Tokyo Church, Japan
Romans 11:13–24
Everything that exists in this phenomenal world cannot exist eternally unless it sets up a center. Even in the case of us as individuals, one who has decided upon a center can be called a strong person.
We always experience through living that, after deciding upon a foundation that can exist eternally, one must set out from there and go on setting up a new standard.
The Eternal Center
The center of the body is the mind. Nature exists centered on the human being. If we broaden the scope and consider it, the world is becoming one centered on the ideal (理想) that created all things.
Therefore, the conclusion follows that, if there is an all-knowing, all-powerful God, all things cannot but become one centered on Him.
In this world today, there are countless nations. Those nations each hold different backgrounds and cultures; the courses they have walked are each different, and their histories too are different. Yet among the nations that exist in this way, in any case, a national form that becomes one center cannot but appear.
That which becomes the center must not be ruled by something that passes away at one time. Nor must it be ruled by anything in its surroundings. It must become the center of all the phenomenal world and a center that all the things people pursue cannot but acknowledge. And this center must be a center that no one, whatever in this present age, can but acknowledge, one that moves the age and exists upon the great root (大本) of history as its foundation.
Further, that center must be a center that cannot be left out in any world whatsoever of the future. That center is what history has been pursuing up to now and what the religious people who seek the path of goodness have been pursuing up to now.
Has that center indeed appeared upon this earth?
It is a fact that the center has still not fully appeared.
If God exists and holds the hope of setting up one center upon this earth, then a true society and a true world centered on the human being must, as is fitting, be established in this world. This is what heaven and earth desire at the same time, and a grave task that the whole of humankind hopes for.
Yet this earth, changing and changing again from one point, has flowed in an erring direction. But it cannot escape the realm of purpose, in which one standard that remains to the very last—that is, one center—must be decided.
In this way, all beings must, centered on the absolute God (神), and further centered on the absolute ideal, yearn for and yearn for that center, find joy in going to seek it out, and find the inner standard by which the value of life can be displayed.
When one ideal world is established upon this earth, that each individual who is to become the center of that world can be placed upon a center that can form an eternal bond in the depths of the heart with that ideal world—that is, can be made one with it—can by no means be done by an external condition.
Nothing of what has hitherto been spoken of by any view of history will do, nor will the conception of the self do. It is possible only by heart (심정), which, in the deepest bottom of the human mind, maintains an eternally unchanging form (型) and can carry on give-and-take action (수수작용) forever before God’s ideal of creation.
When God first created heaven and earth, He had a view of the universe, an ideal of creation, and a purpose of creation, by which He wished to form an eternal bond between this heaven and earth and His inner standard. The center of such things was precisely God’s heart.
When we consider it from this standpoint, we can consider that, though the source of the universe is in every way God Himself, the first ground that gave rise to the phenomenon called the creation of the universe was God’s heart, and that there was a realm of the ideal that could be made one centered on that heart.
To Seek Again the Lost World
Before God created the universe, He thought, with that heart, of the purpose of creating all things and, centering on all internal natures (성상), made all created beings one with the purpose of creation, and, passing them through each process of creation, made them; and what He so made is the human being of the ideal of creation.
What appeared embodied is man, who symbolizes Heaven, and woman, who symbolizes the earth. And in the case of the individual, it appeared as mind and body.
In this way, everything in this phenomenal world embodies the relation of subject and object and, within one realm of purpose, lives, being swept up in the great fortune of the universe, while setting up its standard of living after its fashion.
That it failed to exist and live in that world of purpose centered on God’s heart, as it ought to have, is the tragedy of the universe and the tragedy of the history of humankind. Had the human being, as the substance of God’s ideal, as the center of the purpose, been made one with God’s heart, an absolute standard would have been achieved that no one could disturb and no one could invade.
But because the human ancestors lost that thing of heart-level oneness, we must again restore that world of the ideal, that world of purpose. As a result of the fall, the view of purpose turned to a different position, and the absolute standard of the heart came to be directed in the opposite direction. To put it another way, the center, which ought to have been centered on God, came to move to the opposite position, centered on Satan.
The meaning is that it came to go and stay in a place where it ought not to have gone. So this must be turned back to its original place.
This is why God has, up to now, repeated the providence to seek for fallen humankind, age by age, a new ideal and a new heart. The human being, as the substance not only of the external standard but of the inner standard, ought to have stood upon the absolute standard of heart and lived in that world of purpose; but because they fell and lost that world, human beings have, through long history up to now, gone seeking that world of purpose, the ideal world, the supreme world that is happy and peaceful and free and overflowing with joy, the supreme world in which the heart can rest in peace.
But even if one makes this horizontal world one’s own, unless a standard of heart is set up by which one can, in the depths of one’s mind, rejoice in oneself and rejoice infinitely facing all things, it is impossible to seek the lost world again.
If one sought that world without setting up the standard of the heart, it would have to be set in order again at some time. However great an ideal there may be, or even if one establishes an ideal world of peace by making the whole world one, if each individual does not have a standard of heart by which one can think of that world, respond to that world, and become one with that world following its movements, then however much it may be the longed-for ideal world, that world has no bond whatever with oneself.
The more distant the relationship with such a world, the more we grow complex and undergo severe conflict within ourselves.
Everything that responds to the standard of the heart must become one with that heart and give a strong impression to the center.
Then that center, responding to the standard of the heart, can move toward the whole. Unless such a foundation of unchanging give-and-take action arises centered on the heart and the ideal, the supreme world we desire, the world of humankind’s original purpose, or the world of purpose God yearned for from before the creation, will not be realized.
Seen from this angle, can one say that God does not exist?
God surely exists. Why? Because such a world must inevitably be realized. Yet up to now, such a world of purpose has not been realized.
Then how indeed will God set this world right?
God does it by no means by force. According to the laws and principles of nature, He sets up that center and purpose from a new direction. And while doing so, He seeks to bind fallen human beings here and lift them even to the world of purpose. This was the providential history up to now.
If one looks at the Bible with such an eye, one can know how much sacrifice and effort God has made to set up one center in each age. This is what history proves.
The Prophets Who Were Set Up as Central Figures
When God set up Noah as the center too, He made everything around him pass through a process of forming a bond and a relationship of give-and-take with the heavenly purpose and then enter the realm of the object partner following the fixed center.
Yet when God faces the central human being, He does not set him up as the center and have him do the work, but sets him up in the opposite direction and has him walk the path of returning to the center.
So the central human being cannot but decide the four directions (四方) from there, and everything in those four directions cannot but form an absolute realm of bond that is made one toward the center. God set Noah in such a position. Noah, standing in that central place, had to break down all the obstacles to going toward the purpose.
The good central figure who must decide the heavenly position in the satanic world, the world of evil, must always stand in the opposite position and so cannot but receive persecution. It is so individual, and so at the family level, or at the people level. Before him, everything in the phenomenal world comes to appear as a condition of suffering.
In Noah’s case, too, it was the same. The people of the world at that time all attacked and mocked him. Moreover, Noah was in such a plight not for one year, nor for ten years, but for a hundred and twenty years. His children opposed him, and his wife opposed him. They could not but oppose.
The very thing of taking an axe up to a mountaintop and building a ship—the people of that time could by no means understand it. But it is a fact that God judged the world’s humankind a hundred and twenty years later.
So during that period, the people ought to have prepared. There was such an absolute requirement.
God requires a person who, however he is placed in any world, however he is placed amid any suffering, thinks of the absolute purpose, hopes for the promised absolute position, and can endure everything in a plight difficult to understand.
Only when one stands in such a place does God’s heart at last move toward him, and he is set up as God’s heart-level center.
So God sought to settle Noah, who stood in such a place, as the supreme victor whom no one could shake, as the center of the universe. This was Noah’s judgment of the flood.
In Abraham’s time, too, it was the same. When our forefathers, holding the hope of standing at the center of the purpose, came to appear in the providence, they without fail came to stand in a position of being driven out of that environment.
Even though one is driven and made to retreat from all directions, one must not yield to it but remain in that place to the very last. And only when one stands in the position of having remained as an eternal substance can God at last carry on the providence through him. It was so in Noah’s time, so in Abraham’s time, and so in Jesus’ time. So in this world today, too, it cannot but become so.
The Three Stages of the Course of Restoration
If the human being were born in accord with the purpose of creation—that is, born inheriting God’s purpose and heart—God could not be separated from that heart.
The world purpose-centered on that heart is precisely the world of joy, the world of the ideal. But because the human being fell, it is arranged that one cannot but pass through a process of, as is fitting, taking the opposite direction and returning.
One comes to be in a position of having to seek upward from the lowest to the highest place—that is, to seek inward from the external thing to the inner heart—and decide the center.
If we survey the historical course of restoration comprehensively, we can know that God has, up to now, carried on the providence through the three stages of formation, growth, and completion.
To pass through the age of the servant in the Old Testament Age, the age of the adopted child in the New Testament Age, and the age of the true children in the Completed Testament Age, and to enter the age of the True Parents—this is the course of restoration.
When God decides the providential absolute standard of an age, because that standard belongs in every way to Heaven’s side, it cannot but become a thing that Satan absolutely does not desire. And so, when an absolute standard of Heaven’s side is set up, from around it Satan is driven and driven and cannot but flee.
When that happens, Satan comes to hate that standard to the utmost, and Heaven’s side welcomes it to the highest. Therefore, such a position cannot but be decided.
The providence of salvation for all humankind in the Old Testament Age was salvation into the position of the servant.
This is why, in this age, unless one sets up a center that could remain and win from the very beginning to the very end, one cannot set up the foundation of restoration into the servant.
So God, setting up central figures such as Noah and Abraham, led a history of four thousand years and paid many sacrifices.
While doing so, God sought to set up, even among servants, a worldwide servant, or a cosmic servant, to absolutize the position of the servant, and upon the heart of that servant to set up a standard that God could absolutely acknowledge. He carried on a providence that advanced step by step, one step at a time, in this way.
The Center of the Universe
We must learn the historical fact that our forefathers, who were set up in history, kept that purpose and that ideal and that thought, and however obstacles barred the way, did not collapse but walked on to the very last.
Only when we stand in such a place can we become one with the person decided as the center and become one with that center, whether in what we hope for or in living.
Not only that, but in fighting our environment too, only by becoming one with that center can we know what an important position that center is in.
God has, in this way, carried on the providence up to now, purposing the day when every family, every people, and further the whole world would obey and be made one before that center.
In Jesus’ time, too, had the Israelite people and Judaism become one when Jesus came to this earth, become one with Jesus and obeyed him, then, centered on them, God could have made the start of a providence to realize a new world. But at that time, the Israelite people were split into countless sects and stood in a position opposed to Jesus’ expectation. This is why the standard of the servant that God had set up over a long history collapsed, and the environment that could win was broken.
Therefore, Jesus could not stand upon this earth as God’s substantial Son. So Jesus ought to have moved centered on the original purpose, but, contrary to that, he came to act from the opposite position.
Since the history the forefathers had set up had collapsed, he sought, from that standard, to set up again the condition of victory and realize the original purpose. As the start of such a step, he began the three-year course of public ministry.
God, having in this way decided on some center, again sent to it a greater center, and, linking it with that center, led history on through the stages of formation, growth, and completion. And so at last He decides on a being who can stand as the absolute victor—becoming the worldwide center, the cosmic center, the center of all the phenomenal world, the center of this present age (現世). Here, the central figure of the realization of the ideal, whom countless religions are seeking and whom God too is seeking providentially, cannot but appear.
What has history up to today been seeking?
We have been preoccupied only with realistic problems, but history, beyond this, has gone seeking one absolute center.
This is why the world, which has gone seeking formation, growth, and completion, must today realize the world of the circle (圓) that becomes one with that center. In making a circle, one does not make it from the middle outward.
Since it is, in every way, fallen humanity, one must, from the opposite side, go in toward the middle while seeking the position of that center. The world is now entering such a stage. It is gazing toward the center while sufficiently surveying its surroundings. In democracy, too, they are seeking the inner thing. It is the same with communism.
Then can democracy or communism indeed make this world one?
They have no inner power that can digest the world all at once. If there is truly a thought that seeks to make this world one, that thought cannot but be equipped with the inner condition that can digest this world.
In this universe, there cannot be two centers. An external thing cannot become the center. Procedure (手續) cannot become the center. No form whatever that we can see externally can become the center. One can explain it. That one can explain it means that it stands upon a logical system. That it stands upon a logical system means that it can be manufactured.
We are not ruled by this manufactured thing. Unless there is some view (觀), such as a view of the universe or a worldview, we cannot decide upon any direction.
This is why a new thought cannot but be equipped with content that can adapt to all the realms it relates to.
If we think in this way, we cannot but arrive at the conclusion that the center of the universe is the original purpose and heart of creation.
The Determination of the Center and Its Standard
Then what does the heart need?
There must be an object that can respond to it. It must not be repellent but fusing. The result that arises from a contrary thing colliding with something is not a result that appears from the heart.
If that were right, then the question of how the future world will be realized, by reason of the conception called the opposite, cannot but become a problem.
We must take heart as the standard, and that heart is absolutely holy. It is holy to such a degree that it has more than enough to embrace the universe.
What appears as a result contrary to the heart appears as a repellent action like struggle, seeking to destroy something; it is not a thing that, of itself, presents a contrary condition toward a contrary thing and thereby achieves one purpose. To be contrary means two mutually opposed concepts, differing in conception and differing in content. These are themselves always unstable, so by that logic, one cannot realize the world of purpose, the world of peace, or the world of tranquility.
We have a body and a mind.
If there were no external contrary requirement, there would be no suffering. It simply exists. Because in the laws of nature there is the thing called love, this phenomenon of nature—that is, the heavenly law—is arranged so that it can respond to any part of this universe. This is why one can be at ease. But if there is a part that resists this, a phenomenon of destruction arises. When such a contrary condition appears, God always repels it a hundred percent.
If this works well and one purpose is realized, it shows a good result.
If it does not become so, this universe comes to deny the view of the purpose of this universe, in which the holy center needs an object realm. Everything that exists has a purpose.
In science, too, the phenomenon spoken of earlier arises, but it does not all arise at once in the same way.
For example, even when ice freezes, the whole does not freeze at once, does it?
Centered on some one point, by the action of the whole responding to it, the whole comes to freeze; it does not unfold in reverse.
Some people say the universe was made by force. Of course, it is a fact that all beings are composed of force. But for that force to exist, what is needed?
Some beings are not the force itself. There must, without fail, be a relative standard there. Before we acknowledge force, we must acknowledge a relative standard.
If we acknowledge a relative standard, we cannot but acknowledge the subject and object.
The subject must not be a being that changes according to time. It must be a being that can decide a purpose and make an eternal realm of existence. The relative relationship that can be acknowledged must be a purpose-fitting (合目的) relationship that can correspond to the subject, not a relationship that repels relatively.
A relative relationship is not the relation of thesis-antithesis-synthesis (正反合), in which against a standard called thesis (正) a thing called antithesis (反) stands opposed and is unified into one (because a contrary conception cannot give rise to force, this cannot but be a logical contradiction), but a relationship in which the object responds before the subject. That is, it means the subject and object correspond and act centered on a common purpose.
When this carries on with complete give-and-take action and reaches the object realm, force appears, and then for the first time the center is decided. However much it acts, if it acts in reverse, the world is destroyed.
If one carries on giving and-take action with a fusing and corresponding relative relationship, it becomes the absolute center of nature, and the position of that center becomes the center of purpose and at the same time the center of the heart.
This center is decided by the give-and-take action of the heart and the conception of purpose. What stands in the position decided in this way is the human being.
If this is the absolute formula in coming-into-being (生成), then everything acts with the center that unfolds that purpose as its axis.
If there is something that seeks to destroy this, it cannot but stand upon a standard of heart higher than this. Just as the earth rotates centered on its axis, the created beings created centered on the heart and purpose of God must carry on give-and-take action centered on that purpose.
The medium in carrying on such give-and-take action is the human being. Thus, it forms three points (三點). That is, the subject point (主點) and the object point (客點), and the human being, who is the central standard linking them — these form three points.
All Beings Hold a Dual Purpose
As for what the source of the force that arises here is — it is precisely God (神).
This force is by no means disordered. Nor is it a force that comes out merely unconsciously. That force is the most heart-level, and it can become the center of the human mind.
Everything that exists has dual characteristics (二性). Therefore, the conclusion can be established that all beings have two purposes. Even taking ourselves, we have two purposes.
We have a purpose centered on ourselves, and at the same time, a second purpose that seeks to form a bond with the universe. We have the dual purpose of hoping for the completion of the universe together with our own completion.
If we see such things from a resultant standpoint, all beings appear to be repellent and struggling and to stand in a position opposite the center, but in fact it is not so. We must realize the fact that this is a condition that can always develop.
The human being has the purpose of the body and, at the same time, the purpose of the mind. The mind has the whole purpose, the body the individual purpose.
In this way, whether a person or any other being, it is connected, holding both an inner and an outer purpose. It is within the bonds of up-and-down, left-and-right, front-and-back.
Otherwise, it cannot become a three-dimensional circle (立體圓). And unless this three-dimensional circle is established, the perfect center is not decided. Only where the center is decided and the eternal ideal and the force of the eternal center accompany it, does eternal motion begin, and from here begins the eternal and infinite motion of the circle.
This is why all living beings that exist are moving, tracing some parabola. Because the distance and height and breadth and position that they take as their purpose differ, their forms appear differently, but in inner and outer action, they are carrying on circular motion holding a subject-subordinate relation.
God (神) is today seeking the center of this earth.
If, for instance, we examine Japanese society, there are various thoughts and movements in it. But those cannot exist eternally. Their life is decided according to the content of how they equip themselves with a center.
For example, if some group studies, for some center, with some one content, for a hundred years, or for several centuries, that group exists until it becomes completely one with that center. But once it is made one with it, it is absorbed.
If we survey history up to now from such an angle, we can know the fact that a high culture has absorbed a low culture. And in this way, in the end, it cannot but become one.
God (神) is now seeking the center. That this center God is seeking is set up means that a world centered on God’s supreme ideal, supreme ideology, appears.
Then, where will the place be that the oneness of purpose and heart God hopes for be realized?
There is a person needed who holds an absolute heart and absolute purpose representing the three billion of humankind. Such a person indeed is the True Parent whom all humankind desires. Therefore, if there is a person whose mind is scattered before him, he must compose his mind again.
One must form an environment that can respond to any external obstacle. The person who can receive God’s blessing is the person who stands upon such a supreme victorious standard. God’s providence is carried out through such a method.
Hereafter upon the earth, only the one who enters God’s world of purpose and can correspond with God comes to exist. In this world today, as we see, all groups are fighting group against group. But if that fight is a purposeless fight that cannot correspond with God’s world of purpose, in the end it is defeated and retreats.
Jesus’ True Purpose in Coming
To know what is true and what is false in the present is truly an important thing.
Because the world that all people today think is the supreme world may be a world that rebels against God. A true world is a world that takes God as the absolute center.
That world of purpose is at once a historical purpose and a purpose of the age, an absolute purpose of the future, or a world that accords even with God’s purpose of creation. This is why, when that world is realized, God rejoices and at the same time, the human being rejoices and heaven and earth rejoice together. And in content, heart becomes one, so that nothing whatever can separate it.
Centered on a perfect person who has become one from such a position, the world must be transformed into a new world. That world needs a truth from one center.
Truth must be something that is influenced by nothing and invaded by nothing. And it must be something absolute, which does not change, however one refutes it with thousands and tens of thousands of theories, and which can explain itself against them.
If there is a person who has sought out and set up such a truth, that person is not a savior of individuals (救人主) but the Savior of the world (救世主). In this, all things are included. The nation is included, and power is included.
All future things are included. The Savior must be set up absolutely and perfectly upon such things. The person who stands in such a position is the Savior.
When we think from such an angle, Jesus, who came two thousand years ago, was clearly the Savior. The original purpose of Jesus, who was dispatched from God as the Savior, was not Christianity.
To set up a view of the great universe and, in perfect accord with it, to establish upon the earth a worldview that becomes the center was the original purpose of Jesus, who came as the Savior.
For that, in that time, he had to make preparations to overcome the great enemy called the Roman Empire. Jesus needed a standard by which he could respond to and win on both the inner and the outer sides.
Could Jesus, who was in such circumstances, without a base of support, have said, “Oh! I am the supreme Lord, the only in the universe.” In the Israelite nation of that time, a vassal of Rome, had he said even a single such word, he would not have lived even three days, let alone three years.
This is why Jesus said, “I have many things to say, but it is hard for you to bear them.”
Concerning the true content, he could not even make mention, and he left only the promise, “I will teach you through the Holy Spirit,” and departed.
Then, where now is the view of the universe that the Savior, who came from Heaven two thousand years ago, ought to have set up as the Savior?
Was the purpose to make Christianity and nurture only churches or only piety of faith?
It is not so. If the human being has a conscience and has a character overflowing with holy love, ought there not to be established an absolute realm of the ideal from which one cannot, try as one might, be separated? To set up such a world was Jesus’ purpose. Such content does not appear, however much one reads the Bible.
The only thing he openly said is, “I am the center of the heart.” This alone he could not but say.
However much it is spoken, this saying of Jesus is protected by history. Because the world desires it. It will be the same in the future. It is absolutely required in the past, present, and future. And it is because it is the first center with which any enemy, any comrade, can be harmonized.
But in actuality, that worldview, being centered on the spirit (靈), centered on the heavenly standard of heart, is a worldview floating in the air. The path that can respond to the great fortune of the Cosmos, the path linked to the absolute standard, was not taught, and only the world of the ideal has been continued up to now. But because such a world cannot be permitted forever, God promised that He would send the Lord of the Second Advent.
The Path the Unification Saints Must Go
Then what will the Savior who comes next bring with him?
He will come with an ideal and an ideology that can make one ideal world, which all people living on this earth together desire. Not only that. He brings heart too.
However much one makes an ideal world, the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, there must be an absolute standard that can guarantee an eternal heart there. That is, there must be a standard of heart by which God can rejoice, and all humankind can rejoice, and history can rejoice, and the age can rejoice.
Ideology and the ideal cannot stand without heart. This heart is a standard that appears through the infinitely working center — that is, the absolute God.
When one holds the unified worldview upon the earth, transcending any thought and view, one collides with the problem of “isms.” There is democracy and communism today, but those have still not set up a decisive standard of unification and are moving from relative positions.
Originally, the thing called an “ism” is not the substance itself. Therefore, we must transcend this world of isms.
This “ism” has been a grave problem historically up to now.
If there is a God, it is only natural that God will develop it. In developing, one splits into two, and two split again into three and four, and develop. Therefore, any ism whatever cannot but become so. But the true thing cannot but be one, whenever and wherever.
The several forked paths that seek to go toward the true place are but one expedient and cannot be made to coincide with the truth. A method or means cannot coincide with the reality that is the source of the universe.
For the completion of the purpose within some realm, an “ism” must perform a directional action of seeking out the substance of truth. Therefore, if some purpose itself, which is beyond that ism, comes into being, one cannot but coincide with it. When one enters a perfect realm of purpose, a perfect realm of the heart appears.
To the absolutely true thing, the whole universe cannot but respond. The true thing must not suffer harm. Where there is truth, everything is bound to be drawn there, so the heart follows. When one comes to know the true thing, the heart naturally arises. Whether it be individual or family, the content of the heart is decided according to the standard of how one won that environment.
What do we, the saints of unification, desire now? Now America seeks to govern all the nations of the world, but it is not that all the nations desire America’s governance. More at issue is the standard that can hold an ideal (理想) beyond gaining the whole world and praising its value. It is something that can be robbed away by no one, and something that cannot be made to change even if one exchanged it a hundred times over with one’s own life. Such a standard is needed. But up to now, the human being has not set up that standard.
This is why we are advancing toward that world. We, the saints of unification, are Heaven’s elite soldiers who must go beyond every barrier. Then what is the purpose of us, the elite soldiers? It is to widen the environment with goodness. Is that done by striking? It is not so. It is restoring while being struck.
If one is restored by striking, one must be struck again. This is said because there is still a strike. Therefore, we must recover after being thoroughly struck. This is God’s strategy of battle.
Accordingly, the saints of unification must enter the very bottom of hell. We must break through that place and advance. Let Us Seek the Center and Become One
This is why we are advancing toward that world. We, the saints of unification, are Heaven’s elite soldiers who must go beyond every barrier.
Then what is the purpose of us, the elite soldiers?
It is to widen the environment with goodness. Is that done by striking? It is not so. It is restoring while being struck.
If one is restored by striking, one must be struck again. This is said because there is still a strike. Therefore, we must recover after being thoroughly struck. This is God’s strategy of battle.
Accordingly, the saints of unification must enter the very bottom of hell. We must break through that place and advance.