Matthew 5:33-48
Former Church Headquarters
Seoul, Korea
Prayer
Beloved Father! Brief human life, which seeks after You, may appear to be simple; yet, it is complicated. We must walk this life course. Father, we sincerely pray that You guide us to become blessed sons and daughters who can persevere through each day and spend the rest of our lives in the Father's bosom.
We are not alone in the world in which we live. We know that a myriad satans surround us. They have been engaged in insidious fights and have been putting forth conditions of accusations before the Father for 6,000 years. We know that You are keenly aware of this and have been working laboriously to protect us. Please allow us to realize that the Father's concern exceeds our concern, and that the Father's labors in fighting Satan and the victories You have won are much greater than anything we could accomplish, even if we battled hard for the rest of our lives.
The Father has been deeply involved in the lives of our countless forefathers and has been working to fulfill the will of restoration. We know that Your efforts have been the path of the cross, a debt we can never repay by any means. Please allow us to face You in humility and repentance, realizing with all our hearts and souls our inadequacy to return Your grace.
Father, we know that history until now has been a course of raising unworthy ones to the presence of glory. Please allow us to possess Your sincere heart and to be single-mindedly devoted to You. Please do not let our minds and bodies be ours alone. Allow us to possess a sincere heart which yearns to penetrate deeply into the Father's. Please allow us to become sacrifices drenched in such a heart. Please relate with us as Your beloved sons and daughters who can be embraced inside Your bosom, giving comfort to You and being comforted by You.
We have come here longing for this kind of grace. Please do not abandon us. Allow us to become those whom the Father can personally call, "My sons." Father, we sincerely hope that You will relate with us as sons and daughters with whom You can be and love personally.
Please have compassion on us. We are weak and full of concern about our responsibility to carry on the fight, even if we become exhausted. Father, please give us strength. Strengthen our minds with new powers and abilities so that we can become strong and brave children who will never surrender to our enemies. Please, beloved Father, allow us to become sons and daughters who can glorify You by becoming brave soldiers who can be entrusted with the entire heavenly mission.
Please become the center of our lives. Please let no one among us stumble over some condition, but let us remain in the Father's possession only. Please allow us to become Your pride. Father, these are our wishes, coming from the depths of our hearts.
If the root of sin remains within our hearts, please purify us with Your powers. Please remove all the qualities You do not desire. Please let there be a profound change in our hearts which can bring us closer to resembling Your nature. Father, we pray that, in this hour, works of re-creation will take place, allowing us to feel the shock of new power and love in our minds and bodies, removing all evil elements within to purify us and enable us to be embraced by the Father.
Please guide us to cast away all thoughts and concepts which the Father does not want. Let this be an hour when every aspect of us begins as the Father's own, moves as the Father's own, and bears fruit as the Father's own.
If we do not experience such feelings and impact, then we cannot take responsibility for everything in the great will of the providence. Father, please personally come down upon us and allow us the joy and resurrection of life.
Father, we have the responsibility to awaken this sleeping city. We have the responsibility to guide this peninsula into the new light. Please make our fragile hands strong. Though we are inadequate, allow us to become sons and daughters who can give the final blow to Satan and manifest the glory of Heaven.
Please let us not give up on all the things we pledged and determined to accomplish this year. Allow this to act like an explosive we carry in our hearts and bodies, and thus give life to many. Please allow us to become the atom bombs of life to restore this dark world to the ground of the Father's glory. Please allow us to become sons and daughters who can carry out all our given responsibilities.
Please bless these people and bless humanity. All our wishes belong to You. Father, please be with us and work through us. Until the day we can alleviate the bitter grief of restoration, please guide us, Father. This is our deepest desire.
Please allow us to feel how inadequate are the exertions and efforts we make each day to go near You. Guide us to pioneer with desperate hearts. Please let the powers of Your impact and a sincere heart be the only things that sway our lives.
Please bless Your sons and daughters who are praying to You in loneliness from every corner of the countryside. Please embrace them with the same grace. We sincerely wish and pray that You raise them in glory so that they can proclaim the grace You have given them.
Everywhere obeisance is made today, let the countless heavenly saints, soldiers and angels escort You and bring You joy. Let only the Holy Trinity govern this hour. Let Satan not be found anywhere in this hour. From the depths of our hearts, we pray in the name of the Lord. Amen.
The topic of the sermon I want to speak upon is "Let Us Love Heaven and Become Patriots." Let us become those who love Heaven and the nation.
God Has Guided Human Beings toward Goodness
Originally, human beings were to love Heaven, love their brothers and sisters, and love this land. They should have loved Heaven, people and the earth.
When God created humans, His goal was for them to love in such a way. Yet all who are living on the earth today have lost the ability to love Heaven, their brothers and sisters, and the earth, because they are fallen descendants. This is the grief caused by the fall.
Therefore, to bring fallen people back to their original state, God sorrowfully has faced every kind of battle without hesitation and has repeatedly sacrificed Himself for 6,000 years. In other words, we know that God has been seeking us with the responsibility to restore the lost people.
Although we are ignorant of the will of God's providence of restoration, our minds are subconsciously following the heavenly relationship, which has had a dominant influence in our lives. We often experience this in our daily lives.
How do your minds ceaselessly, yet subconsciously, move in pursuit of goodness and the world of greater ideology? Why is your mind not moving in the direction you desire? This is because there is God, who is leading you in a direction of which you are not consciously aware. He is working through a relationship which surpasses your imagination. This is how our minds are being led by the ideology of goodness.
Heaven is the highest good and the loftiest of all ideals. Heaven is the pinnacle of human life and the center of hope. It has been active in the past and present, and will be active in the future. Hence, we must understand that our minds are being guided in the direction of goodness, which Heaven is pursuing.
Even if your heart is drawn toward goodness and you possess a good nature, you should not assert that this is your doing. Moreover, just because your body has been fashioned in the way of goodness based on the heavenly nature, you should not boast that it is your own.
Even if you possess something that is praiseworthy, good and illustrious, you should not consider it to be yours alone and manifest it as such. If you forget that Heaven has created such in you and are proud of yourself, you will be committing a crime against Heaven. We often witness people committing these kinds of sins all around us.
Today, we all desire goodness and righteousness. Even our minds, which pursue goodness and righteousness, do not belong to us. You have to understand this. If you look at the history of good minds, you will discover the 6,000 years of human history, God's work of creation, and finally God's original nature. You must act on behalf of historical and future relationships and possess the original goodness which operates through this center. If someone tries to block your way as you are trying to possess this goodness and sets up an opposing condition, how can you be sure that this violates heavenly law?
People today should pursue this good mind. Furthermore, after they come to possess this good mind, they should not live for themselves but for the greatest center of goodness. Nevertheless, we know there are not many people who understand this.
The Realization of Goodness and the Function of the Conscience
Goodness is never realized by one's self. It is realized when one transcends one's self, one's environment, nation and world and connects with the highest goodness of the Creator. Goodness is possible only through a course of accomplishment.
We must understand that we should find the direction of goodness, understand its destination, and move in that direction. At the same time, we must become goodness itself and leave behind the accomplishments of a good life. It is not an overstatement to say that no one in history has ever understood this truth and led his life responsibly and confidently. God has worked laboriously with human beings. For 6,000 years God has been guiding human beings, who do not know how to repay His work and who are not grateful for His having saved their lives.
If this course of historical sorrow does not end in your generation, it will continue with your descendants. If you cannot feel that this sorrowful course is active in your life, flowing within the life you breathe, there is no way you can truly say that you love your nation and Heaven.
We must live each day based on goodness, with one heart. A good heart must govern our daily lives. While we are working to reach the goal of our lives, we must make accomplishments of which we can be proud, within the ideal of goodness. Those who cannot achieve this certainly have not made any contribution to history or the course of restoration, which seeks Heaven's goodness. They have not brought any results.
How did the human fall come about? Human beings fell because they thought their lives belonged solely to them. Adam and Eve, the first ancestors of humankind, thought that every affair was fulfilled through them, everything began based on them, and every goal was to be reached through them. This is why they fell. We should understand this.
Accordingly, we must expose the sins of our ancestors and abandon the mentality that we should do everything based on ourselves. We must cultivate a true heart which seeks to bring solutions based on the people, the world, heaven and earth. We must pursue a good world. If there are such people, God will call upon them. God works to accomplish the goal which the conscience seeks and is looking for this kind of people. We must keep this in mind.
The connection of love can be forged only when one clearly understands this truth. One must then have a fresh realization about oneself, possess one's value system and perspectives on daily life, human life, history and the universe, and say, "I love Heaven." You can say that you truly love your nation only when you love it from this perspective.
We must understand that this is a path which both historical figures and the great people of our age must walk. We must analyze ourselves anew.
Although we feel that our conscience is at work, due to the human fall, we do not understand the destination toward which goodness is striving. Although we are under the influence of our conscience, we have been unable to lead the type of life in which we do not feel any pangs of conscience.
Now you must expose such contradictions within yourselves. You must reflect and measure yourselves against the new goal and new ideology. In doing so, you must abandon all concepts, assertions and thoughts and march toward a new goal of goodness. We must understand that humanity living in the last days faces a crisis which compels them to walk toward the goal of goodness.
What Kind of Person Truly Loves Heaven?
How low did people fall? They fell to the position completely opposite to God's ideal of creation. Originally, human beings should have been able to consider this world their own. All of humanity should have lived as one tribe. They should have attended the Creator God as their God.
Have the people who live on earth today formed their own world? They have not. Is there someone or some nation who considers all humanity their clan? There is not. Moreover, is there a group of people who attend God as their God? There is not.
Therefore, we must first establish the standard of goodness and make our best efforts to seek our world, our clan and our God. We have to understand that this is the historical mission that fallen people must accomplish.
Our God has disappeared into nowhere; our human clan has scattered in all directions. The land we should govern has been divided into many pieces.
If there is a Creator, then what is His ideal? It is to make this land our land, to make humanity into one clan or members of one family, and attain unity and harmony with us. We must realize that the Creator wants to emerge as the God of humanity and of this world.
If there is someone who says, "I love Heaven," what kind of person should he be? He should make great effort to search for our world, to make all of humanity brothers, to make the Creator the God of humanity, and to attend God in his life. This kind of person can be said to love Heaven.
Since people have lost this standard, even though they feel the workings of their good minds, their lives cannot bear good fruits. We know this all too well.
The work of goodness is taking place ceaselessly in our minds, based on the heavenly and worldwide ideals which human beings are destined to fulfill. Yet we have completely ignored this, severed ourselves from it, and have lived lives of violation. We should feel this deeply, to the core of our flesh and bones during this hour. Unless we can do this, there is no way we can love God, as fallen people.
What then must we do with all our effort? What must we do at the cost of all kinds of sacrifices? We must build the world for which God wishes, the world for which humanity longs. God is looking for one clan that stems from one parent. In other words, He is looking for the one clan rooted in God. We must understand this and lead our lives according to this standard. Otherwise, even if the ideal world, ideal humanity, and ideal Kingdom of Heaven are built, they will not have any connection with us.
God created human beings and blessed them to have dominion over all things. He also said, "Multiply and fill the earth." God intended to directly govern the people who have fulfilled these words and attained perfection. This was the standard of creation. Yet human beings have failed to fulfill this standard. Therefore, we have failed to rule the earth, multiply the world of true love, or receive God's true love. This is the source of our sorrow. Because we live in such a realm, we have become sacrifices in Satan's tests.
God has to raise up humanity again and have them rule the earth. He has to make good accomplishments to bring resolution to every aspect of fallen human life, which has been thrown into confusion and evil. He has to bring people together in harmony and create a heavenly clan. After all this is done, God plans to govern them. This is the goal for which God is working. This is the historical goal which human beings are pursuing. It is the standard of hope which the heart of humanity reveres.
We should have lived in such a world. Therefore, we must learn to be deeply grateful that every element in us is headed toward that place of our hope.
Human Beings Should Build a World of Love under God
Originally, human beings were to love Heaven, yet they fell to the lowest possible place, they have been working to recover it all in the opposite way. Originally, they should have received God's love and formed love relationships with siblings, spouses and parents, but they became fallen people instead. Therefore, even if one proudly insists that he is a true parent, a true spouse and a true brother, no one has forged a true relationship with God.
Because this is the nature of the clan to which we belong, we do not have any basis to claim that anything we govern belongs to God. This world, which was created to be God's world, does not even belong to human beings. It has become Satan's. How pitiful! People must emerge who experience the sorrow Heaven feels as He beholds this situation. There must emerge those who experience the sorrow of humanity. Otherwise, there is no way to undertake a movement to liberate this world from Satan's bondage.
To conduct such a movement, God has worked to strengthen the influence of the conscience in people. Because human beings, whom God should have governed, were lost, He sent central figures in each age. Taking responsibility for all human problems, God sent the central figures who revealed the mission of humanity in the time they lived. These were the prophets and sages of history.
Due to the fall, we human beings totally lost the six days of God's creation. We can worship God only on the Sabbath. Consequently, having lost human beings, with whom He wanted to relate frequently, God has searched hard for an opportunity to make it possible. He has been seeking human beings with no concern for the infinite efforts He has to make in the process. Yet human beings do not know of the many toils God has undergone.
The prophets and sages who came in their assigned times, the heavenly people who came with a mission for their time, what did they present to the earth? They insisted that the people should not value anything of the earth, but should believe in God. They insisted that the land in which the people lived was not the eternal land, that the lives they were leading were not eternal lives, and that the joy they felt on earth had no connection with eternal joy.
Our ancestors fought to kill the prophets whom God sent, representing their particular moment or age in the 6,000-year course of the providence. Our ancestors betrayed the heavenly will. They not only betrayed the people God sent, they also betrayed God Himself. We must consider this background and reflect upon what kind of position we are in today.
God raised these people and made endless efforts to build a relationship with fallen people. Even though these efforts have piled up and become the grief of Heaven, the grief of the land, and the grief of all people, no one mourns over the affairs of heaven and earth. Countless are ignorant of this grief and mourn only over their individual affairs.
Many people testify that the last days are nearing. At this crucial time, have you ever felt the heart of Heaven? God realizes that there is no one who grieves over His sorrow. Although God has been regretting and lamenting for 6,000 years as He clung to humanity and carried on the fight, human beings still possess conditions for lamentation. Have you opened the doors to your hearts today and fathomed the sorrowful heart of Heaven found deep in heaven, earth and all things? Have you ever fathomed the sorrow of Heaven, piled higher than the highest mountain? This sorrow is deeper than any person's or any nation's sorrow. We must understand that no sorrow ever experienced by a human being can ever compare with God's sorrow.
Abandon a Self-Centered Mentality
If we are to be part of the people who sincerely love Heaven, as descendants of fallen people who must follow this destiny, our minds that seek goodness must explode within us so that we can feel the sorrow of Heaven which lies deep inside everything. We must become people who complete the responsibility to alleviate this sorrow. Unless such a group of people emerges, there is no way that the great will of the providence can be accomplished.
Yet human beings have been battling until now, based only upon themselves. They have been fighting, centering on their families, nations, lands and peoples. Yet this is not Heaven. God has been toiling to become our God, for the sake of our world and humanity. On the contrary, humanity on the earth has been searching for their own self-centered families, their own self-centered nations, and land they can rule based upon themselves. This has been the course of history until now.
Due to the fall, human beings have lost the heavenly heart, conscience, body and all things. Still, they are not aware of this incredible truth. Instead, they have been pursuing material things, their bodies, their minds, and their love, all centered on themselves. If there had been no work done by God to grab these people and drag them through the way in which they can transcend themselves, humanity surely would have perished. They would have been destroyed.
We must be eternally grateful toward Heaven, who has been directing us in our daily lives, through our minds, to awaken us. Fallen people, living selfishly until today, have fallen to the lowest possible state. However, fallen people face the destiny of restoration, by which they must return to their original state.
Your body is to fulfill cosmic value. Everything you possess is a sacrifice which can connect with the cosmos. Yet human beings have been ignorant of this truth. The heart of love you possess can connect with the heavenly heart. You have to understand that God has been laboring until now to build a relationship with ignorant people who stand opposed to Heaven.
All things which commonly took place in the course of history until now were battles fought for the individual's sake. The battles were fought for their people and their territory. People have not gone any farther than to fight for the sake of their territory, their people, and their sovereignty. All the battles have been fought based on selfishness. Yet if we do not go beyond such battles, humanity will inevitably be doomed.
Countless peoples and nations have declined. Many people have demonstrated love and loyalty to their nation or people, their territory and the sovereignty of their era. Where did all these patriots go? All the patriots whose names are recorded in history have disappeared. Although there were many patriots in sovereign nations throughout history, their heart of integrity has disappeared.
When we examine history, we find that many people have fought to seize land and remove borders. What we must realize is that the original, ideal world ultimately cannot be built by these means.
After the passage of the imperialist age when land is seized and expanded, what must we seek? After the age of imperialism, we must seek people. Such a time will come. Ideology and beliefs are necessary to find people. However, if we try to take land based on ideology and beliefs, the ideology will not live. You cannot deny the historical trend which sought a new ideology after the great crisis of the First World War. After the age when battles are fought over the land, there will come an age when battles are fought over people. It is the time when battles will be fought with ideologies.
A New Religion Must Appear Which Overcomes Nationalism and Loves Heaven
What kind of age will come after that? An age will come when people make efforts to recover what the original people lost. Because we have the responsibility to rule all things, our original mind is at work to make the world our own. If we have the power to influence a certain sovereignty, it is human nature to want to elevate that sovereignty to the worldwide standard. This desire of the original mind directs us toward a certain place and governs our minds. Since the world is to be filled with God's sons and daughters, each nation must overcome nationalism based on ideology and thought. Nationalism and national concepts must be finished. This is the kind of fight Heaven has been carrying on even while human beings were unaware.
After governing the earth and recovering brothers and sisters, what must be done? We must love Heaven. Since this is the unavoidable destiny for people, when a new religion emerges, it must love Heaven and surpass the religions of this age.
For the people who are searching for their land, Heaven has mobilized their people in an effort to help them find it and has worked to break down barriers and expand territories. For humanity living in the age of the heavenly dispensation, Heaven has established an ideology and philosophy that can dismantle the walls between peoples. What should emerge next? The ideology and philosophy that teaches people to love Heaven must emerge, the ideology which can dismantle the walls between religions and denominations. This is the only way the history of restoration can be concluded.
Therefore, those sovereignties which desire only territory and which love only their people as they plan to invade other nations will perish. On the contrary, if a nation invades other nations with the new ideology and the guiding philosophy of the new age, it will maintain its power and influence as long as the philosophy is still in effect. This has been the flow of history.
In this way, countless tribes have merged. Which nation possesses the most heavenly ideology? When a nation's ideology is close to the heavenly ideology, it can command sovereignty. Otherwise, it will lose its sovereignty to a third party. The actual situation of the progress of history has been that sovereignty is always seized by the ones who have an ideology with the greatest potential to approach the heavenly ideals.
As you all know, today is the celebration of the Sam-Il Jel. Our people suffered the worst hardships for 36 years under the Japanese empire. The hope we cherished was that Japan would perish. Our people endured, hoping that such a day would come. The more the external situation developed, the stronger our internal determination became. It finally exploded on this day, March 1. You know well that right after the First World War, President Woodrow Wilson's advocacy for the independence of nations spurred the March 1 uprising.
America is the leading nation in the democratic world and has the power to influence it. It will remain in power only as long as the direction it takes is in line with Heaven's providence of restoration. If there is a deviation, America will decline.
In the 36 years of colonialization under Japan, we saw many patriots. Many patriots shed their blood on this land. Even as they shed their blood, they fought on with the hope that, although our people were under oppression at the moment, they would not be defeated but would certainly become independent. For this reason, the Republic of Korea was able to reinstate its sovereignty.
The Reason Jesus Could Become the Messiah
The patriots fought against all conditions of oppression because they loved their nation and land. They had hope for the one victorious day and had an unshakable belief that such a day would surely come. This is how they were able to not submit to the oppression, and carry on their struggle. We should understand this.
These principles hold true in winning a nation. To establish a heavenly ideology, we must have a stronger sense of unchanging camaraderie. Hoping for the holy land, we must act on behalf of Heaven. Although there have been many religious people who upheld God's providence in step with the flow of history, among them all, Christians were offered as miserable sacrifices in fierce battles with Satan. We should understand this.
Even when we look at the 4,000 years of Old Testament history and the 2,000 years of Christian history since Jesus, we find that numerous people have followed the teachings of Heaven, while other people have not even dreamed of such an ideology. As they pursued Heaven's ideals, many people were sacrificed.
In history, many people were sacrificed to establish Heaven's ideology. Where will these two groups of people come together, those who have been sacrificed for the sake of God's will and those who have been sacrificing themselves in the fight for their nations? This is the very question of this age which raises our curiosity. People say that a world government will emerge in the future. History is flowing toward one government and the world of one ideology. These two are approaching each other today. What must we do when these two do not seem to be coming together in a harmonious way?
We must never forget those who fell due to brutal bloodshed for the sake of Heaven and who clung to Heaven's ideals and battled on. God has been guiding them toward the one opportune time. Hence, the time when people seize land and use ideology to win people over will pass behind us.
Religions have already secured their basic form and are moving toward the direction Heaven pursues, but human desires fail to go that far and stop in the middle. Therefore, although there have been many patriots in history, what can they be proud of in the age when history is glorified and the world is actively moving? What can our famous national patriots be proud of on the world level? They can only be proud of themselves on the national level.
If we compare ourselves with Jesus, who came 2,000 years ago, what kind of person was he? Jesus had the ideology and qualification to govern a nation, the world and humanity. He served God as the Father and insisted that he was the only begotten son of God. Is there anything more to be done besides this? He was indeed qualified to be the Messiah.
Today, we wish at most to become the son or daughter of an emperor or the child of a master of this world. Yet Jesus asserted that he was the only son of the Creator Himself. Truly, he was qualified to be the Messiah.
Jesus, who came with such a mind-set, did not lament, no matter what kind of difficulty he confronted. This was the greatest contribution he made to humanity. Because Jesus had this firm resolution and preserved his devotion and integrity, despite the storm of countless tribulation, he can be praised as the Messiah of all people today.
Jesus had this moral standard and offered his life to accomplish the one ideal. When they blocked his path, Jesus said to his parents, "Go your way." He said the same to his people, tribe and religion. He abandoned everything and only held onto the world and humanity. He died clinging to the world and humanity. Even if his parents, family, religion and people were to go their separate ways, he believed that the world and humanity could not part from him. This was the essence of Jesus' thought.
For this reason, the world needs Jesus. Humanity needs Jesus. Before he passed away, Jesus clung to Heaven and lived his life for Heaven's sake. Hence, God also needs Jesus. Since he is needed in Heaven and earth, Jesus is certainly the Messiah. We should understand this.
What Are We Going to Throw Away and What Are We Going to Take with Us?
If history were to end, to what are we going to connect on a worldwide level after that? This is the crucial question which young men and women full of hope, ideals and courage must resolve. What we should hold onto and what we should throw away is an issue upon which humanity, awaiting the judgment of the last days, must decide.
Judging from the situation of that time, Jesus was seen as a traitor to the people. He was seen as a traitor to his church, tribe and tradition. Yet, in truth, he was not a destroyer but a builder; he was not a traitor, but a patriot. He truly loved Heaven. People have come to understand this truth only recently.
When we think of a true patriot, we probably have some idea of what kind of person he is. If someone is a true patriot or a true democrat, he should see the entire world as one people, as Jesus did.
We must reflect again that Jesus, whom we should worship, courageously walked the path of Golgotha, the path of the cross. Even though he walked such a torturous path, where will Jesus find those who understand his bitter course? The last days of history, which can resolve this grief, will one day come, as long as the fruits of Jesus' martyrdom remain on the earth and his sorrows are found in the deepest parts of Heaven. Such a time will come, as long as God's will remains unfinished. We call this time: the day of judgment, the last days, the end of time.
In this time, when we deeply feel the reality of the last days, where should we go and what should we attain? You must ask yourself for an answer to this. Where among this nation and this world can we find people who can follow in the footsteps of Jesus' boldness? We must cultivate the wisdom with which to shift our gaze and look for these people with a different perspective.
Ladies and gentlemen, how is Jesus' day different from our own? There is no difference. We who live in an identical time must contemplate whether we can attend Jesus, who was ostracized in his time.
At this time, when we are pursuing the world, we may ask what is the nature of communism, which claims to advocate equality. Communism advocates, "Let us save the workers and farmers; let us live and prosper."
Let us examine the flow of history again. What kind of people can influence the world in the future? What kind of ideology can impact upon the world? What kind of religion can sway the world? As I have explained earlier, it is democratic religion which is in tune with the ideology of goodness.
This means that goodness is not self-centered. Is there a family that lived only for its sake and did not perish? Is there a nation which attempted to pursue the world for its sake and still lived? One might think that an individual or nation can dominate the world, based on some seemingly eternal and unchanging ideology, but wait and see. If you leave Heaven out, everything will be doomed.
Originally, people were meant to live centered on the heavenly principles. The standard of the conscience found within is what serves as the substitute for the heavenly principles in human life. There is an ideology confronting this standard of conscience, and there is heavenly love confronting this standard of ideology. Restoration is the process by which one seeks the heavenly principles amid this internal environment.
All People Are God's Sons and Daughters
The time when we find our own world, our own people, our own tribe and our own nation and serve our Lord are the last days for which Heaven is hoping. This is the last days determined by Jesus, when he came to the earth for the sake of God's will, the day of hope we should seek. It is the day for which Heaven, Jesus and all of us are hoping. Everything will be resolved on that day.
It is the Principle that the Lord of the Second Advent will return in the same way he left. When you lose something, you must look for it where you lost it. If something is broken, you must fix it in the pattern opposite to the way it was broken. Because this is an iron- clad rule which is bound by the principles governing human affairs, the Lord of the Second Advent will return in the same way he left. You have to understand that things are recovered in the same way they were lost.
Today is the time when all that was granted to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden will be recovered. All the people who live in this land today are descendants of fallen Adam and Eve. You are the descendants of fallen parents. You are not descendants of True Parents. Hence, you must become the descendants of True Parents again. What I mean is that you must receive the blessing of True Parents inside the realm of God's love, where you can relate with God and True Parents directly. You must then form a couple and enter the lineage of the True Parents. Yet, until today, humanity has never properly governed the earth as children of the True Parents. They could not become the sons and daughters of the True Parents. Isn't this true?
Heaven labored for 4,000 years to establish a doctrine in sight of humankind and raise their Lord. God raised Jesus, who cried out, "This world belongs to me. All people are my kinsmen, and God is my Father." This is how God has come to be connected to human beings. Yet, since Jesus could not realize this will on the earth and died on the cross, Christ must return. This has elevated the last days as the day of judgment on the national level to that of the world level.
When Jesus returns to this world in the same manner he left it, he must accomplish the purpose left unfulfilled when he had to abandon everything and die on the cross. There must arise a movement of tribes around Jesus in the garden where the world-level ideology is established.
For this reason, a movement must unfold which promotes unification. This does not just apply to the unification of Christianity. All religions must work toward forming one body. Christians say, "You believe in Confucianism and Buddhism, so you will go to hell." Yet, that is not how it is. Go and see; you will find that is not true. If that is how it really is, then I will go to the next world and protest. That is absolutely not true. People are trying to pull Jesus over to their side. Since it is difficult to pull him horizontally, each claims that they are the best and drive him upward. All humanity dwells inside the realm of God's will.
Jesus abandoned, all at once, the people and his lineage which God had worked 4,000 years to establish. He gave up Judaism and the chosen people, for whom God had toiled for 4,000 years. This does not mean that the chosen people have lost all connection to God. They had absolute bonds with God. They could claim, "God is our God," under any circumstance. When Jesus gave up these people, heaven, earth and humanity also gave them up. Consequently, the Jewish people became the most pitiful people of the earth. They had to wander aimlessly throughout the world and be persecuted by other people.
We who hold our hope in Heaven have also lived miserable lives. Although people have been ignorant of this, when the day comes, we will rise to the position where we will be respected, based on the movement of world history.
The chosen people, who could have possessed the glorious worldwide ideology had they been faithful to Jesus, have suffered all ordeals and have been seeking. Hence, the people who were blessed by God are no longer any different from those who were not blessed.
Jesus forsook the people whom God had raised to claim the world. Jesus was not attached to a narrow mentality, promoting only the good of his own religious tradition. He moved forward with a new ideology and a firm determination that if the Jewish people were to disbelieve him, then he would march forward without them. When we reflect on Jesus' attitude, we learn that Christians today must repent.
Let Us Become the Heavenly People Who Unite the World Based on the Heart
When we summarize these things, we can understand that it is required by the Principle that, after democracy has settled and new doctrines have arisen, religions must be united. What must we do to remain on the side of democracy?
To remain in the free world, Jesus must be with us. If a nation lives for the entire world and all humanity together with Jesus, abandoning everything for the sake of Heaven, then it will remain intact. Jesus called out to God even at the moment everything he had was taken away from him. Jesus was intoxicated in the love of Heaven, to which he clung, and he offered all that he had. If we follow this Jesus, we will remain alive. When a people possesses this ideology, all other people will be defeated at their hands.
What determination should we, the pitiful people of the Korean Peninsula, make? Upon what should we reflect? We must pray with burning zeal, "We who live in this divided nation have given up all that we possess. Without any hesitation, we have left behind our parents, brothers and sisters, families, tribes and all our material things. Heaven, we wish that You allow the place on which we stand to become Gethsemane, where Jesus cried out. We wish this land to be the garden of Gethsemane on the world level. We hope that it can become Golgotha on the world level." If many young men and women are found in this nation who offer this kind of prayer, this nation will never perish.
Those who pray, "Even if history, this age, our ideology, and our tribes are to be abandoned, we will not forsake that which Heaven loves," will come to dominate the world. These are the true people of Heaven.
It has been said that Jesus will return in the same way he left, yet where can we find his footsteps? Where can we find the sorrowful heart he felt in the garden of Gethsemane? Where can we find the sorrowful heart Jesus felt when he was carrying the cross to Golgotha, shedding tears, sweat and blood? Jesus is not the problem; we must find the heart of Jesus.
Those who forgive through the heart, unite through the heart, harmonize through the heart, and live in the genuine love of humanity will live inside the garden of hope. Only when people become the masters who can look at the world through their hearts will all things of this universe find peace. Only then can we call God "our Father" and hold onto Him, overcoming any number of hills of grief built up throughout the 6,000 years. These are the actual fruits of Jesus, who cried out in the garden of Gethsemane, who was crucified on the hill of Golgotha.
Only when such people emerge can all of humanity serve God and unite with each other in harmony in the garden of goodness as members of the same family. That is not the world of those who want to receive. It is a place where those who want to give reside. Satan is the one who has fought hard to seize and receive throughout the course of history. The Kingdom of Heaven on earth, which we pursue, is the world of those who promote goodness and unity not for their own sake, but for other people.
God infused the concept of the chosen people into the Israelites, yet the true chosen people are those who can practice the concept of the chosen people in their lives. Therefore, the person whom God has been seeking is one who understands God's sorrow over having lost the chosen people. He is one who fully manifests the idea of the chosen people, whose purpose is to build the Kingdom of Heaven. The place of unity of all people is the place where the ideal of the chosen people is fully manifested in harmony. Therefore, those who live inside this realm will never perish. What is more, when we base our actions on this ideal, everything we do will work out smoothly. The world of those who live with such a heart to live for others and give to others is the world of God's will. It is the world where God's will is fulfilled. It is the garden of hope for which God suffered all tribulations and hardships.
Those Who Truly Love Heaven Are Those Who Sacrifice All They Have and Live for the Sake of God's Will
If we can find an ideal nation on the earth, which nation would that be? We will call that nation "the Kingdom of Heaven on earth." Only when that nation is realized can we realize the will of God's blessing to Adam and Eve, "Govern all things when you have grown to perfection." Only then can human beings emerge as the true masters of this earth. Only then can humanity become true brothers and sisters to each other and the true sons and daughters of God. Before God, we must become true sons and daughters of filial piety and loyal subjects. We must stand before the world as the true masters. When we accomplish this, God will pass to us all our rightful powers, not just external powers, but also the internal center of the heart. We will become sons and daughters in whom God can entrust everything and be at peace.
Such sons and daughters are greater than any patriot, woman of chastity, or son or daughter of filial piety. The day must come when we can be proud of these people before the world.
Although communists today have created models of ethics and heroism based on their own ideology, this is not what democracy has done. We must surpass them and honor those heroes who have made contributions for the fulfillment of God's ideals and respect their characters. We must follow in their footsteps and possess their ideals to become people who can march toward the world of God's ideals.
Dwelling inside this realm, we must march forward to the day when we can unite this world and humanity as one and attend the Lord of our hope, the day when we can become one with the creation on behalf of heaven and earth. God seeks those who truly love Heaven and their nation, those who long for that one day as they offer all they have and continue to battle with the determination to sacrifice everything.
Prayer
Father, when we reflect back on history, we find that humanity has walked the course of Golgotha. The mountains and streams at which we are looking are full of skulls; the city in which we live is a city of skulls; the land in which we live is barren. We who stand here were abandoned by other people. Father, what is the one thing we can possess? Jesus said that when someone strikes our right cheek, we should let them also strike our left cheek. When someone asks us for our coats, we should also give the clothes we wear beneath it. When and where will these words be realized? They will be realized through a people who assert a certain ideology and through a religious group.
Father, this nation never knew how to speak in its own defense, even when it was suffering through its 4,000-year history. Even when it was suffering through many despairing events, it endured with patience for the one day of hope.
However, this people does not realize that it has been placed on the hill of Golgotha in the last days due to a hidden heavenly connection. Father! Father, please let every part of this peninsula be filled with voices like the cries of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane. Allow us to look for the true people who long for Jesus, he who begged You to forgive his enemies on the hill of Calgary.
The chosen people of Israel did not even recognize Jesus of the garden of Gethsemane. No one understood the sorrowful heart of Jesus, who wept over the heart of God, the heart of humanity, and to alleviate the grief of the land. He cried out, "Let the earth explode, let the heavens explode, let this body be torn apart."
Jesus must have been overwhelmed by the sorrows which had broken his heart, yet his three disciples were completely ignorant and fell asleep. Please let us keep in mind how we have been living only for our own sake.
Father, You have gathered us. We are pitiful. We have come thus far because You allowed us. You allowed us to stay here and have guided us. Please let many sons and daughters gather who will give up all they have and come forward with Jesus' determination, crying loudly that they cannot abandon You and the world in the garden of Gethsemane, that they cannot forsake humanity or the Father. Father, this is our sincere wish.
When we reflect on this day, we feel infinite sorrow. We know that this day is a bitter and sorrowful day for these people. Let this be the day when we can be shaken up by a new eternal ideology and possess a heart yearning for God's will.
I have given them words of truth. Please help them become those who love Heaven and love the original heavenly nation which will be established. Father, we pray for this from the depths of our hearts.
We know countless people have been seeking this path, even as they were dying and offering their lives. We have come to sense the direction in which the Father has pointed us. Please allow us to preserve the heavenly relationship by offering our minds and bodies, and loving Heaven and the nation. Please do not let us trample upon the tradition which has been established through the 6,000-year history. Please let us not become traitors. This is our sincere prayer.
Have these people learned something through the words I have given them? If they have, let them understand that they are words which reveal the profound truth; they must revive their hearts in this, the end of history, cross over the hill of Calgary and be resurrected.
Please allow us to abandon all we possess as Jesus abandoned all that he had for the sake of the ideal of the new world and the new ideology. Please allow us to comfort Your grieving heart and endure in the last days. Please do not let us be defeated by the persecution we will suffer in the last days. Father, we hope for these things from the bottoms of our hearts. Please let all things be fulfilled as You desire. We pray in the name of the Lord. Amen.
