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Ruth 1
Then she told them, “Don’t call me Naomi any longer! Call me Mara,[e]because God has made my life bitter. 21 I had everything when I left, but the Lord has brought me back with nothing. How can you still call me Naomi, when God has turned against me and made my life so hard?”
Richard: In life, many times we don’t know when something is positive or negative in the long run. We could ask “is this good or is this bad?”. On face value, it might be bad, but it good be good in the long run. We just don’t know (at least for some time we won’t realize it). The story of Naomi’s and her daughter Ruth is such a story. It’s better to have a grateful attitude even if things seem difficult.
Isaiah 22
When all of this happened,
the Lord All-Powerful told you
to weep and mourn,
to shave your heads,
and wear sackcloth.
13 But instead, you celebrated
by feasting on beef and lamb
and by drinking wine,
because you said,
“Let’s eat and drink!
Tomorrow we may die.”
14 The Lord All-Powerful
has spoken to me
this solemn promise:
“I won’t forgive them for this,
not as long as they live.”
To Whom Do You Belong?
Sun Myung Moon
March 16, 1958
If you want to call yourself Heaven’s own, you must first enter the position of God, who sheds tears. You will feel what God has experienced through the tormenting course of history, and you will also shed tears. The same thing is true for the ears that are listening. You will not be able to swallow even one spoonful of rice you are eating. If you have become the people who can connect with the distressed heart of Heaven in this manner, then this people can live on. You have to understand that God is seeking this kind of person.
In the Bible, it is recorded about the nine fruits of the sacred spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. (Gal. 5:22-23) These nine fruits of the sacred spirit are the standards of the nation that Heaven advocates, which God is constructing and trying to establish. They are the system of that society and the ideology of life. Have you ever felt this deep inside? If you have such a deeply felt conviction, you will feel the heart of Jesus, who had to close his mouth and persevere while clinging to the rock and facing Jerusalem, though he had many things he wanted to say.
You have entered the Unification Church today. You must not desire the Unification Church for your own sake. You have to understand that the reason we are here is for the sake of the people. The reason the people exist is for the sake of the world. The reason the world exists is for the sake of Heaven. Moreover, although you will exert yourself for the sake of this will and offer something before the altar, you have to understand that God is happier about someone worrying about the will. You have to also understand that, more than preparing a comfortable place for Jesus to sleep in and more than conducting a big and generous banquet for him, God and Jesus are happier about someone who is worrying about the heart of Jesus and shedding tears while holding onto the world.
Jesus wanted the twelve disciples to love the chosen people, forgetting themselves, more than he wanted them to serve him. The same thing was true of Moses, and it is also true of God.
Therefore, you must become filial sons and daughters, loyal subjects, and women of piety who feel a great shame which gives you no room for any excuses. You must feel how inadequate you are for not being able to insist that you will do something, and you must feel apologetic toward Heaven. You must carry on the battle so that you will not become the possession of the Father. If you can become this kind of person and go forward, then history will pass through the people, the nation and the world to cross over into the era of the cosmos.
Who can guarantee that the time will not come when Heaven will play the leadership role? As long as there is Heaven, there will surely come a time when Heaven must play the role of a leader. Because the one standard of human principles has not been set until today, the heavenly principles could not interfere. Yet on the day that the dignity of the heavenly principles is restored before humanity, humankind will have no way to escape from its commands and laws.
The time like this is coming, yet people are ignorant of this. They must reflect upon themselves again. Having done so, passing through the gates of God’s love, you must become capable and confident people who can say, “We believe in God absolutely,” and become the true sons and daughters who can serve the Father.