Morning
World Mission Center
Translator - Bo Hi Pak
Once a year this God's Day celebration comes and everyone gathers together. But it is an intense time and many of you must think that this is a very difficult celebration. If anyone thinks that way, I should be the first one.
When we come together for any celebration, including God's Day, we don't just eat and rejoice; we have a job to do. I have been thinking about why you all gather here together. It isn't just to enjoy a delicious meal, or to experience the exhilarating entertainment by Performing Arts. What else is it that makes our celebration? No doubt, many of you came for the purpose of seeing me, face to face, but by now you are probably tired of my face. I haven't given you any comfort, only a hard time. Perhaps you are wondering, "What kind of Father is he?"
One of the most important aspects of our celebration time is listening to the word of God. Which do you like the best: a good meal, a good program, or a good message? When you receive a good message, can you simply listen and then forget it the next day? What else is your duty? You come here, listen to the message, and then you want to act upon it. Right? Why do you feel that way? Because as children of God you have to prove yourselves superior to the adversary, Satan. We are determined to do the things which the satanic world cannot do.
When difficulties arise, what is your attitude? Do you want to give up, even though Satan rejoices over your failure? Satan loves to see you living a distorted, unprincipled way; he hates to see you obeying the will of God and practicing the love of God. Therefore, the Unification Church is the adversary of Satan; he is our enemy. We will do the things that Satan hates the most and give him a hard time; that is our job. Satan whispers in your ears: "Why do you go to that weird Unification Church? Go to another church where there are plush carpets and, best of all, there are soft, cushioned chairs! It's so uncivilized for you to sit on the floor like that!" The reason we sit on the floor is that Satan hates to sit on the floor; we are doing the thing that Satan cannot stand.
If you were to sit on the floor in a stiff, unmoving posture, Satan would hate it even more. Average American people would never sit the way you do for hours and hours; only the determined people of God can stay. When we sit this way, we know that Satan hates it; but we also know that God likes it. Whenever you separate yourself from Satan, God can smile and rejoice.
Suppose we only indulged ourselves on God's Day, eating, laughing, and enjoying the music and entertainment. Anybody could enjoy such a celebration, even Satan. But if Satan was here enjoying our celebration would God want to come, too? Not at all. Therefore, my way of celebrating on holidays is to make it impossible for Satan to come. We can enjoy our celebration, but we must have something which Satan hates. What is that? Instead of a message of praise, you receive a tough, demanding message, one which Satan simply cannot listen to.
This morning after the 8:00 a.m. Pledge Service, I gave a special message to the blessed couples, including VIPs from all over the world. I never gave them a chance to eat breakfast, and I did it on purpose. There were a lot of long faces in the audience, but no one could accuse me because my stomach was empty like everyone else's. More than anybody else, I work harder and longer; in this way, everyone can feel inspired and feel the desire to do more for God. This is the kind of inspiration you need for a celebration.
Do you want to take it easy when you see me working hard? You might wish that fewer people had come into this crowded, stuffy room; you might have room to stretch your legs a bit. But who would take joy if only a few people came to hear my message? Satan. What about God; doesn't He want even more people to come here and listen to me for hours? Perhaps, if there were absolutely no more room in here, I would make it a rule that every husband must carry his wife on the back of his neck, the way mothers carry their little babies. Would you long for me to finish my message while you listened in such an uncomfortable position? Would your attitude please God or Satan? What if the wife weighed 250 pounds but the husband was eager to persevere and the wife was full of encouragement? That would certainly please God. In addition, if each of you was holding a child in your arms as you struggled to listen to me in that awkward position, how do you think that would make God feel? The greater your suffering for the sake of God, the more historical you become.
You should realize that this way of life, although it is peculiar in the eyes of others, has a reason behind it. Even when you feel totally alone and suffering, you should never complain. Complaint is the worst tool of Satan. Some people might complain because we haven't even served a Coke or soda today, not even a glass of water. You might start to feel that you don't want to participate in such a celebration, since all you hear is me-talking for hours and hours, trying to push you harder. But do these kinds of experiences please God or Satan? That should be our most fundamental consideration.
Not only today's celebration, but also our entire life is determined by this same consideration. If you are consciously trying to do only the things that God likes, then you are bound to align yourself with God; God is bound to like you. You need to have a way to evaluate what is pleasing to God and what is pleasing to Satan.
Today we must celebrate God's Day in a way that God can rejoice over, not Satan. We speak of "God's Day"; did you see God, Himself? Where is He? God is invisible; He stays within the deepest corner of your mind. You cannot see your mind, either. When you acknowledge your mind, you are actually acknowledging God. According to logic, if you can accept the existence of the invisible mind, you cannot reject the existence of God just because He is invisible.
Magnetic power always pulls in a certain direction, not in various directions all at once. Your mind is generally leading you, like a magnet, in the one direction of goodness. Do you think that this mind which is always leading toward goodness sprang into being the moment you were born? Or did that mind always exist within the universe in the form of an Original Mind of the universe?
Which came first, mind or body? Why do you say mind? Because the mind is subject; so before the object, the subject is already determined. But in order to be the subject and master over the body, the mind should have the right qualifications. Consider the relationship between the elementary school teacher and the students. Do you expect the students to be older than their teacher? It is logical to expect that the teacher should have been born first and have acquired more knowledge and experience than the children under him.
In the same sense, the mind should have greater depth, substance, and content to be able to control the body. The mind exists earlier than the body. How much earlier? Your mind is linked to your parent's mind; your parent's mind is linked to your grandparent's mind; the linkage goes all the way to the top, to that original mind. But your body is fixed in one place.
Where did the original mind begin? There must be a subject of the original mind. We say God exists in the deepest corner of the mind and existed even before the mind; therefore, He is the subject of the mind. If your body begins to protest against your mind because it is always telling the body what to do, your mind must be able to demand obedience from your body. Do you have such a mind?
What about schooling for the mind? Do you send your mind to elementary school, middle school, high school and university? Dr. Durst is an authentic Ph.D., so he has the highest degree possible in the academic community. But he still has a mind that directs him, a mind behind that Ph.D. which is the subject over all the knowledge he has accumulated. We don't see his mind bowing down to him because he has a PhD In fact, his mind keeps making things difficult for him, telling him that more is expected of him, since he is a Ph.D. Isn't that true, Dr. Durst?
What qualified that mind to be so authoritative? I have a body that is big and strong, but my mind is stronger and greater. My mind tells my body to work harder, keep going; but my body wants to beg for sleep or food. However, my mind tells it, "You rascal! Keep going! Don't stop!" I have given you enough of a message already for God's Day-at least that is what my body is telling me. But my mind says to me, "No, you haven't even scratched the surface yet!"
The mind is very unreasonable; even when someone is doing his absolute best, the mind is never satisfied. Why is that? Your mind is greedy for one simple reason: it wants to link you to that universal mind, so that you can be loved by the ultimate source.
The mind is a priceless teacher which no amount of money can buy. If you didn't have that mind, you would never have joined the Unification Church; you wouldn't be here today. Your body may decide to obey your mind and, if so, how far will your mind lead you? Suppose you were to achieve the Presidency of the United States. As master of the White House, would your mind let you sit back and relax? No, it would push you even further, telling you there is an even greater goal to achieve.
When the body continues to follow the mind, how far will it lead? To a palace in the Kingdom of Heaven where you can meet the King of Heaven, God? When the mind leads you to God, it can approach Him with two different attitudes. Either it can request that God become its subject or that God become its object. Would you like God to be your subject or would you like to be the subject of God? Maybe to your mind, it's enough to let God be your subject; but suppose I wanted God to be my object! If I wanted such a thing from God, would He proudly proclaim to me, "No, my son; after all, I'm God and I cannot yield that position!"?
Instead of fighting between God and my mind, the best solution would be to reconcile; we would want to unite. What would be the way to negotiate, then? We could ask who existed first. My mind would have to admit to such a logical approach and have to acknowledge that God existed first. Since God existed first, my mind would have to acknowledge Him as the subject. But even at that point, there is still one thing that the mind will refuse to compromise on. The mind will say, "God, you can be my absolute subject, but on one condition: you must give me your love." As long as love is fulfilled, it doesn't matter who is subject and who is object.
Do you or do you not believe in the existence of God? Can you accept the statement that your conscience was there before you? We come to the recognition that God exists in the deepest corner of the mind. God is whispering to the mind, telling it what to do, quietly but distinctly.
Why does God bury Himself so deeply in our minds? Because, in order to go after Him, one must dig down to get to Him and it is such a deep place that no one else is there but oneself and God. You and God are there for the give and take of love; object and subject. Once a subject and object are completely united, they become welded together. Once your sharp, meticulous mind comes to the point of being welded to God, nothing can separate you. At that point, the mind feels totally complete and fulfilled. Consider the plus and minus of the electrical circuit; they long for each other intensely and when they come together, it makes a big spark. But afterwards they are a closed circuit, fulfilled and seeking no more.
Everyone recognizes that he has a mind, but many people fail to realize that their mind is supposed to unite with its subject. With that unity, you will end up in heaven with God.
God is in the position of pouring four billion minds full of love; we can imagine that He needs a huge supply. He is truly almighty because He never runs out of love! God's warehouse is really a big one and it never becomes empty. Suppose a "love thief" came around every night, stealing love from God's warehouse and then distributing it to others. Do you think God would get angry? No, God would encourage him saying, "Go ahead and take all you want my son. I have a limitless supply of love for you to distribute."
If the love thief decided he wanted to become really efficient and put a pipeline into God's warehouse to pipe the love out, God would say, "Of course, my son, take my love out by a pipeline and give it to people everywhere so they can enjoy my love." The only pipeline in the world that gives an unlimited supply of its product without costing any money is this pipeline of God's love. All the other pipelines in the world, like the one between Alaska and the continental United States, have limited resources and will someday come to an end. But there is one pipeline that will never run out: the love of God.
When a person seeks to acquire money, he can never be satisfied. He always wants more and more. Even if someone gained all the money in the United States, would he stop there? He would set his sights on the wealth of Japan or Germany, or some other country. But even if he gained the wealth of the entire world, it is still a finite amount. Even with all the power and knowledge to rule the world, it would come to an end eventually. But there is one resource that never comes to an end; that is the love of God.
Those "love thieves" who are tapping into God's universal supply and trying to distribute it to the world are the persecuted Moonies. The Unification Church goes out into the world giving true love unconditionally to all people. For this reason, the Unification Church will never be destroyed but will go forward, harvesting great things. In a way, I am a paradox because I have all kinds of money at my disposal, but when it comes to my personal money, I am penniless.
If I said to you, "Let's celebrate God's Day with lots of money!" would you say "Amen!"? How about celebrating with great power or wonderful knowledge? You are telling me that you want to celebrate God's Day with true love, even if it requires eating humble food and doing humble activities? With true love, everything is OK. The wife who knows her husband has true love for her doesn't mind giving him absolute power over her.
A person doesn't need education to recognize true love; he knows it automatically, instinctively. Do you think this is illogical? Do you have to analyze true love? When you see a person laughing, you can see whether it is deep and genuine or not. Some women think that just because they are beautiful they have nothing more to concentrate on. If you women had a choice between a husband who was handsome but had no true love, and a man as ugly as the Elephant Man but with a heart of true love, which would you choose? If your eyes are true eyes, you want to look at a man who has true love, regardless of his external appearance.
Ask your nose whether it prefers to be in a place of true love or somewhere else. False love is usually found in perfumed mansions, but true love can be found in the lowliest places, even in the bathroom. Your nose would desire to remain in the bad-smelling bathroom if true love was there, rather than in a sweet-smelling palace of false love.
Your ears have the same motivation. If a noisy factory is the place of true love, your ears would prefer that to a classical music concert. Even if your body gets hit going in the direction of true love, still you would seek after it.
No matter how big the pipeline leading from the warehouse of true love, true love can never be depleted. Even though my shirttail is coming out now and I may look undignified, if I have a heart of true love, do you mind? Everything about true love is OK, any time. Even if you fast for one week, when you are thinking about true love you can have incredible energy. True love is the panacea for the world.
When men and women of perfected love go to spirit world, they have almighty powers. If you have perfect love and you decide you want to give a banquet in spirit world for 100 million people, serving them whatever they desire, you can do it. All you have to do is say, "Let it be done," and it is. Suppose you want to give clothing of gold to all the people who were poor on earth; you can say, "Let it be done," and millions of people will be wearing golden clothing. The only condition is that you have true love. If a person tried to use the same power to gain benefits for himself, he would have no power. If he tried to make all the gold clothing his possession, nothing would happen.
I seldom talk about spirit world because it is such a fantastic place. If I talked about it too much, I would look like a crazy person, even to you. But you should think this way: if God is capable of supplying true love to everyone without limit, isn't He also capable of supplying 100 million people with a delicious banquet or with coats and suits of gold? If God asked me why I wanted to have such a banquet and I said, "God, it is because I want to invite you as my guest of honor and I can dance with You," would God accept my invitation?
In spirit world there are people who are ten, even a hundred million years old. When a newcomer arrives in spirit world, God might hold a banquet for him, inviting all his ancient ancestors. How many people would God like to invite? The tables could be filled with plates of food, then cleared without anyone lifting a finger. All God would have to say is, "Let the tables be cleared." Then, God could command a dancing hall to appear and music to be played superior to anything heard on earth, even Beethoven. Although you may never get a chance to dance and wear pretty clothes on the earth, in spirit world all those things can come to you. The heavenly music will automatically move people to dance, even if they don't know how. It sounds like a nice place to live, doesn't it?
I don't worry about spirit world. I worry about this world, because this is where the problems lie. You know that true love is a more valuable possession than money, power, or knowledge. Is it going to be easy to gain true love? However, the greater the difficulty in obtaining it, the greater the value it has.
The shortest path to the Kingdom of Heaven is under the bottom of hell. Everybody tries to climb up to receive honor and glory; but I am teaching you to go down into the bottom of the most hellish situations, because that is the shortcut to heaven. Other Christian churches may try to go up, but that way leads nowhere. The Unification Church is going down now but it will eventually go to heaven.
The most valuable hand in the world is the hand that can give true love. Once I went to Las Vegas and watched a performance of Liberace playing the piano. Every one of his fingers had a huge diamond ring. But a natural, unadorned hand is far more precious if it can give true love.
In what frame of mind should we celebrate God's Day? Should we seek a lot of rest, food and entertainment? Or should we celebrate with true love foremost in our minds? Your certainty makes me certain, too. I think I have seen true love today in your confidence and determination.
Is it a good thing for a woman to give up everything else in her pursuit of true love? What about a man? Would you like to distinguish yourselves with true love? True love is the supreme victor over everything.
Let's celebrate God's Day with true love. Even if your body aches, your legs become numb and your back hurts, you can have the will to continue. As long as you obtain true love, nothing else really matters. Even if someone sitting next to you smells bad, with true love in your heart it won't matter. If that is the way we choose to celebrate this God's Day, don't you think God will want to visit us? If I am a true love man and Mother is a true love woman, don't you think God would like that? What about you? Are you on your way?
You must become individuals of true love, multiplying into true love families, tribes, nations, universe and spirit world. This will be wonderful. How can you become true love individuals? I have given you the greatest gift, home church, where you can be resurrected into the realm of true love. There is no greater goal than home church, where you can attend True Parents, bring in new brothers and sisters and create the Kingdom of Heaven on the earth. If you really work hard in home church, wherever you go in spirit world you can call out to your home church members and you will never be lonely. In fact, you won't even have to call them; they will already have created a fanfare to welcome you.
If you love the members of the Unification Church more than you love the members of your own family, the members of the Unification Church will love your family on your behalf. You will gain an incredible relationship with God in this way. In the Bible, Jesus told people to love their enemies. This is so difficult, only true love can accomplish it. The Bible also teaches that if a person wants to elevate his position, he will be humbled, but if he desires to be humbled, he will be lifted up.
Are you going to be someone who desperately pursues true love? Then where would you find that true love? In home church. Even though people in your home church area may reject you and mistreat you, you have the chance to live a dramatic way of life by continuing to go there with true love. Your home church work will continue until all that negativity turns to positivity.
After about three years of home church work, perhaps no one will come against you. You might begin to think that you have finished your mission, when suddenly another negative person appears. You must begin again with him and overcome all the opposition, even if it take your entire life.
The mark of true love will be upon your forehead; this will be your passport to the Kingdom of Heaven. You will have gained true love in an arena of 360 degrees, so you will be able to go anywhere with your true love. At that point, you will no longer need the law for you will have transcended it. You and the law will be one. True love will give you the special privilege to go beyond the law. When you obey and practice true love, you are entitled to live in the Kingdom of Heaven.
This year's slogan is Victory of Home Church. With that determination and our manifestation of true love, we will go to home church and gain victory. That is the most meaningful way to celebrate God's Day 1982.
When you are in your area trying to perform a service and you drop a dish and break it, the homeowner will not be angry because you are manifesting true love. When a husband and wife love each other with true love, they might feel so strongly that they bite each other. One thing is for sure: we all want unconditional, true love. In true love, everything is "Amen!" Even if someone persecutes you, kicks you and spits at you, it doesn't affect you if you have true love.
Some of you engaged people worry, "I don't have much feeling for my fiancé and the day of Holy Blessing is coming soon! How can I walk down the aisle with him? I don't know if I can do it." But when true love is there, everything is OK. Suppose there are two couples: the first is made up of two charming, talented people; the second is composed of a handsome, capable man and a woman who looks like an Idaho potato. Which one is more dramatic and closer to true love? Some brothers worry because their fiancees weigh 200 pounds; but with true love, everything is OK. Which one is closer to true love: two slim, attractive people loving each other, or two giants loving each other?
True love doesn't need education to be recognized. If an engaged couple is having troubles at this time, that is a good sign from the true love point of view. If someone rejects all problems, he is not looking for true love but for his own concept of love. Which is closer to true love: a black husband and a white wife; or white people who refuse to consider being married to a black person? Certainly the first. I have made up my mind that at the next matching I will put together the most handsome men and the ugliest-looking women and let them practice true love.
Some members are saying to me, "Father, why should we take time out to come to New York for a matching? We will be happy if you just take our pictures and match them on your breakfast table at East Garden." Some couples are matched and they have to go and look at each other for a long time, analyzing everything before they accept. But some couples accept unconditionally, without even looking at each other, saying, "Father, anyone you match me with is perfect for me." Which one is the greatest example of true love? Where there is true love, everything is OK.
Suppose I asked a representative to do the matching and the couples said, "That's OK; if Father wants it that way, it's OK with me." But some might say, "I accept Father's matching, but nobody else's." Which one is closer to true love? In true love, everything is OK.
Tonight, when you go to your room, look at your eyes. Are they true eyes? If not, you don't need them. Your nose, your ears, as well; if they are not helping you toward true love, you don't need them.
When I received the Blessing from God, I never expected such a beautiful woman as Mother. I expected to receive a 250 pound, short black woman. I have absolutely no complaint against God; whatever He does, I am grateful to Him.
Today is God's Day, so let us set a new tradition Beginning even from our celebration, let us do it differently. Let us do everything with true love. You might have been thinking, "I came such a long distance for this celebration, but I don't have a place to sleep or even time to sleep; I don't even have any food to eat! What kind of celebration is this?" However, after listening to this message today, you can feel dramatic and excited to be living with God's true love. Amen? Amen! We shall continue with this attitude for our entire lives. Will this make our lives valuable? Will you live this way?
All of you who can pledge to God that you will begin from today to win the victory in home church, raise your hands. Amen !
