Red Re-Education at Home" (5) - How Should Christianity Be Understood?

It is common knowledge that Christianity, Catholicism, and the Eastern Orthodox Church are all religions that believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Church of Almighty God came into being because of the appearance and work of Christ of the last days. The Church of Almighty God is the church of Christ in the Age of Kingdom, and it is also a part of Christianity. So why does the Chinese Communist Party deny that The Church of Almighty God is a Christian church? What really is Christianity?

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Testimony of a Christian: I Have Wealth More Valuable Than Money | Eastern Lightning

Finding the Way Back After Getting Lost

When my wife read out these words of God I recalled an incident that occurred in the spring of 2016. At the time, I hadn’t yet properly investigated Almighty God’s work of the last days. I was driving my wife and one of the sisters from the church to another state. On the way, we stopped so that my wife could attend to something, and when she got out of the car the sister also got out. It was cold and windy outside, and the sister stood beside the car stamping her feet in order to keep warm. I called to her to get in the car but she said: “It’s OK. I want to stand outside for a while.” It took a pretty long time for my wife to return, and only then did the sister get in the car. Seeing that she was visibly shivering from the cold my wife asked her: “It’s so cold outside. Why didn’t you stay in the car?” The sister replied: “There’s an administrative decree in our church that states that a man and a woman can’t be alone together or have physical contact. This is one of the requirements that God has of God’s chosen people, and we have to strictly abide by it.” On hearing this, I realized just how different The Church of Almighty God’s people are from ordinary people—even in the most trivial matters they keep themselves in check. When I recalled this incident I couldn’t help but thump my head in self-disgust for not properly investigating the facts and instead blindly believing those online rumors. When I thought about all of the times I’d interacted with the brothers and sisters of The Church of Almighty God and seen how well-behaved they were with members of the opposite sex, how proper and decent they were in speech and action, how principled they were when dealing with people, it was obvious that those rumors online were far from the truth. At this point I felt very ashamed for blindly believing a bunch of online rumors that were slanderous distortions of the truth or outright fabrications, and for having doubts about Almighty God and The Church of Almighty God. I was such a confused idiot! My wife then continued with her fellowship: “God has incarnated in the mundane world to express truths, judge people, and cleanse people. In other words, God wants to thoroughly save people from Satan’s dominion. He wants to rid us of our corrupt dispositions—our arrogance, trickery, deceit, selfishness, vileness, evil, filth, etc., and help us to achieve transformation in our life disposition so that we may live as true human beings. God knows that mankind has been very deeply corrupted by Satan and so doesn’t have the capability to overcome sin. So in order to ensure that people don’t offend God’s disposition during the time when they are accepting God’s salvation, and thus avoid being eliminated and punished, God has laid out the administrative decrees of the Age of Kingdom in order to keep believers in check. Anyone who offends the administrative decrees will be punished by God, and serious offenders will be expelled from God’s house and lose any chance of salvation. God’s setting out of these administrative decrees for the church is so that we gain some real knowledge of God’s righteous disposition which is not to be offended, and also so that we have decrees to keep us in check. This way, there will always be a line that can’t be crossed for all our behaviors, and if we keep within these boundaries then we can generally avoid being tempted by Satan. This is God’s way of preserving us and, even more so, is God showing His true love for us!” While listening to my wife’s fellowship I found myself involuntarily nodding my head, and this is how the knot in my heart was completely untied and the suffering that had enveloped it was alleviated. After that, I once again began to participate in the church meetings.

Every time that I recall this experience there is always some lingering fear in my heart because I saw how damaging these rumors are and how I nearly got confused by them and lost the chance for God’s salvation of the last days. In the Age of Grace, the Israelites also got bemused by false rumors and ended up not admitting that the Lord Jesus was the coming of the Messiah. They abandoned the Lord Jesus and thus lost the Lord’s salvation. This made me realize just what huge obstacles such rumors are for people to accept the true way! But what I still couldn’t understand was why there are so many false rumors and false accusations about The Church of Almighty God online when it clearly is a good church. So, in a meeting, I brought up this question with the brothers and sisters so that we could openly fellowship about it. The brothers and sisters played for me one of the church’s gospel movies, Break Through the Snare, and this movie completely resolved my confusion. With a bit more fellowship from the brothers and sisters I was then able to understand even better that the use of rumors to disrupt and ruin God’s work is one of Satan’s most common methods. When the Lord Jesus came to do His work, the Jewish leaders, chief priests, scribes and Pharisees wanted to ensure that they kept permanent control over God’s people, and so they created many false rumors about the Lord Jesus. They blasphemed the Lord Jesus by saying that He relied on the prince of the devils to cast out demons, they falsely accused the Lord Jesus of not letting people pay their taxes to Caesar, and they also gave false testimony by saying that the Lord Jesus’ physical body was stolen by His disciples and that He didn’t resurrect. I’m sure that if the Internet had existed then those religious leaders would have put all of their rumors and false testimonies online in order to blaspheme, attack, and condemn the Lord Jesus more effectively. Nowadays, in the Age of Kingdom, Almighty God is doing the work of expressing words to judge and purify man, and the government of China and the pastors and elders in the religious community are acting as Satan’s tools. In order to achieve their goal of controlling and entrapping people, they are blaspheming and condemning Almighty God and are creating a mass of rumors and false testimonies in order to frame and discredit The Church of Almighty God. They want to confuse people and keep them in the dark, and attempt to make people abandon God’s work of salvation of the last days and follow them in resisting God. Satan really is just so evil and loathsome!

Then the brothers and sisters read out another two passages of God’s words for me: “On earth, all manner of evil spirits are endlessly on the prowl for a place to rest, are ceaselessly searching for the corpses of men to eat up” (“The Tenth Utterance” of God’s Utterances to the Entire Universe in The Word Appears in the Flesh). “Satan is constantly devouring the knowledge that men hold of Me in their hearts, and constantly, with teeth bared and claws unsheathed, engaged in the last throes of its death struggle. Do you wish to be captured by its deceitful stratagems at this moment? Do you wish, at the moment that the last phase of My work is completed, to cut off your own life?” (“The Six Utterance” of God’s Utterances to the Entire Universe in The Word Appears in the Flesh). They also told me that Almighty God’s words have told us the true situation regarding the spiritual battle, which is that in order to hinder people before they are able to come before God and achieve its goal of devouring them, Satan carries out all sorts of trickery. This includes spreading rumors and false testimonies on the Internet, getting religious leaders to harass and threaten believers, and getting family members to coerce them and prevent them from following Almighty God. In short, anything which makes us doubt, deny or move away from God comes from Satan. If people are unable to seek truths, then they will never be able to see through Satan’s trickery, will easily lose the chance to gain God’s salvation, and will go downhill and eventually be destroyed along with Satan. Thanks to God’s leadership I was able, through watching The Church of Almighty God’s gospel movies and listening to the fellowship of the brothers and sisters, to clearly see Satan’s evil and despicable essence and see through Satan’s schemes.

Since following Almighty God I’ve gained true release and freedom. Now, no matter what happens to me I can read God’s words and pray to God to help me find a path of practice. The brothers and sisters in the church all abide by God’s requirements and seek to become honest people. Their mutual relationships are uncomplicated and open, and they help and support each other as much as they can. As a member of the church, I never have to worry about someone trying to put me down, deceive me, or rip me off. I feel truly happy and content, and this is the life that I always want.

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God’s work of judgment of the last days ultimately makes a group of overcomers, thus entirely fulfilling the prophecy of the Bible’s Book of Revelation. So why can only God’s work of judgment of the last days make the true overcomers?

Bible Verses for Reference:

“I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will show you things to come” (John 16:12-13).

“And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not…. He that rejects me, and receives not my words, has one that judges him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day” (John 12:47-48).

“He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches; To him that overcomes will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the middle of the paradise of God” (Revelation 2:7).

“He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches; He that overcomes shall not be hurt of the second death” (Revelation 2:11).

Classic Words of God:

The work of the last days is to separate all according to their kind, to conclude the management plan of God, for the time is near and the day of God has come. God brings all who have entered His kingdom, that is, all those who have been loyal to Him to the end, into the age of God Himself. However, until the coming of the age of God Himself, the work that God shall do is not to observe the deeds of man or to inquire into the life of man, but to judge his rebellion, for God shall purify all those who come before His throne. All those who have followed the footsteps of God to this day are those who have come before the throne of God, and this being so, every single person who accepts God’s work in its final phase is the object of God’s purification. In other words, everyone who accepts God’s work in its final phase is the object of God’s judgment.

from “Christ Does the Work of Judgment With the Truth”

In the last days, Christ uses a variety of truths to teach man, expose the essence of man, and dissect his words and deeds. These words comprise various truths, such as man’s duty, how man should obey God, how man should be loyal to God, how man ought to live out the normal humanity, as well as the wisdom and the disposition of God, and so on. These words are all directed at the essence of man and his corrupt disposition. In particular, those words that expose how man spurns God are spoken in regard to how man is an embodiment of Satan and an enemy force against God. In undertaking His work of judgment, God does not simply make clear the nature of man with just a few words; He exposes, deals with, and prunes it over the long term. These methods of exposure, dealing, and pruning cannot be substituted with ordinary words, but with the truth that man does not possess at all. Only methods of this kind are deemed judgment; only through judgment of this kind can man be subdued and thoroughly convinced into submission to God, and moreover gain true knowledge of God. What the work of judgment brings about is man’s understanding of the true face of God and the truth about his own rebelliousness. The work of judgment allows man to gain much understanding of the will of God, of the purpose of God’s work, and of the mysteries that are incomprehensible to him. It also allows man to recognize and know his corrupt substance and the roots of his corruption, as well as to discover the ugliness of man. These effects are all brought about by the work of judgment, for the substance of this work is actually the work of opening up the truth, the way, and the life of God to all those who have faith in Him.

from “Christ Does the Work of Judgment With the Truth”

God does the work of judgment and chastisement so that man may know Him, and for the sake of His testimony. Without His judgment of man’s corrupt disposition, man would not know His righteous disposition that allows no offense, and could not turn his old knowledge of God into a new one. For the sake of His testimony, and for the sake of His management, He makes His entirety public, thus enabling man to achieve the knowledge of God, and change his disposition, and bear resounding testimony to God through God’s public appearance. Change is achieved in the disposition of man through different kinds of God’s work; without such changes in man’s disposition, man would be unable to bear testimony to God, and could not be after God’s heart. Changes in man’s disposition signify that man has freed himself from Satan’s bondage, has freed himself from the influence of darkness, and has truly become a model and specimen of God’s work, has truly become a witness of God and someone who is after God’s heart.

from “Only Those Who Know God Can Bear Testimony to God”

I have previously said that a group of overcomers are gained from the East, overcomers who come from amid the great tribulation. What is the meaning of such words? They mean that these people who have been gained only truly obeyed after undergoing judgment and chastisement, and dealing and pruning, and all kinds of refinement. The belief of such people is not vague and abstract, but real. They have not seen any signs and wonders, or any miracles; they do not speak of abstruse letters and doctrines, or profound insights; instead they have reality, and the words of God, and a true knowledge of the reality of God. Is such a group not more capable of making plain the power of God?

from “All Is Achieved by the Word of God”

Having a stance is very important in God’s perfection of people. If you do not doubt a single step of God’s work, you fulfill man’s duty, you sincerely uphold what God has you put into practice, that is, you remember God’s exhortations, and no matter what He does now you do not forget His exhortations, have no doubt about His work, maintain your stance, uphold your testimony, and are victorious every step of the way, in the end you will be perfected into an overcomer by God. If you are able to stand firm through every step of God’s trials, and you can still stand firm to the very end, you are an overcomer, and you are someone who is perfected by God.

from “You Ought to Maintain Your Devotion to God”

Man will be fully made complete in the Age of Kingdom. After the work of conquest, man will be subjected to refinement and tribulation. Those who can overcome and stand testimony during this tribulation are the ones who will ultimately be made complete; they are the overcomers. During this tribulation, man is required to accept this refinement, and this refinement is the last instance of God’s work. It is the last time that man will be refined prior to the conclusion of all the work of God’s management, and all those who follow God must accept this final test, must accept this last refinement. Those who are beset by tribulation are without the work of the Holy Spirit and the guidance of God, but those who have been truly conquered and truly seek after God will ultimately stand fast; they are the ones who are possessed of humanity, and who truly love God. No matter what God does, these victorious ones will not be bereft of the visions, and will still put the truth into practice without failing in their testimony. They are the ones who will finally emerge from the great tribulation. Even though those who fish in troubled waters can still freeload today, no one is able to escape the final tribulation, and no one can escape the final test.

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