By Li Xinzhu, China

Ever since I could remember, I’d often see my father lose his temper and lash out at my mother. As I grew older, my mother often complained to me about her unhappy marriage. She said that she’d lacked food and clothing for the whole time she’d been with my father, that she’d never been happy with him, and that he often lost his temper with her. She often told me, “A woman can only find happiness for a lifetime by marrying a husband who treats her well.” I thought to myself, “My mother has been through this herself, so what she says is true. No matter what happens, I can’t end up like her. I have to find a husband who will treat me well.” Later on, I got what I wished for and found a husband with a good temper who treated me well. After we married, my husband always went along with me in everything, and he never raised his voice at me. Whenever he came home from work and didn’t see me, he would call and ask where I’d gone, and hurry to pick me up on his bike. He also cared for me greatly in everyday life, always asking whenever he saw me upset, “What’s wrong? Is there something upsetting you?” Having found such a loving and caring husband made me very happy, and I felt content in life.

In 2004, I accepted God’s new work and preached the gospel to my husband. He didn’t accept it, but he didn’t oppose my belief either. But later, my husband started believing the baseless rumors the CCP fabricated about The Church of Almighty God, and from then on, he began to stop me from believing in God. He’d also often complain about my going to gatherings. One day after coming home from work, he said to me in a serious tone, “It says online that believing in God goes against the CCP, and that the government doesn’t allow it. You can’t believe in God anymore!” When I saw his unhappy expression, I knew he’d been misled by the baseless rumors spread by the CCP. I told him that these things were just lies and slander, but he wouldn’t listen to me at all. One evening, as soon as my husband came home, he asked me, “Did you go to a gathering again today?” I said, “Yes.” He then shouted at me, “I told you not to believe in God, but you just wouldn’t listen! On my way back today, I saw a teacher being arrested for believing in God. Who knows how many years she’ll get? If you keep up this faith of yours, then sooner or later, you’ll be arrested too. Then the kids and I will get dragged into all this as well and you’ll have ruined our family!” Saying this, he swung his shoe, and without a word, started hitting me on the head, cursing as he hit me, “I told you to listen to me, but you just wouldn’t listen! I’m going to kill you!” I thought he’d just hit me a couple of times to vent his anger, but he hit me really hard. My head was spinning from being hit, and he didn’t seem like he was going to stop. I never would have thought that after so many years together he could be so ruthless! Then my husband told the kids, “Go talk to your mom, get her to say that she won’t believe in God from now on. If she doesn’t say it, I’ll beat her to death today!” My daughter started crying and begging me. I felt weak at the sight of my kids crying. I thought, “Maybe for the time being I should just tell my husband I won’t believe anymore. If I keep holding out like this, and he just gets angrier and divorces me, this family will be done for.” But then I thought, “No matter what happens, I can’t deny God’s name. Saying I won’t believe in God anymore would mean betraying Him, I can’t say that.” So I kept praying to God, asking Him to give me wisdom and faith. Then I thought of a passage of God’s words: “In every step of work that God does on 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 wager 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” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Only Loving God Is Truly Believing in God). The enlightenment of God’s words helped me understand that though it seemed my husband was persecuting me, in reality, Satan’s schemes were behind this. Satan wanted me to deny God and betray Him. I couldn’t say that I would no longer believe in God just out of fear of my husband’s anger; I had to stand firm in my testimony. After that, no matter how much my children pleaded with me, I stayed silent. Utterly exasperated, my husband shouted, “Since your mother won’t say it, I’m going to divorce her tonight and make her leave. She won’t be spending another day in our house!” This came as a complete shock. I’d never thought he would actually want a divorce. I’d been with him heart and soul for so many years, but just because of my belief, he wanted to divorce me, and even wanted me to leave the house immediately. How could this be the husband I’d lived beside for over a decade? I felt completely heartbroken. I wondered, “If we divorce, how will I survive all by myself, all helpless and alone?” My heart felt as if it were being cut, and tears poured down my face. I thought that humans are created by God, that God has given us life’s breath and provided us with everything we need, so it’s perfectly natural and justified for people to worship God. I felt that I couldn’t stop believing in God no matter what. My daughter then said to her dad, “If you two get divorced, my brother and I want to stay with Mom, not you.” Only then did my husband relent and drop the subject of divorce. Later, the CCP’s persecution intensified, and all kinds of heresies and fallacies that slandered and discredited The Church of Almighty God were posted throughout the streets. My husband’s persecution against me also worsened. Every day after work, he would grill me, asking if I still believed in God, and he would lose his temper at me over the slightest thing. Seeing him like this made me very upset. Even though I believed in God and did my duty, I still took care of all the housework and farm work, and I looked after the children as well. He shouldn’t have been persecuting me like this. But then I thought, “If it weren’t for the CCP’s persecution and baseless rumors, he probably wouldn’t be treating me like this. He’s been hoodwinked by the CCP. If I don’t endure it, it’s inevitable that we’ll end up divorcing.” To keep our family intact and preserve our marriage, no matter how much my husband persecuted me, I endured it in silence, even taking the initiative to care for him and make good food for him. Sometimes, this would delay my duty.

Later, I was chosen as a preacher and made responsible for several churches. Some of the churches were far from home, so I wouldn’t be able to come home every day, and this made me a bit worried. My husband was having an affair at that time, and he told me several times after he came back home from drinking that a woman had confessed to him and wanted to start a family with him. I was afraid that my being far from home and not being able to return easily was going to distance me from my husband, and that he was definitely going to divorce me. If that happened, our family would be shattered. But then I thought about how this duty had come from God, and that I couldn’t refuse my duty just to maintain family harmony. So I accepted it. Back then, I would return home once for a couple of days every two weeks or so, doing all the house and farm work, hoping to hold onto my husband’s heart through these efforts. Even though I knew he was having an affair, I never confronted him about it as I was terrified that this would really lead to divorce. This issue often troubled me, and I was distracted even when doing my duty. Often, I was just going through the motions. There was a false leader in one church who should have been dismissed promptly, but I thought that electing a new leader after the dismissal would take time, so I put off the dismissal to free up time to go home. This caused delays in the church’s work. Another time, the upper leader asked me to assist a church in dealing with an antichrist. At that time, some brothers and sisters couldn’t discern this antichrist, so it was necessary to fellowship truths about discernment with them in a timely manner. I thought, “For the brothers and sisters to gain discernment of this antichrist, it might take half a month of fellowship, and even then, there’s no guarantee of results. When would I be able to go home then?” So I told the leader, “This antichrist is too cunning, and their methods of misleading people are sophisticated. It won’t be easy for the brothers and sisters to gain discernment of them, and I can’t handle them either. How about you find someone else to deal with this?” The leader saw I was unwilling to cooperate and had to find another sister to handle it. But due to that sister’s lack of discernment, the progress in dealing with this antichrist was slow, which resulted in this antichrist remaining in the church, misleading and controlling God’s chosen people for over two months. All the church’s work ground to a halt. Later, because of my irresponsibility in my duty, and because I’d seriously delayed the church’s work, I was dismissed. During a gathering, a sister said to me, “Based on your behavior, you should be isolated to reflect.” Her words pierced my heart deeply. I often went home to maintain my marriage, delaying church work. I truly committed an evil deed and should be isolated to reflect. I recalled a passage of God’s words: “How you regard God’s commissions is extremely important, and this is a very serious matter. If you cannot complete what God has entrusted to people, then you are not fit to live in His presence and you should be punished. It is perfectly natural and justified that humans should complete whatever commissions God entrusts to them. This is man’s supreme responsibility, and is just as important as their very lives. If you do not take God’s commissions seriously, then you are betraying Him in the most grievous way. In this, you are more lamentable than Judas, and should be cursed” (The Word, Vol. 3. The Discourses of Christ of the Last Days. How to Know Man’s Nature). God’s words made me tremble in fear. I felt God’s fury, as if I were being condemned by Him. The brothers and sisters had chosen me as a preacher. God’s intention was for me to lead the brothers and sisters to eat and drink His words and enter into the truth, and also to protect the brothers and sisters from being disturbed and misled by false leaders and antichrists. But my heart wasn’t in my duty at all. I placed my marriage and family above everything else, often going home to maintain my relationship with my husband. I knew there was a false leader in the church, but I didn’t dismiss them in time. Regarding the antichrist that was revealed, I was also unwilling to spend time fellowshipping with the brothers and sisters on discernment. I even made excuses, saying that this antichrist was too cunning for me to handle, and shirked my duty. This allowed the antichrist to mislead the brothers and sisters in the church. For the sake of my marriage and family, I treated such important work like the selection of leaders and workers, the dismissal of false leaders, and dealing with the antichrist, irreverently and with indifference. This harmed the church’s work and caused losses to the lives of the brothers and sisters. I had been so selfish and despicable! In what way was I behaving like a person with humanity? So I came before God and prayed, confessing my sins, “Oh God, in my pursuit of marital bliss, I have failed to do my duty well and I have transgressed. According to Your righteous disposition, I deserve to be punished. Yet You haven’t treated me according to my transgressions, and have still given me a chance to do my duty. From now on, I am willing to approach my duty with a heart that fears You.”

Some time later, my husband heard that some more believers had been arrested, so his persecution of me intensified. One time, to stop me from believing in God, he burned all my clothes. I was furious. Later, the police came to my home to arrest me on charges of illegal preaching, but I wasn’t home at the time and managed to avoid disaster. Because of this, I didn’t dare to go home for five months. My husband called my relatives, trying to find me, and to pressure me into coming home, he even reported my cousin, who also believed in God. I was shocked to hear this. I never thought my husband would do such a thing. I felt he was truly terrifying and malicious. If he was willing to report my cousin, would he also report me? I thought back on the sacrifices I’d made to maintain our marriage, and I felt they’d not been worth it. But when I thought about how I couldn’t go back home and our family would collapse like this, and about how the happy marriage I’d always pursued would be gone, I still felt a lot of pain. I came before God in prayer, hoping He would lead me out of this wrong state.

After that, I read a passage of God’s words: “Married people always regard marriage as a major event in life and place great emphasis on marriage. They therefore entrust all their life’s happiness to their married lives and to their partners, believing that the pursuit of marital happiness is the only goal to be pursued in this life. That’s why many people expend great effort, pay a great price, and make great sacrifices for the sake of marital happiness. … 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 satisfaction of their marriage, they fall far short when it comes to performing their duty. They were originally supposed to go to a distant place to preach the gospel, returning home once a week or once in a long while, or they could leave home and perform their duty full time according to their various calibers and conditions, but 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 performing their duty. Especially when they hear their partner complain or sound displeased or have a moan, they become even more cautious with maintaining their marriage. They do all they can to satisfy their partner and work hard to make their marriage a happy one so that it doesn’t break apart. Of course, even more serious than this is that some people refuse the call of God’s house and refuse to perform their duty in order to maintain their marital happiness. When they should be leaving home to perform 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 perform their duty, they make compromises and abandon 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” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (10)). God’s words exposed my state. I’d been influenced by family values since childhood, believing that a woman’s happiness in life depended on whether her marriage was happy and whether her husband loved her. I’d regarded the pursuit of a happy family as my life’s goal. I was living by the satanic thoughts of “Life is precious; love even more so,” and “May I win a heart true to me, and may we never part until the end of our days.” I made my husband the most important person in my life, and entrusted my lifelong happiness to him. Before finding God, I devoted myself entirely to my husband and my family in pursuit of a happy marriage. After I found God, my husband, influenced by the baseless rumors spread by the CCP, began to persecute me, forbidding me to believe in God, and he even threatened me with divorce and resorted to violence against me. To avoid losing this marriage of ours, I kept suffering in silence and compromising, and even when he treated me coldly and mocked me, I still actively sought to please him, spending more time taking care of the household and neglecting the duties I should have been doing. Especially when I was a preacher, I was clearly aware that this duty was crucial, and that it involved the work of several churches, but I worried that our marriage would break down, so I’d often go home to maintain my relationship with my husband, and I couldn’t commit myself wholeheartedly to my duties. When antichrists and false leaders appeared in the churches, I failed to deal with them in a timely manner because I was trying to hold my family together, and this delayed the work of the church. To preserve my relationship with my husband to save our marriage, I completely disregarded my responsibilities and duties and committed serious transgressions. I saw how intransigent and selfish I had been. Upon reflection, I came to truly hate myself.

Later on, I read some of God’s words: “God has ordained marriage for you only so that you may learn to fulfill your responsibilities, learn to live peacefully together with another person and share life together, and experience what life shared with your partner is like and how to handle all the things you encounter together, making your life richer and more different. However, He does not sell you out to marriage and, of course, He does not sell you to your partner to be their slave. You are not their slave, and they are not your slave master, either. You are equals. You only have the responsibilities of a wife or a husband to your partner, and when you fulfill these responsibilities, God considers you to be a satisfactory wife or husband. There is nothing your partner has that you do not, and you are not worse than your partner. If you believe in God and pursue the truth, can perform your duty, often attend gatherings, pray-read God’s words, and come before God, then these are things God accepts and they are what a created being should do and the normal life a created being should live. There is nothing shameful about this, nor must you feel like you owe your partner anything because you live this kind of life—you owe them nothing. If you wish, you have the obligation to bear testimony to your partner of God’s work. If they don’t believe in God, however, and they don’t follow the same path as you, then you do not need and are under no obligation to tell them or explain to them anything or any information about your faith or the path you follow, nor do they have any right to know about it. It is their responsibility and obligation to support, encourage, and defend you. If they can’t do this, then they are without humanity. Why? Because you follow the right path, and it’s because you follow the right path that your family and your partner are blessed and enjoy the grace of God along with you. It’s only right for your partner to be grateful for this, rather than discriminating against you or bullying you because of your faith or because you’re being persecuted, or else believing that you should do more household chores and other things, or that you owe them something. You don’t owe them emotionally, spiritually, or in any other way—they owe you. Because of your faith in God, they enjoy extra grace and blessings from God, and they gain these things exceptionally. What do I mean by ‘they gain these things exceptionally’? I mean that someone like that doesn’t deserve to gain those things and shouldn’t gain those things. Why shouldn’t they gain them? Because they don’t follow God or acknowledge God, therefore the grace they enjoy comes because of your faith in God. They benefit along with you and enjoy blessings with you, and it’s only right for them to be grateful to you. … Those who don’t believe are still not satisfied, and they even suppress and bully those who believe in God. The persecution the country and society subject believers to is already a disaster for them, and yet their family members go to even greater lengths and pile on the pressure. If, in such circumstances, you still believe you are letting them down and are willing to become a slave to your marriage, then that really is something you shouldn’t do. So they don’t support your belief in God, fine; so they don’t defend your belief in God, also fine. They are free to not do those things. However, they shouldn’t treat you as a slave because you believe in God. You’re not a slave, you’re a human being, a dignified and upright person. At the very least, you’re a created being before God, and not anyone’s slave. If you must be a slave, then you can only be a slave to the truth, a slave to God, and not a slave to any person, much less have your spouse as your slave master. In terms of fleshly relationships, apart from your parents, the one who is closest to you in this world is your spouse. Yet because you believe in God, they treat you like an enemy and attack and persecute you. They object to you attending gatherings, if they hear any gossip, they come home to scold and mistreat you. Even when you’re praying or reading God’s words at home and not affecting the normality of their life at all, they will still scold and oppose you, and even beat you. Tell Me, what kind of thing is this? Are they not a demon? Is this the person who’s closest to you? Does someone like this deserve to have you fulfill any responsibility toward them? (No.) No, they don’t! And so, some people who are in this kind of marriage are still at their partner’s beck and call, willing to sacrifice everything, sacrifice the time they should spend performing their duty, the opportunity to perform their duty, and even their opportunity to attain salvation. They shouldn’t do these things, and at the very least they should relinquish such ideas” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (11)). From God’s words, I understood that God has ordained marriage for people to learn to fulfill responsibilities and to experience a life of plenty, not to be slaves to marriage. There should be principles when fulfilling responsibilities in marriage. If the other person has good humanity and supports our belief in God, then we can fulfill our responsibilities within the framework of marriage. However, if the other person obstructs our belief in God and even persecutes or condemns us, then this devil is showing itself, and their essence hates God. In this case, we don’t need to fulfill our responsibilities. If a person can’t distinguish between good and evil and still wants to hold onto such a spouse, then they are utterly foolish and ignorant! My believing in God and doing the duty of a created being meets with God’s approval and is the most just thing, but my husband not only didn’t support me but treated me as an enemy, beating me, scolding me, and threatening me with divorce to pressure me into abandoning my belief in God. The facts clearly revealed that my husband hated God and that his essence was that of a devil. He was well aware that the CCP was pursuing me and that I could be arrested at any moment if I returned home, yet he reported my cousin to try and pressure me into returning home. He showed no concern for my life or death! He was truly selfish and malicious! Later, I realized that before, when he treated me well, it was because I could take care of our family and his mother, which benefited him; otherwise, he would have divorced me long ago. He didn’t truly love me, and in his eyes, I was merely a means to an end. But I’d always regarded him as my support and entrusted him with all my happiness. I even put aside my duties to hold onto him and earn his favor. Thinking this, I realized that I’d been fooled, and I saw just how blind I’d been! Now it was clear to me that my husband’s essence was that of a devil who hates God. How could I find happiness with someone who hated God? Not only would I not find happiness with him, but I’d also suffer more harm from him. I couldn’t be constrained by him any longer. I had to pursue the truth diligently and strive to fulfill my duties to the best of my abilities.

After that, I read a passage of God’s words: “When it comes to marriage, no matter what cracks appear or what consequences arise, whether the marriage continues or not, whether you embark on a new life within your marriage, or whether your marriage ends right then and there, your marriage is not your destination, and neither is your spouse. He was just ordained by God to appear in your life and your existence to play a role accompanying you on your path through life. If he can accompany you all the way to the end of the road and get to the very end with you, then there’s nothing better than that, and you should thank God for His grace. If there’s a problem during the marriage, whether cracks appear or something happens that’s not to your liking, and ultimately your marriage comes to an end, that doesn’t mean you have no destination anymore, that your life is now thrown into darkness, or that there is no light, and you have no future. It could be that your marriage ending is the beginning of a more wonderful life. All of this is in God’s hands, and it is for God to orchestrate and arrange. It could be that your marriage ending gives you a deeper comprehension and appreciation of marriage, and a deeper understanding. Of course, it could be to you that your marriage ending is an important turning point in your life goals and direction and in the path you walk. What it brings you will not be gloomy memories, much less painful memories, nor will it be all negative experiences and results, but rather it will bring you positive and active experiences which you could not have had if you were still married. If your marriage carried on, you would perhaps always live this plain, mediocre, and dull life until the end of your days. If, however, your marriage ends and breaks up, then that is not necessarily a bad thing. You were previously constrained by the happiness and responsibilities of your marriage, as well as by the emotions or way of living of your concern for your spouse, your looking after him, consideration for him, caring for him, and worrying about him. Beginning from the day your marriage ends, however, all the circumstances of your life, your goals for living and your life pursuits undergo a thorough and complete change, and it must be said that this change is brought to you by your marriage ending. It could be that this result, change, and transition is what God intends you to gain from the marriage that He has ordained for you, and is what God intends you to gain by leading you to end your marriage. Although you have been hurt and have taken a tortuous path, and although you have made some unnecessary sacrifices and compromises within the framework of marriage, what you receive in the end cannot be obtained within married life” (The Word, Vol. 6. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (11)). After reading God’s words, my heart felt brightened. God has ordained marriage for people, but marriage isn’t the destination for humans. Whether a person’s marriage is happy and fulfilling, or if it has broken and come to an end, this has nothing to do with whether that person will have a good destination, nor does it determine whether their life will be happy. Yet, I regarded marriage as my destination and my husband as my support, so when I saw my marriage falling apart and merely existing, I felt I had no destination or support anymore. My heart became heavy, and I felt lonely and helpless, and didn’t know how to face my life ahead. Now, I came to realize that my views didn’t align with the truth. From God’s words, I saw that the dissolution of one’s marriage doesn’t mean a person has no future or that life will be bleak; it might be the beginning of a more wonderful life. In the past, to maintain a happy marriage, I did all the chores both inside and outside the home, and spent my days working until my back ached, and I also had to read my husband’s moods. But what was worse was that I couldn’t fully devote myself to my duties. I was just going through the motions, and this delayed the church work. I often felt uneasy, like there was a stone weighing on my heart, and I lived in a state of pain and exhaustion. The pursuit of marital bliss just brought me more spiritual oppression and pain. In the past few months, I couldn’t go home due to the persecution from the CCP, and when I settled my heart to do my duties, my body felt less tired, and my heart felt much lighter than before. When I quieted myself to eat and drink God’s words and lived a church life with brothers and sisters, I was able to understand some truths, and my heart was filled with joy. This was really beneficial to my life. Now, although I didn’t have my husband’s companionship and care, when I faced difficulties and pain, I prayed to God, and with the guidance of God’s words, I felt that God was right by my side, and that He was my true support. Understanding these things, I no longer worried about holding my marriage together, and my heart that had been repressed for so long, came to feel liberated. Later, I kept on performing my duties in other regions and didn’t return home.

One day three years later, I made plans to meet a sister in the park, and my husband’s brother-in-law saw me on the way. He was very surprised and said he had been looking for me. His wife had gotten cancer and could pass away at any moment, and he kept urging me to come to his house. I thought about how my husband often called our daughter to inquire about my whereabouts, he also went to my mother’s house to look for me, and he kept calling relatives to try to find me. If I went to his sister’s house, he would find out almost immediately. What if my husband saw me and begged me to stay at home? I thought of my aging mother-in-law, and about how if his sister passed away, his life would be quite difficult. We’d been married for so many years after all, and I had been gone for almost three years, so would he still persecute me like before? After thinking it over, I still found myself conflicted, so I silently prayed to God, asking Him to guide and lead me. After praying, I recalled a passage of God’s words: “How can devils become humans? This is impossible. Getting the great red dragon to put down the butcher’s knife is impossible; that is its nature. Devils and Satan are of the same cohort, differing only in significance. How you view the great red dragon is how you should view devils; this is correct. If you view devils differently from how you view Satan and the great red dragon, this proves that you still do not have a thorough understanding of devils; if you still think they are humans, believe they have humanity, that they have something commendable, that they can be redeemed, and you still give them chances, then you are foolish, you have fallen for their ruse again, and you will have to pay the price for this” (The Word, Vol. 7. On the Pursuit of the Truth. How to Pursue the Truth (15)). A devil is always a devil and will never become human. My husband hated and opposed God, and his essence was that of a devil. I couldn’t sympathize with my husband, otherwise he’d only hurt me. No matter what, I couldn’t go back. I then thought about God’s urgent intentions. God hopes that more people can come before Him and accept His salvation as soon as possible, so at this critical moment, I had to do my utmost to cooperate in the gospel work. I had regrets for not doing my duties in the past because I was pursuing marital bliss. Now I had to make up for it and be loyal in my duties to repay God’s love. Moving forward, I dedicated myself to the work of watering newcomers and I felt at ease and at peace. I am sincerely grateful to God for rescuing me from the pain of marriage.