Genesis 19:18-29 I Corinthians 9:23-27
Former Church Headquarters
Seoul, Korea
Prayer
We know that the one victorious day the Father desires has not yet occurred. We feel so ashamed when we think about how the Father has been walking a course of bloody conflict, until this hour, to attain the final victory.
We know that we must arm ourselves with the truth to safeguard the will of the Father. We know that to unfold the will of goodness the Father desires, we must offer all that we have and fight on. Please allow our minds and bodies to be mobilized. Allow the faithful people dispersed throughout this land and the heavenly soldiers and angels of Heaven to be mobilized. Father, we earnestly wish that You will allow the imminent arrival of the day when we can offer glory to the Father.
We know that although our ancestors, in the course of history, greatly yearned for the time of the Lord and exhausted themselves and suffered hardships to find this one day, the sorrow of not having realized it yet has pierced deeply into earth and Heaven because of us. Please allow us to understand that there is a bloody situation to go through to find the one day of glory for which the Father hopes. The Father has called upon us: inadequate, insignificant and incapable people. We offer gratitude for the grace of the Father. He has allowed us to make the resolution and determination to offer our minds and bodies to fight for the sake of the will. Father, please sanctify our minds in this hour and receive us as the sacrifice. We pray that You will separate us completely from Satan's conditions of accusation and allow us to become the proud sons and daughters whom only the Father can claim.
Father, please let us fulfill the utmost loyalty toward the will that You desire with our minds and bodies. Let us feel new grace in our hearts in this hour. Please allow us to feel the Father's glorious grace overflowing in our minds and bodies.
Now I am giving Your words. Please be with me so that the heart of the speaker and the hearts of the receivers will not be divided. We pray that You will allow this to be a time when we can connect with the heart of Heaven.
Please allow us to unveil before You the content of our lives and all our failures to fulfill the responsibility and to prostrate ourselves before You. If we recognize that the contradictory knowledge of contradictory human beings cannot replace the truth of the Father, then please allow us to bring out everything that we have before the Father and be immersed in Your love. This is our sincere wish.
Please do not let Satan invade during this hour. Allow it to be a precious time when we can receive the granted grace. Hoping this from the depth of our hearts, we pray in the name of the Lord. Amen.
I will speak upon the topic, "Let Us Not Weaken Our Determination Toward Heaven."
The Standard of the Value of Determination
There must be those among you, who have made some determination, who have gathered today. There might even be some people who can step forward before others and insist, "My determination is correct."
However, you must now think for whom you have made that determination. In other words, you must reflect upon whether the determination you have is only for your sake or is for the sake of the people, the world and God. More than anything, you have to remember that the time is coming when you must meditate upon whether the determination you have is for the sake of Heaven.
The determinations that people have today come in all shapes and forms. The determination that "A" has is different from that of "G," and the determination of a man is different from that of a woman. Moreover, just as one group is different from another group, all groups have different determinations.
For what purposes are the determinations that each of you have and assert you are going to fulfill in the end? When you objectively ask yourself this question, you will admit that you are in a position to completely give up hope.
When those who are living in the last days, humanity on earth, ask whether the determination that they have can influence the people, the world or the many millions of faithful believers in Heaven and even move God, they will have to confess that it cannot. If God has some desire of this kind toward us, then we must consider as most important above all else the question of what we must cherish in our hearts and what hopes we should hold.
Many people have been asserting a doctrine throughout the course of history. If the doctrines that they insisted upon cannot influence our minds today, then their assertions and the doctrines that the countless saints and sages have promoted in the course of history have no relationship with us whatsoever.
Why has human history progressed until now? If you know of the existence of Heaven, then you cannot deny that it has progressed for the sake of the happiness of humanity, for the sake of establishing the eternal ideology of humanity. As long as Heaven exists, you will have to introduce the garden of joy to human beings. You will have to build the garden of eternal bliss through human beings. If God has been guiding His providence through the course of history to accomplish this responsibility, then there is an inseparable relationship between Him and those of us who are living in the last stage of history. Accordingly, those who have not secured the standard of moving when Heaven moves and stopping when Heaven stops will become people who trample upon history and betray the hope of God.
The Determination of God
The laws of the operation of the universe are designed to follow the rules of the heavenly principles. If there is some providence in that operation for the fulfillment of the purpose of the whole, then God also must work through those laws of operation. Humanity must work through those laws of operation too. Now we must set ourselves before these people and think.
Have you ever reflected upon the purpose of the will of God, who is working for these people? Have you ever wondered about the determination of God, who is trying to awaken these people? If you have not, then you have to understand that you will be in the position of blocking the people from being guided to the heavenly principles. If there is some cause for grief in our hearts today, then these people cannot fight on with a united mind centered on the one ideology to tread the path they must travel. You must realize that it is the sorrow of God and humanity that the humanity of the world has not stood united before the heavenly principles.
You must objectively analyze and criticize the position you are in today. Today Heaven is asking us whether we can confidently step forward before the people with the prepared foundation of heart to connect with the heavenly principles. If God has the greatest hope toward human beings, then what would that be? It is fulfilling His determination to realize the will of creation on this earth. Before creating all things in heaven and earth, God made a determination and created all things based upon that determination. Because that determination has not been actualized in the world of creation, God has been suffering through a history of sorrow.
Now we who are aware of this fact must find something even if we must search every corner of this universe. That something is none other than the determination of God. We must find that determination and materialize it on His behalf. By doing so, we alleviate God's grief and sadness.
Therefore, we must have the determination and make the assertion that we will stand in the course of a great revolution centering on this kind of will. Only then can the sorrow of God be put to rest.
God has been walking the toilsome historical course of letting people learn about the will of His determination, even as we were ignorant of it. We must understand that this is the history of the dispensation until now.
The Savior who represents this determination of God must appear on the earth. He must confront all the forces of evil and obliterate them. Unless some representative who can carry out this mission appears on the earth, the will of God will not be realized. The determination of God and the standard of human hope must one day become linked.
One person was sent as the one central figure whose purpose was to accomplish on earth the will that God sought for the people. God had worked strenuously for 4,000 years. He made that person walk through the path of conflict in all kinds of difficult environments. That person is none other than Jesus, whom we believe is the Savior. Jesus came to restore God's determination of creation that could not be realized due to the fall of the human ancestors, Adam and Eve. To put it another way, God sent Jesus to this earth to set up a second Adam figure in this sinful human world and to reveal His determination before the whole universe.
For this reason Jesus insisted, "God and I are of one body." God and Jesus are not two, but one. You have to understand that, based on this, the condition over which God could be glad was set. Jesus had such a firm determination that he could say, "God is my Father. Even if some oppose and block this, no one can seize the core of the determination I have." In other words, he was prepared to offer his life when making this bold proclamation.
Jesus' purpose in the last 2,000 years has been to reveal the determination of God to many believers. We who are living on earth today must understand that God has been toiling without rest for 6,000 long years to send Jesus.
The Determination of Jesus and the Role of the Holy Spirit
Now if you have come forward facing Heaven, then God will ask you whether you have ever felt the sung sang of Jesus, who came forward with determination on behalf of the will of God, as your own sung sang.
After coming to this earth, Jesus lived through all kinds of unspeakably difficult ordeals for the thirty years of his life. In the end, he had to meet the misfortune of walking the way of the cross. Even then, he cherished, in his heart, the center of his being as something so rock solid that no one could shatter. By doing so, Jesus implanted his determination toward Heaven even in our hearts today. Even if death came upon him, even if the disciples who had followed him betrayed him, and even if the chosen people and the church betrayed him, because he knew the nature of the determination that the Father had from before the creation of the world, Jesus maintained an immutable position.
When this hero of determination came to the earth, what did he come to establish before human beings? He came to pass down to his beloved disciples the determination of God before the creation of the world, which he cherished. However, among the countless people of faith who have emerged throughout the course of history, how many of them similarly possessed the determination of God and tried to fulfill the will of God? When we meditate on this, it is clear that the source of God's grief is not found among those who do not believe. It lies with the people who rely on the name of Jesus and claim they believe in him. We must realize that God is mourning while watching over the people of faith who do not have an unyielding determination to represent Heaven.
Jesus had to die without completing the will because he could not find the one object who understood his determination on the earth. Had there been people in this world who had the determination to represent Jesus and God, the fire of unification could have been ignited, and God could have performed His works directly through the heart of that person. Because there was no one with this kind of determination, the will of God could not be realized.
As a result, after the resurrection, Jesus still had the responsibility to raise a hero of determination on the earth, who could act on behalf of the purpose for which he had come. So he sent one person to whom he passed down his mission. You must understand, that person is none other than the Holy Spirit, who appeared before people.
In whom is the determination of God and the determination of Jesus going to bear fruit? God will again reveal His determination to people through the Holy Spirit. Humanity does not know that it is the will of God that this is conveyed by the hero of the will, and that this hero must convey it to the bride. Using this as the stepping stone, the hero of the will must come to this earth to convey it to one family, to the tribe centered on that family, the people centered on the relatives, the nation centered on the people, and the world centered on the nation. The people of faith today do not know this fact.
Can you confidently go forth with the assurance that you can believe in Jesus, you rely on Jesus, and you can go before God? Do you have the determination to represent the heart of God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit such that you can push away whatever ordeals, sacrifices and temptations might come your way? If you cannot answer confidently that you have this kind of heart and determination to represent Jesus, then there is no way that you can avoid more severe judgment than the Israelites who betrayed Jesus and sold him.
Because there were people who could not uphold the will of Jesus, they made the Holy Spirit suffer. The Christians of today, the second Israelites who could not serve the will of the Holy Spirit, made countless apostles suffer. They also made many of our ancestors suffer. Because we have caused suffering, if we cannot possess the heart and determination that Jesus had, then there is no way that we can restore dignity before God. We cannot be dignified before Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Not only that, there is no way that we can stand proudly before the people of faith who have been building countless altars of sacrifice until now. You must understand that in the future there will come a time when those who could not fulfill their responsibility will lament in regret.
The People of Faith Must Possess the Determination of Heaven
As we approach the last days, God is making demands upon us. Jesus and the Holy Spirit are also appealing to us. You must feel deep down in your flesh and bones that God is longing, even in this hour, for us to become the victorious heroes who can eradicate Satan by becoming the embodiment of the Father and possessing His determination. By doing so, you must attain the qualifications to say, "Please allow me to inherit the determination of Heaven. Please give me the determination of the apostles, who persevered through the course of a blood-drenched altar." The time has come when we must have a new realization of how wrong it is for us to want to go to Heaven without having done this.
The responsibility to awaken Christianity rests with us from now on. If the determinations of God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit manifest themselves by becoming connected to us, then we will be performing works that can dominate history.
In the Bible verses I read at the beginning of this sermon, the aching heart of God, who had to bring judgment upon Sodom and Gomorrah, is expressed. When God was about to cast down judgment upon those cities, there was Lot, the nephew of His beloved Abraham. God allowed Lot to escape from the judgment. He did not let Lot escape from the judgment because of his personal merit. Because God loved Abraham, He allowed Lot, who did not have any personal merit, to escape the judgment. It does not mean that the family of Lot understood the heart of God.
Although Lot and his two sons escaped to the place God directed them to, Lot's wife did not understand the will of God. Because she turned back with more longing for the house and environment that she used to live in than she had concern about her determination toward the will of God or was fearful for Heaven, this became the condition for her to receive the wrath of God even before Sodom and Gomorrah did.
There is a path which human beings must walk. That is a path in which we must follow the will of the heavenly principles and be determined to face any kind of difficulty. This is the fateful path that all fallen people must walk. Lot's wife died because she did not have the determination to step forward without regard for all the things that belonged to her. If she had believed in her husband, who obeyed the direction of Heaven, as the representative of God and had complied with his directions, then she would not have died.
In the course of providential history that God led, God raised someone who could represent His heart so that if the people could not believe in God, they could at least believe in his words and make a determination. However, those who cannot even do that will not avoid the judgment.
When we examine ourselves, we experience suffering because we are people of the fallen lineage. We feel in the back of our minds the desire to do our best for the great will of God and to offer our bodes and minds as the sacrifice, making a new determination and putting it into action. Yet the reason we cannot actually carry out this determination in action, though we feel it, is because we are members of the fallen tribe.
Adam and Eve would not have fallen if they had cherished, deep in their hearts, the words of God given at the time of the creation, "Do not eat of the fruit." They should have realized that they had the substantial responsibility to make an unchanging determination based on the thought that they were in an inseparable union with the words and to govern all things.
The reason Adam and Eve fell is that Adam and Eve could not become one and because Adam could not become one with God. As a result, they divided into many directions. Because they were acting according to their own whim in the environment of free will and freedom, they destroyed the ideal garden of the creation. Even in the last days, if one promotes freedom without first securing determination centered on God, the free world will also be dismantled. This is the way the principles of the universe work. If Adam, who should have represented God, had the determination that no matter who tried to tempt him into violating the will, he would never violate it; if he had governed Eve and the archangel based upon this, then he would not have fallen. No matter how much Eve, who had fallen first, tried to seduce and tempt him, Adam would not have died. If Adam had not fallen, then Eve could have been easily re-created.
Because they betrayed Heaven, they became distant from the heavenly will. Because they did not establish the granted words and will as the one center of their hearts, Adam, Eve and the archangel divided and went their own separate ways. We who are their descendants are in the environment in which we cannot believe tomorrow the things that we believed today. We cannot believe in the next century the things that we believe in this era. We cannot believe in the last days the things that we can believe in the next century.
The Hero of the Determination to Liberate God
What is the concern of God? What is the sorrow of God? We have to understand that it is God's sorrow that He does not have one person whom He can trust and to whom He can reveal the depth of His heart. There is no one to share the things that He could not tell the archangel in the Garden of Eden. He wants to say, "After My toils through the 6,000-year course of all kinds of hardships and tribulations, you alone have come seeking me. Now that I have finally met you, I can rest in peace."
Although we claim that we are seeking the Father and are leading a life of faith, we do not possess the environment in which God can rest. For those of us who are in this kind of position, we cannot help feeling more anxious in our hearts. No matter how much we boast about ourselves, the closer we get to the last days, the more we cannot get rid of a sense of restlessness. In this way, we will be put in a difficult position on the individual level, the societal level, the national level and the world level.
Where is the person who can push away the fear and anxiety that plague us in the last days? Where is the master of determination who can find assurance, not in men but in the heavenly principles, and step forward? You have to understand that Heaven is looking for this kind of person.
Because God lost Adam's family, He lost the original family of the creation who could connect with Adam. At the same time, He lost the blood relatives who could connect with Adam, the people who could represent the descendants of Adam, the people who were centered on Adam, and the citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven centered on Adam. However, God has been recovering all that He lost.
To find all people and the world, God has begun from one individual and has been trying to raise a family and a society. Using this as the foundation, God has been guiding the providence to claim back the people, the nation and even the whole world.
God fought on one side. He has been claiming all this back through the historical course of sacrifice. God has created the individual form and has been building the family, the relatives, a people, a nation and a world that represent Adam on this earth.
Therefore, the fact that Adam's family is lost is not just the sorrow of Adam alone. In your own living sphere, you must also feel to the core of your bones the sorrow that has reached every member of humanity throughout the many generations, through the blood lineage of Adam. There are those who are longing for comfortable days and want to enjoy peace and pleasure even in these circumstances, but you have to understand that there is no way this kind of comfort and pleasurable lifestyle can be perpetuated. We have to understand that we are in the position to cross over the gates of fear that lie ahead of us.
You have to understand that to cast away this fear, God has raised one chosen person. Centered on him, He has raised a people. After that, to put these people at the forefront of the world, God has been working in distress even until today.
The people who can build the heavenly nation in the future are not a large population. They are not the people who are dominating the world today. God is conducting the construction of the Kingdom of Heaven in secret, in an unexpected place.
Accordingly, contradictory phenomena are occurring in which those who are betraying the will of God are living a good life and those who are serving the will of God are living a poor and starving lifestyle. Humanity's history of conflict is continuing even today. The reason is that since human beings have lost their heart toward God, in order for them to be restored to the position where God can believe in them again, they must go through this kind of course. If so, then even if the hardships of the 6,000 years of God's labors were to rush upon you at once, you must be able to overcome them. Even if you were to lose your life, you must become the master of determination who never yields and stand as the person whom Heaven can set forth as the representative.
The Ancestors Who Lived with Determination Toward Heaven
God sent Jesus as the representative on the world level who could do all of this. Many of our ancestors walked the path of suffering to raise this one person. To restore the family Adam lost, God chose the one person who, in place of Adam, drove away the faithless tribe and people and made the determination of faith toward Heaven. This person was none other than Noah.
Noah maintained his unyielding determination even when Heaven dragged him around for 120 years. This is what made him greater than Adam. We know that Adam fell when he had not yet reached adulthood. Because Adam betrayed God, to make it possible for God to believe in us again, we must exert ourselves more than Adam. Even if we are to suffer through toils hundreds of times more harsh, we must be able to break through them.
We have to understand that Noah was not affected when his own self, his family, his relatives, his people and anything in the world put up opposition. Fixed on his determination, he clung to God and fought on for the 120 years of his life. This became the condition for him to be elevated before the humanity of that time, representing God.
The most important thing for Noah, who was inside the realm of the grace of God and escaped the flood judgment, was that he needed someone who could inherit his heart, which possessed the heart of God inside it. However, even Noah himself did not know this.
There was no son who could sympathize with the heart of Noah, who was deeply concerned with the heavenly principles, even while suffering through the 120 years of heartbreaking and distressful toils. No one could say to Noah, "Father, please give me any kind of order."
If the eight members of Noah's family had understood Noah's determination to give all of his heart for God, then they should have stood in the position in which they could absolutely obey Noah, whether they lived or died. They should have obeyed to the extent that they would be willing to die if their father were to die. They should have liked things that their father liked. If they had done that, even if another insignificant bad condition was set, if they could have solidified their hearts centered on God, then they would not have had any problem. Ham should have listened to the words of his father, Noah. No matter what his brothers told him, if they were not in accord with the will of his father, he should not have listened to them. Because he did not listen to the words that he should have listened to and instead listened to words that he should have ignored, Noah's 120 years of exertion were undermined.
It was the same for Abraham. It was not easy for Abraham to abandon his homeland and all of his belongings to embark upon the road toward the vast wilderness of Ur of the Chaldeans. After understanding the will of God, Abraham had to abandon all of his homeland's mountains and rivers, as well as his relatives, because of a determination others did not know about. He had to embark upon the search for the land of Canaan.
If Abraham had maintained the same heart he had when he abandoned his homeland and had worried about the will of God, if he had kept to the altar with all his heart and energy, then he could not have made a mistake. While making the offerings, he should have understood that he was in an extraordinary position. By pouring out all of his faith and energy, he should have come forward with the determination to become one with God.
Abraham, who failed at making the sacrifice, needed the sacrifice of Isaac as a substitute for the offering in order to inherit the will of God again. In other words, he needed his son to unite with him and with Noah. This is the reason he searched for the place where his heart and his son's heart could bear fruit in oneness.
The Value of the Determination Which Is Unchanging, Even in the Face of Betrayal
Abraham won the recognition of Heaven at the very moment he placed Isaac on the altar on the mountain of Moriah and was about to strike him with a knife. Isaac submitted before his father. Abraham also submitted before the Father, so they could head in the direction of the heavenly principles. After that, through Isaac and arriving at the time of Jacob, God was finally able to establish the standard that could substitute for Adam's family and Noah's family. Having done so, the seventy people, who were in the form of three generations of relatives, left the land of Canaan and entered Egypt.
On the foundation of achieving the shape of relatives in three forms on this earth through sons and grandsons, they could be sent into the satanic world and could enter Egypt. However, even after having created the environment from the individual level to the levels of family and relatives, they did not travel a smooth path. Those who represented the seventy followers again carried on the fight on the level of a people and stood on the stage of tribulation to form one people centered on God. You probably know that this is the 400-year period of ordeals in the palace of the Pharaoh.
The Israelites, who were chosen during this period of trials, should have felt remorse that their ancestors had held grudges against God and betrayed God's will in the past. They should have returned to the heart of yearning for God again. The stronger this heart, the easier the way would have been for the Israelites to overcome the severe hardships in Egypt and unite to guide the 600,000 to the blessed land of Canaan.
Therefore, Moses, who was to guide the Israelite people suffering in Egypt, felt a deep concern that no one understood for forty years inside the palace of the Pharaoh. He was burning with the spirit of the people whom he loved. However, striking the Egyptian became the cause of his living a miserable life as a shepherd in the wilderness. Moses abandoned all the magnificent glory of the Egyptian palace. He had the determination that if he were to be confronted with a life of hardship in the land of Midian, he would maintain an unchanging heart and worry for the will of God, rather than love himself.
Moses was unshakably determined to break through the torment of suffering all kinds of ordeals and to cling to God, even if he were chased out by the people. Therefore, when the people experienced difficult situations and Moses entered that environment of affliction, the people could become united. God could work through Moses.
It is the method of God's dispensation to raise a certain people as a chosen nation by driving people into tribulation on the world level and carrying on offensive tactics. Therefore, the Messiah, who is coming to construct the one nation centered on God, will face opposition before the chosen Israelites. This is the process of restoration.
In Adam's family, Eve should have followed Adam, yet she struck Adam. Noah's son, who should have followed Noah, struck Noah. Although the 600,000 Israelites should have followed Moses, they chased Moses out to the Midian wilderness. Because of this kind of historical experience, when Jesus came as the master, the chosen people rebelled against him, though they were in the position of a bride to him.
Jesus, who understood the laws of the heavenly principles, was hounded out by the Israelites and Judaism. Not only was he driven away by his own relatives, he was also driven away by John the Baptist's group and the apostles who were following him. He was chased away by the three disciples who could not be traded, even for Heaven and earth. Who understood the situation of Jesus, who had to cling to them and guide them to Heaven? As Adam should have overcome any kind of wicked scheme and temptation of Eve from the same position as Jesus, Jesus was also in a position to win back the people. You should understand that in the same way that Moses led a sad life in the wilderness after being chased away by the people, Jesus would even be chased away by the world.
Jesus thought, "Even if the people and the religion betray me, no one will take away my undying devotion toward the Father. With the determination I have made, the betrayal of John the Baptist, the one chosen by Heaven, poses no problem. The betrayal of the disciples who are following me also poses no problem." Furthermore, because he even had the determination that his body posed no problem, Jesus could not mourn even when his heart was broken. He could not express sorrow even when he felt sad. We have to understand that he had this fate of restoration.
Jesus had one determination toward God and asserted himself as an offering before the universe. He had the type of determination that could not be taken away, even if many millions of people of faith in the spirit world and Satan, who rules over the air today, were to be totally mobilized. This was the historical transition point.
Inheriting the Determination
The foundation of substantial victory must be acquired on the world level in this way. You have to understand that Heaven established the ideology of the restoration of the spiritual Canaan by passing down a second determination to the disciples, centering on the resurrected Jesus.
Jesus came to this earth for the sake of humanity. The people of the world are in the position of the son. In other words, they are in the reciprocal position before Jesus. Eve violated Adam. The Israelites drove out Moses. The burnt offering accused Abraham, and the son of Noah drove out Noah. In the same way, world Christianity cannot avert the miserable course of being driven out from every corner of the world.
The blessing of the second Israelites who are dispersed throughout the world today has not been fulfilled centering on Israel. Therefore, God has been trying to raise the Christians, whom He chose as the second Israelites, to fulfill His heart's desire and to restore Heaven and earth. You have to understand that to accomplish the will of the restoration of the cosmos, God has been searching for one central figure, one central people and one central nation.
Although God has been working hard for the will for 6,000 years, because of the deaths of Jesus, Noah, Abraham, Jacob and Moses, all took on the form of failure. The providence of restoration could not be completed because of the death of Jesus. Therefore, the spirits who are in Paradise today have laid the foundation for the will of Jesus, who tried to restore the first Israel. Furthermore, they are the spirits who have set the condition of having spiritually accomplished the will of restoration. The chosen Israelites should have become the first Israel, but because the first Israel was dismantled, the second Israel was put on the course of spiritual restoration.
The grief of God when Jesus was lost is dissipated through the spirits in the spirit world who belong to the second Israel today. The will of God, who chose the first Israel, must be fulfilled by Jesus. This is the only way that the bitter and unfulfilled heart of God will be soothed. Therefore, now you have to understand that the time of the movement to restore the second Israel by mobilizing the second Israelites and the spirits of the spirit world is the last days.
What kind of time are Christians living in? They are in the period that corresponds to the forty-year wilderness course of Moses. The 2,000-year course of history after the ascension of Jesus corresponds to the forty days of fasting and the forty-year wilderness period of Moses. Moreover, it corresponds to the time when the Israelites were anxious because Moses had disappeared.
What must this Christianity do when it greets the Moses who is to appear again? The Israelites in the wilderness should have upheld the words of the Old Testament, the Ten Commandments of Moses, but they failed to do so. Therefore, they could not become a people of joy. Although the people became traitors to Moses, we must seek the path Heaven wants. On that foundation we must seek the position of the third Israel. By winning the victory, we must achieve the ideology of the restoration of the world Canaan. To do that, we must be determined to receive the new words.
The determination of Moses should have become the determination of the multitude of 600,000. Since this people, who should have inherited the blessing of the second Israel, dispersed throughout the world, and the Christians have not inherited the determination of Jesus, Satan will play the same tricks that he played on the multitude of 600,000 Israelites in the wilderness during the time of Moses. We have arrived at the same kind of period today.
If blood is pounding in your body and if you feel something in your heart today, then you must exert your utmost. You must keep in mind that until the Israelites met Moses, they should have forgotten all about eating, clothing and sleeping. Because they could not do that, Israel lost Moses and the will was shattered.
In the same way, the 2,000 years after Jesus is the period of the wilderness. Christians must neglect eating and clothing and persevere through injustice and distress. Until we meet Jesus, we must restore through indemnity, in the opposite manner, the failure to desperately defend the footsteps of Moses. We must become the Israel who defends the footsteps of Jesus to the last. However, Christians today do not know that they are shouldering this mission.
The Phenomena of the Last Days and the Determination Which Believers Must Have in Their Hearts
Now that the time is nearing, in the course of making preparations for this time, the chosen people are to be handed over to a foreign nation. As you have learned, to usher in the preparation period for the coming of the Messiah, the Israelites went through the period of the Babylonian captivity six centuries before Jesus.
As early as six centuries before the second coming of Jesus, centering on the Renaissance, the worldwide offensive position to destroy Christianity unfolded. How must the Christians of the world today face this course of conflict? To thwart this, we must first make the right determination.
The reason the Renaissance appeared, between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries, is because people tried to research the ancient Greek civilization and form a new ideology of restoration. In the same way that this revolutionary side of culture arose, the Christians who live in the last days today must reflect back on history and be able to experience the heart of Jesus 2,000 years ago. They must revolutionize their hearts by experiencing the heart of God toward Adam before the fall.
Just as there was an attack of the archangel upon Adam and Eve before they began to live for the will, a similar attack surfaced before Noah, Moses and Jesus, and will appear before the people of faith in the last days. This is the attack of Satan. First there will be the material attack, then there will be the emotional attack. This kind of era is unfolding before us today. When Christian history is propelled forward through a nation or people, this course will become the formal basic principles.
The era has turned out to be one in which worldwide Christianity is experiencing rebellion. In this period there will appear an Egyptian- type people like those who opposed the Israelites of the past. When there emerges a Moses-like person before the second Israelites, they will join to drive him out.
What must the people of faith in the last days do? In our surroundings, events similar to those in the land of Egypt will take place. The reality that we are living in today bears a close resemblance to the period of the Egyptian captivity. Not only that, in the sphere of thought, in substantial reality, in regard to faith and in all aspects, we are moving toward the situation where we will surely be invaded.
In the same way the Israelites clung to each other with the dignity of the chosen people and carried on the unification effort to push back the sorrows coming from outside, Christians today must carry on this kind of effort. Those who rely on their denomination or boast about their own church's long history will become the Judas-type people. There were ten people who opposed Joshua and Caleb among the representatives of the twelve tribes who spied on Canaan under the direction of Moses. Who can guarantee that the same thing will not take place today? You must understand that this kind of era has come to our doorstep.
We must now forget all about ourselves. Moreover, to prevent a judgment similar to that of Sodom and Gomorrah, you must take the footsteps of the family of Lot and use them as your mirror. When Jacob returned from the land of Haran to the land of Canaan, he left everything behind him. Our footsteps must resemble those of Jacob. Moreover, in the way that the Israelites shook off all lingering attachments when they were leaving Egypt, we must do the same. In the same way that Jesus abandoned everything and walked the path of the cross by himself, we must also have the determination to walk that kind of path.
Are there those who have the qualifications to show this kind of determination and resolve to all things of creation? You have to understand that Heaven is looking for people with these kinds of qualifications. The process by which Protestantism, dispersed throughout the world today, is being driven away by Catholicism, is the phenomena which repeats the miserable course of Moses.
The Mission of Christians
Now there must appear a new person with a sense of mission who can pioneer this world, which is like a wilderness. One must not draw satisfaction just from being Christians today. The Israelites could not protect Moses during his life in the wilderness. The same thing was true at the time Protestantism emerged. That Protestantism could not win recognition during its wilderness life when it first emerged was similar to the situation of Moses. You have to understand that the will of God will unfold in this fashion.
Moses and Jesus were pitiful people from a humanistic point of view. When you think about Moses and Jesus, do you feel as if your flesh and blood are connected to them? If you have never thought in your heart about Moses and Jesus, who were struggling in their path as they could not even find a place to rest, then you have to understand that this is like being a traitor to the heavenly principles, a person who has sold the sorrowful tears that Moses shed when he was doing his forty- day fasting prayer on Mount Sinai. You will become like the Israelites who fell down in the wilderness.
We must experience the distressed heart of Jesus and accomplish what the first Israel and the second Israel did not accomplish. Do you know the sorrowful heart and footsteps of Jesus who came to fulfill these things? After raising us up, what does God want to achieve through us?
To realize the will of the universal ideology, you must possess the determination to say, "Spirits of the spirit world! I will fulfill all your wishes. People on the earth! I will become your sacrifice. Satans, who have taken control of the air! I will seize you as hostages and drag you up to the judgment stand of Heaven and press charges against you." You must inherit the loyalty and fidelity of Jesus, who decided that he would not change regardless of whether the era changed or the world changed, and who was impervious to the assertions of human beings. If you have not laid the foundation of determination in your heart by transcending the concept of time and the ideology of life to connect with the ideology of the heavenly principles, then you have to unconditionally obey God. Otherwise, you cannot escape the judgment.
If the Israelites had unconditionally obeyed Moses, who had climbed up Mount Sinai, they could have entered the land of Canaan, where honey and milk were abundant. Moreover, it would have been like that at the time of Jesus and in the last days today. In the path that lies before you, the time is coming when you must determine to the extent of the whole value of life. You have to feel deep down to your bone marrow that the Father, Jesus, the Holy Spirit and our ancestors hope that we will go forward for Heaven with the mind-set to take responsibility for the will of God, even when we face death.
If we reflect upon ourselves with these facts, then we can see that our self-centered bodies and our self-centered families are the enemies. For Noah, his family was the enemy. For Jacob, his tribe was the enemy. On the national level, the world was the enemy. God traveled through this kind of historical course. Even now, as He experiences many tribulations, He has to repeat the process by raising other people if some central figures fall. You have to learn to add this to the prestige and dignity of God.
The will of God cannot be fulfilled solely with the power of the individual. God has been using the tactics of encirclement, in which He spreads Himself all over the world and develops the form of one people. Therefore, the time has come when He must raise individuals, families, tribes and peoples and attain the shape of a nation centered on God.
Therefore, today the time is coming when the Christianity of the whole world must form the twelve tribes again. In the same manner that the Israelites, who were dispersed throughout the wilderness, formed ranks, Christians today must also form ranks to carry on offensive tactics against Satan. Such a time is coming. You have to understand that the Christians who are ignorant of this will fall into the same position as those Israelites who were not aware of the direction in which Moses was leading them.
The Time When We Must Unite and March Forward with Force and Courage
Now we face the common fate that requires us to go forward holding each other's hands. We are in the position where we might fall under the same destiny as the twelve disciples. Because of the one person, Judas Iscariot who sold Jesus, they were torn apart and Jesus was killed. Accordingly, the members of our church must take on the shape of ranks in which they can come for the sake of the will. We should say that another's determination is my own and another's heart is my own heart. We must understand that ahead of us there still lies our battleground where, crossing the Red Sea and the Jordan River, we must vanquish the seven tribes of Canaan.
Therefore, now we must shoulder the historical mission and restore this through indemnity. Although God has told us to make offerings on the altar up to now, from now on we must become the offering who can instead tell God, "Please receive us."
The determination of the heavenly principles must manifest itself as the embodiment of the internal and external determination. Centering on this determination, we must confront our family to restore it, awaken the church, nation and people and restore them. That the family, society, nation, church and the world which we behold with hope, all consider us enemies is inevitable.
Today you are receiving persecution in the family and society. However, please do not rejoice just because you have overcome this persecution. When you are shaken by various difficulties in the period of the wilderness and the offensive is taking place, you must not fall down on that battleground. The fate of the heavenly principles is such that we must be hit once before we can overcome. In the course of restoration on the world level, Christianity will be hit. The time will come when it is hit internally and externally. Because the time is coming when the second Israel is mobilized, the spirit world is being mobilized now. The spirit world is mobilized to unfold the second Israel on the world level and to build the third Israelite people.
In the same way that the Israelites were struggling in the wilderness eating the food of life that no one else in other nations knew about or could even imagine, you must learn to eat the food, manna and quail, which Heaven is sending down today in this period. In the near future, the time of thirst will come. You will have to search for manna and quail.
Now the time has come for the construction of the garden of restoration. Even if our bodies are torn apart and our bones are ground to powder, we must be able say for the sake of the one will of the heavenly principles, "Father! The many millions of faithful people in the spirit world! Please work your miracles!" Although the Israelites could not mobilize the spirit world, the time has come when we must mobilize the spirit world. Help from the spiritual world will be with you. If our members call the spirits of the spirit world, they will come. Therefore, many spiritual phenomena are taking place today.
We must understand that we have the mission to raise ourselves and mobilize our families, our people and the world. We have the last mission to bring Satan to submission before the Father. However, the question is, When we will overcome the trial on the individual level, on the family level, on the church level, and on the societal level? Only when we have the determination in our hearts to overcome these trials can we complete the heavenly mission.
Just as God told Joshua and Caleb to be strong and courageous, now the time has come when we must also become strong and courageous. You must keep in mind that the time will come when you must hold hands and unite hearts to seize the victory in the fight against Satan.
