Former Headquarters Church
From the fact that, when the Jewish festival of the Feast of Tabernacles drew near, his brothers said to Jesus,
“Leave here and go to Judea, that your disciples too may see the works you do. No one who seeks to be known openly works in secret; if you would do these things, show yourself to the world” (John 7:3–4),
We can see the fact that his whole family did not believe in Jesus and did not welcome him.
The Life of Jesus, Who Left Behind Sorrow, Suffering, and Han
For Jesus, who had to realize the enormous will of resolving the Will of God and the destiny of the people, the family ought to have been the first foothold; yet that family broke apart. And so Jesus had no choice but to leave the house. My friends! If you doubt this, pray about it.
When a festival came and there was something to eat, his brothers would hide it among themselves and leave Jesus out. But Jesus did not long for something to eat.
More than such things, when the driven-about Jesus, on greeting a festival, saw people who were embraced in their parents’ bosom and held their parents’ hands and enjoyed that day, he longed for such things beyond words.
In accomplishing the great mission and the strong will, Jesus desired to take the household of Joseph, for the first time in history, as a single foundation, to establish upon this foundation the family God desired, and, with Jesus’ kin as a base, to make a foundation that could win over John the Baptist.
Despite this, the family departed, the parents departed, the brothers departed, the relatives departed, and so Jesus had nowhere to go. You must realize that Jesus’ second course was the course of seeking John the Baptist.
When Jesus, having lost his family, set out on the course of his public ministry, he departed with a heart more sorrowful than anyone’s.
Who would have known the lonely heart with which, although he had set a strong will of heavenly order upon his family and hoped in it, he had to forsake that family and set out?
But he did not speak of this hardship to anyone. In his heart, gazing only toward the day of victory, he endured, thinking, “When that day comes, they will know.” We must not forget that, while outwardly he held a resolve grave beyond words, in his heart a sorrow was lodged.
Toward Jesus, who had set out bearing such a sorrowful heart, John the Baptist gave baptism at the Jordan River and testified to him. But John the Baptist’s faction failed to fulfill the way of attendance and the way of loyalty and came to stand in a position separated from Jesus.
In terms of the Will of God, even John the Baptist, who stood in the position of the external family—that is, the Cain-type family—to whom Jesus came, parted ways with Jesus, not knowing Jesus’ inner heart, the will he cherished.
You must realize how infuriating a fact it was that thereby an environment arose in which John the Baptist’s disciples and Jesus’ disciples could not help but quarrel.
This being so, Jesus came to be unable to set his heart even upon his family.
Though he had received testimony from John the Baptist, whom God had established, he came to be unable to give his heart before him.
The hope of making an external fence centered on John the Baptist and so gathering the whole was utterly shattered. And so, you must realize, Jesus had no choice but to seek Judaism. Jesus sought to gather even John the Baptist’s mistake, but Judaism too betrayed Jesus.
Thereupon, Jesus, leaving behind the Judaism that rejected him, sought the people whom the religious body had opposed. Had that nation been an independent country, a sovereign state, he would have sought the sovereign or the ruler of that nation. But at that time the nation had lost its sovereignty and become a vassal of Rome, and being in a position where he could not, for all that, rise against Rome, in Jesus’ breast there was lodged a han beyond words. You must realize this.
You must realize that Jesus, in his thirty-three-year course of life, left behind sorrow, suffering, and han, and could not leave behind hope, happiness, and the Will.
Such a Jesus could not give his heart to the people, could not give his heart to the religious body, could not give his heart even to John the Baptist, the prophet God had established, and could not give his heart even to his family.
Jesus, placed in such a position, had no choice but to become a wanderer: when this village opposed him, to that village; when this street opposed him, to that street; when the Jews opposed him, to the gentiles; when this family opposed him, to that family.
So he lamented, “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head” (Matt 8:20).
Seeing this fact, you must clearly realize that, though Jesus had nowhere to go and nowhere to come, he had to agonize inwardly while shouldering the responsibility and mission he must accomplish.
Jesus, Driven Out by His Family, John the Baptist, and the Jewish Religious Body
Then where was Jesus to go—Jesus, driven from his family, driven from his kin, driven from the religious body, driven before the people?
He had no choice but to seek the most wretched place. He gave up on those who, in that age, stood in places where the multitude welcomed them, and the multitude looked to them and had no choice but to seek people in lowly places.
Why was it that Jesus had to preach the gospel to the poor?
Though Jesus was the Lord, who came to this earth bearing the mission of taking as his disciples people in the most noble positions, of placing all the priests and teachers of the Law of that age under his command, and of refounding the nation of Judea, why was it that he set the national-level foundation behind him and sought the wretched bands?
This is a thing over which Christianity today must grieve and sorrow beyond words. I think you must engrave this fact deep in your hearts.
How greatly, in his heart, must Jesus—who was seeking such lowly places—have awaited the one day of unification, the one day of victory, on which he could, from the highest place, gather the people, gather the nation of Israel, take in hand the nations scattered throughout all directions, judge evil, bring all the enemy nations to surrender, and then offer a sacrifice of glory before the Father!
In an environment where his great hope, his great responsibility, and his great mission had been rejected by his family, by John the Baptist’s faction, by Judaism, and by the leaders of that age, and so utterly distorted, the inner distress of having to gather all this up again was hundreds of times greater than that of a person walking a smooth path.
We must realize that Jesus was an aching and pitiable one who had to bear such distress.
Why was it that Jesus had to offer up such an aching prayer before God beneath the Mount of Olives, and why was it that he had to be driven from this street to that street?
Why was it that, wherever he went, he had to face a band of betrayers?
If this is a riddle, it is a riddle; from the standpoint of human circumstances, it is something that could happen, but from Heaven’s side, it is an infuriating and grievous fact.
We must consider once more how grave the responsibility of Judaism is, which committed such a thing, how great the responsibility of John the Baptist is, and how great the responsibility of the household of Joseph and of Mary.
Jesus had nowhere to go; he tried. Even the footsteps by which he sought unlettered fishermen and tax collectors like Peter and James—the people blocked them at every turn, so that he had nowhere to go. There was nowhere he could break through and go, which is the meaning.
Even so, he could not forsake the Israelite people and go to the Gentiles. Because the Israelite people were the foundation God had toiled over for four thousand years centered on the Will of the providence of restoration, the meaning is that he had to bring all things of the people to a verdict and lead them on, inwardly at least.
The people had done wrong, but you must realize that Jesus was one who, if in the area he was responsible for, set up some condition and inherited them before God inwardly at least and went on, well and good—but before receiving that inheritance, he could go nowhere.
Although Jesus came to possess the world, one who came to embrace heaven and earth, one who came as the sovereign to govern all people, one who came as the central being through whom the glory of all ages was to be realized on earth, he came to lose all of this. He came to give all the glory of Heaven to this earth, but because the Israelite people betrayed him, his circumstances were such that he could not give it.
We must realize the wronged and infuriating circumstances of Jesus, who nonetheless had to embrace these people.
Jesus pioneered his environment, bearing a worldwide hope, a cosmic-historical hope. Yet when he gazed upon the disbelieving Israelite people, though in his heart he wished to pour out curses, he could not do so. Why? Because if Jesus himself, who shouldered historical responsibility, were to curse the Israelite people, the toil of God, who had toiled for four thousand years, would be utterly shattered. That Israel should perish was not infuriating and grievous, but that God’s toil should be shattered was.
Jesus was one who, if he could not grasp with the right hand what he had meant to grasp, had to grasp with the left hand and go forward and clash and had to leave behind some condition by which he could inherit the will and the toiled-over foundation God had left and establish it again. He wished to curse the Israelite people and Judaism, who had made him wronged and infuriated, but because there were such circumstances, he had to grit his teeth and go on.
Who would have known such a heart of his?
The Sorrow of Jesus, Who Could Not Become One with His Disciples
Because the Israelite people were the ones who were to bring all of God’s desire and the han of history to the consummation of the resolution of han (해원성사), how great must God’s toil have been up to the establishing of this people! Each time they walked a course of suffering, God protected them lest they be hurt, lest they suffer harm.
When the historical foundation that God had made—leading them as a band to remain forever and ever, making an environment in which the whole could move by the messianic thought centered on the Jewish religious body—all came to stand in a position opposed before Jesus, you must realize the fact that Jesus, gazing upon this, though his personal sorrow too was great, could not lift his head before the merit of God’s toil.
When Jesus, having lost all this environment, came to stand on the path of destiny on which he had no choice but to seek the garden of Gethsemane, the band that opposed him may have rejoiced, but the hope of God, who established him, and of the multitude who followed him, was utterly shattered.
Jesus took it as a matter of course that he himself was sorrowful and suffering, and that hardship he could endure; but it was sorrowful to him that behind it all, the toil of God, who had sought him out for four thousand years, was being shattered.
God became an offering as He pioneered the historical course, and Jesus, gazing upon the Israelite people and the Jewish religious body—who remained from all that course of toil yet were failing to fulfill responsibility in reality—must have felt curse and indignation toward them proportionally to God’s expectation.
But because there were circumstances in which he must not turn a curse toward them, he went all the way to the garden of Gethsemane, thinking of the responsibility to leave behind, before the people and the world, a condition for having come to earth.
Countless Christians today who claim for themselves the title of bride do not know how it was with such circumstances of Jesus.
Jesus lost all twelve disciples—Peter and the rest—who, having shared joy and sorrow with him through some three years of toil and ease together, had vowed,
“The place you would go is the place we have hoped for; the place you abide is the place we have sought out; the place you have lived is, we believe, the place we have looked to as the foundation of happiness; so we will live with you and die with you.”
You must truly know how to fathom the heart of Jesus, who, bearing a heart beyond describing and a lonely heart that could appeal to no one, was ashamed before God and who, driven by the people, went alone to the Mount of Olives or the garden of Gethsemane and prayed.
When Jesus considered that, although God sent His only begotten Son to this earth that God had toiled over for four thousand years to change it into a foundation of happiness, he himself came rather to stand in a position of sorrow and so would go, leaving a nail in God’s heart, Jesus had no face before God.
You must not forget that Jesus, the Savior of Israel, who came to gather the Israelite people God had toiled over for thousands of years and who was to become the sovereign of Israel, having lost the people, headed toward the garden of Gethsemane in order, at the last, to come to terms before God.
Jesus was a pitiable orphan of heaven and earth. He was like the most pitiable orphan, who could set his heart upon not one place on this earth. Everyone is bound to have feelings of sorrow and joy, but Jesus was a lonely one who could not find a single object of joy.
So he was the most sorrowful orphan in history. This is said not in terms of the world, but in terms of the Will of God and of Jesus’ mission and responsibility. He was one lonely beyond words. So he truly had no face to call out, “Father.”
What must the heart of Jesus have been, who had vowed that he himself must not depart, as he called upon the Father in the garden of Gethsemane?
Though it was a place where his cells leapt and the marrow of his bones melted, the three disciples who had been with him for three years fell asleep. That they could not endure even one hour and so could not take part is, as human beings of this earth who ought to have attended the Messiah, the most grievous fact there can be.
If the disciples had resonated with Jesus’ sorrowful heart, taken hold of the hem of his garment, and wept aloud together with him, what would have happened?
Christianity would not have become so wretched. Had they become chief disciples and died together with Jesus, they would have been resurrected. Because they failed to fulfil the responsibility they ought to have fulfilled before the Messiah, who came for all humankind, before Jesus, who bore historical responsibility, Christianity after Jesus’ passing became a wretched religion.
Whose sin is this all?
It is because of the sin of the three disciples, who failed in their responsibility.
What Kind of Bride Will the Lord Desire?
Then, in what kind of place do you wish to seek the Messiah?
In what kind of place do you wish to meet Jesus, the bridegroom?
With what preparation and in what figure do you wish to appear before him? In the present reality, this is quite a serious problem.
Will Jesus desire a bride who, bearing a lamp of glory equipped in dazzling splendor, comes to meet him, saying, “You are my bridegroom”? Or will he desire a bride of so wretched a figure who, in a lonely place like the garden of Gethsemane, shedding tears and embracing a welling-up heart, says, “Because our forefathers failed in their responsibility…”?
How will you answer?
Before the Lord meets the bride of glory, he seeks the bride of suffering. You must pass through the bond of having become the bride of suffering and so set up the qualification of the bride here. This is the course of restoration. For a child to remove the sorrow of the father, he must go to a place more sorrowful than the father’s sorrow.
If Jesus, having come to this earth, wishes to greet a bride, what kind of bride will he desire? Jesus will require a bride who knows all that he has not been able to speak up to now and all that is bound up in his breast and can comfort him; and beyond that, a bride who can resolve and comfort the han and suffering bound up in God’s breast.
Look: God, who had to forsake that Israelite people whom He had chosen as the chosen people and sought for four thousand years amid suffering and toil beyond words; God, who, though He sent Jesus, His only begotten Son, as the Messiah for the sake of that people, must nonetheless give blessing to the people who betrayed him; God, placed in a position where He can do neither this nor that—Jesus will require a bride who can comfort the heart of such a God.
Who is Jesus?
He is the Crown Prince God sent. He is the prince God sent. The Messiah who comes as the Crown Prince—what qualification must the one who can be the bride before that Messiah be equipped with?
She must be one who can be a partner, inwardly and outwardly, before him who is to be the bridegroom. As he loves humankind, so the bride too must love humankind; as he worries about facing God, so the bride too must worry; as he takes responsibility for the world to come from the present age, so the bride too must take responsibility.
One who wishes to become such a bride must not first pray to be given a blessing. She must first pray, “Give the calamity to me.” Why? Because they betrayed Jesus, who had come to give blessings, one must indemnify that historic sin by sacrificing oneself and resolve that bitterness. The view of the bride that I know is this. Before being forgiven my sin, one must say, “Forgive the historic sin.”
Only one who, with the resolve to pull out by the root and overturn even the root of the sin Adam and Eve committed, says she will take responsibility for the sorrow and suffering and the twists and turns and indemnify them all—only such a one becomes the bride.
This is why Jesus said,
“He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me” (Matt 10:37).
What use is it to say a thousand or ten thousand times in words alone that one loves?
One must love with the body, love with the mind, and beyond that, love with the heart. Mind, body, and word cannot cross the boundary line of age. But seen through Jesus’ mission, Jesus crossed over the boundary line of the age.
Because this one came bearing a heavenly mission representing past, present, and future, every ideal welling up from his heart, too, was historical. Among the tears he could not but shed, there were tears that could represent the individual and the family and the people and the world.
When he ought to rejoice, he could not rejoice. That joy was not a joy centered on the individual. That joy had to take the chosen people of this world as its fence, the disciples chosen upon the foundation of truth as its fence, and the direct family as its fence, and embrace even his sons and daughters.
Father, Strike Me and Forgive Everything
But because Jesus went bearing han in an environment that was not so, one must seek and resolve such han of Jesus.
Thereafter, one must first make individual repentance, family repentance, and clan, people, national, and worldwide repentance, and then be able to say, “Whatever work Thou desirest, I will bear it.” Taking responsibility for sin and indemnifying it all, one must then be able to say, “I will go in Thy stead on Thy hard and toilsome path.” But how was it with Peter, John, and James?
When it came to the brink of death, they packed up their bundles and all ran away. Is this the result left behind through his blood and his ideals?
This is why one must be a person who can say he will go the path of death ahead of Peter and James and John of old.
If one is a believer who says he will become the bride in this present age, then if there is an enemy of God, he must stand before that enemy first.
In this complex social environment of today, this environment in which countless denominations have arisen and fight one another, God will desire a person who can discern which is true and so judge the countless religious bodies and who can step forward saying he will take responsibility, in their stead, for the countless nations that are fighting.
Up to now, you may have said, “Father, give me a blessing,” but the Unification Church is not such a place. Blessing is an utterly public thing. It is a public thing. If you wish to receive a blessing and become the bride, it must not be for the individual. One must first be for heaven and earth.
It is the same as in the world, where, to be married into a household, one must prepare to suit that household. Now, can a bride who is to appear before God’s Crown Prince, the Messiah of all people, the Lord of all things, say, “Make me the foremost bride”?
Even at this hour, God is waging a worldwide battle. My friends, God is even now continuing a worldwide battle. Know this clearly. God fights in the stead of these people, but He is also fighting for the sake of countless peoples. Even at this hour, the brink of death is overturning.
Even in the hours when you are asleep, some people cannot sleep for God’s sake. If there be such a person, God must grieve for him, must pioneer the path he is to go, and must become the shield of his battle.
One who wishes to become the bride must be a person who cannot sleep an easy hour, not one hour of a single day, and cannot live an easy day, not a single day.
And one who wishes to become that bride must, to resolve the historical indignation bound up in heaven and earth, pray on behalf of the world, “Father, strike me and forgive everything.” Is it not so even in the world?
When his younger sibling does wrong and the parent raises the whip, the filial son says, “Father, Mother, strike me and forgive my younger sibling.”
Seen from this viewpoint today, the essence of Christianity has changed.
If there is a representative bride in this Korea who can be called before God, she must say, “O Father! Lay the sorrow of all the religious bodies entirely upon me, and strike me.”
If one wishes to become a bride who stands in the stead of the world, one must say, “Forgive all the things of this world, and scourge me.”
If there were a person who says, “If only by my one self being rejected, my one self being forsaken, my one self being persecuted, and my one self taking responsibility, all the humankind of the world could live, that would be my glory and my desire,” and a person who says, “What is good is mine, what is yours is also mine, what is mine is mine too,” which would you choose as the bride?
When Jesus came to this earth and gazed upon the Israelite people, they were already split in two.
Had they all said, “The blessing you have brought is too heavy for us to shoulder,” the world would have turned.
The purpose for which Jesus came to this earth was not to burn up all the things of this earth, but to gather the Israelite people and save all people.
Yet he went without fully accomplishing that responsibility. At that time, his disciples, to put it in today’s terms, were talking about who would be Minister of the Left and who Minister of the Right.
For Jesus, who stood on a path of suffering and persecution and being driven about, there was no such place of glory. The disciples did not know that there was a path of persecution for Jesus.
Since five loaves and two fish fed five thousand with some to spare, they thought the unification of the whole world was no problem.
The Meaning Contained in Jesus’ Final Historic Word
For Jesus, who had lost the people and the religious body, there remained a second course of having to gather these up again. To walk that second course, he had to bring to a decision the inner bond God had toiled over for four thousand years and the outer bond remaining in the religious body and the people.
Although Jesus had such a mission, his disciples did not know it at all. How would those unlettered ones know? It must have been so stifling that he said, “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.” What a forlorn saying this is!
The path Jesus walked was the path of being driven before the people, the path of suffering, the path of persecution, and the path of refounding the Israelite people.
To gather this Israelite people again, there remained for him the responsibility of indemnifying, within a brief time and by setting up at least the conditions, the toil God had toiled over for four thousand years to establish the nation of Israel and the Jewish religious body; yet despite this, there were only disciples who hoped for glory alone. So Jesus had no choice but to take responsibility, alone, for the bond of heaven and earth and history and go before the cross.
We must realize that the steps by which he stepped forward to take responsibility, in their stead, for what the people he had established on this earth failed to take responsibility for, and what the disciples he had established failed to take responsibility for, are the steps from the garden of Gethsemane to the summit of Golgotha.
You must consider how great the sorrow of Jesus, hanging upon the cross, must have been. Just before Jesus breathed his last, darkness came over all the earth. Hanging upon the cross,
Jesus said,
“My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?”
He was forsaken by God. How wretched it is! At the very hour when the Messiah—whom God had sent, leading the providence for four thousand years and awaiting the establishment of the heavenly kingdom—breathed his last, even God had to turn His face away from the cross.
Why was it that Jesus, who came as God’s prince, had to leave behind such words of tragedy, “My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?” This is a stain upon the history of humankind. It is a historical stain.
The countless Christians scattered throughout the whole world today have a path they must go—what path is it?
To clear away the han Jesus left behind on the summit of Golgotha, they cannot but shed tears and blood and sweat. When Jesus, bearing the cross, climbed the summit of Golgotha and saw the women following behind him shedding tears, he asked them not to weep for him but to weep for themselves and their children. It is a true saying. It was a foretelling: My tears remain to humankind. The path of the cross I walk does not end with this; it becomes a historical path of the cross.
If I go individually, my responsibility ends, but after I have gone, your responsibility remains.
Therefore, there remains individual responsibility, family responsibility, clan responsibility, national responsibility, the responsibility of the nation, worldwide responsibility, and cosmic responsibility; and to fulfill that responsibility, countless Christians hereafter cannot but go the path of tears, cannot but go the path of the cross.
You must realize that Jesus, who went bearing such an overwhelming cross, went solemnly and silently all the way to the summit of Golgotha—even from a wronged position in which, tracing history and tracing the world, repenting the past and criticizing the age, he had to leave behind one starting point of judgment—to prepare one foundation on which the God who had toiled could be attended upon this earth.
When Jesus, upon the cross, said, “My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?” those words were spoken not centered on himself as an individual alone, but as the Messiah who came bearing a great mission.
The meaning was: To forsake me is well. But do not forsake the many who were together with me.
It was an entreaty: Do not forsake Peter, do not forsake John the Baptist, do not forsake the twelve disciples, do not forsake the nation of Israel, do not forsake the countless Christians who will come hereafter. You must realize that this was Jesus’ final historic word.
To Meet the Messiah
We Christians, who must follow such a path, must reach even the heart of saying, even in the place of death, “We embrace the people and struggle before the Father, so do not forsake the people; we take hold of this world and struggle, so do not forsake this world.”
I say again: you must know how great the suffering of Jesus, who stood upon the cross, must have been. Upon the cross, Jesus gazed toward Heaven, and all before him was pitch dark. He gazed upon the earth, and it too was pitch dark; he gazed upon all people, and it too was pitch dark. It was all too dark.
Even upon such a cross, the one stream of heart welling up was, “Why hast Thou forsaken me?” We must realize that within those words, he prayed with an overwhelming heart: “O God, do not forsake me forever.
That humankind was forsaken because of Adam and Eve is a matter of course; but do not forsake Thy toil, who hast toiled holding to a historical heart, and do not forsake what Thou hast labored over. Though Thou forsake me, do not forsake the hope Thou hast wished to establish.
Do not forsake Thy ideal of governing all people through this people.” It was a prayer: “Though I go, what will become of Thy Will? Though I could not establish the way of a loyal subject for Thee, I have at least a loyal heart. And though I could not establish the way of a filial son, I have at least a filial heart. But in a situation where there is not even such a person as this upon this earth, what will become of things if Thou forsake even me?”
My friends, this was not a prayer made by a lamenting himself. It bore historicity. It was an appeal embracing the Father, who had toiled up to now. B
Because such single-minded devotion moved the Father’s heart, the power of re-creation and resurrection arose. And that Jesus prayed, “Do not lay their sin to their charge,” was also, with love, his thinking above all of God’s labor.
It was: “If Thou forsake them, what will become of God’s Will?
Though I go the path of death a thousand and ten thousand times, if Thou forsake them, the merit of God’s toil is shattered.” So you must realize that Jesus appealed, embracing God.
What is it that saddens us today?
It is this: why did our forefathers face in so shabby a manner the Messiah who came after four thousand years?
What Christians today ought to be indignant over is the conduct of these three disciples—Peter and James and John. Even a person going for the sake of one nation of the world could not do such a thing; how could they do so when the master they served was going the path of death?
To meet the Messiah, one can meet him only by going of one’s own accord on the path of death. You, too, who wish to attend the resurrected Lord as your bridegroom, must cross the ridge of the cross and be resurrected. This is the heavenly principle. To find what is lost, one can find it only by going to the place where it was lost.
Upon this earth today, because of Jesus’ cross, there remains a historical cross. Because of the cross, there remains the historical han of Jesus. Because of the cross, the substance of Jesus’ han comes forth as an offering. This is why He wishes to pass through the individual, the family, the clan, and the people, and so set up one sovereign nation of God and gather this world.
Therefore, Christianity, which must gather the second realm, seeks to gather it up in the name of Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Here Jesus and the Holy Spirit must toil again.
To seek and establish one person, they must toil over long, long years. To find one family, they must toil more than in establishing Abraham’s family; and to establish one people, they must undergo hardship greater than the suffering the Israelite people underwent in Egypt.
This is why the history of Christianity up to now is a reenactment of the history of the Israelite people, who fell into a wretched environment beyond words—a reenactment of the environment of two thousand years ago.
The Jesus who came and went upon this earth is a historical substance. He is the historical substance of hope.
So he was the substance that Adam of old had hoped for, the substance of hope promised before Noah, the substance that stood in the stead of Noah’s aching circumstances, the substance that spoke for Noah’s heart; and so it was too regarding Abraham, and beyond that, regarding John the Baptist of that age.
Then, where lay the cause for which Jesus, upon the cross, endured that suffering, biting his tongue and gritting his teeth?
He appealed in his heart, holding up history:
“I will not become a person like Adam. I will not become like Adam, who sowed the seed of disbelief upon this earth. I will not become like Cain, who killed the younger brother he ought to have loved. Even in a place where I could kill, I will forgive.”
The Resolve of Jesus, Who Was the Incarnation of the Prophets
Even if you had been born at that time as the true son of Grandfather Noah, you would have hurled all manner of abuse at the work of Noah building the ark on Mount Ararat for 120 years. To build a boat, one should build it by a river or by the sea—but on a mountaintop….
That was not to deliberately avoid receiving any help from the world, but to change the world. To teach God’s Will to one’s wife and sons and daughters and to restore the family fundamentally, one must witness.
The more the people—and indeed all who have eyes, all the people of one’s household—reject it, the more one must set it up before the Will. One must not become their captive.
At that time, did Grandfather Noah’s wife come before daybreak and say, “Sir, the time for building the ark is getting late, so rise quickly. You must do dawn prayer, so go up and see to it.” Think about it, you women here. These days, make Korean women suffer even one year, and it would not be mere nagging—they would grab you by the collar. Would she have done so?
Think about it. It is easy to say 120 years. But God had to make it so. And do you suppose those three sons said, “Ah, our father is holy. It is God’s command, so do it quickly.”
Would they have had any way of knowing whether he had heard God’s command? Yet would God have said, “Hey, Noah, there is bound to be hardship”? But Noah, though buffeted by wind and wave for 120 years, carried the command he had once received through to the end.
Only after setting up a condition fit to strike them—by having them strike him, betray him, and have his companions oppose him—does He judge. Jesus is the incarnation of that Noah who built the ark. It was: though the blame and ridicule of countless people should dash against my one body, though it should cost my life, my fixed heart does not change. This is a loyal subject.
Abraham, too, was born as the son of Zerah, an idol seller, and God called him out of an environment where he lived in luxury. He was asked to forsake his beloved hometown and depart. He was asked to become a person without a nation, a child who has lost his parents. He was asked to break all the attachments he felt centered on relatives and family.
Because Abraham loathed to the bone that his father was an idol-seller and held a revolutionary heart, wondering whether this could not be remade into something else, God saw that and called him out. On calling him out, He found him usable.
So, “Offer a sacrifice.” When He said, “Offer as a sacrifice Isaac, the son born to you at a hundred years old,” he said, “Yes.” My friends, think about it. Was he not mad? Mad, and mad in the wrong way? Even to be mad, one should be mad rightly; this is being mad wrongly. Is it not so?
When Jesus considered this and that, from the position of saying,
“Before God I am the representative of Adam, the representative of Abel, the representative of Noah, the representative of Abraham, the representative of Isaac, and the representative of Jacob, so I will become a true parent to the sons and daughters of faith,”
He said, even upon the cross,
“If my body, becoming an offering, can accomplish the Father’s will, I will die a thousand times and ten thousand times.”
That Jesus prayed
“O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt,”
was not because Jesus himself wished to live.
Because God stood in a position of having to forsake that whole people, it could not be otherwise when he thought of the course of suffering thereafter. Yet in Christianity today, they say this and that—that Jesus too wore a body, and so on….
If that were the case, would he have the qualification to be the Messiah?
Is it not so?
Even Stephen, while being stoned, did not pray such a prayer; and they say Jesus did so because he did not wish to die?
Jesus worried over the fact that, if his path hardened into the cross, all who would follow him must walk the path of the cross.
Hereafter, when Jesus comes again to this earth and says,
“If there is one who will be my bride, lay down your neck and come forth,” will there be a person who comes forth without hesitation? “My child is crying just now, so let me nurse it first….”
Will that do?
One must stake one’s life.
The path of seeking Heaven is the path of the cross. One must win on the path of the cross. On the course of the cross, one must subdue Satan.
One must accuse him, saying, “You wretched Satan, you Satan who has wrecked God’s providence for four thousand years.”
Only by doing so can one go forward to the glorious place of resurrection. The cross is not a place of completion. The cross is a place of perishing. The cross is a place of forsaking everything.
So one forsakes all. Forsake your mother! Forsake your child! One must forsake all.
We Are Saved by Resurrection
This is why the course of resurrection is to forsake everything and be born anew. It is not by the cross that one is saved. It is by being resurrected that one is saved. The salvation of our Unification Church, too, lies here.
The cross is a place for clearing away han as the fruit of suffering. Resurrection, because one departs from the cross and, having won, comes back to life, is the place of eternal life.
In Christianity, they have hung the cross atop the church, but they pray about it.
Is that God’s glory?
He would say it is grievous. One must believe in and seek the way of resurrection. It is by believing in the way of resurrection that one attains salvation. Thus, Jesus came forth treading such a path.
We, who go seeking the way of the bride, have today learned the historical heart of Jesus.
So you must embrace these people, embrace the world, and weep aloud. Only if there is at least the cry, “If there be any sorrowful circumstance, make me an offering, and I will go to the wretched place.
Grandfather Abraham, I will make such a resolve. O Father! I will indemnify and clear away the historic stain the forefathers left behind.” Can one go before Jesus?
This is why Jesus, from such a position, said,
“I will not become like Adam. I will not become like Cain. I will not become like Ham. I will not become like Abraham, who erred in the offering. I will not stand in the position of Moses, who struck the rock twice. I will not stand in the position of John the Baptist, who failed his responsibility. I will stand in the position of completing the responsibility.”
What Adam failed at by not believing is that one must believe and pass over.
Because there remained the appeal of the blood that drenched the earth, Jesus, who knew that a battle would arise at that historical standard, prayed,
“Grant that, even though I die, I may not appeal with blood.”
Just as Noah had to block God’s infuriating history by the merit of his 120 years of toil, Jesus too had to do a work no less than that. Just as the Israelite people had to live a life of bondage for four hundred years because Abraham erred in the offering, he had to act so as not to commit a historical grievance. Such a prayer Jesus prayed.
Originally, if Moses was the father, Aaron was the son of faith. Jesus had to take upon his body the condition of every historical mistake—like that of Aaron, who failed to complete his responsibility and made a golden calf and worshiped an idol—and, from the opposite position, embrace God and pass over.
Here, God’s forsaking means He would indemnify history, and the fact of resurrection foretells that re-history sets out.
So you must realize that the vindication of history and the opening of a new age came about by reason of the history of resurrection through the place of the cross.
Just as Abel was set up in Adam’s family, Ham in Noah’s family, Isaac in Abraham’s family, Joseph in Jacob’s family, and Aaron before Moses, so John the Baptist was set up before Jesus. Why? Because father and son had wrecked history. Adam fell, and Cain killed Abel.
Since father and son wrecked history, Jesus, who shouldered the chain for restoring such a history, set up John the Baptist—the representative of the world’s humankind—as the eldest son figure, from the position of a worldwide parent.
This successor toppled over. And that over a trifling matter, laying down his neck….
Was that John the Baptist’s responsibility?
Because he was a man of character who could move the Jewish officials and a man who had combined a life of the Way for some three years in the wilderness, eating locusts and wild honey, the people of that age attended him as a prophet and a foreteller.
When such a John the Baptist erred and fell, there was no choice but to set up Peter in his stead. Peter is John the Baptist’s replacement.
This is why it is said,
“The Kingdom of Heaven is gained by those who strive, and those who strive seize it.”
And so, in the moment of bringing things to a verdict, Jesus said to Peter,
“I can take responsibility for all the mistakes of the historical forefathers, so you, fulfill the responsibility of the son.”
It was:
“Become the true Abel of Adam’s family, the true Ham of Noah’s family, the true Isaac of Abraham’s family. From the position of believing in all these products of restoration, become an offering.”
If Jesus is the father, Peter is the son of faith.
Since the intent was to make him a son, had Peter died on the cross together with Jesus, the history of Christianity would not have become so wretched.
To Bring God’s Providence to a Conclusion
And so Jesus, having died and been resurrected, gathered the disciples and carried on the history of the spiritual restoration of salvation.
The view is that physical restoration could not be done. This is the difference between the established churches and the Unification Church.
Christianity stands in the position of spiritual salvation, but the Unification Church asserts salvation in spirit and body. Had Jesus accomplished the Will without dying on this earth, the sons and daughters of Jesus would not need to believe in Jesus.
The meaning is that there would be no need for “Amen” or for a life of faith. How much would you have to believe for that to be so? Whether fine or plain, one would only have to be born into the bloodline of Jesus.
Jesus sought to become the person responsible for the people, the person responsible for the religious body, the person responsible for the nation. Such a Jesus went without becoming a responsible person.
Then how was Jesus’ life up to walking such a path?
Were all his relations with the Israelite people settled?
They were not. As Jesus walked that path, he was driven from his family, driven from his relatives, driven from the church and the nation.
The meaning is that the Israelite people, by reason of having killed Jesus, were betrayed, and from the time after Jesus, who walked the path of death, became a people walking a rough path.
This is the historical view of judgment (審判觀) up to now. This is why the Israelite people have been driven about ever since Jesus. They became the most pursued and driven band in the world. Because they treated the Messiah so, they must receive indemnity.
Because Jesus was driven about, those who believe in Jesus, too, were all driven about. In the world, in the nation, in their families, they were all driven out.
If one tries to believe in Jesus, the whole household opposes. Why? Because one must walk the entire course Jesus walked, being betrayed. Therefore, to bring God’s providence to a conclusion upon this earth, one must indemnify, in one nation, all the suffering Jesus underwent in his generation.
The nation of Judea, for two thousand years since Jesus left, was a band of wandering exiles without a nation. They became a people rejected here and there. It is all because of the sin of killing Jesus.
Because Jesus was driven about, those who believe in Jesus, too, were all driven about. In the world, in the nation, in their families, they were all driven out.
If one tries to believe in Jesus, the whole household opposes. Why? Because one must walk the entire course Jesus walked, being betrayed. Therefore, to bring God’s providence to a conclusion upon this earth, one must indemnify, in one nation, all the suffering Jesus underwent in his generation.
The nation of Judea, for two thousand years since Jesus left, was a band of wandering exiles without a nation. They became a people rejected here and there.
It is all because of the sin of killing Jesus, and there too they became a people rejected. It is all because of the sin of killing Jesus.