Eastern Lightning | How to Control Impulse Buying

How to Control Impulse Buying

By Mu’en, Italy

In February 2018, while I was talking with a friend in Taiwan on the phone, she said, “I’m going to buy some toilet paper because in March its price will be rising thirty percent.” After hanging up, I did not think too much. But in the following days, I saw a lot of posts about people snapping up toilet paper on Facebook. Even when people met each other, they would ask: “Have you bought toilet paper?” The most incredible thing was that the toilet paper in some big malls was snapped up only in an hour or so after the mall opened in the morning. These phenomena sparked heated debate on the internet. One post said, “A profit or a loss? To snap up toilet paper, we will not only pay several hundred NT dollars per hour for the gas and parking, but also expend time and energy.” Another post was more interesting: “Now people in Taiwan are snapping up toilet paper again, but I didn’t follow the trend this time, for I don’t want to be controlled by material desires. In addition, I have bought enough toilet paper before Chinese New Year.” The web discussion aroused my reflections.

Almighty God’s Work Has Caused Us to Walk the Same Path as Husband and Wife

Almighty God’s Work Has Caused Us to Walk the Same Path as Husband and Wife

Liu Xue, Henan Province

In 1991, since we were enduring the hardships of family conflict, my husband and I believed in the Lord Jesus together. From then on, we no longer quarreled. We read the Bible and attended gatherings together very zealously. Not long afterward, my husband left the Three-Self Church and switched over to the Stream of Recovery. In regards to the matter of my husband switching denominations, I did not mind. I believed that as long as we believed in one God, it did not matter which denomination we belonged to.

God Didn’t Have the Heart to Let Me Fall Into the Underworld

God Didn’t Have the Heart to Let Me Fall Into the Underworld

How a Public Security Bureau Local Station Chief Was Conquered by God’s Words

Zhang Jun, Sichuan Province

  God Didn’t Have the Heart to Let Me Fall Into the Underworld 

       Almighty God says: “Look back to the time of Noah’s ark: Mankind was deeply corrupt, had strayed from the blessing of God, was no longer cared for by God, and had lost the promises of God. They lived in darkness, without the light of God. Thus they became licentious by nature, abandoned themselves to hideous depravity. Such men could no longer receive the promise of God; they were unfit to witness the face of God, nor to hear the voice of God, for they had abandoned God, had cast aside all that He had bestowed upon them, and had forgotten the teachings of God. Their heart strayed farther and farther from God, and as it did, they became depraved beyond all reason and humanity, and became increasingly evil. Thus they came ever closer to death, and fell under the wrath and punishment of God. Only Noah worshiped God and shunned evil, and so he was able to hear the voice of God, and hear the instructions of God. He built the ark according to the instructions of God’s word, and assembled all manner of living creatures. And in this way, once everything had been prepared, God unleashed His destruction upon the world. Only Noah and the seven members of his family survived the destruction, for Noah worshiped Jehovah and shunned evil” (“God Presides Over the Fate of All Mankind” in The Word Appears in the Flesh). After reading this passage of God’s words I fell into a state of deep contemplation …

Eastern Lightning | Who Was It That Rescued Her Marriage?

Who Was It That Rescued Her Marriage?

Yang Zi, China

Who Was It That Rescued Her Marriage?

She had just turned twenty, she had a graceful figure and appeared as pretty as a flower, and there were many suitors pursuing her. But she didn’t pay this any mind until one day when her friend invited her to come out and she by chance met Lin. Lin was almost 6 feet tall, he was tall and handsome, with a dignified bearing. He spoke with humor and with wit, and was able to attract her in an instant. And Lin too was quite interested in her. The two of them started seeing each other very soon, and after a few months they got married. Before long they had a child of their own, and this made her feel very blessed. But good things don’t last forever. Just when she was starting to enjoy everything and long for a beautiful future, she discovered that Lin was not engaging in honest work every day. All day long he was idling about, and he would even go out often and get in fights and gamble. When he returned home, he would pick out faults with her no matter if there was something going on or not. He simply did not care for her or their child. She did not understand why Lin was acting this way. Many times with eyes full of tears she would urge Lin to walk the correct path, but not only did Lin not listen, he would even lash out at her, and one time he even went so far as to nearly choke her to death. She had lost all hope in Lin. Before long, Lin got sentenced to prison for breaking the law, and she had to support herself and their one-and-a-half-year-old child on her own. Her life was full of hardships and dashed hopes. It wasn’t until 2003, when Lin completed his prison sentence and was released, that she was finished with this painful marriage.

Eastern Lightning | What Allows Me to Regain a Happy Life?

What Allows Me to Regain a Happy Life?

Xiaoping

  What Allows Me to Regain a Happy Life?

This is an age when people care very much about physical attractiveness and a good looking body. With a beautiful face and a slim figure, I turned heads no matter what kind of clothes I wore. People around me often praised me and envied that I had both a great figure and a great face, and my husband was also very kind to me. Because of this, I was especially confident. No matter where I went, I walked with my head held high and my back straight. I displayed myself to receive praise from others. In my heart I believed: As long as a woman has a graceful figure and a pretty face, she could rewrite her own life.

Eastern Lightning | CenSAMM Symposium The Millennium: A Mystery No More

CenSAMM Symposium The Millennium: A Mystery No More

  

From June 28-29, 2018, at the Panacea Museum Gardens in Bedford, UK, the Centre for the Critical Study of Apocalyptic and Millenarian Movements (CenSAMM) held a symposium about apocalyptic literature, the final disaster, and the Millennium. The event was attended by such renowned religious experts and scholars as Christopher Rowland, Dean Ireland’s Emeritus Professor of the Exegesis of Holy Scripture, University of Oxford, Massimo Introvigne, Managing Director of CESNUR, the Center for Studies on New Religions in Italy, and Matthew Askey, a priest serving at Southwell Minster Cathedra in Nottinghamshire. During the symposium, Professor Introvigne gave a lecture entitled “Filming the Age of Kingdom”. Partly based on The Church of Almighty God musical Human Beings Have Regained the Sanctity They Once Possessed, this stimulating and refreshing lecture provided a clear interpretation of the appearance of the Millennial Kingdom (the Millennium).

Who Lets Him Walk Easily Out of the Wilderness Into Canaan

Who Lets Him Walk Easily Out of the Wilderness Into Canaan

Cheng Yi

One evening, I was very happy I saw Brother Liu log onto Skype. I remembered that Brother Liu had believed in the Lord for many years and that in the past he was always doing service work in the church. But in the past few years the church had grown increasingly desolate and the faith of the brothers and sisters had chilled. He was passive and feeble, just busying himself with his engineering projects, and concerned only with his physical self. He had not come to church for a long time. It was something rare to come across him that day, so we quickly started chatting …

 Who Lets Him Walk Easily Out of the Wilderness Into Canaan