The World Needs Someone Like You

Sun Myung Moon
July 25, 1974

I express special thanks to God that under such hardship you have completed your three-day prayer and fast.

This cathedral or temple [the Capitol Building] is a symbol of America. This is the heart of the nation of America. This cathedral is created not for America alone, but for the whole of mankind, centering on God. God has always thought that this place would be the center for Him, not just for one nation.

When you look at the situation today, America is in crisis. If we have no oneness here-unity of Congress, the Senate and the White House-there is no oneness in this nation, and there can be no unity in this world. The reason we participate in Watergate Declaration demonstrations goes beyond national boundaries; we are centering on God's will for this nation and the whole world. We have been fighting to make unity among the Senators and Congressman and the President and the people. Now the time has come to fulfill his goal, which all nations have been striving for.

With more than 600 National Prayer and Fast Committee members from all over America, we initiated this three day fast right here. We represent the people of America. We are here on behalf of the Senators and Congressmen and President and cabinet. We participated in chis fast in order to bring unity to the three branches of government, to lead them to become one, centering on God. The three day fast was for the three branches of government in this nation to become one, centering on God's will-not on their own will and not on only one nation. We spoke out on one of the biggest issues for this nation and for the whole world.

We are youth, young people. We must take the responsibility for the state of chis nation, for America and for the future. All other American youth are in despair, they have no place to go. Of the young people in America, very few think of the nation, of Congress or of the people. They think about themselves all the time. In contrast to these young people, you are a special breed who will take responsibility for chis nation's future and destiny. The nation of America needs young people like you, centering on God. Not only chis nation but the whole world needs someone like you, because you are centering on God, not on yourself.

We have to be united into one, more desperately, more solidly. We have to increase from six hundred to six thousand young people, and from six thousand to six million. We have to unite all young people who are willing to risk their lives, willing to sacrifice for the sake of the nation and the whole world. You are the ones; you must be the model. I hope you will be pioneers in this area, carrying on in the spirit of the founding fathers. Then you shall be the leaders of the nation and of the whole world.

I appreciate this, and thank God and thank you. You have completely accomplished your mission of the three-day prayer and fast. Also, I give my special thanks to all other people who helped, such-as Senators and Congressmen who came out to show their gratitude and cooperation with your operation, to make it successful. Thank you very much for your generosity and public support, and especially I thank Rabbi Korff.

Sun Myung Moon's words on the Watergate Scandal from 1972 to 1979

Compiled by Taekon Lee
July 22, 2018

In 1972 and 1973 the US president was brought to his knees. I conveyed the Watergate Statement to President Nixon, telling him there would be a way for him to survive if he listened to what I had to say. I also sent similar letters to every US senator and congressman. Watergate was not just a coincidence, but a chance for me to connect to the White House. It is a historical fact that we have been able to maintain ties with the White House for two consecutive years. When people study the Watergate incident, without fail they will see that my name is historically recorded there supporting America and the presidency. Although people may want to deny this, it cannot be denied. (069-308, 1974/01/01)

When America was in turmoil over the Watergate scandal, I cried out for the people to return to God. In order to return to God we need forgiveness, and I told the American people that in order to receive forgiveness they have to forgive. In the Watergate Statement I was declaring that we should forgive. If we cannot forgive the sins of others, we cannot be forgiven. Using one person, President Nixon, as their representative, I was telling the people that individually, as churches, and as a nation, "You are also sinners. You should first repent and forgive President Nixon." I was the one in America who introduced the idea of pardoning President Nixon.

The democratic world is collapsing because Christianity is collapsing. Christianity is collapsing because while the problems in each nation and the whole world multiply, leaders and peoples are not conferring with God but doing things on their own. It is the same as at the time of the Human Fall in the Garden of Eden. (071-247, 1974/05/01)

When I first came to America, I was but one individual who had received the command of heaven, and I had only three years to convey my ideas to all 240 million citizens. Irrespective of whether they listened or not, I had to make an impression and let them know. How would I do this? I had no foundation, no cooperation, and there was even opposition. How could I overcome this situation? I had to go straight forward and reach their hearts. That is why early on I met with prominent senators. I also met with congressional representatives and then I met many prominent and distinguished people. I then considered how to reach the White House, and that's when the Watergate incident exploded. Because of this incident, it became possible for me to meet President Nixon. Americans were in a state of opposition, hopelessness and disappointment. At that point I thought that I should show them a way forward based on Christian love. (075-203, 1975/01/02)

"For a long time, I researched various religions and religious people. I met with many congressmen and other prominent figures. I also met the prominent people of the nation. I met them, but they had no desire in their hearts to save the world. During the Watergate incident, I saw that America can slip and fall to the bottom of the pit with just a minor mistake, and that the religious leaders, including world-renowned people like Billy Graham, should stand at the front line and lead a citizens' movement to protect America. However, these people were not thinking this way at all.

That is why this person called Moon, who was born in Asia, took responsibility. However, this is not something that is done easily. I had to risk my life and consult with God to find out what He wanted. The person standing here in front of you is not a politician. I am someone who acts according to God's Word. Someone should protect the nation and the world, and show humankind the way to go. I knew this and that is why I resolved to tread this risky path. The Unification Church made this final resolution. (072- 025, 1974/05/07)

In 1972, I proclaimed the Word in seven cities throughout America. Based on that foundation, I evangelized 21 cities in 1973. During this time, centered on the Watergate incident, which had come out months before, I concluded the 21-city tour on January 28, nearing the end of the second seven years of the 21-year course. After that, I came here to Washington and met President Nixon.

I did not ask to meet him, but President Nixon himself set a date and offered to meet me. We did not meet by coincidence. If a head of state wants to meet the president, they customarily have to make an appointment one and a half years in advance, so this encounter with him was an historic event. He had cleared his schedule and did not meet with anyone during the two weeks leading up to January 30, when he was to give his State of the Union address to Congress. On February 1, after his address, I was the first person he met. He had turned down all meetings with state representatives and ambassadors in order to meet with me.

When I met him, I said, "Let us pray." President Nixon bowed his head in prayer. It was an historic precedent that we could pray as we began such a meeting. We had an exceptional meeting. He thanked me, saying that Reverend Moon showed more concern about him than anyone else in the nation. I could feel that he was overwhelmed and happy. I cannot deny that it was a historic moment, comparable to that of a Roman emperor meeting Jesus. (070-281, 1974/02/14)

As a result of the Watergate incident, America's future had become uncertain. I opened a way for Christianity and helped stabilize this country. We also established a way for the democratic world and America to go forward. This is possible because I met with President Nixon according to God's Will. That is why I prayed when I met him. It was not coincidence. People may not know, but it was already determined that we would overcome a major obstacle at that point in the providential era. (070-236, 1974/02/10)

My support for President Nixon was not for him as an individual, but for his position as president. American citizens should know this in the future. The leader of the nation should have authority when he establishes new policies and decides the fate of the nation. That is why I supported him.

If President Nixon had remained in office, the Vietnam war would not have ended as it did and Cambodia would not have been left in the state it was. I predicted that President Nixon's departure would lead to the current outcome. It is a national shame to have left behind billions of dollars' worth of weapons for the communist world. It should be considered a major defeat for this leading country in the democratic world. (080-040, 1975/10/04)

supported President Nixon so that America could end the Vietnam War quickly and with victory. I thought that with this victory, Asia's defense zone would be expanded. I concluded that the Nixon Doctrine had to be revised. If the Nixon Doctrine had stood, the security threat surrounding Korea would immediately have subsided. God desires to see America and her president unite and join in solidarity with Asia.

However, the American people separated from their president. Seeing this, I insisted that they should forgive, love and unite. Then Christianity would have become one with President Nixon and with all American citizens. If that had occurred as a result of what I advocated, people eventually would have united with me. I came here as a benefactor to save and unite America. That is why President Nixon needed my counsel. The Watergate incident could have been resolved very quickly. (106-121, 1979/12/16)

Becoming a Responsible Person

Sun Myung Moon
July 14, 1974
Tarrytown, NY

Rev. Moon gives direction to American and international leaders. Seated at left are Rev. Reiner Vincenz, Rev. Paul Werner, and Neil A. Salonen

Everybody wants to be a responsible person over others. Among responsible persons there are those who are supported by others, and those who are not supported by others. There are many kinds of persons responsible over others. Some are responsible over ten people, or a hundred people, over an organization, over a nation, and even over the whole world.

Seen from the viewpoint of God's providence, there are people responsible over internal things and people responsible over external things. Which kind of responsible persons are more important? Many young people think that they want to be responsible over a nation. Each one thinks that he wants to be the most important, capable leader of the nation. He especially wants to cause his nation to develop and progress more than ever, and thinks of many ways to do this. He must have the capacity, potential, or power to do this, and he will have many ways to apply the power. He must know how to organize and develop. Before taking action he must study the situation closely and see how things have been developing in his nation. Then he must use some power or capacity to cause progress to occur. He wants to leave what is already good and either improve or revolutionize what has been bad or not desirable.

Those who are capable get responsibility.

A person who is responsible over others must have a certain capacity. He must have not only the power or capacity to take responsibility but also the power to cause things to develop. He must be efficient and capable, and he needs strong leadership ability; then he can cause his people and his organization to grow. His ability cannot be perfected in an instant, but he must have much experience. Through education we will inherit the knowledge which other people have accumulated, and then we must put it into practice ourselves. We must first have the knowledge, and then put it into practice until it is proven. Unless what you have is better than what others have, you cannot be responsible over others. Naturally we come to the conclusion that people who are more capable than others will be responsible over them. Whether the group is large or small, it doesn't matter. The same principle applies.

In order for you to be a leader, you must have the ability to organize, but more than anything else, you must be the person who is the center of love. It is simple to ask what kind of personality God has; we can first of all say that He is the person who wants to believe or trust people, while they are not trustworthy.

When in the Garden of Eden God commanded Adam and Eve not to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, He wanted to trust these people. Of course, there were many things for which God could not trust them, but He tried to trust them and put them in the position of His children whom He could rely on. In creating the universe, too, of course God created the universe for Himself, but mostly, or in another sense, He created the universe for His children, Adam and Eve. God wanted to give love, a love of untold value, to those children who were yet immature.

The most important thing is to lead in love

In order for you to become responsible leaders, you must be equipped with external qualities of course, but then the next thing, or the most important thing to come, is to know how to love them, lead them in love. People need a leader over them who is responsible for them and who will take care of them. So they want to believe that the leader is for them, and that the leader loves them. These qualities are indispensable for a leader, a genuine leader.

However hard you may struggle to be a good leader and give out your love and your whole being to the people, sometimes they not only betray you but they would try to use you. When the leader's love towards his people is self-centered, and if he calculates on what's coming as the reward, he is apt to be discouraged at the moment when he is faced with rebuff, and then think that he is not for these people, and he will retreat from his position.

When you are responsible over financial things, it is easy. You calculate and you say you have obtained so much profit, and you think you have done your part. But for spiritual leaders, things are different -- and more important. In the financial matters, if you have acquired what you have planned, then you are successful. But on the spiritual level of things, even though you have won some people's hearts, if others complain or others are in low spirits, and if you cannot distribute your love evenly and people are not equally happy, you are not a successful leader.

As a spiritual leader, you must not be satisfied with their response, and even though your group is happy for the time being, you must add more things to them and try to make them happier and still happier. The greatest of all the spiritual leaders being God, you can well imagine how difficult God's situation is. Do you imagine that the great spiritual leaders of the world always feel happiness in their hearts? If you can get them to be really frank to you, they are always distressed, they are always unhappy or miserable. It is because a spiritual leader always has to give away what he has, always be giving. He has to deal with so many types of people all the time, and if he cannot give things out to them, in that case his love must not be one-sided, and his love has to be fulfilling to every kind of person. There are all kinds of people, and if they cannot feel contented or satisfied, what would he do? Problems are apt to arise there.

Seen from this viewpoint, God is the loneliest one and the most pitiful one, because He's responsible for all humanity. Those who receive are not easily satisfied. On the part of the giver, He has no one to receive from. He wants to receive from the central figures, the great leaders of the world. So God must be the one who has all things and all qualifications. If God would find all the people just wanting to receive from Him, He would have difficulty. He is of course ready to give whatever He has, but if all the people would want to receive good things from Him, for instance love -- well, everybody wants His love -- He will be put under great strain. Then He must emphasize how to carry out your mission, and He would want you to trust not for the sake of yourself, but for the sake of other people, those whom you are going to trust, and give love for the sake of other people and do everything for the sake of those who are under you.

Trust, sacrifice and love for the sake of others.

Trust or belief in the truest sense is trust for the public -- for the greater public, the super-public, or the greatest public. God being of absolute goodness is absolutely for the public, the greater things and the greatest. That's what places Him in the central position.

Suppose you are on the central point, where you have every direction radiating from you, md all distances are equal. When you are a leader, you are the central figure, and being the central figure means your bearing is right in the middle and you don't put more stress on a certain people, and you are not favoring a certain people and not others. You must be even and fair. In order for you to be able to move other people, manipulate the people, you must lose yourself or deny yourself. What you eat, where you live, and what you wear must be well balanced with others.

If you have too strong a personality, you must try to erase that. If your personality is etched, you must scrape it out or rub it in such a way that your personality will be rounded. As a leader you cannot say, "My principle is to sleep eight hours a day." You cannot say, "I cannot go on without eating three meals." You cannot say, "I must be created well and they must respect me." You can never dream of being that kind of person as a leader. If you are the leader over so many people do you think of things in the selfcentered way, never thinking of the public, then just wait and see -- you will lose the quality of the leader and people won't respect you. You may be so clever as to be able to cheat them and pretend as though you are a great leader, and that may pass in the outside world, but in a spiritual movement that cannot be accepted. The spiritual world will work in the group, and the people will lose trust in you, and they will somehow feel like disliking you.

Always be anxious to do more

If and when you are a leader, if you feel easy and not out-going, not standing in the vanguard of others, then you can safely say that you are losing the quality of a leader. You must always be anxious to do more things; you cannot just sit with folded arms and with easy heart, but you must feel like working more than your people and for the people, and then people will respect you and you will be strong leaders. You can cultivate more leadership.

In the Bible we read that we must love God with all our heart, with all our sincerity, and with all our might, and if we lose that quality you are not for that mission. So I can safely define that when you are a leader over 100 people, you are and you must be the most wretched and unhappy and miserable person of them all. If you are responsible over 1,000 people, you must be the most miserable one of them all. More than that, the responsible person, the leader, cannot get rid of the burden at any moment. You are heavyladen with the burden of responsibility. But fortunately, when you are the spiritual leader, there are assistants coming from the spiritual world. In that case, the leader's life must be one of deep faith.

In the face of difficulties, you must be able to get the willing cooperation of other people and respect and trust from other people. If you lose that, you cannot go on. You must be able to arouse the attention of people and get them either interested in you, trusting and believing in you, and to love you and sacrifice for you. And reversely, you must be doing the same for them. Sometimes you are discouraged by your people and you can call out and say, "I am discouraged by the people, but you know what I am, and I hope you can trust me and you can love me, and I love you so much. I rely on you." And then you can even get spiritual cooperation from nature which will strengthen you.

However small a thing or a person may be, if you rely on it or on him and put out your love and energy and sacrifice for him or for it, then certainly something great will come from it or him. All things considered, the leader's position is the most difficult one. His is a position of weakness and helplessness. But when you are weak or helpless for the sake of others, you are safe. You will be aided by the vast spirit world and you will have many deep spiritual experiences which will strengthen you. If you are ready to receive spiritual cooperation from above, then you, by going through those kinds of experiences, will find yourself being successful as a leader because you have cooperation from the spirit side.

I can readily understand Jesus' heart when he said, "If you are not like these little children, you cannot enter the kingdom of God." He was faced with difficulties and he was disappointed by people not believing in him; because of their disbelief he would turn to the children, and when he saw small children he would talk to them saying in his heart, "You know me and you can believe me, and I love you, and I can rely on you." They are so innocent and so pure, he saw a quality in them which entitled them to the kingdom of heaven.

When you pray to God, you cannot be boastful of your title of leader, by saying, "Oh, God, I am the leader of such and such a group. Please do this for me." That kind of prayer cannot be heard by God. You must be able to put yourself in the position of children crying to God, calling for help, and denying yourself. You have no "yourself" there, but you should just rely on God, seeing Him as the only existence in the world, then you are sure to be answered.

To lead means to obey others' needs

Leaders on the external level, or on the worldly level, think that their role is to give commands to other people. But for spiritual leaders things are otherwise. Your responsibilities will be assigned when you are able to put yourself in the position to be given orders, and obey and fulfill others' needs.

What surprised me in the United States when I first came here was that you must make an appointment to see doctors. Immediately I thought that patients must have a disease or ailment according to a timetable. I could see that doctors make appointments from a self-centered point of view. Doctors are those who deal with people's lives, so in case of need they must be alert and attend to patients the whole day long, or around the clock, even 24 hours a day.

Spiritual leaders must go beyond the limits of time considerations and must be able to deal with people at any moment of need. Even though you have to sacrifice your sleeping hours, you must be ready to help others. You must not think of your meal hours as fixed. You must cultivate the attitude that every moment of your life is for other people. If you have that kind of attitude as a leader and put it into practice, you will be a good or successful leader.

When you look at bad points in other people or bad things being done in your group, don't be too impatient and too quick in judging people or doing away with or disposing of them. Wait and encourage good points in the people and good things that are being done, and then reserve your judgment to the end, and you must hope that that person will correct his mistake. It is very likely that you will find a person doing wonderfully, but if you had cut him off years ago he wouldn't be there, and he would almost rebel against you, but he is now doing a good job after having repented and corrected his mistake on his own.

With all these things in mind one can say that leaders are in the most miserable position. When someone knocks at your door, the leader would receive any people at any moment to his living room, his bedroom, or anywhere. So your home will be a public place. When the visitors urgently need you, you must see them. At that moment you are really for those people and not for your wife. So you must look as though you love those people more than your wife. And the leader would like to sell whatever his wife has that is good and use it for needy people. And then what will become of his home? If the wife were not understanding a rupture might occur in that family.

The leader's role is a lifetime commitment

You should realize that this is not a short-term difficulty, but it will go on for your lifetime. How many families can sustain it and endure to the end and maintain a good attitude, helping each other and liking the idea? This is the leader's position in which you always have to carry the cross.

If the people close to you say things for your sake, and they love you and sacrifice for you, you would tell them rather to sacrifice for the people whom I want to sacrifice for and love the people whom I love. At the table, before taking your first mouthful of food, you must think of your people first, and when you are going to buy clothing for yourself, you must think of your people first. Even at bedtime hour you must think of your people and how tired they must be, and then everything will be a cross for you. You are so tired that you take a nap for a while, and you immediately feel ashamed or guilty.

When your attitude as the leader is what I have described, then spirit world will be sure to be mobilized in cooperation with you, so you will be a successful leader. You must use your whole being for the sake of others. You must re-evaluate yourself to know if your eyes have not been misused and have been used for the sake of others; and likewise with your ears, your nose, your mouth, your limbs. All things, when they have been used for the sake of other people, will make you a success. Otherwise, you are a failure.

In order for you to" be responsible leaders, I have enumerated many necessary qualities. In order for you to become that kind of leader, you must have good training. Before becoming a responsible leader over 1,000 people, you must train yourself to be a good leader over one individual. You must ask yourself, "Do I have one person who can really believe in me, who can really rely on me, and who can really look up at me as a leader or teacher?" If you have gone though all those tests or experiences and have such qualifications and are sent out to the field, you must start by winning the heart of one individual on a perfect level. If you are going to be a perfect leader over one individual, then you must be responsible over his well-being, including criticism of his bad points and uplifting and encouraging his good points. You cannot just say, "I am responsible over your good points but not over your bad points," but you must be responsible over the whole person of that individual. What makes you separated from him or divided from him is always the bad point, not the good point. So you must be able to encompass and be responsible over the bad points as well as the good ones. You must be able to help him eliminate his bad points, then he will be a good person, helpful to you.

Then you must always ask yourself this question, "Can I be responsible over a single individual on the perfect level?" If you are qualified for that you can further be responsible over your family as the good leader, the perfect leader in that situation; then there is no problem for you to be the leader of a bigger group. If you are going to be the perfect leader of your family, it means you have to bear the cross for the members of your family. If the family members are responsible for their own problems, so much the better. But if they cannot be, if you take responsibility for their shortcomings, then they must obey you and they must rely on you for that, at least. So you must train yourself for that. If you are a good leader in your family, there is no problem for you to be the leader of your church. In that case, you must think of the church members as though they are your own family members and be ready to take the responsibility over whatever shortcomings they have; then they can rely on you.

Take responsibility for others' shortcomings

Instead of having other people responsible for themselves or for each other, you must be responsible for those people or their bad points. In that case, your people must willingly come under your guidance. The same thing applies to a national leader. You must ask yourself the question of whether you are qualified for those things; you can judge yourself whether you are a good leader and a qualified one.

When I am working for the nation of the United States, if I trust and love this nation more than God would, what would happen? The conclusion is that God cannot judge the United States too soon. Unless God can give us more than that which the leader gives to this nation, He cannot judge this nation, and judgment will be delayed. So it is simple to know in what way we can lead this nation, and it is that we must be responsible for the shortcomings of this nation, for its difficulties. What are the most difficult points in this nation?

First is the ruin or the crisis in the Christian world. We must be responsible for the corruption in the Christian world. In this nation, not only the Christian ideology, which was the founding ideology of this nation, is being corrupted, but also the families committed to that ideology are being corrupted, are collapsing. If families are collapsing, it means the nation is collapsing. The God-denying ideology of Communism is infiltrating the nation and undermining the hearts of the people and separating them from God. Those three important questions are the most crucial ones.

We must be a strong group of people, ever progressing, while the Christian world is being corrupted. While in the Christian world even the Christians are almost ruining the nation, we, coming out of Christianity, must be able to save this nation. We must be a different species of Christian. Are you different from them? (Yes.) Then there is hope for us. I low many years would it take us to save this nation? How many hundred years, how many thousand years? How many years? You may say we can save this nation in ten years' time, and you already imagine that you can rest after that. You must be ready to work for this nation for your lifetime. Are you that responsible? (Yes.) Then you are hopeful people. Go ahead and do that.

Family disunion and rupture is another problem. Because of that problem young people are leaving their homes, there are adolescent problems, problems of delinquency. How would you deal with them? We must do things reversely from what they are doing. When I ask you to do so, you will go back to your homes and restore your family, restore your neighborhood, relatives, and other people. You must be 180 degrees different from them.

The leader bears a heavier cross.

In order for the Communists to grow so fast, they do not care what measures are, used, but we must be much stronger than those people. It takes a leader who is strong enough to be able to sacrifice for the sake of other people and bear a heavier cross than his people and be equipped with the many attributes I have enumerated.

What I have so far done in this nation, making our movement conspicuous in the public eyes, will long remain when you inherit this mission and carry it out. You must be able to revitalize the Christian world, reunite families and maintain harmony as the lowest or smallest unit of the society or nation, and you must be able to annihilate Communism, exterminate it and make all the population of the world Godloving people. It may not be as easy as it sounds. You cannot do it with folded hands. The whole population of America is anxious to do the job, but they have so far failed to do it, and the handful of people in our group want that, so we have mobilized for that mission. With this in mind, can your hearts be at ease?

You must put yourselves in my position at all times and be responsible leaders over some group at least; then you will feel my heart and do the same. Jesus was the representative who bore the cross instead of letting others do it. He was the only historical figure who willingly volunteered to bear the cross himself and to be responsible for other people's lives, and to be connected with them through eternity on the spiritual level.

From that point of view, you must fancy or grasp the picture of how you are going to act when you are responsible for all the population of the world in the future. When you have to fight against the Communist power, it may be even easier. But when you want to absorb them and win their hearts and make them to be what we are, then what are you going to do with them? If you fight against them and win over them by power, they will not be conquered in the real sense, and they can gather up their strength and come against us. But in time after winning over them, we must be able to absorb them and make them into our members. Unless we establish the principle that we can trust them, by loving them and being responsible for their eternal lives, we are not real victors.

The Communists, in their way, are thinking of erecting a kingdom of their own. But by going through untold sacrifices, we will save them and restore them and show them that the kingdom we mean to erect is far better than what they dreamed of, and they will be convinced and persuaded. Unless we do that they won't be convinced. Isn't that true?

We have a vast job ahead of us

We have such a vast job ahead of us. In order for us to be qualified enough to do that we must be able first to trust them and to sacrifice ourselves for the sake of those people, and be ready to love them as though we would our own people. First is trust, second is serve, next is love, and last is sacrifice -- trust, serve, love, and sacrifice for them. There is no other way possible for us to win over them. Do you like the idea? You must be able to trust them while they don't act kindly. You must be able to serve them. You must be able to love them and sacrifice for them. And that you must do not unwillingly, not reluctantly, but out of your heart, from the very bottom of your heart. Can you do that? What do you think God would do? Even for God, it is a most difficult job.

God Himself would want to prove Himself reliable and would trust them, serve them, and sacrifice for them to the fullest extent. When you can trust a person while he is not trustworthy, when you can serve a person when he is not worthy, when you can love those people when they are not lovable, and when you can sacrifice yourself for the sake of those people when they are not worth sacrificing for -- unless you can do that, you are not qualified as a responsible person.

When God had to leave Jesus in satanic hands and had to let him be killed, it was a demonstration of His love towards mankind; even at the cost of His own loving son, He had to trust the people that sooner or later they will be saved, and serve the people in giving His son, and love the people to the extent that He gave His own son and sacrificed His son for the sake of those who came against him. This kind of attitude will qualify you as the responsible leader.

We will absorb the Communist world

Would you want to be that kind of leader? (Yes.) You must realize it is a difficult job. But if you are willing to accept the responsibility and carry it out, then you will be relied on by God and be trusted by Him. God is in the position to do the job, and since He is an invisible entity, in place of Himself He sent the Messiah to do the job, and we must follow him, and walk with him as the example. And after we will have erected the kingdom of God on earth, to whom are we going to leave it? To the whole of mankind, of course. You know that half the world population is Communist.

In a way, it means we are going to leave the kingdom we will have erected to Satan himself. By that time the Communists and Satan will not stay our enemies, but they will be convinced of our trustworthiness and be touched by us and be absorbed.

On God's part, He will have us go through three stages in order to meet Him, or in order for us to be able to erect His kingdom. We must be able to erect a kingdom for the world: first, for God-loving people, and then for Communist people. That means we must make the Communist world into the kingdom of heaven, and the satanic world, into the citizens of the kingdom. If and when we will have erected a certain stage of the kingdom of heaven on earth, do you think the Communists would be willing to come and live as citizens in that kingdom at first? (No.) Then in our world, we must have a stronger economic system than theirs, and a stronger political system and a greater culture than theirs in order for us to be able to absorb them.

What I am doing in the United States is at the risk of my life. I am that serious. When your ambition is to save so many nations and the whole world, can you imagine that you can do it without risking your life? You may wish that you would live a happy life and make others live a happy life, but that's almost impossible. In order to save one worldly nation, to win independence, so many people have been martyred and denied themselves, and eventually were killed; how much more difficult it must be to erect the kingdom of heaven.

So I want you to realize how difficult a job we are going to take on from now on; be ready for that and become reliable, trustworthy leaders. When I look at my people working in the garden or doing anything, I always think, "If I were they, I would erase the time concept from my mind and think of that just as my job and there is no one else but myself to do the job, and then I can just work on and on without stopping after a certain hour." Only those who have experienced that would know how almost sacred it is to love work - to work until you are exhausted and eat at the spot of your labor, and lie down and fall asleep right at the place of your labor. Then your meditation, your prayer to God on the spot will be heard and answered. It is a great thing of beauty, even though at that time you are all dirty with mud and you are perspiring all over and your face is dirty like a discarded doll's. But that is a great thing of beauty in God's sight.

Sun Myung Moon speaks to 10,000 on July 4th at Belvedere Estate

Joy Schmidt [Pople]
July 4, 1974

Forty thousand red, white and blue fliers advertised a free fireworks display and international singing at the Unification Church's Belvedere Estate in Tarrytown, New York on July 4, 1974.

An estimated ten thousand men, women and children flooded the Belvedere grounds in anticipation of a "bigger and better display than last year." Several thousand more were turned away because there was no more parking area.

New York area residents who have become increasingly more aware of Reverend Moon and his projects jumped at the opportunity of hearing him speak at the program, his first public speech in New York since last October's Carnegie Hall Day of Hope programs. Preceded by patriotic band music and about an hour of international entertainment by Belvedere leadership trainees and New York Unification Church members, Reverend Moon spoke strongly of each individual's responsibility to live for others and of America's responsibility to the world.

"My message to you today is that God created man to live for others, to serve others," he spoke. "Today America celebrates a birthday. It was born in the Christian spirit, based on the teachings of Jesus Christ. All throughout the Bible we are taught to serve others, to give ourselves for our fellow man."

Reverend Moon recounted some of the blessings God has bestowed on America, but warned that blessings never come without a responsibility. America can only survive by serving other nations, he added.

"I came here to bring this nation closer to God, and I pledge my entire heart and soul to that purpose," he said. "The destiny of America depends on how much closer this nation moves toward God."

Reverend Moon's 45-minute speech was interpreted by Col. Bo Hi Pak, who flew in from the Louisville, Kentucky Celebration of Life program for the occasion. Reverend Moon's theme was similar to that of his "God's Hope for America" speeches during his 1973 Day of Hope tour and his Watergate Proclamation of November 30, 1973. On a day honoring the long tradition of independence and individual freedom in America, Reverend Moon issued a serious challenge to the audience co live for others and for God. Each person who came was given a copy of Reverend Moon's speeches, "Christianity in Crisis -- New Hope," and an invitation to the Madison Square Garden program on September 18. Those who had attendee the July 4th program last year had been very impressed with the dramatic fireworks display, the singing, Reverend Moon's talk, and the kindness of the young people, and many returned this year with their friends.

A small dinner party for special guests last year was expanded into a gala reception and Korean-style banquet for about fifty local dignitaries, including the mayors of Tarrytown and nearby Hastings-on- Hudson, a state assemblyman, a state senator's representative, several professors, and a judge. As during last year's dinner, Reverend Moon sang for the guests and several, caught up by the spirit, spontaneously sang solos in return. Dinner guests received gifts of corsages and boutonnieres, ginseng tea, and the chopsticks from their plates.

Much hard work on the part of the Belvedere trainees and national staff members from Washington, D.C. created the stage, singing, refreshments, decorations and logistics which made the event pleasant and successful for the thousands who came. Bobby Wilson, general manager for the Belvedere Estate commented, "It's really beautiful. I feel a connection with all the people working; the carpenters worked day and night to construct the stage. In lectures we learn the truth, but on this project we are being taught to grow."

All the arrangements for the celebration were coordinated by Keith Cooperrider, executive assistant of Unification Church president Neil Salonen. Mr. Salonen shared with early celebrants his vision for the evening: "We want to show our spirit for America. People will sense our happiness for God and for America, and our love for each other this way." Door prizes of a potted plant, a three-month supply of ginseng tea, and matching Korean marble vases were given just before Reverend Moon's speech.

In introducing Reverend Moon, Dr. Joseph Kennedy reminded the listeners that 198 years ago, people gathered here because they had a need -- a psychological, political, economic, and spiritual need -- for freedom. "These men gave their lives that a nation might exist; they gave their lives for the cause of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness that had never been known anywhere else."

"We have come here as guests of a man who believes in America," he added, explaining Reverend Moon's first-hand experience of the threat of Communism and his "forgive, love, unite" campaign. "Someday when you travel around the world," Dr. Kennedy went on, "people will ask where you are from. When you say 'Tarrytown,' they will answer, 'Oh, that's where Reverend Moon is from!'"

The spiritual celebration was climaxed by the long-awaited fireworks display. In what may become a yearly tradition in the New York area, the fireworks emblazoned the sky with unbelievably dazzling shapes, colors and roars. The Tarrytown newspaper the following day took due note of the "rousing display" and "appreciation of the crowds."

Second National Conference of 1974 - Unification Church and One World Crusade - Portland, Oregon

The Unification Way

Sun Myung Moon
April 1974

Photo date and location unknown

We do not go through the path of life for ourselves alone. We are going this way under God's will -- the great cause God would have us accomplish. God's will is to establish an ideal world, ideal kingdom on earth. The world must be composed of an ideal society, ideal families, ideal individuals.

When we view life from the standpoint of idealism or the ideal world, we must question if there is really an ideal individual in this world, an ideal family, an ideal society, an ideal nation, and if this world is an ideal place. There is God, who is Himself ideal and absolute. But is there any single individual in this world who is the accomplished pattern of God's intention, or God's ideal? I should say there is none. So God is working His providence to restore man back to the original form. In order for God to make this world ideal and make it into His kingdom, there must be an agency, a group of people representing His ideal.

God wanted the people to love Jesus

The one responsible for all these things was the Messiah, Jesus Christ. Before sending the Messiah to the nation of Israel, God had prepared for so long a time because the nation of Israel had to be cooperative with Jesus, and become one with him in harmony. The Jewish people should have known that God was pleased with Jesus Christ, and when they saw God loving this person they should have loved him too. God loved him and God lived with him in love and harmony. The nation of Israel, the people of Israel should have done the same -- loved and lived with him.

The Jewish people at that time were in the position to beg God to show them how much He loved Jesus and in what manner they should love him, live with him, and work with him to make this world an ideal one. They were in the position to want God to show them in what manner they should conform to God's will. They saw that God loved him, but they had to understand how much and in what manner God loved him. They knew that God lived with him, but they had to understand how. From then on, they had to learn to do everything in the same manner as Jesus did. Through this method alone the people of Israel could understand God's will and carry it out.

Furthermore, the Jewish people should have worked in accordance with Jesus' project, and investigated how he loved his people, his nation, and the whole world. If they had, they could have established the Kingdom at that time. But there was practically no one who really understood that God loved Jesus, who saw God's love for him, and who truly understood Jesus' love for the people. And they didn't understand in what manner they themselves had to love the people. Jesus' three years of public ministry were not years of living with the people in love, but years of paying indemnity to restore them back into the bosom of God. So his course during those three years was one of struggle, difficulty, hardships, and untold misery.

Christians must go the way of hardship

He chose disciples whom he could teach and show how to love people. But other people did not understand his plan and whose will he was seeking to fulfill. He was in great agony to win over Satan and bring the people back to God's bosom. He alone tasted the bitterness of his struggle. Nobody else understood. We must recall that after those three years of bitter struggle, all his disciples rejected, denied, and deserted him. He was all alone, put on the cross, and he passed away in resentment. So we as Christians inherited the bitterness and struggle he left undone in this world; we have not inherited love, harmony, and all those beautiful things.

We are not allowed to taste the glory and love of God, because Jesus himself was deserted without experiencing them. Jesus himself could not have love from God to the fullest extent, because the world did not receive him. So we are not qualified for that. He was not loved as an individual, he was not loved with a family or by members of his family. The nation and the whole world were unfulfilled under God's will. That is to say, no love and harmony were created and realized on the national base and the worldwide base. This required the ideal of the second coming of Christ.

So we as Christians must start by going through difficulties and hardships in order to restore and indemnify God's original world. We must have chis as our goal. Until we reach the goal, we must struggle hard under God's will. The question follows, what position are we Christians in for carrying out God's will? Our position is right in the middle of the battle; but we must resolve to overcome all obstacles and fight through until we gain the goal. In accomplishing this, we must anticipate the love, harmony, and all the beautiful things which are ahead of us, which are to be ours after we have gained the goal. That's why in the Bible Jesus said, "He who endures co the end shall be saved."

The way of self-denial

And in another place, the Bible says, "you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and with all your mind," pouring out your soul in sincerity and love. You must love God alone. The Jewish people rejected Jesus, who brought God's love and who was the incarnation of God's love; thus he was rejected and went through bitterness. So we must start right from that point -- we must go through bitterness and struggle in order to obtain happiness and love. In order to love God we must deny ourselves. The Bible says: "For whoever would save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." This means we can attain the goal and receive the Lord of the Second Advent, who will bring God's love. We can love him, live with him, work with him, and accomplish what he will accomplish only when we practice these things.

So we must be read to give out our lives, lose our lives, and deny ourselves in order to obtain God's love. Then through that love, and through that person whom God sent, we can accomplish our mission. We must be ready to lose our lives for God and for God's will. You must bear two things in mind: to be able to love God and to love God's will. In God's will are many levels: re-creating or saving individuals, saving the family, saving the nation, saving the whole world, and saving the macrocosm, including the spirit world. Only after having accomplished this much are we really qualified to enjoy God's love.

We learn love first on the individual level

The Messiah represents God's will as individual, as the core of the family, and as the central figure of the nation, the world, and the whole macrocosm. Because of this, the Messiah is supposed to teach us on the individual level how to love God. Representing the family, the nation, the world, and the whole universe, he teaches us how to love God and His will. Because he lives completely in accordance with God's will, in loving individuals, families, nations, the world, and the whole universe, he is with God and in conformity with God. So he is an example for us to follow.

Have we learned how to love God on the individual level, according to the Messiah's standard? Has there been a single Christian who has done that? There has been no such person, no such family, no such society, no such nation, no such world, and no such universe. So we must stare right from the beginning.

God is discouraged. He has not been able to see any such individual, any such family, any such nation or world up to the present moment. God cannot abide in a world which is against His will. In chis dark world which opposes His will, God is really longing for one person who can be responsible for God's will, family, nation, and world.

If God finds a group of people who are willing to deny themselves, lose their lives for God's great cause, and establish the Kingdom of God under God's will, God will be compelled to love chis group. Even if He has co desert the other groups of people, He will be with those people and abide among them. We are supposed to carry out that kind of mission.

We must be resolved co work hard while other Christians and other people in the democratic world are at ease without working for the cause of God. If the people outside go a different way, we must go the other way, struggling hard without sleeping or eating, forgetting about every worldly worry, and forging ahead with our goal and our vision. Our way is the path of restoration, in which we must go the reverse way. And we must not just walk the way but go the way restoring ourselves through indemnity.

Re-creating through indemnity

We do not go through the course of indemnity blindly, without a purpose in mind, but we must go according to God's principle of restoration through indemnity. That is the way of re-creation. We must know that we are in the position of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, before the fall, when God's intention in creating man was not accomplished. Therefore, we must accomplish that through ourselves. In order for the word "re-creation" to mean anything, we must start from the point that there is no such thing as Satan. However, Satan is around us, so we must win that position by struggling to defeat Satan on the individual level, family level, national level, and worldwide level. After we have gained that much, we have to go through the course of re-creation. After we have won over Satan, there will no longer be anything like indemnity.

When God created heaven and earth and everything therein, He could only do it by pouring out His energy and power. To have poured out His energy and power means that He put a part of Himself into the creation. When God created man and everything else, He did it for the sake of those created beings, not for His own sake. Without pouring all of Himself into the created object, He could not create on the perfect level. He poured out His love, His ideal and everything else into the created object. The Principle says that God created man in order to receive joy from him. But, when we think of the manner in which we receive joy, can we get joy by ourselves alone? No. Joy is not produced when you are alone, because joy does not come from you, but is returned from the object.

Love is a reciprocal experience; you cannot love by yourself. The same with happiness; you cannot be happy when you are all alone. Suppose you have a lot of money, and you are full of dreams, full of ideas. But are you happy if you are all by yourself, in solitude? When God created objects, He created them not for Himself, in the first place, but for the created. God created men for the sake of men themselves, then after that He was going to receive joy from them. We must know that men are created for the sake of God. God exists for the sake of men and men exist for the sake of God.

Love does not come from one's self, but comes from the other, from the object. We can say God created man in order to have joy from him. Although God may be full of love, if He doesn't have any object to give His love to, His love has no life. Then His love is not love; it is dead. When He finds a person as an object, His love is animated, and when the love abiding in God's heart comes out and is given to the object, His love bears fruit. When Adam and Eve, as man and wife, can form a couple, reproduce, and multiply, we see God's love. If these three beings are separated, we cannot think of love. When God loves men and men love one Another -- especially the love between husband and wife -- there we really experience God's love.

You are born from love

When God created the first man, He was thinking of making one who could truly receive His love and return it to him. In the course of re-creating we will fulfill that. Then the question is, which is first, love or life? For God, the source of life, life is more important. But man is born from love, from the act of love, so love is first and more important to human beings. God had life and then required love to exist, but man has been born out of love and pursues life. Man's life is built on the basis of love. Then his life must be fruitful in love. Because man is formed on the basis of love, he has life. God can love that life, and man can return love or joy to God. God cannot but love man, because man is created in such a way.

From God's standpoint, man should be born out of love, live joyfully in love, and die in love. That's what God would have men do. You are not born from the life of your parents, but from the love of your parents.

Since you are born out of the love of your parents, your parents are all prepared co love you from the moment of your birth. Since you are born out of love, you must live in love and must die in love; by doing that you will have joy. Even in the United States, where individualistic ideas are flourishing, is there anyone who does not want to be loved by his or her parents, by his family, by the people around him, by the whole world? Are there any such people? Why is it so? That is because we are born out of love, we are supposed to live in love, to get joy in love, and die in love. That is the natural law. So, that is why we desire such love around us. It is a bitter thing to know that there is such a high rate of divorce.

The more money you have and the more friends you have, the happier you are. But are you happier the more parents you have? You don't want to have thousands of parents, but just one pair -- the smallest unit. That is the proof that the path of love, that path of happiness begins at one point.

What is the most valuable thing in the whole world? If you were asked that, what would your answer be? Before marriage, your parents. There is nothing more valuable co you than your parents' love. It is not because they have life that they are dear to you, but they have love. The next most important thing is marital love. The third precious thing is love of children, your own children who are born out of your love. Those children are the most precious things in the whole world: parental love, marital love, and love of children. The reason why we take those three loves to be so precious is because those three loves represent God's love. With those put together we feel, know, and understand God's love. Without experiencing all those three loves, we cannot experience God's love fully. We cannot really know the existence of God without experiencing all those things.

Is there a single person who does not like the idea of being loved by his parents, by his spouse, by his children? How does love operate? First, there is God who is full of love, but just by Himself His love does not flow. If He has an object, His love flows and is returned in the form of joy. The more you feel you exist for your husband, for your parents, for your children, the stronger your love becomes. So whether you love God or another person, you must love with all your heart and with all your might and with everything you have; and then it will be returned in the form of joy, joy to the fullest extent, perfect joy. On God's part, when He created man, He poured out all of His energy, all of His life, His everything - - so from that point of view we can say that He was consumed in creating.

Love is total investment

Suppose you are a businessman who is going to invest a million dollars. When you do that are you ready to lose it? If you have in mind to gain by investing that amount of money, you are joyful, you are happy to invest it. We are always happy to give something for investment. When you invest your money, it is gone from your pocket; but if your investment of a million dollars will return to you with another $100,000 added to it, it will bring your more joy. If the return is doubled, tripled, or quadrupled you will be so glad that you will dance around the room.

With God it is the same. He knew that if He created man in the perfect form, the joy that man would return to Him in perfection would be a thousand fold or more. He had that in mind when He created man. He looked forward to perfected Adam and Eve bringing back so much more love to Him. When He poured out His life and love and everything else into man He was not sorry that He was losing those things, because He knew very well that all would be returned a thousand fold, with added joy and happiness. The more He poured out His whole being without reservation, the more He knew that perfect love and joy would be returned to Him. This is the law of creation, centered on human love.

Without love man could not have been created. So also in the course of re-creation, without love we cannot re-create the people of the world or re-create the world. For us fallen men, we have to re-create our own selves. Our first human ancestors fell and we are responsible for that, so we have to re-create our own selves in relation to God.

After having re-created ourselves, our objects to re-create are our spouse, our family, our tribe, our nation, the whole world. This is why religions teach us the way of sacrifice. When they demand sacrifice, they want us to pour out our whole selves, to give of our life, give of our love, money, and everything else. If we pour out those things completely, what will be returned to us? For example, when you pour out all your being and all you have into one person, that person himself including his love and heart, will finally be yours. If you desire love, the secret of gaining it is to pour out yourself, your life, your love, and your everything. This is the law of re-creation -- simply to win the hearts of people.

Suppose you have ten friends and you try to define who is the best friend. You immediately think of one -- the person who has given out all that he has to you -- his love, life, and everything. Whoever did that most for you is your best friend. Isn't that true? Out of the whole history of the United States who do you think is the greatest patriot? The person who has fought, struggled, and given up everything he has for the sake of the country. All the citizens of the United States would be willing to give out all that they have to that person, with their love and their heart added. That is the formula which can be applied to any nation regardless of background, to people of any culture, custom, or tradition.

When we think this way, we realize God is such a wonderful God. According to the criterion of who has given out the most, who has given everything he has, the best person is God. If the people of the world really knew that God was like that, and that God is still pouring out all He has -- His life, His love and everything -- to us, they could not but love Him and return joy to Him. They would want to live for Him, die for Him, and belong to Him. God knew that, and knows that still. If you know that for the first time you are loved by a person, 100 percent without reservation, you would want to return it, not 99 percent or less, but more than 100 percent. Isn't that true? That is a great and wonderful thing.

If there is any person who received God's love to the full extent and truly knows how to return it to Him, we must learn from him how to love God. If there are any such people who can follow this person and try to love God through him, those people too will be loved by God. The more you try to love this person, the more you are loved by God, and by loving this person you are loving God. If you do that, your neighbor will love you and be attracted to you, and something more is added to your love when it is returned to you. When love is multiplied, how much is returned? More than 100 percent. But you must remember the wonderful fact that love starts only from sacrifice, from giving of yourself and investing yourself, your life, and your all. So, a person resembling God fully is the person who is prepared to give of himself completely. That person we can call an ideal person.

We are not created for ourselves

Between man and man, the same may be applied. When we are born or created, we are not created for ourselves. We are created for our spouse. Do you understand? Is a woman born for the sake of women? No, for man. Likewise, a man is born for the sake of a woman. You men don't be too proud of yourselves -- you are born a man, but you are nothing if you don't have a wife. From the time of our birth we are born for the sake of others, not for ourselves. We must remember this. So we conclude that if there is any good man, any ideal man, any happy man, any respected man, he is the one who is ready to sacrifice himself for the sake of others.

Then let's return to American individualism: "I am born for myself," you say, "I must do as I please." Is that right? That attitude is destined to lead us into destruction. I want to cry out to American youth, "Remember, if you go on like that you are doo t led." With the Divine Principle formula in mind, when I look at the country of the United States, I am sad. This country is doomed to destruction. Then who is going to save this country? We are only a handful of people, but we are ready to save this nation, at the cost of our own lives. We must be confident that we are those who can save this nation. In the United States, I find that many young people enjoy love for their own sake, just the physical side of love. They misuse the most precious gift, divine love; and I am most unhappy to see this. Without God's love, without the precious side of love, there is no life, there is nothing. There must be an eternal give and take of love, and then there will be an ideally happy society. When we find that love, experience that love, and are ready to multiply that love, the ideal world cannot help but come. This precious love is obtained only through the person in the object position. So when you love, you must respect that person, treasure that person, and cherish what he has. That must be your attitude. Only by living in that way can we realize the ideal and find our ideal happiness.

No democracy in love

No one in the world likes the idea of a dictatorship; yet love is the greatest dictator. You want to be dominated by love, occupied by love, dictated over, bossed over. You are ready to be bossed by the greatest love. Is there anyone here who wouldn't like that? When you are embraced you want to be hugged until your bones are crushed. Even though your whole body would be crushed and out of joint, you would be intoxicated in love and joy. Love is the greatest experience and love is the greatest dictator. In this dictatorship we find joy.

When you make love with your spouse, do you let any others interfere there? Well, there is no democracy there. Under God's love we will have dictatorship. Then whose love do you want to receive in that manner? Whose love is like that? God's love. Even though He may be boss over you by the strongest dictatorship, you are ready to receive it and only too glad and happy to receive it. When we come down to the human level, a man would like to have the most perfect woman -- the most beautiful externally and internally, a perfect creature, a perfect girl -- for his wife. A woman wants a perfect man for her husband. You want your love to be more perfect, more perfect, and more perfect until you reach God's love. You want first God's love, and then you want your owl love centered on God's love. But alas, there is only one God. What should we do? Shall we fight against each other in order to win God? If we know that anything and everything is the object of God's love and that God's love is infinite, the question is solved.

I have a handkerchief here. It is like any other handkerchief, but if you really want to be loved by me and I am the only one you respect and love, then my handkerchief would be valued more than other handkerchiefs. Mine has a sentimental value. You want to have this more than anything else. You want to be given anything by the person whom you love. When you find God, you discover that God is loving you. God is perfect and absolute; God is full of love, the original love. If you find that you are loved by Him, you wouldn't desire anything more. The Divine Principle teaches that we become one in the love of God; that's a wonderful expression.

Suppose you have just one thread of hair of your loved one. That has infinite value. As a child, you loved your doll, and if you have a strand of her hair, it is a part of that doll and it represents her. When you have that thread in your hand, you can feel as though you have that doll in your bosom, and that means everything. For us fallen men, the most important thing is to love God. That is why the Bible says, "You must love God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind." In that case, by loving God, you lose nothing. It is all returned, doubled, tripled and even more.

The way of re-creation

So we understand the method or the ideal way of restoring or re-creating ourselves -- the Principle of recreating ourselves into ideal men. Love is reciprocal, and only through love we can re-create ourselves. That means that we must have an object in order to re-create ourselves. In order to find an individual to be our object, we must pour out our love. And in order to find a family, nation, and whole world, we must give out our love and everything we have. That is the way to re-create an individual, family, and the whole world.

Have you ever done anything to re-create such a family, such a society, such a nation, and such a world? Adam and Eve fell and caused God's will to be nullified. Therefore, in order to re-create ourselves, we must find our original selves on the individual level and then we must restore our families and bring restoration on the national level, the worldwide level, and then the universal level (including the spirit world). In what manner and how much have you participated in re-creating the world? Does God have His own nation? Does He have His own world? No. That means there is no world which God can love, and no nation at all. In order to re-create or restore yourself, you must pour out all you have for that purpose; in order to re-create or restore the family, you must pour out all you have, your life, your love, and your all.

And in order to restore or re-create the nation you must pour out yourself including your family, for that purpose. In order to restore the world, you must give everything, including your nation, your family and yourselves as individuals into this. Without doing that much, you can never dream of restoring the whole world. When you do things, do you want them to be done perfectly or imperfectly?

Perfectly -- everyone wants to do things perfectly. If you want things to be done perfectly, you must be ready to pour yourself, your whole being into your actions 100 percent. You want yourselves to be perfect, but have you been doing whatever you can to accomplish that? If not, you cannot think of being restored. That is the Principle; that is the formula. Some of you here may be very proud of what you have accomplished, thinking, "I have done this, I have done that." But have you really put your whole being into that work? Have you loved each other and harmonized with each other? And in oneness did you pour out your energy for this great cause? If you have done that, this whole nation of yours will be touched and moved and stirred, and it will return to you. Have you done that?

Other people's lives are in your hands

Before God, you must always be humble and think, even after having done what you could, "I have not done quite what I could, I want to do more." And, you must apologize before God for not doing what you should have done and be ready to do more for the future. That must be your attitude. After a day of hard work, you are tired and exhausted and you sink into bed. When you are praying, you must have this attitude: "Oh, I have not done all I should have done. Oh God, I apologize before you. Please help me do more tomorrow. You wanted me to do this, and I could not quite accomplish it. Please give me more strength to do that tomorrow." And there comes God's sympathy. God's heart is touched and moved and then His energy is poured out to you and you are strengthened for the days to come.

Have you ever loved anyone with your whole heart? If you have never loved a person with all your heart, how can you love God? You cannot say you love God. Then Jesus said that he came not to be served, but to serve the people. His love was not that which would be poured out just to those persons who loved him, but he was ready to love the enemy. Have you ever been so serious that you think that a person's life or death is in your hands? So when you want to speak to that person, you are really serious and you almost tremble before God to think that there is a possibility you might fail this person. Then you will be doing right. At that moment you must pray to God, "Help this person from your part, but use me as an instrument to love this person. Save the life of this person. All is in your hands, so please use me to do your work." When you are that serious, God will be working with you. Even in the work of re-creation, God must work with you, you alone cannot do anything.

Have you ever loved any person in your family, in your neighborhood, people on the street in that seriousness? Remember the law of restoration through indemnity based on the principle of the relationship between Cain and Abel. Re-creation is more difficult than creation. Creation is like sprinkling water and molding the clay. It will work when the clay is obedient. But re-creation is something like pouring oil mixed with water on the clay; it will scatter and will not be molded according to your will. You must try to get rid of the oil. And when you have removed that oil, you can use water to mold the clay to form. Removing the satanic element from man is something like that. Between Cain and Abel, we must have Cain obedient to Abel. By doing that alone, we can mold people back into the original form. That resembles God's work He tried to get rid of Satan, who comes attacking even God. When God loves His people, even touching the heart of Satan, everybody becomes like clay in His hands, obedient, and utterly devoted. Then He can mold the clay into the forms He desires. The course of re-creation is like that.

Love God more than I do

We must be the symbol and the subject of re-creation. We must be proud to be the soldiers fighting for God's cause, for the Great Cause, on the individual level, family level, national level, on the level of the whole world and the universal level. Don't you feel that by our pouring out the whole of our being into this cause, the whole world is being changed, being re-shaped, being renewed? And although I am a small being, like a grain of sand in the ocean, as I worked through my course, I always experienced that God was there, helping me, sometimes going ahead of me and doing things for me. Let's believe in God and trust in Him -- the God whom our forefathers, our first ancestors Adam and Eve, deserted and did not believe in. We must be prepared to minister to God, whom Adam and Eve failed to serve. Let us love God, the sad God whom Adam and Eve failed to love. Let us be ready to lose our lives for the sake of God and His will, while Adam and Eve failed to do that.

If our family is to prosper at all, the descendants or children must be greater than the parents. What I want you to do is to love God more than I have -- love God whom I have loved, but more than I did. I want you to serve God and love God, more than I served and loved Him. From the start, I was resolved to throw away my life, to lose my life, to deny myself for God; but here I am, still living. And I am sometimes shameful of that. But you are in your youth; you are in your twenties and thirties. You have a long life ahead of you -- why can't you fight for the cause?

By your doing that your ancestors will be benefited in the spirit world; your family, your neighbors, your friends and your nation will be saved by your doing this. Like a parent looking at his children and wanting them to do greater things than he has done, I expect and want you to do the same. I want you to do greater things than I do.

If you really love me, I want you to love God in place of me, more than I do Him. If you really love God, you must be loving your brothers and sisters whom God loves. If you can do this, even if you may not have found and seen the kingdom of God while on earth, you will enjoy the kingdom of God in the spirit world.

We must inherit the heavenly tradition

Sun Myung Moon
March 24, 1974

Until now, we have not known what would become of humankind. We have not known what would become of ourselves. In other words, people have not understood history. They have not understood where history is headed. They have not known what would happen in the future or their purpose. Why is this so? It is because they have not had true parents and ancestors. But as for us, because we are attending True Parents, we can say, "Ah, I know history; I know the circumstances of the history between God and each of us." Also, we have come to know the present and future. We can both know such tradition and inherit it. Now we can have the tradition with which we can win over history and the future. From whom? Why? It is because you have met True Parents. You follow what True Parents teach, and what they do, and you desire what True Parents desire and inherit from them. You are inheriting these things from them.

…

Until now, there have been no parents in this universe. Those who acted like parents were evil parents, using and ruining their children. What got broken through this? Brothers and sisters, brides and bridegrooms, and fathers and mothers, who are meant to become perfect, have split apart. They have not had children of goodness, meaning they ultimately lost the family. The family is a representative of universal history; it represents the world, the heavenly kingdom, the nation, and all families. God is trying to find its center. History also has been looking for it.

People living today should be connected to this center. In other words, the common purpose pursued by God and human beings is this alone, and there is nowhere else that the past, present, and future can be bound together. Then who should do it? True Parents must accomplish the tasks that Adam and Eve were meant to do. Hence, what you have now is something Satan does not own – you should have the best brothers and sisters; the kind that are not found in the evil world. You must have brothers and sisters who are not from the satanic world. This is how it should be for you. This is until your twenties, before you marry. You need to establish such a tradition. You should leave your sons and daughters a tradition that teaches them how to live.

The reason you are fighting such a hard battle in the countries you have gone to is so that you can leave behind a tradition for your descendants. This is a great opportunity that comes only once, an opportunity to educate your children saying, "We worked amidst this kind of hardship. " You have the chance to establish a tradition you can leave behind as your testament. That is why tradition is the issue. This cannot be changed. It is an eternal tradition.

Since we have transcended the world, white people and black people should be brothers and sisters. This is to realize the brotherhood realm of humankind, the realm of Adam and Eve, which has nothing to do with the Fall. Then, what is the basic philosophy to establish that tradition? Everything will work out if we live for the sake of others. From here, your sons and daughters will grow up without suffering in this kind of environment. They will become descendants who can go straight to the heavenly nation with actual accomplishments that surpass the satanic world and can directly connect with heaven. Next, these brothers and sisters will marry one another. For us, marriage transcends nations. We have the mind-set that we can marry a black person if told to do so, marry a white person if recommended to do so, and marry a yellow person if recommended to do so. Such a tradition should be established from now. This has not yet been established. We should create oneness from now on. So you must guide your descendants and the world with this. The two must become one. When you become one you should not bear evil children. To bear children of goodness, the husband and wife should be completely one. Without becoming one, no children of goodness will come out. Thus, they should become completely one centering on God's will.

The New Future of Christianity

Sun Myung Moon
March 9, 1974
Hyatt Hotel, Birmingham, Alabama, USA
Thirty-two-city speaking tour in the United States

Photo date and location unknown

Ladies and gentlemen who have gathered here this evening:

I thank you with all my heart. The title of the speech I wish us to consider together this evening is, “The New Future of Christianity’’ Please allow me to share with you for a while on this topic. As you may well know, when people talk about the United States, what often comes to mind is that this greatest nation in the world is based on Christianity.

The Lord comes to fulfill God’s Will

What I am going to speak to you about is not something that can be learned and understood through today’s life of faith or theologies. It deals with a completely new perspective, and so I believe that you Americans need to listen to it. This is the reason I am appearing here.

Since the Last Days are almost at hand, it is important that we clarify crucial facts of history beyond any doubt. Since hearing the command of God to go to America and speak out to you for three years, from 1972 through 1973 to this year, 1974, I have stood on podiums in every corner of the United States. I hope you will understand what is happening here.

I hope and pray that you will realize that you and I are in the position of brothers and sisters who are living for the sake of God’s Will and working to fulfill His Will. I hope and pray that, with a tolerant heart, you will not make a judgment right away if what I say offends the faith you have lived and believed until now. I pray that you will make a judgment only after you have searched and investigated extensively through prayer and meditation.

We know that for the past two thousand years and up until this day, Christian faith has called believers to wait for the Lord. However, now that the Last Days are almost upon us, the time has come to do more than just believe in him; we need to make preparations to receive the Lord who comes in the Last Days. I believe that it is unacceptable for us not to make such preparations.

Even when we are planning to hold a small event, it is only when we have drawn up a program and taken steps based on the exact details of that program that we can bring that event to a satisfactory conclusion. This event of the coming of the Lord in this day is the greatest event since the onset of history, the most important in the course of human history, and so we cannot think that it could be carried out blindly and without preparations. I believe the time has come for us to know clearly the exact details of what is to come.

If you came here on a train bound for Birmingham, all you had to do was to ride on that train at your ease. Now that you have arrived, however, you must understand clearly the new direction and purpose you need to follow. It makes perfect sense that, within the order of Christianity you have believed in until now, there must be a certain organization that is making preparations for the coming of the Lord.

The Lord must come without fail. Then for what purpose does he come? He comes for the Will of God. Then what is the Will of God? We, the believers of today, know that God carries out His providence through a Will behind the providence of salvation. What we also need to realize is that there can be only one essential Will of God.

This providence of salvation of today is something that was not necessary in the world of the ideal of creation, the world as originally planned by God. Because that original Will was not fulfilled due to the Fall of humankind, the providence of salvation emerged as the process of working to complete the fulfillment of the Will. We need to clearly know this.

God cannot go against the Will He has set. Since He is the Absolute Being, only when He has perfected that Will can He stand in a position of authority and dignity. Because this is the truth, we need to realize that God cannot become the absolute God unless He perfects fallen humankind by lifting us to the standard He originally purposed.

God’s Will for salvation and the mission of Christianity

Then, if Adam and Eve, the first human ancestors, had not fallen, what kind of a world would have been realized? If they had reached perfection under the protection of God’s love, He would have called them and conducted their marriage Blessing ceremony. That was the reason for His creating man and woman.

If this had come to pass, we would not have the fallen ancestors of humanity on this planet; rather there would be the sinless, perfected and true ancestors of humanity beloved by God. Adam and Eve would have become the True Parents. After that, the true bridegroom and bride whom God could truly love would have been on this earth. Moreover, instead of brothers who are each other’s enemies, true brothers would have been born on this earth, who could cooperate completely with the Will of God, who would live in the midst of His love, and who would belong to Him. This would mean that a family centered on God would have been formed on the earth, where sinless parents would have given birth to sinless sons and daughters, who would in turn have formed a sinless clan, a sinless people, a sinless nation and a sinless world. Thus, the human beings living on earth would have been under God’s dominion both in name and in substance, and God would have become the King of this world. Such is the conclusion we can reach.

If all this had taken place, there would have been no need for a Savior. Neither religion nor prayer would have become necessary. We did not know until now that the reason we need a Savior, the reason we need religion, and the reason we need salvation is a result of the Fall.

Salvation presupposes the Fall having taken place. When one is ill, one needs a hospital to cure the illness, and when something is broken, one needs a shop to repair it. What is religion? It is similar to a repair shop or a hospital. This all refers to salvation. You need salvation because you are ill. Today’s Christianity has not set the standard based on this principle; it advocates believing in Jesus unconditionally, without an understanding of the true meaning of salvation. This will not be enough.

Then let us find out through the Bible what kind of world we are living in. It is written in John 12:31 that the devil Satan is “the ruler of this world.” How could that evil Satan, the devil, become the ruler of all humankind, who are beloved by God? It is because humanity fell. For this reason, God and Satan are enemies. As a result of the Fall, we came to have fallen, sinful human ancestors.

A false couple came into existence, and false brothers who killed one another came into being. That couple gave birth to sinful sons and daughters, and this sinful family expanded to become a sinful tribe, a sinful people and a sinful world. Consequently, Satan, the devil, naturally came to stand as the ruler.

From this evil world, we need to move to a sinless world, and this is what salvation is. This move refers to salvation, and we need to know that it is nothing other than restoration. The original Will of God did not include the process of salvation. Therefore, we need to return to His original Will. The purpose for the coming of the Messiah is to fulfill God’s Will. What is God’s Will? It is to save all people in the world from Satan, the devil, and then to exile Satan from this world.

In the places where you live today there is the devil Satan, who accuses you when you commit a sin. You need to exile him. Today’s Christianity does not know what purpose they need to pursue. Saying, “I will be saved and will go to the kingdom of heaven” refers to a trivial salvation. We did not know until now that it is the Will of God to save humanity, and that it is also His Will to eternally exile from the earth the devil, Satan, who ruins and violates humanity.

If the Messiah, who needs to begin such a world, comes as a lone individual before Satan, Satan will seize and kill him. That is why the Messiah was sent to govern the world only after God had laid the foundation of forming a nation, passing through the restoration stages from the individual to the family, tribe and people, so that the nation and the people could unite with the Messiah at his coming.

However, the followers of Judaism did not know that the purpose of their religion and the reason for them being called as the chosen people was to make preparations for the Messiah’s coming. This resulted in God’s providence being extended, but even when the Lord comes again for the world, God’s Will remains the same. Thus, we need to realize that, when the Last Days come throughout the world, Christianity will be required to expand the Will and build a global foothold. This is the mission of Christianity.

The Biblical background of the crucifixion of Jesus

Then the question at hand concerns how the Lord is going to come, and we need to clearly know the answer. The Bible tells us that, with regard to the Last Days, neither Jesus himself, that is, the Son of Man, nor the angels, will know anything. Only the Heavenly Father will know. That is why there are two ways of answering the question of how he is going to come. One is to find out by discussing with God, and the other is to find out through our own human wisdom. By the latter, we can positively deduce the answer by examining the way the Messiah, the Lord, came and departed in the past. You must know that there are only these two ways to find the answer.

If I found the answer by discussing with God, going to the spirit world to receive revelations, would you believe it? If Reverend Moon standing right here were to speak on that foundation, you would not believe him. Therefore, I need to present my answer based upon clear evidence. This being the case, by clearly learning about the Messiah who came before, you can draw conclusions about the future. This is the normal method by which we draw conclusions.

The yearning of today’s Christianity for the coming of the Messiah is exactly the same as the yearning of Judaism two thousand years ago for the Messiah. In the case of today’s Christianity, it has continued down its path for two thousand years in its longing for the coming of the Messiah, whereas in the case of Judaism, Heaven sent many prophets for four thousand years and sacrificed them to convey God’s promise to send the Messiah. For four thousand years, God promised them the Messiah, and people believed devoutly for four thousand years, so that when the Messiah came, they would unite completely as one and fulfill the Will of God.

God sent Jesus Christ, the Messiah, to that people as promised. According to His plan, the people were in the position of having the responsibility to receive him. However, the people who had yearned for the coming of the Messiah did not receive him. Rather, they watched their leaders persecute him, seize him and have him killed. Ladies and gentlemen, is this not confusing?

To give an example to illustrate this, let’s say that when the Lord returns, today’s Christians who are waiting for him stand by as the highest leaders of Christianity, such as the pope, cardinals, bishops and pastors, seize and kill him. What happened back then can be said to be the same. Simply saying Jesus came to die is insufficient. It is logically wrong. If you came to die, why would you ask God to forgive those who killed you? There is no reason for the death of innumerable prophets for four thousand years and the suffering of the people of Israel if their role were to reject the Messiah.

If the purpose of his coming were rejection, God could have sent him to a group of uncivilized savages. How easily they would have killed him. How would you answer that?

This being the case, we need to examine how the chosen people came to seize and kill the Messiah, in spite of the fact that they had long yearned for God to send him. I hope you will not find this too serious if you are hearing such a thing for the first time. We need to find the answer to the question of why they seized and killed him.

They did so because, first of all, the Old Testament persuaded them to do so. The Book of Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament, corresponds to the Book of Revelation in the New Testament. Malachi 4:5-6 states, “I will send you the prophet Elijah before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes. He will turn the hearts of parents to their children and the hearts of children to their parents.” We need to know that such a return of Elijah was definitely prophesied.

Who was the prophet Elijah? He was the man who ascended to heaven in a chariot of fire nine hundred years before the coming of Jesus. Because God loved this people and had foretold that He would send Elijah again, the people knew that Elijah, who had ascended, would come down again, for the Bible definitely said that he would return. But Elijah himself actually did not come. Now, the Bible is a book that traces the identity of Israel for four thousand years. It was the center of Jewish faith and devotion. Could the mere words of Jesus drive such a people to abandon their Bible?

Ladies and gentlemen, would you yourself do such a thing? It would be as if you were yearning for the Lord to come down from heaven upon clouds, and then someone came up to you and said, “I am the Lord.” Could you, a Christian of today, believe that person?

Let us now find out, from Jesus’ own words, if he had troubles like this or not. I refer you to the Gospel of Matthew 17:10. The disciples did not know much about the Bible. So we had people who were relatively ignorant of scripture believing that Jesus was the Savior and going out to witness, crying out, “People! The Messiah has come, so believe!” Then the scribes answered, “Hey! If your teacher is indeed the Messiah, don’t you know that the Book of Malachi says that God will send Elijah before the coming of the Messiah? So where is Elijah?” The disciples did not know about this, and the Bible records that they asked Jesus about it, and his response.

Now, if Elijah had come, it would not have mattered even if Jesus had been blind, deaf or lame. The problem was that, as far as the scribes were concerned, Elijah had not come.

So, it is written in the Bible, “And the disciples asked him, ‘Why, then, do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?’ Jesus replied, ‘Elijah is indeed coming and will restore all things; but I tell you that Elijah has already come, and they did not recognize him, but they did to him whatever they pleased.’ Then the disciples understood that he was speaking to them about John the Baptist.”

Was John the Baptist Elijah? If you had been there, would you have believed Jesus’ words? Elijah had not come from the sky, and here was Jesus, attaching the name of Elijah to John the Baptist. So the religious authorities decided that Jesus was attaching the name of Elijah to John the Baptist because he was a fraud pretending to be the Messiah. Thus Jesus was called a blasphemer who brought ruin to the Judaism of Israel and the chosen people of Israel, established by God for four thousand years, and they determined him to be empowered by Beelzebub, the ruler of the demons. They concluded that he was without a doubt the son of Satan, the devil. They would not believe that this man, who seemed to claim that Elijah had come when he actually had not, was the Savior.

The religious leaders wrongly interpreted the Old Testament

Throughout the centuries, Judaism and Christianity have been at odds. At this point, we need to take a moment to figure out what sort of a book the Bible is. In the work of making a person, family or nation that can fulfill the Will of God in the fallen world, the people involved are in a position similar to that of intelligence agents who have been sent into enemy territory. God would have to instruct them in words that the enemy could not decipher.

The Bible is a record of God’s instructions issued in parables and symbols. If, for instance, the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States were to send an agent to the Soviet Union, would they send a letter stating clearly, “Do such and such a thing at this place and time?” No, they would send the message in code. If God had taught us about the coming of the Lord with vivid clarity, the fallen world would have easily seized and killed the coming Lord at the earliest opportunity. We need to know that God needs to create an environment where the Lord cannot be seized and killed in the Last Days. Therefore, most people would not know the details of his coming, for God teaches and guides us in code.

We need to realize that for this reason, the people interpreted the Old Testament wrongly and so ended up killing the Messiah. Just as only one person, the director of the CIA, has the means to reveal the ClA’s code, only God and no one else can reveal the code of the Bible.

However, in order to fulfill His Will, God must teach us in advance, and also teach us again when the time comes. If you were to look up Amos 3:7, you will read, “Surely the Lord God does nothing, without revealing His secret to His servants the prophets.”

We have to know the fact that the leaders who spoke for the Old Testament interpreted it wrongly, and thus came to commit the historic sin of seizing and killing the Messiah. Now, the Jewish believers of the time were relatively righteous, and the actions of Jesus who claimed that John the Baptist was Elijah were alarming to them. I’m sure they had many conversations along the lines of, “The people have seen him perform mighty works and miracles, and also many new and strange works never before seen, and they could neither deny them nor approve them. And so let us hold a public discussion, saying, ‘Now then, since he claims that John the Baptist is Elijah, everything will be resolved if we decide whether Elijah has come or hasn’t come. So, let us ask John.’”

The question they asked is recorded in the Gospel of John 1:19 and following. When they asked John the Baptist, “Who are you?” he answered he was not the Messiah or Elijah or a prophet. Even if he did not confirm that he was Elijah, at the least John the Baptist could have emphasized that he was a prophet. However, he answered all the questions in the negative.

Why did he do so? The people of Israel all firmly believed that he was a prophet, so why did he deny it? It was because the situation had already become unfavorable to him since Jesus was being cornered by the leaders of the nation and the religion. Because it was clear that these people were referring to what Jesus had said, John the Baptist looked upon the actual circumstances of the matter. The leaders of Israel and the Pharisees were determined to seize and kill Jesus by consensus, and John knew there was trouble brewing.

Therefore, John the Baptist would not speak on behalf of Heaven from the position of a human being. Instead, he denied even the fact that he was one of the prophets. This being the case, do you think that people would give more credence to the words of Jesus or the words of John the Baptist? To bring it home to the United States, if a certain young person came forward and said of Reverend Billy Graham, “Billy Graham is Elijah and I am Jesus,” and Reverend Graham denied it, would you believe it?

History thus turned a corner, and we cannot deny the fact that, though God had sent Jesus Christ to the Jewish people, whom He had prepared for four thousand years, with faith and hope, the people of that time seized him and let him be killed in their ignorance and disbelief. Let us now find out if this is true or not through the apostles of the New Testament.

At the time, Paul, before he became an apostle, stood at the forefront as an instigator of Christian persecution after the execution of Jesus. Paul was on his way to Damascus to oppress Jesus’ followers, when a holy light struck him. Thus he came around to God’s side and repented and testified to Jesus.

Paul knew what had happened to Jesus better than anyone else, and so he was able to declare boldly in I Corinthians 2:8 of the mysteries of God, “None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory”

Without even thinking about how appalling it is that the Lord who came was made to walk the miserable path of the cross, we have believed blindly. In spite of the fact that Jesus did not have to die, we believed that since he died on the cross, he must have come for that purpose. How then can we go before Jesus? Even if we are saved, can we dare meet him?

The mistake of John the Baptist

The Jewish people could seize Jesus by virtue of their understanding of the Old Testament, yet what about John the Baptist? When you read Matthew 11:2 and following, you find the story of how, when John the Baptist was imprisoned and about to die for having spoken about the love affairs of Herodias, he sent two of his disciples to Jesus to ask him, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” Did John the Baptist, then, believe Jesus or not? How could he, with the same mouth that had once declared at the river Jordan before a large crowd, “He is the Lamb of God who bears the sins of the world,” ask the question, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” And by proxy!

Think about how dumbfounded Jesus must have been when he heard these words, for it was at a time when no one in the world acknowledged him and the entire nation was opposing him. And here was John the Baptist, whom Jesus had looked upon as his last ray of hope and only lifeline, asking him at the last moment, “Are you the Messiah or not?” That was why he pointed out in Matthew 11:6, “And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”

In the next verse, Matthew 11:7, Jesus criticized what John the Baptist had said and done when he had witnessed to Jesus in front of a crowd. That is why Jesus denounced him with the words, “What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind? What then did you go out to see? Someone dressed in soft robes? Look, those who wear soft robes are in royal palaces.” And in verse 11 he said, “Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” How could he say such contradictory things about John? The prophets who have passed on into the next world were all born of women, for they surely were not born from rocks, were they? They were all born of women and John the Baptist was also born of woman, and so he must be great even in the next world. Why, then, would he become the least of them?

It is because the prophets who came and passed on into the next world were sent to earth to testify to the Messiah from a historical distance, yet John the Baptist was sent as the prophet whose mission was to testify directly to the Messiah. Since he was the one who was to see the Messiah with his own eyes and testify to him, his mission was the greatest.

Why then did Jesus say that the least in the kingdom of heaven was greater than he? Even the least prophet who had gone to the spirit world knew Jesus Christ was the Messiah and attended him as such. On the other hand, John the Baptist, who would have become great by testifying to Jesus, was unable to attend him when he was supposed to attend him, and so he could be only in the bottommost position. You need to know that this is the content upon which Jesus based his words.

Let us look up Matthew 11:12 to see if this is in fact true. It says, “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force.” This refers to the fact that a struggle could have broken out between Jesus and John the Baptist to occupy the kingdom of heaven. What this signifies is that John the Baptist did not devote his energies to fulfilling his mission. We must now find out what would have happened if he had devoted his energies properly. If he had done so, John the Baptist would have become Jesus’ first disciple.

If John the Baptist had become the first disciple, wouldn’t his disciples have joined the twelve disciples, wouldn’t John the Baptist’s multitude of followers have been included in the ranks of the seventy disciples and 120 followers, and wouldn’t the ruling class of the entire Jewish nation have joined the group following Jesus? Was John the Baptist sent to oppose Jesus? Then let us look into the matter of how great a man John the Baptist was. Through the words of Jesus and the Bible, let us find out what a special man he was, sent down with God’s official approval.

In Matthew 11:13, Jesus declared, “For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John,” signifying that John came as the fruit that culminates the Old Testament. If John the Baptist had become one with Jesus, the people who believed in the Old Testament were bound to follow in his footsteps and become one with Jesus. If such a thing had come to pass, who could have seized and killed Jesus? The Messiah, the prince of God, came to utilize the foundation that was laid down. Would he have had to bring together lowly fishermen, prostitutes and tax collectors and feed them to become their master and teacher?

Let us once again look clearly into the matter of whether John did indeed follow Jesus or not. If you read the Gospel of John 3:26 and following, you will find that the disciples of John the Baptist reported to John about Jesus, “Rabbi, the one who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you testified, here he is baptizing, and all are going to him.” John the Baptist answered, “He must increase, and I must decrease.” Christian tradition interprets this to mean that since John the Baptist was a great prophet he humbled himself before Jesus in this manner and said that he, John, would decrease.

If one has suffered hardships for three years to receive the Messiah and then has finally met the Messiah he has been longing to meet and has testified to him, he needs to be ready to die for the Messiah if the time comes for that. What this means is that, if John the Baptist had walked the same path as Jesus by his side, if the Messiah increased he too would increase, and if the Messiah decreased he too would decrease. Therefore, when he said that they had to go separate ways, he plainly stated the decisive truth that he would not follow Jesus.

Based on this, we realize our ignorance until now that the Crucifixion of Jesus was caused first by the wrong interpretation of the Old Testament, and second by John the Baptist.

The Lord will not come on the clouds

Let us go on to the third cause. At the time, the Jewish people believed that the Messiah would come on clouds. Why was this the case? In Daniel 7:13, it is prophesied, “I saw one like a Son of Man coming with the clouds of heaven.” Therefore you need to understand that those people, who valued the Old Testament as much as their own life, could not help believing that he would come on clouds.

The ministers gathered here may say, “Reverend Moon is saying that because he doesn’t know any better. Those words refer to the Second Advent and not to the time of Jesus.” But that’s not the case at all! If everything had happened as Jesus had called for, everything would have been finished at the time of John the Baptist. All the prophecies and prophets of the Old Testament would have culminated in John the Baptist.

With the people of Jesus’ day believing that the Messiah was coming on clouds, do you think that Jesus, who was born as a man and as the son of Mary and Joseph and who had brothers and sisters, appeared qualified to be the Messiah? Christians believe that the Lord is coming on the clouds, so would they believe him if he came as a human being? It is the same today as two thousand years ago. Let us find out through the Bible if this matter posed a problem at the time of the apostles.

If you look up 2 John 1:7, you will find these words: “Many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh; any such person is the deceiver and the antichrist!”

What this means is that some early Christians believed that the Lord came with only the appearance of flesh. But Christians today may have the same attitude and will oppose him if he comes as a human being. Then, according to the apostles’ words, they will be the same as antichrists. There is no way whatsoever to make excuses. All that I have spoken today is based on the Bibles words, which you believe in. Because I love the Will of God more than anyone else, and because I hope for us all to walk the path of His providence rightly, I have no choice except to speak these words before you.

You may ask, “With what authority is Reverend Moon saying these things?” Yet I do have the authority to say such things. I met Jesus and John the Baptist in the spirit world and discussed this with them. From them, I found out that my understanding is correct. I also studied about these things in the Bible and discovered them to be true. Since both accounts match, I am sure that what I am saying is true. Why don’t you bring this to the world, to see whether what you believe is right or whether what Reverend Moon is saying is right? If you do not believe it, your sons and daughters will believe it without a doubt.

What was lost at the cross

In this light, the fact that Jesus died in such a manner, when he did not come to die, remains as the sorrow of God, the sorrow of humanity, the sorrow of history and the sorrow of the future. We have not known this. You need to understand that the Old Testament has prophesied the coming of Jesus, the Messiah, in two ways. When you look at Isaiah 9, 12 and 60, you see that he will appear as the Lord of glory, while chapter 53 of the same book prophesies that he will die a cruel death. We need to find out why it was necessary to make contradictory or dual prophecies.

We fallen human beings fear God, and we also fear Satan. This is because at one time we will believe devoutly in God yet then betray him, pair up with Satan and attack God’s world, and then, after we are paired up with Satan, we will come back to God and attack Satan’s world. We need to know that for this reason we fear both God and Satan.

We also need to realize that if the Jewish people had believed Jesus, he would have become the Lord of glory, yet because they did not believe him, it came to pass that he had to die on the cross. You need to comprehend the fact that his coming to bear the cross was a sudden and contingent event. Then when was it decided that he would die on the cross? Let us find the answer in the Bible.

Luke 9:30-31 says, “Suddenly they saw two men, Moses and Elijah, talking to Jesus. They appeared in glory and were speaking of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.” To make a long story short, it was decided at the time of the Transfiguration.

This was because Judaism was opposing Jesus, as was the nation of Israel, and even John the Baptist had taken an opposing position, and so all the footholds through which God’s Will could be fulfilled had collapsed. So God had no choice except to abandon His Will to complete the work of salvation in both the kingdom of heaven on earth and the kingdom of heaven in heaven, restoring spirit and flesh in the providence of two dimensions. He had to cut off the physical world and establish the world of spiritual salvation by having Jesus walk the path of the cross. If Jesus had not died on the cross, both sides would have been lost. Therefore, in order to bring at least spiritual salvation, God had no choice other than to hand over Jesus to be nailed to the cross. You need to clearly understand this.

Today’s Christians assert that Jesus undoubtedly came to die, based on words written in the Gospel of Matthew 16:22-23. Those words describe the scene where, when Jesus spoke of having to go to Jerusalem to die, his first disciple Peter said, “Lord, this must never happen to you.” Then Jesus turned upon him and said, “Get behind me, Satan!” Christians think that Jesus said this because he had come to die and Peter opposed his fulfilling his mission. However, you need to clearly comprehend that this incident took place after Jesus’ death on the cross had been decided at the time of the Transfiguration, and so Jesus had no choice except to give Peter such an answer.

What would have happened had John the Baptist, the Jewish leaders and the people of Israel believed in Jesus? The people of Israel would have become one with Jesus. The Arab realm then would have become one with Jesus and together they would have reached out to Rome. Within forty years, Rome would have been brought to God’s side. Since Jesus conquered Rome in four hundred years after his Resurrection, centering on the living Jesus, Christians would have been able to declare the constitution of the heavenly kingdom within forty years. Then there would be no Protestantism or Catholicism today; everyone would be in the position of the people of Israel fulfilling the Will of God.

If all this had come to pass, the people of Israel would not have met such harsh circumstances in the Middle East and Christians would not have had to shed blood so tragically. If Christianity had attained the godly foundation to move the world by bringing together the rulers of the nations, who would have hunted and killed them?

The world would have become the heavenly kingdom in accordance with the will of Jesus. The world would have been united and there would be no need for the Lord to come again. Christians need to realize this. From this perspective, the place where Jesus died on the cross is the place where God and Jesus lost everything. The cross was not the victory of God; it was the victory of Satan, the devil. It was the place where the Son of God was had nails driven into him.

On that cross, God lost the nation of Israel, the Jewish people, the global historical providence and all the apostles. At the very end, only the thief who died on Jesus’ right-hand side stood with him. At that place, there was neither Christianity nor the beginning of Christianity. Everything was lost. From where did Christianity begin? It began after the Resurrection of Jesus, forty days later. We did not know until now that ours is not the path of the cross, it is the path of resurrection. Two thousand years of Christianity teaches us this fundamental lesson. You cannot deny this when you read the Bible. When Judas Iscariot came to help seize him, didn’t Jesus call that moment a time of darkness?

If Jesus had come to die, would he have said, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I will but what You will,” when he prayed three times at Gethsemane? If he said such a prayer because he was afraid of dying, it makes him unqualified to be the Messiah. You need to know this. Why did he say such a prayer? Was it because he was afraid of dying? Christians say, “Oh, Jesus was also a man in the flesh, and so he must have done so for fear of the pain of death.” That is not it at all. He did not pray because he was afraid of death.

He had no choice except to utter such a prayer when he pondered the fact that, once he died on the cross, all Christians in the world would have to follow the path of the cross in his footsteps. Due to his having shed his blood, the condition was set through which Satan would be able to violate the physical bodies of all Christians in the world, and so many people would be made to shed blood and make sacrifices. Moreover, he knew that the footholds prepared for four thousand years, the nation of Israel and Judaism, would be left with no stone standing upon another. When he thought about the toils of God in the four thousand years of His providence, he had no choice except to cry out such a prayer, sweating blood. You need to understand this.

That is why, at the final moment of his passing, Jesus said, “My God, why have You forsaken me?” What do you think is the meaning of this prayer? We need to know that the world being engulfed for three hours in darkness when he died means that the world that could have been realized according to God’s Will was engulfed in darkness. You have now come to understand that the Messiah did not have to die in his historical age. He came to fulfill the Will for the kingdom of heaven on earth in his age. You cannot deny it.

Jesus was born from a woman

Then let us now ponder the matter of how the returning Lord will come in the future. There are dual prophecies in die New Testament, just as in the Old Testament. It means that today’s Christians are in the exact same position as the Jews at Jesus’ time. The only differences are that the Christian sphere has been expanded globally, and that Christianity does not have both the flesh and the spirit, for it only has the spirit. It does not have a nation. In other words, it does not have a foundation on the national level like the chosen people of Israel. Why is this so? It is because Jesus died. Therefore, we need to understand that its position is inferior to that of Judaism at Jesus’ time.

Jesus succeeded in becoming the spiritual king. In other words, in spite of the fact that the Will of God is to save humanity, to exile Satan, and to become the King, due to the death of Jesus God was unable to subjugate Satan’s world on earth completely. Since this Will of establishing a nation that God can govern, by exiling Satan and making Jesus its king, could not be fulfilled, and since it is the Messiah who needs to fulfill this Will, he must come again. Therefore, all Christians in the world need to become one and, centering on the Coming Lord, they need to make a strong global nation that goes far beyond the mistakes of the past, in order to establish the kingdom of heaven on this earth.

In the Book of Revelation 1:7, it is prophesied that the Lord will come on clouds. First Thessalonians 5:2, on the other hand, states that he will come like a thief. How can he come like a thief when he comes on clouds? Can you decide on your own not to believe in the Lord who comes like a thief and only believe in the Lord who comes on clouds? If you believe that he comes on clouds, you are the same as the people of the Old Testament when they believed in Elijah and the Messiah coming on clouds. If, on the other hand, he comes like a thief, as 1 Thessalonians tells us, he will come as a human being.

Based on how God has carried out His work in the Old Testament Age, do you think that Jesus will come on clouds? If you believe that, you will end up seizing and killing him again. The people who believe in Jesus will seize and kill the one who comes again.

What I am saying is that it is best to be open to both prophecies, and affirm that he could come on clouds and he could just as well come as a human being. Why? Well, if the people who believe that he comes on clouds see that he has come as a man, they might seize him and kill him. However, if you believe that the Lord will come as a man, and then he comes on the clouds, you will undoubtedly welcome him. It is written in Revelation 12:5, “And she gave birth to a son, a male child, who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron,” saying, in effect, that a woman will give birth to the Messiah. Until now, the church had no other way of interpreting this passage other than attaching it to a coming on the clouds.

However, let me suggest to you that such passages in the Bible will be falsified if he does indeed come on clouds. Please look up the Gospel of Luke 17:20 and following. “Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, ‘The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed.’” Would you not observe the Lord coining on the clouds? And Luke 17:22 states, “The days are coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it”

How would you not see it if he came on clouds? In Luke 17:25, it is said, “But first he must endure much suffering and be rejected by this generation. Just as it was in the days of Noah, so too it will be in the days of the Son of Man.” How could a Lord who comes on clouds be made to suffer? How could things be as wretched as they were at the time of Noah? Such a thing would happen only if he comes as a man. If he comes as a man, things will turn out as described without a doubt.

If all the Christians in the world believe that the Lord is to come on the clouds, and he comes as a man, wouldn’t people with unassailable foundations of power, such as the pope and the bishops, issue the command to seize and kill him as a heretic who is destroying Christianity and God’s Will? Ladies and gentlemen, wouldn’t that be the case? The Bible tells us as much, and because historical facts lead us to the same conclusion, we can be certain that God is alive and that His Will works according to a plan and with authority.

Fortunately for you, this Mr. Moon has appeared here and is teaching you these things enthusiastically. If there were no one teaching you such things, you would seize and kill the Messiah again. You would have no option other than to seize and kill him. The time has come. Can you guarantee that, if Reverend Moon did not cause you to think twice, you would not do so?

If we go on to read Luke 18:8, we find the question, “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” These words refer not to those who believe in him, but to those who will not have faith in him. If he comes on the clouds for all eyes to see, how could he find people on earth who don’t believe? You would act in the same way as the religious devotees of Jesus’ time. If everyone believes that he will come on the clouds, and then he comes as a man, would there be even one person who believes him? Among the disciples of Jesus, were there scribes and priests? Can you find among them even one person of conventional faith? Considering all this, the words of the Bible would be proven false if he comes on clouds.

Christianity has to receive the Lord who comes as a person

What would God want? Would He want to be the God of a Christian denomination, or would He wish to be the God of all humanity? His Will is to be the God of humanity on the world level. The Savior did not come to save only Christianity. He came to save the world.

The Bible verse that you know so well, John 3:16, states, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” It does not say that He loved only a religious denomination or an individual, does it? It says He loved the world. Then has the entire world found this God? Has it exiled Satan? Since human beings were lost on earth, the Messiah must come down to earth to restore all people.

That is why it says in Matthew 16:19 that when Jesus went to the spirit world, he gave Peter the keys of the kingdom of heaven and said, “Whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven,” meaning that the earth is the central concern. Everything needs to be resolved on earth.

Has a kingship through which God can reign over the entire world of humanity been established on this earth? Since Satan holds the kingship, if God were not able to establish His kingship, He would not be able to carry out His plans and He would not be God of failure. Because of whom? Because of Satan. Then the conclusion would be that He is inferior to Satan. This is why God said, as stated in Isaiah 46:11, “I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass; I have planned, and I will do it.”

Let us come to a conclusion. We have fallen Adam and Eve, and from them came evil ancestors, evil husband and wife, and evil siblings. Because we have not had original, good and true ancestors, husband and wife, and siblings, we cannot give birth to sinless sons and daughters. We will not be able to do so unless we see all this realized here on earth. Therefore, if we cannot restore the True Family centered on God, we cannot recover the nation and the world either.

That is why Jesus needs to come back to this earth and form a family beloved by God. In short, he needs to come as the bridegroom and find his bride, for only then can True Parents come to be, can true husband and wife come to be, and can true brothers and sisters come to be. Because this was not conclusively achieved, Jesus prophesied that he would come again to achieve it, and this is the Marriage Supper of the Lamb at which the bridegroom will take a bride.

Only when there is a True Family can the tribe be restored, can the people be restored, can the nation be restored and can the world be restored, and so the family is the problem. You need to understand that the Marriage Supper of the Lamb is held so the coming bridegroom and bride can set up the family. You need to know that the bridegroom and the bride must meet. The Will at the Alpha, which would have been fulfilled by God when there was no Fall, will be fulfilled at the Omega after going once around in a circle and eliminating the evil world.

The Fall of the first Adam needed to be restored by the coining Jesus who is the second Adam. Because he was unable to complete this, it is something that needs to be completed by his coming and trying again for the third time. This is grounded in the statement in 1 Corinthians 15:45 that Jesus is the second Adam. You need to know that, since he cannot achieve all this if he comes on clouds, he needs to come as a human being. Therefore, you need to realize that it is the mission of Christianity to receive the Coming Lord, to make a new kingship in the world and establish the heavenly kingdom centering on the true ancestors of humanity, the true husband and wife, and the new Christianity.

I hope that, with the realization that such a time is approaching right before our eyes, you will be able to enter such a place in the midst of your prayers. I would like to conclude my speech with the request that you will ponder what I have said to you this evening, that you will not jump to conclusions, and that you will try to resolve your questions by talking to God in prayer.

Thank you.