one else can do it in His stead! If we refuse or don’t accept it, it will be too late for us to regret on the day when God’s work is concluded. Almighty God admonishes us, “You must not blindly condemn the words expressed by God because of the appearance of false Christs during the last days, and must not be someone who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit because you fear deception. Would that not be a great pity?”

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