Sun Myung Moon
April 1, 1988
Belvedere
Translator: Col. Sang Kil Han
True Parents offer the whole creation to God in prayer at the Main Pledge Service at East Garden on the Day of All Things, June 14, 1988
The whole of humanity, as well as the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms, has a certain mission to fulfill. Since God is the Creator, He must have a certain plan or pattern for what He wants to accomplish, according to His will. However, we often feel that we would like to do things only the way we want to do them, according to our own will. There is no difference between the races as far as this feeling goes. Oriental or Westerner, rich or poor, all have that same urge: I want to do as I like.
There are many different classes and levels of people among the five billion people of the world, from the lofty to the lowly. We all think we exist separately or independently from other people or groups; but we do not exist that way. Americans are ancestrally connected to Britain, Europe, and Africa. Beyond that, we are connected to all of history. We are not alone. We are not independent. Have you ever stopped to think that your eyes are not yours alone? Your father's eyes, your mother's eyes, your grandparents' eyes, and all your ancestors' eyes are in your eyes. They are a part of all history.
When we go out on the street in the springtime, we see women dressed in all different colors, shapes, and designs. Each one wants to stand out from the crowd and be unique, doesn't she? People like feel, "I do not belong to anyone. I am completely independent. I don't have to be influenced by anyone." But to think like that is to no avail, because it just isn't so.
While every one of us exists as "I," as an individual, we are never alone and independent or detached from others. We are a part of the whole of mankind, the whole line of history, and "I" exist in the center of that.
We All Have a Proper Place
Let us consider that we are all like works of art in an exhibition. If the world is a museum, then "I" am one of the exhibits. Each exhibit must stay in his position. No matter how valuable an object is, or no matter how valuable an individual may be, if he does not stay where he is supposed to and wanders around according to his own will, he immediately loses value because he is not serving his purpose.
We all have a proper place and should not go just anywhere we feel. If I stay where I am supposed to stay and go in the direction true human beings are supposed to go, then I, as a representative of all human beings, will be cherished by the universe.
Leaders should be in the leaders' position. If a leader leaves his position on his own and goes somewhere else, he loses his value. He is the same person, but if he is in a different position, he is not as valuable there. When a leader leaves his proper place and goes the wrong way, the other people feel, "I wish he wasn't my leader." In the same way, parents have certain expectations of their children; they want their child to do what he is supposed to do and become successful in life. But what if that child becomes involved with the wrong things and makes trouble all the time? The parents might think, "Oh, I wish that child wasn't mine." Is it because the parent is unloving that he thinks this way? No. We can understand that parent's heart. It is because the parent knows universal law; he knows which way his child should go. His original mind and conscience know, and when that child goes astray, he feels a great deal of pain.
This situation extends to the society and national level. Even a country is supposed to go in a certain direction. If it doesn't, we may wish that country just didn't exist. Look at the powerful communist countries. A few decades ago, some people briefly thought that communism was the highest ideology, but time has proved that communism is not going in the direction of mankind's ideals. Now they are saying, "Communism must contain itself; it must not spread." Even many of the communist countries themselves think that communism should be dissolved.
Why is this? Because each individual human being has a conscience and knows the original way he is supposed to go. We always have to check and make sure we are in the right position. If we are not, either we correct our position or our position is eliminated. We have to constantly ask ourselves, "Am I standing in a position where I will never be eliminated?" You should have the confidence to say, "Yes, Father. I am where I am supposed to be. I am very sure about that. I must stay where I am because the world needs me and the universe needs me." This is a serious matter.
Some people are not sure, so they try to find out where their leader wants them go to. But suppose there is a person who is constantly checking himself and striving to go in the right direction, the unmistakable direction. He continually tries to bring himself more and more closely into the true position. Such a person is destined to be a leader of the rest of mankind.
What Is the True Way?
The Orient has produced many saints. Confucius, Buddha, Jesus, and Mohammed all came from the East. But who is the saint of all saints? Christians would say Jesus is the greatest, but wouldn't the Buddhists say Buddha? This could be confusing. Are there many different paths a human being must go? What if those four saints got together and tried to determine whose way was better. One thing they wouldn't say is, "My way is best." Instead they would each say, "I will ask Heaven and see which direction is the best of all." That is the difference between saints and ordinary people.
What about someone from the secular world? How would they come up with the best idea? They would probably form a Board of Directors and hire representatives; they would analyze their findings and come to a certain conclusion. Their answer may be right for a season. They may be right for that time in history, but for all other times it may not apply.
The founding fathers of America agreed upon a system of democracy. They saw very clearly that democracy was the only thing that would work. They tried to be very conscientious in creating their constitution and then they asked God if it was right. When they got the answer that it was, they ratified it. But that was 200 years ago. Look how much the environment has changed since then. Is what the people decided 200 years ago exactly right for now? Impossible. The American people should be constantly going back to God and asking, "Are we still all right?" Yet has there ever been a president who asked God exactly how to do things? No. Not here or anywhere. Pragmatism has always served the immediate purpose. Pragmatism means doing not what God decides but what man decides is the most practical thing in the moment. We cannot be satisfied with pragmatism. We know there is something higher. Shouldn't we abandon secularism and humanism in hopes of reaching something more lasting and enduring?
When each of those four religious founders started out, each was quite confident that he was going in the most righteous direction. But eventually each came to realize that his way was not perfect after all. Today, their followers are fighting bitterly amongst themselves and against each other. That is proof enough that none of their ways is the ultimate way.
Then how shall we resolve this? Where can we find the true way? We have to go back to Heaven and ask God what we should do.
More Precious than Scripture
Why did I come to America? It is very simple. I knew that while the direction Christianity was going here may have been right once, it is no longer adequate. The people need to be shown a higher way, a way that represents human beings and history more fully. The people need to be uplifted so that America can serve as a leader of the entire world. I came to America to provide that impetus.
What if the four religious founders got together for a conference and, with God as the chairman, discussed how the world should be? First, there would be a debate, with each holy person explaining his own view. Do you think they would come to a conclusion as to which was the true way in one month's time? How about a year's time? If God and the saints were at the conference table year after year with still no consensus, they would get exhausted and give up, wouldn't they?
Then would God, who is also getting tired of the conference, say, "Well, since we can't come to an agreement, I'll make the decision"? No. The four would say, "God, You can't go against the law of Your own creation, the law of man's responsibility." God would admit, "Okay, you're right. You four saints represent all of humankind, so you decide. Tell me, what do you think are the most significant teachings?" Jesus might say, "The Bible is the utmost direction-giver. Without the Bible we could never follow the true way of life." Then Mohammed might say, "No, we must decide everything based on the Koran." Then there would be even more serious debates. But think about it. What is more important and significant than those holy books? You Unification Church members are saints or near-saints -- or should be anyway. What is more significant than the Bible, the Koran, or any book? What is the point about which all holy people would say, "Yes, I agree that that is the most important thing of all"?
Yes, it's true love. No one would oppose this. Even Satan knows this. The most important things are true love, true life, and true living. People have been so serious about the Koran and the Bible, yet the purpose of these books is to lead people to a conscientious way of life, the true way of life. The books themselves are not the goal.
Suppose these three things -- true love, true life, and true living -- came up for consideration as the most important things in the world. Would you and Confucius and Jesus all vote for them? Yes and all five billion people in the world would agree about these three points. Do you think anyone would find any objection to this conclusion, saying, "That's not enough"? Not likely.
How about God? Would God reject that conclusion? No, even God would have to agree. But should God say first, "This is what I know you need"? Or should the four saints go to God and say, "God, there is nothing more precious than this. This is what we are longing for. Please give it to us."
The True Love Direction
Today's topic is "The Will and I." What is the will of God, anyway? The will of God is that man should stand in a certain position and go in a certain direction -- the true love direction. That is what God wanted to express from the very beginning. If saints leave their position and go in a deviated direction, they no longer have anything to do with God or God's will. If the saints do not become one with the will of God, can they remain in the position of saints?
Imagine that the Unification Church is a big exhibition center where all the different things that God wants to see are exhibited. Shouldn't a person on display stay where he is supposed to stay and go in the direction he is supposed to go? Here is the American museum. But suppose the museum moves to Korea and all the objects have to be moved to the Korean museum. Will the objects say, "No, I don't want to go to the Korean museum. I am fine in the American museum"? What if the display were to go to Africa. Would the objects say, "No, I would rather not go to the African museum"? The purpose of the display is to show the whole world. If that person on display says such things, is that person connected with God's will or has he failed?
As a human being, actually as a saint, we must say, "There is a way I must go. There is a way I must follow, whether it be straight or winding. Whatever I may personally feel about it, still I am destined to go that way."
It is very hard to k low God and stay with God, but at least we can know the head of the museum, who can tell us where we are supposed to be. There are many religions and some are very good, but who is qualified to be the head of the museum of religion? All of the religions of the world have been separated; they have been fighting and they have been confused, but there is one that spends millions and millions of dollars plus time and effort and prayer to bring all the world's religions together.
Religious people are saying that the only hope of the religious world is Rev. Moon. He has brought religious people to the point where they would rather worship together than apart. What is the purpose of the Unification Church? Is it to separate Buddhism from Christianity or to divide the Christian churches? No. The purpose of the Unification Church, of course, is to bring all the churches together into one.
Many churches still insist merely on the truth of their own scripture. But there is one church that places much more importance upon these three things -- true love, true life, and true living. Would God go to a place where utmost importance is put on doctrine or would He follow us here? Why? Because when people come here, they can always find their rightful position -- being an object to the true subject, God.
Perpetual Circular Motion
Once you have correctly established the position of subject and object, you can always talk to God. You are free in this position of object to God, and you can find real peace and security there. You are provided for; you have no worries. As long as you take these three things seriously, then you don't have to worry about anything else, because this is the will of God.
As you have noticed, the words "life," "love," and "living" are all abstract nouns. They do not have a shape. Therefore, God took time and great pains to make physical things out of His ideas. Men and women were created by God with substantial, physical bodies to be the embodiment of true love, true life, and true living.
Did God inject true life and love into man or did man inject it into God? God did it, therefore He is the subject body. He is the center of being, the one who exists totally for the sake of others. This is the way God intended it. This is the philosophy that the Unification Church is teaching -- the philosophy of living for the sake of others. This is very, very important; this is the very essence of God's ideal.
What is true life? God is the center of life, and He invested His own life into the creation. That is true life. God invested Himself completely, not halfway. He did not keep some back. That is what "true" means. True life means that God has completely placed Himself into others.
True life is direct. It allows for no deviation. But if you just continue going straight ahead and never return, there can be no ideal. The ideal exists where there is perpetual circular motion, going out and coming back again and again, forever. With true life alone there can be no ideal. You need a response, or else there is no eternity. But true love has the power to make you turn around, so when you add true love to true life, the ideal is created. Look at little children -- they never want to just go in a straight line even for a minute. They want to go around and around. Aren't you that way too?
Why is love so precious and necessary? Because love brings you your object or subject. Why did God inject such preciousness -- His own self and life -- into man? Isn't it because God also needs love? Does God take pleasure in always pulling you in one direction? Doesn't He need some response? When He pulls on you, wouldn't He want you to pull back on Him?
God invested in us until He had nothing left. He emptied Himself completely. That is the nature of being true. So we should give something back to Him, shouldn't we? How? By living for the sake of others. When you live for the sake of others, there is a force always coming back and igniting love. Do you follow?
Invest Yourself Totally
This is how God is: God invests everything into a being, and then that being experiences love. Then that explosive love will be returned back to the original Being who made all that investment. God created everything according to this principle.
God gave everything to man. A man should want to give everything to a woman. Then the woman will want to give everything back to the man, and the man will want to give everything back to God. Things are created that way. When this give and take action takes place in a lively way, then the two will come into complete unity and never separate. That is the focal point of God's love. When a man and woman are really in love and live in love, God is living there too. That is the most ideal place, the nucleus.
This is the secret of a subject/object relationship, the secret of being a spouse. Pour your love into your spouse; live for the sake of your spouse; do things for his sake, day after day. When he gets saturated, he may say, "Why are you doing all this? I don't want this," and he may even want to escape. But if you continue loving him, he will turn around and return your love. Love will grow. That is the Principle of Creation.
What are saints? Saints are the ones who are ahead of other people in realizing, practicing, and teaching this principle. In other words, saints are people who have expanded this realm of living for the sake of others. It's all part of the law of the creation. We must go and we must love. We must put all our love and everything we've got into our families, into other people, and into the nation. This is the course we have to follow, and then this living principle will just go around and around and expand throughout space.
There is only one way for us to go. I, as an individual, must love my spouse and then bring all of society into oneness and later meet God. Then I will fall in love with God and jump into that love and live happily day by day. When I really live for the sake of other people, the society, and the nation, love always comes back to me.
If you are trying to find love, that is the wrong process. You cannot "find" love. That goes against the process of the law of creation. You have to invest yourself first. Have you done that? Have you poured your love into your spouse? Love is bound to come back to you as much as you have poured your life into the other. When that happens, love starts coming back.
When Ownership Begins
We are establishing this tradition here on earth for the first time in history. I have lived for the sake of leaving this tradition behind. I have lived absolutely consistently with the will of God. I always put in everything I've got. I spare nothing. I always search out how I can give even more. Then all things start to follow me. That is when ownership begins. That is when you start to truly own things. A husband and wife may think they love each other and say they love each other, but if one disagrees with the other and gets offended and they start quarreling, that is obviously not love. Love is when we want to put our whole life into the relationship so there is nothing more to put in. Then love starts coming back. Then there is no more quarrelling.
The more we love, the more love and ownership will come to us. That is the living, daily philosophy of the Unification Church. When we practice this, we are guaranteed to be on the right path. Even if we do not realize where we are going, we are going in the right direction.
Imagine a big family with many, many brothers and sisters and uncles and aunts and in-laws. Who is going to be the center of that family, the master of that house, in the future? It will be the person who invests the most into that family, giving everything he's got for the sake of the other family members day in and day out and not expecting anything in return. You can predict who is going to be the center of that household and be the true owner of everything. Everyone and everything will want to belong to that person.
We know we must love the world, but that concept is too vague. How do we love? This is something that Unification Church members must know. We've got to put our life totally into what we are doing -- just as God did for us; then all things will want to belong to us. In order to own everything with love, give. Give all you have. This is our credo.
Don't say, "Where is love?" Don't say, "My husband must love me," or "I expect love from my wife." If you do, peace and love can never be realized within your family. There is no love until we put our love in. Do you understand? This is an amazing truth. On an individual level all the way up to the national level, we must love unto our very lives. Put in everything you have, then your investment will return as love towards you. How wonderful that is!
If you want to be a true mother or true father, you must ask yourself how much you have loved your children in a righteous way. Children who are loved absolutely will never want to leave you, even if you scold them. When everything comes back to you and wants to be owned by you, then you can live happily every day. That is the ideal.
God loves us, but we have to love God too. All things belong to God, and if we love God, all things also belong to us. There is no other way to own anything in the universe except through loving God. Then we begin to own things.
Your Own Mind Knows
Now we know all men and women must go this way. How do you know if you've invested everything? Your own mind knows before anyone has to tell you. You know whether you have given your 100 percent or not. Nobody needs to tell you. In the spirit world you will not be able to pretend, because everything will be revealed. Daily living for the sake of each other is the ideal. There is no other way you can find the ideal. Did you know that God tries to love even Satan? That is the amazing reality we must learn.
Every day I am so excited that I hate it when one day ends; I can't wait until the next day dawns. That kind of excitement is the ideal way. Unless and until we put everything we have into what we are doing, we cannot realize true joy. Just put in more and more every day without thinking what will be returned. Then you will always have more and more -- never less. I have always followed this formula.
At the last moment you may feel you have done enough. Then insist on putting in one more bit of effort. That one step makes all the difference. When love owns you, you can't oppose it. You have to belong to somebody. How can you object to belonging to someone who truly loves you?
Do you think I'm a happy person? Why do you think so? Because I know that in the future, even Satan, even the communists, will not be able to oppose me. How can they oppose me when I love them?
What is the will of God? It is to fulfill the ideal of creation, which is to form a four position foundation and live for the sake of others. Then all the love ownership comes back to God. The person who has done this will have lived the will of God. Such a couple will be an ideal family and live happily ever after. This is the nucleus through which the whole world can be connected. The world is an extension of such a family.
The ideal life is putting everything we have into our ideal. No country will oppose this way of life; therefore, we can go anywhere and be welcome. This is the ideal; this is the will of God and this is our philosophy. If we really live this philosophy, won't the world become the ideal world?
The secular world today has its philosophy: "I want to be loved. I'm going to take whatever I can get." With that philosophy, there can never be unity or peace. The Unification Church's teaching and God's formula is to live for the sake of other people. Then automatically, the world will come into unity.
How can we say that it will automatically come into unity? Because God lives that way. If we live that way, our unity becomes broader and broader. God lives the way I have described, and we are about to live the same way. This is the way I have always lived. There is no other way; there is no other secret but this. The proof is striking. Now we all see that the ideal world is at hand.
Do you say, "Oh, I expect the ideal world will come pretty soon. I'd like to sit in that kind of world, and when I die, I will go to heaven"? If we think like that, we are no better than thieves. What is a thief? He doesn't work, yet he takes everything. You have to realize that you have come this far because of the investment of True Parents. Without that investment, you would not be able to participate in God's world.
If we do not do enough, how can we stand in front of God? Our conscience will not permit us to. One thing we should never be in the future is ashamed of ourselves. I have always lived conscious of the fact that I could never lead a life I was ashamed of.
We need salvation. This is a very real situation. We want to be saved, and we will be saved, not with shame but with dignity. We cannot eat as we like; we cannot sleep as we like; we cannot say and do things as we like when there is the possibility that later we might be ashamed of that action. At this very moment, our brothers and sisters are losing their lives at the hands of Satan. How can we be complacent?
You must not just borrow this way of thinking and this way of life from me, but you must make it your Own. You must be proud of the concept itself and live this life just as I do, so that you can become true descendants. I do not just think this, I live it. It is not just words; it is actions. Do you understand clearly?
Now we know how we will achieve salvation; how we can be saved with dignity, without shame. We are all individual messiahs of love. When we practice love, love will come back to us, with ownership. That is reality.
Plant love and you will never perish. You may suffer, but you will never perish and you will never be ashamed. Do you understand? Those who say, "Father, I understand deeply now and I will live the way of love," raise your hands.
Let us pray.
Religious scholars examine the nature of God at the sixth conference on God: The Contemporary Discussion, held in Key West, Florida.
Our Standard of Devotion
Home Church Is My Kingdom of Heaven
1/1/81, World Mission Center
Maybe you think, "Father talks too much about witnessing to 360 homes; I will do it sitting in my living room." Sometimes things happen if you set the right conditions; but sometimes you have to act to make things happen. How nice it would be if home church could be accomplished just by setting some condition! For instance, it would be nice if you could put down the names of your 360 families on a big piece of paper and write something on it every day, thinking, "This will serve as my condition of having visited my area every day." But it doesn't work that way.
Just as I have worked hard, you also have to work hard and do everything as I did. That kind of effort is needed to make home church successful. Heaven on earth is the place where your ideal and your love can dwell. Home church belongs to you, and when you really work at it, your ancestry and the supporting spiritual world will come down and help you accomplish it. You will discover that the spiritual world will actually help you very much, but you won't find this out until you do it.
The Things We Want to Be Proud Of
10/25/81, Belvedere
Do you like home church? Do you want to do it yourself, or together with someone else? Can two people become the greatest in your home church area at the same time? There can be only one greatest person, not two. So shouldn't you do it yourself? In home church, you know it is difficult to become the greatest, but this is what you must do.
Is it greater to work for the world or for the nation? Would you then choose to work in America or in another country? Would you even go into the desert or the jungle? Would you rather go to a part of Africa where white people are welcomed or to a place where they are persecuted? How much more training do you need here to meet this kind of challenge? You know what I will say to you even before I speak; I will keep telling you to suffer more and work harder, even though you feel it is impossible. Should you ignore this kind of teacher, or should you welcome him, even if it is painful?
Let Us Protect Ourselves
5/1/82, Belvedere
For four years, I have been telling you that you must work hard in your home church area, but how much actual work have you done for the sake of home church? Our whole objective is to invite God to dwell with us. Are you making a base for Him in home church? Within your own mind, how much do you actually want to go out and do home church? Your words alone do not prove anything. Too often American young people say something but cannot carry it out. How can such a standard be trusted?
We all say we want to become righteous people, but what is a righteous person? A righteous person is one who will go against any odds, any difficulties, to keep on the right path. In the Bible, Abraham prayed to God and begged Him to spare Sodom if there were only ten righteous people in it. God answered that He would. You are in the very same position today. If you follow my direction and work diligently in your home church area, you will be the righteous people standing before God in America. Because you are righteous, someday all your home church members will also be righteous. By observing the way you sweat and shed tears for them, those people will find their hearts reviving; eventually, they will have the strength and inspiration to go out and do as you do.
If you are focusing only on when your wedding will occur, you are certainly not serious enough. America is literally in a last- minute position. The country has to be alive first before your individual and family situation can be secured. How can you think about how you look or whether or not you have nice clothing and makeup and so forth when the country is in such spiritual danger?... Now we are engaged in a spiritual war, and nothing else is more important than winning that war. Do you understand that?
Some people say, "I need to study more; then maybe I will be able to do home church," but they have not realized the urgency of the situation. Your shoes should wear out from walking in your area. The number of pairs of shoes you wear out will be your pride and your record of accomplishment in the future. The spirit world is always eager to help you, but you must create the conditions that enable them to do so.