Authors
1. You cannot imagine how many tears were shed, unseen and unnoticed, before the True Parents came. I'm not talking about a few moments of weeping. If you were aware that this struggle was not only in the past but has continued until today, you would not be able to speak of it without shedding tears.
You should find that same degree of resolve within your heart. You should not be complacent about having sinned in the past and continuing to sin in the present. You are fallen people, so to return to God you need to shed tears of repentance, followed by tears of gratitude.
Without going through this process to be restored to God, you cannot enter the heavenly kingdom. No matter who you are, you should have that kind of heart. Then you will truly be the kind of people whom God welcomes.
(55-163, 1972.05.07)
The course to start the providence
2. I was born during the most miserable time in Korean history. The March First Independence Movement had started the previous year and was spreading. It had been a lean harvest that year.
This made it a most difficult period for the people of Korea. Many people lost their lives during the March First Independence Movement. Not only were we going through some lean years but, we were also facing an internal national crisis. People died one after another.
Moreover, during my twenties, there was not a single day that I did not go hungry. During that period, we had nothing. We missed all the things we had known. Because my great-uncle fought for our country's independence, our extended family faced such severe repression that we were completely torn apart.
Our family was all destroyed. We faced civil unrest, national strife, and family upheaval. (125-185, 1983.03.20)
3. When I was sixteen by Korean age, I had an extraordinary experience. On Easter morning I was offering a long and tearful prayer when Jesus Christ appeared and revealed many things to me.
Jesus spoke to me of profound and amazing truths. He told me that God was in deep sorrow due to the suffering of humankind, and he requested that I take on a special role in God's work on earth. So many things happened following this. I would pore over the Bible while I continued my schoolwork.
I continued receiving profound messages from Jesus that most people would have found hard to understand. I was arrested and put in prison on several occasions for teaching people those things.
I was incarcerated in a North Korean death camp for almost three years. In that camp people often died within a few months. Yet, God protected me for nearly three years, allowing me to survive even amid such terrible suffering.
(134-145, 1985.02.02)
4. I was in the same position as Jesus, who was abandoned by his people; therefore I could not witness to my family or try to influence them. I did not talk about the Divine Principle to my brothers, my parents, or any of my relatives. Instead, I went out alone into the world at large to find people.
Now that I have restored people outside my family, blessed them, and formed a tribe, I can witness to my relatives and bring them along with me.
(52-196, 1971.12.29)
5. There was no one whom I could lean on, not my parents, friends, or teachers. I did not have a comfortable environment. All I had was a lonely heart. All alone, I faced a heaven and earth that seemed so bleak. Nevertheless, I pulled myself together and summoned the heart to call out to my Father.
As I shed tears, the wind blew; that wind became my friend. The sunlight rising from the east became my friend, with whom I shared my heart. The lowly soil at my feet became my friend, as did everything in nature that I saw around me. If you ever experience such a heart, you will discover a new self.
I found new value there, and based on that, you too will find a new self within you. Welling up in your heart you will feel a new determination to make a new relationship with God.
With such resolve and heart, I prayed, bowing down before God. This is not something that only I had to do; you too must pray to release God from His bitter sorrow. You are called to shed sweat and blood for Heaven, even if it means sacrificing not only yourselves but your entire tribe and people as well.
(150-170, 1960.09.04)
6. I have been wandering everywhere searching for a people that could receive God's blessing and a land that could receive God's blessing. That search took me to prison. It was a miserable path that left me bloodied; a path on which I often risked my life. The land of the enemy was so vast; it was like an open sea. Looking up, I saw nothing but endless sky. I had no friends, no companions, and no comrades-in-arms.
I even had to distance myself from my parents. But I did not despair. I was keenly aware of the path Noah had walked as he lamented and suffered, the historical path of the Israelites who collapsed in the wilderness, and the miserable historical courses of Jesus* disciples who pressed forward for the sake of Heaven, even to the point of being crucified upside down.
Nevertheless, I chose to go that path. Since there had been no one up to that point who could take responsibility for this world, I felt I had no choice but to set out on this perilous road. (12-332, 1963.08.11)
The course of suffering and victory
7. My life has been filled with misery. I have to recover the birthright of the eldest son, and for this, I have to go out and fight until I win before I can return home. But I do not fight with my fists.
I have to sacrifice myself, even to the point of vomiting blood. By walking this tortuous path soaked with my blood and tears – the path of loving my enemies – I have to transform the realm of Cain into the realm of the eldest son on Heaven's side. I must then ascend from the younger son position to the eldest son position.
That means I must bring them to the point where they offer themselves to work with me – not only themselves, but their property as well, and even their nation. Unless they do, I cannot recover the position of the eldest son. To achieve this, I must pass through eight stages. (120-340, 1982.10.20)
8. How many levels must you pass through in the course of history to reach the level of the True Parents? The first step is to be a true servant of servants. In that position, some of you will have to bear the cross. If you think you cannot bear it, the True Parents can never appear.
Even among sinners, there have to be “true sinners,” who want to change. You have to go that way and build bridges to the True Parents. I am the representative of love who began from the most miserable place in the world and overcame everything. To accomplish this, I had to shoulder the cross of love. In this way, I built a bridge.
Step by step, I had to rise from being a true servant to the position of a true adopted son, then a true son, a true Cain, and eventually a true Abel. This is the path I have followed. I have been building bridges from stage to stage by walking that way of suffering, surviving the struggle, and emerging triumphant.
So whenever you see a pitiable person on the street, remember that I was in that situation. Even though I was indignant when I was being stomped on, kicked, and tortured by communist interrogators, I never prayed, “Heavenly Father, strike these enemies with a thunderbolt and slaughter them all.” Although my body was bleeding, I was praying for them to receive a blessing. (116-114, 1981.12.27)
9. When I began my seven-year course immediately after Korea's liberation from Japan, and as I looked at the fortune of the nation during those seven years, I was seriously concerned. I knew that God would be with Korea if it did well; otherwise, He would not.
If Christians had united with me during that seven-year course, we could have worked together successfully. If that had happened, the Unification Church would have expanded throughout the world within those seven years.
The Communist Party in North Korea and communist parties throughout the world would all have been gone long ago. I was supposed to make a family-level foundation during those seven years. This was the hope of history, the hope of humankind, and the hope of all religious seekers. (17-133, 1966.12.11)
10. If Christianity had received me in 1945, I would have united the world in seven years. Through the Blessing, I would have opened the gates of both earth and heaven and realized the kingdom of heaven.
But as I sought to restore the nation, Christianity, together with the rest of the world, opposed me. Moreover, as I sought to embrace the world, the earthly and spiritual realms united to oppose me.
Nevertheless, I must bless all humankind by overcoming even this persecution, using a hidden method that I am keeping secret on behalf of God. All people must receive the Blessing in the end, becoming absolute couples who abide by the ideals of absolute sex. (305-164, 1998.06.13)
11. If the Christian leaders had listened to me after Korea gained its independence, I would have prepared the groundwork for the salvation of the world within seven years, investing my total effort. I knew clearly where the world was heading. I knew it was headed to ruin if it kept on its present course.
Would I have walked this stony path for forty years had I not known that? It has been an exhausting and rugged path, one that neither my mother my father, nor my brother could understand; indeed no one at all could understand it.
Because they were already in Satan's realm, I did not even try to make them understand. At that point, I was kicked out into the wilderness. I was like a useless stone thrown into a corner. Who could have known that this discarded stone would become a rock of vital importance to the Lord God?
(167-032, 1987.06.14)
12. God is the King who created heaven and earth, yet due to the Fall of the parents, Adam and Eve, He lost His authority. Ever since God lost His authority to Satan, He has been unable to exercise His royal authority even once. God must be crowned, but He cannot crown Himself.
It must be done by the True Parents. If the True Parents do not do it, no one can. The right of kingship is the original standard by which God created heaven and earth. Once this kingship has been achieved, the family can be restored, followed by the tribe, people, nation, and world; this will usher in the age of God's kingship on earth.
This is a process, so we should not talk about heaven and earth being restored all at once. Human beings and the archangel together overturned God's kingship.
Nonetheless, the True Parents came, eliminated Satan, and established the standard by which to complete God's providence.
They abolished hell both in the spiritual and earthly realms and standing in the position of the unfallen True Parents, they enabled God to stand in His rightful position of royal authority. (339-087, 2000.12.07)
Restoration course of blood and tears
13. I do not have a teacher. Even God could not be my teacher. If God had been my teacher, then all people of prayer would also have been my teachers. How did I become a Teacher? I made myself into the Teacher.
How did I become the True Parent? I made myself into a True Parent. How did I become the True Owner? I made myself into the Owner. This is re-creation. If God could have done it for me, He would have done it immediately.
(316-261, 2000.02.15)
14. I once prayed for seventeen hours straight. I often prayed for more than twelve hours, staying up all night in the process. I prayed until my cotton-padded pants were so soaked with the tears of my bitter weeping that I could wring water from them.
The Unification Movement was not built with games and laughter. I built it by going the way of truth, with blood, sweat, and tears, wringing my flesh and spilling my blood. I came to know the standard, I fulfilled it, and I built a victorious foundation.
Only because I know it is correct, having confirmed it through my experimentation, am I teaching it to you. I am not saying I will become the True Parent; I already have.
That is why I could proclaim True Parents and the Completed Testament Age. Now is the time to firmly secure the Completed Testament Age. We are in a time when nothing in this world can invade that.
(257-308, 1994.03.16) 15.
How can I sleep soundly while Unification Church members receive persecution throughout the world? How many times have I been unable to eat or sleep? After learning that a missionary had been sentenced to death by a communist regime, would it have been right for me to sleep or to eat well?
Even though I had never met him, he had heard my words from a distance, across many national borders, and said while offering his life, ''Father, please be victorious! I am crossing over first.”
How do you think I felt at the core of my being – in my bone marrow and flesh-when I was told that he had spoken those last words? I was deeply sorrowful that we did not yet have a nation. Who could ever fathom that God would have to suffer this much? (365-326, 2002.01.14)
16. Until I was thirty years old, there was not a day that I did not go hungry. It was not lacking money or food. I deliberately ate only two meals a day. Until I was thirty, I did not buy clothes for myself.
This was because I knew I was responsible for saving the world's poor. Even when I had nothing to eat and could not afford to wear good clothes, I prayed that God would save the hungry and liberate the poor, who could not wear good clothes. Such prayers reach Heaven directly.
(276-099, 1996.02.04) 17.
We are called to bear a great cross. Our individual and family ordeals have been but preparation to build a tribal foundation. You should not think that the path we are called to go will be easier simply because we no longer face persecution or trials as before. Our scope is greater now.
If in the past we bore our cross while sitting down, from now on, we must bear it while walking. If in the past we bore our cross with our eyes fixed only on one point, from now on, we have to look in every direction – east, west, north, and south – as we go forward.
I must attend to the path that God takes, and you must attend to the path I take. I am walking a more difficult path than you are, and God who is leading me is walking an even more difficult path than I am. (13-232, 1964.03.22)
18. God wants to give all good things to His sons and daughters, and His sons and daughters want to possess all the precious things God has. Likewise, I want to give you everything, and you also want to possess all the good things I have.
Such a family with True Parents at its center. We all desire this. I try to give you all good things on behalf of God and you, in turn, want to receive them. This is a basic principle. I am guiding you along this path because I know this principle.
(127-329, 1983.05.22)
The course of seeking the True Parents
19. How can you find yourself? The center of your being must be connected to God and True Parents by true love, true life, and true lineage. God is the vertical Parent and True Parents are the horizontal Parents.
Perfect love settles in the place where the two become one. When you as two become one to settle the vertical love of God and the horizontal love of True Parents, then your true value is manifested. That is where you can settle as well. We then can expand it to the family, tribe, people, nation, and world.
(421-263, 2003.10.18)
20. In the beginning, God created Eve through Adam. Therefore, the True Father creates the True Mother. This is recreation. After surmounting the eight stages – individual, family, tribe, people, nation, world, cosmos, and God – we, True Father and True Mother, came to stand side by side as God's true son and daughter.
I am saying that the two of us stand at the same level. It was not God who made this possible, but True Father. The Declaration and Celebration of True Parents' Cosmic Victory was held on that basis. You must fully inherit the model of the True Parents.
The mission of the True Father and True Mother is to clean up the world of evil begun by Adam and Eve, the false parents. Hence, if you become one with the True Parents through absolute faith, absolute love, and absolute obedience, Satan cannot interfere. (310-292, 1999.07.27)
21. With our Heavenly Parent at the center, Adam and Eve were supposed to have inherited true love, true life, and true lineage. Then all humankind would have become one tree.
However, they became the opposite, like a dead tree. The True Father and True Mother must come to remedy this, and from them, true sons and daughters also must come.
Then based on the True Parent's blood kin, we must organize tribes, peoples, and nations, complete the kingdom of heaven on earth and in heaven, and move forward to liberate the universe. (355-099, 2001.10.04)
22. The original position should have been perfected in Adam's family, but it was lost due to the Fall.
To restore this, everything must be put back together in reverse order. Therefore, True Mother must stand as the representative of the world. For this, True Father is placing all the women of the world in the position of Eve, the position representing True Mother.
Just as there was mother-son cooperation in providential history, True Parents, who came on behalf of God, will teach you sisters, who stand in the position representing True Mother, how to unite in the mother-son relationship.
This mother-son cooperation must be carried out according to the eight stages of love. By becoming one, we can turn around this world, in which the absolute, unique, unchanging, and eternal God has struggled with Satan.
(332-229, 2000.09.23)
23. I must do all the necessary preparatory work for Mother before I go to the spirit world. There is much work to be done. Do not wish for me to live well over one hundred years.
You do not know how much work needs to be done in the spirit world. I have to go there and reorganize its structure. Originally, I was supposed to receive the key to the gates of the kingdom of heaven and open them. This is symbolic and conditional. I am saying there are huge issues at hand. (316-212, 2000.02.12)
24. In the era of the realm of the Fourth Adam, I have to put my children forward. You, too, should do the same. You men have to raise your wives and put them forward to build a foundation for your extended family. If they cannot, you should do it through your children.
To stake your claim as an outpost you must first prepare your sons and daughters; once your sons and daughters are united, their mother must stand with them. The Messiah's thought, the teaching of the True Parents, is that God can establish Heaven's tradition for the sons and daughters through the mother.
Through this, we will stake our claim to the tradition of a heavenly nation. This is not a tradition for the family, but a tradition for the nation. The family exists for the sake of the nation. AU families represent the nation. Unless families make sacrifices, Heaven's nation will not emerge. Blessed families must sacrifice to see that nation arise. (324-029, 2000.06.04)
25. How will everything be connected to the Heavenly Parent and the True Parents? All the family members are divided and scattered. Families in that condition have to be brought into unity, and for that, they must unite with the mother. This is the course of restoration.
The sons and daughters must become one with the mother and then one with the father. Thereafter, they are to be connected to the Lord of the Second Advent, the True Parents. After that connection is made, the question is how to restore everything.
Restoration happens when a father and mother and sons and daughters become one. Then God will be present. That is where the kingdom of heaven on earth begins. (315-050, 2000.01.25)
26. True Mother must re-create the sons, Cain and Abel, and create a realm of unity with them. She needs to connect everything to the tradition and standard lifestyle, beyond the nation to the world level, to live in the kingdom of heaven. To achieve this, she must create oneness with her children, educate the Cain world, and reach the level of God's nation.
Only when we reach the level of God's nation can we restore the right of the eldest son, the right of the parents, and the right of the king? Therefore, a True Mother is in a position of leadership and must be an example in all things. She is in the position of the subject partner, and she has to govern the environment.
Mother is in the subject partner position, not me. We must relieve the bitter sorrow of Jesus and bring Mother, who at this time is positioned as the bride at the national level, up to the world level. (330-103, 2000.08.13)
Sun Myung Moon