Sermons of Rev. Moon, Volume 4 |
Oh, Father! We Welcome You Prayer Beloved Father, please watch over us. Although our minds are in all kinds of conditions, please allow Your nature to be manifested in our lives. Allow us to become the righteous embodiments who can move when the Father moves and halt when the Father halts. The Father knows that we have knelt before Him and are facing Heaven. Therefore, even if our bodies have been captured in some vulgarity and are blocking the Father's grace, please allow us to manifest Your hyung sang through our minds and bodies by subjugating every vulgar thing. Father, please perform Your works so that we can feel in our minds and sense in our bodies that this providential will, this providential grace and providential love, are linked to You. Our minds are dashing toward absolute goodness today, but our bodies try to seize vulgar things and are making endless attacks upon our minds. Father, please allow our minds and bodies to become one, centering on the Father's will. On that foundation, Father, we ardently hope that You will break down the gap of heart that exists between the Father and us so that the foundation for the activities of Satan within us can be completely uprooted. Even though Heaven wants to cling to our bodies when they are centered on our minds and wants to love us, until now we have failed to manifest ourselves as perfect objects of beauty before the sung sang and hyung sang of the Father, filled with true feelings. We know that this is the sorrow and lament of history. Our minds and bodies have no choice but to kneel before the Father's knees. We are tainted by sin and unworthy, yet we desire the abundant grace of the Father. Please do not allow us to have anything that we do not rightfully possess. Please cling to our whole minds and bodies. All that You have given us is not ours but Yours, so please be with us and govern us. Please allow us to return joy before the Father's Sung sang and emerge as people who can respond to the Father. Please allow us now to set the standard of hope for which the Father has been longing for 6,000 years. Let us kneel before the solemn presence of the Father and return glory to Him. Beloved Father, we earnestly wish that You will allow this to be a moment when we can manifest Your Sung sang so that You can rest in peace. We know that all doctrines, assertions and authority that human beings have will disappear. Please let us enter the basic position where our minds and bodies can exist eternally in order to attain the newly exploding power in our hearts and the eyes of resurrection. Father, we sincerely wish that You will guide us to forsake a self-centered lifestyle and return to the lifestyle centered on the cosmos. Father, please allow us to represent the people. Allow us to represent the humanity of the world and all the things of creation. Beloved Father, we ardently wish that You will allow us to bow our heads before the Father and alleviate the bitter heart which has been bound for 6,000 years. Allow us to become sons and daughters about whom the Father can boast before Satan. Father, please bless the countless altars who have gathered today, because they long for Your solemn presence. Please show compassion toward these people, lamenting in misery. Though these people do not understand the Father's will and are enslaved in the realm of death, there are many who belong to the altar of life. Father, please grant grace upon them. Beloved Father, we sincerely pray that by constructing the one victorious garden and realizing the will of the Father, You will allow the day of rejoicing for the whole universe to come quickly. We offer everything we have to You. Father, please receive it with joy and govern us as Your own. Centering on the words I want to give, please allow the grace of re-creation. Please let the heart of the speaker and the hearts of the listeners not become divided. We understand that the will of the heavenly principles centering on us is urgent. Please be with us so that our minds can move naturally to fulfill the will of God in an efficient manner. Beloved Father, we sincerely wish that You will allow this to be an hour when we can feel the mind of the Father as if it were our own and experience the heart of the Father as if it were our own. We have entrusted everything to You. Please do as You will. We offer this prayer in the name of the Lord. Amen. The title of the speech I want to share with you today is, "Oh, Father! We Welcome You." I will speak upon this topic. The Original Garden of Eden and God We know that the garden without the fall is the garden where God can freely contact all things and visit people freely to discuss things with them. This is the garden of glory where not only people, but also all the things of creation (which were created for people) can serve God. It is the garden of joy where man can consult with God. However, we also know that, with the birth of the term "the fall," people could not relate with God nor could all things rejoice with God. God created all things of the universe. He created people as the center of all things, so that He could dwell with them eternally. Therefore, we must come to a new realization today that all the things of creation should have revealed the glory of God through people and returned joy to God through them. Yet because that garden of creation did not come about, God set the day this can be accomplished as the culminating point of history, the one standard of hope. He has been guiding the providence based on that. What kind of garden is the ideal garden that is sought, yearned for, and admired by the countless people of today who have inherited the lineage of the fall and cannot escape from its kinship? That garden is the place where you can call God, the Creator of heaven and earth, "Father." It is where you can attend the Creator and feel His joy with Him. Not only that, it is a garden where this joy can be sent to all things through us. If this garden is not materialized, then the whole ideology of the creation of God will turn into a failure. The providential will that humankind has served during the course of history also will come to naught. You have to experience the day when you sense deep in your bone marrow that if this takes place, then even all things, which have looked up to humankind, will return to the realm of anguish. Our minds must be moved by this heart and our bodies must feel it. Only in this situation can we face Heaven and long for the Creator. Only when we attain the original beauty in regard to all things can we become the resurrected embodiment whom the Father can work through. In this kind of position, there must be a moment when we can unveil ourselves before the Creator and all things of creation, and analyze ourselves. You must understand that if we do not experience this, then God's heart cannot seep into us, and the sorrow of all things cannot be liberated through us. Originally, people should have attended God in their lives. All things should have attended God and rejoiced. However, we have lost the Father who created us, the Master who should rule us. Therefore, we have become pitiful people, much like orphans. From the moment we realize this, we can seek the new providential will. When have human beings ever called the Creator whom they lost in the Garden of Eden "our Father"? When did we feel that the garden of goodness we lost in Eden is where we were originally supposed to live? Although several thousand years have passed, such a time has not yet emerged in the human world. The Mission of Humankind As we are today, we cannot represent the absolutely unique goodness of Heaven. Realizing that we are descendants of the sin of the fall, who can dare to face the Father? What must we do? What must we do after we raise ourselves up? We must find the will of the Father. Even if we are to lose and sacrifice all that we have, we must be able to say that God, the Master of the ideology for which our ancestors yearned, is our Father. Only when we manifest God in our living sphere can we stand as God's sons. We must understand that if we cannot usher in the day when we manifest God in our living sphere and before all things, then the course of the dispensation that our ancestors walked during the historical course will come to naught. What must you fulfill after you awaken your sleeping heart? Toward what will you dash after raising your body? You must fulfill the desperate and sincere heart that God had toward Adam and Eve. You must be able to feel the heart of the Father in the substantial realm of time. He wanted to taste the beauty of creation in all things and rejoice while relating with people. If you do not have this kind of heart, then even if that garden of ideology was to come, even if the day comes when the Father can reveal Himself on the earth again, it will have nothing to do with you. Who is going to close the gap between you and God? Who is going to bridge this abyss of grief? Today, we feel that this is the historical agony and grief of humankind. Who created this gap between God and us? The sinful lineage begotten by the fall of the human ancestors created this. Therefore, it is your mission to forge a relationship with Heaven with your minds and bodies, by rising above it to receive the lineage of Heaven, and build a relationship between the family, the society, the nation, the world and the cosmos centered on you and Heaven. When you reflect on your past today, you probably cannot help but feel that you have inherited the lineage of sin. This is the reason that God and all things have been in agony. We have to understand that until now, God has traveled through a history of toil for the sake of saving fallen people. Now you must put yourselves on the line and climb over all the internal walls. You must be able to pray on behalf of the hyung sang of Adam before the fall who could face God and say, "Father! We welcome You." God has been seeking the ideal garden lost when He forged a bond of restoration with fallen people. The providential history of salvation and restoration that we are walking through today is how God is working to restore fallen humankind, to build the garden of joy of Adam and Eve before the fall. He is constructing the world ideology based on the joy of Heaven. Accordingly, you who are walking through the course of restoration today must make yourselves stand before the course of the heavenly principles and make self-criticisms. You must reflect upon what position you are in, in what situation you are struggling. You have to understand that because of the love of God, who wanted to teach that position and direction to humankind, the religion which can represent humanity has been founded today. Therefore, promoting the term "faith," God has been searching for humankind in the course of history centering on religion. Until this hour today, God has been exerting Himself without rest, wishing that He could live with people in the human world. God has transcended time and space to search for the people who betrayed Him. Yet when we consider that, in spite of this, there were not many people who received God. When we consider this, we deserve to be whipped before Heaven from the position of fallen descendants. Nevertheless, God has taken on the toil of guiding the providence for 6,000 years. We ourselves are lone individuals and only one out of thirty million people of this nation. Yet if we can become the children who can attend God and make it possible for Him to descend to this earth, then we will become more valuable than the thirty million. We will become more valuable than the 2.4 billion people of the world. You have to understand that the Father has been working hard because He wants to relate with us as people with this kind of value. The Heart of God Longs to Become One with Humankind In our lives today we too often neglect the value of the important part within us. When we think that Heaven has come seeking us throughout the course of history and is always working in our surroundings, when we understand that Heaven wants to reside with us, we have to bow our heads before the historical course and the providential will of the period. Although people should bow their heads before the will of the heavenly principles, they have neglected the providential will. Forgetting their dignity and honor, they have failed to find the direction in which they must steer. You have to feel the anguished heart of God as He looks down upon such people. You have to understand that the time has come when you must become concerned about this will of God's providence. If we outwardly say that we want to attend this Creator as the subject of our faith, but in reality conduct our faith centering on ourselves, then we have nothing to do with Heaven. When we look at ourselves, we can see that, although each of us is merely one part out of the 2.4 billion people of the world, God is trying to believe in us and love us as the ones who have the value of the whole cosmos. He wants to live with us. However, people today cannot imagine this heart of the Father, even in their dreams. God is relating with us with infinite hope, but we are facing Heaven with limited hope. Who is going to be responsible for bridging the gap between this limited and unlimited hope? We have to understand that the greater this gap, the more Satan will accuse us before Heaven. Therefore, you must recognize that you have come into this crisis, the realm of historical sin, and we must lower our heads before the heavenly principles. We must possess a heart of repentance and become like clay and water, which can be molded again. Nonetheless, many people today disregard the heavenly principles because of their own assertions and beliefs. You must understand that their movements and actions do not remain with one individual, but connect with the whole world, the whole cosmos. To whom is Heaven going to entrust this task? You must take charge of it today. You can take charge of this task in the state you are in and fulfill your responsibility before the providential will. You must be able to attend God. What must you do to fulfill it? First, you must know the standard of God's hope. You have to understand the heart of the Father, who rejoiced while creating humankind. You have to understand the ideology of the creation in which God wanted to rejoice. With what heart did God create this world? God created this world with a heart that longed for all things to become worthy of His infinite trust. He longed for human beings to become worthy of His infinite trust. Accordingly, inside the realm of the uniform ideology in which there is no need for such a term as "faith," you must form such an inseparable mind-body relationship and unity with Heaven that even after many years have passed, you remain unchanging. God tried to believe in people, that they could stand in the position of oneness and not even have a sense of the word "faith." The heart of God, who tried to have such eternal faith, was left behind due to the human fall. God wanted to inject His eternal life into humankind and to raise them as immortals on the earth. Because of the fall, though people lived, it was as if they were dead. The foundation of God's love, where God and people become eternally one and are immersed in the uniform ideology, the foundation on which all things of the creation can be in harmony, was shattered because of the fall. Accordingly, people became such that God could not believe in them, beings who bore no trace of God's life. Consequently, God's love could not take root, and our ancestors were chased out of the Garden of Eden. The Results of the Human Fall However, this did not just affect human beings. All the things of creation fell outside the realm of God's trust. The signs of the life of God could no longer be found in all things. They could no longer express the stimulation of beauty in relationship to the love of God. Therefore, centering on God today, we must become the true parents who are invulnerable to the invasion of Satan. If the human ancestors had attended God and become true parents, then their descendants would have realized the ideology of the family that would allow them to attend God eternally in their lives. However, because humankind fell, they have inherited the lineage of the fallen parents and have been carrying on a life of attending Satan, instead of God. You have to understand that because our ancestors destroyed the garden of goodness God wanted, we the descendants inherited the unfinished work of sin. As a result, we were invaded by sin. In the end, we have come to believe in things we must not believe in. We have experienced joy that we should not have enjoyed. We are engaged in love that we must not engage in. When we think about ourselves from this perspective, we can see that Heaven cannot trust us. We have not become the beings of life with whom God can relate. Not only that, we do not possess the heart of love with which we can stand before God. The people of succeeding generations who have fallen parents cannot rejoice with God eternally in Heaven. The people who should have possessed the eternal life of God and attended God joyfully in their lives, inside the realm of God's eternal love, could not do so. When the human world became a world of sin, people believed in things they should not have believed in; they possessed a life they should not have possessed. They lived a life of love of which they should not have been a part. Because this incredible kind of world came into being, an incredible course was left behind. This is hell in the spirit world and hell on the earth. You have to understand that the contradictory state of these two worlds is measuring you in the balance. On the one hand, the faithlessness of hell is appealing to you. On the other hand, the love of God is appealing to you. In other words, on the one hand, the realm of the deathly love of the world is appealing to you. On the other hand, God is appealing to you to develop eternal faith and eternal love. You will be able to feel that you are in this kind of situation. Because of the fall, our bodies are forced to grow by taking nutrition from all things of the creation, which are inside the realm of God's sorrow. If we analyze our bodies, which are in the realm of God's sorrow (in the realm of sin), we will discover that there are more evil elements than good elements within us. Therefore, in our entire life course, in our course of faith and in our course of love, this evil is operating most strongly. The purpose of the Creator in creating this world will be realized centering on humankind. However, you can probably sense that some wound was inflicted deep inside the human heart due to the fall. You are probably feeling that some trials are about to confront you. No matter how evil a murderer and robber a person might be, he will feel guilty in his conscience about the evil action which he has committed. This is the original nature of man. Because this is the way of the laws of the heavenly principles, when people violate the laws of the heavenly principles, there is no way for them to escape. When people violate them and commit evil deeds, they have to feel guilty. There are many people today who cannot believe in anything on the earth. They cannot depend upon anything on the earth nor feel any love on the earth. They are mourning and holding grudges against the whole universe. However, there is no one who craves the love of eternal trust and gladness, sheds tears and feels agony at the same time. Heaven is trying to realize God's will through the people who are concerned for the sake of the will of goodness. When we compare goodness and evil from this position, we can understand that evil outnumbers the good many times over. Looking down upon this situation, God is filled with desperate grief, even today, as He seeks to find the goodness that can replace the grief of humanity. You have to understand the anguished situation of God, who cannot believe in humanity although He is in a position where He must. Originally, people were to be worthy of trust and love, worthy to become embodiments of the life of God. Yet there is no way God can believe in people, no way He can share life or love with them. You have to understand this sadness. The Relationship of Life and Love You must look toward the earth and lament, "This earth where the sorrow of God is! Humanity, who is building up the wall of God's sorrows!" At the same time, you must note whether in the last chapter of history one person appears who can mourn for God. If such a person does not appear, then God's history of toil will be in vain. The conditions for Satan's accusations will remain. We will have no choice but to live in the world where the conditions of grief caused by sin remain. Today we forget that we are sinners. Unable to feel what is blocking the path before us, we want to have hope in this frustrating situation. This is why the heart of Heaven is in more misery looking down upon the situation. We have inherited the lineage of our ancestors, who have betrayed God in the course of history. If we are the fruit of this sinful blood, how are we going to propel our bodies to remove the sins? You have to become new people now. You have to become the brothers and sisters of Heaven with a new ideology, new faith, new life and new love. You have to reflect upon whether you have become someone who can feel the urgent heart of God seeking to find us and can cry out, "Father, we welcome You!" Our ancestors came to the earth to take charge of some mission in their era on behalf of the will of God, but all of them were demolished. You have probably learned through the Divine Principle that this repetition has been the history of restoration until now. God, who feels the deep grief of restoration, has been persevering until now with an anguished heart. In other words, even as He was ostracized, God endured. Even while being betrayed, God endured. Have you ever felt, deep in your flesh, bones and blood, the situation of God who has raised us and maintained hope in us until today? You have to sense in your minds and bodies that the Father, who has been working until now, is truly our own father who has toiled for our sake. Even if our Korean people do not own anything and are miserable, if someone appears among us who responds to the hope of Heaven, who shares the concerns of God and possesses God's heart of faith, if we can make that kind of gathering or become that kind of people, then who can say that we cannot inherit the powerful feat of Heaven? These miserable people have no one to depend on, nowhere to rest our hope. What is the hope that we must now possess? We must possess a repentful heart toward sin. We must possess faith, hope and love toward God. When we do that, we can become the children of the Kingdom of Heaven. In other words, we can dwell inside the new Garden of Eden and become a new people who can represent the purpose of the ideology of creation. God's nature is such that He cannot forsake fallen humankind, who should be forsaken. Rather, He tries to claim them back. Yet what kind of relationship existed originally between God and humankind? We had the bond of life and the bond of love. What then must we claim back by mobilizing the humanity of the world today in these last days? We must find the life and love that connect us to God. Humanity is struggling to find this today. God has been working until now because He wants humankind to form the one world in which He can eternally trust them. He wants them to form one eternal family and wants to be able to converse with them eternally. Although we are fallen, God has been seeking us. Who Was Jesus? In the Garden of Eden, our ancestors could not become people who could be trusted for eternity. Who had the standard for the heart of eternal trust? God had it. They should have become people who had the standard of heart for eternal life, but because they betrayed God, God possesses this standard. Although they should have become people who had the standard of heart for eternal love, because they fell, God also kept the standard of heart for that love. If we ask who came to point out to humankind the elements that could guide the ideology of the Garden of Eden, it was none other than Jesus. Although God toiled throughout the long course of history to find the one standard on earth which could represent the faith, life and love of God, He could not find it. Although He tried to find it through Noah, Abraham, Jacob and Moses, He could not find anyone with this standard. Jesus was the person He could finally raise after 4,000 years of toil. What kind of person was Jesus? He was not one with worldly powers. He did not have worldly knowledge. He was cornered and driven out as the traitor of the era. He was the representative hero who was driven out into this sinful world on behalf of righteousness. The reason Jesus was mistreated was not because he was not precious or because he was lacking somehow. It was because the whole world was a land of faithlessness. He was ostracized because the world did not have life and love. What kind of representative was Jesus? Because of the fall in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve could not become trustworthy parents. Jesus thus came as the substitute for Adam. He came as the hero of faith in whom one could not help but believe for eternity. He came as the representative of the love of God to reconnect the bond of the life of God, which was lost in Eden. He came to connect the love of God, which was lost in Eden, to human minds. What kind of person is Jesus? He is the Messiah of faith, the Messiah of life, and the Messiah of love. In other words, he is the Savior of faith, the Savior of life, and the Savior of love. During the 4,000 years when God governed human history, He hoped to fulfill the standard of heart for His life and love. This was actualized through Jesus. Consequently, the providential history of God finally had another beginning on the earth and the new will of restoration was realized. The people of that time should have had substantial faith in Jesus, who came with this historical will. They should have become one with his ideology. Jesus came as the one incarnation in which God's formless ideology of faith, His formless ideology of life, and His formless ideology of love were expressed. However, there was no one who testified, "Oh! You are the fruit of the faith of God, who has been exerting Himself for 4,000 years in search of us. You are the embodiment of God's hope and life that He has been seeking for 4,000 years. Oh! You are the hero who comes with the eternal love with which we can rejoice in the garden of God's ideology." No one welcomed him. No one probed into his heart and revealed his secret words to the earth. This was the second cause of the sorrow of humanity. Jesus came to the earth for this reason, but he passed away without testifying to the faith, life and love of God as His one embodiment. Therefore, the faith, life and love which are one with the spirit of Jesus became far removed from humankind. If we were to reflect upon it closely, the fact that Jesus became the hero of spiritual faith, spiritual life and spiritual love is not a joyful thing. You have to understand that the deep-rooted sorrow of Heaven lies in that fact. In other words, God wants the embodiment who represents His ideology on earth. Jesus, as the embodiment of God, came to the earth with the faith, life and love of God. Because humanity destroyed that embodiment, God became a God of tears. The Sorrow of Jesus When God comes seeking humankind, He seeks an embodiment through the spirit. Through that embodiment, He seeks all things. However, people have failed to become qualified for the faith that can connect with that embodiment, for the life and love that can substitute for that incarnation. Instead, we feel these things only spiritually. In other words, humanity today is seeking the ideology of spiritual salvation, spiritual life and spiritual love. We know that it was for the providence of the salvation of Paradise and the providence centered on the New Testament that God exerted Himself for 4,000 years. This was so that people could attend the one substantial person of glory on the earth and create an environment in which they believed in him eternally, enjoyed eternal life with him, and shared love with him for eternity. However, there must come the time on earth when the belief, life and love, for which the spirit world hopes, will be manifested substantially on the earth. The ideology of Eden is not only attending God after achieving unity between the mind and body centering on God; it is attending God after becoming one with all things as well. Because these are the basic principles, God has been trying to become one with you through the historical course of toil. You have to understand that these kinds of agonies have taken place. Had Jesus actualized the concrete temple when he came, had he realized the substantial family that could represent the ideology of God and begun to attend God on that basis, today we would not have any need for the idea of a kingdom of a thousand years. There would be no need for the idea of a second coming. If you can connect with substantial faith, substantial life and substantial love centering on Jesus, then as a substantial couple you can obtain substantial children. When this takes place, you can become people of substantial faith toward God. You can attain substantial life and become people of substantial love. However, it is God's sorrow that this kind of foundation has not yet emerged on the earth. This is the reason Jesus said, "The Kingdom of Heaven is within you." The Kingdom of Heaven first comes to you from your heart. After that you must be able to say, "The Kingdom of Heaven is inside me." In other words, only when we can assert that the Kingdom of Heaven resides within our substantial body, can our bodies and spirits finally become one and call God "Father." This is the sorrow of Jesus. Although he formed the spiritual Kingdom of Heaven that can represent the Kingdom of Heaven in the heart, he could not create the substantial Kingdom of Heaven. Therefore, he has to come back. He faces the fate to pray for the sake of humankind on the right hand of God during the course of history. Therefore, the people who are living today in the last days must have substantial faith. When we think about our own course of faith until now, we find that our minds and bodies have turned away from God's will. Therefore, you must find a relationship with God's eternal life of love and be able to say that you have embodied it. To do that, you must always pray, "Father! Please allow us to become Your embodiment." If you cannot become this kind of people, there is no way that humankind can pay off the debt of history and restore the lost ideology of the Kingdom of Heaven. For this reason, God has been concerned about humanity until now. He is especially concerned about those of us who are living in the last days. He is seeking us. Accordingly, we have to become the people of one hope who can represent the substantial body of Jesus Christ who came 2,000 years ago. The Standard of Faith Which People in the Last Days Must Have You must always be able to frankly reveal to the Father whether you are living as the expression of hope in faith, life and love. You must live with the mind-set, "Yes, Father! I will believe in the Father. Even if the Father cannot believe in me, I will believe in the Father. Even if the Father abandons me, I cannot abandon the Father." Is there a hero who would not betray the Father even if the heavenly principles were to change or even if Heaven was to betray him? Is there a hero who would believe when no other in heaven and earth could believe? God has been guiding the providence until now, longing for the one day of hope when He can find this kind of person. Are there, however, any who understand this sorrowful situation of the Father? Is there such a church? People are pitiful beings who are ignorant of this. Those in the world who cherish the will of Heaven in their hearts will be rejected. At the time of Jesus, everyone was his enemy. Those who are not rejected, those who are not enemies of the world, are false. After coming to the earth, Jesus lost his foundation in his family. He was ostracized by John the Baptist's group, whom God had chosen and prepared. He was ostracized by the religious sect God had prepared through 4,000 years of toil. He was persecuted by the chosen Israelites, by the blood kinsmen of Abraham. He was persecuted by the whole of humanity. He was abandoned, even by the spirit world. He was abandoned, even by God. This is the reason he had to die in a miserable situation as it is recorded in the Bible verse, "Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?" or "My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46) You must not forget that the one who suffered this kind of torment is our savior, the savior of humanity and our leader. You must connect to that heart of Jesus. When Elijah was ostracized by the Israelites and being driven away, he appealed to God, "Father, I am the only one who remains." Have you ever connected with that kind of heart? You must be able to say, "I will not abandon You, even if all of the thirty million people were to turn away from You. Even if the 2.4 billion persons of the world and all spirits were to turn their backs on You, I will not." Those who have experienced this kind of heart cannot go to hell, even if they try. They will not perish on the earth, no matter what. They cannot be destroyed by anything. You have to understand that Jesus' heart of appeal, "Father, if it is possible then please let this cup pass from me. But do not do as I will, but as Thou will," (Matthew 26:39) became the central point that allowed him to step over the realm of death and rise above it. Jesus was ostracized by the people, the church, his tribe and by Satan of the invisible spirit world when he came to the earth. In other words, Jesus did not even have one friend. The question is whether the people at the time even entertained the thought that this kind of Jesus would appear as the Savior of humanity. When we consider it from this perspective, we can see that Jesus set the standard for the creation of a new history. Jesus possessed the eternal and unchanging heart. He had the attitude that the Father was the master of his faith, his life and love. Because there was no one who could cut off the faith, life and love of Jesus, Christianity did not falter, no matter who attacked them. Instead, Christianity progressed. If you who are coming to the Unification Church today want to live for the sake of humanity, then you must possess the kind of faith Jesus had. In these last days, you must possess the standard of faith with which Jesus could confront the path of death and offer his life. You must possess the standard of faith by which Jesus could sacrifice even his body. Heaven is longing for this standard of faith to be found among the people of faith in the last days. God Is the Substantial Hero Who Shares All Pain and Joy with Humanity We must be saved and must pursue eternal life. To be embraced inside the love of the Father, we must overcome all kinds of hardships and wounds. Even if our family, our society, our nation and the world all oppose us, we must step over it and stand in the position of Jesus, who came forth clinging only to the will of God. We must become the elite soldiers of Heaven who can march toward the historical tribe of death. How would Heaven come seeking us? God, who exists as a spirit on the heavenly throne, waited 4,000 years after the creation of the world to raise Jesus and tried to reach out to humanity. After Jesus, He exerted Himself for 2,000 more years in the spirit world, which represents our minds. He has been seeking us through 6,000 years of the footsteps of toil until today. However, do you have the heart of filial children who are determined to alleviate the grief of the Father, who has been working to find you, and say, "Father, we are sorry. Father, we are so ashamed. Father, what can we do?" If you have become the sons and daughters who have this kind of mind- set, then in the same way Jesus clung to the heart of the Father and produced the miracle of resurrection, with a heart of compassion and love amidst tribulation, you must also have the same heart and step above the realm of death to produce the miracle of resurrection. If you cannot become such people, then there is no way you can rise above the realm of death and live in the glory of resurrection. You must clearly understand God in your minds and bodies now. The time has passed when you could comprehend God through your brains. You are not to comprehend God in your heads; you are to understand Him in your hearts. Now is the time when you cannot understand only in your minds. You must understand also in your bodies. Accordingly, the era of conceptual faith has passed. The time has come when you must believe in your minds and experience in your bodies. The last days is the time when we seek after the embodiment of unchanging faith, when we are trying to raise the reincarnation of eternal love. When this substantial embodiment emerges, then the term "faithlessness" will disappear from our bodies. Therefore, you must now become sons and daughter who can demonstrate concern for the heart of the Father and attend Him. Otherwise, you will become pitiful people. If you do not know that God exists, then it is a different story; but if you do know, then you have to understand that the God who has been exerting Himself to seek us is not someone whom we should attend only as the hero of our minds. We must form one body with God on earth eternally. We must live with Him. He is the substantial Master who can share all pain and joy with us eternally. He is the origin of unchanging love and the reincarnation of eternal hope. Before this God, Jesus could forget himself without any pretense or excuse. He was willing to do anything for the sake of the Father's will. You must become sons and daughters who inherit the footsteps of Jesus. Jesus gave us the words of the Gospels during the thirty-odd years of his life. When he met starving people as he was going around with his disciples, he fed 5,000 with five loaves and two fishes. He gave everything he could. He introduced faith, life and love. He introduced all that humanity could demand. Have you ever received the words of Jesus as his substantial body? Have you ever felt through the words of Jesus that he is the embodiment of God's eternal faith? Have you ever felt through the words of Jesus that he is the embodiment of eternal life? Have you ever felt through the words of Jesus that he is the embodiment of eternal love? If you cannot feel this even after you have heard Jesus' words, then Jesus' heart will be torn. The Hope of Jesus and God's Request of Humanity When Jesus was walking through the thirty-odd years of his life course, as he was being chased around from this village to that, he said, "Foxes have holes, and birds in the air have their nests, but the son of man does not have a place where he can rest his head." (Matthew 8:20) The people of that time did not know that the words of Jesus, who clung to the lonesome heart and felt the torment, were words which represented the culmination of 4,000 years of the heavenly principles. The Israelites did not know that Jesus was the embodiment of the life of re-creation and eternal life for which God hoped. They did not know that he was someone who was to realize the will for which humanity had hoped for 4,000 years. Who is going to clear up and cross over this hill that could not be crossed over because of the lack of recognition toward Jesus? Even if you today are a pitiful group who is being chased around and have no place to rely upon, I hope that you will become the heirs who inherit the will of Jesus. Now the time has come when we must appear before the people with the attitude that we are walking through the historical course of Jesus with a lamenting heart. Only when we can appear before the people and the world with this heart can we prevent the history of betrayal by Israel, the history of betrayal by Judaism, and all that the blood relations of Jesus blocked. Only then can we prevent the betrayal of the apostles and disciples. In other words, we have to be able to resolve all of this within ourselves. Jesus distributed bread among many people on an empty hill near Beth- saida 2,000 years ago. Why did the people who ate the bread all perish? Why did the people who heard the words betray Jesus? Why did the disciples who followed Jesus through all the hardships of three years betray him? The reason they betrayed him was that they thought his words were only for the sake of that day. They thought the bread he gave out was only to fill the stomach for that moment. They did not know that the words Jesus gave should have been conveyed to the ends of the earth through them. They did not know that the bread Jesus gave out should be shared with the humanity of the world. Because the words and the bread that Jesus gave were his substantial embodiments, his intention was for them to give out his mind and body to the neighbors, the people, the nation and the whole of humanity. They were doomed, because they did not know this. Now when you stand before the Lord or before the Father, you will feel the request, "Oh, my beloved son! I am giving you these words, so cherish them and become God's beloved son!" Some of you will also feel, "Oh, my beloved sons and daughters! Become the substantial temple in which the Father can dwell during your lifetime!" Accordingly, you must feel that only the Father is the origin of your life. Only the Father is the origin of your love. Do not despair because you do not have any friends, family or companion. If you have become someone who, as the substantial body of the Father, is immersed inside the heart of the Father's love and life and who lives according to the will of the heavenly principles, please do not despair, because the words of the Father are with you. Even if we suffer many ordeals as we are driven about today, we must persevere. This is because we endure our hardships for the sake of the people and for the world. Now if there are those who, feeling the torment of heaven and earth, pray and overcome the hardships that pierce into their bones, then they will become the friends of Jesus, friends of the people, and friends of the world. In this way they will become the masters of this world. The problem is whether we stand inside God or outside God. God wishes to fulfill His hopes through our hearts. Therefore, everything in our lives, every place that we reside, all the injustice we suffer must be done for the sake of the Father. Even if our love is cut off, even if we are deprived of material things and friends, if we have the relationship that is for the sake of the Father, then we will not have any worry. More than the love of the earth, the life of the earth, and the people of the earth, if we have the faith of the Father, the life of the Father, and the love and hope of the Father, then no desire of ours will go unfulfilled. If all that belongs to the Father is with us, we can become substantial sons who can represent the many lives on this earth. We Must Feel Our Oneness With God More than anyone else, you are shedding tears for the sake of the people. You are leading a life in which you must look back and shed tears. However, since you now have come to understand the will of the Father which asks you to stand as the embodiment of His hope, faith and love, you must fulfill this mission. These Korean people do not have friends among themselves whom they can trust. Moreover, they do not have the one true family where they can settle down for life. What must you leave behind for this people? You must leave faith for the people who cannot believe, a family for the people who do not have families and love for this pitiful people who have no one upon which to rely. When you possess this kind of heart, you will feel that Jesus' situation in the Garden of Gethsemane is our own situation. In other words, his situation is our situation today, and it is the situation of our ancestors who lived through the course of history for the sake of the will of the heavenly principles. Therefore, you must now receive historical persecution and overcome it. No matter what kind of Satan you fight with, you must triumph 100 percent. You must overcome whatever realm of death you are in. Crossing through that world of death, you must be able to head toward the blessed land of Canaan. You must be able to cling to the Father and share with Him the sorrow of His 6,000 years. You must clear up the mistakes of Adam and Eve. Possessing the heart of Heaven, you must be able to receive glory on behalf of the Father. God has been traveling the path of sorrow, determined to pass through the path of thorns. When you are driven out, you must endure through it by beholding the Father, who is concerned about you. You must be grateful to Him for giving you a day when He embraces you. The time when we can believe in our heads has passed. Now you must become the incarnations of faith who can believe with your minds and bodies. You must understand Jesus, who has come alive, but the time when you understand with your head has passed. The time has come when you must understand through your minds and bodies. You must comprehend through your minds and bodies that the substantial body of Jesus represents the faith, life and love of God. Therefore, if you say "Left," then the providential history of God, which represents the history of the heavenly principles, should be able to say "Left." If you say "Right," then God's life should be able to say "Right." If you say "Stop," then God should be able to say "Stop." The grief of God is having lost the person and the family who can bring this to pass. You must not shed tears over your own sorrow. One day you will feel God wiping the tears off your eyes. Do not complain that you have suffered injustices. God probably already knows about that, too. Contrary to your assumption that the Father has left you, you are standing in front of the Father. Contrary to your assumption that you do not know the love of God, your body is already deep inside the love of God. When you come to realize that, you will feel that the Father is your father. The Father that you will come to know is not the God of faith who is bound to concepts. He is your real father whom you can experience substantially, whom you can experience in the sphere of your life. In the same way that Jesus prayed, "My Father, if it is possible, please let this cup pass from me. But not as I will but as the Father wills" (Matthew 26:39), you must stand in a serious position and feel that you have become one with the Father. When you do that, the faith, life of hope, and love of hope will become harmonized in you. When you move, all things will move. When you go, all people will follow you. When you enter this state, all things will feel joy from you. You will hear what others do not hear, see what others do not see, know what others do not know, and experience what others do not experience. To Become True Sons and Daughters Who Can Attend the Father This is the way that people who are to attend the Father in the original Garden of Eden should be. However, you have to understand that we are fallen people who cannot sense this. Thus, we must represent the 6,000-year history, the 2.4 billion persons of humanity, and the countless lives of the many generations. Placing yourself before the Father and clinging to His heart of agony over 6,000 years, you must pledge, "We will take responsibility for the distressed heart of the Father. Please entrust to us all Your worries, sorrow and pain. We will become the filial sons and patriots who can comfort the Father, who has exerted Himself for 6,000 years." Have you ever called out to the Father and appealed to Him with this earnestness and urgency? If you have not, then you have to repent. When we look back at our own life of faith, we can see that although God came seeking us, He did not look for us as individuals. You have to sense this. God loved us not to love only us, but to love the whole of heaven and earth. He called us not to benefit us centering on ourselves, but for the sake of heaven and earth nor was His trust merely for our own sake. His loving us and trying to raise us up as the embodiments of life are not for our own sake; it is for the sake of the whole universe. Therefore, you have to realize that your minds and bodies are not eternally yours. Have you ever offered gratitude before the will after receiving the grace of Heaven? Before you rejoice, you must first shed tears. "I am happy, yet how are all the people on the earth? I am rising, yet the glory of Heaven is not being revealed. How will this glory of Heaven be revealed before all people?" You have to think about these things. You are not to rejoice or be merry alone. You have to understand that the universal providence of God remains, and revolves around you as the mediator. When God relates with us, He completely forgets His own dignity as the Master of heaven and earth. God is associating with you, who are inside the realm of Satan today, with the faith, life and love of heaven and earth. You must not forget this. You must understand the wishes of God and bring to pass the will of God's faith, life and love. By doing so, you must cause the flame of eternal love and life to be ignited. You have to be able to sense this each moment in the realm of your life. You have to realize that the mission to attend the Father and pioneer the path of ordeals rests with humankind, who came from fallen descendants. Therefore, now after you fight all battles and defeat all enemies, you must offer bows of victory to the Father. Your bodies and minds must become His peaceful resting place. Having done this, you must rekindle the memory of having caused sorrow to the Father at the time of the creation of the world and be able to say, "As You relate with me, please feel the joy that You would have felt if You were relating with unfallen Adam. Father! Please claim back the will that You lost because of the fall of Adam." You have to remember that only when you can do that can you become sons and daughters of the Father who can say, "Oh, Father! We welcome You." Prayer Beloved Father, You have sought us out by sending many righteous prophets and patriots and by sending Jesus. You have built a foundation in our hearts. Now we know that the unfinished will calls us to realize the will of the Father with our bodies. We ourselves must fulfill the will of the Father through our families and must establish all things before the Father. Father, please be with us. We know that the construction of the Kingdom of Heaven, where You dwell in us, is not the whole of the Father's will. We know that we have the responsibility to also build the substantial Kingdom of Heaven, where the Father can dwell inside the realm of all things. We realize that when the Father sees that those of us who must take charge of this universal responsibility are still inside the fallen world, He feels worried and anxious about our future path. Please guide us, inadequate and weak as we may be, so that You can hold onto us and allow us to have eternal life. If the Father guides us, we will not despair. We will not collapse. Beloved Father, we sincerely wish that by allowing us to defeat the enemy Satan for the purpose of possessing the life and glory of the Father, You will guide us to become the brave soldiers of Heaven who can build the individuals, the church, the nation, the world and the Kingdom of Heaven that the Father can direct. Now we ardently wish You to guide us to become sons and daughters who, feeling the heart of the Father in our hearts and sensing the life of the Father within our bodies, can establish the realm of all things before the Father. Requesting earnestly that You will allow the happy news to be heard by the countless numbers of humanity today, we pray all these words in the name of the Lord. Amen. |
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