319. True Parents and the Completed Testament Age
Book 3: Cheon Il Guk and Our Mission
Part 2: True Parents, the Hope of God and Humankind
Chapter 6: True Parents and the Completed Testament Age
This speech was given by Rev. Sun Myung Moon on May 13, 1993, during a 12-city tour in the United States and then by Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon between May 26 and December 22, 1993, during a speaking tour in the United States, an invitational address given at the US Congress, a speaking tour in Japan, a speaking tour of universities in Korea, an invitational address the Korean National Assembly, and a global speaking tour.
Dear House and Senate members, and respected ladies and gentlemen:
I express my deepest, sincere gratitude to all of you who have honored us with your attendance. As leaders in this great nation, you all have a responsibility in guiding the United States of America, and even the world, into the upcoming new millennium. The promise of a peaceful and prosperous future depends on how we act today.
As we all know, our world today is not filled with happiness or peace; rather it is rife with conflict and despair. We are confronted with broken families and decaying social mores, among other issues. We have debated these matters numerous times, but we have yet to find a solution. Why is that? The true solution to these problems must come from God. We must deal not only with the phenomenal aspects of the problems but must reveal the original root in order to bring a solution. To reveal this root, we need to understand deeply God's purpose of creation and realize that we are at a turning point in God's providence.
God's ideal of creation
God created this world for the sake of the experience of true love. God's ideal in creating the first human ancestors, Adam and Eve, was that they perfect themselves through true love so that they could then create a good family possessing true love, true life and true lineage. A good family like this would have been formed on the basis of united heart and mind among family members in front of God.
If God's original ideal had been realized, there would have been no need for a messiah or for God's providence to save humanity. Adam's family, though it was merely a single family, would have been the center of the ideal clan, nation and world. It would have been the blueprint for all families in the future. It would have been the model for the realization of God's ideal world. However, this present world is far from the good world of God's ideal.
If you read the Bible carefully, you will see that the Fall of human beings involved the loss of Adam's entire family. First, the position of parents was lost through the Fall of Adam and Eve. Second, the position of children was lost as Cain murdered Abel. Because the first family practiced self-centered love, they came to multiply evil rather than goodness, and they bequeathed false life and lineage to their descendants and thus came to form a false world. Thereupon, the history of God's providence of salvation was begun.
In order to restore True Parents centered on true love, God needed a man and a woman who could stand in the stead of Adam and Eve. Only then could a true family be formed in accordance with God's original plan. To restore the original family, God needed to unite Cain and Abel so that the position of true children could be reclaimed, and then He needed to reclaim the positions of True Mother and True Father. To do so, He worked in reverse of the way by which human beings fell.
This pattern of reconciliation of Cain and Abel is the foundation and consistent formula for restoring the True Parents. The separation of Cain and Abel occurs again and again in Judea-Christian history. God separated fallen human beings as siblings into two sides, that of Cain, symbolizing Satan and Abel, symbolizing God, to work out the hatreds resulting from the Fall. God established the pattern of having Abel be struck first and sacrificed. As a result, Abel gained a foundation from which to stand and embrace Cain and recover the blessing given to the eldest son.
By virtue of this principle, the religion that most advances the purpose of salvation always receives Satan's most severe persecution. It walks the path of receiving constant opposition, yet continues its sacrificial effort to save the sinful world. Likewise, good people always stand in the position of being struck first and sacrificing.
The violation of the first family and the course of restoration
Ladies and gentlemen, because illicit, self-centered love invaded the first family, selfishness and greed have continued to dominate human history from the individual to the family, society, nation and world. For this reason, God's work of restoration has to begin at the individual level. Since Satan knows this, he also focuses his efforts on the individual level.
It is not by chance that self-centered individualism has become the dominant way of life in these Last Days. People feel increasingly alienated from those around them, and bear little sense of responsibility for the well-being of their country, their society or even their own family. Rising divorce rates indicate that husbands and wives feel little responsibility for their marriages. Parents do not take responsibility for their children. Individuals, devoid of any sense of human dignity, do not even take responsibility for themselves.
America has seen such phenomena at work, expanding with the youth movement of the 1960s. Idealistic youth rejected the materialism around them in order to seek peace and love. Yet in the process, they also abandoned morality and responsibility. Unable to find the true love that they sought, many disillusioned young people destroyed their lives through drug abuse and free sex, and the suicide rate rose dramatically.
Among all violations, the one that pains God most is free sex. A world of free sex is utterly contrary to the Will of God. Love needs to come from the stimulation of unblemished emotion. However, free sex is totally devoid of purity or true emotion. How many of us have been touched by the cruelty of infidelity and divorce? Where is God in a one-night stand? What about the nightmarish situations in which children are sexually abused by a parent or relative? Is free sex worth the price of a broken child? Where there are homosexuality, free sex, drugs and alcoholism, the world of true love is far away. In this world, Satan openly tells people, "Drink! Smoke! Take drugs! Have sex!" The lifestyle of those who do God's Will, on the contrary, is 180 degrees different from this.
Throughout history, those who chose to walk a spiritual path of self-sacrifice were bitterly opposed and persecuted by the rest of the world. It is only God's love and blessing which have allowed the Unification Church, despite worldwide opposition, to prosper. The fact that our church has risen from obscurity in war-torn Korea to become a world-level religious movement in only 38 years testifies to God's continued guidance and support.
Ladies and gentlemen, religion teaches that what has gone wrong can be corrected through a process of restoration. The Divine Principle refers to making restitution for a wrong as "indemnity.” To make restitution for her wrong actions, fallen Eve needed to take full responsibility. What this signifies is that Eve must first unite Cain and Abel, her children, so that they can be the foundation on which the True Parents can be restored.
Through Abel's love, Cain was supposed to recognize Abel as God's chosen person and unite with him. However, Cain murdered Abel and thus the opportunity of restoring Adam's family was lost. This was why God had to wait for a woman who could reclaim the position of Eve.
In the Bible, one of God's great heroines is Rebekah, the spouse of Isaac. As the mother of Jacob and Esau, Rebekah held the same position in Isaac's family that Eve held in Adam's family. Unlike Eve, however, Rebekah understood God's providence and helped her second son Jacob, who occupied Abel's position, gain the blessing destined for the eldest son.
When Jacob received the birthright and then Isaac's blessing, the elder brother, Esau, just like Cain, wanted to kill him. However, with Rebekah's help, these brothers ultimately did not resort to violence but reconciled in a warm embrace. This reconciliation was a major victory for God. This victory, nevertheless, was not complete, since the reconciliation represented only a symbolic change of lineage. The substantial change of lineage needed to be accomplished in the womb. This is the context for the enigmatic story of Tamar. By understanding that Tamar, like Rebekah, was in the position of Eve, we can see why Jesus was born of the tribe of Judah, which was her lineage.
I am sure that many of you have read the story about the birth of Tamar's twins. (Gen. 38) Tamar conceived with Judah, her father-in-law, the twins Perez and Zerah. The Bible tells us that the two sons struggled even in the womb for the position of firstborn. During Tamar's labor, Zerah's hand emerged and the midwife tied a red string around his wrist. Then, Zerah's hand disappeared back into the womb and Perez, who would have been the younger, was born as the elder. Thus, the second son reclaimed the position of the firstborn son in the womb before they were born.
In terms of conventional morality, the stories of Rebekah and Tamar are questionable at best. However, we can see now why God blessed them, and how they played the role of reclaiming His lineage from Satan, to make it possible for Jesus to be born.
From this same lineage, Mary was born in Israel 2,000 years later. Mary had the responsibility of restoring the right of the eldest son on the family, clan and national levels through paying the indemnity necessary to unite Cain and Abel figures. At that time, the law was to stone to death any woman who became pregnant out of wedlock. Mary responded to God's call and conceived Jesus at the risk of her life.
Because of Mary's faith, and the providential victories of Rebekah and Tamar, Satan could not claim sovereignty over Jesus in Mary's womb. Jesus was born in the position of a true son under God's perfect, direct lineage. He is the first True Son of God, based on the change of the fallen lineage. That is why Jesus is the saint of all saints and the ancestor of the true lineage. His birth represented the conclusion of the Old Testament Age and the national dispensation, and the dawn of the New Testament Age, the worldwide dispensation.
Mary, in the position to restore the original Eve, needed to build unity between Jesus, who was in the position of Abel, and his elder cousin, John the Baptist, who was in the position of Cain. John had a large following and was widely respected. Their unity was crucial if the people of Israel were to identify Jesus as the Messiah. If they had become one, this would have laid the foundation for the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. Jesus would have stood as the True Father of humanity, and his Bride would have stood as the True Mother of humanity. Eventually, the Kingdom of Heaven would have been established on earth.
Even though he had received a clear revelation at the time of Jesus' baptism, John the Baptist did not become one with Jesus. Without seeing John's public support for Jesus, it was impossible for the Jewish people to believe in and follow Jesus. Alone, Jesus then undertook the difficult path of self-proclamation.
Confronted by the faithlessness in Israel, Jesus determined to give his life to bring spiritual salvation to all who believe. Nonetheless, he said that he would come again in order to bring salvation on earth, which is "physical" salvation, on the foundation of "spiritual" salvation.
The opening of the Completed Testament Age
That is why the mind can draw close to God through Jesus, though the body continues to struggle with evil. Even Saint Paul anguished over the contradiction between the desires of the flesh and the desires of the spirit. Many great Christian evangelists have also suffered because of this contradiction. At the dawn of the Completed Testament Age, the crucial challenge is to accomplish both physical salvation and spiritual salvation. That is why we need the Lord of the Second Coming.
God's preparation for the Second Advent included a world-level foundation of Cain-Abel reconciliation. God carried out this dispensation through events surrounding the Second World War. The Allied countries of Great Britain, America and France represented Christianity and were in the position of Abel. The Axis countries of Germany, Japan and Italy were under the influence of nationalistic militarism and stood in the position of Cain. This war was the world-level expansion of the conflict between Cain and Abel.
Immediately after the Allied victory, great strides were taken toward a world of peace on the basis of the worldwide cultural foundation rooted in Christianity. With Great Britain in the position of Eve on the global level, and America and France representing Abel and Cain, respectively, these Allied nations stood ready to receive the Lord of the Second Advent.
Despite this preparation, God's dispensation was not fulfilled at that time. God's representative came to bring His word, yet he was met with tremendous persecution and almost universal misunderstanding. This paralleled Jesus' situation 2,000 years earlier. Just as the people of Israel in Jesus' time awaited the second coming of Elijah on a chariot descending from heaven, Christians awaited the Second Coming by looking for Jesus himself to descend on a cloud from the sky.
At that crucial time after the Second World War, God instructed my husband to bring a new message of truth to Christians in Korea. Korean Christian leaders, however, rejected the possibility that a humble young man had been chosen to bring a new message.
Instead of uniting with my husband, these religious leaders became jealous of him because of his growing number of followers. They blindly opposed him without hearing him out. They even spread lies about him. They exploited unfounded rumors of sexual misconduct and greed, the very antitheses of my husband's teachings, to assassinate his character. The whole world opposed his work and cast him into the wilderness.
Unfortunately, because Christianity did not unite with my husband after the Second World War, the moral authority of Christianity suddenly declined. America, as well as other nations that are founded on Christianity, came to face severe social and cultural crises. Thus, the Cold War began. Humankind was divided again into two worldwide spheres of Cain and Abel, just as it had been during World War II. Denying God, just as the thief on the left denied Jesus, communism represented the Cain-type world. Christian democracies, which affirmed the existence of God, represented the thief on the right, the Abel-type world.
The first battle of the Cold War was the Korean War, which involved 16 nations from the free world gathered under the banner of the United Nations. Then what happened? Forty years later, at the 1988 Seoul Olympics, 160 nations that were hostile toward one another could come together at one place in peace. Following that, in the year 1991, South Korea and North Korea, which represent Abel and Cain respectively on the world level, joined the United Nations.
Such incidents of harmony and reconciliation have taken place in Korea because it is the nation to which God has sent the True Parents.
During the 40 years of the Cold War period, my husband fought to break down barriers and rebuild the foundation to receive the Messiah. During that period of time he was completely misunderstood by others. For doing God's work, he was unjustly imprisoned six times, including for three years in a North Korean communist concentration camp. Moreover, the media has vilified him as a cruel monster who brainwashes people for his own profit.
Can anyone disagree when I say that Reverend Moon is the most persecuted religious leader in the world? My heart is broken when I think of how God has suffered to see His messenger rejected time and time again. His only desire has been to comfort God's heart, yet he finds that it is God who always comforts him.
He has walked a path of indemnity and restitution to restore the mistakes of the past, including those of the Old and New Testament ages. Korea represents the Old Testament Age, while America, a mostly Christian civilization, represents the New Testament Age. For the first 20 years of his ministry, my husband walked the road of indemnity to restore the Old Testament Age, centering on the Korean nation and the Unification Church, representing the positions of the nation of Israel and Judaism. In the course of this work, in 1960 we conducted the Holy Wedding of True Parents on the national level. Then, in 1971, we moved to America. The reason America is essential to the providential dispensation is because of its close ties with the Christian churches, Judaism and Israel. During the next 20 years in the United States, we walked the path of indemnity to fulfill the New Testament Age and to begin the Completed Testament Age.
All dispensations related to the Old Testament Age, the New Testament Age and the Completed Testament Age have to be completed centering on True Parents. Bearing this in mind, Israel, America and Korea share a common fate as nations chosen by God. That is why the United States, which represents the democratic world and the free world, needs to work to bring about the reunification of North Korea, an atheistic communist nation, and South Korea, a nation where democracy and Christianity are flourishing.
People need to realize that God blessed America not for itself, but for the sake of the world. The Pilgrims did not come here for wealth. They came here to attend God. If America does not remember the purpose for which it has been blessed, its blessing will dissipate and it will perish.
God has granted my husband an understanding of the forces involved in His providential history. The truth of God is contained in the Divine Principle. Looking at history and the stories of the Bible from a providential viewpoint, the Divine Principle unlocks the answers to questions unsolved for thousands of years. Those who have sincerely studied its contents have found it to be a true gift from God, providing solutions to the problems facing our society today. Even in the formerly communist Commonwealth of Independent States, former Soviet leaders and thousands of young people have found their lives renewed through their study of these teachings. Free at last from the oppression of communist ideology, they are hungry for spiritual truth to guide their nations.
The role of women and the Blessing
Dear friends! When the foundation of Christianity was lost after World War II, God's dispensation was delayed 40 years until the year 1992. That is why, in April 1992, my husband and I founded the Women's Federation for World Peace. Last year, with the heart of True Mother, I visited twelve countries around the world, including those nations that represented Cain's side on the world level at the time of the Second World War, namely Germany, Japan and Italy and those nations that represented Abel's side on the world level, the United States, Great Britain and France. Just as I had done in Russia and China, in those twelve nations I emphasized to more than a million women leaders that we need to lay down the foundation to receive True Parents. On that foundation, my husband and I, as the first True Parents, were able to declare the advent of the Completed Testament Age. I hope that all of you who have come here today will follow our lead and become true parents yourselves.
Ladies and gentlemen, at the dawn of the Completed Testament Age, the time has come for each family to take up the messianic mission and complete the work of salvation all around the world. After restoring your family, the next step is to restore your community, your tribe and your nation. That is the mission of the tribal messiah. In the Completed Testament Age, the mother's role will be crucial. She has to unite her children with her husband and link her family with the True Parents. Already, we have sent thousands of tribal messiah missionaries around the world. Soon the original ideal of the family will be achieved worldwide.
In the completed family, grandparents will be in the position of kings and queens representing God, parents will be in the position of kings and queens representing present-day humanity, and children will be in the position of princes and princesses representing all future descendants. The past, present, and future will live together in harmony when the three generations are united.
Ladies and gentlemen, it is my great privilege to announce to you the establishment of the first true family. My husband and I, together with our 13 children and 24 grandchildren, are absolutely dedicated to serving God and humanity. With three generations in one family, we have achieved, on the family level, the central root, the central trunk and the central bud of the tree of life mentioned in the Bible. It is our sincere hope that you will graft into this lineage and join us in our efforts to create an ideal nation and world.
With the advent of the Completed Testament Age, we will be able to fulfill God's original purpose, which was to create Adam and Eve and have them live together with Him. Realizing this, we have to accomplish the unity of our mind and body, the unity of parents and children and the unity of husband and wife. Then we can establish ideal families practicing God's love.
Last year in Korea, my husband and I officiated at the marriage Blessing ceremony of 30,000 couples. Those couples dedicated their marriages to God, to each other and to the world. In today's homes, most parents are unable to guide their children effectively, especially in such personal matters as love and marriage. My husband and I, however, brought together young people from 131 nations in the world and helped them realize their precious dream of love. In this way, families centered on God can come together and build ideal nations and an ideal world.
When we are able to create such families, social breakdown will disappear. People who have become God's true children will never become slaves to alcohol or drugs. Furthermore, by understanding the sacredness of the love between husband and wife, they will have the moral power to stand strong against illicit and promiscuous sexual relations. Lastly, when this power is pooled together, it will carry out the work of eradicating war, racism, famine and disease. On this foundation, we will be able to build a world where we can fully enjoy true freedom,
peace and happiness.
Esteemed friends! It is my hope that, as leaders of this nation, you will come to understand the meaning of this message considering its significance with a deep heart and an open mind. I sincerely pray that, by fulfilling God's ideal, we can all reach the place of His blessing. May God bless America! Thank you very much.
Part 2: True Parents, the Hope of God and Humankind
Chapter 6: True Parents and the Completed Testament Age
This speech was given by Rev. Sun Myung Moon on May 13, 1993, during a 12-city tour in the United States and then by Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon between May 26 and December 22, 1993, during a speaking tour in the United States, an invitational address given at the US Congress, a speaking tour in Japan, a speaking tour of universities in Korea, an invitational address the Korean National Assembly, and a global speaking tour.
Dear House and Senate members, and respected ladies and gentlemen:
I express my deepest, sincere gratitude to all of you who have honored us with your attendance. As leaders in this great nation, you all have a responsibility in guiding the United States of America, and even the world, into the upcoming new millennium. The promise of a peaceful and prosperous future depends on how we act today.
As we all know, our world today is not filled with happiness or peace; rather it is rife with conflict and despair. We are confronted with broken families and decaying social mores, among other issues. We have debated these matters numerous times, but we have yet to find a solution. Why is that? The true solution to these problems must come from God. We must deal not only with the phenomenal aspects of the problems but must reveal the original root in order to bring a solution. To reveal this root, we need to understand deeply God's purpose of creation and realize that we are at a turning point in God's providence.
God's ideal of creation
God created this world for the sake of the experience of true love. God's ideal in creating the first human ancestors, Adam and Eve, was that they perfect themselves through true love so that they could then create a good family possessing true love, true life and true lineage. A good family like this would have been formed on the basis of united heart and mind among family members in front of God.
If God's original ideal had been realized, there would have been no need for a messiah or for God's providence to save humanity. Adam's family, though it was merely a single family, would have been the center of the ideal clan, nation and world. It would have been the blueprint for all families in the future. It would have been the model for the realization of God's ideal world. However, this present world is far from the good world of God's ideal.
If you read the Bible carefully, you will see that the Fall of human beings involved the loss of Adam's entire family. First, the position of parents was lost through the Fall of Adam and Eve. Second, the position of children was lost as Cain murdered Abel. Because the first family practiced self-centered love, they came to multiply evil rather than goodness, and they bequeathed false life and lineage to their descendants and thus came to form a false world. Thereupon, the history of God's providence of salvation was begun.
In order to restore True Parents centered on true love, God needed a man and a woman who could stand in the stead of Adam and Eve. Only then could a true family be formed in accordance with God's original plan. To restore the original family, God needed to unite Cain and Abel so that the position of true children could be reclaimed, and then He needed to reclaim the positions of True Mother and True Father. To do so, He worked in reverse of the way by which human beings fell.
This pattern of reconciliation of Cain and Abel is the foundation and consistent formula for restoring the True Parents. The separation of Cain and Abel occurs again and again in Judea-Christian history. God separated fallen human beings as siblings into two sides, that of Cain, symbolizing Satan and Abel, symbolizing God, to work out the hatreds resulting from the Fall. God established the pattern of having Abel be struck first and sacrificed. As a result, Abel gained a foundation from which to stand and embrace Cain and recover the blessing given to the eldest son.
By virtue of this principle, the religion that most advances the purpose of salvation always receives Satan's most severe persecution. It walks the path of receiving constant opposition, yet continues its sacrificial effort to save the sinful world. Likewise, good people always stand in the position of being struck first and sacrificing.
The violation of the first family and the course of restoration
Ladies and gentlemen, because illicit, self-centered love invaded the first family, selfishness and greed have continued to dominate human history from the individual to the family, society, nation and world. For this reason, God's work of restoration has to begin at the individual level. Since Satan knows this, he also focuses his efforts on the individual level.
It is not by chance that self-centered individualism has become the dominant way of life in these Last Days. People feel increasingly alienated from those around them, and bear little sense of responsibility for the well-being of their country, their society or even their own family. Rising divorce rates indicate that husbands and wives feel little responsibility for their marriages. Parents do not take responsibility for their children. Individuals, devoid of any sense of human dignity, do not even take responsibility for themselves.
America has seen such phenomena at work, expanding with the youth movement of the 1960s. Idealistic youth rejected the materialism around them in order to seek peace and love. Yet in the process, they also abandoned morality and responsibility. Unable to find the true love that they sought, many disillusioned young people destroyed their lives through drug abuse and free sex, and the suicide rate rose dramatically.
Among all violations, the one that pains God most is free sex. A world of free sex is utterly contrary to the Will of God. Love needs to come from the stimulation of unblemished emotion. However, free sex is totally devoid of purity or true emotion. How many of us have been touched by the cruelty of infidelity and divorce? Where is God in a one-night stand? What about the nightmarish situations in which children are sexually abused by a parent or relative? Is free sex worth the price of a broken child? Where there are homosexuality, free sex, drugs and alcoholism, the world of true love is far away. In this world, Satan openly tells people, "Drink! Smoke! Take drugs! Have sex!" The lifestyle of those who do God's Will, on the contrary, is 180 degrees different from this.
Throughout history, those who chose to walk a spiritual path of self-sacrifice were bitterly opposed and persecuted by the rest of the world. It is only God's love and blessing which have allowed the Unification Church, despite worldwide opposition, to prosper. The fact that our church has risen from obscurity in war-torn Korea to become a world-level religious movement in only 38 years testifies to God's continued guidance and support.
Ladies and gentlemen, religion teaches that what has gone wrong can be corrected through a process of restoration. The Divine Principle refers to making restitution for a wrong as "indemnity.” To make restitution for her wrong actions, fallen Eve needed to take full responsibility. What this signifies is that Eve must first unite Cain and Abel, her children, so that they can be the foundation on which the True Parents can be restored.
Through Abel's love, Cain was supposed to recognize Abel as God's chosen person and unite with him. However, Cain murdered Abel and thus the opportunity of restoring Adam's family was lost. This was why God had to wait for a woman who could reclaim the position of Eve.
In the Bible, one of God's great heroines is Rebekah, the spouse of Isaac. As the mother of Jacob and Esau, Rebekah held the same position in Isaac's family that Eve held in Adam's family. Unlike Eve, however, Rebekah understood God's providence and helped her second son Jacob, who occupied Abel's position, gain the blessing destined for the eldest son.
When Jacob received the birthright and then Isaac's blessing, the elder brother, Esau, just like Cain, wanted to kill him. However, with Rebekah's help, these brothers ultimately did not resort to violence but reconciled in a warm embrace. This reconciliation was a major victory for God. This victory, nevertheless, was not complete, since the reconciliation represented only a symbolic change of lineage. The substantial change of lineage needed to be accomplished in the womb. This is the context for the enigmatic story of Tamar. By understanding that Tamar, like Rebekah, was in the position of Eve, we can see why Jesus was born of the tribe of Judah, which was her lineage.
I am sure that many of you have read the story about the birth of Tamar's twins. (Gen. 38) Tamar conceived with Judah, her father-in-law, the twins Perez and Zerah. The Bible tells us that the two sons struggled even in the womb for the position of firstborn. During Tamar's labor, Zerah's hand emerged and the midwife tied a red string around his wrist. Then, Zerah's hand disappeared back into the womb and Perez, who would have been the younger, was born as the elder. Thus, the second son reclaimed the position of the firstborn son in the womb before they were born.
In terms of conventional morality, the stories of Rebekah and Tamar are questionable at best. However, we can see now why God blessed them, and how they played the role of reclaiming His lineage from Satan, to make it possible for Jesus to be born.
From this same lineage, Mary was born in Israel 2,000 years later. Mary had the responsibility of restoring the right of the eldest son on the family, clan and national levels through paying the indemnity necessary to unite Cain and Abel figures. At that time, the law was to stone to death any woman who became pregnant out of wedlock. Mary responded to God's call and conceived Jesus at the risk of her life.
Because of Mary's faith, and the providential victories of Rebekah and Tamar, Satan could not claim sovereignty over Jesus in Mary's womb. Jesus was born in the position of a true son under God's perfect, direct lineage. He is the first True Son of God, based on the change of the fallen lineage. That is why Jesus is the saint of all saints and the ancestor of the true lineage. His birth represented the conclusion of the Old Testament Age and the national dispensation, and the dawn of the New Testament Age, the worldwide dispensation.
Mary, in the position to restore the original Eve, needed to build unity between Jesus, who was in the position of Abel, and his elder cousin, John the Baptist, who was in the position of Cain. John had a large following and was widely respected. Their unity was crucial if the people of Israel were to identify Jesus as the Messiah. If they had become one, this would have laid the foundation for the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. Jesus would have stood as the True Father of humanity, and his Bride would have stood as the True Mother of humanity. Eventually, the Kingdom of Heaven would have been established on earth.
Even though he had received a clear revelation at the time of Jesus' baptism, John the Baptist did not become one with Jesus. Without seeing John's public support for Jesus, it was impossible for the Jewish people to believe in and follow Jesus. Alone, Jesus then undertook the difficult path of self-proclamation.
Confronted by the faithlessness in Israel, Jesus determined to give his life to bring spiritual salvation to all who believe. Nonetheless, he said that he would come again in order to bring salvation on earth, which is "physical" salvation, on the foundation of "spiritual" salvation.
The opening of the Completed Testament Age
That is why the mind can draw close to God through Jesus, though the body continues to struggle with evil. Even Saint Paul anguished over the contradiction between the desires of the flesh and the desires of the spirit. Many great Christian evangelists have also suffered because of this contradiction. At the dawn of the Completed Testament Age, the crucial challenge is to accomplish both physical salvation and spiritual salvation. That is why we need the Lord of the Second Coming.
God's preparation for the Second Advent included a world-level foundation of Cain-Abel reconciliation. God carried out this dispensation through events surrounding the Second World War. The Allied countries of Great Britain, America and France represented Christianity and were in the position of Abel. The Axis countries of Germany, Japan and Italy were under the influence of nationalistic militarism and stood in the position of Cain. This war was the world-level expansion of the conflict between Cain and Abel.
Immediately after the Allied victory, great strides were taken toward a world of peace on the basis of the worldwide cultural foundation rooted in Christianity. With Great Britain in the position of Eve on the global level, and America and France representing Abel and Cain, respectively, these Allied nations stood ready to receive the Lord of the Second Advent.
Despite this preparation, God's dispensation was not fulfilled at that time. God's representative came to bring His word, yet he was met with tremendous persecution and almost universal misunderstanding. This paralleled Jesus' situation 2,000 years earlier. Just as the people of Israel in Jesus' time awaited the second coming of Elijah on a chariot descending from heaven, Christians awaited the Second Coming by looking for Jesus himself to descend on a cloud from the sky.
At that crucial time after the Second World War, God instructed my husband to bring a new message of truth to Christians in Korea. Korean Christian leaders, however, rejected the possibility that a humble young man had been chosen to bring a new message.
Instead of uniting with my husband, these religious leaders became jealous of him because of his growing number of followers. They blindly opposed him without hearing him out. They even spread lies about him. They exploited unfounded rumors of sexual misconduct and greed, the very antitheses of my husband's teachings, to assassinate his character. The whole world opposed his work and cast him into the wilderness.
Unfortunately, because Christianity did not unite with my husband after the Second World War, the moral authority of Christianity suddenly declined. America, as well as other nations that are founded on Christianity, came to face severe social and cultural crises. Thus, the Cold War began. Humankind was divided again into two worldwide spheres of Cain and Abel, just as it had been during World War II. Denying God, just as the thief on the left denied Jesus, communism represented the Cain-type world. Christian democracies, which affirmed the existence of God, represented the thief on the right, the Abel-type world.
The first battle of the Cold War was the Korean War, which involved 16 nations from the free world gathered under the banner of the United Nations. Then what happened? Forty years later, at the 1988 Seoul Olympics, 160 nations that were hostile toward one another could come together at one place in peace. Following that, in the year 1991, South Korea and North Korea, which represent Abel and Cain respectively on the world level, joined the United Nations.
Such incidents of harmony and reconciliation have taken place in Korea because it is the nation to which God has sent the True Parents.
During the 40 years of the Cold War period, my husband fought to break down barriers and rebuild the foundation to receive the Messiah. During that period of time he was completely misunderstood by others. For doing God's work, he was unjustly imprisoned six times, including for three years in a North Korean communist concentration camp. Moreover, the media has vilified him as a cruel monster who brainwashes people for his own profit.
Can anyone disagree when I say that Reverend Moon is the most persecuted religious leader in the world? My heart is broken when I think of how God has suffered to see His messenger rejected time and time again. His only desire has been to comfort God's heart, yet he finds that it is God who always comforts him.
He has walked a path of indemnity and restitution to restore the mistakes of the past, including those of the Old and New Testament ages. Korea represents the Old Testament Age, while America, a mostly Christian civilization, represents the New Testament Age. For the first 20 years of his ministry, my husband walked the road of indemnity to restore the Old Testament Age, centering on the Korean nation and the Unification Church, representing the positions of the nation of Israel and Judaism. In the course of this work, in 1960 we conducted the Holy Wedding of True Parents on the national level. Then, in 1971, we moved to America. The reason America is essential to the providential dispensation is because of its close ties with the Christian churches, Judaism and Israel. During the next 20 years in the United States, we walked the path of indemnity to fulfill the New Testament Age and to begin the Completed Testament Age.
All dispensations related to the Old Testament Age, the New Testament Age and the Completed Testament Age have to be completed centering on True Parents. Bearing this in mind, Israel, America and Korea share a common fate as nations chosen by God. That is why the United States, which represents the democratic world and the free world, needs to work to bring about the reunification of North Korea, an atheistic communist nation, and South Korea, a nation where democracy and Christianity are flourishing.
People need to realize that God blessed America not for itself, but for the sake of the world. The Pilgrims did not come here for wealth. They came here to attend God. If America does not remember the purpose for which it has been blessed, its blessing will dissipate and it will perish.
God has granted my husband an understanding of the forces involved in His providential history. The truth of God is contained in the Divine Principle. Looking at history and the stories of the Bible from a providential viewpoint, the Divine Principle unlocks the answers to questions unsolved for thousands of years. Those who have sincerely studied its contents have found it to be a true gift from God, providing solutions to the problems facing our society today. Even in the formerly communist Commonwealth of Independent States, former Soviet leaders and thousands of young people have found their lives renewed through their study of these teachings. Free at last from the oppression of communist ideology, they are hungry for spiritual truth to guide their nations.
The role of women and the Blessing
Dear friends! When the foundation of Christianity was lost after World War II, God's dispensation was delayed 40 years until the year 1992. That is why, in April 1992, my husband and I founded the Women's Federation for World Peace. Last year, with the heart of True Mother, I visited twelve countries around the world, including those nations that represented Cain's side on the world level at the time of the Second World War, namely Germany, Japan and Italy and those nations that represented Abel's side on the world level, the United States, Great Britain and France. Just as I had done in Russia and China, in those twelve nations I emphasized to more than a million women leaders that we need to lay down the foundation to receive True Parents. On that foundation, my husband and I, as the first True Parents, were able to declare the advent of the Completed Testament Age. I hope that all of you who have come here today will follow our lead and become true parents yourselves.
Ladies and gentlemen, at the dawn of the Completed Testament Age, the time has come for each family to take up the messianic mission and complete the work of salvation all around the world. After restoring your family, the next step is to restore your community, your tribe and your nation. That is the mission of the tribal messiah. In the Completed Testament Age, the mother's role will be crucial. She has to unite her children with her husband and link her family with the True Parents. Already, we have sent thousands of tribal messiah missionaries around the world. Soon the original ideal of the family will be achieved worldwide.
In the completed family, grandparents will be in the position of kings and queens representing God, parents will be in the position of kings and queens representing present-day humanity, and children will be in the position of princes and princesses representing all future descendants. The past, present, and future will live together in harmony when the three generations are united.
Ladies and gentlemen, it is my great privilege to announce to you the establishment of the first true family. My husband and I, together with our 13 children and 24 grandchildren, are absolutely dedicated to serving God and humanity. With three generations in one family, we have achieved, on the family level, the central root, the central trunk and the central bud of the tree of life mentioned in the Bible. It is our sincere hope that you will graft into this lineage and join us in our efforts to create an ideal nation and world.
With the advent of the Completed Testament Age, we will be able to fulfill God's original purpose, which was to create Adam and Eve and have them live together with Him. Realizing this, we have to accomplish the unity of our mind and body, the unity of parents and children and the unity of husband and wife. Then we can establish ideal families practicing God's love.
Last year in Korea, my husband and I officiated at the marriage Blessing ceremony of 30,000 couples. Those couples dedicated their marriages to God, to each other and to the world. In today's homes, most parents are unable to guide their children effectively, especially in such personal matters as love and marriage. My husband and I, however, brought together young people from 131 nations in the world and helped them realize their precious dream of love. In this way, families centered on God can come together and build ideal nations and an ideal world.
When we are able to create such families, social breakdown will disappear. People who have become God's true children will never become slaves to alcohol or drugs. Furthermore, by understanding the sacredness of the love between husband and wife, they will have the moral power to stand strong against illicit and promiscuous sexual relations. Lastly, when this power is pooled together, it will carry out the work of eradicating war, racism, famine and disease. On this foundation, we will be able to build a world where we can fully enjoy true freedom,
peace and happiness.
Esteemed friends! It is my hope that, as leaders of this nation, you will come to understand the meaning of this message considering its significance with a deep heart and an open mind. I sincerely pray that, by fulfilling God's ideal, we can all reach the place of His blessing. May God bless America! Thank you very much.
Share this Godible. Start a conversation.
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us at support@godible.org.
You can also share your testimony about Godible here!
FFWPU, USA. All Rights Reserved.