By Yi Xin, China

When I was sixteen, I was diagnosed with thrombocytopenic purpura, and the following year with systemic lupus erythematosus. This type of illness is incurable and can only be managed with medication. From that point on, a shadow was cast over my life. I had to be hospitalized almost every year. Later, the joints in my limbs began to swell and ache, and sometimes the pain was so bad I could barely walk, and I couldn’t even tie up my own hair. Seeing myself in such a state at such a young age, I felt pained and helpless, wondering why I had to get such a disease. At times, the pain was so intense that I wanted to die, but I couldn’t bear to do so when I saw my family working so hard and rushing around for me. I was just getting through one day at a time.

In September 2012, someone preached Almighty God’s work of the last days to me. When I heard that believing in God could bring His care and protection, it gave me a glimmer of hope in my despair, so I gladly accepted. A year later, my health had improved quite a bit. I was very grateful to God in my heart, and I hoped that one day my illness would be completely cured so I could live like a normal person. But one day in April 2014, my nose suddenly started bleeding uncontrollably. Blood just kept gushing out, and nothing could stop it. I kept wiping it with tissues, and soon the floor was covered with blood-soaked tissues. I was home alone at the time. A wave of fear washed over me, and I burst into tears, terrified and unsure of what to do. At that moment, I thought of God and cried out to Him, “Almighty God, please save me….” I kept crying out to God, but the nosebleed didn’t stop. I stared at the ceiling in despair, feeling for the first time that death was so close. I thought to myself, “If I’m going to die, so be it. I can’t escape it anyway, and death would be a release….” Later, my parents rushed home and hurried me to the hospital. During my hospital stay, I thought to myself, “Isn’t believing in God all about being kept safe? I believe in God now, so how could something like this still happen to me? If God really exists, He should have performed a miracle and stopped my nosebleed when I cried out to Him. But why didn’t God heal me? Why did He let my illness relapse? So what’s the point of me believing in God? I might as well not believe.” After I was discharged and returned home, I gave the books of God’s words back to the leader and decided to stop believing in God.

Later, when the brothers and sisters from the church learned about my state, they came to help and support me, and they read me a passage of God’s words: “When Job underwent trials, God and Satan were betting with each other, and God allowed Satan to afflict Job. Even though it was God trying Job, it was actually Satan that came upon him. For Satan, it was tempting Job, but Job was on God’s side. If that had not been the case, then Job would have fallen into temptation. As soon as people fall into temptation, they fall into danger. Undergoing refinement can be said to be a trial from God, but if you are not in a good state, it can be said to be temptation from Satan. If you are not clear about the vision, Satan will accuse you and obscure you in the aspect of vision. Before you know it, you will fall into temptation” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Those Who Are to Be Made Perfect Must Undergo Refinement). One of the sisters fellowshipped, “Today, God has come to do the work of saving us, but Satan constantly disturbs us, causing bad things to happen to us. Its goal is to make us complain about God, or even deny and abandon Him, so that it can ultimately devour us. We have to see through Satan’s schemes. It’s just like when Job faced his trials. It was Satan accusing Job in the spiritual realm, saying that Job only feared God because God had given him too many blessings, and that if everything he had was destroyed, he would surely abandon God. After that, Satan did everything it could to harm Job, taking away his children and his vast fortune, and even causing him to be covered in sore boils, all in an attempt to make Job abandon God. But Job held fast to his faith in God, did not complain, and even praised God’s name, standing firm in his testimony for God. In the end, Satan retreated in shame. This shows that Satan loves to toy with and harm people, and its purpose is to make people distance themselves from God and betray Him. Today, you’ve stopped believing in God just because your illness relapsed. Aren’t you falling right into Satan’s trap?” After hearing the sister’s fellowship, something clicked in my mind. I realized that this illness was a test for me, to see whether I would stand on God’s side or Satan’s. If I really stopped believing, then Satan’s scheme would have succeeded. Thinking of this, I decided to continue believing in God. So, I asked the church for a copy of The Word Appears in the Flesh and began to read God’s words earnestly at home every day. Through reading God’s words, I came to understand the origin of man’s sickness and pain. In the beginning, God created Adam and Eve, and they lived happily in the Garden of Eden. But because of Satan’s temptation, they ate the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. From then on, they lived in sin, and that is how birth, aging, sickness, and death came to be. As mankind became more and more deeply corrupted by Satan, people drifted further and further from God, their sickness and pain grew more severe, and their lives became more and more miserable. This time, God has personally become flesh to do the work of judgment and chastisement, expressing the truth to cleanse man’s corruption, completely save man from Satan’s power, restore man to his original likeness, and bring man to a beautiful destination. In the future, there will be no more pain and no more tears. Understanding all this, I was deeply moved. I felt that God’s love for man is so great, and I resolved to pursue the truth earnestly and experience God’s work.

One day, I read a passage of God’s words and gained some understanding of the impurities in my faith, namely my intention of pursuing blessings. Almighty God says: “So many believe in Me only that I might heal them. So many believe in Me only that I might use My power to drive unclean spirits out from their bodies, and so many believe in Me simply that they might receive peace and joy from Me. So many believe in Me only to demand from Me greater material wealth. So many believe in Me just to spend this life in peace and to be safe and sound in the world to come. So many believe in Me to avoid the suffering of hell and to receive the blessings of heaven. So many believe in Me only for temporary comfort, yet do not seek to gain anything in the world to come. When I grant My fury to people and seize all the joy and peace that they once possessed, they become doubtful. When I grant to people the suffering of hell and reclaim the blessings of heaven, they fly into a rage. When people ask Me to heal them, and I pay them no heed and feel loathing for them, they depart from Me to instead seek the way of evil medicine and sorcery. When I take away all that people have demanded from Me, they all disappear without a trace. Thus, I say that people have faith in Me because My grace is too abundant, and because there are far too many benefits to gain” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. What Do You Know of Faith?). After reading God’s words, I felt that God truly scrutinizes our innermost hearts. He had completely exposed my intention of pursuing blessings in my faith. My belief in God was solely to receive grace from Him and to have Him heal my illness. At first, I had gladly accepted God’s work of the last days for the sake of being cured. When God bestowed peace and blessings upon me and my health improved, I was full of thanks and praise for Him. But when my illness relapsed and my nose wouldn’t stop bleeding even after I cried out to Him, I complained that God wasn’t protecting me, and I began to doubt Him, even to the point of wanting to stop believing. I saw that I didn’t truly believe in God at all; my faith was just about gaining blessings. I had treated God as a doctor, and my expenditure in my duty was also aimed at getting God to heal me. This was purely trying to bargain with God; it was deceiving God! Humans were created by God and should believe in and worship Him without attempting any transactions or making demands. Yet, I believed that since I believed in Him, God ought to heal me. So the moment my illness relapsed, I complained about Him and even betrayed and abandoned Him. How could I have been so lacking in conscience and reason! If God hadn’t used the brothers and sisters to help and support me, I would have been harmed and devoured by Satan. Thank God for saving me! Realizing this, I repented to God and confessed my sins. I decided to no longer believe in God with the intention of gaining blessings, and became willing to place my illness in God’s hands and submit to His orchestrations and arrangements.

After my discharge, my platelet count was almost back to normal, but it kept dropping during my weekly check-ups, and small bruises started appearing on my body. The doctor increased my medication to the maximum dose, but my condition still didn’t improve, so I had to be hospitalized again. I felt very weak and worried, thinking, “I’m trying to believe in God properly now, so why isn’t He letting my platelet count rise?” I realized I was making demands of God, so I prayed silently, “Oh God, I know I shouldn’t make demands of You, but my stature is so small, and I’m never able to fully submit to You. God, I pray that You will guide me and give me faith.” Then I thought of God’s words: “Do not worry about how tomorrow will be, nor how the future will be. So long as you rely on Me to live every day, then I will surely lead you” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Utterances of Christ in the Beginning, Chapter 28). “Faith is like a single log bridge: Those who cling to life and fear death will have difficulty in crossing it, but those who are ready to give their lives can pass over, sure of foot and worry-free. If people harbor timid and fearful thoughts, it is because Satan has fooled them; it is afraid that we will cross the bridge of faith to enter into God. Satan is trying in every way possible to send us its thoughts. We should at every moment pray for God to illuminate and enlighten us, at every moment rely on God to cleanse Satan’s poison from within us, practice within our spirit at every moment how to come close to God, and let God have dominion over our whole being” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Utterances of Christ in the Beginning, Chapter 6). God’s words helped me understand that those thoughts of worry and fear all came from Satan, and only by relying on God at all times and having the will to risk my life could I cast off my cowardice and overcome Satan. God’s words gave me faith. God holds sovereignty over all things and governs everything. My illness is in His hands. No matter what happens, I am willing to rely on God to experience it. With God by my side, I have nothing to fear. For an insignificant person like me, riddled with illness, to be able to come before God today and enjoy His words is already His grace and exaltation. Even if I were to die one day, my life wouldn’t have been in vain. Realizing this, my heart was no longer so worried or afraid. I became willing to submit to God’s sovereignty and continued to read God’s words as usual every day. Afterward, the doctor reduced my medication, and to my surprise, my platelet count actually went up. I was discharged from the hospital soon after. I thanked God endlessly in my heart. I saw that God has the final say in all things, and my faith in Him grew. After that, my platelet count rose month after month, and a few months later, it was completely back to normal. I couldn’t help but marvel at God’s almightiness and deeply appreciated that God holds sovereignty over everything. My heart was filled with infinite gratitude for Him.

Later, I read two more passages of God’s words and gained a new understanding of my problems. Almighty God says: “In the notions of man, God must always display signs and wonders, must always heal the sick and cast out demons, and must always be just like Jesus. Yet this time, God is not like that at all. If, during the last days, God still displayed signs and wonders, and still cast out demons and healed the sick—if He did exactly the same as Jesus—then God would be repeating the same work, and the work of Jesus would have no significance or value. … Why is the work of God today different to the work of Jesus? Why does God today not display signs and wonders, not cast out demons, and not heal the sick? If Jesus’ work were the same as the work done during the Age of Law, could He have represented the God of the Age of Grace? Could He have completed the work of the crucifixion? If, as in the Age of Law, Jesus had entered into the temple and kept the Sabbath, then He would have been persecuted by none and embraced by all. If that were so, could He have been crucified? Could He have completed the work of redemption? What would be the point if God incarnate of the last days displayed signs and wonders, like Jesus did? Only if God does another part of His work during the last days, one that represents part of His management plan, can man gain a deeper knowledge of God, and only then can God’s management plan be completed” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Knowing God’s Present Work). “Today, it should be clear to all of you that, in the last days, it is principally the fact of ‘the Word becomes flesh’ that is accomplished by God. Through His actual work on earth, He causes man to know Him and to engage with Him, and to see His practical deeds. He causes man to clearly see that He is able to display signs and wonders and that there are also times when He is unable to do so; this depends on the age. From this, you can see that God is not incapable of displaying signs and wonders, but instead changes His way of working according to the work to be done and according to the age. In the current stage of work, He does not show signs and wonders; that He showed some signs and wonders in the age of Jesus was because His work in that age was different. God does not do that work today, and some people believe Him incapable of displaying signs and wonders, or else they think that if He does not display signs and wonders, then He is not God. Is that not a fallacy? God is able to display signs and wonders, but He is working in a different age, and so He does not do such work. Because this is a different age, and because this is a different stage of God’s work, the deeds revealed by God are also different. Man’s belief in God is not the belief in signs and wonders, nor the belief in miracles, but the belief in His practical work during the new age. Man comes to know God through the manner in which God works, and this knowledge produces in man the belief in God, which is to say, the belief in the work and deeds of God. … In each age, God reveals different deeds. In each age, He reveals part of His deeds, and the work of each age represents one part of the disposition of God, and one part of the deeds of God. The deeds that He reveals vary with the age in which He works, but they all give man a knowledge of God that is deeper, a belief in God that is truer and more solid. Man believes in God because of all of the deeds of God, because God is so wondrous, so great, because He is almighty and unfathomable” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Knowing God’s Present Work). After reading God’s words, I realized that the notion I had revealed during my illness was exactly this: the belief that if He is God, He should perform signs and wonders, healing the sick and casting out demons, and if He doesn’t, He isn’t God. My viewpoint was so ridiculous and absurd! Satan and evil spirits can also imitate God by performing some signs and wonders to heal people. Does that mean they can be called God? Isn’t that blasphemy against God? God is the Creator, who rules over and holds sovereignty over all things, and can guide and save humanity. In the last days, God has become flesh to express the truth to thoroughly save mankind. By accepting the judgment and chastisement of Almighty God’s words, people can cast off their satanic corrupt disposition, attain salvation and be made perfect. This kind of work and these kinds of words far surpass the authority and power of God performing signs and wonders to heal the sick and cast out demons. It is something that no created human, nor Satan or any evil spirit, can achieve. I thought about how many people today determine whether someone is God based on whether they can heal the sick or perform miracles. When Satan and evil spirits give them a few benefits or work some miracles, they worship them, treating Satan as the true God, while shutting the door on the true God who expresses the truth and can save mankind. As a result, they lose their chance to be saved. Such a view is truly absurd and ruinous! From God’s words, I also understood that healing the sick, casting out demons, and performing signs and wonders was the work that God did in the Age of Grace. If God were to do it again in the last days, it would be repetitive. If God were always healing the sick, casting out demons, and performing miracles, then everyone would believe in and follow God simply because their illnesses were cured or because they saw a miracle. This would make it impossible to reveal who truly believes and who has false faith, let alone sort each according to their kind. This time, God doesn’t perform a single sign or wonder in His work, which can better reveal people’s corrupt dispositions and is more conducive to transforming and cleansing them. Take me, for example. If God had really granted my every request and completely healed my illness, I would never have reflected on my erroneous views on faith or my despicable intention of trying to bargain with God. I would have continued to delimit God based on my own notions and imaginings. Believing in that way, I would never gain the truth and life, my corrupt disposition would not change, and I would ultimately be eliminated. Although I suffered some physical pain during this illness, Through praying and relying on God amid my suffering, God enlightened and guided me with His words, freeing me from the constraints of my illness and from living in pain and fear. I gained some faith in God as well. These were gains I could never have made in a comfortable environment. I truly felt that God’s work of using His words to save mankind is so practical and so wise! Understanding this, I prayed silently to God, “Oh God, no matter what happens with my illness in the future, I am willing to entrust my all to You, to pursue the truth earnestly, and to fulfill my duty.”

I then read more of God’s words and came to know what true faith in God is. Almighty God says: “‘Belief in God’ means believing that there is a God; this is the simplest concept of belief in God. To take this a step further, 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 belief in God means the following: On the basis of the belief that God holds sovereignty over all things, one experiences His words and His work, and thereby casts off one’s corrupt dispositions, satisfies the intentions of God, and comes to know God. Only a journey of this kind can be called ‘belief in God’” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Preface). “You may think that believing in God is just about suffering, or doing many things for Him, or your flesh being at peace, or everything going smoothly for you, and you being comfortable and at ease in all things. None of these are purposes that people should have in their belief in God. If you believe for these purposes, then your perspective is incorrect, and it is simply impossible for you to be perfected. God’s actions, God’s righteous disposition, His wisdom, His words, and His wondrousness and unfathomableness are all things people ought to understand. Through this understanding, you should come to rid your heart of your personal demands, hopes, and notions. Only by eliminating these things can you meet the conditions demanded by God, and it is only by doing this that you can have life and satisfy God. The purpose of believing in God is to satisfy Him and to live out the disposition He requires, so that His actions and glory may be manifested through this group of unworthy people. This is the correct perspective for believing in God, and this is also the goal that you should pursue. You should have the right viewpoint about believing in God and you should seek to obtain God’s words. You need to eat and drink God’s words and you must be able to live out the truth, and in particular you must be able to see His practical deeds, His wonderful deeds throughout the entire universe, as well as the practical work He does in the flesh. People can, through their actual experiences, appreciate just how God does His work on them and what His intentions are toward them. The purpose of all of this is so they can cast off their corrupt satanic disposition” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Those Who Are to Be Made Perfect Must Undergo Refinement). “Now do you understand what belief in God is? Does belief in God mean beholding signs and wonders? Does it mean ascending to heaven? Believing in God is not easy in the slightest. Those religious practices should be purged; pursuing the healing of the sick and the casting out of demons, focusing on signs and wonders, coveting more of God’s grace, peace and joy, pursuing the prospects and comforts of the flesh—these are religious practices, and such religious practices are a vague kind of belief. What is real belief in God today? It is the acceptance of God’s word as your life reality and the knowing of God from His word in order to achieve a true love of Him. To be clear: Belief in God is so that you may submit to God, love God, and fulfill the duty that should be fulfilled by a created being. This is the aim of believing in God” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. All Is Achieved by the Word of God). From God’s words, I came to know that believing in God shouldn’t be for the sake of physical peace, nor should it be for blessings. Instead, it should be about eating and drinking more of God’s words and experiencing His work, to cast off one’s satanic corrupt disposition and live by God’s words and be able to know, submit to, and fear God; only then can one ultimately be saved by God. But my perspective on faith was wrong from the very beginning. I wanted God to heal me and give me physical peace. This kind of faith is a vague religious belief, and God does not acknowledge it at all. I thought of Job. He didn’t seek physical peace in his faith. Instead, he focused on appreciating God’s sovereignty and knowing His deeds in his daily life, and he pursued fearing God and shunning evil. When he was afflicted with physical illness, he did not sin with his lips. He would rather endure extreme pain than complain about or blame God, and he still praised God’s name. His faith received God’s approval. But I didn’t pursue the truth in my faith; I only sought physical peace. When my illness relapsed, my heart was filled with complaints against God, and I even denied and betrayed Him. I couldn’t even begin to compare with Job. This life of mine was given by God. The fact that my life wasn’t in danger during that unstoppable nosebleed was already God’s care and protection. Yet, I didn’t thank God; instead, I complained about and betrayed Him. I was truly so lacking in conscience and reason! Besides, I had gotten this illness before I even believed in God. Even if I hadn’t believed, I still would have had flare-ups. My relapse had nothing to do with whether I believed in God or not. I shouldn’t have complained about Him. I then understood what true faith in God is, and I became willing to pursue the truth earnestly according to His requirements and experience God’s work.

Afterward, whenever I experienced sickness, I focused on reflecting on the corrupt disposition I revealed and seeking the truth to resolve it. By practicing this way, I was no longer so constrained by my illness. Thank God for using this illness to give me some understanding of my erroneous views on faith and to help me find the right path of faith in God. No matter what happens to my body in the future or whether my illness can be cured, I will follow God and walk the path of pursuing the truth. Thank God!