Gossip Is a “Fearful” Thing——The Church of Almighty God

Gossip Is a “Fearful” Thing

Li Zhong
Jiyuan City, Henan Province

A world in man’s heart with no place for God is dark, empty without hope

Whenever I remember that in those gloomy days, I was fooled and deceived by satan and therefore dared not accept God’s new work, I even more loathe and abhor satan and all the schemes it employed.
At that time, my wife and I were both key co-workers of the Praise Church. In the meetings, we often heard our leader say, “People of ‘the Eastern Lightning’ are extremely vicious and full of wiles. They have a connection with the underworld. Once they fasten on you, if you don’t accept, they will harm you in secret. Several people will follow you secretly, suddenly bring you to the ground, and then break your legs with steel bars and run away. In other places there are many people whose ears have been cut off or eyes have been gouged out by them. Or they will buy you off with money, giving you eight or ten thousand yuan. Or they will give you whatever you lack. What’s more infuriating is that they are promiscuous, licentious and corrupt….” These appalling words scared us so much that we dared not go out, both feeling fear and detestation of “the Eastern Lightning.” During that period, I also served as satan’s accomplice as others did. However, I, who was guilty of the most heinous sin, received the Almighty God’s salvation and got the invaluable word that God brought to mankind in the end time—The Word Appears in the Flesh. At the same time, I saw the joy and happiness of the brothers and sisters who lived in the light. How enviable! Under the care of God’s love, they were full of cheers and laughter, without barrier or fleshly entanglement. They were leading a life on earth as if in heaven. For the sake of their common goal, they strived to the utmost with their hearts linked and their hands joined, they feared no hardship or tiredness, and they bore misunderstandings and humiliations, never losing heart or getting disappointed. Here, I saw that the group of people led by the Almighty God were like the good soldiers of the kingdom. Although they had manifestations of corruptions, they could mutually know themselves. So, all the rumors that we had heard before collapsed by themselves before the facts. What’s more, it is stipulated explicitly in Article 4 of God’s administrative decrees: “Man has corrupt nature and even more has emotions. So, in serving in coordination, all are forbidden to coordinate with the opposite sex alone. If they are discovered to do so, they shall be expelled, no matter who they are.” As to cutting off people’s noses or ears or gouging out people’s eyes, it was even more a sheer fabrication out of nothing. Then I understood that those rumors were the “masterpieces” of some people with ulterior motives (satan’s schemes). Their intention was to wreck God’s work and blind people’s eyes. They attempted to possess the brothers and sisters for their own enjoyment and forever deprive them of the opportunity to accept the true way. Thinking of these, I could not help shivering all over. What a close thing! I had almost been ruined at their hands! Thus I thanked God even more for his tremendously great salvation. However, satan vainly tried to war against God to the end. It continued its deathbed struggle, using vile means on us and still playing dirty tricks to attack us. Yet little did it know that God’s wisdom is based on its schemes.

I Felt Bitter Remorse for Resisting the Almighty God

I Felt Bitter Remorse for Resisting the Almighty God

The picture is from The Church of Almighty God

Li Mingguang
Zhoukou City, Henan Province

I was formerly a worker of the Hua Xuehe sect. On December 2, 1998, I accepted the Almighty God’s end-time work and began to eat and drink the present word of God. Gradually, I have known that God’s work always progresses forward and is done age by age to save man. I have known the inside truth about and the substance of God’s work in the Age of the Law, and also known how God redeemed all mankind in the Age of the Grace. Even more, I have known that on the basis of the first two stages of the work, God has opened a new age—the Age of the Word. Through his word, God chastises and judges people and will eventually conquer and perfect them completely, so that they will be restored to their image created by God in the beginning, be fully compatible with God, become God’s manifestation on earth, and become the proof of God’s defeating satan. This group of people are the ones who can testify about God’s deeds and are the 144,000, the overcoming man-child, mentioned in Revelation.

9. A Confession——The Church of Almighty God

9. A Confession

The picture is from The Church of Almighty God

Yang Xiaohui
Jiyuan City, Henan Province

I—a great sinner guilty beyond forgiveness!

Before God I have committed monstrous sins. I resisted the Almighty God’s end-time work by every possible means all along. I even condemned and blasphemed God’s flesh, burned up the book of the Almighty God’s word, and beat, abused, and insulted the brothers and sisters many times who preached God’s new work. However, the Almighty God, who is full of mercy and love, did not put me to death but stretched out his hand of salvation and gave me the opportunity to be saved. Today, facing God’s grace of salvation, I am in floods of tears and overwhelmed with sorrow and regret….

I am Yang Xiaohui, formerly a co-worker of the Praise Church. In 1996, when I was studying in Wen County, the leader told us, “Now false christs and deceivers run rampant. A cult called ‘the Eastern Lightning’ is preaching everywhere that God has returned in the flesh as a female. They deny the Bible and say that God has done the new work and spoken the new word, and that new word is the opened little scroll. They also say that only the little scroll can sanctify man. What they preach victimizes people deeply. Once you listen to their preaching or read their book, you will be deceived. At some place, the whole church which consists of seventy to eighty believers has been deceived into joining them. Moreover, they pay special attention to deceiving leaders. They can receive 500 yuan whenever they convert one person. If you want to back out after accepting what they preach, they will cut off your ears, gouge out your eyes, or beat you up with sticks. So, everyone must guard the gate of our church carefully. Don’t receive anyone who is not sent by our church.” At these words, I was so frightened that my hair stood on end. I felt that “the Eastern Lightning” was too terrible, and at the same time, I had resistance in my heart: “It’s nonsense that the little scroll can sanctify man. If one does not hold on to the Bible, he cannot become holy even if he eats the little scroll!” From then on, I had an irreconcilable hatred for “the Eastern Lightning” and began my evil deeds of resisting God.

Right after I returned home from my study, I went to seal the churches everywhere. I told everyone not to receive anyone who was not sent by our churches, lest they be deceived by “the Eastern Lightning.” We also made it a rule to pray in shifts around the clock specially for cursing “the Eastern Lightning” and asking God to hinder the work of “the Lightning” and to strike down those “evildoers.” But after we prayed and cursed for a period of time, to my great surprise, “the Eastern Lightning” not only did not fail but became more prosperous. Our churches, however, gradually lost the working of the Holy Spirit. The believers in our churches had envy and strife and formed factions among themselves, and they chatted and dozed off in the meetings. The leaders intrigued against one another; some started a new group, and some even simply returned to the boundless world. Seeing such a condition of the churches, I felt bitterly disappointed. Later, I fasted and prayed with several co-workers, asking God to move us to achieve the oneness of the churches, and to restore the brothers’ and sisters’ faith. But no matter how hard we prayed and pleaded with weeping and tears, it was to no avail. Our churches became more and more chaotic and had lost the working of the Holy Spirit completely and also lost peace and joy. Once, the brothers and sisters left for home after a revival meeting. On their way it rained heavily, and some of them were washed away by the flood unexpectedly. That was really perplexing. From then on, the churches became more and more desolate. Fewer and fewer people attended meetings, while more and more people accepted the Almighty God. And my hatred toward “the Eastern Lightning” grew deeper and deeper.

8. How a Son of Disobedience Was Conquered by the Almighty God

8. How a Son of Disobedience Was Conquered by the Almighty God

The picture is from The Church of Almighty God

Sun Yongping
Datong City, Shanxi Province

    I am Sun Yongping, formerly a co-worker of a house church. Because I was single, without family burdens, and was willing to pursue to make progress, the church paid special attention to training me. So I often had chances to work and study in other places. In recent years, every time I went to work out of town, I came back loaded with rumors about “the Eastern Lightning.” Unconsciously, I was deeply poisoned. Especially after I read a book called Refute the Cult the Eastern Lightning, I was more encouraged to resist the Almighty God. Without verification or investigation, I had a strong aversion and hostility to this “way” that I knew nothing about. So, I joined others in rebuking and refuting “the Eastern Lightning,” and even mobilized all the brothers and sisters to curse “the Eastern Lightning” in their daily prayers. Meanwhile, I also heard the rumors say, “The means of ‘the Eastern Lightning’ is extremely cruel. If you do not accept what they preach, they will use violence on you, such as gouging out your eyes, cutting off your nose, or cutting off your ears. Besides, they will seduce you with beauty or buy you off with money. And as long as you accept their ‘way,’ they will give you whatever you lack. …” Soon those rumors were spread everywhere. The entire religious world accepted them to be true. And I felt more hatred, hostility, and fear toward this “way.” All day long I lived in dread, fearing that I might “lose my footing” and fall into the “trap” of “the Eastern Lightning.”

7. I Shed Remorseful Tears Before the Almighty God

7. I Shed Remorseful Tears Before the Almighty God

The picture is from The Church of Almighty God

I. Having Listened to the Rumors and Believed the Lies, I Blindly Resisted God;

For “Guarding the Church” and “Defending the Way,” I Shut Out the Lord.

Wang Haijun
Shenyang City, Liaoning Province
I am Wang Haijun, formerly a preacher in the “Justification by Faith Church.” Like other brothers and sisters, I believed in God for the purpose of going to heaven and gaining eternal life, and I served God for the purpose of gaining the crown of righteousness. While I was earnestly expecting the Lord to return to reward me, I actually shut the door on the Lord and became one who resisted God, because I was foolish and ignorant and believed the rumors.

5. God’s Discipline Made Me Examine Myself; God’s Word Conquered Me——The Church of Almighty God

5. God’s Discipline Made Me Examine Myself; God’s Word Conquered Me

The picture is from The Church of Almighty God

Zhang Congxian

Fuyang City, Anhui Province

I was formerly a leader in the Born Again Church. Since 1997, the believers in the Almighty God had been constantly preaching the gospel to me, no matter whether it was windy or rainy, extremely hot or bitterly cold, daytime or nighttime. However, I always retorted upon them, saying, “‘The Eastern Lightning’ you preach is a female Christ. Don’t deceive me. Moreover, you cannot deceive me. I have searched the whole Bible. It never says that God will be incarnated the second time, much less as a female Christ. You say that God has been incarnated the second time. It is a deceitful lie and is purely a heresy, a cult! Believers in God should take the Bible as the standard. Anything apart from the Bible is not to be believed. Even if you come ten thousand times, I absolutely will not accept!” And I often used Alarm Bell (a handbook printed by our Born Again Church specially for blaspheming and resisting the Almighty God’s end-time work) to seal the churches and said to the brothers and sisters many times, “‘The Eastern Lightning’ is a heresy, a cult. Take strict precautions against it! None of you can receive them or dispute with them, because you cannot match them in dispute. Even less should you listen to them. Once you listen, you will be deceived, and once you go in, you cannot get out. They even cut off others’ noses, gouge out others’ eyes, and commit sexual immorality. They are the ones who drag people into hell and into the lake of fire. … Only our Born Again Church is the true way. The Lord has promised us that once saved always saved, and he will definitely come and take us to heaven. We absolutely cannot accept ‘the Eastern Lightning’!” In this way, I condemned and resisted the Almighty God’s end-time work all along.

Is God Greater or Is the Bible Greater? A Talk About the Relationship Between God and the Bible——Almighty God's Word

Ⅰ Is God Greater or Is the Bible Greater? A Talk About the Relationship Between God and the Bible

The picture is from The Church of Almighty God

1 For many years, people’s traditional means of belief (that of Christianity, one of the world’s three major religions) has been to read the Bible; departure from the Bible is not the belief in the Lord, departure from the Bible is an evil cult, and heresy, and even when people read other books, the foundation of these books must be the explanation of the Bible. Which is to say, if you say you believe in the Lord, then you must read the Bible, you must eat and drink the Bible, and outside the Bible you must not worship any book that does not involve the Bible. If you do, then you are betraying God. From the time when there was the Bible, people’s belief in the Lord has been the belief in the Bible. Instead of saying people believe in the Lord, it is better to say they believe in the Bible; rather than saying they have begun reading the Bible, it is better to say they have begun believing in the Bible; and rather than saying they have returned before the Lord, it would be better to say they have returned before the Bible. In this way, people worship the Bible as if it were God, as if it were their lifeblood and losing it would be the same as losing their life. People see the Bible as being as high as God, and there are even those who see it as higher than God. If people are without the work of the Holy Spirit, if they cannot feel God, they can carry on living—but as soon as they lose the Bible, or lose the famous chapters and sayings from the Bible, then it is as if they have lost their life. And so, as soon as people believe in the Lord they begin reading the Bible, and memorizing the Bible, and the more of the Bible they are able to memorize, the more this proves that they love the Lord and are of great faith. Those who have read the Bible and can speak of it to others are all good brothers and sisters. For all these years, people’s faith and loyalty to the Lord has been measured according to the extent of their understanding of the Bible. Most people simply don’t understand why they should believe in God, nor how to believe in God, and do nothing but search blindly for clues to decipher the chapters of the Bible. They have never pursued the direction of the work of the Holy Spirit; all along, they have done nothing but desperately study and investigate the Bible, and no one has ever found newer work of the Holy Spirit outside of the Bible, no one has ever departed from the Bible, nor have they ever dared to depart from the Bible. People have studied the Bible for all these years, they have come up with so many explanations, and put in so much work; they also have many differences of opinion about the Bible, which they debate endlessly, such that over two thousand different denominations have been formed today. They all want to find some special explanations, or more profound mysteries in the Bible, they want to explore it, and to find in it the background to Jehovah’s work in Israel, or the background to Jesus’ work in Judea, or more mysteries that no one else knows. People’s approach to the Bible is one of obsession and faith, and no one can be completely clear about the inside story or substance of the Bible. Thus, the result is that today, people still have an indescribable sense of magicalness when it comes to the Bible; even more than that, they are obsessed with it, and have faith in it. Today, everyone wants to find the prophecies of the work of the last days in the Bible, they want to discover what work God does during the last days, and what omens there are for the last days. In this way, their worship of the Bible becomes more fervent, and the closer it gets to the last days, the more credence they give to the prophecies of the Bible, particularly those about the last days. With such blind belief in the Bible, with such trust in the Bible, they have no desire to seek the work of the Holy Spirit. In people’s conceptions, they think that only the Bible can bring the work of the Holy Spirit; only in the Bible can they find the footsteps of God; only in the Bible are hidden the mysteries of God’s work; only the Bible—not other books or people—can clarify everything of God and the entirety of His work; the Bible can bring the work of heaven to earth; and the Bible can both begin and conclude the ages. With these conceptions, people have no inclination to search for the work of the Holy Spirit. So, regardless of how much of a help the Bible was to people in the past, it has become an obstacle to God’s latest work. Without the Bible, people can search for the footsteps of God elsewhere, yet today, His footsteps have been “contained” by the Bible, and extending His latest work has become double difficult, and an uphill struggle. This is all because of the famous chapters and sayings from the Bible, as well as the various prophecies of the Bible. The Bible has become an idol in people’s minds, it has become a puzzle in their brains, and they are simply incapable of believing that God can work exclusive of the Bible, they are incapable of believing that people can find God outside of the Bible, much less are they able to believe that God could depart from the Bible during the final work and start anew. This is unthinkable to people; they can’t believe it, and neither can they imagine it. The Bible has become a great obstacle to people’s acceptance of God’s new work, and has made it difficult to broaden this new work.

Knowing the Three Stages of God’s Work Is the Path to Knowing God

The picture is from The Church of Almighty God

Knowing the Three Stages of God’s Work Is the Path to Knowing God

The work of managing mankind is divided into three stages, which means that the work of saving mankind is divided into three stages. These three stages do not include the work of creating the world, but are rather the three stages of the work of the Age of Law, the Age of Grace, and the Age of Kingdom. The work of creating the world was the work of producing the whole of mankind. It was not the work of saving mankind, and bears no relation to the work of saving mankind, for when the world was created mankind had not been corrupted by Satan, and so there was no need to carry out the work of mankind’s salvation. The work of saving mankind only began once mankind had been corrupted, and so the work of managing mankind also only began once mankind had been corrupted. In other words, God’s management of man began as a result of the work of saving mankind, and did not arise from the work of creating the world. There could be no work of managing mankind without the corrupt disposition of mankind, and so the work of managing mankind includes three parts, rather than four stages, or four ages. Only this is the correct way to refer to God’s management of mankind. When the final age comes to a close, the work of managing mankind will have come to a complete end. The conclusion of the work of management means that the work of saving all mankind has been completely finished, and that mankind has reached his journey’s end. Without the work of saving all mankind, the work of managing mankind would not exist, nor would there be the three stages of work. It was precisely because of mankind’s depravity, and because mankind was in such urgent need of salvation, that Jehovah concluded the creation of the world and began the work of the Age of Law. Only then did the work of managing mankind begin, which means that only then did the work of saving mankind begin. “Managing mankind” does not mean guiding the life of newly-created mankind on earth (which is to say, a mankind that had yet to be corrupted). Rather, it is the salvation of a mankind that has been corrupted by Satan, which is to say, it is the changing of this corrupt mankind. This is the meaning of managing mankind. The work of saving mankind does not include the work of creating the world, and so the work of managing mankind does not include the work of creating the world, and only includes three stages of work that are separate from the world’s creation. To understand the work of managing mankind, it is necessary to be aware of the history of the three stages of work—this is what everyone must be aware of in order to be saved. As creatures of God, you should recognize that man was created by God, and should recognize the source of mankind’s corruption, and, moreover, should recognize the process of man’s salvation. If you only know how to act according to doctrine in order to gain God’s favor, but have no inkling of how God saves mankind, or of the source of mankind’s corruption, then this is what you lack as a creature of God. You should not only be satisfied with understanding those truths that can be put into practice, while remaining ignorant of the wider scope of God’s management work—if this is the case, then you are too dogmatic. The three stages of work are the inside story of God’s management of man, the advent of the gospel of the entire universe, the greatest mystery among all mankind, and are also the foundation of spreading the gospel. If you only focus on understanding simple truths that relate to your life, and know nothing of this, the greatest of all mysteries and visions, then is your life not akin to a defective product, good for nothing except being looked at?