Question 1: “All scripture is given by inspiration of God” (2Ti 3:16), Paul’s words are in the Bible. Therefore, they were inspired by God; they are God’s words. Believing in the Lord is believing in the Bible. Regardless of the denomination, if it strays from the Bible, it’s heresy! We believe in the Lord, so we must always act according to the Bible, that is to say, we must keep the words of the Bible. The Bible is Christianity’s canon, the foundation of our faith. Leaving the Bible is not believing in the Lord; if we leave the Bible, how can we believe in the Lord? The Lord’s words are written in the Bible. Is there anywhere else where we can find His words? If our faith in the Lord is not based on the Bible, then what is it based on?

Answer: You say that because Paul’s words are in the Bible, they were inspired by God; they are God’s words. That’s not really proper, is it? Did the Lord Jesus ever say, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God”? Did the Holy Spirit testify to this? No! Well then, can you really say that all the words in the Bible were inspired by God?

Question 3: We think all of God’s word and work are recorded in the Bible. There’s no word and work of God apart from the Bible. Therefore, our faith in God must be based on the Bible. Is that wrong?

Answer: Many believers in religious circles feel that: “God’s word and work are all recorded in the Bible. There is no word or work of God apart from the Bible.” Does this saying conform with the facts? Do you dare say that every single piece of work performed by Jehovah in the Age of Law is entirely recorded in the Bible? Can you guarantee that all of the word and work of the Lord Jesus in the Age of Grace are entirely recorded in the Bible? What is the outcome if this view does not conform with the facts? Would it not make people look down on God, delimit God, and blaspheme God? Isn’t it something that offends God’s disposition?

Question 2: You say Paul’s words are not the truth. Then why are his words in the Bible? Paul’s words are written in the Bible. Therefore, they were inspired by God; they represent God’s words. We should pursue them!

Answer: Although Paul’s words are written in the Bible, that does not mean they’re God’s words. This is because the Bible was compiled by man; it was not compiled by Jehovah God, not compiled by the Lord Jesus, and it was definitely not compiled by the Holy Spirit. Can something compiled by men be free of errors?

Question 11: Pastor Yuan was also persecuted by the CCP for his belief in the past. I never thought he could work hand in glove with the devilish CCP to resist Almighty God. Isn’t this flagrantly opposing God? How could these pastors and leaders be so treacherous and malicious?

Answer: Every time God becomes flesh He exposes some antichrists, devils, in religious circles. When the Lord Jesus came to earth, He exposed all the hypocritical Pharisees and evil forces of antichrists. Now Almighty God has come, and He has also exposed the evil antichrist forces in the religious circles of the last days. The appearing and work of God incarnate reveal people so much. There have indeed been many religious leaders who were persecuted by the evil CCP. Some were imprisoned for 10 or even 20 years. Some were separated from their wives and children, had their families destroyed. But they still don’t see the true face of the CCP devils. 

Question 9: I want to know how Almighty God of the last days performs His judgment work to save mankind from Satan’s influence. Can you tell us about your experience and testimonies?

Answer: That’s a great question! We should ask these key questions in investigating and seeking God's work of the last days. This is too beneficial for us to gain salvation through our faith in God! 

Question 8: Even though the religious world is ruled by pastors and elders and they are hypocrites who walk the path of the Pharisees, what do their sins have to do with us? Although we follow and listen to them, who we believe in is the Lord Jesus and not pastors and elders. I feel we have not embarked on the path of the Pharisees. How come we have also become Pharisees?

Answer: There are a lot of people in religion who blindly believe in and worship and follow Pharisees. So whether the path they walk is the path of the Pharisees is obvious once you think about it. You dare say you worship and protect Pharisees in your heart but have nothing to do with their sins? You dare say you follow hypocritical Pharisees, but aren’t like them, a person who resists God? Can people still not see through such a simple question? 

Question 9: We accept God’s work of the last days, but how do we experience God’s judgment and chastisement so that we can receive the truth and life, get rid of our sinful nature, and achieve salvation to enter the kingdom of heaven?

Answer: How to experience God’s judgment and chastisement to gain the truth and life, and get rid of our sinful nature to achieve salvation and enter the kingdom of heaven, this question is very important, because this is the major issues that relate to our ending and destination. To seek this aspect of the truth, we should first read a few passages of Almighty God’s word:

Question 9: If we accept Almighty God, are we guaranteed to enter the kingdom of heaven?

Answer: Almighty God has spoken very clearly about this problem. Let’s first take a look at what he has said.

A Letter to a Sister in the Lord: How to Be an Honest Person in Whom God Delights

By Wang Yue

Sister Wang Yue,

Hi there! I have a question for which I’ve yet to find a good answer—I’d like to seek with regard to this question for a moment. The Lord Jesus taught us, “Truly I say to you, Except you be converted, and become as little children, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3). The Lord Jesus calls for us to be honest people, to be as simple and honest as children and to tell things like they are. Only as such may we enter into the kingdom of heaven. Having read God’s word, I know that being honest is very important and I would like to practice being an honest person in accordance with God’s request. However, in my interactions with people, when it comes to my own personal profit, I can’t bring myself to communicate my actual thoughts and beliefs. Sometimes I lie and deceive—I know this makes God unhappy and afterward I’m always very regretful, but I just can’t help it. I’m feeling very frustrated and don’t know how I ought to resolve this issue. With regard to this aspect of the truth concerning how to be an honest person, I’m curious to hear how you practice. Would you mind fellowshiping with me on this issue?

Yours sincerely,

Chen Xin

June 25, 2018

God’s Work, God’s Disposition, and God Himself I

Today we are communicating an important topic. This is a topic that has been discussed since the commencement of God’s work until now, and is of vital significance to every single person. In other words, this is an issue that everyone will come into contact with throughout the process of their belief in God and an issue that must be touched upon. It’s a crucial, unavoidable issue mankind cannot separate itself from. Speaking of importance, what is the most important thing for every believer in God? Some people think the most important thing is understanding God’s will; some believe it is most important to eat and drink more of God’s words; some feel the most important thing is to know themselves; others are of the opinion that the most important thing is knowing how to find salvation through God, how to follow God, and how to fulfill God’s will. We will put all of these issues aside for today. So what are we discussing then? We are discussing a topic about God. Is this the most important topic to every person? What is the content of a topic about God? Of course, this topic certainly cannot be separated from God’s disposition, God’s essence, and God’s work. So today, let’s discuss “God’s Work, God’s Disposition, and God Himself.”

2. Practicing the Truth and the Duties One Should Do

Most people now are basically clear regarding the question of what after all we should obtain from our faith in God, namely we obtain from God the truth, the way, and the life. On the two occasions that He was God incarnate, God said that He is the truth, the way, and the life. This also explains that God’s intention and the aim of God’s work is to confer upon man the truth, the way, and the life. Regardless of the manner in which God conducts His work, men are able to obtain from God the truth, the way, and the life. What is the relationship between the truth, the way, and the life? We may put it this way, the truth is the life, and it is the path that man ought to follow. Once he obtains the truth, he also has life, and he has a path for his life. Once he obtains the truth, all is resolved. These three things are in fact one thing that is explained from three aspects, God is the truth and He is also the life and the way. These three aspects are three major aspects that ought to be resolved through man’s belief in God. Once these three questions are resolved, the important questions in the life of man are resolved. We obtain life once we have the truth, and the truth itself is also the way. When we have the life, our lives are resolved, and when we have life, the fundamental questions of man are resolved. This is precisely the entire work of God’s salvation of man, and it is a simple and generalized way of explaining it.

Only He Who Experiences the Work of God Truly Believes in God

Though many people believe in God, few understand what faith in God means, and what they must do to be after God’s heart. This is because, though people are familiar with the word “God” and phrases such as “the work of God,” they do not know God, much less do they know His work. No wonder, then, that all those who do not know God are possessed of a muddled belief. People do not take belief in God seriously because believing in God is too unfamiliar, too strange for them. In this way, they fall short of the demands of God. In other words, if people do not know God, do not know His work, then they are not fit for God’s use, much less can they fulfill the desire of God. “Belief in God” means believing that there is a God; this is the simplest concept of faith in God. What’s more, believing that there is a God is not the same as truly believing in God; rather, it is a kind of simple faith with strong religious overtones. True faith in God means experiencing the words and work of God based on a belief that God holds sovereignty over all things. So you shall be freed of your corrupt disposition, shall fulfill the desire of God, and shall come to know God. Only through such a journey can you be said to believe in God. Yet people often see belief in God as something very simple and frivolous. The belief of such people is meaningless and shall never gain the approval of God, because they tread the wrong path. Today, there are still those who believe in God in letters, in hollow doctrines. They are unaware that their belief in God has no substance, and that they are unable to gain the approval of God, and they still pray for peace and sufficient grace from God. We should stop and ask ourselves: Could believing in God really be the easiest thing on earth? Does believing in God mean nothing more than receiving much grace from God? Can people who believe in God but do not know Him, and believe in God yet oppose Him, really fulfill the desire of God?

Spiritual Warfare: A Septuagenarian Christian’s Joys and Sorrows Dealing With Her Family’s Resistance

By Jinbu, South Korea

A Septuagenarian Welcomes the Lord’s Return

I turned 74 this year. I used to be a member of the Three-Self Church in China, but after my husband passed away I came to South Korea to live with my daughter and her husband. I kept trying to find a church here that possessed the work of the Holy Spirit, but I discovered that the pastors and elders always preached on the same old things and I didn’t gain the least bit of spiritual sustenance. I was feeling really discouraged.

A German Christian’s Reflections: I Have Found the Path to Victory Over Sin

By Anna, Germany

Editor’s Note: Are you still struggling in the agony of sin? Are you discouraged and disappointed because you live trapped in a cycle of sinning and repentance? What must we do to escape the bondage of sin? I hope reading this article will be of some help to you.

Seeing Through the CCP’s Lies, God’s Love Draws Me Back to Him (Part 2)

By Kemu, South Korea

After Seeing the Truth I No Longer Stand in the Way of My Wife’s Faith

The brothers and sisters then played a video for me, The Truth Exposed Behind the May 28 Zhaoyuan Case. It revealed several major suspicious aspects of the case and then dissected them layer by layer. I was really engrossed in it and did my own analysis of the case along with the video to ferret out the truth, and the furrow in my brow gradually relaxed as the video went on. As I saw layer after layer of the lies exposed I let out a long breath. I realized that the May 28 Zhaoyuan Case was single-handedly concocted by the CCP to stifle religious beliefs and eradicate The Church of Almighty God. The offenders in the case, Zhang Lidong, Zhang Fan and others, denied with their own mouths that they were members of The Church of Almighty God, and said that they were completely unaffiliated with the church. But the CCP completely disregarded the suspects’ testimonies and flagrantly went against the facts, insisting that was done by people with The Church of Almighty God. What was even more outlandish was that even without a court trial or verdict, the CCP didn’t wait to publicly, definitively plant the case on The Church of Almighty God through TV and Internet media, and that was all to create a public uproar to suppress it and wipe it out. The CCP framed the church and created that kind of false case so that it could start madly suppressing and arresting Christians with the church without a hitch. It’s just like how they suppressed the June 4 students’ movement in 1989—the CCP first fabricated rumors to portray the students’ patriotic movement as revolutionary violence, and then they started carrying out arrests and murdering people. Faced with the facts, I finally saw with complete clarity that the CCP’s tactic for eradicating any dissenters has been to first fabricate rumors and distort the facts, then frame them, and then violently suppress them. Turning the truth on its head and distorting reality and framing The Church of Almighty God so that the people, who don’t know the truth, are taken in by their lies and will misunderstand the church is detestable! But something I still didn’t understand was that the brothers and sisters in The Church of Almighty God are upright people who are nothing like they say online, so why would the CCP so madly persecute the church and go to great pains to plant that murder case on The Church of Almighty God, and arrest its members? What was really going on?

31. What Is the Nature of God’s Love?

By Siqiu, Heilongjiang Province

God’s words say: “If you’ve always been very loyal and loving toward Me, yet you suffer the torment of illness, the impoverishment of life, and the abandonment of your friends and relatives or endure any other misfortunes in life, then will your loyalty and love for Me still continue?” (“A Very Serious Problem: Betrayal (2)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). Whenever I read this demand that God has of man, I feel an inexpressible sadness, and think: “O God, how can You allow those that are loyal to You and love You to meet with such misfortune? The man used by the Holy Spirit previously gave a fellowship that said, ‘God’s last demand of man is loving and sincere.’ How should we understand this?” These words had always puzzled me.

6. God’s Words Led Me Out of the Woods

By Xiao Rui, Sichuan Province

When my duty in The Church of Almighty God was preaching the gospel, while doing this I encountered religious leaders who bore false witness to frantically resist, disturb, and block people’s investigation and acceptance of God’s work in the last days. They even called the police to have them arrest those of us sharing the gospel. As a result, those we were preaching to didn’t dare come into contact with us, and those who had just accepted the gospel were subjected to disruptions and became uncertain about God’s work. Our gospel work was greatly hindered. I felt really anxious when I saw so many brothers and sisters with genuine faith who were hoodwinked and disrupted by the pastors and elders. They were unable to return before God and accept His purification and salvation of the last days. I worked hard every day to share fellowship on God’s words with them to resolve the notions they held regarding God’s work, but after doing this for a period of time, our gospel work still hadn’t taken a turn for the better. I thought: “Evangelical work is so difficult to carry out. It would be so wonderful if God just displayed some miracles and punished those who bear false witness as well as those who seriously resist Him to show to those who have been deceived. Then wouldn’t the work of the gospel advance more quickly? It wouldn’t be so difficult for us to preach the gospel.” This is how this hope came up in my heart every time I encountered difficulties. Later, I read the book of Classic Examples of Punishment for Resisting Almighty God and during fellowship heard some testimonies on God’s signs and wonders, and I felt very glad in my heart. I hoped even more that God would do some things in the areas that I worked in so that our gospel work there could be carried out smoothly. But no matter how I hoped, I still didn’t see God perform any miracles there or do anything to punish evil people. The religious people were still fully resisting God, and the difficulties in our evangelical work were still great. I became negative, thinking: “Why doesn’t God open up a way out for us? Could it be that our faith is inadequate?”

Several Principles for Leading Non-Religious New Believers

God’s salvation of people is not limited to those who are already religious or are outsiders. As long as a person is willing to accept God’s work, is able to eat and drink God’s words and seek truth, then they are a suitable target for God’s salvation. God’s will is such that all those who can accept the work of Almighty God and attain purification are those who shall attain God’s salvation. There is no seniority among believers when practicing faith in God. As long as someone seeks truth and accepts God’s judgment and chastisement—thereby achieving transformation in his or her life disposition—then they are someone perfected by God. Therefore, mankind’s conceptions, imaginings or delineations about God are all ridiculous. God is righteous; God does not treat anyone with preference. To nurture and give sustenance to non-religious believers—truly bringing them into God’s words and helping them to enter into all truths—is God’s requirement, and this is also God’s commission to the leaders and workers of God’s house. All those who have prejudice against or exclude non-religious new believers, all those who muddle through the work of nurturing and giving sustenance to non-religious new believers, are all servants of Satan and they are all interrupting and disturbing God’s work. This is entirely the revelation of mankind’s satanic nature that opposes God. This must be clearly discerned.

Principles for Establishing a Church and Managing Church Life

1. Principles for Establishing a Church

The principles for establishing a church are: So long as there is a group of people (around 20) who have truly accepted God’s work, who request to formally join the church, and who are willing to fulfill their duties, then a church can be established. If there are around 10 new believers who ask to have gatherings, a gathering group can first be set up, but a church cannot be established. If the new believers have not formally recognized and accepted the true way while they investigate it, then a church should not be established. The establishment of a church should be done in person by a church leader, a gospel preaching deacon or a nurturing deacon. Before establishing a church, it is most critical to first clearly communicate how church leaders and deacons are elected. After the new believers have all understood the principles for electing leaders and deacons, an election can then be held. After the church leader and deacons have been elected, the person responsible for establishing the church shall preside over and hold a prayer meeting during which they should formally announce the establishment of the church, announce who are to be the church leaders and deacons, and then begin to pray. Everyone shall pray before God and declare that they formally believe in Almighty God and are joining the church. They should also declare that they thoroughly accept and submit to God’s work, will seek truths to attain God’s salvation, will exalt God and bear witness for God to repay God’s love and spend their whole life for God. They may also relate their wishes, aspirations and innermost thoughts to God. After God’s chosen people have finished their prayers, the church will then have been established, and the leaders and deacons may officially begin leading the church life.

The Story of Job: Why Did Job Curse the Day of His Birth?

By Mu Cheng

It is dusk, and a grey-haired old man was sitting by the ashes of his fire, his exposed skin densely covered in painful boils, the surface of the boils broken and suppurating in a horrifying scene.