Cheon Seong Gyeong 2206
Then even after your death your loyalty and filial piety will remain as that which belongs to heaven and to earth. Humankind will pass this tradition down as that which belongs to earth. That is how it is. (155-235, 1965.10.31)
Cheon Seong Gyeong 775
Water symbolizes the age of the womb. Your nose symbolizes the age of air. After coming out of your mother’s womb you live in the age of air. Afterwards, it becomes the age of the eyes, the age of the sun and the age of light. Love is also called light. It is said that love lights everything up, isn’t it? It is the world of light.
Life goes through three periods. Even a dragonfly spends time in the water, on land and then, after discarding its shell, it flies about feeding on other bugs. It goes through three stages. It is the same with human beings, the lords of creation. After the age of the womb, when you emerge from your mother’s womb, do you come out with your arms full of household goods or do you come out destroying and cutting everything away? It would cause serious trouble if you came out with even one item.
You used to eat and breathe through your umbilical cord. Wouldn’t you expect to die if you cut it? Yet you need to cut it in order to come out of the mother’s womb. You have to cut it ruthlessly. You have to destroy everything as you come out. (299-37, 1999.2.1)
Hope
Hope is integral to faith in God. A hopeful view of the world’s future follows from faith in the God of history who is moving forward to fulfill His promises. God has promised an end to violence and oppression, poverty and sorrows. Even though people do not always see the realization of their hopes in this world, they can still hope for a future beyond death, a new life in the eternal world. Therefore, God created human beings to hope, and by keeping hope alive we can draw closer to God.
Father Moon teaches that in the religious life we should keep a positive and hopeful attitude, ever maintaining our vision and our hopes regardless of the circumstances. We should keep our minds fixed on eternity, with a hope that transcends even death. We should carry the torch of hope, following in the footsteps of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses and others who, in the words of the Letter to the Hebrews, possessed “the conviction of things unseen, assurance of things hoped for.” Above all, we should hope for the fulfillment of God’s Kingdom, especially in these days of the advent of the True Parents.
Where there is no vision, the people perish.
Youths may faint and be weary,
and young men may fall, exhausted;
but they who hope in the Lord shall renew
their strength.
Isaiah 40.30
Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who
fear him,
on those who hope in his steadfast love,
that he may deliver their soul from death,
and keep them alive in famine.
Our soul waits for the Lord;
he is our help and shield.
Yea, our heart is glad in him,
because we trust in his holy name.
Let thy steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us,
even as we hope in thee.
Psalm 33.18-22
Let him who hopes for the encounter with his Lord work righteousness, and not associate with his Lord’s service anyone.
Qur’an 18.110
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it men of old received divine approval.
By faith we understand that the world was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not appear.
By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he received approval as righteous, God bearing witness by accepting his gifts; he died, but through his faith he is still speaking. By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death; he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was attested as having pleased God. And without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, took heed and constructed an ark for the saving of his household; by this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness which comes by faith.
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place which he was to receive as an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was to go. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked forward to the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God. By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.
These all died in faith, not having received what was promised, but having seen it and greeted it from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one…
Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
Hebrews 11.1-16, 12.1-2
What more shall we be than we are? Listen to John the evangelist: “It is not yet apparent what we shall be: [but] we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him.” How? “For we shall see Him as He is.” A great promise, but the reward of faith… If you believe, ask for the reward of faith; but if you believe not, with what face can you seek the reward of faith?
Saint Augustine, On the Gospel of John 40.9 (Christianity)
We therefore hope in Thee, O Lord our God, that we shall soon behold the triumph of Thy might, idolatry will be uprooted from the earth, and falsehood be utterly destroyed.
We hope for the day when the world will be perfected under the dominion of the Almighty and all mankind learn to revere Thy name; when all the wicked of the earth will be drawn in penitence unto Thee.
O may all the inhabitants of the world recognize that unto Thee every knee must bend, every tongue pledge loyalty. Before Thee, O Lord our God, may they bow in worship, and give honor to Thy glorious name.
May they all acknowledge Thy kingdom, and may Thy dominion be established over them speedily and forevermore. For sovereignty is Thine, and to all eternity Thou wilt reign in glory.
Daily Prayer Book, Alenu (Judaism)
Difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future. When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.
Martin Luther King, Jr. (Christianity)