I was formerly a co-worker of the Hua Xuehe sect. On December 2, 1998, I accepted Almighty God’s end-time work and began to eat and drink the present word of God. Then, I have got to know that God’s work is always progressing forward and is done according to the age to save man, understood the inside story and the substance of God’s work in the Age of the Law, known how God redeemed all mankind in the Age of the Grace, and even more known that God has opened the new age—the Age of the Word, on the basis of the first two stages of the work. 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, attain full harmony with God, become God’s manifestation on earth, and become the proof of God defeating satan. This group of people are the ones who can testify about God’s deeds and are the 144,000 overcoming male children mentioned in Revelation.

After reading God’s word, I have understood God’s work and God’s intention to save man, so I hate my past even more bitterly. Looking back, I still vividly remember my disobedience and resistance to God….

I remember that in September 1997, a leader of my sect said to me, “Be careful! Now there appears a Reaping sect called ‘Eastern Lightning.’ It is very powerful. Once you get involved in it, you cannot escape from it. They are not the ones who enter by the gate, but robbers. Their belief is different from ours. Now if anyone comes to preach to you, don’t receive him lest you be deceived. If you join that sect, you can’t withdraw. If you try to do so, they will gouge out your eyes, cut off your nose, or break your legs! He who joins it will no longer be accepted by our Church even if he backs out. God will pull up weeds first. Let’s see who will be pulled up first. Those who are pulled up are the ones who have no discernment.” Hearing my leader’s words, I declared my stand right away: “I will never receive any outsider. If they don’t leave, I will beat them out!”

Only a few days later, a brother came to preach Almighty God’s end-time work to me. As soon as I saw him, I pushed him toward outside without saying a word. The brother said, “Let’s talk about the trend of the Holy Spirit’s working….” “No need! I won’t believe anything you say! I think you are a busybody who has nothing to do. You are neglecting your own duties! Go away right now!” Then I slammed the door shut. The brother stood outside for a long time. Later my daughter came back from outside, and she said to me, “Dad, that man is crying.” Hearing that, I was not moved in the slightest, but said, “He’s lucky that I didn’t beat him. If he comes again, I will definitely teach him a ‘lesson’!” Several more days later, another brother who was a little older than me came. When he saw me, he called out, “Brother!” “Who is your brother? I’ll not have it! Don’t try to tempt me!” I said fiercely. But the brother said gently, “The Scripture says, ‘Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it.’” “Entertain you? I would rather entertain beggars than you. Get out of here! Otherwise, I will slap you!” As I said that, I walked up to him and gave him a slap on the cheek. However, he was neither annoyed nor angry, but still tried to persuade me, “Brother, it’s not proper for you to do so….” “Not proper? Very proper. No mercy to people like you!” With that I asked my wife to push him out. After the gate was shut, I stood in the yard and looked outside. There, he left reluctantly in tears…. At this time, I beamed with pride. “You embarrass yourself. You deserve it! Even if you come more than one hundred times, I will not believe what you preach. I will never be taken in by you!” Three days later, two sisters came to my home. The moment they walked in the door, they called my wife, “Sister.” At first, I thought they were my wife’s relatives from her hometown, yet finally I knew that they were the preachers of “Eastern Lightning.” So, I waved my hand and said impatiently, “Go away right now! No matter how true the way you preach is, I won’t believe in it!” Because they were women, I could not push them out. So I sicced my dog on them. But to my surprise, the dog just did not bite them. (In the past, my dog would bite the strangers as soon as it saw them, and it was very ferocious.) Seeing this scene, I still did not wake up; but instead, I said to my wife, “If they don’t leave, we leave….” In this way, I refused God’s salvation once again.

I abided by the leader’s word all along and never received anyone who preached God’s end-time gospel. I also firmly believed that only our Church was the true way and was personally led by God. But unexpectedly, one day, one of my co-workers came to my home and said to me, “When our upper workers were about to come home from doing the work outside, each of them bought a suit, a handbag, and hunks of beef and mutton. They each spent more than two hundred yuan!” Hearing this, I kept mumbling to myself, “Isn’t such a practice stealing sacrifices?” Then he asked me, “Have those gospel preachers been to your home?” I began to boast, saying, “Yes, they have, but they have all been beaten away by me. I listened to the leader’s arrangement and received none of them!” He said, “Some have come to my home too. Their behavior is much better than ours. They have patience and humility. What they preached is reasonable and higher than our way, and they can tell many mysteries. Revelation 5:3-5 says: ‘But no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth could open the scroll or even look inside it. …the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed. He is able to open the scroll and its seven seals.’ This means that only God Godself is able to break the seven seals and open the scroll. This scroll is what man has never seen and is new. But our teacher Hua has never done any new work. We should seek. We may as well go to have a listen. If it is the true way, we will believe in it; if not, we will still stick to our old way. What do you think?” At his words, I, being downhearted, nodded my head reluctantly. However, I was still afraid of being deceived and always felt insecure in my heart.