A Life of Faith

1. In leading a life of faith, you cannot be a spectator. You follow me, but you should not practice your life of faith centered on me; you have to practice it centered on yourself. So you must preserve your way of faith irrespective of what others do.

A life of faith centered on Heaven is a life of gratitude and contentment in the deepest sphere of the heart, unlike any experience you may have with a person who is close to you.

Our life of faith should be such that, no matter how evil the world may be, we can look at heaven and earth and say, “I am grateful; I am happy'' If we cannot feel this way, then in this sad circumstance, we must determine ourselves anew and pray, “I am a sinner. Please grant me the courage I lack.” (153-136, 1963.11.15)

A true view of faith

2. With faith, nothing is impossible. We need faith. We need to think, “The prime subject partner is God, and I am His object partner. The perfect plus creates the perfect minus. Hence, I was created to reach the position of a second God, second Jesus, and second True Parent, and I can attain this position.”

You may wonder how I can undertake worldwide activities by myself, alone. It is because I have this kind of philosophy and because I work on the national level. Thus, you need to promise me, “We will inherit your philosophy and live according to it!” (131-326, 1984.05.19)

3. I have brought four great truths to the world of faith. First, I clarified the relationship between God and human beings. I also gave a clear explanation about the portion of human responsibility and indemnity – things that no one in history had known about before. We didn't understand why human beings are as they are today. I made this point clear.

I then explained why life is difficult for conscientious people, while evil people live well. No one has known about the law of indemnity or the problem of Cain and Abel. Finally, I explained why, even though people seek goodness, situations often get worse, little by little.

This is an issue of lineage; it is due to our blood being tainted by Satan. This question has been unresolved due to the fundamental ignorance concerning the problem of lineage. All the problems of the world are related to the issue of lineage. (161-153, 1978.01.18)

4. A life of faith until now has been a quest to find the true self. It has been a quest to rise from the position of fallen Adam and Eve and create the original sinless self. Now, what is God's ultimate wish?

First, it is for sinless individuals to form families based on His love. Then through such families whom God can love, the tribe, the nation, and the world can be redeemed. This is God's overarching Will. (5-110, 1959.01.04)

5. Heaven made limitless efforts to enable us, human beings living with our earthly human hopes, to go over the peak of death with new hope and to live with reverence for the eternal world.

Therefore, people who live a life of faith should not live embracing only our earthly hopes but should live dreaming of the eternal world of hope that can conquer even death. To achieve this aim, we practice our life of faith continuously.
(6-046, 1959.03.22)

6. Anyone who can experience God's heart, so that he or she feels every shock and impulse within Heaven's sphere of heart, is unstoppable. No matter what kind of persecution he or she faces, even walking the way of death, such a person would be relentless.

This heart touches the mind and moves the body. Devout believers in this secular world today, walking step by step through their daily lives, are thus advancing toward the infinite realm, even if they don't realize it. (6-069, 1959.03.29)

7. God does not want Christians with a life of faith that puts their denomination first. Even though I put up the signboard of the Unification Church, my concern is, “When will I be able to take it down?”

Although you may be identified as a Unification Church member, the question is, when will this type of identification cease in this land of Korea? Unification Church members all over the world are exerting their utmost effort to relieve God's sorrowful heart.

With devoted and loyal hearts, these members walk a path of tribulation in God's place. Unification Church members with the highest level of resolve are ready to sacrifice themselves for this work. This is a blessed path to be on.
(015-215, 1965.10.10)

8. It is with grave concern that God looks upon your notion of faith. If I were not on this earth, I wonder how many of you would remain. I bet a fight would break out. I am looking at you and wondering, how many among you are willing to die for God's Will? You have to be serious about this.

You need to reflect on the issue of how much devotion you have offered to your wife and children in your family, and how much devotion you have offered to the members of your church. (42-166, 1971.03.04)

9. A person who is unable to sow seeds of compassion will not have an enduring life of faith. The The same applies to me. Even though it was because of my public position that I was late for a service, I entered with prayer. There are times when I am unable to attend Sunday service.

Whenever this happens, I offer a prayer of repentance. The members put their faith in me and offer sincere devotions, seeking blessings and solutions to life-or-death situations.

So, as the person bearing the subject partner responsibility for the members, if I am unable to attend a Sunday service, I offer a prayer asking for forgiveness. Such prayers are necessary. (43-115, 1971.04.25)

10. We need to sacrifice and advance for the sake of the world. The time required to achieve a goal will be reduced proportionally to the sacrifice made by the person seeking to achieve that goal to the amount of sacrifice offered for the sake of the object partner.

We in Korea must live for the sake of Korea, but if Korea is unwilling to live for the sake of the world, we must live for the sake of the world. By raising people or descendants who share my faith and philosophy, and by establishing a foundation whereby my philosophy can be bequeathed to posterity for tens of thousands of generations, Unification Thought will be the thought that engenders a new global culture. This is my view, and it is God's view. (45-198, 1971.06.27)

11. You need to have zest in your life of faith. In the past, when I sent you out to the countryside to witness, I used to visit the Tongil business two or three times every day. I also visited Chung Pyung every other day.

What was the purpose of having such a hectic schedule? I had a zest for the work. I could feel what ordinary people could not feel. In that situation, when I offered devotions going from place to place, all the cells of my soul became alive, generating spiritual power.

We need this kind of experience. Thus, whether it rains or snows, we need zest in our life of faith. (127-145, 1983.05.07)

12. The Lord comes to this earth to establish the kingdom of heaven on earth. What kind of place is the kingdom of heaven? It is where those people who are qualified to attend the Lord and who successfully lead lives of attendance.

The kingdom of heaven is the world where, before the entire universe, we can be eternally proud of preparing and actualizing a life of attendance. Do you know what people are doing in the kingdom of heaven? Some may think it is simply a place to play and walk around, but it is not so.

Even to play and walk around, you must have made preparations and real-life conditions. However, people often pray for blessings without making any real effort. Therein lies the primary reason that divinely inspired people have difficulties as they advance. Even tremendous grace from God will not last beyond seven years. (8-307, 1960.02.14)

13. Expecting blessings unconditionally is not true faith. What then must we do to receive blessings? All humankind on earth today descended from Adam over six thousand biblical years.

Our hearts should reach the standard where we can tearfully embrace all the people of the world. Otherwise, we cannot establish a connection with this world.

This means that when you see a pitiful beggar, your heart aches unbearably; when you see a person with shabby garments, you cannot dress fashionably; when you see a hungry person, you cannot eat. Your heart cannot seek personal comfort when you are concerned about others. (8-307, 1960.02.14)

14. There are two types of religious people in the world. One type is those who hide their shortcomings and seek material comforts, blessings, and the welfare of their religious denomination or people. Religions that focus on receiving blessings will disappear.

Since we came to know this, the Unification Church emphasizes personal sacrifice to help God and liberate Him. What is to be achieved through unification? It is the liberation of God.

Originally, the true God, in the ideal world under His dominion, would have sung songs of praise and happiness with the first human ancestors, who would have attended Him. But instead, because of God's miserable situation, we seek to liberate Him. This is a wonderful plan.

That such an idea has emerged in the realm of religion is tremendously joyful news to God. (176-243, 1988.05.11)

15. A life of faith is about resolving the issue of death while on earth. You may not know much about convicts on death row, but I know well, having lived with them. You have no idea how serious such convicts become when facing death.

When a holiday such as Chuseok approaches, those convicts reflect on it as if it were the last Chuseok in history. When the wind blows or a typhoon hits, they observe it in the same way.

They say, “This typhoon will be the last one I experience while I am on earth.” They spend their last days looking at all things with a serious heart, a new feeling, and a new appreciation.

Among those people who walk the path of faith, I wonder how many have such a serious attitude, and how many value their life as a divine life and face each day with new resolve. This is an important question. Because I am in this serious place, I keep going this way. (160-025, 1968.12.29)

A life of faith is a life of attending God

16. Faith means living in attendance to God, living together with God and attending Him. If we do not walk such a path, we feel uneasy. We feel physically uncomfortable, and we meet obstacles in our environment.

A life of faith is a life of living together with God and attending Him. The sun rises in the morning, reaches its zenith at noon, and sets in the evening. This is unchanging. It will not change in tens of thousands of years. If an orbit goes awry, everything goes awry.

We need to go out and find the mind of love, the path of true love. The person who inherits true life and true lineage becomes part of God's family and always lives with God. Living with God also means living happily with nature and coming and going happily in our daily lives. (277-016, 1996.03.17)

17. In our lives of faith, there is the communal life of faith and the individual life of faith. In the communal life of faith, it is possible to receive shared grace, but it is difficult to receive personal grace to receive personal grace, we must lead a life that is close to God. Accordingly, our devout prayers and constant daily efforts to come closer to God lead to a greater depth of faith. (269-070, 1995.04.07)

18. To undertake a mission in the Unification Church, you need to renew your determination as a person of faith. Before that, the center of your faith must be well-grounded.

You will be unable to practice a life of faith that can manage the world if you do not realize that the center of your faith is even more important than the world. You will also be unable to identify the attributes of faith.

If you like to climb to the top of a mountain, you have to be ready to climb despite the conditions. Similarly, you should undertake a major action only after confirming again and again in your mind that you are going the right way.

Otherwise, you should not undertake such an action, and before you take the first step you have to strengthen your resolve ten thousand times. If you do this, you will be able to resolve whatever crises you face as you go forward. That is a life of faith. (27-113, 1969.11.30)

19. A life of faith is not aimless. A life of faith is like gathering the equipment required to reach a mountaintop, the summit of the highest peak. Hence, when faced with an obstacle, we should not make a detour around it.

Instead, we should proceed through the obstacle. When faced with hardships, we should determine not to give up, and be ready to face even greater difficulties. With an indomitable spirit, we should strive to discover the subjective self that can digest all difficulties. (27-113, 1969.11.30)

20. People pursue lives of faith in the belief that they will prevent evil and leave a legacy of goodness. What is humanity's greatest hope?

It is to become beings of perfect goodness. It is written in the Bible, Matthew 5:48, "Be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect."

As the absolute subject partner of love, God's greatest desire is for human beings to stand as His object partners of love. Human beings too want to be beings of goodness as object partners to God. As the subject of goodness, God does not want His object partner to be suffering under the yoke of evil, accused by Satan. There is no doubt about this.

Thus, as the absolute subject of goodness, God wants people to be absolute objects of goodness. Was this God's wish from our very birth? Of course. After our birth, does God want us to live that way throughout our lives? Yes, of course. God has always wished that we would be good and will always wish this.
(057-014, 1972.05.21)

21. Faith means believing in and reverently attending God. Where is the endpoint of such faith?

Where is the final destination of the faith that endures all, and overcomes all? It is the place where we can jump on top of God and take a ride. It is the place where, more than attending God, even if we held on to His hair and danced on Him, He would say with delight, “Good, keep on dancing!”

That is the endpoint of our faith; we need to rise to that level. In this sense, there is nothing you cannot believe in. If you have such a foundation, there is nothing that is beyond the grasp of faith. (44-254, 1971.05.23)

22. In the Unification Church we attend God as the object of reverence in our daily lives, and we promote harmony and unity based on God's love. This was my motivation for founding the Unification Church.

Our religion began on the best theoretical foundation. It is not a wild fantasy. From its inception, the Unification Church presented concrete substance. (083-312, 1976.02.15)

23. A life of attendance means that, even after living this way for a thousand years, you still do not think about yourself. You should not think, “I have spent decades in the Unification Church attending Reverend Moon.”

I don't like that kind of person. I have forgotten everything I have done in attending God so far. When you continue, forgetting everything, a greater life of attendance awaits you. God is like that too. (301-188, 1999.04.26)

A life that finds hope through faith

24. A person of faith should pray with a public mind, for a greater cause. Then how can such work unfold horizontally? We should not merely daydream about this; we need creative ventures that can make it real.

Hence, as people of faith, we need to struggle endlessly with our environment and strive to realize our ideals through innovative lives. A life of faith means the way of the greatest pioneer, the way of the greatest warrior, and the way of the greatest evangelist. Such achievements lead to the way of the greatest victor. This is the life of faith we must lead. (28-271, 1970.02.08)

25. We should believe in ourselves, place our hope in ourselves, and love ourselves so we can say to God, “Dear God, please accept my love, please rejoice in my hope and my faith.”

When I do so, God should be able to respond, “Yes!” This is the aim of our faith, the purpose of our hope, and the reason we long for love. If we achieve this, we will meet the Lord, and thereafter we will live with Him. (7-165, 1959.08.30)

26. The issue lies not in the small mistakes you make here and there but in whether you can go forward with absolute faith and obedience to God. If you do not have results, take heart and have hope. Having hope requires absolute faith and a record of striving to achieve results.

Representing all men in the world, I have to overcome a path of tribulation greater than that experienced by anyone in history. I came with authority certified by the spiritual and physical worlds, but you did not. Hence, if you have no accomplishments, you can get by with faith.

What kind of faith should it be? It cannot be self-centered faith that is pleasing only to you. Even if you accomplish the Will with such faith, God will not like it. The more you insist on doing things your way, the more you distance yourself from God and me.

It is inappropriate to say, “I will do what I like and not what I dislike.” God has to like what you do. That is where the real issue lies. The same applies to me. This is why I exhort you to have faith, even though you may not practice it as you should. If you believe, you can get by. (033-100, 1970.08.09)

27. Unification Church members need to believe in my words. They need to seek hope and faith as they did in the past. In those days, members may not have known the entire providence, yet they moved forward, filled with hope and longing for love.

So even if you are unable to reach a certain place on your path, you can still believe in my words, have faith in God's love, and advance according to my guidance. There is no other way. You need to go through this course.

Even if you may be victorious on the individual and family levels and receive God's blessing on those levels, you must keep going through the levels of the tribe, people, nation, world, and cosmos.

Overall, you need to go up through seven levels. You need to pass through seven stages to reach God. There are seven summits altogether. To reach God, we must have absolute faith in God. Whatever God orders, we must obey.
(014-256, 1965.01.01)

New life through repentance

28. Some people say they will begin their life of faith when they grow old, that they will go to heaven by having faith when they come close to death. They couldn't be further from the truth. You cannot go to heaven that way.

The time when you begin your life centered on God is important. If you begin your life of faith in your twilight years, it amounts to having spent a lifetime betraying God. In that case, you have to repent proportionally to your betrayal.

Those who persist in saying that when they are old, they will somehow have faith and then go to heaven are foolish. (32-032, 1970.06.14)

29. Some members here have lived a life of faith knowing God's Will for only one year, others for more than ten years or half a lifetime. The issue then is whether you have stood still, made progress, or retreated.

You need to know where you stand, and then you can go over the next hill. You may have made significant progress in the past, but if you are at a standstill today, God's living vitality cannot be with you, and you cannot maintain a loving relationship with God.

You may have made tremendously positive strides in the past, moving forward with boundless value, boundless vitality, and the boundless power of love, but if you are now at a standstill, you are already separated from God.
(32-019, 1970.06.14)

30. Repentance is necessary for fallen humanity to enter God's realm of life and love. If one hundred points worth of sins have accumulated through our ancestors up to now, much greater effort and repentance are needed. Hence, when we speak of our life of faith, we cannot leave out repentance.

We were born through countless generations of ancestors. If our ancestors were good, then as their descendants we will automatically be attainable in God's realm of life. However, if we have evil ancestors, we will find ourselves far removed from God's realm of life.

For a person who is distant from God's realm of life to draw near to it, a period of repentance that outweighs the evils committed by his or her ancestors is necessary.

Unless this person completes this task, he or she will be unable to access a world of vitality greater than his or her own. Because of this, the path of faith requires heartfelt tears of repentance. (32-024, 1970.06.14)

Living by the Word

31. If you have been living a life of faith for ten years, you should have had some experience of struggling to unite with God's heart in those years. If you experienced great joy while carrying out a particular mission, that should stimulate you so that one day you will completely fulfill your task.

This idea should be deeply embedded in your heart, so that when you are surrounded by difficulties, you can say, “When the spring comes, I will exert myself one more time for this, to the farthest reaches of heaven. Wait and see. When that time comes, I will do this.” We need such conviction.
(043-105, 1971.04.25)

32. Faith is necessary to motivate action. When the Bible teaches us where to find the kingdom of heaven, it does not say merely to believe in it; rather it teaches that the kingdom of heaven lies within us.

That heaven is within us does not mean that the subject partner's position depends on the world of the object partner. I determine the kind of subject partner I will be. Human beings have the impetus that determines this. (46-071, 1971.07.25)

33. You need to apply the faith you have learned, either spiritually or through me, in your endeavors. Where you do so, there the kingdom of heaven will unfold. When we look at this centered on God, we are in the second position and our environment is in the third position.

There are three stages – formation, growth, and completion. Since I am in the central position, I can perfect heaven and also perfect the world. Thus, in the Bible, the second position is always a problem.

Whose position is the second position? When looking at God and the created universe, it is the human beings' position. (76-157, 1975.02.02)

34. The human being is the connector between three points on a line. Therefore, when human beings reach perfection, we will also witness the perfection of God and the universe. Thus, in my pioneering course, what I need is spiritual experience and practice in coordinating these two worlds.

If spiritual experience refers to the spirit, practice refers to the truth; if we call spiritual experience the right hand, practice is the left. When I perfectly align spiritual experience with practice, I emerge as a son of God representing the entire universe. (76-157, 1975.02.02)

35. You need to have some accomplishments. The issue is whether at least one person on a battlefield achieves noteworthy results. I am not interested in worthless practices.

As representatives of God, our families, and our nation, we must shed blood in the fight to obtain results worthy of respect. We cannot do this while laughing. However, when we go forward with life-or-death determination, results commensurate with our efforts will naturally emerge.

Now is the time to invest our best abilities and leave a legacy of achievements. (217-080, 1991.04.16)