Ephesians 6
4Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, 15and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
2nd Samuel
14I will be his father, and he will be my son. When he does wrong, I will punish him with a rod wielded by men, with floggings inflicted by human hands. 15But my love will never be taken away from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed from before you. 16Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before meb ; your throne will be established forever.’ ”
When Will We Stand Before God?
Rev. Sun Myung Moon
September 8, 1957
Chung Pa Dong Church
Seoul, Korea
Since we have been born within the realm of the new ideology of the heavenly principles, we have to find the universal ideology during our life. We must understand that Jesus passed through the ideology of the Divinity. We must believe and understand as a matter of course that Jesus stands on the highest standard of conscience and goodness, and that he is the representative of the entire character of God.
Why have we not become like Jesus? It is because, no matter what we do now, the environment we are in is rushing toward us powerfully. It is the force that oppresses our minds, which wants to accomplish something. People are ignorant of this fact. Moreover, even if our conscience is heading toward the highest good, in other words, toward the substantial existence of the Absolute Being, our mind cannot carry actions out smoothly. Why is that? It is because, as a ramification of the fall, this world has become a world of sinfulness.
The power of darkness, which is more powerful than the power of our minds, is oppressing our original minds and forcing us down. In Christian churches, they call this power of darkness “Satan.” We cannot but think about how to break through this power of darkness.
The power of darkness and the evil elements in our bodies are dragging us to the world of death by causing doubt and by causing us to carry out sinful actions. We must cultivate an environment that can obstruct them and push them away. The religion that is trying to achieve this is Christianity.
Thus, Jesus told us, “Believe in me,” in the same manner as he had a firm belief in God. Although that “me” was something only Jesus accomplished, who can produce such individuals and initiate a movement to multiply this in the human world? This cannot be done with human power. God must do it. Nonetheless, this is where man’s faith is needed. In other words, we must believe in God and march forward in the same way that Jesus chased the forces of darkness out of his surroundings by belief in God. Then, although Satan appears momentarily in the place where we are moving, eventually Heaven will come forward and defeat Satan. Jesus set the conditions of faith to determine this one standard.
To set the conditions of faith, to what level must we believe? You must not be content with just believing to the extent of your imagination. You are not just to believe to the extent that your thoughts can reach. People do not have the exemplary level of faith in this world today. If you believe for the sake of the substantial embodiment of the Divinity, then you have to set the standard of faith that can compare with the value of the great and lofty God.
To what extent then does the faith of the human beings of the present age reach? The extent of that faith is very low, as shown by the words of Jesus: “If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” (John 3:12) Similarly, Jesus spoke in very pessimistic terms about the faith of men. Can the people who are of the faith today set the absolute standard of faith? This is the problem.
Until today, Christianity believed in God only as a being inside the Bible. However, even within God, there is faith. As long as God has the infinite idea of creation, He has the conviction to fulfill this idea. That is something in which even God believes. Therefore, we must pursue infinite faith. If we possess such faith, then we can believe in all the words in the Bible.
Moreover, only when you can believe in all the words in the Bible can you think about the words of truth that even Jesus could not reveal while he was on the earth. Only by discovering in this way the parts that Jesus could not talk about, can you climb over the hill of universal doubt. You can then comfort the ancestors who have passed through universal death, tribulation and the universal history of sin.
Although you believe in the Lord, the subject of faith, you must not stop at just believing in Jesus. Based on the condition of believing in Jesus, you are to put your eternal life at stake and develop a relationship of faith with Jesus. On the foundation of having developed a relationship of faith with Jesus, you are to feel the substantial existence of God. If you genuinely believe in Jesus, then you can accomplish these things.
This will bring infinite progress to people who are searching for the course of limitless faith. The average Christians of today are not aware of this. Similarly, you must understand that God is waiting for true men of faith who are captivated by this idea of infinite faith. They are the hope for the realization of the Kingdom of Heaven.