By Yiping, China

When I was at school, I loved to listen to songs and read ancient poetry. Most of these works were themed on love. I was conditioned by outlooks on love like “Love is supreme” and “holding hands and growing old together.” I was drawn toward the idea of a marriage of lasting romance, and was eager to meet someone who would look after me and grow old with me. After starting work, I met my husband. After we married, he was very attentive and looked after me. Sometimes, he would insist that I go to the hospital for treatment even if I just had a mild headache or a fever. When we walked on the street, he would always make me walk on his right because he was afraid of me being hit by a car. Whenever there was some minor friction in our life, he would accommodate and tolerate me. In addition, he was extremely romantic. Every time he came back from a business trip, and on every holiday no matter how minor, he would buy me gifts. When I saw how my husband treated me with such care, I felt like I was the luckiest woman in the world. I entrusted all my happiness in this life to him.

In July 2013, I started to believe in God. From God’s words, I found out that Almighty God is the One who created the heavens and earth and all things and holds sovereignty over everything. He is the Savior of humanity. I am a created being, and should properly believe in God, follow God, and fulfill my duty. At that time, I would read the words of God and actively preach the gospel whenever I was free. My husband didn’t oppose me believing in God. By June 2014, he heard the CCP’s baseless rumors that discredited The Church of Almighty God. He was afraid that he would be implicated because of my belief in Almighty God and began to obstruct my belief in God. I told him the truth and asked him not to believe those baseless rumors. He saw that I hadn’t listened to him, and so from then on, he quarreled with me constantly.

In June 2018, my husband came home drunk at around ten one evening. He kicked open the bedroom door, grabbed my hair, and pulled me from the bed onto the floor before starting to hit me on the head. He put a lot of strength into it, and every slap made my head ring. Next, he started slapping me in the face, and after he finished, he went to get a knife from the kitchen. Spewing curses, he said, “If you believe in God again, I’ll kill you and then I’ll kill myself.” As he spoke, he pressed the back of the knife onto my neck. In my heart, I called on God constantly. I didn’t dare to struggle physically. After what seemed like an age, he put the knife down. When I saw how my once-caring and loving husband had turned so violent, my heart shattered. The next day, he apologized to me and asked for my forgiveness. I thought to myself, “We’ve been married for many years and he has always been good to me. This time, it was probably because he was drunk and impulsive.” So I forgave him. However, from then on, I started to feel constrained when gathering and doing my duty. Every time I came back from a gathering and saw that my husband was out, I would breathe a sigh of relief. If he was home with a dark scowl on his face, I would actively talk to him, or ask him what he wanted to eat and hurry to the kitchen to make it. I would be even more considerate of him than previously.

In June 2019, I was elected to be a leader in the church. When I heard this news, I was very happy, and thought that as a leader I would have many opportunities to train and make fast life progress. However, I was also filled with misgivings, “Before, my husband would always give me dirty looks or complain when I went to gatherings. Leaders have more work to do, and I’ll need to go out to gatherings frequently. Will he try to obstruct me even more? If that happens, then we’ll never have a harmonious life again.” On one side, my duty; on the other, my marriage. I was conflicted. I prayed to God in seeking, and thought of the words of God: “If you play an important part in spreading the gospel work and leave your post without God’s permission, playing the deserter, there is no greater transgression. Does it not count as an act of betrayal against God?” (The Word, Vol. 3. The Discourses of Christ of the Last Days. Preaching the Gospel Is the Duty All Believers Are Bound to Fulfill). If I refused my duty in order to maintain my marriage, that would be a grave transgression. I am a created being, and doing my duty is my responsibility and my obligation. I cannot stop doing my duty in order to live my little quiet life. Therefore, I accepted the duty of a leader. At that time, it just so happened that my husband was on leave. He saw me go out early and come back late every day, and quarreled with me every couple of days. Many times, he blocked me at the door and wouldn’t let me go to gatherings. He even said that I wasn’t looking after our family or him, and that if I carried on believing in God, he would divorce me. My mouth then formed the words, “Well, just divorce me then!” but I felt weak inside. I thought, “What if my husband really does divorce me? What would my life be like after that?” As soon as I thought about divorce, I felt like I wouldn’t have any happiness to speak of afterward. My heart was in so much pain it felt like it was being stabbed by a knife. I didn’t want to go out every day to do my duty anymore. However, I was a leader in the church, and I was responsible for the overall work of the church. If I abandoned my duty, I would be really lacking in conscience. I had to just screw up my courage and soldier on. At gatherings, I just went through the motions, asking if anyone was in an incorrect state and finding out a bit about the work. I engaged in some simple fellowship, but did not seek results. Sometimes, the work had not finished being implemented, but as soon as I saw it was time to end the gathering, I rushed back home. As a result, the problems and difficulties of my brothers and sisters were not resolved in time, and some work could not be implemented in a timely manner.

Once, my elder sister followed me to a sister’s house to stop me from believing in God. For the safety of this sister, the upper leaders asked me to not be in contact with my brothers and sisters, and that I should do my duty to the extent that I was able to given the situation at home. The first few days, I felt lost and sad because I couldn’t do my duties. Later, when I saw my husband cook for me every day and busy himself with trying to cheer me up, I soon slipped back into the emotions of married life. I was well aware that the sister I was working with had only just been elected as a leader and was unfamiliar with the work of the church. There were many items of work that urgently required the two of us to work together to implement and follow up on. Moreover, my husband wasn’t following my every move. I did have opportunities to go out and do my duty, but I was afraid that my husband would be angry if he found out. Our relationship had only just been restored, and I didn’t want to destroy this situation. So I didn’t inquire about the work of the church for two months, using “safeguarding the environment” as an excuse. As a result, all the items of work were hindered to different degrees. The upper leaders saw that I was completely living in the fleshly life, and not doing the work of the church, so they dismissed me. At the time, I cried. I had had chances to do my duty in these two months, but I didn’t hold to my duty. Was I not a deserter? I felt self-reproach and guilt in my heart. At one gathering, I read a passage of God’s words, which I remember as if it were yesterday. Almighty God says: “If I were to place some money in front of you right now and give you the freedom to choose—and if I did not condemn you for your choice—then most of you would choose the money and forsake the truth. The better among you would give up the money and choose the truth reluctantly, while those in-between would seize the money in one hand and the truth in the other. Would your true colors thus not become self-evident? When choosing between the truth and anything to which you are loyal, you would all choose in this manner, and your attitude would remain the same. Is that not so? Are there not many among you who have wavered between right and wrong? In all of the struggles between positive and negative, black and white—between family and God, children and God, harmony and rupture, wealth and poverty, status and ordinariness, being supported and being rejected, and so on—surely you’re not ignorant of the choices that you have made! Between a harmonious family and a broken one, you chose the former, and you did so without any hesitation; between riches and duty, you again chose the former, even lacking the will to return to shore; between luxury and poverty, you chose the former; when choosing between either your children, wives, and husbands or Me, you chose the former; and between notions and the truth, you still chose the former. Faced with all manner of your evil deeds, I have simply lost faith in you, I have simply been astounded. Your hearts are unexpectedly so incapable of being softened” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. To Whom Exactly Are You Loyal?). When I read God’s words of judgment, I felt deep self-reproach, and I couldn’t stop myself from crying. I was one of those in-between people, who God exposed. With one hand, I clutched my marriage and family tightly, unwilling to let go; with the other, I held onto God’s salvation, not wanting to be abandoned. When I was a leader, although I was going out to do my duty every day, I didn’t want my belief in God to anger my husband and affect our relationship. When I did my duty, I was just going through the motions. I didn’t invest any effort in fellowshipping about and resolving the difficulties of my brothers and sisters and the problems they faced in their work. When isolating at home to safeguard the environment, I simply took the chance to lay my duty down while enjoying a so-called happy life. I was well aware that the sister I was working with had only just become a leader and could not look after all that work on her own. Moreover, my husband wasn’t monitoring me every day, so I could have cooperated with my sister to do some work. However, in order to protect my relationship with my husband, I didn’t concern myself with the work of the church at all for two months. Caught between my duty and a harmonious family, I chose to maintain my family and readily let go of my duties. I didn’t have any loyalty to God at all, and even during those two months I didn’t feel the slightest bit of self-reproach or indebtedness. I had read so many of God’s words, but when something actually came upon me, I behaved, shockingly, in this way. I truly lacked the smallest scrap of conscience or reason! God says: “Faced with all manner of your evil deeds, I have simply lost faith in you, I have simply been astounded. Your hearts are unexpectedly so incapable of being softened.” As a leader in the church, I had a weighty responsibility. I should have taken responsibility for safeguarding the normal progress of the various items of work in the church, and should have supported and helped my brothers and sisters understand the truth and do their duties well. But instead, I didn’t care if the life entry of my brothers and sisters was affected, or if the work of the church was damaged. I only thought about maintaining my own marriage and family, and abandoned my duty casually. I really was too selfish and vile! I was an untrustworthy person! I only had myself to blame for being dismissed. I felt very regretful, and secretly determined that I would no longer abandon my duty for the sake of maintaining my marriage and family. Later, I started doing duties in the church again and my husband used both the carrot and the stick to force me to abandon my belief in God. When he saw I would not listen, he kept mentioning the topic of divorce every single day to threaten me. I prayed to God and begged Him to give me faith and strength. In this way, I always persisted in going to gatherings and doing my duty. Slowly, my husband stopped controlling me as strictly, only demanding that I come home every day.

In July 2023, the leaders arranged for me to do a duty. Because the work involved quite a lot of matters, I would only be able to come home once every couple of weeks or so. I felt a little constrained, “If I only come home once every couple of weeks or so, would my husband agree? If I’m regularly not at home, and not at his side keeping him company and caring for him, then our marriage will slowly and inevitably crack.” However, I remembered my previous experience of failure. This time, I did not want to be left with regrets, and I accepted this duty. After some time, I was a little worried, “If I continue not to go back home, my relationship with my husband will grow increasingly distant. If he falls for someone else, then our marriage will be at an end. If I lose my marriage, then will I still be able to have a happy life in the future?” On the surface, I was busy with work every day, but my heart constantly felt disturbed. As soon as the work was complete, I would start calculating the days until I could go home. I even thought about asking the leaders to alter my duty to one I could do at home. I realized that this was being picky with my duty. It was not reasonable, so I didn’t speak of it. Helpless, I told my innermost thoughts to God and begged God to enlighten and guide me.

One day during my devotionals, I read a passage of God’s words that was of great help to me. God says: “There are even some people who, after they’ve come to believe in God, accept their duty and the commission given to them by God’s house, but in order to maintain the happiness and bliss of their marriage, they severely compromise the performance of their duty. Originally, they are supposed to go to a distant place to preach the gospel, returning home once a week or every once in a while, or they could leave home and do their duty full time according to their calibers and conditions in various aspects. However, they’re afraid their partner will be displeased with them, that their marriage won’t be happy, or that they’ll lose their marriage altogether, and for the sake of maintaining their marital happiness they give up a lot of time that should be spent doing their duty. Especially when they hear their partner complain or sound displeased or grumble, they become even more cautious with maintaining their marriage. They do all they can to satisfy their partner and work hard to maintain their marital happiness and prevent their marriage from breaking apart. Of course, even more serious than this is that some people refuse the call of God’s house and refuse to do their duty in order to maintain their marital happiness. When they should be leaving home to do their duty, because they can’t bear to part with their spouse or because their spouse’s parents oppose their belief in God and oppose them abandoning their job and leaving home to do their duty, they make compromises and give up their duty, instead choosing to maintain their marital happiness and the integrity of their marriage. In order to maintain their marital happiness and the integrity of their marriage, and to prevent their marriage from breaking up and ending, they choose only to fulfill their responsibilities and obligations in married life and abandon the mission of a created being. You don’t know that, regardless of your role in the family or in society—whether it be as wife, husband, child, parent, employee, or anything else—and regardless of whether or not your role in married life is an important one, you have only one identity before God and that is as a created being. You have no second identity before God. Therefore, when God’s house calls upon you, that is the time when you should fulfill your mission. That is to say, as a created being, it is not that you should fulfill your mission only when the condition of maintaining your marital happiness and the integrity of your marriage is fulfilled, but rather it is that, as long as you are a created being, then the mission God bestows upon you and entrusts to you should be fulfilled unconditionally; regardless of the circumstances, you should complete your mission, treating it as your bounden duty, and place the mission entrusted to you by God first, while placing the mission and responsibilities bestowed upon you by marriage in a secondary position” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (10)). After reading this passage of God’s words, it was like a beam of light had shone into my heart. I suddenly felt clear and enlightened. Just as God says, I was attaching a lot of weight to the integrity and happiness of my marriage. I only wanted to do some duty provided I could maintain the happiness of my marriage. As soon as it affected my marriage, I couldn’t do my duty with a peaceful heart, and even wanted to let go of my duty to preserve my marriage. I did not place the duties of a created being first. I remembered when I was at school, I was deeply affected by views on marriage such as “holding hands and growing old together” and “May I win a heart true to me, and may we never part until the end of our days.” I always wanted to meet my other half who would treat me genuinely, show me consideration, look after me, and accompany me through life. After getting married, I treated my marriage as the most important thing, and always strove to maintain it. After I started believing in God, my husband listened to baseless rumors and tried to stop me. I was worried about cracks forming in our marriage and so searched for ways to curry favor with him. When doing the duties of a leader, I was perfunctory and just went through the motions. At every gathering, I arrived and left on time, as if I was clocking in and out of work. The implementation of some tasks was not completed, but when I thought about how my husband had probably finished work, I hurriedly ended the gathering and went home. When I was on the way home, I was even thinking about how to win my husband’s favor and maintain my relationship with him. During the two months I was at home safeguarding the environment, I could have done some duties. However, in order to maintain my relationship with my husband, I ignored the work of the church completely. This not only delayed the life entry of my brothers and sisters, but also damaged the work of the church. In addition, when I came out to do my duty this time, I only accepted it on the outside; I didn’t do it wholeheartedly. As soon as I had free time, I started calculating when I would go home. I even thought about changing my duty so I could be at home every day. I treated maintaining the happiness of my marriage with far too much importance; it was as if losing my marriage was as major an event as the sky collapsing. I am a created being. It is God who gave me life and bestowed me with everything. It is my mission to do the duty of a created being well. But in order to maintain my marriage, I constantly did my duty in a perfunctory fashion. I was so ashamed before God! I didn’t have the slightest hint of conscience or reason. When I understood this, I felt self-reproachful and pained in my heart. I secretly determined: In the future, I would practice the truth and repay God’s love, and use all my time and thoughts on my duty.

One day in September 2023, I returned home. My husband came home after being out drinking in the evening and aggressively asked me, “You’re regularly not at home. Where are you staying? What are you doing?” He also told me to stop believing in God. I didn’t agree, and so he started to hit me. I was so angry I moved out of the house. One day in November, I went to my mother’s home. My mother said, “Your husband said that he can’t carry on living like this. He wants you to go back home and go through divorce proceedings.” When I heard this, I let out a long sigh of relief. I thought to myself, “Over all these years, he’s persecuted me a lot and tried to stop me from believing in God. If we get a divorce, I can believe in God freely and won’t be constrained by him anymore.” However, when I walked out of the door and saw the married couples strolling down the street, I thought about how I had been married to him for twenty years. If we got divorced, that would mean that from then on there would be no relationship at all between the two of us anymore. If I got ill, who would look after me? Without his company, would the second half of my life be desolate and lonely? Could I really put an end to twenty years of married life just like that? When I thought this, my heart ached with sadness, and tears flooded from my eyes. I prayed to God, “Dear God, I know that there is no more need to maintain my marriage with my husband. I am willing to divorce him, but as soon as I think about divorcing him, it still deeply pains my heart. Dear God, may You give me faith and strength to enable me to make the correct choice.”

Afterward, I read the words of God, and found out how I should treat marriage. Almighty God says: “God has ordained marriage for you and given you a partner. You enter into marriage but your identity and status before God do not change. No matter whether you are a man or a woman, there is one thing which you both share, and that is, you are both created beings before the Creator. Within the framework of marriage, you tolerate and cherish and protect each other, you help and support each other, and this is fulfilling your responsibilities. Before God, however, the responsibilities you should fulfill and the mission you should accomplish cannot be replaced by the responsibilities you fulfill to your partner. Therefore, when there is conflict between your responsibilities to your partner and the duty a created being should do before God, what you should choose is to do the duty of a created being rather than fulfill your responsibilities to your partner. This is the direction and the aim you should choose and, of course, it is also the mission you should accomplish. Some people, however, mistakenly make the pursuit of marital happiness, or the fulfilling of their responsibilities to their partner, and caring for, looking after, and cherishing and protecting their partner, into their mission in life, and they regard their partner as their whole world, their life—this is wrong. … As far as marriage goes, all people can do is accept it from God and adhere to the definition of marriage God has ordained for man, with both husband and wife fulfilling their responsibilities and obligations to each other. What they cannot do is decide their partner’s destiny, previous life, present life, or the next life, let alone eternity. Your destination, your destiny, and the path you follow can only be decided by the Creator. Therefore, as a created being, whether your role is that of wife or husband, the happiness you should pursue in this life comes from you doing the duty of a created being and accomplishing the mission of a created being. It does not come from marriage itself, much less from you fulfilling the responsibilities of a wife or husband within the framework of marriage. Of course, the path you choose to follow and the outlook on life you adopt shouldn’t be built upon marital happiness, much less should they be determined by either spouse—this is something you ought to understand” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (11)). “As for marriage, as long as it doesn’t clash or conflict with your pursuit of truth, then the obligations you should fulfill, the mission you should accomplish, and the role you should play within the framework of marriage will not change. Therefore, asking that you let go of the pursuit of marital happiness doesn’t mean asking you to abandon marriage or to get divorced, but rather means asking you to treat marriage correctly, and then, on this foundation, complete your mission as a created being and fulfill the duty you are supposed to. Of course, if your pursuit of marital happiness impacts or hinders your performance of the duty of a created being, or even causes you to abandon this duty which you ought to do, then you are an immensely rebellious person. If you seek the truth on this matter you should be able to see clearly what people should hold fast to and what they should abandon. What you should abandon is not merely your pursuit of marital happiness; you should abandon your entire marriage. In this way, you will achieve complete alignment with the truth principles. … If you want to be someone who pursues the truth, then what you most ought to be thinking about is how to let go of that which God asks you to let go of and how to accomplish that which God asks you to accomplish. Even if you are to be without a marriage and without your partner beside you in the future, you can still live to see your final years and live well. If you abandon this opportunity to do your duty, however, then that is tantamount to you abandoning the duty you should do and the mission God has entrusted to you. To God, you would then not be someone who pursues the truth, someone who truly wants God, or someone who pursues salvation. If you actively abandon your opportunity and right to attain salvation, abandon your mission, and instead you choose marriage, choose to live together with your spouse, choose to accompany and satisfy them, and choose to maintain the integrity of your marriage, then in the end you will surely lose something while gaining something. You understand what it is you will lose, right? Marriage is not your everything, nor is marital happiness—it cannot decide your fate, it cannot decide your future, and even less so can it decide your destination” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (10)). After I had finished reading the words of God, my heart felt extremely bright and clear. God has ordained that for humans, the meaning of marriage is just to allow people to accompany each other and look after each other. But the responsibilities of marriage cannot replace the mission of a created being. When duty calls, I should prioritize doing the duty of a created being well. If I abandon my duty in order to pursue a happy marriage, I will lose my chance to gain the truth and receive God’s salvation. In the end, I will fall into the great catastrophes and be destroyed. In the past, I only thought about pursuing a happy marriage. I spent a lot of time and effort maintaining my relationship with my husband. I wanted to hold onto my marital happiness with one hand, and the truth with the other. I tried to attend to both things, but my heart felt utterly exhausted, and I simply had no happiness at all to speak of. Now, I have believed in God for many years but still do not understand the truth. I have wasted a lot of time. I was too foolish! I also realized that believing in God is perfectly natural and justified. My husband didn’t believe in God and also tried to stop me from believing. As soon as I mentioned anything to do with believing in God, he would get angry with me, berate me, beat me, and curse me. He often threatened me with divorce to force me into abandoning my belief in God. It is clear that his essence is that of a demon who hates the truth and hates God. Just as God says: “Believers and nonbelievers are inherently not compatible; rather, they are opposed to one another” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. God and Man Will Enter Into Rest Together). We were just people of two incompatible types, and were walking on two radically different paths. There was simply no way for us to grow old hand in hand. But I still foolishly maintained this marriage meticulously. Was this not blindly following a demon? I was too muddleheaded and foolish! Maintaining my relationship with my husband would only lead to me shunning God, betraying God, and cutting off my own chance at salvation. Living by a mistaken view of love, I regarded the pursuit of a happy marriage as my mission. I was unwilling to discern my husband’s essence. Without the revelation of the facts, and without the enlightenment and guidance of God’s words, I would still not have been able to see through this. I was truly blind and ignorant! I could not carry on living in these mistaken thoughts and views. Even if my husband wanted to divorce me, I still had to do the duty of a created being. This is what my mission really is!

During my devotionals, I heard a hymn of God’s words.

Let God Come Into Your Heart

1  Only when you open up your heart to God can He enter it. Only when God has entered your heart, can you see what God has and is, and see His intentions for you. At that time, you will discover that everything about God is so precious, that what He has and is is so worthy of treasuring. Compared to that, the people, events, and things around you, and even your loved ones, your partner, and the things you love, are so unworthy of mention, so insignificant, and so lowly to you. You will feel that no material object will ever be able to draw you in again, or make you pay any price for it again. In God’s humility you will see His greatness and His supremacy.

2  Even more so, you will see in some deed of God that you previously believed to be quite small His infinite wisdom and His tolerance, as well as the patience, forbearance, and understanding He shows you. This will engender in you an adoration for Him. On that day, you will feel that mankind is living in such a filthy world, and that, whether it be the people by your side or the things that happen around you, or even those you love, their love for you, and their so-called protection or their concern for you, none of this is worth mentioning—only God is your most beloved, and your most precious treasure. God’s love is so great, and His essence is so holy. In God there is no deceitfulness, no evil, no envy, and no strife, but only righteousness and authenticity. All that God has and is should be yearned for by humans, and humans should also pursue it and aspire to it.

—The Word, Vol. 2. On Knowing God. God’s Work, God’s Disposition, and God Himself III

I was really moved when I heard this hymn. The love between people is built on a foundation of transaction. When I kept my husband company and looked after him and the children, he treated me well; when I couldn’t look after him full-time, he started getting angry and wanted a divorce because he wasn’t getting any benefits from me. In those years, I once put aside my duty and betrayed God in order to maintain the happiness of my marriage. However, God did not treat me according to the way I acted. God still showed me mercy and grace, and used His words to enlighten me so I could see through Satan’s schemes. He brought me out of my mistaken views on marriage so that I would no longer be harmed by Satan. I realized that only God loves people the most, and only God’s love is genuine and holy.

Later, when I agreed to divorce my husband, my husband didn’t want to anymore. He even said that as long as I went home, he would treat me well like he had done previously, and would not try to stop me from believing in God anymore. I thought of how my husband had used threats, violence, and curses to force me to abandon my belief in God. When he saw that those tricks hadn’t worked, he used sweet-sounding words to dupe me. No matter how his tricks changed, his essence is still that of a devil. His essence of being an enemy of God will never change. He had tried to stop me from believing in God for a decade. If he were capable of change, he would have changed long ago. If I believed what he said again, I would only fall for it and end up being tricked, and I would lose my chance to be saved by God. So I ignored what he said. I thought, “Even if we don’t get divorced, I cannot let him hinder the performance of my duties.” Afterward, I always did my duties in the church, and my heart became peaceful. I stopped thinking about how to maintain my marriage and family, and was finally able to break free from my husband’s constraints and the bonds of marriage. I am now free to believe in God and do my duty. Thank God for His salvation!