Another Debate: The Pastor Threatens Me With Expulsion so I’d Give Up the True Way

Hardly a few days went by and Pastor Jin came back to the fruit stand. I was really excited at first, thinking that he had been looking through the Bible and had gained understanding of the Lord’s return. But to my surprise, he said smugly, “Deacon Li, the Bible says, ‘You men of Galilee, why stand you gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as you have seen Him go into heaven’ (Acts 1:11). This verse is very clear. The Lord Jesus went up into heaven on a white cloud, and when He returns He will certainly be on a white cloud as well.” Seeing that Pastor Jin was still so certain that the Lord would return on a cloud in the last days, I felt a little confused and thought, “Last time we talked about how the Bible also prophesies that He’ll come in secret. I thought that Pastor Jin would go back and engage in seeking, so why does he still think this?” Pastor Jin was going on and on about how the Lord should come on a cloud as if he were bound and determined to convince me of it, and I felt a bit of concern. “Although I’m totally certain that Almighty God’s work is the true way, I don’t understand enough the truth yet and he’s been a believer and a pastor for many years. He knows so much about the Bible. What if I don’t have enough discernment and I’m led astray by all those absurdities?”

I quickly made a silent prayer to God and asked for His guidance so that I wouldn’t be deceived by the fallacies Pastor Jin was spouting. I then thought of a passage of God’s words that brothers and sisters from The Church of Almighty God had read for me: “Man believes that, following the crucifixion and resurrection, Jesus went back to heaven upon a white cloud, and took His place at the Most High’s right hand. Man conceives that similarly, Jesus shall descend, again upon a white cloud (this cloud refers to the cloud that Jesus rode upon when He returned to heaven), among those who have desperately yearned for Him for thousands of years, and that He shall bear the image and clothes of the Jews. After appearing to man, He shall bestow food upon them, and cause living water to gush forth for them, and shall live among man, full of grace and love, living and real. And so on. Yet Jesus the Savior did not do this; He did the opposite of what man conceived. He did not arrive among those who had yearned for His return, and did not appear to all men while riding upon the white cloud. He has already arrived, but man does not know Him, and remains ignorant of His arrival. Man is only aimlessly awaiting Him, unaware that He has already descended upon a ‘white cloud’ (the cloud which is His Spirit, His words, and His entire disposition and all that He is), and is now among a group of overcomers that He will make during the last days” (“The Savior Has Already Returned Upon a ‘White Cloud’” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). God’s words clearly tell us that the “white cloud” is God’s Spirit, God’s words, and God’s disposition and all that He has and is. It’s not something physical at all. While God is working in secret we won’t see the Lord Jesus returning on a white cloud; it’s only after God’s secret work is completed that we’ll see that. This passage of God’s words is really clear; since I thought Pastor Jin would surely understand if he heard them, I read it out to him. Surprisingly, the moment I finished, before I could say another word, Pastor Jin pulled a long face and said with scorn, “The Bible is crystal clear on the issue of how the Lord will return. Why read another book? I’ve served the Lord as a pastor for many years—you really think you understand more than I do? Besides, if what you believe in were really the true way, why would leaders across the entire religious world condemn it? I urge you to turn back right away. At first I thought I could get Deacon Pu (my husband) to urge you to come back to our church—I never imagined you’d be so stubborn. If you insist on continuing to believe in Almighty God’s words, you can’t blame me for taking the necessary action. I’ll make a report in the church that you are believing in a heresy and I’ll have you expelled from the church. I’ll make sure everyone steers clear of you and casts you aside.”

Hearing this left me stunned. I thought, “I’ve been a member of that church for more than a decade and the brothers and sisters there feel like my own family. Now that I’ve welcomed the Lord Jesus’ return, I wanted to share the gospel of the last days with you so that you could accept it and lead them into the fold as well. However, not only did you not seek or accept it, but turned the truth on its head and falsely claimed that my belief is heretical, wanting to kick me out of the church. That’s not how someone who’s been serving the Lord for all these years should behave.” I then thought of how my husband had yelled at me a few days earlier, “Pastor Jin said in church that anyone who believes in Almighty God will be expelled from the church. Aren’t you afraid of being kicked out if you keep believing in this? What will we do if the other brothers and sisters won’t have anything to do with us anymore? Some of them have already found out and they won’t even acknowledge us when they walk by the fruit stand. From now on you can’t go to The Church of Almighty God!” With all these facts laid out clearly before me, I finally realized that Pastor Jin was stopping believers from investigating God’s work of the last days by using threats of expulsion. It was so despicable, so sinister. I used to always think that he had served the Lord for all these years, that he was humble, and had love in his heart for other believers. But it turned out, he was a fake; he was deceiving others. Then that film popped into my mind—those pastors and elders of religious circles were pretending to be humble and pious in front of believers, but behind all that they were using all sorts of tactics, all sorts of methods to keep them from investigating and accepting God’s work of the last days. Seeing that Pastor Jin’s behavior was exactly the same as the pastors in that film, I felt a sense of revulsion and the high esteem I had held him in came crashing down in an instant. At that moment, I just continued to do my business and no longer paid him any mind. Seeing I was no longer paying attention to him, he slunk off.

Continuing on the True Way but Cursed by the Pastor

For the following two weeks, Pastor Jin would come to the fruit stand to talk to me from time to time, trying to convince me to return to his church, which I never agreed to. Seeing I wouldn’t listen to him, his humiliation morphed into anger.

One day Pastor Jin stormed over to my fruit stand and, no longer referring to me as “Deacon Li”, said, “Xiangming’s mother (my son’s name is Xiangming), don’t be such a fool! The Bible clearly states ‘This same Jesus … shall so come in like manner as you have seen Him go into heaven’ (Acts 1:11). So when the Lord returns He will definitely be on a white cloud—let go of this Almighty God stuff! On top of that, if you’re going to believe in that you can, but do you really need to drag your two kids into it? Deacon Pu has always had such a devout family, and even the kids’ grandparents were devout during their lives, too. I can’t let your family’s name be destroyed!” I was indignant hearing him say this and thought, “I’ve accepted Almighty God’s work of the last days which is keeping up with the footsteps of the Lamb and being raptured up before God’s throne. This is an incredibly wonderful thing, so how could you say I’m destroying my family’s name? What’s even more upsetting is that not only do you want to keep me from believing in Almighty God, but you’re even trying to control my children’s freedom of belief. How could you try to control our investigation of the true way?” I then rebuked him in my righteous anger: “God’s sheep heed God’s voice. No man can stand in the way of a person’s faith in God. My children have read Almighty God’s words and they understand that it’s God’s voice. That is the guidance of God! When I went to church before to seek and investigate, my children weren’t interested, but now they want to go to The Church of Almighty God with me. They have their own freedom of belief and I’m not putting limitations on them. Why would you try to restrict our children’s freedom of belief?” Pastor Jin couldn’t say anything to refute that, so he just said some angry, debased things to curse me and then stalked off. I was shocked by his behavior. Although I felt upset, I primarily felt confused. I thought, “Pastor Jin used to always pray for our family to be blessed, so why would he be so vicious today? Is it really because I’ve accepted Almighty God’s work of the last days that he’s so hateful and oppressive, that he’s cursing me this way?” I was really at a loss.

After some time I shared Almighty God’s gospel of the last days with two sisters from my old church. They were happy to listen to Almighty God’s words and got in touch with me frequently. But not long after, Pastor Jin learned that they were looking into God’s work of the last days. I don’t know what sort of tactics he used to threaten them, but they stopped contacting me and started intentionally avoiding me. I felt not only upset, but angry, and I couldn’t help but think the Lord Jesus’ words rebuking the Pharisees: “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for you neither go in yourselves, neither suffer you them that are entering to go in” (Matthew 23:13). Not only did Pastor Jin refuse to accept God’s work of the last days himself, but was doing everything in his power to stop the other brothers and sisters from seeking and investigating it. He was even threatening people with expulsion from the church to keep them from accepting Almighty God’s work of the last days. Isn’t that just like the Pharisees who stood in the way of believers accepting the Lord Jesus’ work of redemption? Not only did they refuse to accept God’s salvation themselves, but even dragged other brothers and sisters down into hell with them. That will certainly be damned by God!

To be continued……

Source From:  The Church of Almighty God