Sun Myung Moon
October 1, 1977
Pasadena, California
Translator - Bo Hi Pak
Los Angeles is a very lovely city, a wonderland for living, with many things here to attract the attention of young people in particular. California's intriguing qualities draw people from all over the country and many young people who come to California join the Unification Church.
Why is California so attractive? You could say the reason is mostly historical, since California has always been a meeting ground between the cultures of the East and West, but the simplest answer is the wonderful weather here. The open spaces and a clear blue sky match the spirit of young people. The state of California radiates a beautifully free and optimistic feeling, with the sun out and smiling back at you all the time. Young people have enthusiasm and hopeful vision, and would like to become as the sun beaming on all the world. They want to freely interact with the whole world.
A thunder storm is a vivid demonstration of the power of heaven, seeming to reveal an angry god. Lightning and thunder have a fearful, threatening quality that makes the world tremble. No one looks forward to it, but on the other hand, everyone welcomes the sun each morning. The sun shining in the blue and endless sky symbolizes hope, giving out warmth and light. Young people are poetically minded, thinking in dramatic and romantic ways, and when they see the sun in the blue sky shining on a green world their inspiration is stimulated. The singing of birds and the harmony of animals and nature all inspire the feeling that they are involved with the entire universe, echoing its heartbeat.
I didn't come to lecture about literature or poetry this morning, but I can't help it today. I love the weather and the sun. Usually older people are so entangled with worldly affairs that they don't have time to appreciate the sun and the sky, but I am like you young people, with a mind of admiration and appreciation for nature.
Usually when people hear my name they associate it with government investigations and think I must be miserable after becoming so controversial. On the contrary, I am the happiest person, enjoying nature and beauty, warmth and love and light. I can understand why young people come to visit here and I love to visit California just like you do. You want to look up at the sky and embrace the beauty of nature, singing out your renewed sense of hope and vision. That's the way I see myself and this must be the reason why so many young people around the world come to follow me.
Some of you may think I love California only because I don't live here; you may be bored to death with blue skies and dry weather and think you like the rainy weather and seasons up north. If that is the case, you don't know all my different sides.
I would like to dwell on this thought a little more before I start my main topic. I spent many, many hours at sea this summer. When I went to sea I saw nothing but blue all around-the blue sea, the blue sky and the dark blue of land on the horizon. I speculated about why everything is so blue and who it all resembles. I wondered whether the sea was blue because it was looking at the sky, or the sky was trying to be blue like the sea. Which one carne first?
I came to the conclusion that because the sky is blue, everything dwelling on the earth wants to be like the sky. The sky, or heaven, is the subject and everything else wants to take after it. When I say this, some Western young ladies should smile broadly because their eyes are blue too, but I don't see any of you smiling. Your lack of response must mean your poetic or romantic capacity is near zero!
Anyone with blue eyes can think, "My eyes are blue because the sky is blue; the dwelling place of God is blue." Everything seems very poetic when you think that your eyes are all blue, but solid eyes would be monotonous. At the center of your eyes are black dots that break up the monotony. How awful it would be to have an eyeball that was nothing but blue with no center. Because that black dot lends depth and mystery, blue eyes never become tiresome to look at.
I have analyzed the eyes of white people very much. After looking at you once I would never be stimulated to look at you again, but the black dot in the center gives you such mysterious depth and profound feeling that I never get bored. It's just like the sun which contrasts with the blue sky. The sun shines on all things, giving light, and your eye is the center which can perceive and analyze and understand your surroundings.
Why am I speaking like this today? Every time you come to a conference you hear basically the same things and afterwards you go back and forget them all, but now at least you'll remember this new thing-the meaning behind having blue eyes.
Now I have spoken with you for a short time and the ice is already broken. We have harmonized our hearts and have become one. That shows the beauty and goodness of the word, but at the same time it is fearfully powerful. After years of meeting people I can spot the newcomers when I look around because they are completely stiff and frozen! I gave you a relaxing message at the beginning because when you are at ease you can experience a flow of emotion; you can go up and be inspired and go down and be determined. When you are stiff, nothing can take place! Envision how the ocean waves always move up and down, up and down, and how a big log in the water can be a disturbing factor by interfering with their free flowing motion. In the same way, the free flow of emotion will disappear when you are nervous. Just be natural.
If your roots are deep then you will be invincible
Let's go to the main subject now. Some of you have come here with questions on your minds that you really want answered, but please put them aside and get ready to listen.
Do you like sweetness or bitterness? Most people would prefer sweetness, but if you experience only sweet things then you easily become bored, forgetting and never understanding the sweetness. The person who understands bitterness can truly appreciate sweetness. The truth has both extremes, which harmonize together to compose meaning.
American young people are not receptive to much besides good things, preferring only to go up and pursue sweetness. They have no balance and don't understand where they are. Americans forget to be grateful for a full stomach and they take food for granted. Most of you have become totally insensitive to the beauty of having a place to dwell and you never even appreciate having parents. American young people have become nomads who are numb to beauty, numb to sweetness. You need the discipline of suffering.
If God really loves this nation of America then He must prepare some way to balance your lives. The Unification Church, therefore, has been given a mandate by God to train American young people to appreciate beauty and sweetness by bringing them back to suffering and hard work, back to the taste of labor and sweat. By doing so they can become people of depth and appreciation, people who can understand experiences from one extreme to another.
Many people come to America trying to find the ideal world but instead they find that everything here is floating because there are no roots. Nothing is settled and unchanging. When a big tree becomes taller and taller it needs deeper and deeper roots underground. When I carne to America I thought that if I could help Americans understand the necessity of roots which grow deeply into the soil, then I could give them the power to help the world.
Many of my critics think that I have some really good ideas and they accept the ideology of the Unification Church, but at the same time they think that I enslave you young people. They see that I am pushing you in a direction completely opposite to your previous way of life, compelling you to dig your roots deep into the ground. The important thing is not to break, but to drive your roots deep into the ground and firmly secure yourself. If your roots are deep in the soil then you will be invincible. I myself live this life and I will be second to none in pursuing the highest ideals. My goals are the highest and I pursue the highest state of goodness, yet at the same time I am not floating around in the air; I am realistically rooted in the ground, working and sweating to help society. This is my way of life.
If you are sending your roots down in rocky soil, are you going to have shallow roots with many small branches or are you going to penetrate down deep, like a drill? How much have I suffered in my life? If I revealed the extent of my suffering, every one of you would break down in tears. If you heard the full testimony of my life you could not stay still. But do I seem tired out or helpless, or am I fresh with love and humor and fighting spirit?
I am the one who has really suffered. The nation of Korea tried to crush me but my deep root was not cut. Later Japan tried, and now America is trying, but this will not bother me. Even the President of the United States left office after just I 1/2 years of opposition. The world has been trying to uproot me and the Unification Church, but it has failed and now is realizing that this root is giving out leaves and flowers and life. Soon they will find hope in us. Even while America opposed me I have been putting down roots in American society.
The whole world is trying to force you into changing, but instead of being crushed, send your roots down deeper and deeper. As long as you survive to come back strong then nothing can curtail you. Americans have vehemently opposed me and tried to get me out of the country, but what they have done instead is to make me very famous. No one can deny that I have had impact on American society. The more people try to push me away, the stronger I will become and the more they will be amazed.
I have been driving during my whole trip around the continental United States but next time I will need a new mode of transportation. Maybe I will buy helicopters and airplanes. Undoubtedly the media will accuse me of using you to buy airplanes for myself but the important thing is the purpose behind it. If there is a genuine need and purpose then it doesn't matter what the public says.
The 747s can carry 360 people. If I were going to Europe and 20 people were going with me I would tell the public that anyone who wanted to could fly with me to Europe free. What do you think would happen? There would be a long, long waiting list. What would we do for seven hours on the flight over? There would be a good meal and then we would have good entertainment. Sunburst and the New Hope Singers would perform, one of our films would be shown and a Divine Principle lecture given! The waiting list to accompany us would be so long that if we took everyone it would take ten years to get them all to Europe.
What I need is a big plane so that more people can come and I will be the pilot myself. Think of what tough competition that would be for the other airlines. Certainly no one else can afford to fly people to Europe for free. The airlines will demonstrate against me, but what about the people who want to go? Do you think this is a good idea? I have decided that we really need to buy a jumbo jet.
You must be able to harmonize your ideas, bitter experiences and the suffering ahead
I will drive you into the earth like stakes. You may hit rock farther down but still I must drive you in. Will you complain? No? Then the meeting is over now. Let me go. If you are so determined to do everything, then what else would I need to tell you? My power comes from the fact that no matter what I start to do, I just hang on tenaciously until the end. Nothing can stop me, not even the curses and persecution of the whole world. I want to take the worst and the best. Having only the in-between is not good enough for me. If I hang on long enough I will be victorious.
The task that I face from now on is a rugged one. Are you willing to follow such a leader? To be candid, let me say that following me is not easy. You must be born for your mission because otherwise it's too difficult. You should pack up quickly and leave if you're not ready to go all the way because the person who will be merely halfhearted and mediocre is better off not even starting. Why do you persist in following me? Your own parents are trying to crush me and if you weren't here they would stop. Do you still want to come? Will you totally give yourself up for three years? What if you don't even get the chance to be married?
I want to ask a question of the newcomers here who have never seen me before. Have you made up your minds that you are determined to follow with all your heart and soul, no matter what happens? We are going to lead history and to do that we must be capable of enduring any kind of hardship. I am tough and flexible and strong and I can withstand anything; even though I often seem to be at the breaking point I never break. Sometimes people think they have pushed me to the brink but then when they let go I bounce back. On one side I am very human and warm, but then sometimes you see me get a little angry. You haven't really seen me angry yet, though. When I really stand up to fight then nothing can stop me. I am a born fighter, period.
I want you to be like me and become real fighters. Would you women like being married to men like me? Could you be wives who would support and follow husbands like that? It is not easy to give encouragement and support to such a man. Mother is very tired after traveling several thousand miles in a car. This morning she asked to stay in the room to say a little prayer for me while I came down to speak, but I told her to come down because everyone would want to see her.
If you really want to have an ideal husband you must be able to carry burdens and suffering yourself. First become a person of high caliber yourself, because otherwise you are not worthy to marry a man of high caliber.
Do you think that everything is guaranteed now and that our way will be easier from now on? Now more than ever we need strong determination to give our whole selves and voluntarily take any amount of suffering. There is suffering ahead of such degree that it cannot be described in words but only understood heart to heart. You must go in and out of that level of suffering many times in order to be perfected. Don't be naive and think only about your ideals. You must be able to harmonize your ideals with the bitter experiences and the incredible suffering that lie ahead. In this way you will become a true man or woman.
People are drawn to see the awesome power of Niagara Falls more than they are to see the smoothly flowing Amazon or Mississippi Rivers. Niagara Falls is much smaller but people are fascinated by the incredible activity of the water there. God is just the same. He is like a tourist looking down at the earth, seeing many rivers of men which resemble the Amazon or Mississippi, but being drawn to the person who is like Niagara Falls. I don't want to be like a smooth river. In order to attract God I want my activity and power and gusto to be even greater than Niagara Falls.
A normal river doesn't have a Niagara Falls. Should the Unification Church be like other churches? The fact that we are not is the greatness of our Church and the greatness of our challenge. Things happen to us that never happen to other churches, with your own parents even trying to kidnap you and persecution coming on all sides. Do you still want to go ahead under those circumstances? If you do then you will create something even greater than Niagara Falls in the sight of God. In living that way of life you are writing the greatest poem and creating the greatest masterpiece of art. We are becoming the creators of great things.
Expensive trees are the ones which have developed unusual shapes or symmetry in the course of their rugged lives. The human race can be evaluated according to the same principle. For example, the Korean people have gone through all kinds of suffering and struggle throughout their history and in the sight of God they have something to be appreciated. My own life has been a focal point of such suffering. I am not controversial only in Korea, however; we are seeing the same pattern emerge in Japan and America. People who closely analyze our Church think that it is fragile and insist that it cannot last more than six months, yet we will not only endure but continually prosper. The source of our strength is the secret beauty that gives the Unification Church true value.
If you never lose sight of your ultimate goal when you are falsely slandered and criticized then that will become your ultimate value. When you do not lose sight of your own king then you are a loyal subject, and when you do not lose sight of God then you are a saint. Outside of such devotion there is no real value and nothing really precious existing in the world. Having such a heart gives us the most precious value we can possess.
Did you ever think that you are the bone of this country?
If you were asked if you would rather be flesh or bone, what would you answer? Maybe some of the women would want to be flesh in order to be seen and appreciated. A bone is ugly looking and very tough and if it is struck it makes a sound, but thinking people who appreciate value would want to be bone, not flesh. Bone forms the framework, the structure. Bone is like the principle out of which everything starts. Without a frame nothing else can stand.
What actually makes a man handsome? Bone is subject and flesh is object, yet no one thinks of that essential bone. When people say you are handsome they are noticing your face and body. No one says that your bones are very handsome. American culture centers on the physical things instead of pursuing the foundation or framework of things. The bones of American culture are rotting; its bones of love and morals, of social behavior and ethics are crumbling into dust. However, the "good life" of fleshly gratification will not last long. It is like morning dew and will vanish tomorrow.
We recently experienced a 24-hour blackout in New York City and the jungle-like turmoil that resulted clearly demonstrated that America is dangerously close to crumbling. Who is going to save New York? No amount of flesh can save New York. Only bone is adequate and we are intent on becoming the bones of society. I am going to create one bone after another and link them to every facet of society, After we have put new bones in American society we are going to create a whole new America.
Are you becoming solid bone? The life of a bone is very different from the life of the flesh and you must know very clearly what the difference is. You could live a luxurious life on earth for less than a hundred years and be a dictator who can command anything to be done, but in the end your flesh will decay and what will remain? Nothing. In educating people about dais, the Unification Church is fulfilling a most critical role.
Some of you have been in the Unification Church for many years. Did you ever think that you are the bone of this country, a bone which nothing will tarnish or bend? Have you ever thought that you would be the Rocky Mountains of this country which would stand firm? Have you state leaders ever thought that you are the solid bone of your state'? If a bone becomes soft and rots then everything else will die. Your bones must be tough yet flexible so that they cannot be broken. You must not allow yourself to be broken.
I did not come to compliment the American culture or to make money. No, I came to train some people to be extensions of the heavenly movement, to put the missing bones into Western culture. The situation of Christianity today is something like a new baby, which after nine months in its mother's womb is trying to be born, but which is having difficulty in the delivery. It is supposed to come forth as a newborn baby, but who is going to safely deliver it? I have come to make that delivery possible in America. This movement shall take the role of delivering the princes of the New Age in America.
You have truth, but do you have conviction?
There is one word that is very critical in our movement: the truth. Everything is true and everything is real. That is why we have True Parents, true sons, true daughters. How do we become different from others? We don't just react emotionally; when something happens we analyze and appreciate it.
What I have been teaching you this morning shall remain at the center of your heart, even if you come to think it's too difficult to follow and you pack up and leave. No one can erase this teaching from your heart because it is true. If you leave the Unification Church and go out to live your own life then still you will teach your children what I have taught you this morning. Even though you may not mention the name of the Unification Church, no one can remove this teaching from you because it is like the bone.
I have left my footprint in America's culture and no one can remove it. Modem religious history will be changed by it. My body can be destroyed but I shall live on in your hearts in the form of this teaching and no one can take me away. Do I teach you this way because I want you to follow me? I have told you it is not easy to have roots that can never be pulled up. Are you ready to follow anyway? If you are a tree you must be the root. If you are a man you must be the bone. You must become an essential part of the human being.
America is a proud country and is trying to prove all over the world that it is the greatest country on earth, but where are its roots? In free sex and the hippie movement? It will all be destroyed by the first hurricane that blows because those things are ephemeral. Thinking people must see that there is no root here in America.
God has a purpose for this nation but this country is floating now. It is imperative that we send down a strong root into the good earth. That's the philosophy behind all the work I am doing. Modem people are just floating and have decided to go wherever the wind blows. There is no strong sense of justice and righteousness in this country.
I have been working for thirty years and during that time many people met me but passed by. All kinds of people may come and go but this one person will never change his course. Every day I keep going. Many people have thought that following me meant losing because I would surely be defeated, but what has happened in the meantime? All those who opposed me in the past in one way or another have become miserable, but I have survived all kinds of storms, I will become even more well-known than now. Looking at me today everyone must concede that I am a successful man and there is no question about the fact that I am having an impact on history. Do you want to become that kind of man and woman? Do you want to become like the bone, or like a tree with deep roots? Who here has determined to become a root so deep that you are inseparably entwined with my roots?
For the sake of human history this movement is indispensable but the task we face is a difficult one. I must make you into fighters. You should not be people who are resigned to being here or who reluctantly, passively approach your responsibilities. I must transform you into people who just can't help but live this way of life. You must be born champions, born revolutionaries.
After the crucifixion of Jesus, Christians suffered for 400 years, demonstrating their devotion even at the cost of their lives, and ultimately Christianity became the bone of the Roman Empire. The remarkable thing is that though they had great power, their understanding of truth was shallow. If those Christians with all their determination had had the enlightenment of our truth, they could have conquered the whole world.
Let us ask ourselves a question. Today the basic truth of heaven and earth has been revealed. If the Unification Church has determination that surpasses the determination of Christians 2,000 years ago plus having the ultimate truth, then can we become the bone of the world? That is the movement I have ignited. Each one of you must be tough, equipped with both truth and conviction. While I was fishing in Boston my pattern was to get up at 3:30 a.m. and be out at sea by 4:00, not because I wanted to make lots of money in tuna fishing but to show this revolutionary zeal. Americans really hate getting up early in the morning, particularly to go out to sea. I want to conquer something Americans don't want to do. The sea is the best place to train men and women to be tough.
When the first class graduated from the Unification Theological Seminary the students thought of themselves as the intellectual elite of the Unification Church, but I told them that they didn't need any more lofty ideas, that instead they needed to conquer reality, to conquer the deep valleys and dirty ditches. If they can do that, they will be the kind of leaders we need. That is my purpose in sending them out for six months on the MFT.
I'm sure most of them were flabbergasted at being given such a menial assignment. Those who cannot be successful on the MFT will not be given special missions. Each of them must emerge from the valley and demonstrate Ws capability. I want the Seminary students to conquer the extreme of the high pinnacle where the sweet wind blows as well as the deep valley.
I am a man for all seasons. I can be the best farmer, or go to a fishing village and be the best fisherman, or at a factory be the best worker. There is nothing I cannot do and there is nothing I hesitate to do. I am at home in any surroundings and will always come out being the best at anything. I want to be a triumphant person in the struggle of living a God-centered way of life and I want you to strive to be triumphant in that way of life also.
I want you to think of everything in reverse. I see that everyone else's nose faces downward, but I think of my nose as being upside down and my eyes as seeing backwards. I even train myself in the reverse process of things happening. I want to be a person who receives abuse instead of praise, not for doing evil things but for doing good things. I have trained myself to endure hunger and go without sleep I even forget to eat sometimes. Who said you must sleep eight hours a night? One hour is good enough sometimes, and if you don't have to sleep that one hour then that is even better. Who said it is abnormal to go three nights without rest and then just sleep a little the third night?
My body has been tortured to an incredible degree, more than anyone else can imagine. I am almost sixty but people twenty and thirty years old have given up trying to keep up with me. I feel that they avoid being with me sometimes because they are exhausted, but what's the difference between us? We all have the same kind of physical body. When Mother and I were driving from the East to the West coast Mother was very concerned about my health and would say, "Father, you need a little rest, even in the car. I brought a pillow, so would you lie down and take a little nap?" At such moments I thought about how our trip was an historical event and I didn't want to leave the record that I just slept while driving. So I threw the pillow aside and told Mother, "No, I want to took after you."
I always feel like I'm a marksman on the front line, always aiming at the enemy. I am always intent and take a great interest in everything.
Do you women here feel that you could keep up with me? I asked Ye Jin whether she would like someone like me who pushed her all the time, or an easygoing husband who would let her sleep and enjoy life a little more. She answered she wanted a husband like me because there would be more excitement to life. I don't have even one minute of private time because my life is public, but this time I gave instructions that no one should try to keep track of where Mother and I were going. Are you confident that you can be like me? Remember, our struggle is an eternal one. The foundation that you lay today will have eternal value, so it is worthwhile pursuing. I want to make sure whether you really want to follow me or not. If at the moment you are dying you can think that you will never give up, then regardless of what people say about you, you are the greatest.
So far we have had a pretty good talk, so shall we stop here? What more do you need to hear? You will become the bone of America and the world. What else do you need? You should answer that since you will become the bone you need the flesh, right?
I want you to reap a wealth of experience so you can harmonize the world
MFT members, have you been grumbling at me in your hearts or have you been thankful for your mission? Have you been taking an easy course and always goofing off? If I were fund raising I would never settle for reaching a certain minimum goal every day but think about how to get higher and higher goals. I want to work until my arms and legs give up. I don't want to take the time to sleep lying down but instead sleep and walk at the same time. That's the kind of life I enjoy. Sometimes at night I go to the bedroom to sleep for a few hours but I only get halfway there, and in the morning I wake up and find I have been sitting in a chair for those few hours. On some days my legs ache and throb with pain, but I just lean against the wall to take a little rest.
When I have exhausted my physical body, my mind is peaceful and my conscience is clear and I feel the deep love of God flowing through me. Sometimes I just half lie down on the bed, but when I'm half-asleep I feel someone come and lift me up onto the bed, even though no one is there. I don't want to talk about this kind of thing too much because you will think I am superstitious, but I know that there is always spiritual power around to support me and encourage me. One day I was very fatigued and my legs were very sore but as I was walking my legs suddenly felt feather light. That kind of power is always available for you too.
Since you are going to go to spirit world eventually, do you want to come to the part of spirit world where I will be? I will lay the highway and provide the car for you, but you must do two things: you must learn how to drive the car and provide the gas. Since I cannot do everything, at least that part is your responsibility. You must learn how to drive the entire length and breadth of society without an accident or collision. Everyone is looking at you because you are Unification Church drivers. They must recognize that you really know how to navigate your way through all parts of society. You never know when a collision will occur if you doze, either spiritually or physically.
I want you to know that in MFT training the money you gather is not the major goal. You are training yourselves to be the people who can be self-sufficient, who can create the gas for your car, so to speak. Once you are trained on the MFT then you have basic training for supporting yourselves and after that you will have witnessing training and learn how to win people. I am looking forward to meeting the ideal people that you will become. When you really fulfill your mission on the MFT and in witnessing, then not only can you be blessed and have a home and a family but you will become the champions who will save the world. If you want to become a citizen of the world then you must raise people of at least ten other nationalities in your own home, making it one family.
I want to make the world one world and your families will be a focal point of that unification. Because the family will play the major role in bringing together all kinds of nationalities, you should be able to create harmony in your home. You have to be self-sufficient so that you can help other children and educate them in your own home. If the husband goes on some other mission then the wife can carry on that work and if the wife must be gone then the husband can carry on. The Unification home shall always be autonomous. I want you to become the kind of men and women who can maintain your own homes.
Now when you are young you will visit a great variety of homes and have the precious experience of learning about human beings and human affairs. By associating with many different types of families you can experience many different things which you will then call your own. If you are with a beggar you will be able to relate to him because you have learned what it is to be a beggar. You will treat rich people in certain ways because you understand them. You will understand the working people and the uneducated people because you have associated with them. By going through every kind of experience you can become a harmonizer, bringing people together from every part of life.
Only someone with a wealth of experience can harmonize the nations, the poor and the rich, the learned and the uneducated. I have experienced all these things so I see into your hearts. I was the number one worker in the communist prison camp. I have worked as a miner and even experienced being a beggar. Why should I do all that? Not to fill my own stomach or receive some kind of glory but to offer my whole life for the sake of God and humanity. My unselfish purpose has been clear from the very beginning.
The world may come against me and even put me in jail but I am only worried about God and the salvation of humanity. Even under the adverse conditions inside the North Korean prison, working with an impossible kind of people, I never gave up. How much more should I do when I can move freely about, when all the necessary materials are available? How could I rest even a minute?
What is the suffering here in America?
Whatever I do I will be second to none. I even have experience in all kinds of sports and I know how to harmonize sports people because I know their world and their psychology. That's why I was already in action the minute I landed in this unfamiliar country of America. I didn't start cautiously or pause to learn about this country before taking action. America is called a melting pot and it is said that anyone who stays here five years will be absorbed by America. However, I have not seen America to be a genuine melting pot but instead a nation that is decaying. How could I become a part of that?
I must make it God's melting pot instead, and once I grab that mission I will never leave it until I am finished. Thinking Americans predict that if America continues like it is that it will not survive very long. Have you heard your own people predict the decline of America? America was once a respected name all over the world but today Americans are looked at with suspicion in other countries. If this continues, then in ten years Americans will be ashamed to be Americans when they travel overseas. People will want to spit at them. We want to be people who are welcomed wherever we go. Even in the African jungle people should say, "Are you Unification Church members? Welcome! Come with me." Only if we set up that kind of tradition will America survive.
I know you fundraisers are going through persecution every day but do not ever think that you must endure just because God needs money. There is a much more important purpose behind what you are doing, which is for you to become a man or woman who is so tempered and polished that you can become a catalyst of world unity, a person who can be self-sufficient in any life.
When I was teaching in Korea twenty years ago I was pushing the members, telling them to go out and suffer, to fast and work hard. The Korean way of life has always been one of suffering and our members were already tired, but I pushed them even more until they were totally exhausted. Now twenty years later they come to me and say they are grateful for my pushing them so hard in those days.
The worst suffering can be described as having no shelter, no warmth and no food, but what is the suffering here in America? No one suffers from hunger here or has to worry about where to live or what to wear. This is really heaven as far as physical needs are concerned. You live in the kind of country in which you can actually survive for fifteen days on one day's earnings. If you earn the minimum wage and work for ten hours then you have $30 in one day. With $30 worth of groceries you can survive for one month. One hamburger can sustain you for one day with no problem. It's hard to truly suffer in this country.
You don't understand that in other countries people are starving. America has many restaurants and tons of food are thrown out every day. You can go to such places and find food to survive on with no problem. Don't think lightly of hunger; it is the worst kind of suffering.
How much do you appreciate your clothing? Without adequate clothes a person is miserable but in this land of abundance you have never suffered for lack of clothing, have you? The worst kind of situation you have faced is not having the right kind of clothes for some special event like a wedding. There is no shortage of housing either; often a large house has only one lonely couple living in it. If you were to help them a little bit they would love you and be more than happy to have you stay with them. Many grandfathers in the city are so lonely that when you talk to them for thirty minutes they will ask you to stay with them for a few days. There are literally thousands of people who yearn for someone to stay with them.
Life in Korea is entirely different. If you have no house then there is absolutely no place to rest, even in a farmer's barn. What is so difficult about life in America? Many years ago in Korea when members went out pioneering, the Korean economy was so poor that one day of hard work would not buy one day's food for them. Here bread is nothing special, but over there they could not afford bread to eat so they would crumble what they had into water and drink it. They were always hungry and the young people were so undernourished that their legs would sometimes buckle as they were walking.
In those days our missionaries were assigned to work in certain cities, and in order to survive they would walk miles outside the city to work and then come back to teach in the evenings. They never had one night's sleep free from hunger at that time. Many people were taught the Divine Principle back then who never knew how their teacher was suffering. After six months or one year they learned what kind of suffering those people had gone through and they embraced them in tears. From that time on people who were being taught would sometimes bring their lunch to the missionary and themselves go hungry all day at school or work. Our pioneer would eat that lunch for the sake of his mission, thinking, "I am eating this in order to go on. I've got to accomplish."
Eventually the schoolmates of those young members noticed that they didn't bring a nice lunch to school any more. In order to not have this reported to their parents, those students would walk around outside at lunch time in order to be inconspicuous, but the news got back to the parents anyway. People would ask, "What happened to your son or daughter since they joined the Unification Church? Why don't you give them lunch any more?" Can you imagine how shocked the parents were? They asked their children, "What happened to the lunch I gave you?" and the students would have to confess that they gave it to our missionary so that he wouldn't starve. The parents would not believe their children and became angry at our missionary, accusing him of stealing from their sons and daughters and calling him a bloodsucker.
There are too many such stories to tell you all of them. Sometimes communities would organize to evict the missionaries and stop them from working. Sometimes our members were severely beaten. Our missionaries were called wolves and accused of coming to steal the lambs, the children of the town. At the same time there was another level of persecution coming from Christians who spread all kinds of dirty rumors and slander about the Unification Church.
I was leading those suffering missionaries and my heart was aching every day. I told God, "I have only one hope. I want to go on for ten years and then You will be vindicated." I was determined that we would make the money to buy our own food and I gave all my energy to creating our factory, devoting myself to it 24 hours a day, giving instructions and ideas. In this way I laid the foundation ten years ago while our members were suffering.
America is really a sanctuary for missionary work. There is persecution here, but how many of our members have been beaten to the point that they have to go to the hospital? The Korean Christian churches created an image of me as a bloodsucker and told parents they must defend their children from me. Then those parents tried to create incredible barriers so that their children wouldn't join the Unification Church.
Knowing that this situation existed in Korea, the Japanese members determined that it must be vindicated by their blood and sweat in Japan. Japan is totally different from Korea but they wanted to suffer as much as the Koreans and work as hard as they could, feeling serious about not being indebted to me and to the Korean members. Our Japanese members worked very hard and earned much money, the money that I spend in America for you and for this country. I bring hardly anything to Korea but instead use it all for America. I am looking forward to the day when you will be ignited, the day you will seriously say to me, "Father, we Americans will never fall behind the Japanese or Koreans. You wait and see; we shall never let you down."
You should know, however, that even if you make a great deal of money here in America I will never use it back in Korea and Japan. I will spend it for the sake of the world. Just as the Japanese determined that they would never be behind the Koreans in suffering and then gained a tremendous result, I look forward to having you say, "America will never be behind Japan or Korea. America shall be the champion of champions."
My consuming concern is for unity among the races
I would like to see the black members saving their lunch money to help support the white leaders and I would like to see the white members leaving their lunch for their black leader and being scolded for helping a black man. If that kind of historical situation occurred in American schools, America would be revolutionized overnight. Unfortunately, that kind of situation is practically impossible in this wealthy country.
I am thinking about how to form a spiritual link between black and white so that they cannot be separated by anything. Should the link be as teacher and student or as brother and sister? That problem has been a consuming concern for me, that black and white can truly live as one family, eat as one family and dwell as one family, with no selfish motive.
Have you ever thought about saving a bit of money every day to feed me with in case I don't have the right things to eat, and even if I do have enough food, to want the privilege of feeding me anyway? Have you ever thought about buying me clothes or getting a house to welcome me one night? There is only one way you can create that spiritual link and that is to devote yourself to total unity with your leader and to work 24 hours a day without any complaint. By doing this all other things shall be forgiven. In that case our spiritual link will not be broken.
The important thing is whether you leaders in particular have the kind of conviction to work 24 hours a day, being absolutely crazy about God's work morning, noon and evening. Are you that dedicated, that single-minded? If you become that kind of leader then you will raise up that kind of follower. Even though I have spoken at some length on this, your faces are blank and you don't really understand. Why do you follow? Do you have a poignant, painful realization about the situation down to your bones? We must create that kind of profound spiritual link among us.
I have come to one conclusion: In an atmosphere of persecution you will do your absolute, unselfish best and then you will win unselfish followers and become one with them. It is the only way you can create that important spiritual link. You must feel that you are born for this mission and that you will leave this tradition behind. I went through the five provinces of Korea many times, but I have poured out more soul-searching energy into this country of America. I have traveled this path many times, visiting each state with a heavenly heart.
When I first came in 1965 I had no nights of rest because I spent them in the car. I am still willing to go at that pace, but out of concern for Mother I must slow down a little bit, though I still maintain a hectic schedule. I must be sympathetic with Mother because she has had ten children and her energy has been drained. Her body has been absolutely given to God. Sometimes people think Mother must be made of iron but that's not so. In the Korean custom the wife usually massages her husband, but he never massages his wife. That kind of thing is unheard of in Korea, but sometimes I must ignore that custom and massage Mother's legs because she is so tired she just can't go on.
Suffering creates the strongest spiritual link among us
Our war is fought everywhere, even in the home. How can we overcome the present difficulties and achieve the next goal? Suffering creates the strongest spiritual link among us and without it we have no deep emotion at being together. If we have been pushed down together and have been hungry together and tried to take care of each other, then a deep heart-to-heart relationship can be formed, regardless of whether we are Korean or Japanese or American. The way you can find a heartistic relationship with the True Parents is to accept suffering. There is no other way. Because you follow the True Parents you have been persecuted and kidnapped and deprogrammed, going the same course your leaders have already gone. That faith will forge an unbreakable link between leaders and members and the True Parents.
When you go through incredible suffering you can pray, "God, You have been suffering more than anyone else. Our True Parents have gone ahead of us to pave the way and they have faced many times more suffering than anything I face, so let me go on. I shall be triumphant and bring glory to You." If your heart is that willing to give your total self for the sake of God, the True Parents and humanity, then even before you cry out your ancestors and the spirit world will cry out on your behalf. You will become an indispensable person for the spirit world. There is no other way to find a heartistic link with God and with each other.
What can bind together the spectrum of the world's races here in America? Certainly knowledge and organization are inadequate for that. Money cannot help and words are cheap. Only one thing can unite you-heart. Unless you feel this sense of unity to the bone, nothing will work. Your stomach, your dwelling place and your sleep are most critical, but you rise above them by loving your town, your mission and this way of life more than you love to eat or sleep.
How can God set up His world of heart here in America? Think of it. You are used to sleeping eight hours every day and having three meals; you can get anything you need to wear and you can go out and get cheap love anywhere, even for $5. How can God set up the blueprint for His kingdom here in America without instituting some drastic changes?
You leaders must not become complacent. You dank that if you have a few members, that they can go out and do the witnessing and fund raising and come home and do the cleaning and cooking at the center. If you give orders in that way, you will bring to yourself the worst kind of curse you can receive as a leader! A leader should be crying out at night with more tears than anyone else.
I am determined to buy up land and houses for your future security, but not now. Eventually I will have all the best schools and homes for you, but until you show that I can call you my children I will not do those things. I will not speak to you until you are qualified to listen, and until then my words will be judgment to you. The people who were with me on the New Hope wished many times that they could sleep a little more and get some better food. Out on the boat they would sneak out to take a little nap, but I want to demonstrate to you the kind of person who is always in the forefront. I am never standing on the sidelines. That standard is exactly what I am asking of you today.
I am only one man but none of you love this country more than I do. In that respect I am asking you to compete with me. All the buildings I have bought and put to use, like Barrytown, the Manhattan Center, the World Mission Center, are for the American people. I will take nothing away for Korea. My life would be much easier if we didn't need to buy such buildings.
Anyone who takes my words seriously cannot help but become a leader in society
You young men and women must truly realize what I am saying and stand up from today on. You must love America and you cannot complain. I am praying for you when you do not know it. The New York winters are cold and windy but I many times go out in such weather to cry out, hiding my tears from Mother. I sometimes feel pity for you because if you hadn't met me you wouldn't have to suffer this much. If you were only suffering for my sake then I would be the worst kind of criminal, the worst devil under the sun, but my conscience is absolutely clear that this is the right thing. No matter how much you suffer, it is more than necessary for the sake of this country, your own people, your own relatives and eventually God and humanity.
If you precisely follow my instructions, then I predict that in ten years we will be so superior in economy and manpower, in prestige and every possible way that we shall easily surpass our opponents. A man who takes my words seriously cannot help but become a leader in society. The women will lead women's groups and you men will lead your town or society. You cannot help but become number one because nothing is superior to this teaching. Society will have to admire you because your way of life is unselfish and your attitude is humble and your character is correct. How could anyone deny you if you are dedicated and hardworking?
Your MFT work is not just to pay bills. You are leaving an important tradition behind for everyone who works hard and serves God and humanity. Don't ever think that you are working for the sake of the Church; the Church is only providing you with training. Those who will ultimately benefit will be humanity and God and that is why I came to work in America. Without reservation I am pouring out every ounce of energy into the mission, using all the money and knowledge I can muster in this showdown in America. I even want to borrow money and become a debtor for the sake of God and humanity. If I died one day and left billions of dollars in debts behind, when people discovered the truth about why I borrowed that money everyone would want to pay off the debts and do still more.
What kind of leaders are you going to be? If you are going to be with me then you are also going to be liable for my bankruptcy if it comes to that. Would you run away? Or would you say, "Father, never mind. Let me take care of it. My shoulders are big enough to bear this burden. " If we take up the burden together then we can satisfy our creditors. With whatever money we have we will buy land and build many universities. Our real future lies in our posterity, our own children. We want them to become true God-centered champions, and in order to train them well we need schools and universities.
Mr. Kamiyama is now responsible for the finances of our Church. All kinds of bills come to him and people complain about how he handles money, but he barely gets rid of one debt when a bigger one comes along. Sometimes he is discouraged and seems to lose heart, but then I tell him that he and I are just guests in this country, that we are going to help the American people to stand on their own feet and to pick up the world. After all, we are not the masters of this country. Let the American people do that. We can leave them the tradition by giving our sweat, our blood and all our energy for the sake of this country. Some day the American people will understand, and even though they do not appreciate anything now, history will understand.
You have been crying, but for whom did you shed tears?
You have the same nose, two eyes and strong body that I do. You must not be defeated by my standard but do more than I do. I know you are treated in all kinds of abnormal ways, being spit at and cursed, but take this as a privilege. Think of it as a joy and honor that you are beaten, not for your own sake, but for God and His sake.
Your goal is not me but God. You must become a champion who will move the heart of God and also touch the hearts of mankind. Let me cry out for you because of your deeds. Let the members who have heard about you cry out for you. Then the rest of mankind will indeed cry for you.
The link of tears should transcend the level of God so that your tears can mix with His. It is then that the world will be moved. I know it is true that when God's tears are shed for you then you are really a godly man. I am a man of tears. I have shed many tears in the past and I know there are more to shed in the future for the sake of mankind. I am looking for the place where I can shed my tears. I want you to know that if God is moved by your deeds then His blessing and assistance will be with you.
In prison I never taught one word of Divine Principle but I did things that moved the heart of God and then the spirit world came down on my behalf, preaching the Divine Principle and bringing disciples to me. The people who don't know this kind of history from their own experience and who don't know the deep meaning of this path I have gone are not ready to be known as Unification Church members.
If someone asked me what I would say to my children on my deathbed I would answer, "This is my will, that you children take over my mission for God and humanity. You must know the taste of tears and work with tears. I haven't accomplished it all. This is my will."
Don't complain or talk about trivial things because there are much more worthwhile things to do. Has God ever made an excuse for Himself?. God never wants to make an excuse; He merely wants to consummate the work of restoration and let the world see it.
I trust you MFT members and want you to do well. When you are persecuted and mistreated I want you to feel that you are mistreated on behalf of God and Jesus and the True Parents, and that you should bear the beating for your own children in the future. It is a glorious challenge. You can take delight when people curse you for being a Moonie and you can thank God for the opportunity to experience what He has experienced. There is a profound, mysterious kind of joy you can feel which establishes you as a true member.
I want you to know that there is no way you can come close to me or be a true leader of the Unification Church without going this path of tears and suffering. You have been crying, but for whom did you shed tears? For whom has your tongue spoken? Have you pitied yourself or had some anger you could not contain? Your tears should be for God and humanity and your tongue should be speaking for God and humanity. Then you are truly Unification Church members.
For whom has your body been living? You have been living for yourself but now you must give your body for something else. There is a way now for God and mankind to live and you should invest your body for that purpose. When you shout it out from a position of struggle, God will answer. Then mankind will respond to you because you have had common experiences; you also are good and bad and you have had success and failure. The destiny of mankind and God is hinged upon whether God and mankind can respond to you.
This is the third seven-year course. We have now completed almost seventeen out of twenty-one years. Continue until we enter the twentieth year and you will see how much you can withstand of the threats and frustration which should not even have been yours. These are God's frustrations. You must withstand God's frustrations and anger and always try to vindicate God, not yourself. I have had to withstand beatings and character assassination for thirty years and I want you to be patient also.
When my eyes see something awful I tell them to forget it. When my ears hear something ungodly I tell them to forget it. Try not to see or hear those things. You have a heart full of pain but be patient. For the sake of God and humanity you can do it and finally the day will come when you will vindicate God and humanity. We can do far better than to sit and wait for God's comfort to come down; because we are in a position to consummate our mission, we are going to comfort God. Unless you live this way you really have no right to even pray. If you just pray with your mouth you are a hypocrite, but when you have some deed to show you will have matching words to say. This is the path the Unification Church must take because this is the only shortcut to the heart of God. There is no other way to become close to Him, no magic way to go this route.
The life you are living now is my workshop for you
A husband and wife should be united heartistically and then they can unite in a common struggle, becoming one body. The Church is not trying to exploit you but is training you through your hard work. What you are doing now in training is what you will be doing for the world for the rest of your life. The life you are living now is my workshop for you, training you to transform the world. After this training you can turn around and do the same thing for the world. 'Ibis is a privilege because by doing so you are participating in the work and tradition of the True Parents, and above all the work and tradition of God. You are literally inheriting His Kingdom of Heaven here on earth.
We want to be victorious in love because that is the ultimate victory, nothing else. You may not conquer a nation or conquer the world by force but when you become a victor of love you can conquer and unite the world. Everything else becomes small. Eventually everything will come under this one love.
Jesus was crucified on the cross and externally speaking he was a failure; however, he dramatically demonstrated his love for humanity by forgiving and loving his own enemies. That deed made him a victor of love. Love conquers all and nothing can displace or overthrow it. Once you occupy this highest pinnacle of love no one can topple you. If you love me then we do not necessarily need to be together physically; when you pursue the same goal and follow the same way of life and tradition then you are actually living together with me. We discuss, live and push forward together in the same way of life.
When you have a hard day and return to the center in the evening you might say, "God, I had a rough day but I won. I never gave up and I never did a shameful thing. I love You and I want You to be proud of me." Many times you murmur to yourself, don't you? When you are driving and talking to yourself you are actually talking to God and when you become more and more involved in this, the living God will actually answer you and say, "My son, I heard you. I understand and am glad that you won the battle. You are indeed my son." You will actually hear His voice. The key to this relationship is how much of your heartistic energy you pour out to God. There are no technicalities. You know the credo of the Unification Church, to shed tears for earth, sweat for man and blood for heaven. Those are not empty words but living words.
When the hot weather comes most people try to get away somewhere to be cool, like the seashore, but you Unification Church members simply sweat even more when the hot weather comes. Under those circumstances would you think about how miserable you are, or would you thank God that you sweated for Him that day? One person might curse the heat but the other would thank God.
Your spiritual growth will eventually become a straight line, just as the existence of God is like a straight line. Often God comes and goes-you experience God and then He disappears and then comes again later-but that indicates that you too must become like a straight line. I am merely one Oriental man, but there is something mysterious about me that makes you want to see me again. When you see me you are awed by some kind of power and at the same time you feel a loving warmth. Sometimes I come to you in dreams to give you guidance. What kind of man am I?
Tears often come when you think of me and in the next moment you realize you are entirely open to the spirit world. All the important spiritual areas have been blocked because of the fall of man, but when the blockage is removed you can purify yourself in heavenly love. There must be a movement creating such exciting and explosive energy that every individual in the universe can break through that spiritual blockage. The spiritual world and the physical world are actually one, so that the power needed to break down the barriers is really simple; it all depends on one thing: how much more you love God than you love worldly things. How pure and genuine is your love? Ultimately we must become victorious in love, where there is no boundary.
Who sees me frequently in their dreams? Sometimes you may find yourself crying when you are missing me. If you are out fund raising and all of a sudden you are struck with such love for me that you start crying and missing me, then a few steps ahead of you I will be standing there, even carrying the same kind of fund raising product you have and going ahead of you fund raising. This is happening all over, particularly in Japan. There are many mysterious spiritual things happening to our Japanese members, especially to those selling the marble vases door-to-door. All kinds of spiritual assistance are coming to them and other members themselves are completely flabbergasted at how much money they are earning. The secret is that God comes down and helps them.
Many times their underwear is so ragged that they would not want it to be seen by their friends, but they have no regrets about it. Day after day they have been shedding the genuine tears I have been speaking of this morning, God's tears. The agony of mankind is real to them and the tears of God are real to them. Of course they are given money to buy underwear and so forth, but they are thinking about how they can spend this money for the sake of God. Instead of spending it for themselves they want to give it back as an additional contribution. These little things move God. God is infinite but He takes delight in those little things and that's the way I live too. I want every bit of my life to be that dramatic. Many times in the past God literally cried out for the True Parents because of this attitude.
I have many hidden secrets known only to God. God knows how easily I break down in tears but I don't want to act that way in public. I really want to live a deed before I talk about it and then I can teach this way of life with authority. I'm not just a philosopher. There is nowhere else under the sun that you can find someone who is like me. There is no one who can replace me or replace Mother. This position is absolutely precious and irreplaceable and unique. In order to accomplish this position and relationship, a great foundation has been laid at tremendous sacrifice. Many nations have crumbled and many billions of people have suffered to lay the foundation without seeing its glory, You are like the flowers which have seen the ultimate day of blooming, but there are many people who fertilized the seeds who have never seen the flowers' glory, people who were the trunk, soil and water to lay the foundation: You must always remember and appreciate this.
I want you to take the initiative out of your own desire
For whom do you work on the MFT? The clearest answer is that you do it for yourselves in order to become people who love God and humanity. Without that you can never have a relationship with the True Parents. No matter how much we say we love God, as long as we do not fulfill our responsibilities towards God and humanity, we have nothing to do with God and humanity. All the work you do is ultimately to make you the kind of person who loves God and humanity so you can have a relationship with True Parents. Each moment on the MFT is absolutely priceless. How can you be tired and to whom can you complain if your labor is for your own benefit?
I want you to become subject and take the initiative out of your own desire, with no one forcing you to do anything. If you want to push yourself and discipline yourself and really give 100% for God and humanity, you will become God's pride. I never want to feel that you are just following my instructions but rather that you have really perfected yourself in the image of God on your initiative. You may not know your value, but the Unification Church members will know how perfected and precious you are.
I'm sure many of you complained in your hearts before coming to this meeting, wondering why certain things have to be done or figuring out shortcuts for doing things you don't like. Have you thought in that way before? Those who say they have never complained aren't telling the truth. I myself have sometimes complained to God but then God gave me a real spanking! Then I knew that complaining doesn't work and it's better not to do it! If you have never complained then you are better than I am.
Internal discipline is such that you can force yourself to do something even when you don't want to. Particularly in the beginning of your spiritual growth that is necessary. Sometimes I am super stubborn and don't want to listen to anyone. God knew that if He sent me out in that condition that I would run into lots of trouble, not just getting fines for speeding, but something serious. God trained me every day giving me all kinds of discipline, and after He finished, the whole direction of my life was different. In this way God has opened up new opportunities, giving me instructions Himself and telling me what to do. I have conquered myself and become God's pride. This is the way a son of God should behave.
What kind of person will you become? There are two ways to go. All of us will go to the spirit world, but if you can live the way I have been describing then God Himself will prepare a dwelling place to welcome you. Otherwise you can live a dirty and untruthful life on earth and end up in a trashcan in heaven. There are two ways to live, and it is obvious which destiny you would rather have.
I want to give you two pieces of advice. First, under any circumstances do not complain. Second, do not give up. How about you Seminarians, do you complain? Your faces look a little bit tired. You studied for two years and you thought that you were graduating from the Unification Church. I want you to know that instead you are just entering it. What you need is not just thoughts about heaven but the working heaven, the deeds of heaven. Christianity has only been thinking about heaven so it has declined, but we are making a new Christianity which shall be different.
I have been thinking very much about how we can clean up a city like Las Vegas. Maybe we could set up a gigantic casino with all the gambling machines and games and then set fire to them and bum it all up in one night. That would be dramatic! Then I would explain why we have to do this, why gambling is no good and why so many things in Las Vegas are wrong. People would certainly listen. If I were an ordinary man who was in business to get rich then I could make billions of dollars in Las Vegas and buy up the city.
Another place I want to clean up is New York. There is a tremendous amount of prostitution, not only in New York but also in Japan and Korea, and I have been thinking very much about that dark side of society. Religious leaders must look at reality and try to find solutions instead of avoiding the problems. One of my main motivations for buying the New Yorker was that it was located at 34th St. and 8th Avenue, right in the middle of the prostitution district. We don't need an empty heaven, but a realistic one.
What is the value of our time together here?
I really regret that I cannot train you state leaders directly, in totally different circumstances than in your states. Particularly the first graduates of the Seminary have great responsibility. Did you keep a diary when you were fund raising after graduation? You could have written a beautiful book. The ideal heaven is up there but reality is right down here, the top and the bottom of heaven. You can write a beautiful masterpiece about how to bring it together.
There are all kinds of human lives and all different levels of living. I must be able to link each of them with heaven and take them all there. It is your responsibility to learn how to lead those who refuse to go into heaven. It is easy to lead those who are willing to go to heaven; the people who want to join the Unification Church are no problem, but fuming the adversaries of the Unification Church around and convincing them of the truth is your duty.
What you feel about your state is more important than what you know about it. Do you want all the people in your state to listen to you obediently, or are you unconcerned even if the opposition fires machine guns at you? If they don't "shoot" at you then you ,'shoot" at them. When I carne to America no one ,'shot" at me so I "shot" at America.
Even without speaking I am opening up tremendous new horizons in the hearts of the American people, changing their understanding of the Oriental culture and people. Indirectly I am contributing toward welding the two cultures together. Orientals have always been a minority in this country, being unrecognized and unknown, but since my arrival America's entire concept of Koreans has changed.
Like Americans, there are all kinds of Koreans, tough ones, unbeatable ones and controversial ones. Look at me. I am a mystery to the American people who don't understand how I can influence their sons and daughters, inspiring them to change their lives and do extraordinary things. But let me ask you, do I threaten to shoot you if you don't obey? All I do is talk to you. I don't even want to talk too much but you asked me to talk so I must. You are the cause for this long speech!
While we talk we develop some rapport, a meeting of heart. Conviction, power, truth, righteousness and light are shining upon us; the darkness is disappearing and you are automatically becoming new people without even knowing it. You have met an incredible person, one who not only gives inspiration but who also appears in your dreams and visions. Your hearts are pulled towards me and when you unite with my direction your conscience is clear, but when you disunite you suffer in your heart.
Are you some kind of prisoner? Are you held captive by invisible bars and chains? No, you are embroiled in one event that has never happened in the past and will never happen again in the future. This work will continue on for thousands of years, but you are the only ones who can be with me as a living person and hear directly what I have to say. Future generations will understand about me through spiritual revelations, but you have both physical and spiritual experiences with me. That is your honor and your pride.
When you know me and I embrace you spiritually then that spiritual oneness intermingles with the physical world. No one in the past and no one in the coming generations will have this experience. only you. This experience could never be bought even with billions of dollars; it is that precious. You are unaware of its value now, but when you go to spirit world you will see our movement and its origins, and you will know what a priceless treasure it is to have lived at this time, face to face with me.
Are you happy or unhappy people? I don't see any realistic happiness yet. Let me illustrate. Suppose you have a wonderful husband and you love him with all your heart but suddenly he dies; then you become totally despondent and your deepest desire is for him to be revived. If all of a sudden you find your husband walking toward you to embrace you, you are filled with the greatest ecstasy and excitement. What I am trying to describe is the same thing that is happening to you here. Your happiness today shall be greater than that, if you really understand the value of this moment. Unfortunately, its value cannot be described and I don't blame you for not understanding because you know so little about spirit world and the origins and future of this movement.
All you worry about is your own part of the world and your own individual mission of fund raising or witnessing. Your worries center around making good public relations or being good salesmen, but I tell you that once you really realize the true value of sitting right here facing me, nothing in the world will matter to you.
If you are full of contradictions, it is a joke to talk about the Kingdom of Heaven
The key to the Kingdom of Heaven is right here on earth. The Kingdom of Heaven is not the hazy realm that Christians describe but a real kingdom of love and perfection. Do you want to hear about it? I wanted to cover several subjects but I have hardly covered any ground at all yet. You are sitting and listening but my legs are getting sore standing up all the time.
You know me, you know the direction and you know the goal. The new members here have discovered that I am just a man, not a superman. I have humor and I am a genuine person, but at the same time I am other things. You can understand the external, visible Reverend Moon, but what about the internal, invisible me? Do you want to know him too? Do you think you would like Reverend Moon better at this stage in life or as a young man? Actually we are tailing about external differences. There are two types of Reverend Moon externally, but internally speaking there is no difference.
If you ask a grandmother if her mind is as old as her physical appearance, with gray hair and wrinkled skin, what would her answer be? She would smile because the question is amusing and the answer is obvious. She will never hesitate to say, "No, young man; even though I'm seventy years old my mind is just as young as yours." Could that be the case? It certainly is. In the physical world there is difference in age but in the world of mind there is no age. There is only the prime of life.
What would you want other people to notice about you, your physical appearance or your mind and appearance together? Especially the young people who are looking forward to marriage should be serious about this question. What are you looking for in a husband or wife, just physical appearance or the invisible character as well? What kind of love would you like to receive? What kind of person could you love? Would you prefer a husband or wife who can give only physical love or would you want one who would give you his internal self also? What kind of love is more genuine? How about yourselves? Are you living only on the physical level or the internal level as well?
The religious world has been pursuing the internal man, but since it couldn't find the ultimate answers it has been declining. The Western world has been following after the external or physical man and has been declining. What remains? Increasingly men are asking, "What is the essence of man? What is the essence of the nation? What is the meaning of existence?" All these questions are being pursued more and more intensely but no answers are emerging.
When you observe one man he is full of contradictions between his mind and body, right? Those of you who have no contradictions between your mind and body, raise your hands. Is there anyone? You know the truth. If individuals of contradiction marry and have children then that contradiction is multiplied. Hegel theorized that the universe started in contradiction and he developed dialectical materialism to describe it, but only a fictitious God would create man in this condition. Such a God should be cursed for making man in this way. No one in history has toiled more with this question than I have. Unless contradiction is resolved there is no use talking about world peace or a brotherhood of man because there are no means of obtaining them. When your body and mind unite into one temple of God then you can dwell in a happy society, nation and world, but if you are full of contradictions within yourself then trying to dwell in the Kingdom of Heaven is a big joke. Actually the nation and world are not the subject; you are the subject. You are more significant than the society and the nation, and the most precious thing for you is subjugating yourself.
This explains why you cannot solve your parents' problems; only they can solve them. Your problems must be solved by you; no one else can solve them for you. You can be an object and lend support to someone who is struggling, but you cannot take the subjective position over their problem. Even if the rest of the world has become the Kingdom of Heaven, is this kind of heaven any good for you, or anyone, if the heart and mind are suffering?
I toiled more than anyone to find the solution of man's internal contradiction
You find two people fighting within yourself and the difficulty is to unite them into one. If God is all-powerful and can solve this question, why hasn't He done it already? Since He hasn't, He either is incapable of doing it, or doesn't exist. Have you thought about that? This has been a fundamental question for mankind. The great religious leaders like Buddha, Socrates, Mohammed and Confucius all encountered the same questions, but where is the obvious answer? All mankind has been waiting for the answer and even God Himself has been waiting for the answer, but it has not been found before now. How can the answer be found?
If all love starts from contradiction, how can you find anything genuine? If we are drilling a hole in a wall you need a sharp drill with a sharp center, but history is like a drill with two points. With such a drill you can make all kinds of nicks in the wall but you can't make a hole. If God could have solved this quandary He would have done it a long time ago, but it is a man who must do the job. I determined that I would find the answer and explain how the contradiction could be resolved.
I am only a resultant being so I must know my origin. Do you have some awareness of how you spent the nine months in your mother's womb? After you were born you gradually became aware of having a mother and father who gave you birth, but did you actually become aware of where you came from? We have to deal with our ultimate origin.
I am here myself and that is reality, but is God a reality? There is no guarantee. I am dealing with all kinds of contradictions outside, but there is no guarantee that I can ever find God. Communists and atheists are insisting that there is no God. To find the origin, I started by making a hypothesis: "If there is a God, He should be like this. If there is no God then the world should be like this." The world should be a world of peace, stability and tranquillity, but if two people are fighting constantly then there can be no world of peace. How can you have a peaceful home if the husband and wife are constantly fighting? In our hearts we desire to see one united world of peace and harmony. That is surely man's most far-reaching desire and ambition, and it hasn't changed at all throughout history.
If man's original desire did not change, what did change? Our bodies always betray us, moving in all different directions because they are not stable. The person who vacillates and goes off in too many directions at one time, or who frequently alters his basic position, is more evil than the person who is stable. History reflects man's constant effort to harmonize the two contradicting forces. There is a constant and unchanging will to bring this about.
The universe is far more precise than a computer, moving according to law. No heavenly body can deviate from the laws of nature. What would happen if the sun and earth moved at random? There would be incredible chaos and catastrophe in that case, but in reality the planets have stayed on course every minute for millions of years. They will not deviate from cosmic law. How could the universe be that precise? The communists and other atheists explain it as being a natural phenomenon, but there is a loophole in their argument. Can randomness create the precision of law and nature? Can a random mind project regularity? Even the slightest deviation in a rocket's plotted course to the moon can create a catastrophe.
Our solar system alone has many satellites but this solar system is just one of many systems. There are billions of systems like ours moving in the universe, so can you say that it just happened without someone's planning it? There are billions of cells in the human body, all of them differentiated. They are all specific for one function or another but they are harmonized together to make one man; they all have the same purpose.
Could man make chunks of gold appear at his command? Even if be prayed for years and years or produced sophisticated machinery, man could not create gold. Helpless man is trying to evaluate the universe but it is impossible. Man is incapable of judging the universal law and the universal system, because man is merely a small part of it and not capable of knowing everything.
Why do you have eyelashes and eyebrows and what would you do without them? Did your eyes just happen to appear as they are? Did they know ahead of time what conditions in the atmosphere they would encounter, and prepare to be protected by blinking eyelids? Did your eyes make themselves, knowing ahead of time about drying winds and dust and hot weather so that they could provide for eyebrows and blinking? Of course not.
The eyes didn't know ahead of time, but the important thing is that someone did know! Someone knew and planned and provided for the eyes to encounter dry weather and dust. Is the eye the result of some random action or whim? Who planned ahead? When we pursue this more deeply we come to the question of whether matter or spirit came first. If you ask a communist whether the eye knew ahead of time that it should be equipped with eyelids, he will have no answer. He cannot deny the logic that a universal intelligence must have existed before the eye. Before the eye could be created the concept was already in someone's mind, someone who knew the necessity for eyes and knew exactly which design would be best.
I do not possess universal intelligence because I am a result. I didn't know where I came from and it was not my will that brought me here to earth. There must be a great wisdom which preceded any existence here on earth. We call him God. Ask the communists about how to revolutionize eyes and how to change the law so that eyes are upside down or so that one is in front and one in the rear. Can you revolutionize how your nose perceives smells or how your mouth detects taste? What the communists are trying to revolutionize is the economic system, but the economy is not one of man's higher-level activities. The communists proclaim that a person's occupation is what determines his personality and his value, but should something that insignificant be man's master?
There will never be peace until man knows his origin
Unless we can find the one ultimate source of the universe there is no way that man can find peace on earth. If there is no real God then even if we conjure up a fake or conceptual deity we will have no solution. Is God real or not-this is a fundamental question. You must align yourself with a particular solution, but in any case, you are part of the problem. If there is a God then you are the cause of the world's problem and if there is no God you are still the cause of the problem. However, the solution is different depending on how you answer the question of God's existence. The communists propose one extreme solution and either they are correct and there is no God, or there is a God. The two situations cannot coexist.
If God does exist then the next question is why He is so helpless as to leave the world in this condition. It could be that a relevant, working relationship with man was severed and since then the living God has not been able to re-establish it. God could be an honest and true God who wants to make a relationship with a true man, but since there has been no true man it has been impossible for there to be a true relationship. Our logical conclusion is that God exists and He is a God of true love, but He has not yet found a deserving object of His love upon this earth. Since He cannot have a relationship with an evil man, He is seeking some solution for the future. This has been His situation throughout history.
If there is a God, He must be true, pure and perfect. If that God created man, but man came to be dominated by conflict both internally and externally, then there is a contradiction, for perfect God would not produce that kind of man. Only one explanation could account for this situation-simply that man is the one who is out of order. God has been waiting for the day when mankind will elevate themselves into being His genuine objects. Then God will be free to establish a real working relationship with man. All of human history has been the process of striving toward that goal.
There are two solutions that can be proposed; First, an individual might think, "I know that I am a deviated man and I am striving to somehow win the ideal world." Or he might think, "Because I am out of order I need to perfect myself first and then seek the original relationship with God." God will intervene in the second situation. If you think of yourselves as being legitimate and perfect then this world is full of contradiction, but when you look at yourselves as radios that are out of order and need to be repaired then a logical conclusion emerges; "Yes, I must change because my present self is not the original one. I must revolutionize myself to fit the original concept of God and then not only can I be restored, but the relationship between God and man can be restored, and the relationship between man and the universe can be restored." For this purpose the religious world has come into being and all throughout history it has grappled with the task of restoring man.
If there is a true God, His solution for the problem of history must be the road of restoration. God looks at this world as one which is out of order and needs to be mended. God must plan for man to be restored back to his original state, making possible His original relationship to man. By accomplishing this the society, nation and world will be mended. Religion has been creating a cultural sphere which is moving toward God's ultimate goal for the universe. It was small in scope in the beginning, but through history it has enlarged to the level of tribe, nation and world.
The modern world is divided into four basic cultural spheres-the Oriental or Confucian cultural sphere, the Buddhist cultural sphere, the Islamic sphere of Asia Minor and the Judeo-Christian sphere of the Western world. If there is a God, He must be striving towards one world. He has one love which will govern the entire world and one culture which He would like to see throughout the world. God doesn't want to see America clinging to its one way of living, separate from other countries. God wants one concept of love to make a cultural sphere which will permeate one nation and then spread to all nations of the world.
Knowledge of the fall offers man his greatest hope
How would God achieve this? With money or some business venture? By power or knowledge? You all talk about love but what is your concept of love? You all know the love of a divided mind and body going in all different directions but what is the origin of that kind of love? Where does love dwell? Does love start in your physical body and then flow into your mind, or does it start from your mind and flow into your physical body? Most people think physical love comes first, but what kind of trashy love is that? The communists say they can revolutionize even your mind and love, saying that love is just a physical sensation to be gratified and your mind a product of economic environment.
Should love be changeable? When love is based on physical sensation a person can go after all kinds of love, just like animals, and by having relationships with many people he feels more stimulation. A husband and wife usually fight over lack of love or miscommunication of love, but are they fighting because of their bodies' or their minds' miscommunication of love? Normally the wife protests to the husband that he is just loving her body but not really giving his real heart to her. She insists she doesn't want to be treated like an animal and reminds him that he pledged to love her with all his heart and soul and mind instead. One partner may say something but his mind can actually be somewhere else. A couple will fight when they see something fake about their love which reveals that their minds and bodies are separated. Nobody loves a changing love.
Where is the origin of love? Does love come from a changing source or an unchanging source? Can you find physical love that is unchanging, eternal and unique? Everyone is looking for the kind of love that originates in an unchanging source. The mind will never get old and infirm, but always stay as fresh as in a person's prime once he makes up his mind that he wants to always pursue unchanging love. We usually ask someone who is being untruthful if their conscience doesn't bother them because we know that the mind is supposed to have unchanging qualities.
There are body-oriented men and mind-oriented men and they are not necessarily friends. If one goes first and the other follows, then at least we have hope that the other will catch up some day, but this is never the case. The mind always pulls in one direction and the body in another. If God made man this way then He is man's worst enemy, but we have shown that instead some man-related event imposed this situation. It is not of God's own doing at all. When an unprincipled power pulls the body in one direction then you are its prey or victim. These things can be explained in one sentence: this is the result of the fall of man.
Knowledge of the fall offers the greatest hope to fallen man because with this understanding we can find the road of restoration. Not only that, God's existence and the contradiction of man's existence can now be understood. Mankind must know that man was broken by the fall and must be repaired. God's mandate is for man to become whole again and return to Him.
Why can't God deal with man as he is? The Bible says to forgive your enemies seventy times seven, and if that is the virtue of a loving God then why can't He come down here and embrace fallen man? Why can't He intervene?
The real battle is being fought in you, not in the nation or world
We must understand the essence of the fall of man. Another power named Satan was involved in the fall of man. Consequently, there is a good god which is God and there is an evil "god" which is Satan. That does not mean that originally there were two gods, two origins of the universe. How can man ever find harmony within himself unless some reconciliation is made between the two gods? God is not God unless He can deal with this evil "god" and the evil fallen body of man. If God cannot bring man's evil body to the side of good then Satan will bring man's good mind to the side of evil. God must be capable of liquidating this evil world that has come under the subjugation of Satan.
What is the domain and base of the evil god? Satan's working base is not America or your family but your physical body, while God's working base is your mind. Expanding this pattern onto the world scale, there are two worlds: the God-denying world and the God-accepting world. The two must be divided and a final solution found. Desiring to create the world which represents Him and His ideology, God is inspiring religious leaders and champions and letting them expand their influence all over the satanic world on the social, national and worldwide levels. The external appearance of that world at this time in restoration is known as the democratic society, or free world, and the representative of that free world is America. The other world is the communist world, which claims that there is no God and also claims that the end justifies any means. Communists don't care how many people they kill but only want to control the world. In the process they treat men like animals because for them human life has no value.
In the democratic world we enjoy freedom to grow spiritually, but the communist world only grants the freedom to glorify the communist state. Freedom does not mean giving license to your body to do anything. Freedom means liberty within the law of God; God is giving us the freedom to actualize goodness. Instead, America today considers freedom the right to pursue individual gratification, particularly when it has to do with the body. True freedom, however, gives man the right to live for the dispensation and purpose of God. Misuse of freedom brings destruction to the eternal nation and world and is not part of the true freedom of God. Freedom should result in constructiveness and be an asset to the Kingdom of God. The concept of equality is also important and means that everyone is equally valuable in the sight of God and for the purpose and will of God. In that respect we are all equal. This is not blind equality where you can claim you are equal to everyone and have a right to do anything anyone else does.
We have been talking about the free world and communist world, but don't concern yourselves too much with them. The thing to worry about is yourself as a base for Satan or God. The real battle is fought in you and you will determine its outcome. Would everyone be happy if the communists took over the world? The very people who claim to be communist also experience struggle between their minds and bodies, the same contradiction you fight against every day. You are the problem area.
If you want to become a godly man, then in subjugating your physical body with your mind you should not want to become only a citizen of one nation but a world citizen or universal citizen. Did God create national boundaries? They are obstacles created by man, not by God. God is thinking of how to eliminate boundaries without seeing wars erupt all over the world. What would be God's most effective tool-power and threats? Definitely love is God's way, but why couldn't God have done it a long time ago? This question presents a very grave problem. God seems very foolish to have allowed all kinds of problems to emerge without intervening. Love is not a new word, but God sees very clearly that until He can find one man who is truly victorious in His sight and who can be a living example of His love, He has no base upon which to work on earth. God is looking for one man, not one nation.
When God gives His love, does He want to give it with just His body at one time and His mind at another, or all together? In the sight of God we must become an acceptable base by being united in mind and body as one central point, No power or money exists which can unite mind and body into one; the only possible way is through the love of God Himself. The power of the Almighty God should be pure and perfected enough that it can cleanse all iniquity and unite mind and body into one. Perfect unity should be caused by the perfect love of God. It's logical that if you are to become a reflection of God you must empty yourself and become a new man, causing your mind and body to resemble God's mind and body. Then God will come down to you and dwell in you in love.
What kind of love does God need, and if God has everything, why does He even need our love? Although God is the origin of love, His love cannot be activated until a circuit is formed and to do that there must be an object to which energy can flow. Without an object God's love and energy will remain dormant. Do you men have love? How about you women, do you have love? Does your love manifest when you are all alone as an individual? It is a universal truth that love is activated when there is a circuit formed by having an object. No matter how almighty God is, unless He can find an object of give and take, He is lonely and very poor. Those who want to live a bachelor life for eternity, raise your hands, If there is such a person, he has some problem. God would be really angry at you if you ever suggested that with His loving heart He should forget about all His headaches with fallen man and remain a bachelor.
Through your hard work your body is being conditioned to lead a heavenly life
Man has two desires: He wants to love and he wants to receive love. Many times women, especially American women, think about how to be loved but they forget about giving love when they get married. If a person just wants to receive love then he is the worst kind of robber. God's love is the only unchanging and unique love, and without having that kind of love as a cure we will never have any hope for humanity.
You must empty yourselves completely and receive the love of God; then you have hope for your mind and body to become one. When they are united in the love of God there is nothing that can separate them. Even in the fallen world men and women sometimes think they love each other so much that they would rather die than be separated, but how much would they be intoxicated by the love of God? The love of God can totally consume you because it is incredibly pure, genuine and unchanging.
There is no solution in the human world that can cure the division between the mind and body of fallen man. The only solution is the love of God and if it comes into you, you must totally open yourself up. Let the love of God dwell in the temple of your body and let it become master of your mind and heart. That is the only possible hope for this fallen world. The body always opposes the will of God but your mind does not need so much nurturing or education. It knows what is best while the body always blocks the will of God. The fall of man created this entanglement of love and now the mind and body go in two different directions. Because it was illicit love that brought the fall of man, man has since emphasized body-oriented love and resisted the coming of heavenly love.
Throughout history God's constant effort has been to suppress the influence of the body. This emphasis is the principal teaching of religion, with religious life always stressing denial of the bodily desires. God's mandate is that your body should obey your mind and if the body wants something else, don't listen to it. This teaching has been God's tool and is always the beginning point of good religious teaching. You cannot fulfill the period of restoration instantly but must nurture your mind with the word and power of God, making it God's ally in your body. In time the body will be conditioned into obeying the mind. Through your hard work you are conditioning your body into accepting a certain way of life.
Satan broke the law of the love of God and when he did that he destroyed virtually everything in the universe. If God were to forgive Satan, He must then destroy everything else because then there would be no hope for restoration left in the universe. That's why God cannot forgive Satan. Jesus taught that you must forgive your enemy seventy times seven and more. That means you should love the pitiful person who is victimized by Satan, but not that you should forgive Satan who caused the sin. If God had forgiven Satan then there would be nothing left to restore because God would be compromising His own love. That would threaten the very existence of God Himself.
When you look at Satan you must know that he is the enemy of the love of God because he did the unforgivable: he broke the law of the love of God. When the end of this fallen world comes close, Satan will go on a rampage out of desperation. That is why there is so much free sex and abnormal satanic love in today's society. It has even become common for married couples to exchange partners for a night and think it's fun!
Satan has always been trying to absolutely control the world, but when the complete revelation of God's truth is given and the Messiah comes, then Satan knows he has no hope of success. Then he will shout defiantly, "I can't have the world but I'll never let you get it either." Satan is using the communists as a tool to undermine this nation internally; they demand acceptance of the lowest kind of social behavior because they know that it's the way they can eventually make this nation crumble so they can easily take it over.
The Unification Church will stand up, expose and thwart this activity and liberate the world. We will expose to the world what Satan has been doing and who he is. Satan has been winning for 6,000 years but at this time I am pushing Satan into a corner and telling him to stop! The love of God is the only way we can bring a solution to the world. We have the total truth revealed by God, and Satan is on the defensive now. If you can win the love of God then nothing else matters; you may lose your country, the world, even your own life, but even so you are winning a greater life. Once you possess the love of God, nothing else matters.
This movement is pursuing two goals: We are searching for the way to make God real and also searching to find the God-like man who can act on behalf of God here on earth. Once we become the embodiment of God's truth we cannot go in any direction except God's, and once we find the solution then this world will begin to shake.
The Principle describes the past and present, explaining not just one topic, but all of history from man's origin to the present time, including a vision for the future. When you engage the love of God you become a universal man because God does not belong to one country or race. Unity of all races, nations and the world becomes possible in the love of God because it transcends all those levels.
Our ambition is the greatest of all, being not only to win God but to penetrate the love of God and possess it completely. Then we have won the world. Man's value becomes limitless and without price when he is united with God. You are to make yourselves into people who are the embodiment of God, who are no longer bound by human weakness. God will become a real subject to you and govern your daily life, and even though you dwell on earth you will then live in two worlds because the spirit world will be so close to you.
Anyone dwelling in God's love is like a magnet, pulling others to him
This principle is a real one. My life has been dedicated to verifying this truth over and over by living it in all situations. When we all manifest it, God will be visible to everyone. Once you become a prisoner of God's love you want to become one with the person who is the center of that love on earth. Such a person is like a magnet which has pulling power over anything nearby.
God is one magnetic pole in heaven and I am another magnetic pole here on earth and together we have formed an electric field. Everyone in that magnetic field can be activated. You may feel as though you are being pulled towards me, but then when we are one you will realize that you have become a magnet also. Then you can pull many others, so great is the supreme power of love. You are not drawn to me personally, but to the love of God which is being transmitted through me. That love belongs to God and not to any individual.
God never created a power greater than love, and when you are truly intoxicated in the love of God then all the mundane needs like eating and sleeping and worldly love become secondary. You can transcend their influence once you are caught by the love of God. At that point your longing and love for me will become so strong that you cannot forget me for a moment, even in the midst of any activity. It is then that the world of impure love will no longer be of interest to you and a big door will open wide to a pure, genuine, spiritual love. That should be real to you in experience, but also clear to you by logic.
The problem is whether the Unification Church is actually living this way. Do you really love me that much? Am I more important to you than eating and sleeping? When you experience this, that love will become real right here in the Unification Church, and even more amazing, anyone around you will feel the same magnetic power and be pulled to you. They will want to love and respect you and do anything to support you.
God has been longing for 6,000 years to see the day when that would come about. Actually the number 6,000 is just symbolic; God has been longing and waiting for millions of years for that day of fulfillment. That day is happening now in this junction of your lives and mine. You believe this is the truth but because of your lukewarm attitude you do not live it. Later when you go to spirit world you will see the most realistic and incredible truth unfolding before you and you will feel ashamed.
How much do these pounds of flesh mean to you? A wise man will invest his body to attain external value at this key time in history. That is why Jesus taught that the Kingdom of Heaven is in the midst of you, that no one should seek the Kingdom of Heaven anywhere else. The Kingdom of God is composed of the love of God, which is very logical. Jesus said, "I am in the Father and the Father is in me and you are in me and I am in you." All of this makes sense once this principle becomes real to you. Your day of perfection comes when you are inseparably linked to the powerful, explosive love of God.
Throughout the thousands of years since your first ancestors were on earth the physical body has been serving Satan, but when you revolutionize your body as a base for God instead, those thousands of years of stains will be wiped out. Something that dramatic is possible and will throw Satan into despair and bring the day of glory and vindication for you and for God. Can you declare your day of victory? Have you ever thought about the love of God and do you feel that you are becoming the embodiment of His love? I know you have tried and that you are beginning to sense it, but the day will come when it will be real and you will feel ecstatic joy. If you taste that love even once then you won't want to go anywhere else. If you are lying down at that moment then you'll say, "God, don't disturb me. I want to lie in this position for eternity." I won't explain these experiences too much for your minds won't grasp it.
I have examined these things from the historical point of view, the religious point of view and the dispensational point of view, and from every angle I have come to the same conclusion. The most important verification of it is my own tears. I have cried out for Heavenly Father's heart for many years, shedding tears which are testimony that this is the truth. Alone I discovered this precious jewel that no one could possibly buy with money. Since I am the one who discovered it, I am the front-line soldier who must show the way so that no one else will be mistaken.
I am crazy and impatient to lay the highway so that everyone else might arrive at the same conclusion. I have been walking the path from the individual level, to the family, tribal, national and worldwide levels. I came to the pinnacle at the Washington Monument Rally, the symbolic victory representing the universal level of God's victory.
When spiritual people ask God who I am, God's voice reveals to them that they must know clearly that I have done greater things than they. God has done much more than I have, working for millions of years, but I have fulfilled His providence on the physical level in several decades. Logically you understand how religion has been the tool of God. I want you to know that what I have explained is very scientific, confirmed by theory and logic.
Since confirming the truth, I can come to America and proclaim that I can unite the world. Without such a background no one could boldly announce such a thing, but you have met the very man who can make such a declaration. I started out with nothing, without one handle to grasp in this vast universe. I didn't know where to start because there was no teacher, no comforter, no friend. Now I have many friends in you, but I was the one who re-created you.
Are Americans indebted to me or not? Those parents who kidnap their own children will later repent and regret how foolish they were. It seems unreal now, but in the future their lineage will have a black mark if they cause their children to leave this movement.
What kind of person do you want to become, a possessor of God's love or of a Ph.D. from Harvard? Is it more precious to be President or a child of God? It is quite clear to you now, but coming to that conclusion was not so easy for me. You have no idea how I prayed for hours and hours, and how even now I sit on the floor in prayer every night. I am a serious man. Unless I had the real answer to all the world's questions I could not tackle this mission. No other religious leader had the answers that I now know.
Even if what I say is a lie, you could never lose by following this way of life. Suppose I had created a whole new theory for uniting the world that God never thought about; God would come down and bargain to buy it from me.
What method will bring you to the love of God?
Now we come to a matter of more reflection. You want to be taught the method which will bring you to the love of God, but you are all greedy to get such a precious thing without paying for it. How much tuition would you be willing to pay? All the people in the spirit world and the physical world put together couldn't pay for it. Many people think that I came to America for selfish reasons, but I laugh at that because possessing America is far too small a goal. My goal is much bigger: I wanted to know how to have the love of God, and I found the answer to be very simple. Do you want to know what it is?
Let's start by saying that there are three undeniable urges in man. If you are hungry enough you will do anything to get food. When you are tired you have the urge to sleep, and when you have the urge to make love it can be overwhelming. If these three elements are denied man there cannot be any happiness.
Who here has fasted seven days? On the seventh day you may count the minutes until you can eat, but that final moment will determine whether you pass or fail your entire fast. If you run to the kitchen and grab your food then you have failed, but if you can think of God at that moment and say, "Heavenly Father, I love You more than food. I can sustain far greater hunger than this for You" then you have succeeded. If you can fulfill your responsibility with a hungry stomach then you are an even more precious child to God. If you even forget about mealtime you are more precious. Women are generally weaker in this area than men. You must be victorious in overcoming hunger. Your love for God must make you strong enough to overcome the love of food.
You must be able to endure lack of sleep for love of God. Sometimes I am busy at night and just forget the time to sleep. For seven years in the early days in Korea I didn't have any bed to lie on and be comfortable in so I just lay on a table and slept a couple of hours. You can go out walking at night and say, "God, I'm here. While the world is sleeping I came out to meet You." Even now I love nature because it reminds me of the past when I went out in nature asking God to meet me.
Can you overcome the urge for physical love out of love of God? In the old days in Korea, many women chased after me but I was victorious. How could I withstand the temptation presented by having many women following me? Only through the power of the love of God. You will also face these temptations.
My first wife wanted to divorce me because she thought that I didn't love her and was only intoxicated with God. She just couldn't stand it and protested and protested, trying to win my attention, but it wasn't possible. She always said she could never find another husband like me and always complained that I should pay attention to being with her for just thirty minutes. Knowing the Principle, I really tested myself to show God and humanity that the power of God is so strong that nothing could hamper it. Could you interrupt loving your mate out of love for God? The ultimate test is whether you love God more than anyone else.
Even if you made a hole in yourself with a drill it would not equal the pain of liberating yourself and loving God most of all. How much are you fulfilling the qualifications to be a son or daughter of God? You must feel ashamed when you cannot win over all the temptations in perfection. What would you say when you pray? "God, help me. I want You to love me"? Ask yourself if you are really ready to receive the love of God. Have you made yourself qualified? An imperfect person should say, "For my sake, for Your sake, don't come too close to me. I'm not worthy. Let me make myself ready for You first." Why can't you become sons and daughters of God more easily? Do you want to eat anything you like and sleep all the hours you feel like? Do you want to live the way you like and still claim to be God's son? God has told me, "You are my loving son," and you certainly want to hear the same thing from God.
Do not try to get God's blessing of marriage too quickly. Blessing is fearful in a way. I am sure some of you are wondering why you haven't been blessed yet, but instead you should think that you are not ready to receive a member who is really loving God, and that you can't lift up your face before God. When you know the standard then you know how unworthy you are and you can honestly think that this person is too good for you. That person is God's representative and you in turn should be able to love him as God's representative.
The Americans who have had free sex come to me and think that they are ready to be blessed. How can they think that? I compared their lives to my own standard and then I reasoned that everyone has a past to be forgiven and decided that they could be accepted with repentance. The important thing is your attitude and you should use every second of the day to elevate yourself to the higher goal. In many cases I don't see that urgency in American Church members. Complacency and apathy are a big problem. In any case I am not the one who will judge you; the Principle will judge you instead of me.
You state leaders are important to our Church but you don't know me too well. It is a serious situation. It is providential that we have met but how can we succeed together? "True Parents" is an awesome word but you say it without thinking. Sometimes I don't like to hear it spoken because it is too cheaply said.
Instead of complaining, put meaning into your difficulty
There is indemnity for you to pay and you must do your 5% by taking your hunger or sleepiness as a condition of indemnity. Put meaning into these things instead of complaining; show that your love of God is greater than all of your desires. By doing that you can fulfill your 5% very quickly. I have become victorious in overcoming hunger. I have become victorious in overcoming lack of sleep and I have become victorious in overcoming the urge for love.
Up to now you have been eating for your own comfort and satisfaction and you have slept for yourself and made love for yourself. Instead of fasting all year in restitution, you must revolutionize the concept of eating and sleeping and loving. When you have your meal in front of you, think that you are going to consume the meal as God's representative. Let God eat the meal instead of yourself. For the sake of God and humanity you need that meal and as God's representative you will take the meal for your body. After you eat go out and use it for God's work instead of your own entertainment. God gave you a full stomach and now you can go and work for humanity. That's how your concept should become different.
Don't sleep for yourself. Sleep for God and humanity so you can be a better fighter tomorrow. The physical body does indeed have some limitations but don't stop there. Go to your maximum and when you reach your limitation don't stop. Cross that limitation and then come back and rest. Then your concept will become different.
It is the same in making love. As a blessed couple your love is for the sake of all humanity and for the sake of posterity. You are doing a favor for God in creating your family, but husbands must look at their wives as the symbolic total of all women of the world and of all future women of the world. By loving your wife you can love all the women of the world. Remember the greater love that you can pursue-love of God, of the Church, of the True Parents. You can transcend your personal love and become an offering for the greater purpose of love. Always be ready to go beyond yourself.
How could you not expect persecution and suffering for following such a high goal? Being a man of God, you are not persecuted as one man but as a son of God, as the representative of God. By receiving persecution and suffering, you are paying indemnity for all those in the past who suffered here on earth. Had you ever thought that you were doing them that favor? God is giving you the chance to win over all facets of human relationships-political, religious, physical, economic, sexual-and clear them in the spirit world. Actually you are setting a condition to liberate yourself in all those areas and then no one can accuse you because there will be nothing left for Satan to manipulate.
No one can do your 5% except yourself and you must search after it and liquidate it. When you make yourself God's representative then everything you do becomes God's act. When you pick up peanuts or gum for fund raising, it is God's act. God has given you a mandate to fund raise and even though you may look like a beggar you are actually God's ambassador. If you fund raise under much persecution then you will feel lonely, but if you win the result with the conviction that you are God's ambassador then it is even more precious. People may not like to give you money but you have a right to receive it because it will be used to restore the ungodly world. Everything depends on how your mind works. That creates value.
Life on the MFT is valuable indemnity. There you meet all kinds of people, circumstances and suffering and the only way you can sustain yourself is by making yourself an ambassador of God. It is excellent training. Perhaps you have been in the Unification Church for three years but still you are humbly dressed and externally you have gained nothing. You might even look more pale and humbly dressed than you did three years ago but now you have some precious luggage, a package of indemnity. If you did anything wrong while you were sincerely trying to do God's will then that becomes my responsibility, not yours.
If you have a big package of indemnity then you can go to God and pay indemnity for your family, your race, your country and even the spirit world, all out of your own spiritual bank account. It parallels the love you can give in the spirit world. My thinking is different from yours; I am looking for the next problem because I want more criticism and controversy so I can fill a bag of indemnity big enough to liberate everyone, including the spirit world.
Is going on the MFT a blessing or curse? On the MFT you can meet God. When you go out to the streets with a sincere and earnest heart then God will speak to you. Do you think that you are a wise guy to avoid hard work? No, you are foolish, wasting your energy and time. Whether people recognize your work or not, jump into it and bite into the mainstream of the movement. The Bible says that you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free, and now you know why the Unification Church must go this way.
Money manipulates everything in this world, but our money is entirely different because it has nothing to do with our own power. I am winning money for God's purpose and spending it for humanity, not for myself. You have to go beyond loving your own race and nationality and make yourself a person who loves God. Then you are a world citizen, a universal man.
At first you were frightened, but now you are confident to do the job
Ours is a dream-like task but we are seriously tackling it as reality. After being on the MFT you will go witnessing, sweating and shedding tears for the restoration of man. Later you will sweat and labor for the construction of your family and home. MFT duty or witnessing is a light burden compared to harmonizing one heavenly home here on earth. Perfecting your love in your home is not easy! When you are husband and wife, you may quarrel about trivial things and then you will look back on your days on the MFT and witnessing, remembering how you were really patient to win one person. When you think of that then you know that winning your husband or wife is more difficult.
At the outset of human history Satan plundered the heavenly creation and Adam and Eve, and ultimately took away the love between God and man. Now we are restoring all things by restoring love and creating heavenly homes. I know very well that we have to pay the historical debt and I know how difficult it is. When you set the condition of absolute obedience then whether your result is good or poor doesn't make any difference. You can grab me and say, "At least I did one thing; I obeyed you unconditionally," Then I have no excuse and God has no excuse. If you love me then how could I send you away?
Originally God wanted man to become physically and spiritually mature at the same time, having one man and woman create the heavenly Garden of Eden. When man and woman, mind and body, East and West become one and are ignited by the love of God, then the true Garden of Eden will exist. Can you imagine the time when all indemnity is paid and you are lifted up by the fire of love? You would blast off and zoom all the way through the cosmos.
This world is trying to evaluate the depth of such knowledge and truth but it can't be captured by only watching me or by using special lenses or a microscope. When I went to sea, people in nearby boats were studying me with binoculars but all they saw was an ordinary Oriental man sitting there. The depth of someone's heart cannot be seen. You can hide a beautiful love in your own heart and no one can see it. Each one of you should have a powerhouse inside that is not visible to the human eye. When you become a powerhouse of the love of God you can communicate with the spirit world and with God Himself.
In the beginning when I would push you out you were almost frightened, but now the truth has filtered down to the depths of your heart and you feel that this job needs to be done, and you also feel confident that you can do it. I am not just blindly pushing you. I never ask anything that I have not already experienced, so don't think I am just a cruel man. Once you know the truth then you can joyfully respond and push yourself out. You will become a self-disciplined man.
Shall we continue to search after the love of God? If the rest of the world were competing to do more for the love of God, what kind of world would we have? If America is restored, then its young people will ask where they can go to suffer and put on the shoes of a servant in order to help the people. You have learned that already so you want to practice it here in America, and if all American young people were mobilized in that fashion, then with the love of God the world could be conquered as though it were a small peanut.
Usually I do not speak this openly. Do you know why I am in such a jubilant mood? I drove westward for several thousand miles and now I feel as though I have arrived home in Korea.
When I see immature, uncommitted people I feel almost sorry for them. Will you determine to live up to my expectation? This is your country, so you should want to restore it more than I do. Would you like to do it in place of me? Your yes is not a committed yes. Since we were searching for the love of God and we found it. That's all I have to say. Is there anything further? You have the highest goal and you know it clearly now. Don't worry about whether God comes down to help you in your state. You can tell God to go help the weaker people in another state. You can tell me to go take a trip and really appreciate America or to take a year or two and visit other continents instead of coming to visit you. Can you do it? I don't even need to worry about ten or twenty years from now? I heard your answer. Let us pray.