By Kara, South Korea

I used to have a happy family, and my husband was really good to me. We opened a family restaurant that did pretty well. Our friends and relatives all envied us. But confusingly, I always felt so empty inside. Every day felt exactly the same as the last, like there was no meaning in life, but I had no idea what the right way to live was. Then in late 2010, I had a difficult labor while giving birth and ended up hemorrhaging. The hospital issued a critical condition notice at the time. My mom, really anxious, whispered into my ear, “Honey, pray to Almighty God!” I called on Almighty God in my heart to save me, as though I were clinging to a lifeline. Before long, the bleeding stopped, and I thanked God from the bottom of my heart. I started reading Almighty God’s words every day from then on, and had gatherings and fellowship with brothers and sisters all the time. Over time, I learned that God created man and that everything man has comes from God. We have to have faith, worship God, and do our duty as created beings; only then does life have meaning. So, I took on the duty of preaching the gospel, and every day felt really fulfilling. My family hadn’t accepted the gospel, but they weren’t opposed to my faith.

In late 2012, the Chinese Communist Party started another crazed wave of suppression against The Church of Almighty God, and fabricated all sorts of rumors to frame and smear the church. Lots of radio stations and television stations were disseminating these lies. From that point on, my husband would pull a long face and sulk whenever I came back from a gathering. One day around lunchtime I returned to the restaurant from a gathering, and he grabbed me and dragged me over to the TV, and said, “Look at this God you believe in!” I saw that they were broadcasting all sorts of Chinese Communist Party’s blasphemous words and slanders against The Church of Almighty God that were absolutely baseless and turned the truth on its head. I got really angry, and turned around and said to him, “The news is full of lies. These are just rumors made up by the Communist Party. They hate God and resist Him more than anything, and they’ve brutally persecuted religious beliefs ever since coming to power. How could you believe anything they say that condemns the church? We’ve seen plenty after being in business all these years, so it’s not like you don’t know what this government, what this Party is like. They have fabricated all sorts of unjust, fake, wrongful legal cases, and falsified reports. I won’t even talk about the Cultural Revolution, but just in more recent years there was the Tiananmen Square Incident, the brutal suppression of the Tibetan protests, and so on. What they always do is start by making up lies, twisting the truth to make a group look bad and whip up outrage, and then comes a violent crackdown. It’s the same with how they treat The Church of Almighty God. This is the Party’s usual tactic for eradicating dissent. Besides, brothers and sisters have held gatherings in our home while you were there. You know that we just gather and read God’s words, fellowship on the truth, and sing hymns. Are we anything like what the Party is saying?” But my husband was too thoroughly misled by the Communist Party’s lies, so he was deaf to what I was saying. He kept berating me, saying I should just live a nice life instead of insisting on believing in God, and that if the government says you can’t have faith, then just give it up. My husband said if I kept going to gatherings, he’d smash my electric motorbike so I wouldn’t have any way to get there. He even said that he would keep me cooped up at home. It didn’t bother me too much at first. I thought my family was just temporarily misled by the Party’s lies, and that their anger was out of concern for me, and it would all blow over in a few days. But things weren’t quite that simple. There were more and more lies being broadcast on TV and the internet attacking and defaming The Church of Almighty God, and there were lots of reports of believers being arrested. My family clamped down on me even more when they saw this. Trying to get me to give up my faith, my husband tore up my book of God’s words, and broke the MP3 player I used to listen to hymns. He also repeated all of the Communist Party’s lies to our neighbors so I couldn’t preach the gospel to them. They were misled by the lies, too, and avoided me like I was a leper. My husband’s behavior really shocked me. He’d always been so simple and guileless—how could he change so much, so dramatically? After years of marriage, how could he be so devoid of understanding and respect? Time went on, and he was constantly on my case, even blaming everything that went wrong at home on me and my faith. When business slowed down he blamed my faith and wouldn’t let me into the restaurant, saying I’d bring bad luck. His parents were always pulling long faces and berating me, and often banging things around in anger. They kept me from going out, and the moment I took a step outside they would call me, demanding to know where I was and who I was with. I was kept under their watch during that time. I couldn’t read God’s words or contact brothers and sisters. I didn’t have any personal freedom whatsoever. This was really trying for me, and I was wondering why having faith was so hard, why it was such a struggle, and when I wouldn’t have to live that way anymore. Sometimes I thought I could just stop going to gatherings and doing my duty for the meantime, but I felt that wouldn’t be in line with God’s intention. In pain, I desperately prayed to God and asked God to guide me. I recalled a passage of God’s words: “Today, most people do not have that knowledge. They believe that suffering is without value, they are renounced by the world, their home life is troubled, they are not beloved of God, and their prospects are bleak. The suffering of some people reaches an extreme, and their thoughts turn to death. This is not true love for God; such people are cowards, they have no perseverance, they are weak and powerless! … Thus, during these last days you must bear testimony to God. No matter how great your suffering, you should walk until the very end, and even at your last breath, still you must be faithful to God and at the mercy of God; only this is truly loving God, and only this is the strong and resounding testimony” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Only by Experiencing Painful Trials Can You Know the Loveliness of God). I was really touched as I pondered God’s words. I realized that it wasn’t God’s intention to have us suffer, but to perfect our faith through persecution and hardship so we would have the chance to bear witness for God. I couldn’t yield to Satan because I was afraid of suffering; I had to have faith in God and stay on this path until the end no matter how hard it was.

Later on, because I continued to preach the gospel, my husband became even more oppressive. One day when I got home from a gathering, he really tore into me, yelling, “What are you doing preaching to restaurant guests? Everyone’s talking about you being a believer. How could you humiliate me like this? You’ve seen what they’re saying on TV. If you keep on like this, just wait to be arrested!” I saw he was just getting more and more agitated, so I didn’t say anything in response, but just went inside my room. What I saw there stunned me. He had ripped up my books of God’s words, and the floor was covered with paper. My father-in-law came over just then, and the moment he walked in, he said, “We wanted our son to get married to have a nice life. This family will be ruined if you’re arrested for your faith. Either give up your faith, or get a divorce right away.” Then he started saying blasphemous things. I couldn’t hold my anger back, and I cut him off, “Since marrying into your family I’ve treated you with nothing but respect. I’ve never been angry or argued with you. If I’ve failed in my duty to this family, you have the right to reprimand me, but there’s nothing wrong with my faith and you shouldn’t stand in my way, much less blaspheme God—” Before I could finish, his expression changed and he shouted, “What’s wrong with having my say about your God? I don’t believe I can’t handle you!” He started pulling on my clothing, trying to drag me off to the police station, but I yanked myself free. Seeing how determined I was and that I wasn’t about to budge, he left in a huff. Right after that I heard a thud, and just as I was turning around, I saw my husband coming at me, and he smacked me right in the face, sending me flying to the ground. I was seeing stars, my ears were ringing, and my face was burning with pain. My mind was entirely blank. It really shocked me that he would do that. We’d been together for nearly ten years and he had never hit me, but he did that day because of my faith. Looking at him, I felt like he was a stranger. As if he’d lost his mind, he forcefully dragged me up off the floor, pressed me up against the wall and said fiercely, “I’m telling you, we’re settling this today. Either you give up your faith, or we’re getting divorced right away. Tell me, are you still going to believe or not? Do you want your faith, or this family?” While talking, he was maniacally banging me against the wall. Seeing that face I knew so well become so demonic, I responded calmly, “I choose my faith.” Enraged, he pushed me onto the bed and wrapped his hands tightly around my neck. I couldn’t breathe, and I wanted to get away, but he was too strong. There was no way I could fight him off. As I struggled to get any air, I became really afraid and thought, “I’m probably going to die this way today.” Just then, my three-year-old son suddenly woke up. He got up and started calling “Mommy! Mommy!” Seeing my husband choking me, he started to hit him and push him, and then desperately tried to burrow into my arms. Seeing this, my husband let go and said to me viciously, “If it hadn’t been for our son, you would have died at my hands today.” He left, and I thought over what had just happened. My heart was completely chilled. Because the persecution of my faith encroached upon his personal interests, shockingly, he was ready to choke me to death. Isn’t that a devil revealing itself? The more he hit me, the more I saw what kind of person he was, and the more I wanted to follow God until the end.

My mother-in-law came to see me the next day and said right as she walked in, “Could you just stop believing in God? I know that having faith is a good thing, but it means the Party will arrest you and do terrible things to you. What do you say?” I said, “You know how difficult my childbirth was; the hospital issued a critical condition notice. It was Almighty God who saved both me and my son. I have to repay God’s love; I cannot act without a conscience. Almighty God is the one true God who created the heavens and earth and all things, and He’s the Savior who’s come back to save mankind. Disasters are getting bigger and bigger, and only God can save people. Even if we are arrested and suffer for following God, it will only be temporary. That would be better than going to hell with Satan.” She responded, “I understand what you’re saying, but as a woman, you have to think of your child and husband. Your son is so little. Could you really bear to toss him aside just like that?” Hearing her say this, I really felt like crying, but no tears came. I thought, “Is it really me who’s tossing him aside? It’s the Communist Party who’s arresting and persecuting believers. And it’s your son who believes the Party’s lies and is insisting on a divorce and tearing this family apart. How can you blame this on my faith?” But looking at her, with a head full of white hair and a pained look on her face, and thinking about my son being taken away from his mom at such a young age, I felt more and more miserable. I started to weaken a bit. I silently called out to God, asking Him to guide me. A passage of His words came to mind: “In every step of work that God does within people, externally it appears to be interactions between people, as if born of human arrangements or from human disturbance. But behind the scenes, every step of work, and everything that happens, is a wager made by Satan before God, and requires people to stand firm in their testimony to God. Take when Job was tried, for example: Behind the scenes, Satan was making a bet with God, and what happened to Job was the deeds of men and the disturbance of men. Behind every step of work that God does in you is Satan’s wager with God—behind it all is a battle. … When God and Satan do battle in the spiritual realm, how should you satisfy God, and how should you stand firm in your testimony to Him? You should know that everything that happens to you is a great trial and the time when God needs you to bear testimony” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Only Loving God Is Truly Believing in God). I thought about God’s words, and saw that on the surface, everything that was happening to me today looked like it was people standing in my way and persecuting me, but Satan’s tricks were behind it all. Satan was using my family to impede me, to disturb me, using my feelings for my son and family members to threaten me, trying to get me to betray God and lose my chance at salvation. I knew I couldn’t fall for Satan’s tricks; I had to have faith in God, stand firm in my witness, and humiliate Satan. And so, I said to my mother-in-law, “Man was created by God, so we should have faith and worship Him. Besides, my life was given to me by God, so no matter what happens, I will follow Him until the end. Don’t waste your energy trying to convince me otherwise.” She shook her head, then turned around and walked off.

That night my husband found out I was still reading God’s words and got really angry. He said, “You still have the nerve to do this? Don’t you know that this will get you thrown in jail? Don’t you care if you live or die? If you don’t care that’s fine, but leave me and our child out of it. If I’d known you’d become a believer, I never would have married you in the first place!” Then he shoved me out the front door and said hatefully, “If you keep holding on to your faith, then get out of this house!” Then he slammed the door shut and locked it. Seeing my husband being so heartless and hearing my son scream “Mom” at the top of his lungs, my heart was about to break. It was late, after 2 a.m., and I didn’t have any money on me. I wondered at that time if I really was leaving home, and leaving my son for good. I didn’t know what to do, and I felt so incredibly forlorn as I thought about it. I realized I had my phone on me, so I called my mom. The moment I heard the sound of her voice, tears poured down my face, and the pain and grievances I’d been stifling for so long all came welling up. Holding back the sound of her own crying, she said, “Honey, calm down. He wouldn’t take you this far and then abandon you. Just believe in Him and lean on Him.” With my mom comforting and encouraging me, telling me to believe in God and trust Him, the pain in my heart lessened.

The next day, cold and hungry, I was wandering aimlessly through the streets when I happened to bump into a sister. She took me back to her house and read me a couple of passages of God’s words, which helped me understand what I was going through. Almighty God says: “In a dark society such as this, where the demons are merciless and inhumane, how could the king of devils, who kills people without batting an eye, tolerate the existence of a God who is lovely, kind, and also holy? How could it applaud and cheer the arrival of God? These lackeys! They repay kindness with hate, they began treating God as an enemy long ago, they abuse God, they are savage in the extreme, they have not the slightest regard for God, they plunder and pillage, they have lost all conscience, they go against all conscience, and they tempt the innocent into senselessness. Forefathers of the ancient? Beloved leaders? They all oppose God! Their meddling has left all beneath heaven in a state of darkness and chaos! Religious freedom? The legitimate rights and interests of citizens? They are all tricks for covering up sin! … Why put up such an impenetrable obstacle to the work of God? Why employ various tricks to deceive God’s folk? Where is the true freedom and the legitimate rights and interests? Where is the fairness? Where is the comfort? Where is the warmth? Why use deceitful schemes to trick God’s people? Why use force to suppress the coming of God? Why not allow God to freely roam upon the earth that He created? Why hound God until He has nowhere to rest His head?” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Work and Entry (8)). “God is going to awaken these people, heavily burdened with suffering, to rouse them till they are fully awake, and to make them walk out of the fog and reject the great red dragon. They will wake from their dream, recognize the substance of the great red dragon, become able to give their whole heart to God, rise up from the oppression of the dark forces, stand up in the East of the world, and become proof of God’s victory. Only in this way will God gain glory” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Work and Entry (6)). God’s words helped me understand that God has become flesh and come to earth in the last days, working and expressing the truth in order to cleanse and save man. The Communist Party is afraid that everyone will accept the truth, follow God, and be saved by Him, then they’ll be free from the Party’s control and harm. That’s why they madly suppress and arrest believers, and create all sorts of lies to condemn and slander The Church of Almighty God, misleading and inciting the people to deny and resist God along with them. The Communist Party is truly detestable! My family was only treating me this way because they’d been misled by the Communist Party. The Party uses all these lies and fallacies to pull the wool over people’s eyes, so that everyone will resist God along with them, and then end up being punished in hell. That was Satan’s ruse. At that point it became crystal clear to me that the Communist Party is just a pack of demons that resist God and harm people. I knew I couldn’t fall for its tricks, and no matter how my family persecuted me, I could never betray God; I had to keep following Him and doing my duty.

Later on, in order to get me to give up my faith, my husband called some of my relatives and friends from my hometown to ask them to persuade me. They called me and passed the phone around, grilling me one after the other. My older brother said, “You can do anything at such a young age. Why does it have to be believing in God? You’re a housewife, so having kids and taking care of the family is your responsibility. Why bother believing in God? If you do, the Communist Party will arrest you and throw you in jail. We’re just regular people—how can we possibly fight it?” My aunt took the phone and yelled at me, “Have you lost your mind? A perfectly good home shouldn’t be broken up by your faith! Don’t you care about your family? You are being incredibly hardheaded!” Another aunt yelled at me, “You haven’t been married all that long and your son is still so little. If you end up in prison, what will happen to him? Just take our advice—this is for your own good!” Then my older brother grabbed the phone and added, “If you insist on doing this, your husband will divorce you, and then don’t even think about coming back to us. We’ll cut off ties with you!” Even my 80-year-old grandma said, crying into the phone, “You can’t believe. What if you’re arrested? Listen to me. We want the best for you.” After hanging up, I felt really upset. There were so many things I wanted to say to them, like “You say it’s for my own good, but is that really the case? I would have died a long time ago if Almighty God hadn’t saved me, so would I even be here today? Who is really breaking up this perfectly good home? Who is really tearing apart this family? It’s the Communist Party, not me. The Communist Party arrests and persecutes believers, but instead of hating the Party, you stand on their side, persecuting me and trying to get me to betray God, even threatening to cut off all ties and disown me. How can you not know right from wrong? Do you really want the best for me? What kind of family are you? My life was bestowed by God, so what is wrong with me doing my duty to repay God’s love? What is wrong with having faith and taking the right path in life?” For a few days, my family called me and harangued me nonstop. I really was in agony, so I earnestly prayed to God and asked Him to watch over my heart. In the end, I kept going to gatherings and doing my duty.

My husband gave me a divorce agreement he had drawn up himself and said, “If you’re keeping your faith, let’s get a divorce. You won’t be allowed to see our son after we separate. However, if you’re willing to stop believing in Almighty God, I’ll act as if nothing ever happened.” I picked it up and took a look: The husband and the wife had no shared assets, no shared business, and no shared property; the husband would have custody of the son, and the wife would walk away with nothing. But if I didn’t agree to the divorce, he would turn my mom and me into the police, reporting on us as believers in Almighty God. I saw he had planned all of this long before, secretly transferring everything we owned, so when we got a divorce we wouldn’t have any shared assets. Looking at the divorce agreement in my hands, I was thrown into torment once again. If I signed that paper, it would mean leaving this home and not being able to see my son again. He was so little—I couldn’t bear to part with him. I was in utter agony. I called out to God, asking Him to guide me so that I could stand firm. Then, I thought of these passages from God’s words: “While undergoing trials, it is normal for people to be weak, or to have negativity within them, or to lack clarity on God’s intentions or their path for practice. But in any case, you must have faith in God’s work, and not deny God, just like Job. … In your experience, no matter what refinement you undergo through God’s words, what God requires of mankind, in brief, is their faith and their God-loving heart. What He perfects by working in this way is people’s faith, love, and aspirations” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Those Who Are to Be Made Perfect Must Undergo Refinement). “You must suffer hardship for the truth, you must give yourself to the truth, you must endure humiliation for the truth, and to gain more of the truth you must undergo more suffering. This is what you should do. You must not throw away the truth for the sake of a peaceful family life, and you must not lose your life’s dignity and integrity for the sake of momentary enjoyment. You should pursue all that is beautiful and good, and you should pursue a path in life that is more meaningful” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. The Experiences of Peter: His Knowledge of Chastisement and Judgment). God’s words comforted and encouraged me, and they pointed me toward a path of practice. I realized that my husband threatening me with divorce was something that God was allowing to happen. I thought of when Job was being tested. Everything he owned was taken from him by bandits and all his children died overnight. He was sitting in a pile of ashes, covered with boils. Even his wife rejected him, and his friends mocked and judged him. But in the face of all this suffering, he still praised God, saying, “Jehovah gave, and Jehovah has taken away; blessed be the name of Jehovah” (Job 1:21). Only that is true faith. I had made a solemn vow, and resolutely told God that I would follow Him until the end no matter what. But when faced with my husband’s threats, I was stuck in negativity and weakness. That wasn’t genuine belief in God. Ever since he’d heard the Party’s lies, not only had he ripped up my books of God’s words, but he’d been violent with me, nearly choking me to death. Afraid of being implicated because of my faith, he not only wanted to get a divorce, but would leave me penniless and keep me away from my son. He was going to turn me in if I didn’t agree. What kind of husband was that? Wasn’t he more like a demon? I remembered the words God said: “Believers and nonbelievers are 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). I saw that my husband was threatening me with divorce because he’d listened to the Communist Party and he hated God. So although we were husband and wife, he was following the Party, and was on a path that goes against God and leads straight to hell, whereas I was on the path of following God to gain the truth and eternal life. Believers and nonbelievers are on different paths. I knew I couldn’t let him constrain me anymore. The more he persecuted me, the more determined I was to follow God to the end, stand firm in my witness, and shame Satan. So I told him I agreed to the divorce.

On the day we went to the Civil Affairs Bureau to finalize the divorce, I couldn’t help but feel some anxiety over being left with nothing. How would I get by after this? Thinking about how incredibly hard I’d worked for the sake of our home and our business over the years, only to end up with nothing, it was really hard to come to terms with. Then I thought of God’s words: “For My sake, are you able to forgo considering, planning, or preparing for your future path of survival?” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. A Very Serious Problem: Betrayal (2)). This question from God really put me to shame. Everyone says that hardship tests sincerity, but when I encountered persecution and adversity, I just thought about my personal interests. Was that true belief in God? Everything about me was in God’s hands, so I was determined to submit to His orchestrations and arrangements, and stop worrying about my way out. After we’d signed all the papers, I asked him, “Why were you so determined to get a divorce?” He said, “My cousin told me the government has issued confidential documents saying that believers in Almighty God are high-priority criminals, and that any Party member found to have a believer in their family will be kicked out of the Party immediately, any civil servants will be fired, their children won’t get into university, their parents’ pensions will be canceled, and their family assets will be confiscated. It used to be that a criminal’s family was implicated for nine generations; now, if a person believes in Almighty God, all their relatives will be implicated. I had to let go of you to protect everyone else. Otherwise, my older brother would be kicked out of the Party.” I was so angry to hear him say that. God has come to save mankind, which is such a wonderful thing and a blessing for all of humanity. But the Communist Party is madly resisting God and hates God. It’s using every despicable means to disrupt and destroy God’s work, and it will stop at nothing. They’re a pack of murderous, cold-blooded demons! I really saw the true face of the great red dragon and was no longer deceived and fooled by it. I resolved to do my duty well to repay God’s love and bring shame to Satan. After that, I left my home and continued doing my duty and preaching the gospel. Thanks be to God!