Return to God

What is the true meaning of salvation? Can those who live in sin gain salvation and enter the heavenly kingdom? This Christian’s experience will help you understand the mystery of salvation and avoid losing God’s final salvation.

By Hui Min, Australia On a Sunday morning, the sun just arose. I received my mom’s phone call while I was still sleeping. “Minmin, are you going to church today?” “I’m afraid I can’t go today. The final exams are coming and I have a lot of schoolwork to finish.” “No matter how busy you are, you must pray to the Lord. Especially in a strange land, you must pray to Him more!” “Hmm. OK.” ………… Being Self-blamed After the Phone Call I hung up and my drowsiness was gone. Thinking back to these years when, although I believed in the Lord, I had never adequately worshiped Him, I felt self-blamed in my heart … When I was six years old, my little brother and I followed my mom in believing in the Lord Jesus. At that time, although I was too young to understand the sermons, I knew the first chapter in the Bible says that God is the Creator of all things. And it’s right that mankind believes in and worship God. From then on, we three attended the worship in the church together. Not long after, this was discovered by my grandpa, grandma and father, all of whom were unbelievers. They did their best to stop us believing in the Lord. However, they couldn’t stop my mom, so they took charge of me and my little brother and did not allow us to go to church. Because of their pressure, I didn’t dare to attend meetings every weekend afterward, and only on holidays could I seek the opportunity to sneak into the church to attend worship. In this secretive way, I reached my nineteenth birthday … At the age of nineteen, I came to Australia to study. Getting rid of the obstruction of my family, I finally was free to worship God. However, I wasn’t happy for long. In the beginning, I visited several churches but felt none was proper: In some churches, when they worshiped God, everybody was reveling and dancing with many flashing and dusky lights, just like worldly people holding a concert. Some churches were far away from my home. … So I didn’t go to any of them again. It was not until two years later that I finally found a relatively suitable church. However, due to the heavy schoolwork, I had to find some time to go there. Thinking of this, I felt worried and ashamed in my heart, so I prayed and repented before the Lord. The “War” After I Returned Home In December 2017, the tense final exams were over and done with. I returned to my hometown in Malaysia and was reunited with my family. My mom happily told me that she had gotten acquainted with several sisters online who really loved the Lord, and that they had regular meetings to fellowship the Lord’s words together. Hearing her words, I felt it was very good to spend more time in the Lord’s presence. After several meetings, mom told me with excitement that the Lord Jesus has returned as the incarnate Almighty God, and that Almighty God has expressed a lot of words and performed the work of judgment beginning at the house of God in the last days. I was shocked by her words and immediately thought of the negative propaganda about The Church of Almighty God that I had read previously online. It said that they misused the name of the Lord Jesus and testified that the Lord Jesus had come back. Moreover, the Bible records that the Lord Jesus prophesied that false Christs would appear in the last days. I was afraid that my mom would take a wrong way, so I tried desperately to refute her. I said, “The Bible clearly records: ‘Then if any man shall say to you, See, here is Christ, or there; believe it not. For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; so that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect’ (Mat 24:23–24). Therefore, whoever testifies the Lord’s return is a fraud, and we cannot believe it.” Mom said, “Minmin, the last days is when false Christs arise, but it’s also the very time that the Lord returns. We cannot blindly condemn all those who preach the Lord’s second coming because of guarding against the deception of false Christs. Otherwise, we would easily miss the Lord’s return and even resist the Lord. Moreover, when reading the Bible, we cannot take meaning out of context. If we integrate them with the following two verses—‘Behold, I have told you before’ (Mat 24:25), and ‘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’ (Mat 24:27)—we can know that in fact the Lord Jesus said this to tell us: In the last days, He will come again through incarnation as the Son of man. By saying ‘For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; so that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect’ (Mat 24:24), the Lord Jesus is to tell us the deeds of false Christs and false prophets. They mainly deceive man by imitating God’s past work and showing signs and wonders. Therefore, those who can show supernatural things such as great signs and wonders are just the ones we should guard against. In addition, in the last days, when it comes to the matter of welcoming the second coming of the Lord, not only should we learn to discern the deceptions of false Christs, but even more we should be wise virgins and focus on hearing God’s voice. This is the only way we won’t miss the opportunity to welcome the Lord’s return and be raptured to His presence.” My mom’s fellowship made me calm down a little. I thought to myself, “So the Lord Jesus’ intention in saying these words is…

Editor’s Note: At every level of society, from officials and elites all the way to the most humble common people, anyone who gets hit with the gambling bug finds it very difficult to quit. How many have sunk from riches to poverty because of gambling?

Through a gathering, I found the reason for the church’s desolation, obtained the supply of the wellspring of living water, and welcomed the Lord’s return.

By Jinyi, United States Hearing the Good News of the Lord’s Return at a Meeting I began believing in the Lord in 2016, and went to meetings every week. Later, a new sister started coming to our meetings. After several meetings with her, I found that she could shine new light on many different scriptures in her talks. Everyone felt very well supplied by her, and I admired her very much. I thought, “She is so young, yet despite her age, her fellowship on the Bible is better than our pastor. How does she manage to read the Bible like that?” Curious, I asked her privately, “Your understanding of the Bible is impressive. How do you understand so much of it?” She said that she also attended another meeting where the brothers and sisters fellowshiped more clearly and understandably, and she invited me to come and listen, to which I happily agreed. The next Sunday, she took me to the meeting she had told me about, and the brothers and sisters there warmly welcomed me. After sitting down, they told me that the Lord Jesus had returned as the incarnated Almighty God, both to express many truths and to do the work of judging and purifying mankind, which fulfils the biblical prophecies, “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God” (1 Peter 4:17). “The word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day” (John 12:48). A sister also fellowshiped with me about God’s six-thousand-year management plan, how to discern the voice of God, the mystery of mankind’s destination, and many other aspects of the truth. Her fellowship was very detailed, I understood it very clearly, and I learned that there are indeed many mysteries involved in believing in God, so I decided to investigate The Church of Almighty God. After the meeting, my sister gave me a book of God’s word to take home and read. Forming Misunderstandings of Judgment After I returned home, I read Almighty God’s words in my free time, and after doing so, I felt that God’s words were very good, and I enjoyed them very much. One day, I read in Almighty God’s words that, “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.” I thought to myself: The Lord Jesus has returned incarnate in the last days to do the final winnowing work, to separate all people according to their kind, which means that everyone who accepts the work of God in the last days must undergo His judgment. I couldn’t help but think that I was still capable of deceiving others with my words, of tricking others and being envious, of hating others when they hurt me, and that I still had many problems; I often lost my temper with my family, got angry with my coworkers, and so on. Today, I thought, the Lord has come to do the work of judgment, and if I were made to account for my past behaviors, wouldn’t I be condemned? How would I ever enter God’s kingdom? Thinking of this, I was very worried about myself. I felt that I couldn’t enter God’s kingdom, so I became very negative. Although I wanted to openly fellowship with my brothers and sisters and seek solutions, I was afraid that if my brothers and sisters knew who I really was, they would laugh at me and belittle me, so I chose escape, and stopped attending meetings. My brothers and sisters, unaware of the truth, often invited me to meetings, but I always said I was busy with work or made other excuses. After a while, my brothers and sisters sent me a message and asked me when I was free, saying they could arrange meetings according to my schedule. Faced with the concern of my brothers and sisters, my closed heart was touched. I thought, “I’ve tried every means to refuse them, and even deliberately did not return messages, but they don’t make an issue of it, and continue to tolerate and be patient with me, and think of every possible way to solve the problem of me not coming to meetings. They often asked if I was experiencing difficulties, and their words revealed concern and support for me. Isn’t this true love? The sincere invitation of my brothers and sisters left me too embarrassed to refuse, so I began going to meetings again. The first few times, I couldn’t calm myself, because I thought, “I live in a state of sinning and confessing every day, and the moment God judges me, I will still be condemned, so listening at meetings is pointless.” But I never spoke that thought to my brothers and sisters. Instead, I tried to preserve my dignity and muddle through the meetings. Eliminating My Misunderstandings of Judgment This continued until one day when my sister fellowshiped on aspects of the truth regarding judgment, and my notions about it were finally eliminated. Sister Yang fellowshiped, “Almighty God expresses the truth in the last…

By Ramadi, Philippines As a Christian who has believed in the Lord for years, I’ve often heard pastors say in their sermons, “Believers such as us have been redeemed of our sins and are absolved. When the Lord returns He will rapture us directly into the kingdom of heaven.” But while I was impatiently waiting for the Lord Jesus to return and take us into the kingdom of heaven, something happened that was particularly painful and confusing for me. After I became a believer, even though I frequently read the Scripture, prayed, and attended gatherings, a quandary for me was that I often found myself unable to uphold the Lord’s teachings in my day-to-day life. I well knew that the Lord instructed us to love our neighbor as ourselves and to forgive others seventy times seven times, but every time my husband wouldn’t listen to me or someone around me did something I didn’t like, I couldn’t help but get mad. Even though I would feel guilty and remorseful and would frequently pray to the Lord and confess, whenever I encountered another situation I still just couldn’t control myself. Plus I couldn’t overcome the temptations of being drawn in, enticed by the trends of the world—I always pursued worldly trends. I was enamored with beautiful clothing and makeup and was constantly thinking about buying stuff and going window shopping. My heart was completely taken over with material pleasures and I spent more time on that sort of thing than I did on my devotionals or reading the Scripture. After a while I even got to the point where I felt less and less like reading the Bible, and I didn’t really want to go to church services, either. I knew that the Lord doesn’t like that kind of behavior, so in an effort to not continue down that path of depravity I forced myself to read the Bible and look for sermons online. But even though I stuck to my plan, I just wasn’t enjoying it at heart, and my life grew distant from the Lord’s words. I reached out to my church friends about this as well, but everyone just said that as long as I prayed more, He would show me mercy and love, that He would forgive and pardon our sins. I didn’t feel any relief from their answers because it’s stated very clearly in the Bible: “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14). “For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins” (Hebrews 10:26). If the Lord would forgive us without limits like everyone said, as long as we pray to the Lord our sins would be forgiven, so why does the Bible say that if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there will be no more sacrifice for sins? Without sacrifice for sins how could we enter into the kingdom of heaven? I just couldn’t make heads or tails of these questions within my heart. I was often distressed over this and prayed to the Lord, “Oh Lord, I’m living in a constant state of committing sins and then confessing those sins; I’m so troubled. What can I do to escape from sin? Where can I find the answer? Lord, please tell me what Your will in this is! Amen.” Then in January 2018 I met a couple of sisters from China online, and by chatting with them learned that they’re very devout Christians. We talked about all sorts of things regarding faith and after a period of interaction I began to feel really close with them, that we could really open up our hearts to each other. They were also really devout in their lives and had unique understanding and insight into the Bible. Their fellowship was really illuminating and enjoyable—I really liked delving into the Scripture with them. Once Sister Susan told me very seriously, “The Lord has already returned and He’s doing the work of the last days of judging, cleansing, and saving mankind.” Shocked to hear this, I said, “The Lord Jesus was already crucified and redeemed us of our sins, completing His work. When the Lord returns shouldn’t He just directly bring us into the kingdom of heaven? Why would He also do the work of judgment? Could it be that His work hasn’t been completed?” In response, Sister Lucy shared this fellowship with me: “It’s certainly true that the Lord Jesus’ work of being nailed to the cross has been completed and that we’ve been redeemed of our sins, that we are absolved. However, does redemption mean we can enter the kingdom of heaven? Let’s read a passage of God’s words, then we’ll understand. ‘Man was … forgiven his sins, but as for just how man was to be purged of the corrupt satanic dispositions within him, this work had yet to be done. Man was only saved and forgiven his sins for his faith, but the sinful nature of man was not extirpated and still remained within him. The sins of man were forgiven through the agency of the incarnate God, but this does not mean that man no longer has sin within him. The sins of man could be forgiven through the sin offering, but as for just how man can be made to sin no more, and how his sinful nature may be extirpated completely and transformed, he has no way of solving this problem. The sins of man were forgiven, and this is because of the work of God’s crucifixion, but man continued to live within the corrupt satanic disposition of old. This being so, man must be completely saved from his corrupt satanic disposition, so that his sinful nature may be completely extirpated, never to develop again, thus enabling the disposition of man to be transformed. This would require man to grasp the path…

By Xiaocao Ever since I was little my mom would take me to church to read the sacred texts and attend Mass. We’d often leave at 3:00 or 4:00 a.m.; the church was really big and was always full, and sometimes there would even be parishioners standing at the entrance listening. After attending one Mass if I heard of another one being held I would really want to go to that one, too. I never failed to pray the Rosary every morning and evening and on the occasions I did forget I’d wake up halfway through the night and pray it before going back to sleep. But after a few years, for some reason Mass attendance had dropped by half or more and while listening to the priests some people would fall asleep or chat with each other. Some went to church to sell cosmetics, while some went to set people up with each other or chat about their home lives. I wondered, why was that happening? Weren’t they going to church to worship God? Plus, the priests didn’t pay any mind to all of that, but just kept on talking about the same old spiritual principles corresponding to the same times of the year. When they started talking we’d know what was coming next—it was all platitudes without any new light or new harvest to reap. Services had become just going through the motions and didn’t seem to help us know God at all. Plus the priests would hold Mass for parishioners who had given offerings of 500 yuan or more and had really good relationships with them, but they’d make all sorts of excuses not to do that for poorer members of the church who gave less. I wondered why the church had become like a marketplace where even the priests were seeking money—they were blinded by greed, disdainful of the poor and solicitous of the rich. Where were they leading us? It felt like there was a big stone blocking my heart and my faith became tepid, just as most other church members. Without any enjoyment in services, I just waited for the Father to say “Go in peace” so I could get home a little early. One time in 2003 when a Mass was about to begin, there was a dispute between two of the priests and that Mass was never held. The church ended up dividing into two factions. When I went somewhere else to attend a large Mass, everyone was talking about the church splitting up. I thought of something the Lord had said: “A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one for another” (John‎: ‎13:34–35). We were taught by the Lord to get along in harmony and have love for each other, but not only were the priests failing to guide us to carry out the Lord’s words, but they were attacking each other and setting up separate factions. They really didn’t appear to be what a Catholic should be. When some parishioners were discussing whether splitting up the church was in line with God’s will, one of the priests said, “This isn’t a matter for your consideration. There’s just one God and all you have to do is follow Him.” There were even some who shamelessly boasted, “If a Father does something wrong that’s for God to manage. Don’t worry about it.” I thought to myself, isn’t that to prevent us from having our own discernment, but just blindly following along? Some of the younger parishioners with family and secular entanglements would look to the priests for help, but they’d just halfheartedly explain it away, “These are just crosses that we have to bear.” They’d make no effort at pointing out a path of practice. Hearing this left them helpless and they just continued to live in the pain of their worldly entanglements, without a path to take. What the cause of so many problems cropping up in the church? I felt really lost without a direction or target, and I didn’t want to go to church anymore. I sat in my chair thinking back over the last few years of practicing my faith. I would get sleepy when reading the sacred texts and I wasn’t interested in attending Mass. I just observed the four major Catholic holidays, but I no longer enjoyed that feeling of peace and fullness from enjoying the Holy Spirit’s work. I thought of something I had memorized from the Catechisms: “Why are we in this world? We are in this world to worship God and to save our souls.” I couldn’t help but cry out in my heart, “Oh God, where are You, really? How should I follow You? God, where is the path You’re guiding me onto? If this continues on my soul will certainly end up in hell.” But no one could tell me the answer. In that moment, feelings of emptiness, sadness, distress, and helplessness all welled up. I was really suffering and on the verge of tears. One day in October, my mom said to me, “The Lord we’ve been waiting for has already come. I’ve been listening to some sermons these past couple of days—do you want to go too?” I was pleasantly surprised. I had just been hoping for God’s guidance—I hadn’t imagined that the Lord had already returned! That meant there had to be a path to take and all of my problems could be resolved—I knew I had to go listen to that sermon. I happily went along. The next day was rainy and cold; I went to the home of a friend from church with my mom, as planned. When we got to the entrance we saw that there were two sisters who had arrived early. They had come quite a ways, and in their hurry…

“You believe in the Lord and yet you lose your temper at the drop of a hat. Why haven’t you changed at all?” This was my husband’s rebuke to me. I used to feel such distress that I was unable to live out the Lord’s teachings, and I often implored the Lord to lead me to cast off the bonds of sin.

By Dandan, United States The Trinity Becomes a Personal Mystery In May 2018, encouraged by a friend, I encountered the Christian faith for the first time. By reading the Bible I learned that heaven, earth, and all things were all created by God with His words, and we humans were personally created by God from dust. We didn’t evolve from primates at all. That we can go on living is entirely from the sustenance of God’s own breath. I was shocked, and my heart became full of reverence and gratitude to God. From then on I read the Bible every single day and attended gatherings enthusiastically, but there was quite a bit of the Scripture that I still couldn’t understand, particularly the Trinity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit of the one and only God that the pastor spoke of. This was really confusing for me. Since the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are just one God, why would we say that there’s both a Father and a Son? I really wanted to figure this out, so I plucked up the courage to go ask the pastor. The pastor said, “The Father is Jehovah God. He’s mighty and very authoritative. The Son is the Lord Jesus, and the Holy Spirit is a spiritual body. They are three different persons and together they are called the Trinity of the one true God.” I still felt a bit bewildered after hearing the pastor’s explanation, but I knew that there is definitely just one God. Later on I switched to a new job, which was too far from the church, so I couldn’t attend services anymore. I never asked the pastor about that again, but the God Who is a Trinity, and the relationship between the Father and the Son, remained a mystery for me. Attending Online Gatherings and Exploring the Mystery of the Trinity I started feeling anxious because I couldn’t always attend services on the Lord’s day, so a sister from my old church recommended a small group online gathering to me. I was so happy. Even though Sister Keke who led the group was pretty young, her fellowship on the Bible was really full of light. After we had met a few times I understood God’s will in creating mankind, the parable of the ten virgins and differences between faithful and evil servants, as well as the root cause of the Pharisees’ failure in their faith. Plus, Sister Keke had really clear explanations for every question I asked, and I always gained something, so I asked her about this confusion that was within my heart. I said, “Sister, there’s a question that has been confounding me for quite some time. The pastor said that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are the God of the Trinity. But I don’t understand, since there’s just one God, how could there be a Father and a Son? Could you explain this to me?” Sister Keke replied, “Thanks be to God! Sister, you’ve asked a great question. To understand the God of the Trinity, you must first know the root of this expression. In the Council of Nicaea in AD 300s, religious leaders from a number of countries began debating over God’s unicity and multiplicity. They finally proposed that God is a Trinity—this was based on human notions, imaginings and logic. From then on people have believed that God is made up of three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. But in fact, the idea of the Trinity doesn’t appear in the Bible. God never mentioned it, nor did the prophets or disciples, and the Holy Spirit particularly hasn’t borne witness to it. So we can be certain that the idea of the Trinity is man-made, and it’s something that people have dreamed up from their own heads, something they thought of with their own logic. It’s not in line with the truth. The reality is that there’s just one God—the Creator, the one and only true God—who created heaven, earth, and all things. There are no separate persons of God. Genesis 1:2 tells us that in the beginning, God’s Spirit was hovering over the waters. We can see that God was originally a Spirit and He was also called the Holy Spirit, the Spirit, and the sevenfold Spirit, without shape or form yet encompassing all things, full of the universe and the world. In heaven, God is a Spirit without shape or form, but He can also become flesh to become the Son of man with shape and form, to live among us. God’s Spirit is everywhere and there is nothing He cannot do. There’s a passage of words that explains this very clearly. I’ll send it to you—please read it for us!” I read, “There is only one God, only one person in this God, and only one Spirit of God, much as it is written down in the Bible that ‘There is only one Holy Spirit and only one God.’ Regardless of whether the Father and the Son of which you speak exist, there is only one God after all, and the substance of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit you believe in is the substance of the Holy Spirit. In other words, God is a Spirit, but He is able to become flesh and live among men, as well as to be above all things. His Spirit is all-inclusive and omnipresent. He can simultaneously be in the flesh and throughout the universe. Since all people say that God is the only one true God, then there is a single God, divisible at will by none! God is only one Spirit, and only one person; and that is the Spirit of God” (“Does the Trinity Exist?”). After reading that, I thought, “So it turns out that the idea of the God of the Trinity didn’t come from God. God is a Spirit and is only one person! So then why did the…