EIGHTH SESSION - HISTORY
ADVANCED DP WEBINAR…
Rev. Dr. D. Michael Hentrich Jr.
Welcome back, we're going to begin looking at history from the four families. I added Joseph in there. He's extremely important; and, we'll look at the reason why as we get there. But, I want to mention to you that, as we go through history, I'm not going to do it in the traditional manner, as you might already expect. But, sometimes I feel, in going through history many times in Cheong Pyeong, that sometimes we're so busy looking at every tree and every bush and every plant in the forest that we, we miss the forest. You know, we don't see the big picture, the theme. What's going on here?
And I noticed that history can become very uninteresting and boring. Even teachers have told me that they don't teach history because it's boring. Well, I think we need to look at the them of history. What is going on here and what does it have to do with me. And why should I care about it? And what is it saying to me. And I think we need to look at it that way, once. And it doesn't mean that all the details aren't very critically important. They are. And they're very interesting, if you're very interested in it. And if you're really a history buff, you can go into the book and get lost in all the details. It's wonderful. But, for a lot of us, we want to know, 'What is it all about?'
So, the approach that I'm going to take is more of a sociological explanation rather than a detail of condition by condition by condition. I mean, we're going to look at that; but, ... anyway, you'll see. So, let's do this.
CREATING THE TRADITION
So, what we're talking about here is creating the tradition. Now, I know that certain conditions need to be made for the new Adam to come, the new Adam, which is Jesus. For Jesus to come, conditions have to be made. That's what it's all about, right? But in another sense, in a sociological sense, we can also understand it as creating a tradition, a culture, which can understand Jesus, which can relate to Jesus, which can adore Jesus, which can embrace Jesus. which can get excited about Jesus, which can follow Jesus, and which can want to become like Jesus, prepared for him, a tradition and a culture like that.
For example, let's say The Messiah is coming; and, he's into basketball. He's a basketball whiz. He's a master at it. And but, you're into fishing. So, somebody comes along. The Messiah is born. He's on the earth. He's playing basketball. He's the master. He's the best. And someone comes along to you and says, 'Hey, do you know Jesus?' 'No, I haven't heard of him. What's he about? Is he into fishing?' 'No, he plays basketball.' 'No, I'm not interested in that. If he ties fishing lures and he does bass fishing, then I'll be interested. I'm into fishing. I'm not into basketball.'
So, in that kind of sense, God raised up a people. He started by creating a tradition. And it took Him millions of years, millions of years, to create this tradition. And what is the tradition? What is the tradition? The tradition God started to create right in Adam's family immediately after the Fall ... the tradition God started to create was this tradition:
TWO TYPES OF RESTORATION
SUBSTANCE - 'Love your neighbor ...' (horizontal)
FAITH - 'Love God above all things...' (vertical)
Loving God above all things with your whole heart, mind and soul, that's absolute love of God, right. That's faith. That's the foundation of faith. In other words, healing the broken relationship with God. That's the first main pillar of this new tradition. It's worshiping and loving and coming under One God and giving your life to Him.
And the second part of the tradition is the horizontal tradition, right? loving your enemy, loving your brother, love one another as I have loved you. I mean, these are the things that Jesus taught, right? So, he came and somebody asked Jesus, 'You know, there are 613 laws under Moses, so what's the most important Jesus (They were trying to trick him up). And Jesus said that the first most important law is to love God above all things with your whole heart, mind and soul. And the second is like unto the first, 'Love your neighbor as yourself, love one another...' And later he made that more tight by saying 'Love your enemy, love one another as I have loved you.' So, he understood the Principle perfectly, Jesus did. He expressed it in a little bit different words than we do; but, it's the same.
But, the point is that the tradition that God had tried to instill into the Jewish people in preparation for Jesus was that same tradition, right? Faith, absolute faith, faith of Noah, faith of Abraham, Father Abraham, and the love. Love your enemy, as Jacob and Esau did, right? That's the tradition that God worked millions of years as the first step to prepare the world for the coming of The Messiah. That's the tradition so that they could identify with him, recognize him. So that when Jesus came along teaching these two things, the Jewish people should have said, 'Hey, wow! I like that Jesus. We already believe that. We understood that from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Yeah, that's pretty neat. You just boiled down 613 laws into two. Wow! Do you have a two-day workshop or something we can go to?'
See, that's the kind of preparation that God was giving the Jewish people, sociologically speaking, so that they would recognize Jesus, appreciate him, adore him, learn from him, follow him, believe in him and become like him. God worked a long ... millions of years to create that tradition. So, it's very, very important.
THE MIDWAY POSITION
So, what happened in the Garden of Eden to start this history understanding is that Adam ended up being in the midway position, right? and Eve too and everybody after that. But what does that mean? The point is that Adam was confused. He didn't even know what he did wrong. He didn't know what was up and what was down; and, God couldn't use him. He was right in the middle of this slippery slope. You know, the influence of the dark side is just as loud in his ears as the influence of God. And he was just not useable. God had to separate him.
So, this brings up a very important point: HOW DO WE MAKE SATAN OUR GOD? How do we make the dark side god in our life? We never talk about this. But, in 2009, Bishop Ki Hoon Kim and Joshua Cotter came around the United States. And they came all of a sudden with an emergency message from Father. And we all gathered at the church and we thought, What is this emergency message?' And they came and sat on the stage and they said to us, 'Father said, (very short message), Father said that you have to hear His Words, you have to believe His Words and you have to act on His Words.' That was it. That was the message. It's very profound, actually. And just before hearing that from them, I had read the same thing in Kevin McCarhy's book, The Blood-Stained Voice,' which I'm going to put on my website soon here.
But anyway, he had explained the same kind of concept that this is how we make Satan our god. We make Satan God in our life. Whether we know it or not, whether we're a Moonie or not, whether we ever heard of Rev. Moon or the Principle or not, doesn't make any difference. We hear the dark side's word or perspective on life. We hear it all the time; and, we believe it. We believe it. And then we act and we live our lives according to it. That's how we do it. That's how we make Satan God in our life. WE HEAR HIS WORD, WE BELIEVE HIS WORD AND WE LIVE IT. We hear his word, we believe his word and we live it. We put it into practice. We act accordingly to what we heard.
And Father is saying the same thing, "Hear My Word, believe it and live it and put it into practice in your life.' It's a very big point. If you don't remember anything else from this 12 days, remember that.
So, here he is, Adam, he's in the midway position, right? So, God has to distinguish (him) from good and evil. There has to be some distinguishing here. There has to be some process undertaken here to work this out; so, He divides the situation between his two oldest sons. Actually, Dae Mo Nim said that they had many children. But anyway, Cain and Abel, and Cain was the elder son and Abel was the younger son, second son, the youngest, whatever. It's doesn't matter the order at all. So, how do they know they are Cain and Abel? Did God come to them and give them T-shirts and one said Cain on it and the other said Abel, or baseball caps, a bumper sticker for their car or what?
How do they know they are supposed to be Cain and Abel? How do they know that they received their mission? Well, if you think about it, it's very natural. There doesn't have to be any assignment made to it. The thing is, Cain represents who? Cain represents Lucifer. And Abel represents who? Abel represents Adam. Now, why is that? It's not just because one's older than the other. The main point is that Lucifer has lots of life experience. And that's a good thing; but, it also ended up making him arrogant, thinking that he's better, whatever. So, God had to kind of clean that out, that fallen nature problem. He couldn't respect his younger brother enough.
So, he has more life experience. Well, it just so happens that the older brother naturally has more life experience than his younger brother. I mean, that's the way they think. 'Here, younger brother, I'll show you how to tie your shoe laces. I've done that a thousand times. Here, I'll show you how to do it.' 'Wow! older brother, that's neat.'
The older brother has more life experience; and, that just naturally resonates with the point of view of Lucifer. And Abel resonates with the point of view Adam in this situation; because, he has less life experience. He doesn't know. He hasn't been around the block as many times. It's just natural. So, God did not have to tell them or assign them, 'Hey, you're going to be Cain and you're going to be Abel.' It's just natural. It's the way it's naturally going to fall out and be.
So, in the Principle we say that God related to Abel and Satan related to, Lucifer related to Cain, right? They had one master. Well, let's be a little more accurate here for the sake of future scholars and theologians who know their Bibles who are going to choke on that statement; because, let's face it, God went to Cain, begging with him, pleading with him, 'Cain why has your countenance fallen? (Why is your face so angry?) Don't you know that, if you do well, you'll be accepted. But, if you don't do well, sin is couching at the door. And it's desire is for you; but, you must master it.'
God was pleading and begging with Cain, 'Get over this. Don't let these feelings get the best of you.' Right? And Abel, he had some fallen nature too. Probably a little arrogance and insensitivity, right? We talked about that in our workshops. Well, who's aggravating that? It's the dark side. So, (they did not only have one master). I mean, they're both in the midway position. They're (each) both Cain and Abel. And all of their descendants are in the midway position, including you and me.
So, that means the dark side and God are always influencing us, both. So, to say that Cain has one master and only Lucifer is speaking to him and only God is speaking to Abel is just a little too simplistic here. I mean, it's just not even Biblical. So, we've got to clean that up, that language there, make a little footnote so that people don't choke on it and close the Principle Book and say, 'Well, this isn't even Biblical; so, we don't want to read the rest of it.' No, we have to be accurate in our statements, right? and be clear for people so that they respect it. Do not undermine our credibility. That's what I'm trying to say.
So, God distinguished them. Cain is in the midway position; but, he's more in a position to be influenced by the dark side because he's older. He's got more life experience like Lucifer; so, he's (Cain is) more akin to him (Lucifer). And Abel is in a position to be more akin to his dad because he has less life experience. So, here we go, we're going to replay this whole thing here.
So, God says to Cain and Abel, both of them, 'Show Me your faith.' He's trying to start this tradition now. He's working on it right now. He's going to start creating the tradition, 'Show Me your faith.' And so, Cain is a farmer in the field and he has crops. And he brings that to the altar. And Abel has a flock of animals. And he brings an animal to the altar. And they both show their faith, both of them demonstrated their faith. It doesn't say that Cain's offering was bad. It didn't say that it was unacceptable. It just says that God didn't accept it.
God had to not accept it. So, let's think about this here for a minute. Cain was so mad. Here's painting somebody made of this stuff. Here's Cain with a basket of stuff from his garden. And here's Abel with his lamb. So, they offered this on the altar to God; and, God didn't accept Cain's offering. And Cain got so made that he killed his brother, killed him. This is the vertical offering here that they made. God didn't accept Cain's offering; and so, he killed him (Abel). So, what does that say to us?
THE PRIMARY CHARACTERISTICS OF THE FALLEN NATURE
GOD AND ADAM --- THE FALL --- ARCHANGEL
1. FAILING TO TAKE GOD'S STANDPOINT
2. LEAVING ONE'S PROPER POSITION
3. REVERSING DOMINION
4. MULTIPLYING EVIL
Cain was probably a very sharp guy. He was very smart. He knew what he was doing. His offering was probably perfect in every way; because, he was so mad that God didn't accept it that he killed his brother. I mean, if he had not made his best effort and made a perfect offering, why would he get so mad.
I mean, if his offering... if he had only made a half-hearted effort, you know, kind of sluffed off, not really taking it too seriously, then he, when God didn't accept his offering he may have said, 'Well, you know, I didn't really try my best. I could have done better. I could have done better, but I didn't really put everything into it so, maybe next time ... But no! Oh, no! He killed his brother over this. So, that offering was probably perfect. And so, because he was put into this situation to feel these feelings that Lucifer had felt, then he had to ... he had to do these things.
He had to take God's viewpoint. He had to side with his brother. And he had to reverse all these fallen natures that he was feeling, multiplying evil, reversing dominion, get in his proper position ... He didn't understand all this. He didn't have Divine Principle Book. We have a lot less excuse than Cain had. He didn't have any idea what he was doing. He didn't know what he was doing. God just said, 'Make an offering to Me.' He didn't know anything about the Principle.
All these characters in the history of the providence of restoration, they didn't have a clue what they were doing. We have so much grace. We have the Divine Principle Book. We have lectures. We have workshops. We have Cheong Pyeong. We have some idea what we're doing. It's incredible. But, he didn't have any idea.
So, Father explained what should have happened here to make this right, to do what God was hoping would happen. And it's not so mechanical to kind of dissect all of these four points, you know. It's very simple, very natural. Father said that what should have happened is that Cain should have went to Abel and said, 'Well, Abel, hey, you know God accepted your offering and didn't accept mine; so, how about if we ... and just put his arm around Abel's shoulder and said, 'How about, why don't we make an offering together because I want to be accepted by God too?' That's all. That's all. And they go off together and they make an offering together. And God's just jumping up and down because, that's it. That's all they had to do.
It's not so mechanical and mechanistic, you know. It's not ritualistic. It's just that God wanted them to overcome the fallen natures and love each other and see God in each other. That's all. Make an offering together. That's all they had to do.
Okay, so we have a score board here. We're going to keep track of this. We need a foundation of faith, which is the faithful expression of absolute faith in God. And we need a successful foundation of substance, right? which is the horizontal. I'm just going to call them vertical and horizontal, so that I don't bore you to death, vertical and horizontal. We need to love our enemy and get over this fallen nature stuff.
So, we got a successful offering of faith from both Cain and Abel (just God didn't accept Cain's offering; and, there was a reason for it, right? But, we could not somehow get the successful resolution of the fallen nature when Cain killed Abel. So, now we have to move on to another central figure. And this is millions of years later, you know? Not a few thousand years later. Not twelve hundred years later. It was millions of years later, maybe ten million years later at least, from Father's Words.
So, we're going to talk about Noah's family now. Noah. Well, there's a lot of interesting things to know about Noah's family, in creating this tradition. First of all, God gave Noah this (saying), 'Noah was a righteous man.' (As it says in the Bible). And God said, 'Show me your faith.' The same thing, going to start over again here. And before Noah could start his mission. Actually, the mission comes after ...
Anyway, Mrs. Noah ... She is an interesting person in the Bible because we don't know her name. And my wife and I attended a Blessed Couples' workshop in Korea when we were living there for some time. And the counselor of this workshop made a big deal ... His whole theme was comparing the wife of Noah with the wife of Abraham. And his point was that we know everybody's name in the Bible. The names are just jillions but we don't know Noah's wife (her name). We have no idea about her name and it's such a glaring omission. It's screaming at us. Why do we not know Noah's wife's name? We know everybody's name.
And his belief that he taught was that Noah's wife's name is not there for a reason; because, she didn't support him. She pulled the rug out from under him by complaining and criticizing all the time, 'Where is my husband? He's up on that hill building that darn boat when the farm needs work. And the cattle and the animals need to be cared for and fed. And where's the money. And he's up on that hill building that stupid boat every day'
So, the point is that this kind of attitude (as he taught it, which is probably correct) soaked into the children, the sons paving the way for the problem later on after the flood, so that they couldn't respect their father. I mean, why couldn't they respect their father? The story seems so clear that they just had a problem with their dad, maybe even before the flood. So, the theory here is that they got (that attitude) from the mom. And that's why we don't have her name. Her name is omitted. It's a big, glaring omission.
So, we don't know all this stuff for sure; but, it's probably right. So, we have the story. He builds the boat all of his life. He sacrifices everything. God is number 1 in his life. It's very clear what the story is saying.
And, we have this arc. You know, there's some rich people in the world, who took all the detailed instructions in the Bible and they built an arch. The arc symbolizes the creation. You know, we're starting over again. Every central figure has to restore all the failures of the past before they can start their own mission.
So, the arc represents the creation and Noah's family, the eight members of his family represented Adam's family. He's restoring the past and then he can do his own mission. Mother and Father had to do the same. This is a very important point to catch and hang onto for later.
(picture) So, here's one example. This rich guy built this arc. This is in the Netherlands. It's awesome. I don't know how accurate it is; but, it's pretty neat. There are several ... There's one in Texas and there's several around the world where people tried to build an arc.
So anyway, you know the story. When he finished the arc, the animals came in but the people didn't come in because they didn't believe him. His family went in the arc. And then the rain came. And it rained and rained and rained, right? So, we call this the forty-day flood judgment. That's what we call it; but, you need to know that the flood wasn't forty days. You need to know that; because, some Christian person, or anybody who reads the Bible is going to point their finger in your face and say, 'The flood wasn't forty days.' And you're going to say, 'Oh yeah, Dr. Michael told us that. I knew that. No, the flood was a hundred and fifty days. So, how is it that we say 'forty-day-flood judgment?' Well, it rained for forty days and forty nights. That's where we get that. So, that's fine. That's fine; but again, so that people don't choke on that who know the Bible, why don't we put a little footnote on the bottom of the page, 'The forty-day-flood judgments refers to the forty days of rain. It rained for forty days and forty nights.' (Then they can say, 'Okay.') Because if we call it a forty-day flood, we just discredit ourselves.
The Bible says that the flood was a hundred and fifty days; so, people who read that are going to say, 'Well, I'm not going to read that anymore. They don't even know their Bible.' We don't need to do that. It doesn't change the Principle at all. We just need to be very clear and accurate in what we're saying, put a little footnote there at the bottom of the page.
Okay, so then there's lots of symbolism in the story; and, I'm not going to go through all that. I don't have time as you know. And so, it's interesting reading. Read about all that stuff, all the symbolism. And when the flood was over then Noah opened the door, the hatch, and let this bird go out three times. And he came back and revealed that the waters were going down. You know, it's interesting. There's so much symbolism here. Noah could have just stuck his head out of the hole and looked himself, right? He didn't have to send he bird out. But it's symbolism here. It's very symbolic and it's a very amazing story. It's so great.
So, the flood's over and the water goes down and the land dries and he sets up his homestead again. And he makes a farm and sells grapes. And Noah's about 500 years old now or 350 years old, 530 years old. I can't remember. Anyway, he's really old. I don't know exactly how old he was; but, he was old. So, from here the story is very clear about what it is trying to convey to us. Noah is an old man. He's killed himself to make this boat to save his family from the flood. And his family owes him everything, right, their life, their future. And he drinks too much wine from his vineyard. And it's a hot day. He takes his clothes off and lays down and takes a nap. He drank too much wine and he's laying naked. Where is he laying naked? Where is he laying naked, anyway? Is he out on a picnic table somewhere in a park exposing himself to the public? No. He's in his bedroom with the door shut, his tent. He's in his tent and the flap is shut. He's in his bedroom. I mean, is that so bad?
I understand how it connects to the nakedness of Adam and Eve. I understand that. That's correct, of course. It's all correct; but, I'm just making a point that the story bends over backwards to tell us that he's in a fairly respectable situation with the door shut. And his son, Ham, comes in an discovers his nakedness. And he gets all angry about it because he's naked. 'Oh, what a dirty old man.' He's disgusted at his nakedness. It really keys in on the Adam and Eve ... They lost their innocence in the garden. That's exactly his feeling. He's really connected to the dark side, Ham is. He's really connected to the dark side's thinking and feeling. He's really bought into that point of view, he believes it and he's living it. He goes to get his two brothers in and they cover their father's nakedness with the same disgust and attitude that Ham had. He's multiplied his evil to them; and, they've disqualified themselves from the Cain/Abel relationship, right. So, we understand that.
So, you know, because they couldn't respect their father (and maybe it comes from the mother from when he started building this boat, whatever. They lost the qualification to be the central figure in this dynamic. We also say that Ham is the second son in the position of Abel, which is correct. I mean, Father said that, so that's correct. If the Bible is not in line with what Father said, then Father's Word is correct, because He knows. We don't hold the Bible in front of Father's statement. But it just so happens that here is another good place for a footnote so that people don't choke on this. It says in the Bible that Ham is not the second son. It says it twice very specifically. Ham is the youngest son (which is fine. He's younger. It doesn't matter if he's the second son or third son. He's not the second son, it says.
However, we can argue successfully with a Christian person that he's the second son, because it says three times in that story, Shem, Ham and Japeth; Shem, Ham and Japeth; Shem, Ham and Japeth. Well, we can stand on that. And they can accept that. Why would it say that, if he wasn't the second son. So, we have every right to say from the Biblical perspective that Ham is the second son. So, I just want to bring that up to you in case somebody says that. That's why I'm trying to help you here. You should know how to come back at them, 'Yeah, I know that; but, it says Shem, Ham and Japeth.
Now, Father said about what should have happened in the story. (Remember we talked about Cain and Abel and what should have happened?) What should have happened here in this story according to Father? What should have happened? Father said Ham, when Ham looked in the tent and saw his father's nakedness, he should have said to himself, 'Oh, my elder father, he's tired. He's hot. He gave his life for us. He's such a great man. And then Father said that Ham should have taken his clothes off and laid down with his father to show unity with his father sleeping naked next to him, to show unity of heart. Father said that that is what should have happened.
So, you see, it's very natural, providence. It's not so mechanical. It's very natural what should have happened there. And there's another big thing about this that Mrs. Eu brought up in her gold-colored book here that I always hold up here that you should read. There's a couple of pages in there that I don't understand what she's saying; but, most of it is just gold. Anyway, she talks on page 313 in there about this story; and, she says that, actually, you know, Father used to make proclamations about every week it seemed like for a while there, proclamation after proclamation. And we didn't know what He's talking about or why He's doing it; and, I always wondered, 'Why is He making all these proclamations?' And Mrs. Eu explains that, actually, Father (She asked Father about proclamations and He explained about proclamations) said, 'A proclamation is a special kind of dedication.'
I mean, after the flood Noah did build an altar and offer his experience to God. He did do that. But, it wasn't technically a proclamation. So, a proclamation is a special kind of dedication ceremony where you, in a sense, put a big stake in the ground. Boom! It's like in your computer it's called a restore point. You can always go back to that point if something goes wrong afterward and restore your computer.
So, a proclamation, He said, is like putting a stake in the ground so that ... if Noah had made a proclamation, a formal proclamation properly after the flood, then no matter what the sons did, the value of the flood judgment would have been saved, preserved forever as a foundation of faith for the providence. It wouldn't be lost. It can't be lost. No matter what happens afterwards, it cannot be lost because you're putting a stake in the ground and you can never go back from there. It doesn't matter what anybody does, you can't take it away. So, Father knew the value of proclamations; but, how could Noah know that? He didn't know anything what he's doing.
So, that's an amazing thing. I didn't know that.
until I read that I didn't know why Father made all these proclamations. Every inch that He made in the providence, He put another stake in the ground and made another proclamation and, 'Boom!' every inch... You know, it's like cross country skiing. You put the pole in the ground and you can't slide backwards. So, that's very interesting, I think, to me, the value of proclamations. Noah should have made a proclamation. He didn't know that.
Father said, "In a family, who is at the center? The person who is the oldest member of the family, that is, if the great grandfather is still living, he would be the center of the family. If the other family members choose to ignore him just because he will soon pass away, it would be the same as ignoring their vertical world. Even if he became senile, he should still be the center of that family." CSG, Page 1501
Wow! So, Father is talking about Himself, right? how our attitude should be toward the vertical world through Father.
And here now, the scoreboard again, God said to Noah, 'Show me your faith.' And he did that. But because of the sons, they pulled the rug out from under his providence and so it failed. The horizontal foundation of substance was lost, couldn't even start it, couldn't even do it.
So, now we go on to Abraham, right? We go on to Abraham, Abraham's family. Now there's a lot of interesting things in Abraham's family. And again, central figures and failures of the past have to be restored before he can even begin his mission. So, if you notice in Abraham's story, he had this beautiful wife, Sari, who later was called Sarah. And she must have been gorgeous fashion model or something, I don't know, because he was going around with her and some soldiers from Egypt saw them. And they wanted to take her and bring her to the pharaoh to be in his harem.
So, this counselor in this Blessed couples' workshop commented a lot about Abraham and Sarah. And he pointed out that Abraham's attitude was really kind of strange because his attitude was, 'Well, okay you go ahead. Just don't tell him that I'm her husband so he doesn't kill me.' It's like, wow ... I mean, how would you feel, ladies, if your husband said, 'Well, you go ahead and be in his harem, but don't tell him that I'm your husband.' Anyway, it's okay, but she was such an incredible woman of faith. She just went with him no matter what. That's his main point, was that she seemed to be so different than Noah's wife who seemed to be against him all the time. (Father did say that she, Noah's wife, was against him).
So, because she (Abraham's wife) was returned to him without being defiled, that was restoration of the Garden of Eden story, right? in some symbolic sense. And then he was asked to make an offering, 'Show me your faith.' So he had to offer all these animals. And you know all the symbolism there. I'm not going to go through all that; but, he didn't cut the birds, right? He kills the birds and the birds were dead but he didn't cut them in half.
And the story really makes it clear what the story is saying. These birds of prey came down on the carcasses...this 'carcass' means 'dead bodies,' so, the birds were dead ... but he shewed them away and he went to sleep. And in his dream he was cursed that his descendants would suffer in a land that is not theirs for four hundred years, because of this, because of what he had done. So, his attitude was lousy. I mean, think about it. He had slaves to help him with this offering. He had to offer a heifer. A heifer is a huge animal. It weighs thousands of pounds, a big cow. You have to kill it, drain the blood, cut the animal in half from head to tow and burn it on the altar. It's a huge job. But cutting the birds?
I mean, those knives were not real light weight. They're heavy steel knives. You could probably just drop the knife, just drop the knife on the bird to cut it in half. It doesn't take any work. It doesn't take any time. So, it' very clear what this story is tying to say. He had a wrong attitude. That's what the story is trying to say. So, after he failed this offering then he had to go back again and restore again the Garden of Eden scene. So, the same thing happened again. You know, his beautiful, ravishing, gorgeous wife, he was traveling around with her and some soldiers from the King of Gerar from Abimalech saw her and they wanted to take her back to be in his Harem.
And Abraham said the same thing, 'Well, you go ahead, but don't tell them that I'm your husband (same kind of crazy thing). So, anyway, she went and she was not defiled they realized ... And he got all kinds of money and jewels and gold from these two kings because they were mad, 'Why, didn't you tell us that he's your husband. I wouldn't have taken you into my harem.' And they returned Sarah to him without defiling her. So, the very same thing happened again. It's very clear that the central figure has to restore everything in the past before he can go on with his own mission.
Then God said, 'Okay, I'll give you another chance. You offer your son, Isaac, on the altar.' Because he didn't have any children. But God had promised him children who would number as the stars of the sky, if you could number them. But he didn't have any sons. So, Sarah said to Abraham, 'You take my servant girl, Hagar, and you have a son with her because I seem to be barren. I don't seem to be able to have any kids.' So, he did. He had a son with Hagar, the servant girl. And his name was, Ishmael. And he became the ancestor of what is now the Muslim culture. And after that, Sarah became pregnant. This often happens, right?
Sarah became pregnant. She had a son with Abraham. That was his real, full-blooded son, not by a concubine; and, his name was 'Isaac,' right? So we have Isaac and Ishmael.
And Sarah had a problem. She was jealous of Hagar. So, she kicked Hagar out; but, Abraham brought them back, took them back in. Then, it's not Cain and Abel. It's a female problem that has to be resolved; and, you're going to hear more about it later.
So then, Ishmael and Isaac are growing up together, little boys; and, Sarah gets angry again and says to herself, 'I'm not going to let Ishmael have the inheritance of my husband. It's going to go to Isaac.' So, she kicked them out again. And God had sympathy for Hagar and Ishmael and promised them great blessings. And so, Sarah had a real issue there that had to be restored later on, even by True Mother.
So, when we get into the story where God asked Abraham to sacrifice his son on the altar, here's one point here where you've got to be careful; because, if you're teaching Muslims, (Muslims are very easy to teach the Principle to. They love the Fall of Man; because, they already believe it's a sexual fall but just don't know the details. They like the whole Principle a lot. We used to have Muslim leaders with us at the big seminars; and, they were just jumping up and down, 'Wow, the Principle is so great. Why do you use the Bible? Why don't you use the Koran?' That's what they said to us.) there's two points that you need to watch if you teach Muslims and one point is this one:
They believe that God...that Ishmael was taken up on the hill and sacrificed on the altar, not Isaac. They'll be more than angry at you if you say that it was Isaac not Ismael and you might burn your bridge with that. So, when Rev. Michael Jenkins used to teach OSDP Seminars and he had Muslims in the audience, he would be very smart. He would say, 'And God told Abraham to take his son up on the hill side and make an altar and offer him.' He didn't mention which one, so that Muslims are happy because they thought it was Ishmael and the Christians are happy because they thought it was Isaac. And he just didn't say.
The other thing is that, when you're teaching a Muslim, they don't have any problem with Father being the Messiah and True Parents. In their book Father would be the Messiah; because, they think that Jesus is coming back. So, they don't have any problem with that. But if you say that Father is a profit, they'll kill you. This is because Mohammed is the last profit in their book. There can't be another profit; but, Father being the Messiah, that's okay.
But if you're teaching a Christian person that Father is a profit, that's okay. They don't care about that. But if you say He's the Messiah. 'Oh, no, that can't be.' You just have to maneuver through these big mind fields. That's the only thing you have to watch.
So, here's the picture of Abraham. He's making that vertical offering; and, he's shewing the birds of prey away. (By the way, it says birds of prey ... eagles ... birds of prey, never mind, we'll talk about the other one later) Okay, the birds of prey came down. They want to get those dead birds and eat them; and, he's shewing them away.
So then, he goes up on the hill, Mt.
Moriah, to offer Isaac. He builds this altar. Isaac carries the sticks. He
knows what's going on. Isaac totally cooperates, not
like Ham, totally opposite of Ham
and his brothers. (He was even pushing his father (We got this revelation from
the spiritualists), 'Father, what are you doing. You've been wandering around for three days. You know, God's waiting for your offering. Let's
go! And even when he's lying on the altar, 'Come on
father, God's waiting.' He knows he's the offering. He
knows he's going to be killed. He knows he's going to be sacrificed. He's
pushing his father, 'Come on, God's waiting for you.'
So, Father said that if Isaac had complained in his heart, even once, he could be the central figure. He could not make a successful offering if he complained even once in his mind and heart, even if he didn't say it (out loud). Wow! Complaining is really poison. So, he raised the knife and before he could kill Isaac on the altar and offer him, this angel appeared and said, 'Stop. Do not lay your hand on the lad, for now I know that you fear God.' Genesis 22: 9-12 And they turned around and they found a little animal in the bush and they offered it together.
So, here's some real angel talk, right? 'Now, I know that you fear God, you fear God.' That's kind of the angel (like) perspective, isn't it? I mean, if Jesus had appeared and said that, he may have said, 'Now, I know you love God more than anything else in your life, even your own son.' But, fearing God, that's a little bit angelic there. But, that's okay. That's the way they are.
ABRAHAM'S OFFERING OF ISAAC
GOD
ABRAHAM
SLAY AND OFFER ISAAC ON MT. MORIAH
GENESIS 22: 9-12 'Stop. Do not lay your hand on the lad. For now I know that
you fear God.' .
VERTICAL - CAIN/ABEL
successful offering of faith
HORIZONTAL - CAIN/ABEL unsuccessful
offering of substance
(requiring another central figure set up as much as ten million years later,
not merely 2,000 years)
VERTICAL - NOAH
successful offering of faith
HORIZONTAL - NOAH'S FAMILY
unsuccessful offering of substance
(requiring another prolongation and another central figure set up)
ABRAHAM
VERTICAL OFFERING
First One successful
Second One required successful
(both successful largely because of Sarah's faith and unity with God and
husband)
HORIZONTAL OFFERING
First one unsuccessful (failure to cut the doves and 400 years of slavery of
his ancestors)
Second Chance with the offering of Isaac successful AND ISAAC ALSO JOINED IN
THAT FAITH
(largey because of Isaac's willingness and encouragement to Abraham to give God
the offering of himself)
So, what's the scoreboard here now? Abraham failed the first time to demonstrate absolute faith but he succeeded the second time. And Isaac also now joined in that faith with his father and inherited that faith, stood on that faith. So, we're done with the faith now. We have established the vertical tradition, the tradition. So, all Christians and Jews say that the father of their faith is Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
Abraham and Isaac showed absolute faith in what Jesus came teaching, 'Love God above all things with your whole heart, mind and soul.' That's absolute faith. That's where they get this tradition. Did Abraham know what he was doing? No. Did he wake up one day and say, 'Well, I think I need to make a foundation of faith here. I'd better go out ...' No. He had no idea from a providential perspective what he was doing. Isaac didn't either. They didn't have a Divine Principle Book. And we just take it for granted, 'Oh well yeah, that book. Some day I might read it.' We take it so casually. Those guys, if they had a Divine Principle Book, history would be all different, right?
We have it. Sometimes we don't really appreciate it, 'Hoondokhae, hoondokhae again? Geez... I have to read that thing every day...'
So, next we have here this slide. It talks about offering Isaac and making the foundation of faith. But, it says here in the Principle Book, this paragraph's sentence that "Abraham's zeal to do God's Will and his resolute actions carried out with absolute faith, obedience and loyalty lifted him up to the position of already having killed Isaac. Therefore, he completely separated Isaac from Satan.'
Okay, 'completely separated Isaac from Satan.' So, talk to me now. Put your thinking caps on. Here we go again. Don't we need a little footnote here. Okay, 'completely separated Satan from Isaac.' Does that mean Isaac doesn't have any original sin any more? No. Does that mean Isaac has no collective sin any more? No. Does that mean that Isaac has no ancestral sin any more? No. Does that mean Isaac has no personal sin any more? No. So, what does it mean? 'completely separated Isaac from Satan.'
We've got to really understand this, okay? So, here we are, the midway position. So, by making this incredible offering on the altar whereby Abraham was giving his life by killing his son and Isaac was ready to give his life because it was an offering to God, by that absolute offering of faith, now Isaac is way over here to God's side on this midway position. But he's still in the midway position.
So, now we're going to talk about Isaac's family.
https://www.facebook.com/300617987127985/videos/315174589005658/
EIGHTH SESSION - HISTORY
ADVANCED DP WEBINAR..
.
Rev. Dr. D. Michael Hentrich Jr.
ISAAC'S FAMILY
So, Isaac had two sons, twins, born to Rebecca, Esau and Jacob. And it says in the Bible that God told Rebecca that the elder will serve the younger. Two nations are at war in your womb. The elder will serve the younger. Well, it didn't say that Esau will serve Jacob, it said that the elder will serve the younger; because, that's the providence. That's the restoration formula. But, people don't know that. Only we know that. Only Father discovered that and showed us that this is what it's all about. Nobody knew that. Rebecca didn't understand that; but, she just had total faith in her revelation.
So, she raised them up; and, Esau became a hunter and Jacob liked to hang around mom and cook and stuff. And they were both good boys. And when they were older, Esau was out hunting and he was hunting for one week and could not catch anything. And he came home and he said, 'Jacob, I'm starving. I couldn't catch anything all week.' He (Jacob) was cooking some soup and some stuff; and, Esau said, 'Give me some food. And Jacob said, 'Well, I'll give you some food if you give me your birthright.' You know, the inheritance of the family. And Esau said, 'Well, what good is the birthright if I starve to death. Go ahead, you can have it.' You know, people don't recognize very clearly that Esau kind of forsook his birthright at that time. But he thought it was a joke. He didn't really pay attention to it, take it seriously. He didn't really take it seriously. He thought it was just small talk.
This painting by the way is a little inaccurate, right? I don't know what the artist was thinking when he made this painting; because, here's Jacob cooking and here's Esau holding a deer, right? And there's a wolf looking at the deer with hungry eyes. He wants to eat the deer. So but, the story is that Esau came back empty handed when he was hunting. So, anyway, I don't know where Henry got this idea when he painted this painting.
So, life went on and Isaac was blind and losing his health, although he did live for a long time after that. And he decided to give the inheritance, give the blessing. So, he called Esau to his room and said, 'Hey, go and hunt my favorite venison meat, which is deer meat, and bring it to me and make a big banquet. And I want to give you the blessing now. And he was all pumped up, 'Wow!' So, he went off hunting and he's going to find that deer.
And Rebecca heard that. She pushed Jacob in there. She said, 'You've got to get in there and convince your father that you're Esau and get that blessing from him. And Jacob just refused. He said, 'I can't do that. That's not right. No. I'm not going to do that.' And she just insisted. Rebecca was the champion in the first part of the story. She just insisted, put an animal skin on him. And you know the story. So, he gets the blessing from his father, tricks his father.
And Esau comes home. And from here I realized some really deep things about Esau. I mean, like Cain. Cain wasn't all bad at all. I think he was a good guy. We don't have any reason to think not. And you know, Esau came back and said, 'Here I am father. And Isaac said, 'Well, I already gave it. And they both knew what happened. And Esau says to his father, 'But father, don't you have a blessing for me?' It was such a touching statement. He wants a blessing from his father. So, his father gave him a blessing; but, it wasn't the for real blessing. But, it really showed Esau's heart. He wants a blessing from God through his father. It was just very touching to see that.
But then after a while Esau just boiling and boiling and getting madder and madder. And Rebecca says, 'Jacob, you better get out of here. He's going to kill you. So, she sends him to her brothers house, Uncle Laban, right? So, Jacob goes to Uncle Laban's house. What does he have when he's on the way to Uncle Laban's house? I mean, he got the blessing. He got the inheritance of the family, right? But, what does he really have? He has nothing. He has the shirt on his back. He doesn't have any money. Esau got everything. Esau has the ranch. Esau has the servants. Esau has the cattle, the money. Esau has everything ... from a material point of view. Esau had everything. The point is that Esau was not a materialistic person. Then, Esau would have said, 'Hey, good riddens brother. I hope I never see your face again. Go away, cause I got the blessing. You didn't get the blessing. I got it.' He got all the material things; but, what did he want? He didn't care about that.
Esau was a good guy. Esau wanted God's blessing. That's the only thing he didn't get. The only thing he didn't get was God's blessing through his father. It really penetrated me. I thought, 'Wow.' I know he wanted to kill his brother. He hired four hundred men and gave them weapons and kept them on the payroll for twenty-one years, waiting for his brother to come back to kill him. He was so angry; but, he was angry because he didn't get God's blessing, that's all. He got everything else.
So, Jacob goes to Uncle Laban; and, you know the story. I don't have time to go over it; but, Jacob gets tricked and tricked and tricked over and over again by Laban, tricked our of money, tricked out of cattle. He wanted to marry Rachel, his (Laban's) beautiful second daughter. But, he went through the marriage ceremony and he woke up the next morning with Leah, her older sister that he didn't want.
And I always thought that story was kind of funny and strange, you know. How could it be? But, this Jewish brother, who was the first Jewish man to join our community, to join True Parents and was studying to be a rabbi so that he knows everything about this stuff he said, 'Oh no, you don't understand Hebrew tradition at that time.' He said, 'At that time you don't even know who you're marrying untill after the ceremony is over and you lift her veil.' And I thought 'Wow! ... wow' That makes our matching look like nothing, right? So, you don't even know who you're marrying.
So, he's tricked and tricked and tricked. Why was Jacob tricked so many itmes by Uncle Laban. He was tricked and tricked and tricked because he needed to learn the heart of his brother who was tricked out of the inheritance. He needed to learn.
By the way, Father said that He (Father) didn't really feel very good about the way that this was all done. He said that it was by trickery and was too messy. It's not really clear. Jewish people don't even recognize Jacob as the good guy that he was. They think he's bad. Father said that it should not have been done that way. It should have been done a different way.
Father said that Noah shouldn't have been lying naked in the tent either. It confuses people. It should have been done a different way. It confuses the position. In the indirect dominion, God uses what you do. God uses these things. It may not be what God had in mind, but He uses it because it fits the need of the providential circumstance and He (God) uses it. But, maybe it's not the best way to do it. Father said that Noah's lying naked in the tent was not the best way to do it even though it did connect with Adam and Eve's nakedness and failure. I understand that. And Jacob and Esau, the trickery ... That wasn't the best way to do it. Interesting.
So, why did Jacob have to be tricked over and over again? Because he had to learn the heart of his brother. See, Father said that it's not enough just to have perfected love. You can't go to Heaven just by perfecting your love. You can't just grow perfect love and go to Heaven. You have to learn how to overcome Satan in your life. So, St Paul said that Jesus became the Messiah through his suffering and struggles. In other words, he had to experience Satan in his life and learn how he works and how to overcome it and deal with it. Father too. Father had to learn all about Satan in his life. He was not born with (that victory). He had to learn it and overcome it and resolve it. Father said that you can't just grow perfect love and go to Heaven. You have to overcome all the fallen nature and evil, you know, Satan, in your life. Jacob had to do that. Jesus had to do that. Father had to do that. We have to do that.
Same thing, Buddha. He had to leave the comfort of the palace and go out into the world so that he could find nervana, what it's all about. And he learned how to, kind of, reach some inner peace inside by his meditations and reflections. So, you can't just take a comfortable and learn what you need to learn and grow what you need to grow. You've got to master.
So, Jacob eventually takes his family and all of his stuff and he runs away from Laban. And that was a hot pursuit kind of thing. I don't have time to talk about it; but, it was an interesting story. He (Laban) wasn't going to let Jacob leave. But he did. He got away. And he finds this angel and he wrestles with this angel. And Father said that this is what is really more important than re-uniting with Esau, more important that he fight with this angel and overcome. Because somebody had to set the record straight. Where Lucifer had dominated humanity, now humanity has to take its rightful dominion over the angel. So, this is very important, as Father said, more important. And so, the angel knocked Jacob' hip out of joint. The angel wanted to leave because the sun was rising and Jacob said, 'You're not going anywhere until you give me a blessing. The angel turned around and gave him a blessing and said, 'Your name will be 'Israel' which means 'the victorious one' 'the victor'. And that's where the name 'Israel' comes from. And Jacob went on with his dislocated hip, the thigh bone. And he hobbled along until he came to Esau.
And he came to Esau. And there's Esau on the distant horizon. So, he lines up his family and his flocks and his servants and everything. And Jacob pushes them (his family) ahead of him. He's scared when he sees the four hundred armed men waiting to kill him. Anyway, he limps along until he's at the foot of Esau. And he bows seven times. And he gets up and they embrace each other and they hug each other and Jacob says, 'When I see your face, it's like seeing the Face of God.' And they cry and they hug each other. And I thought, 'Man! This is the victory.' I mean, it is the victory; but, finally somebody overcame the fallen natures and loved their enemy and resolved this thing. Finally, the tradition, the horizontal tradition is now set. Wow! This is huge. It's so huge.
But actually, Father said, 'All central figures fell short and didn't do everything that God wanted them to do.' And I always thought to myself, 'Well, it seemed like Jacob and Esau did it all.' I mean, where is the shortcoming here. But actually, if you dig and do your homework you find out that Father explained that actually, after they embraced each other here, there was a big blowout. And it had severe effects on the providence, and it was not good.
So what happened here is, after they embraced each other and made small talk or whatever, then Esau said to Jacob, 'Hey, brother bring your families and your flocks and your kids and your servants and everybody and come and move in again at the homestead. And we'll live together. What a good guy Esau is. Esau said that, 'Come, brother.' He wanted to kill him; but, now he's forgiven him. 'Come and live with us.' 'Come and live together on the homestead.' And Jacob said, 'Sure, brother.' And after Esau left and went back to the homestead, Jacob took his family and all of his things and he ran away. Jacob ran away.
He didn't go and live with his brother. He ran away. He went to a far away place and set up a homestead there for himself, far away from Esau. They never lived together after that. Father said that was a huge mistake, big mistake, big mistake. And it made a lot of repurcussions of the providence after this. Jacob ran away. Esau is a good guy. He's really a good guy.
Anyway, that's how it went. And that's why now we have a victorious union of Jacob and Esau here; but, there's another chapter. And that's Jacob's family. Now we've got Jacob's family.
Have you ever wondered why on the timelines of history, we have Joseph here now? It's not because we need an extra few years on the timeline here that we're going to stick Joseph on here. Because Jacob and Esau did it all, that's not why Joseph is on there. The first timeline ends with Joseph. The first timeline is establishing the tradition; but, Jacob and Esau made a big mistake here, big blowout. We don't talk about it. Jacob and Esau never lived together and now we have the story of Joseph. (It's very important in order to understand about Moses, so I need to talk to you about that in a little bit.)
Joseph was the first son of Rachel andiii her other son was Benjamamin. And all the other kids were born to Leah; and, they had a lot of jealousy between them that is another bad thing that has to be restored in future generations, future providential things. But anyway, to make a long story short, Jacob really loved Joseph, his favorite son. Joseph had dreams and interpreted dreams and had a coat of many colors. Any anyway, his brothers just hated him. They were so jealous of Joseph. And they wanted to kill him. So, they made a plan that they're going to take him out into the woods and kill him.
And they took him. And on the way, Judah, who was the righteous one among them convinced the other brothers, 'Well, maybe we shouldn't kill him ourselves with our own hands. It's too bloody and messy and bad; so, why don't we just dig a whole, a big whole and we'll throw him in the hole and we'll let some animal kill him. And we'll just take his clothes and put some animal blood on there and bring them back to our father and tell him he's dead. How about that?' That was Judah's idea. So, they did that. They dug this big hole and they threw him in there and they were going to leave him to die.
And they were walking away with this bloody clothing that they had to give to their father. And they saw on the distant horizon, they saw some caravan of traders going to Egypt to trade slaves. They were selling slaves to Egypt. And they (Jacob's brothers) thought, 'Hey, wait a minute here. We can get some pocket change out of this guy. Why don't we sell him to the slave traders and get some money out of him. That's even a better idea.' So, they pulled him out of the hole and they sold him to the slave traders. And they went home and told their father that he was dead.
So, Joseph goes to Egypt and he's sold on the slave auction to the head of security for the palace, the pharoah's palace. And his name of Podifer. And apparently Joseph was a very handsome young man; because, the wife of Podifer just couldn't get enough of Joseph. She wanted to sleep with him so bad. And the story is that she just tried to tempt him and seduce him so many time; and, he always refused. Such a righteous young man. I mean, they didn't even have something like the ten commandments yet. But he just refused to be seduced by Podifer's wife.
And one day he went into Podifer's house and nobody was around except Podifer's wife. And she just insisted that he get in bed with her. And he refused and was running away. And she grabbed his clothes and tore some of them off, or whatever. And he ran away. What a righteous guy, just unbelievable, right? So, when Podifer came home she said, 'Hey, this Hebrew guy, he tried to rape me. Look it here, here's some clothes from him. So, Podifer, what's he going to do? so, he throws Joseph in jail. So, he sits in jail for years.
Now, Joseph could be complaining. He could be thinking, 'What in the world? Where's God in my life? I tried to be a righteous guy. I tried to be so righteous. I tried to be good; and, here I am sitting in jail.' He could have said that. But he didn't. He did not complain. Such a good guy, like his father, Jacob.
By the way, Father said that, if Jacob had complained in his heart even once, without even saying it, (while he was under Uncle Laban) if he had complained even once, he would have been disqualified from his mission. That's how much complaining is poison for our life of faith. If Jacob had complained even once during all the trickery of Uncle Laban, he would have been disqualified, even if he didn't say it, if he just felt that way. Wow!
So, here's Joseph. He's not complaining either. So, it turns out that two of the pharoah's cooks got thrown in jail with Joseph. And during the time that they were there together they learned about how Joseph could interpret dreams. Because, nothing to do in jail. And one of the cooks died there and one of the cooks went back into the pharoah's kitchen.
And pharoah was having these horrible, horrendous nightmares; and, nobody could interpret it. And so, the cook said, 'Hey, there's this Hebrew guy in jail. He can interpret that dream.' And the pharoah (he was a young guy, the pharoah) said, 'Bring him here.' And they brought Joseph out of jail; and, they told Joseph the dream and Joseph interpreted the dream.
And the pharoah said, 'Wow!' Joseph told him that means that there's going to be seven years of bountiful harvest, followed by seven years of total drought and famine, no rain. And all so many people are going to die if you don't save up all the food in a storage bin so you can feed the people through the seven years of drought.
The young pharoah was so grateful to Joseph. He loved him so much. He made him (Joseph) the Prime Minister of Agriculture in Egypt, which is the No. 2 government position in Egypt. Wow, God must have been thinking, 'Look at that. No. 2 man n Egypt now.' And the pharoah loved him. He even asked him (Joseph) to give him (the pharoah) a prayer of blessing over his kingdom.
So, all of a sudden (after the seven years of bounty), and they wanted to get some food because now there's a drought, there's a famine, there's no food. So, they came to Egypt looking for food. And they didn't expect to see Joseph. And they didn't recognie Joseph either. They didn't know who he was. He probably had a beard now or whatever. So, Joseph was in the room and he hinted at them who he was, but they didn't get it.
So finally, he came out from behind a curtain and he told them who he was and they all cried together and everything. And Joseph told them to go back and get their father and all their relatives back, all their kinsmen and all their family, bring everybody to Egypt and I'll take care of you here. So, that's great. So, that's restoring what Jacob and Esau didn't do. He told his enemies to come here and live together here with me. That was the key point of Joseph's life beside the fact that he became No. 2 man in Egypt. The pharoah loved Joseph so much, he said, 'Yeah ...' He gave him chariots, horses, wagons. 'Whatever you need. Go get your family and bring them here to Egypt.
So, another little thing that we've got to clarify and put a little footnote in the Principle Book about is how we say that it was 400 years of slavery in Egypt. That's just not hisorically correct. There was a four-hundred year period of indemnity with slavery; because the slavery didn't start until a hundred years later, or a hundred and fifty years later when a new pharoah came to the thrown in Eqypt who didn't know anything about Joseph and didn't have any affinity with Joseph and just was afraid and angry at the Hebrews. And he turned them into slaves, took them into slavery.
And this was a long time after Joseph. It didn't start after a hundred years. It was about a hundred and fifty years of slavery DURING the four-hundred-year period of indemnity with slavery. God had said to Abraham, 'Your descendants will suffer in a land that is not theirs for four hundred years. It didn't say that they would be slaves for four hundred years 'sojourners in a land that is not theirs'.
So, again we need a little footnote there so that we don't lose our credibility with people who know the Bible and study history and the scholars; and so that, they don't choke on it and close the book and say, 'Well, this is not accurate. I can't accept it.' No. All we need is a little footnote there to explain, 'It was a four-hundred-year period of indemnity with slavery' instead of saying 'It was four-hundred-years of slavery'. It wasn't four hundred years of slavery. It just wasn't. But, that's okay. It doesn't change the Principle at all. It doesn't change anything, just we have to clean up our act here. That's all. Just clean it up a little bit.
The point here is that the Principle is something we need to live. It's not something we just believe in, we have to live the Principle with faith, substance, absolute faith in God, put God first in our life, love our enemies, learn how to overcome Satan. We have to live this stuff, no complaining. Because if we don't try to live it, if we don't live it and try to realize what the Principle can do for me in my life, then why should I tell somebody else about it? Why should I think it's going to save you if it hasn't saved me? Why should I think it's going to save the country or the world if I haven't tried to apply it enough in my own life to realize what it can do for me? Why would I do that?
The Principle is a guide book of how to live our life. It's not some belief, some religion, 'Well, I believe in True Parents.' So what? What's that do for you? You have to become like True Parents. You have to become the Principle. That's the transformation that it's all about. St. Paul said that. Father said that. Jesus said that. We still don't get it. Transformation. I need to become the Principle. I need to become a son and daughter of God.
I don't think that the God Who created this whole universe really cares what you think. Who cares. What kind of person are you? God wants to resonate with you. He wants to live in you. He wants you to be like Him/Her. That calls for transformation. That's what it's all about. So, that's what I want to share with you today about 'creating The Tradition.' how the tradition is set for Jesus. Love your enemy, love God above all things. This Tradition is set. This took millions of years. It took millions of years.
These people didn't know what they were doing. Joseph didn't know what he was doing. Jacob didn't know what he was doing. They didn't know what they were doing providentially. God found just a small hand full of crazy people .in history that would do the right thing. It took a looonngg time to create this tradition. We're going to expand it now. Tomorrow we'll talk about expanding this tradition.
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