In the world, countless people are living. We know that anyone, at the present point, hopes for a better tomorrow, pledges one day that can be better, and seeks content of greater value. But we have been seeing within the life of reality the actual state in which, when they cannot find that and cannot fulfill such content, they become discouraged and despairing.
The place where a human being ought originally to dwell
Then, when we consider where it is that a human being ought originally to go and where it is that he ought to dwell, that place would be some future world that we hope for today. It is the present way of people’s thinking to understand that such a stage of living, or such a foundation of heart, will be accomplished centering on the hope of tomorrow.
Seen originally centering on the will of God, the position in which the unfallen ancestors of humankind stood was not a position of living with emotions such as misfortune or lamentation or grievance or resentment. That position, we know, was a position of being nurtured, embraced in the bosom of parents, and a position of being protected.
If there was a factor of misfortune there, God would take responsibility for that misfortune before the human being became unhappy; or if there was a factor that would bring discouragement there, God would prevent that content of discouragement beforehand. When we consider that such a position is the original position of sons and daughters, then although Adam too was originally in a position of no misfortune and Eve too was in a position of no misfortune, the fall took place. Since their environment was not one of misfortune, why did they come to fall? That is the question.
Looking at us human beings today, if there are two people, their ways of thinking differ, and if there are ten people, the ways of thinking of those ten all differ. That is why we know that in every matter such things as division, collision, and distress break out. But when two people, or ten people, go forward from the same position for one purpose, there can be no strife and there can be no division.
If Adam and Eve had felt how great God’s love is
Originally, God must be centered on Adam and Eve, and Adam and Eve must stand in a position of being for God. But because Adam and Eve cannot stand in a position of being for God without reaching perfection, they had to pass through a course of growth until they could stand in a position of being for God.
In passing through this course of growth, Adam and Eve were in a position of thinking of the future centering on the present point, that is, on the present; but God was in a position of facing and loving the whole, beyond Adam and Eve’s present position, all the way to the future position. The position of the present is a limited position and a position of being for oneself. We know that Adam and Eve were in a position of observing the content of present reality, centering only on themselves, without thinking about what the purpose God aimed at and desired was, centering on their relative relationship.
But we come to know the fact that God loved Adam and Eve not from a position like that of Adam and Eve, who thought of centering only on themselves, but keeping in mind the historical future after their lifetimes had passed. Adam and Eve may have been satisfied merely by the fact that God appeared directly and faced them, but God had been loving them in the present, centering on something higher and greater than that in the future. Adam and Eve did not know this fact.
If Adam and Eve had felt how great that love of God was, they could not have fallen even had they tried to fall. But because they did not know how great that love of God was, and because they stood in a position of feeling that they could resolve the circumstances colliding with them in the environment of reality and all the problems in which they themselves were placed, a problem arose here—this you must know.
The origin of human discouragement and despair
We see much of the wretched actual state of fallen human beings today, who are discouraged and lose heart within the living environment in which they are placed upon this earth. But if one comes to know that today’s trials and sufferings do not end merely as today’s trials and sufferings but are an important element without which the foundation of the future cannot be pioneered and prepared, one will not lose heart in the life of reality, nor will one despair or give up on oneself.
If there is a person who feels that, by passing through such an environment, there dwells within his sphere of living a value of the present by which his hope in the future is consolidated and the value of tomorrow’s life can be pledged, then we can infer and know the fact that, however difficult the environment may be, that person does not drive his whole being into the pit of discouragement. And what kind of position is such a position? You must know that it is the very same position as at the time when Adam and Eve fell.
God protected Adam and Eve, centering on the whole, and faced Adam and Eve, centering on a more eternal value. Although He raised Adam and Eve centering on such vast and deep content of value, a problem arose because Adam and Eve thought and felt centering on the position of each passing day. Inferring from such facts, when we ask where the origin of that nature by which we human beings, born as descendants of fallen ancestors today, become discouraged and despairing came from, it came from thinking of oneself as the center. From here, all problems break out.
Because the environment in which one is placed appears as a phenomenon opposite to what one desires, one bears all responsibility and struggles and fights to break through such an environment, but when one cannot sustain this by oneself, here there is discouragement and there is despair.
One must deny the present and affirm tomorrow
In such a fallen environment of reality, it is a plain principle that however much one tries to find the conditions of happiness, one cannot find them. That is why, however fine and however great a person may be, if one analyzes the course of his lifetime, he did not live centering on happiness or content of value. Seen from this viewpoint, when we set before us the question of how many people live giving thanks with a view of life in the true sense, we come to know well the fact that such people are extremely few.
Why is that? It is because they do not possess conviction about the future. So they cannot supply the driving force that can stimulate vitality for today’s living, centering on hope for tomorrow. That is why you must know well that human beings in this fallen world today are in a position of unavoidably having to await the world of hope of tomorrow.
That is because we human beings have not reached the position where we can be treasured by God, who wishes to treasure human beings centering on the future. Therefore, there remains for us human beings a road of destiny by which we must go seeking that position again. Because human beings living in a fallen world must go seeking such a road of destiny, we today must pass through a process of suffering and struggle in the life of reality.
For that one does not weave a smooth life but must carry out a new revolution. The life of every religion is revolution. Without passing through the course of a pioneer who must develop anew, one cannot reach the world of hope that human beings must accomplish. Speaking in the words of our Principle, one must go forward in Restoration by passing through a course of indemnity.
The course of restoration through indemnity is not a road one follows purely according to some formula and rule. One cannot but pass through a process of pioneering and struggle. That pioneering is not limited to resolving the problem of an individual’s life. It is worldwide pioneering. It is pioneering to resolve global problems. Moreover, that struggle too is not an individual struggle but a worldwide struggle. Human beings do not know such facts.
Today the very life of us human beings stands in a process of worldwide war, stands in a course of worldwide pioneering, and stands in the ranks of a new worldwide revolution. We human beings have forgotten such facts.
Because the ancestors of humankind fell into a position of forgetting the hope of tomorrow, centering on themselves—that is, in a position of affirming themselves and denying tomorrow—we must stand in a position of denying today’s self and affirming tomorrow. Without becoming standard-bearers of a revolution that can affirm the future and deny today, one will have a life of no value, and in every aspect of life, one cannot take off the mask of sorrow. This is a matter of course.
If human beings had not fallen, it would be one thing, but given that they fell, by repeating the mistake of the human ancestors, who affirmed the present and denied the future, one cannot escape the realm of the fall. That is why we must stand in a position of denying the present and affirming the future. In other words, you must know that, because the ancestors of humankind fell by affirming the present and denying the future, we cannot find the right road of life without each of us furnishing new content by which we can deny the present and affirm the future.
Then the question is how much we can deny the present. Where is the limit of that denial? When we set before us whether it is a denial within the realm centering on the conditions of a new future that we seek today within religion or within the realm of the fallen world—with a denial within that realm, one cannot go seeking a new future world. That is why one must deny even beyond that realm. You must know the fact that, otherwise, one cannot bring the realm of denial within the realm to a result of victory.
Then what sort of thing is the ideal we desire today? It is not a life of affirming the present. The life of faith is, to the very end, a life of denying the present. At the same time as denying the present, it consolidates the affirmation of the future.
When we set before us the question of which of these two positions—the position of religious people today affirming the present and denying the future, and the position of denying the present and affirming the future—must be stronger, the position of denying the present and affirming the future must be stronger than anything. Only a person who can do so can find the love of the future. But by seeking one’s own self, centering on love within a sphere of living centered on oneself, one cannot escape the suffering caused by the sorrowful fall that Adam and Eve committed. This is a matter of course.
That is why religious people have gone the road of suffering and trial without rest until now. Where does that purpose lie? It is not to repeat the mistake of the forebears who affirmed the present and denied the future but in order, through a paradoxical method, to deny the present and affirm the future. You must know that this is the road religion takes.
The necessity of establishing a view of value concerning the new future
You must know that today we, between these two, are overturned in mind and body, centering on the life of a single day, and at the same time each day is overturned. It is arranged that today and tomorrow are decided by the overturning of mind and body, centering on your mind and body.
Therefore, in passing each day, we must not let today’s trial continue into tomorrow. One must have today a foundation that pursues a new affirmation of tomorrow and can connect this to the new affirmation of tomorrow. You must know that otherwise tomorrow cannot appear to me as a foundation of happiness. You must know that the road of maintaining vitality at such a borderline and going forward is the road people of faith must walk.
The road of faith is not going forward holding God with one hand and holding the world with the other hand, but denying the world and affirming Heaven. Then when we ask whether there has been content by which one can affirm the future and deny the present, until now there has not been. They did not know it. The mind pursued a direction of value and came forth, but the life of faith until now has been one in which, in that direction it pursued, one could not find a subject-object even if one tried.
That is why here a new bond is needed in order to pledge for oneself the promise of tomorrow, and the establishment of a view of value concerning a new future is needed. That established content of value must be subject to a stronger and more thorough content than anything of the present. Otherwise, one cannot deny and overcome the notions of reality and the stage of living of reality, centering on the world of the future.
Looking at an individual’s course of faith, at the very beginning he lives a life of faith very well. But as the days go by and as the scope of that environment widens, he fails to furnish still greater three-dimensionality. He set out strongly at first, but eventually he became weak. You must know that this is so because the establishment of a view of the future is insufficient.
Then what is it that our Unification Church presents today?
We must present not only the view of living by which we live at present but also, clearly, a view of the future. Therefore, there is no need to say twice that, apart from our Unification Church, no new purpose and no new hope can be presented before the reality of this world in the days ahead. That is why we must plant a clear ideology concerning a view of the future. For that, one must clearly know a view of value concerning the future. Our Unification Church teaches such things.
The family is of more value than the individual; the clan is of more value than the family; the people are of more value than the clan; the nation is of more value than the people; the world is of more value than the nation; the Cosmos is of more value than the world; and God is of more value than the Cosmos. And even within God, God’s love is of still more value.
That which can bind the hearts of human beings into one
Then what is it that our Unification Church can use to govern and rule the world and string it all together at once? This is not something our individual selves desire. Each of us lives one age within a hundred years and dies. But history continues eternally. To connect history, there is an individual society, and there are a family-level society, a clan-level society, a people-level society, and a national-level society.
Upon this earth live many types of peoples whose climates differ, whose traditions differ, and whose historical backgrounds differ from one another. With what shall one bind them into one? It cannot be done with power or sovereignty. It cannot be done with any material thing of the world either. If there is a single method that can bind this, what is it?
If you ask anyone where he would like to live, he will say his hometown. However long an old man has lived away from his hometown in a foreign place, he longs for the hills and streams of his hometown. Even after decades have passed since his parents died, a period long enough to forget his parents, it is human nature to go seeking his parents’ graves and, tracing old memories, to try to feel the life of that time. When we consider such things, where indeed does our heart wish to dwell?
It is not money. It is not that one wishes to go to one’s hometown to go to that house because one’s parents’ house is there. One goes seeking the beloved parents and brothers and sisters and wife and children who are there. When we consider this, we cannot deny that it is a matter of an inner, demonstrable dimension rather than an outward one. Then what is that very thing that can bind this world and bring it to one purpose? It is love.
That love is not the sort of love we practice within the reality in which we live. It is original love. Where must this love begin?
It must begin from the highest position. Because God is the Absolute Being and the Highest One, the departure of that love too must be from the highest position, and the place where that love can dwell must also be the highest position. You must know that that love is a cosmic love.
With that love we must become incarnations of love who can transcend clan and people. In that love there is clan-level content that can connect an individual and a clan, a clan and people, people and a nation, a nation and the world, and the Cosmos, or even God. That is, that love must be an absolute love that becomes an absolute origin that can form a vertical bond reaching to the family, the clan, the people, the nation, the world, the Cosmos and God and, at the same time, can spread horizontally to the world and bind the humankind of the world in a bond of brothers and sisters and can eternally deny all the negative conditions that have appeared in the process of history.
Therefore, the question will be whether, centering on the love the Unification Church presents, one can transcend the individual, family, clan, people, nation, and world on the vertical plane. On the horizontal plane too, the question is whether one can transcend all the changes of thought concerning the climate of society and culture. You must know that when all this is possible, this ism cannot but be the final ism.
If, at a present point where that is possible both vertically and horizontally and where it bears life common to all people, it is an ism possessing a love that can truly win victory before all people and an ism that, having won, can arouse the same emotion in all people, then this ism can become a womb that can pledge the hope of the future in the human world and pioneer a new foundation of hope for the future.
Then what is that love centered on? That love is not centered on the individual. That love is not centered only on the family, nor centered only on the clan, nor centered only on the people. Nor is it centered only on a nation, such as the Republic of Korea. Love is a love that transcends all of these. It is centered on the Cosmos, transcending the world, and it is a love centered not only on the Cosmos but on God. Moreover, you must know that Unification Thought is to go forward, centering not only on God but also on God’s love.
When we ask whether God’s love can be exchanged for the world, it cannot. And when we ask whether God’s love can be exchanged for God Himself, that too cannot be. To find that love, God Himself has sacrificed. Considering the fact that God Himself has sacrificed for the sake of that love which is within Himself, love is the fundamental content that cannot be exchanged even for God Himself. Isn't this love alone the foundation that can penetrate our marrow and govern our flesh and blood? This is a fact plainly revealed through the emotional life of fallen human beings today.
That is why the Unification Church teaches the history of the heart and the world of the heart. Why the history of the heart? Because it unfolds the vertical world of heart into a horizontal world of heart. You must know that this is Unification Thought.
To unfold vertical love horizontally
Then how does one unfold vertical love horizontally?
To unfold vertical love horizontally, one must not be conscious of oneself. Such a position is the position of the True Parents.
If a point of origin that can become a foundation for bringing such vertical and horizontal love to a conclusion has appeared upon this globe, this cannot but be the hope of our humankind.
By that, humankind can see vertical perfection and can see horizontal perfection. That is why there is content by which one can deny everything related and step forward with dignity before the standard of perfection.
Seen from this viewpoint, if you yourselves have an ideology in the world of reality, how lofty will that ideology be? It ends together with your lifetime. Because that ideology is an ideology held within a realm you must, in any case, deny, it ends together with your lifetime.
Moreover, it must not be handed down to your descendants. It is an ideological condition that must be settled within my generation. To settle this, I must overturn today’s notions of living.
We know the truth that the waning moon waxes again and that where there is shade there is also sunlight. Considering that there is a point at which high and low thus cross, we come to know that the world of today is by no means a world of happiness alone. That is why we can infer and know that denying the present world is to pursue a happy one.
We must not feel God’s love only conceptually but must apply this love to the stage of living of reality and bring it forth. For that, what must you think about? The question is how God’s infinite value and one individual entity of reality form a relationship. Going to seek that world is the road of Restoration, but it is not connected by transcending the individual truth body.
To go to a great place, one must set out from a small place. That must begin from my words. What I say must form a relationship with the world of the future, and what I see and feel must also form a relationship with the world of the future. This is the question.
For that, what must one do? It cannot be done by me alone. This you must know. When one goes the road of the Way in a deep realm, offering devotion alone is to become God’s object. But when one comes to unfold God’s will, it cannot be done alone.
However much one may have mastered everything in the world of the Way and stand in a position where that authority is known in the heavenly world, he may have formed a vertical relationship with God, but without possessing a relative foundation that can be related horizontally, it ends at the clan-level standard.
That is why, in the light of the Principle, although God is in the position of a subject and vertical center, He cannot but set out to seek human beings living upon the earth.
Every existing thing upon this earth cannot feel happiness by itself alone. We human beings too cannot feel happiness only within the present. One can feel happiness in a present that can be connected to the future. One must feel the value of today’s living in a present that can be included in and absorbed by a more valuable future world. Only then can one establish a view of the future world. You must know that such a position becomes the dividing point of our living. For that, considerable effort is necessary.
The great term True Parents
We human beings in the fallen world today have not possessed a center. A human being alone in a fallen position cannot face God directly. That is why the thought of the Second Advent, the thought of the Messiah, is that God will send to this earth one person who can face God directly.
The Messiah does not come to this earth and carry out that mission alone. To become a center, one must furnish the four directions. Only when one furnishes the four directions and possesses a power that can give and receive from an equal position is balance accomplished. Otherwise, if that power tilts, balance is not accomplished. That is because what gives little rises and what gives much sinks. If balance is not accomplished, it cannot be eternal.
To become equal, first a subject is needed who becomes the origin point of balance. Moreover, there must be an object possessing an equivalent value that can form balance with this center. And only when a line is drawn that can connect that subject and object in the same position is a horizontal line accomplished. Therefore, we must know that a relative factor is absolutely necessary here.
Then why did God make it so that a woman is necessary before a man and a man is necessary before a woman? This is the question. It was not to raise one person and let him live by himself, but to raise two and let them live together toward the future world, completely centering on one hope and bearing God’s love. The life in which those two give and receive is a supremely hopeful life. Here one must be able to draw in the life of the future and live, sensing and feeling it in the life of reality, and what is it that can do so? It is husband and wife.
If in such a family there is a couple who, clasping each other’s hands, sing of happiness and promise the future, and who pledge the world of the future and deny the present and affirm the future world, no living environment whatsoever will be able to rule over them.
However difficult the life of reality may be, it does not bring a hindrance before the future world; rather, the more difficult it is, the more it adds vision concerning the future world. You must know that when it becomes so, no difficulty of reality whatsoever can bind them.
If both man and woman stand in such a position and love the future and respect each other and live with a heart of being for the future, and if they furnish here a conjugal bond that can of itself carry along and honor the value of the future, then from here the foundation of happiness will be established.
You must know the fact that God set up Eve for Adam and Adam for Eve as ideal partners because they were necessary to each other. That relative being cannot be connected to the future without forming a bond with the subject in reality. That Jesus and the Holy Spirit, too, were set up in the positions of subject and object was because there were inner circumstances for passing through these cosmic circumstances. This no one can deny.
Seen from this viewpoint, to break through the society of reality, which must be denied, there must be comrades. There must be a teacher. To climb higher, there must be a teacher, and there must be comrades. In reality, in order for something absolutely new to be injected before history and the people, one must without fail unite as comrades and go forward with a burning heart toward the world of hope of the future. Just as one cannot deny the fact that from there a new history is created, you must know that the law of Heaven too is established only through such a process.
Your families must not end merely as families. Before you lies the tremendous goal called the organizing of the clan centering on the family. Only when the family is completely one can one stand before the clan. If one cannot become one, one comes to stand in a position of avoiding the clan.
Until today, we human beings did not know this. We have struggled until now, thinking that if it is done in the south, then in the south, and if in the east, then in the east, everything will be resolved. It must not be done that way. Only when the individual, as an individual, and the family, as a family, furnish inner and outer content and stand in a position of being one with the will does God accompany them; and only when one furnishes such content can one govern humankind.
Why does it become so?
Because descendants come forth as men and women centering on the family-level foundation, there must be content of value by which the representative standard of man and woman is bound together before the family centering on heart. It becomes so by being thus bound and becoming an object whom all people can commonly admire. Only then can one govern the world. Without this, it cannot be done. That is why the term “True Parents,” of which the Unification Church speaks, is great. Of course, the content of the truth too has depth, but the words “True Parents” are a great term.
From here, the departure toward the future is guaranteed. Conviction and value concerning the future can be guaranteed. Moreover, if there is one origin point that can guarantee value upon the stage of reality, it comes from those words.
Form a family of love centering on the Parents
Here, what must we do?
We must become one. Centering on whom must we become one? We must not become one centered on ourselves. Nor must we try to become one by dragging the True Parents in, centering on our family. We must be drawn before the True Parents. In being drawn, it is not oneself alone who is drawn; one must drag along one’s parents if parents, one’s husband if husband, or one’s wife if wife. Not only that, one must drag along the members of one’s household and even the material things in the family. Thus, one must become one.
Looking at the ages of history, in the Old Testament Age they came forth centering on material things, and in the New Testament Age they came forth centering on love. Jesus spoke of love, but human beings did not know what love is.
In the Old Testament Age, offerings were given for the sake of indemnity. Without an offering, it would not do. Thus, one had to pass through a course of giving offerings. Here, what is an offering? It is a sacrificial thing. That is why in the Old Testament Age, as an offering of atonement in place of human beings, all things were offered, and together with material things, animals were offered. We know the fact that such was the Old Testament Age.
Next, Jesus raised it one stage and introduced God’s love. In the Old Testament Age, Moses could not introduce the God of love but introduced only the God of authority, the God of power, and the God of judgment. But Jesus introduced love. He introduced the God of love and introduced the Jesus of love, but the human beings of that time did not receive it.
Through such a process, it has come to this point. Here, what we must know is that one must center on the Parents. Love cannot appear without parents. Only when a person is born from parents can love be given and received. Without furnishing such a relative standard, love cannot be accomplished.
All things exist for the sake of human beings. When we ask what the whole of history concludes in, it concludes in material things and children and parents—in other words, in the standard of the family. This is the foundation of the universe. Without parents, children cannot be born. Children born of parents must govern all things centering on the parents. Adam and Eve, too, must govern all things. All this applies at once.
When you say you must live to accomplish the will, you cannot go alone. One must go having gathered all such content. If one presses down what has been thus gathered, it becomes one point. Is that not so? If one compresses it, it becomes one point. If this one point were divided in two, a collision would break out here.
Vertical history must be indemnified horizontally. Seen three-dimensionally, when we set before us the question of what history corresponds to for you, it corresponds to the family. The family is the historical central foundation.
The goal of every revolution for presenting hope before the world of the future is not the nation. It is not the world. In such a process of history, there have been people who presented a view of national revolution and who presented a view of world revolution, but there has been no subject force that presented a view of family revolution to prepare a new framework for the family.
Then what does the Unification Church seek to do?
Before there is a revolution of the family there can be no revolution of the clan; before there is a revolution of the clan there can be no revolution of the people; before there is a revolution of the people there can be no revolution of the nation; and before there is a revolution of the nation, there can be no revolution of the world. That is why, together with the perfection of the individual entity, we seek to carry out a family-level revolution.
A revolution cannot be accomplished without discarding and breaking up what already exists. Without removing what is past, one cannot accomplish what is new. Therefore, one must deny oneself, must deny one’s own family, and must deny one’s own material things. It will not do otherwise.
The family is the foundation of the universe
Jesus did not say to love one’s own children. He said to love God before loving one’s children. He said to love God more than oneself. That is why Jesus said, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your mind and with all your soul. This is the first commandment.”
Because we human beings have no root of life, we must be grafted onto the root. Shall we be like duckweed, pushed this way and that whenever the wind blows? There is no root. Though these words may sound like violent speech, in a fallen world that requires such environmental conditions, they are words of the gospel beyond telling.
Then how shall one love God?
Shall one set Him up in a palace of paradise, or shall one let Him go about? We have struggled until now to find a road by which it can be changed over from being centered on the kingdom of heaven to being centered on daily living.
Since in the human world until now there has been no road by which it could be changed over to being centered on daily living, there must be such a road. What do these words mean? They mean that there must be a subject of true love centering on God’s love.
Seen centering on one nation, if the sovereign of the nation is regarded as the father, then the people are in the position of sons, and the land is in the position of all things. Likewise, seen centering on the world, all people are in the position of sons; this whole globe is in the position of all things; and the Lord who comes as the center of the world is in the position of the father. Seen centering on the whole Cosmos, God, the center of the Cosmos, is in the position of the father; the historical human being who can be connected with God is the son; and the whole created world is all things.
The basic unit that reduces this in scale is the family. Therefore, in the family, what belongs to the father and what belongs to the son must all be offered as God’s. Without distinguishing whose son and whose things, all must be offered as God’s.
Some people say they will offer only their sons and daughters, omitting material things. Others say they will offer only their sons and material things, omitting themselves. With that, total restoration cannot be done.
In order for a nation to be formed, there must be sovereignty, there must be a people, and there must be territory. It is the same with the heavenly kingdom. What stands in place of sovereignty is the Parents; what stands in place of the people is sons and daughters; and what stands in place of territory is the nation. Not one of these can be left out. This is an iron rule.
Then where is the foundation on which you must go forward in place of the nation? Where is the altar of the nation? It is the family. Therefore, in the family, children and all things must become one, centered on a loving husband and wife. If it belongs to the nation, it also belongs to the world. My children and I and all things are not mine but the nation’s. That is certain. Therefore, whenever the nation demands them, one must be able to hand them over. Otherwise, one cannot fulfill the way of loyalty before the nation. This is the principle.
Loving one’s nation is not to take from the nation but to give more. People do not know such things. Why is the Republic of Korea today becoming corrupt? It is because people try to take from the nation. If one gives well for that nation with God’s love and is loyal to that nation, one can set right what the nation has done wrong.
Why must one serve and sacrifice for the sake of the world?
Unification Thought is the thought of sacrificing one’s own nation to save the world. In the end, this is not sacrifice but an exchange for the world. To sacrifice a small thing to gain a great thing is normal. One who exchanges for something of greater value is a wise person. That is the rightful road for going to the world. Human beings yearn for the greater, not for the smaller. They hope for the greater, not for the smaller.
To say that one must deny something is not to imply that one should end with denying, but to exchange it for something greater. One must furnish practical content that can do so within this present sphere of living, but because they have not furnished such content, human beings today end their lives within the polluted environment of a fallen world. We see this actual state well.
If only one finds the Parents, finding the son and all things is easy
Everything is in the position of parents and children and all things. Even in living through this world today, behind the parents the son follows, and behind the son all things follow. Centering on something greater, the son and all things go forward, guarding the parents. One must go forward that way even into the eternal world. In this fallen reality, one must drag it along even into the world of death. The parents must lead the sons and daughters. That is why the Messiah must lead the sons and daughters to save them. Having led them, next he must lead all things.
Weren't all things prepared for that?
If one is born as a child, one is already prepared to become a parent. That is why sons and daughters must stand surrounding the parents. When a foundation of heart appears upon this earth in which sons and daughters wish to sit, surrounding the parents eternally, the kingdom of peace is built.
Then do you have a heart that wishes to stand surrounding the Teacher of the Unification Church eternally? This is the question. You must have a heart that wishes to be beside the Teacher without leaving that place and that can follow without changing your present positions. Nor must all your possessions end merely with becoming one. In the natural environment, they must become a foundation that can move as Heaven’s and can be transformed as Heaven’s.
Then where has the offering of all people gone?
Where has the offering of the son gone, and where has the offering of the parents gone? Until now, has there been a time upon the earth when these offerings could be gathered and embraced in the bosom of the parents? Have I become one who can say to humankind, “Beloved sons and daughters! Your sons and daughters are my grandchildren, and what belongs to those grandchildren is mine.” This is the question.
Before there is a family, there can be no clan; before there is a clan, there can be no people; before there is a people, there can be no nation; and before there is a nation, there can be no world. That is why the Unification Church sets forth Cosmism (천주주의).
What is Cosmism?
Speaking of the family, it is a family in which, even if there were gold and silver and treasures enough to fill the whole world and more in the family in which I live, one does not live intoxicated by them but forgets them and can always live intoxicated by God’s love. What belongs to the son is the parents’, and what belongs to the parents must be connected intact as God’s.
The road of the Principle we walk is a road on which one goes putting material things before God. When God created the created world, He created all things first.
All things appeared first, and after that the Son appeared. That is why one must set all things at the very front in going forth toward the Father and then set the Son and go. Only after doing so does the Father call us.
The purpose of God’s Providence of salvation is not to find all things but to find the Son. That is why we denied all things. If only one finds the Son, all things are naturally transformed there. And if only one finds the Parents, the Son is bound to be born. That is why going forth seeking the Parents of humankind is the history of Restoration. You must know this.
The person who can give thanks before God in the true sense
Then what kind of person is one who can give thanks before God in the true sense?
A person who tries to go without having received God’s command by himself alone cannot do it, no matter what. With that, one cannot reach the position of perfection. It is not a worthwhile position.
However much one may stand in a position of grace that the free world and heaven and earth can remember, with that it will not do. One must become one with one’s own sons and daughters. One must also become one with all the material things one possesses. This you must know.
Because the ism of the Unification Church is Cosmism, one must pass on the inheritance centering on the family and must be registered centering on the family. Such an age is coming. We cannot yet be registered because we have no nation in which to register. There is no nation that can do so. The Republic of Korea is not a nation in which we can register. You must know that we, placed in such a destiny, are a band of gypsies, a band of vagabonds, in the same plight as a wandering band.
That is why we must somehow secure a foundation and establish sovereignty. We must become a band possessing a subjecthood that can restore those peoples, centering on one worthwhile value within the realm of the suffering of countless peoples. This is the question.
You must know that there is a time of registration ahead for you. Going out to receive the Blessing is not registration. This is no more than a symbolic registration. That is why we go seeking a nation in which we can register.
What kind of nation is that nation?
It is a nation in which sovereignty stands in place of the parents, the people stand in place of the son, and the territory stands in place of material things, forming a trinity (三位一體). To form a nation, there must be sovereignty, there must be a people, and there must be territory. It is the same with religion.
For you today, the question is how to unfold this relationship of whether it is mine or the Father’s. This is the greatest problem we bump against at the borderline while living today. Do you understand? Is it mine or the Father’s? Is it public or private? Because we now seek to unfold a re-education about this, Satan works first. If some issue is presented for the whole of the Republic of Korea and this goes wrong, this nation will be swept away.
One family is like a cell in forming one nation. Just as a person, A, possesses all the conditions he must possess as an individual, one family possesses all the conditions that can form one nation. With such a purpose, the Unification Church blesses families.
How shall one live a life of gratitude?
Then what becomes the question here is whether you live a life of gratitude. How does one give thanks? When one sees a person with many children, one will say that that person has much hardship, but you must know that on the other side, he feels a happiness that a person without children has never felt. A person who has raised children will know this. Comparing a person who has raised children with a person who has not, the one who has raised children feels the worth of living, however noisily and complicatedly his children bustle about, but the person without children cannot feel such a thing.
Through children, one feels the worth of living. It is not unhappiness because the environment in which one is placed is complicated. Hope for tomorrow is grafted in there. We must know the fact that the more sons and daughters one has that others do not have, the more one can furnish four-directional completeness in each field and possess new hope and therefore can overcome even one’s own difficult environment.
Seen in this light, how one lives a life of gratitude becomes the question. You are always facing material things. Yet you hold the thought of using those material things to feed and support your sons and daughters. But one must say that with material things, one will feed the nation and will feed the world. When God sees a person who, facing material things, however small they may be, wishes to give to the world and offers devotion, and a person who clutches those material things and trembles, wanting to leave them for his sons and daughters, what will He think?
You must know that goodness is without fail a public position. However small the material thing may be, if it is something upon which one has offered devotion to God, one can enter staking the world upon it. This you must know. You must know that when a person who has only a hundred won enters staking God’s love upon that hundred won, that hundred won stands for the whole and stands for that person’s character.
One cannot call even a scrap of land the width of an inch one’s own property. All of it was received from God. Since it was received from God, it must be returned.
However small it may be, since it was received from God, it must be returned to God with value. When one does so, history ripens. Since one received in that way, one must become a person who gives in that way. Unless it becomes a world of such people, this earth cannot become the kingdom of heaven.
All the things I saw and heard within the sphere of living of the twenty-four hours of a day—for whose sake did I see and hear them? For God’s sake. One must see and hear for God’s sake. And what one feels too must be felt for God’s sake.
Although we are living upon the earth, we must live connecting it with the life of the heavenly world. Is it not so that a person who has not lived the life of the heavenly world cannot master the heavenly world? It becomes so.
A filial son is given the name “filial son” because he lived much in connection with his parents’ love, and a loyal subject obtains the name “loyal subject” because he made much effort to make the whole of his life one with the nation. This one must know.
When you give and receive one object, you must give and receive it as the world’s. How much do you feel and master such facts within your life? Some among you think, “Ah, I believed in the Unification Church for decades, and by believing in the church I have ended up in this pitiful plight,” but that is a mistaken thought.
For whose sake do you give? And for whose sake do you receive? One must give for God’s sake and receive for God’s sake. Since one received for God’s sake, one must give for God’s sake. Since one gave for God’s sake, one must not say one will receive for one’s own sake.
That is why Jesus Christ, even in the midst of suffering, prayed, “Not as I will, but as the Father wills.” But fallen human beings would have prayed for themselves in such a position. They would have said they wanted to receive for themselves. This is where fallen human beings differ.
Be ashamed even after giving and awed when you receive
Centering on whom must you give and receive?
You must give and receive centering on God. You must give and receive not what is private but what is public.
If you gave one object to someone centering on God, would God, who loves you, wish to give you only that, or would He, in a state of heartache from wishing to give something greater than that, hold a heart of being ashamed even while giving? This is the question. Parents do not boast while giving; rather, they are ashamed even while giving.
Parents, even while giving to their child, regard it as shameful and sorrowful that they cannot clothe him like others and cannot give more even though they wish to. We must feel that there is a parental heart that sheds tears of itself at seeing the child cry. That is public. A son born of parents with such a heart will become a fine son.
Since that son was born publicly, he must live giving and receiving for the world. A person who always lives furnished with such an attitude of heart—a heart of being ashamed even after giving and of being ashamed and awed beyond knowing what to do when receiving—is a person who lives a life of gratitude. You must know clearly that through such a person, new history is unfolded and that through such content, the kingdom of heaven is accomplished.
Today many of our Unification Church members have made international marriages crossing national borders.
Such people are those who step forth with a worldwide authority that can unify the world of enemies, with an authority that no one of that nation and no motive of that people’s history can govern. In this sense, they should be respected and praised as noble people.
If there is a band who, even while walking such a road of suffering, can say they are grateful and who even after that can lament their insufficiency, these people will conquer the world and will rule over thought. This you must know.
That is why you must give thanks with tears in the position in which you are placed. You must give thanks to God, who furnished your insufficient and insufficient selves with what you did not even ask for. A person who, because he received feelings of shame, holds an attitude of heart that can feel shame even while giving, will absolutely not perish. Just watch whether he perishes. You must know that such a person cannot but live a life of gratitude.
A life of giving gladly and receiving gratefully
If Adam and Eve, when they heard God’s word “Do not eat,” had received this word with thanks and lived holding a heart of bowing their heads with an awed heart, saying, “That such a lofty and precious One should say such a word to us, who are shameful,” and of conducting themselves carefully, they would not have fallen.
Centering on God’s love, you must become protagonists of love who respect one another with a humble heart even while giving love and who can feel shame even after giving love. A family in which such people live cannot but be happy. You must know clearly that this is the only road today by which, in public and private matters, private matters can be resolved and connected to a public foundation.
A person who lives in such an age will without fail enjoy happiness. It is only a matter of time and a matter of the period; such a person is one who lives, inheriting God’s work within his sphere of living. Knowing this, you must consider that your responsibility is great.
A person who walks the road of the will cannot simply go in silence. Within the Father’s voice dwells the han of many a steep pass of suffering. When we consider the Father, who came forth wearing blood-stained clothes while passing through a course of bloody struggle, it is because the Father had a heart that wished to give even while suffering and that wished to give again even after giving so He could come over those steep passes of historical suffering.
In the process of history there have been many fine people, but there was no one who felt insufficiency even after giving and who received gratefully when receiving. You must know that, whatever the outward form, only a person who receives gladly and receives gratefully can love God.
What shall we boast of hereafter?
It is not that we should boast that Unification Church members are fine. That we can always receive gladly and always receive gratefully what God gives is our boast, and that we hold a heart that can give gratefully is our boast.
If the Unification Church is one that establishes such a tradition, the Unification Church will be eternal, unbroken together with world history.
Only a person who lives in that way is a person who lives a life of gratitude before God. You must know clearly that the only road by which we can remain in the world is the road of living a life of gratitude for everything.
Because the fall, centering on the problem of life and death, became the origin, and we have thus woven a road of twists and turns; to cross over this, we must deny the present and affirm the future. To inherit in the present a heart that affirms the future, one must hold a heart that can give everything with a heart of gratitude.
Without such a heart, it will not do. You must know that a person who knows this and practices it will, without fail, become a son or daughter of God.
