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1. We wish to resemble God, and it is only natural that God would cherish the hope that we would resemble Him as His sons and daughters. For this, human beings must be born again, assuming a form that can resemble God.
God and human beings are eagerly waiting for the day on which they can fly together forever. The day of our death when we discard our physical body is the day when we are reborn as people who can fly. That being so, should we welcome death, or grieve over it?
Naturally, we should welcome it. And when we die, what are we dying for? We should declare that our death will be for God's true love, that is, love for the sake of others. If this is so for us, we will shed our physical body to participate in the realm of activity of God's infinite love and for the sake of the world of God's love.
(297-256, 1998.12.19)
2. If you fall sick and are about to die, you typically lapse into a coma. You are in a state in which you are not sure if you are dead or alive. While there in the spirit world, you see everything about the place where you will live. Your friends and relatives who are already there come and greet you.
The vast kingdom of heaven that unfolds before your eyes is so dazzling and splendid that you exclaim, “I should hurry and come here.” Your life continues and eventually, you transition to that world.
As you head toward different places, each better than the last, you pass through a first, a second, and a third gate and enter the next world, where you are welcome.
Death is not something that should dismay or dishearten you. You are not going down; instead, you are escaping. In short, you ascend. Therefore, you should not fear death. Death comes by a natural cyclic law, as the process of moving you to a better world. (196-271, 1990.01.02)
Beginning a new life
3. People generally think that everything ends when we die, but that is not the case. Because there is a spirit world, life continues as it is. While on earth you need to prepare to enter the spirit world.
Since you breathe love in the spirit world, to breathe freely there, you should keep love at the center of your life on earth. If you do not center on love during your physical life, you will be unable to breathe freely in the spirit world.
Because the spirit world is a world where you breathe love, you can consider it to be a world in which love is your air. Your second new beginning is referred to as death. Hence, there is nothing to fear. Death opens the door to a new beginning.
(249-281, 1993.10.11)
4. Between life and death, which is stronger? Is life stronger than death or is death stronger than life? In Satan's world, death is stronger than life. After coming to know God's Will, you should not dread having to die.
Only by dying can you resurrect. So what is the death mentioned in the Bible referring to? It does not signify the ending of our eternal life that comes from God.
Instead, it means ending the life we inherited through the fallen lineage of Satan's world. This is why those who seek to lose their lives for God's Will shall find it.
(34-047, 1970.08.29)
5. At the end of our physical life, we go through a second birth. This is death. The place where we experience our second birth, the place where we go after death is the spirit world. As we enter that world, God, who is our third Parent, bestows upon us true love that represents the entire universe.
We are supplied with the true love of God's ideal. That is why unity will surely be achieved in the spirit world. Currently of death, we leave behind our second world, the world of air, and we need to connect with our third world, the new world where we are designed to breathe love.
We leave behind the love of our parents and of our siblings, go to the spirit world and ultimately enter the world of true love harmonizing with God, the Original Being. Since the Original Being planted the seed, the fruit needs to return to the Original Being. (298-311, 1999.01.17)
6. The reason we die is that our ability to love in our physical body is limited. If we want to possess the true authority of God's boundless true love as His object partner, our limited physical body will not suffice. This is why we need to transform into an incorporeal spirit. We do so to share the ideal of love equally with all the heaven and earth.
For this reason, the moment of our death is not the doorway to a path of pain; it opens the door to happiness through which we can possess universal true love.
Death signifies a transition from the earthly world, where we can only crawl and walk, to a world where we can live and fly freely.
To qualify as a traveler who can enjoy true love with the entire universe as his or her stage, and enter that world, we are made to pass through death. Death is nothing less than being born anew. (298-312, 1999.01.17)
7. Someday we will discard our physical body and go to the spirit world. As human beings born into this world, we need to be prepared for death. We need to endure hardships, through which we develop good character.
That will become our true self in the eternal world. You will be born as a good and healthy baby only if you receive good prenatal care inside your mother's womb. Your life on earth is similar to your life in the womb.
So you have to model yourself after God's external form and divine character to grow properly. And even when you are fully grown, you have to overcome obstacles at the risk of your life. (14-017, 1964.04.19)
8. Because our death is a second birth, it is not something tragic. If Adam and Eve had not fallen, they would have lived in a realm of resonance with God. Their body and mind would have been in resonance.
When we live on earth centering on love, we achieve love that has the same standard wavelength as the love of the spirit world. As we do so, we can perceive the spirit world while living on earth.
Just as we are born of our parents on earth, live together with them, learn from them, and thus perfect our life on earth, we are born again centering on God, the Parent of love in the heavenly world.
We who have perfected the five spiritual senses live together with our Heavenly Parent in the eternal world of love as God's sons and daughters, His friends, and His body.
That is why death is not the end. Death enables us to smash the boundaries between the limited world and the infinite world. By dying, we cross that summit, entering our second life. (306-209, 1998.09.23)
9. Death is similar to coming out of the womb, where we live in a world of water, and the process destroys the umbilical cord and the amniotic sac. Death is our second birth. It is our departure from this limited world, where we breathe through our nose, and our arrival in the place where we can receive God's love.
That is what death is. This is why we have a first ancestor and a second ancestor. Our path of life is such that we leave this world where we receive our parents' love and seek the place of the love of God, our infinite and eternal Parent.
Embraced in God's bosom, we form bonds of infinite life and love and return to the original homeland where we can live eternally. There we breathe love, just as we breathe air now.
We originated from God, and by achieving this real authority of love we incarnate God. In love, our value is equal. (298-295, 1999.01.16)
10. Since human beings were born from the world of spirit, they have no choice but to return to the world of spirit. The Korean word toraganda (to die, to return) is interesting. To where are we returning? It is not to a cemetery. It is to our place of origin. We did not begin life in a cemetery.
The word implies crossing the vast expanses of history, even beyond its beginning point. It does not mean to return as a Korean even if one was born a Korean. A Korean who dies does not return to that path as a Korean.
We return to the original world that brought forth the ancestors of humankind. It means returning to the place where the Creator is. Since that is where we originated, it is to there that we return. (141-270, 1986.03.02)
11. If someone dies of old age, the Korean expression is that that person “returned.” When someone asks about our deceased grandparents, we say, “They went back,” don't we? To where did they return? They went back to the spirit world.
Since we originally come from the incorporeal God, the incorporeal world is our original homeland. From the incorporeal world, we come to the corporeal world, multiply on this earth, and then return to the incorporeal world. This is the path by which we go back.
We originate from the incorporeal Father, then we are born through our corporeal Father and Mother, and we live in the corporeal world. Later, we discard our physical body, return to our original form, and go to the spirit world.
(242-168, 1993.01.01)
12. Once we are born, it is inevitable that we will die. But where do we go after death? We do not dissipate like smoke. We go to the spirit world. When we go to the spirit world, we will find there is a territory there.
Who, then, is the owner of the spirit world? It is God. Therefore, we should become the sons and daughters of God. If we do not become God's children, we cannot enter Heaven. (208-109, 1990.11.17)
13. You may not know the reality of the heavenly world, but I do. I enjoy a spiritual gift from God, that gives me clear insight into that unknown world. Digging into the root of that world, I found its principles to be elementary. Only those who live for others in line with God's universal principles, that is, who live for the sake of the original ideal, can enter that world.
The world that is structured along those lines is the ideal heavenly kingdom. It is the original homeland that humankind should seek. We are fallen human beings exiled from our original homeland, but we are destined to return.
Nonetheless, because we cannot return through our efforts alone, God had to set up a specific path through the course of history by which we can return.
(78-117, 1975.05.06)
Going to the world of God's love
14. Whether we know it or not, we are headed for a certain destination. We are getting closer to both when we are moving and when we are resting. Not just you but also this person, this world, and even heaven and earth are headed there. This is an undeniable fact.
Where will you go after you have lived through this life on earth? This is an important issue that everyone needs to resolve. Religions have mobilized to resolve this issue, as have philosophies and history itself. You, too, cannot deny that this destiny completely captivates you and pulls you along.
Whether you can resolve this issue in your mind or not, you are destined to go. This body will see its end and be buried in the ground at the time of our death. Yet will this mind, this life, this heart, these thoughts, and even this hope be buried together with our body?
A person who is unaware of this, and who has not resolved this in his or her mind, with a clear view of his or her purpose, will surely suffer misfortune.
(8-194, 1959.12.20)
15. If God is the Parent of humankind, what does that tell us about how and why He created us? When the God of love created us, we started from the place where He had us participating in His love.
It is our path of life to start on the heart of God. We are to grow up in the embrace of His love, reach maturity, and form a family in God's love. We are to become mature people who can develop our love to a global level on earth and finally return to the embrace of His love. (135-267, 1985.12.15)
16. Because we are spiritual beings, our life is eternal. Why have some people practiced loyalty before Heaven, walking the way of death for Heaven with hope in their hearts, though they followed a path many would not have wanted?
They have done so because they felt something that ordinary people could not feel; they knew heavenly values that ordinary people did not know. It was for that reason that they could tread even the path of death.
You may encounter adversity or sadness in the course of life. Unless your mind becomes stronger than death, you will inevitably feel regret when you face death, and retreat from pain and sorrow. (6-055, 1959.03.22)
17. You are born from your father and mother, but where do you come from, fundamentally? You come from God. Furthermore, you are born through your father's seed and your mother's womb, yet your mother and father did not create you. You were born so that you could seek true parents.
You need to find True Parents through the universal Parent and your natural parents. That is why the moment of your death is a time of jubilation when you go to meet your True Parents. There you will find the true love of True Parents. This is the spiritual kingdom of heaven, a place made up of love. It is a place abundant with the love of the True Parents.
That love is a love based on the principle of service and sacrifice, maintaining absolute law. To become eligible to stand for the test, you have to love the universe. Your life on earth is the training ground for you to love humankind and the examination room.
This is the basis of the universe. If you undergo such experiences and live with such love during your life on earth, meeting the standard, then when you pass on you will surely come into the presence of God. (105-109, 1979.09.30)
18. People aspire to resemble God. God plans to enable us to resemble Him. We therefore need to be reborn into a form that can resemble God. Both we and God eagerly await such a day. The day of our death is the day of our birth as such people. Therefore, should we welcome death or not?
We should welcome it. When we are asked what we are dying for, we should answer, “I am dying for the sake of God's true love.” Accordingly, we discard our physical body so that we can participate in the realm of activity of God's infinite love, and for the sake of the world of God's love.
To die means to be born into a state of being enveloped in God's love. However, in this world people protest, saying, “Oh, I'm dying!” The moment you transition through the point of death is the moment of your second birth.
You can experience the joy of leaving the realm of limited love and entering the realm of infinite love. You cannot establish a relationship with God unless you liberate yourself from the fear of death. (116-173, 1982.01.01)
19. Human beings inherit a purpose for their life, but then they live for different purposes.
For what reason are you asked to "love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind"? (Matt. 22:37)
It is so that you can become God's child. Therefore, you should be willing even to risk your life to love God. This is what we are meant to do, so we cannot go and die in the lowest of places. Instead, we need to die in the highest place. We should die centering on the heavenly kingdom.
We should die in the only heavenly kingdom in heaven and on earth. Even in dying, there is a proper method and a proper place. The usual Korean way will not suffice.
You need to die in the highest position, centered on the nation of God's heart, which passes through heaven and earth. You have to die at the very center of the heavenly kingdom. Your death should be such that the universe welcomes you with flags flying. (34-184, 1970.09.06)
20. A person who lives cherishing Heaven's hopes can joyfully surmount even the peak of death, which is otherwise an object of grief. That is why, when you face death, you should not have resentment, nor grieve over things of this world.
Instead, you should rejoice and stand before Heaven speaking boldly of the value of your death. God is looking for such sons and daughters of hope. God cannot help but love a person who feels Heaven's joy in such a situation.
If there were a throng of such people raising their voices to Heaven, God could not help but answer their cries. (6-055, 1959.03.22)
Sun Myung Moon