By Emily, The Philippines

I grew up in a poor family, and there were eleven of us children in my family. From a young age, I wanted to earn a lot of money to lift my family out of poverty. I was particularly inspired when, during college, a classmate invited me to attend a business seminar in which the speakers shared their experiences of rising from poverty to wealth. I too wanted to become a successful businesswoman, and to do things like making lots of money, owning a house and a car, and traveling the world. That way, those who knew me would see me as a role model of a poor girl breaking free from poverty, and they would admire me.

After graduating, I went to the UAE, and I worked as a receptionist at a company. Because my income was low, I was constantly searching for part-time jobs, and I also tried to make a number of investments. I often worked during the day and ran a side business at night. All of my investments ended in failure, and my life became even harder. I felt quite discouraged at that time, and I couldn’t understand: “I’d worked so hard to make money, so why did things keep turning out this way? Why did I keep failing no matter how hard I worked or invested?” I felt utterly exhausted. In February 2020, I accepted Almighty God’s work in the last days. There was a passage of God’s words that really moved me. Almighty God says: “As members of the human race and devout Christians, it is the responsibility and obligation of us all to offer up our minds and bodies for the fulfillment of God’s commission, for our entire being came from God, and it exists thanks to the sovereignty of God. If our minds and bodies are not dedicated to God’s commission and the just cause of mankind, then our souls will feel ashamed before those who were martyred for God’s commission, and much more ashamed before God, who has provided us with everything” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Appendix 2: God Holds Sovereignty Over the Fate of All Mankind). From the words of Almighty God, I came to understand that as created beings, we should carry out our obligations and responsibilities, and fulfill the duty of a created being. This is because God has arranged everything for us, including our family, parents, and the environment in which we grow up—all of this was predestined long ago by God, and as created beings, we should repay His love. I was deeply moved by God’s words and wanted to do my duty to repay God’s love. But I understood so little truth that I couldn’t resist the temptation of money, and my heart was constantly focused on making money.

Later, I went from being a receptionist to an HR assistant, and my salary also increased. But I wasn’t very happy because this job couldn’t make me rich or make others admire me. If I kept going like this, when would I be able to build a house back home, improve my family’s life, and take them on trips? So I needed to find a higher-paying job or take on more work on the side. So, I sent out more resumes. Soon after, I started a new job at another company as an administrative assistant in the sales department. I was really happy, because in addition to a fixed salary, there were commissions, and so long as I performed well, I’d also get bonuses. I thought, “I finally have a chance to make more money, and once I’ve had a house back home built, people there will surely look up to and admire me.” Since it was a new job and I had no experience, I had to spend a lot of time learning in order to earn the high income I wanted. To earn more money, I often worked overtime. During that time, I put all my time and energy into work. At work, I often ate at irregular times or even forgot to eat at all. Especially when my manager or coworkers needed something urgently, even when I was sick, I still had to keep working. At that time, I was a gospel worker, but I was too busy with work to preach the gospel. Every day, all I thought about was work. Even after I got home, I was still working. Sometimes I’d want to preach the gospel, but after a day’s work I’d be too tired and want to rest. Sometimes the leader asked me to host gatherings, but I mostly declined because I didn’t have time to ponder God’s words, and after working all day, I didn’t have the energy to host. During gatherings I was often inattentive, and I’d often attend online gatherings while still working. Sometimes I even fell asleep during gatherings. Because I was just focused on making more money, my results in preaching the gospel were poor, and I felt very guilty. “I was willing to keep going in my work even when I was tired or sick, but I treated my duty perfunctorily and did it passively.” Although I felt some self-reproach, I was good at forgiving myself, thinking, “I’m still new in sales, but once I get better at this, I’ll have more time for my duty.” However, things didn’t go the way I expected. The more familiar I became with the job, the longer I had to work. I not only didn’t have more free time—I became even busier. My heart started becoming restless, because I knew that as a created being, my duty was the greatest thing, and my obligation and responsibility, and that I should do my duty properly to repay God’s love. At the same time, I was also really afraid, because I was always pursuing worldly things—my heart was drifting further and further from God. I couldn’t feel the Holy Spirit’s work in my duty, and my gospel preaching wasn’t bearing fruit. I prayed to God in my heart, “Almighty God, I feel I’ve lost my direction. I can’t feel the Holy Spirit’s work or Your guidance. Please help me.”

Later, I read a passage of God’s words: “Are there not many among you who have wavered between right and wrong? In all of the struggles between positive and negative, black and white—between family and God, children and God, harmoniousness and rupture, wealth and poverty, status and ordinariness, being supported and being rejected, and so on—surely you’re not ignorant of the choices that you have made! Between a harmonious family and a broken one, you chose the former, and you did so without any hesitation; between riches and duty, you again chose the former, even lacking the will to return to shore; between luxury and poverty, you chose the former; when choosing between your sons, daughters, wives and husbands, and Me, you chose the former; and between notion and truth, you still chose the former. Faced with all manner of your evil deeds, I have simply lost faith in you, I have simply been astounded. Your hearts are unexpectedly so incapable of being softened. The heart’s blood that I have expended for many years has surprisingly brought Me nothing more than your abandonment and resignation, but My hopes for you grow with each passing day, for My day has been completely laid bare before everyone. Yet now you are still pursuing dark and evil things, and refuse to loosen your grip on them. What, then, will be your outcome? Have you ever given careful consideration to this? If you were asked to choose again, what then would be your position? Would it still be the former? Would you still bring Me disappointment and wretched sorrow? Would your hearts still only possess a modicum of warmth? Would you still be unaware of what to do to comfort My heart? At this moment, what do you choose?” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. To Whom Are You Loyal?). What God exposes is our actual state. Many times, we know what is right and what is wrong, what are positive things and what are negative things, but we still choose these wrong and negative things. Just like me, ever since I accepted Almighty God’s work, I knew that as a created being, I should fulfill my duty, but when faced with real-life situations, I still pursued money, reputation, and status. I expended so much energy in order to be admired and looked up to by others, and to gain more money and enjoy a better material life, but ever since I became a believer, I hadn’t done my duty wholeheartedly. I spent my days busy with work, and after work in the evening, when I should’ve been spending time on my duty, all I thought about was how to make more money. I thought that as long as I was doing my duty, this was enough, and I didn’t care at all about whether my duty was yielding any results. I saw that I was truly irreverent and willful in my duty, and that I’d been truly rebellious! I’d believed in God but I’d been unable to truly follow Him, still choosing worldly things and walking the path of a nonbeliever. With God still giving me a chance to do my duty, I should treasure it, and focus my energy on pursuing the truth and fulfilling my duty. This is what is most valuable and meaningful. From then on, I began to actively attend gatherings, and no matter how tight the time was, I no longer let work delay my duty. Before, I always worked overtime after getting back home, even taking work calls at 11 p.m., but now, I stopped taking work calls and messages after 8 p.m. Also, I used to rarely pray and didn’t engage in regular devotionals, but now I was getting up early for devotionals, to read God’s words, to listen to church hymns, and to watch brothers’ and sisters’ experiential testimony videos. In the mornings, I’d invite potential gospel recipients to gatherings, and in the afternoons, I’d gather with them. I’d even use my work breaks to do my duty. Practicing this way filled my heart with peace and joy.

Not long after, a friend invited me to join in on an investment. Before, I hadn’t joined them in the investment because I hadn’t had enough money. But one day in October 2023, my previous company gave me a sum of money as a severance benefit, so I then had enough to join in on the investment. They promised that joining in on the investment would make me a lot of money, and that not only would I be able to buy a car, but I could also build a house, and even travel to other countries. These were all my dreams! I thought to myself, “Investing is just putting in money and there’ll be profit every month, so it won’t affect my duty.” So, my sister and I joined in on the investment together, and we spent 500,000 pesos to get our contract. We received profits for the first two months after investing, but in the third month they couldn’t pay anymore, so we asked for our money back, but they kept making excuses and refused. I was furious. I wanted to recover the capital, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get it back. I was really upset, and I wanted to quickly find a way to earn back the money I’d lost in the investment, as this was the money I had set aside to build a house in my hometown. So, I worked even harder, often putting in overtime. But my salary was delayed due to company restructuring. At that time, I only had a little money left, and even paying rent or buying food became a problem. These things occupied my heart, and once again, I became passive and perfunctory in my duty. I only invited potential gospel recipients to gatherings, but I didn’t actually conduct any follow-ups. I realized that if I went on like this, my state would just keep getting worse, and that I might end up losing the Holy Spirit’s work and be abandoned by God. So I came before God and prayed, “God, please forgive me for being so rebellious toward You. Over these last three months, I’ve been more concerned about my work than my duty. My heart has been entirely occupied with making more money and recovering my investment. Oh God, please don’t leave me. Please enlighten me and guide me back to Your side, back onto the right path. I want to let go of those things that disturb my heart and draw me away from You.”

After this, I read a passage of Almighty God’s words. God says: “The fate of man is controlled by the hands of God. You are incapable of controlling yourself: Even if man always rushes and busies himself on his own behalf, he remains incapable of controlling himself. If you could know your own prospects, if you could control your own fate, would you still be called a created being? In short, regardless of how God works, all His work is for the sake of man. It’s just like how the heavens and earth and all things were created by God to serve man: God made the moon, the sun, and the stars for man, He made the animals and plants for man, He made spring, summer, autumn and winter for man, and so on—all these were made for the sake of man’s existence. And so, regardless of how God chastises and judges man, it is all for the sake of man’s salvation. Even though He strips man of his fleshly hopes, it is for the sake of purifying man, and the purification of man is done for the sake of man’s existence. The destination of man is in the hands of the Creator, so how could man control himself?” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Restoring the Normal Life of Man and Taking Him to a Wonderful Destination).From God’s words, I came to understand that a person’s fate is in God’s hands, and that people cannot change their fate. No matter how hard people work to achieve their goals, or how much they long for a comfortable and beautiful life, whether they achieve it or not isn’t up to them. Just like it was in my case—I wanted to switch jobs and invest to earn more money and fulfill my dreams, and to have a bright future. But not only did I not earn more money—instead, my investment failed and I lost a lot, and ended up wasting a lot of time and energy as well. I failed to fulfill my duty, I lost the work of the Holy Spirit, and my life became even worse. This made me understand that whether a person lives a life of riches or poverty, it has all long since been predestined before they were even born. If God hasn’t predestined me for great wealth and fortune, then no matter how hard I work to make money, I’ll only end up failing.

Later, I read more of God’s words and gained more clarity about my problems. Almighty God says: “‘Money makes the world go round’ is a philosophy of Satan. It prevails among the whole of mankind, in every human society; you could say it is a trend. This is because it has been instilled in the heart of every single person, who at first did not accept this saying, but then gave it tacit acceptance when they came into contact with real life, and began to feel that these words were in fact true. Is this not a process of Satan corrupting man? Perhaps people do not have the same degree of experiential knowledge of this saying, but everyone has different degrees of interpretation and acknowledgment of this saying based on things that have happened around them and on their own personal experiences. Is that not the case? Regardless of how much experience someone has with this saying, what is the negative effect that it can have on someone’s heart? Something is revealed through the human disposition of the people in this world, including each and every one of you. What is it? It is the worship of money. Is it hard to remove this from someone’s heart? It is very hard! It seems that Satan’s corruption of man is deep indeed! Satan uses money to tempt people, and corrupts them into worshiping money and venerating material things. And how is this worship of money manifested in people? Do you feel that you could not survive in this world without any money, that even one day without money would be impossible? People’s status is based on how much money they have, as is the respect they command. The backs of the poor are bent in shame, while the rich enjoy their high status. They stand tall and proud, speaking loudly and living arrogantly. What does this saying and trend bring to people? Is it not true that many people make any sacrifice in order to get money? Do many people not lose their dignity and integrity in the pursuit of more money? Do many people not lose the opportunity to perform their duty and follow God for the sake of money? Is losing the chance to gain the truth and be saved not the greatest of all losses for people? Is Satan not sinister to use this method and this saying to corrupt man to such a degree? Is this not a malicious trick?” (The Word, Vol. 2. On Knowing God. God Himself, the Unique V). From God’s words I came to understand that “Money makes the world go round” is a satanic philosophy. At first, I had no discernment about this saying, and I only knew that without money, people couldn’t live a good life or get what they wanted. Thinking about it now, this is indeed a trick Satan uses to corrupt people. Satan corrupts and lures people through money, making them believe that only by having money will they be respected, able to gain a foothold in society, and be looked up to. I lived by these rules of survival, and I was filled with a thirst to make money. I wasn’t content with a fixed monthly income and fell for Satan’s trap by going into investment. I thought that in this way I could earn more money and realize my dreams—build a house, travel with my family, and live a life others would look up to and admire. To pursue money and material pleasure, I kept putting my duty aside, and my heart drifted further and further from God. I lived in darkness, and I was unable to feel the Holy Spirit’s work. Now I clearly saw the schemes and conspiracies Satan uses to mislead people, namely, to entrap people in the snare of money, making their hearts stray from God and betray Him, until they are finally cast into hell with it. I also saw that many wealthy people—though they lead lives of luxury and could buy whatever they wanted, like beautiful houses, expensive cars, and so on, seeming to live carefree lives—are not truly happy. Some die from serious illnesses caused by long-term alcohol and drug abuse, and no amount of wealth or renown can save their lives. Others start businesses, but after many years of hard work, they still end up bankrupt, and are left deep in debt. Some people can’t bear the pressure, fall into long-term depression, and eventually commit suicide. There are so many examples of this. Satan uses money and lives of luxury to lure people, causing people to live ever more empty, evil, and depraved lives. After this failure, I no longer thought about how to recoup my investment, and I became willing to submit to God’s sovereignty and arrangements, and to put my heart into my duty.

On January 2, 2024, our company got a new manager, and my workload increased. In addition to my original job, I also became his personal assistant. This made my work even busier, and I was on standby for work almost 24/7. But this time, I told myself that no matter what, I couldn’t let this affect my duty. Later, a church supervisor asked if I was willing to train to give sermons and preach the gospel, and I agreed. I was truly joyful and I felt this was an opportunity given to me by God. I’d believed in God for so long, but I’d always pursued money and I hadn’t done my duty well, so this time, I would really cherish this chance. From then on, I devoted more time to preaching the gospel. But my work kept getting busier, and even after getting home from work at night, my manager often called or messaged me. Sometimes when I was fellowshipping with a potential gospel recipient, my manager or coworkers would call me, and I couldn’t quiet my heart while doing my duty. But I didn’t want to lose the chance to do my duty again, so I prayed to God to guide me and give me strength. I remembered the Lord Jesus’ words: “What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). From the Lord’s words, I came to understand that even if I gained great wealth and also gained status and reputation, if I didn’t have God’s protection and hadn’t gained the truth and life, in the end, my outcome would still be destruction. In this world, many wealthy people have abundant material wealth, but when the catastrophes strike, their money won’t be able to save them at all, and they will still perish if it is their fate. Money and status are useless in the face of catastrophes. I then read a passage of Almighty God’s words: “There is an exceedingly simple way to free oneself from this state, which is to bid farewell to one’s former way of living; to say goodbye to one’s previous goals in life; to summarize and dissect one’s previous lifestyle, view of life, pursuits, desires, and ideals; and then to compare them with God’s intentions and demands for man, and see whether any of them is consistent with God’s intentions and demands, whether any of them delivers the right values of life, leads one to a greater understanding of the truth, and allows one to live with humanity and the likeness of a human being. When you repeatedly investigate and carefully dissect the various goals that people pursue in life and their myriad ways of living, you will find not one of them conforms to the Creator’s original intention with which He created humanity. All of them draw people away from the Creator’s sovereignty and care; they are all traps which cause people to become depraved, and which lead them to hell. After you recognize this, your task is to lay aside your old view of life, stay far from various traps, let God take charge of your life and make arrangements for you; it is to seek only to submit to God’s orchestrations and guidance, to live without individual choice, and to become a person who worships God” (The Word, Vol. 2. On Knowing God. God Himself, the Unique III). From God’s words, I came to understand that I should break away from my old way of living, and live according to God’s intentions and requirements. Reflecting on myself, I saw that although I’d believed in God for several years, because my views on things hadn’t turned around, I always wanted to make lots of money, and I pursued status and fame so that others would look up to me. I was always busy with work, doing my duty perfunctorily and without a sense of burden, and as a result, I lost the Holy Spirit’s work and lived in emptiness and darkness, missing many chances to practice the truth and do my duty. The enjoyment that money, fame, and gain brought me was only temporary, and it couldn’t save my life. Only by pursuing the truth could I cast off my corrupt disposition and attain salvation. During this time, I often prayed, asking God to guide me to make the right decision.

On February 6, 2024, I handed in my resignation to my manager. He was very surprised and asked me why I was quitting, and he even said he wouldn’t agree to it. But I firmly said, “I have more important things to do in the evenings and on my days off, so I can’t continue with this job any longer.” In the end, he had no choice but to agree and sign. On February 12, I left the company. I felt a great sense of relief after leaving, as if a heavy burden had been lifted from my heart. I genuinely felt inner joy and happiness. On February 28, 2024, I was accepted for a new job I’d applied for, and the benefits were decent, with the manager promising a raise after six months. This job was really tempting. But I thought, “This job will be just as busy as my last one, so how will I still be able to do my duty?” I prayed to God to guide me in making the right choice. I thought of God’s words: “As someone who is normal, and who pursues the love for God, entry into the kingdom to become one of the people of God is your true future, and a life that is of the utmost value and significance; no one is more blessed than you. Why do I say this? Because those who do not believe in God live for the flesh, and they live for Satan, but today you live for God, and live to follow the will of God. That is why I say your lives are of the utmost significance. Only this group of people, who have been selected by God, are able to live out a life of the utmost significance: No one else on earth is able to live out a life of such value and meaning” (The Word, Vol. 1. The Appearance and Work of God. Know God’s Newest Work and Follow His Footsteps). From God’s words, I came to understand that pursuing the truth and doing one’s duty well is what gives life true value and meaning, and that this was what I should pursue as a created being. Only those who love and pursue the truth are qualified to enter God’s kingdom, and they are the ones who are truly blessed. But those who constantly pursue money, wealth, fame, and gain are living under Satan’s influence, and they will ultimately be abandoned by God. If I were to give up my duty again for the sake of work, I would surely end up living in darkness and emptiness again, and I would ultimately ruin my chance at salvation. So, I turned down the job. That way, I could have more time to do my duty. Six months later, I found a suitable job. The work hours didn’t interfere with my duty, and there was no overtime. I received a fixed salary each month, and though the pay was a bit lower, I felt at ease, because I now had time to do my duty. Now, I’m doing my duty in God’s house, and I have the chance to preach the gospel and testify to God’s work in the last days. This is a truly blessed thing! I’ve come to realize that it’s enough for us just to be clothed and fed, and that fulfilling our duties and pursuing the truth to gain God’s salvation are the most important and valuable things. Thanks be to God!