Cheon Seong Gyeong: Episode 142

Cheon Seong Gyeong Book 5: True Family
Chapter 4: The Education of Children and the Kingdom of Heaven in the Family
Section 2: The Family Is the Textbook of God's Kingdom, 24
Section 3: Parents’ Love and Responsibility, 07

(24)  The kingdom of heaven originates from the family, so we have to turn the family around, based on true love. For this, the second generation has an important role to perform. Satan is striving to destroy young people. He herds them into drug dens. Shot by the devil's arrows, they engage in free sex without thought to the consequences. Young people in every town should unite with the police to confront gangsters and expel them. Our families will bring hope to towns when our second-generation young people take responsibility to deal with gangsters and educate other young people, together with their parents. Beginning in the family and expanding to the world, we have to create the foundation for a palace of peace within our own families. Those who do this are wise. When there are many such families, they will receive blessings in the future as a people.

(25)  Those whose heart is to serve the world just as they serve their own grandparents will face no obstacles on the way to the kingdom of heaven. We need a uniform foundation of education for people of all nations to build a world of unity. For example, as you are about to enter a restaurant, if you see an elderly couple looking worried because they have no money, you should take them into the restaurant with you and treat them well, as if they were your own grandparents. If you live for the sake of others you will be blessed. Such a legacy will never disappear. When you invest with love, nothing is lost.

(26)  What is God's sorrow? It is that He has been unable to secure three generations on the horizontal level. God could never see Adam and Eve become a true couple or true parents, and thus, He could not see true grandchildren. Achieving this would have made three generations. Since these three generations were turned upside down by the Fall—that is, since we inherited the wrong life, love, and lineage from the fallen world—we have to turn everything right side up. This brings us to the conclusion that the grandfather should be in the position of the grandson, the father should be in the position of the son, and the older brother should be in the position of the younger brother. This is unprecedented as if heaven and earth are turned upside down; it is revolutionary. From the vertical perspective, the grandfather represents the first position, God; Adam and Eve represent the father and mother, and the children represent the princes and princesses. Hence, we ought to attend the grandfather and grandmother, who appear in the family on the horizontal level representing God. This is the original principle of family education.

(27)  Parents need to be strict in the family, especially today. These days, parents are required to take responsibility in managing and educating their children, even to employ disciplinary measures so that they will not be tainted by the fallen world.  Free sex, the public flaunting of sex, and homosexuality are the devil's tricks. Our way, which takes us to the heavenly nation, is 180 degrees different from the way of this world. It is natural that someone like me would be opposed by this world. Therefore, unless I proclaim that I have completed all that I had promised in the course of restoration, I cannot enter the realm of perfection in substance. By achieving the eternal standard of the Blessing, as the partner of true love, I can unite with God, the subject partner who is centered on true love, the ideal of creation.

(28)  The grandfather is a special envoy of the kingdom of heaven; the parents are the king and queen of the present world, and the children are the princes and princesses of heaven and earth. That is why a grandfather loves his grandchildren more than he loves his own sons and daughters. After becoming a grandfather myself, I found this to be true. We need to create educational institutions where our grandchildren can study. If we cannot do that, we have failed our mission as grandparents. Our grandchildren will call us to account for this again and again. Our grandchildren should be the parents who begin the re-creation of the kingdom of heaven throughout heaven and earth. We have to become grandparents and ancestors who can fulfill our mission to make it possible for our grandsons and granddaughters to stand in such a position.

Section 3.  Parents' Love and Responsibility

(1)  When we raise our children, we have to care for them with more love than that with which we care for ourselves. When we fulfill our responsibility as parents, our children come to understand parents' love, and when they have their own children, they will raise them the same way. In this way, children come to realize and share their parents' sorrow and joy as their own, and their parents' responsibility and work as their own. Thus, even if they are not told to do so, the children willingly consider their parents' adversaries to be their adversaries, accept their parents' work and responsibility as theirs, and inherit their parents' circumstances. Raising such children is in accordance with the principles of creation.

(2)  The power of love gives insight that is impossible to come by otherwise. The parents' heart of love transcends distance to connect with their children. You have seen such a scene in movies: A child is involved in an accident far from home, and his father or mother sees the scene in a dream and wakes up distraught. This is the response that comes through the line of love; it conveys reality exactly as it is. It is not just a vision; it is reality that is communicated. Likewise, on earth, you can contact God's substance directly through the line of love.

(3)  Parents do not expose their beloved children's shortcomings, even though they may have flaws. They want their children to resemble only their own good points. After seeing that a child has done wrong, a parent may spank him or her, but will soon regret it and sympathize with the child. This is a parent's heart. A parent may discipline a child as a response to misbehavior, yet a parent's heart is always to magnify a child's good points, the points in which they see the best of themselves, rather than magnify his or her bad side.

(4)  Parents cannot teach their children filial piety just by words. They have to inspire a filial attitude within their children. The child cannot learn this overnight. It requires a long period of consistent influence. Parents should set an example in daily life that inspires their children to emulate them. They should be experts at inspiring this practice of filial piety, based on God's Will.

(5)  Parents should set the example in leading a life focused on the Will. They have to teach their children the life of prayer, the custom of family worship, and the life of faith. They should also teach them the importance of pledge service. The parents should conduct pledge service and use that time to educate their children about the Will of God. Parents first need to practice what they want to see in their children. They should be a model of loyalty to the Will. Their children should regard them with so much respect that they would not utter a word contrary to what their parents say. If they do not become such models, the children will not follow them. With regard to church life, children will observe their parents and compare their actions with what they understand of the Will and the Principle. If children see that their parents neglect their church duties and do not live according to church guidelines, but expect their children to live in a principled way, they will surely disobey their parents.

(6)  If the parents of today are no different from the parents of the past, they are not qualified to educate their children. Hence, you have to be clearly different from the past in your family life and in your relationships with the people of your community. Children have their own understanding as to how people who are walking the path of the Will should behave, and will see their parents from their own point of view.

(7)  Children sense whether their parents are good or bad. If you maintain a right heart and attitude toward the Will, someday your children will recognize you and your situation. You, as parents, should bequeath the heavenly tradition even when you die.  You exist for your family and your children, but before that, you should serve God and your country. In the end, this is the path that will most benefit your children. Only through this can your children gain the fortune of God, the world, and the nation.