Extra Early Bird Registration for the Urban Life Teaching Abstinence and Achieving Blessed Marriage Conference on November 24 to 26 in Harpers Ferry, WV is now open. Save up to $20 per ticket by registering now: http://bit.ly/2x9trEQ.
CSG 673
In the Unification Church, we nev-
er think that you can receive salva-
tion as an individual. We do not go to
heaven as individuals. Nobody can go
alone. That’s the rule. From the Gar-
den of Eden, Adam and Eve were to go
to heaven together. Were the husband
and the wife to go there alone? Couples
and families not united cannot go there.
That being the ideal, what kind of heav-
en would it be, if the father went to hell
and the mother to heaven? We must go
to heaven as couples, families, clans, and
entire nations. (50-61, 1971.10.30)
Isaiah 23
Its people have spread
to distant lands;
8 its merchants were kings
honored all over the world.
Who planned to destroy Tyre?
9 The Lord All-Powerful planned it
to bring shame and disgrace
to those
who are honored
by everyone on earth.
Richard: I just got an image in my mind as I was watching a slide show of the massive flood damage in Houston Texas. This is the very city where the lesbian mayor demanded that pastors give copies of their sermons to check for forbidden anti-homosexual content. And now it has been hit be a literal flood judgement. I pray for all those who lost their lives or have been displaced and lost their belongings.
Let Us Experience the Sorrow of God
Sun Myung Moon
March 2, 1958
Romans 18: 12-27
12 My dear friends, we must not live to satisfy our desires. 13 If you do, you will die. But you will live, if by the help of God’s Spirit you say “No” to your desires. 14 Only those people who are led by God’s Spirit are his children. 15 God’s Spirit doesn’t make us slaves who are afraid of him. Instead, we become his children and call him our Father.[b] 16 God’s Spirit makes us sure that we are his children. 17 His Spirit lets us know that together with Christ we will be given what God has promised. We will also share in the glory of Christ, because we have suffered with him.
18 I am sure that what we are suffering now cannot compare with the glory that will be shown to us. 19 In fact, all creation is eagerly waiting for God to show who his children are. 20 Meanwhile, creation is confused, but not because it wants to be confused. God made it this way in the hope 21 that creation would be set free from decay and would share in the glorious freedom of his children. 22 We know that all creation is still groaning and is in pain, like a woman about to give birth.
23 The Spirit makes us sure about what we will be in the future. But now we groan silently, while we wait for God to show that we are his children.[c] This means that our bodies will also be set free. 24 And this hope is what saves us. But if we already have what we hope for, there is no need to keep on hoping. 25 However, we hope for something we have not yet seen, and we patiently wait for it.
26 In certain ways we are weak, but the Spirit is here to help us. For example, when we don’t know what to pray for, the Spirit prays for us in ways that cannot be put into words. 27 All of our thoughts are known to God. He can understand what is in the mind of the Spirit, as the Spirit prays for God’s people.
Prayer
Father! Please allow us to examine our hearts. Allow us to examine our bodies. Please guide us to become the sons and daughters whose minds and bodies can pierce into the heart of the Father.
We know that all the people of faith in heaven who served the cause of the providential will could not raise their heads before You and suffered great embarrassment over the fact that they were fallen. We who are on the earth have to bow our heads before You and make an effort to possess Your heart. Therefore, beloved Father, we earnestly wish that You will not let us display any impudence. Let our demeanor not be disrespectful toward the Father.
Please allow us to have the desperate heart that recognizes we are sinners and longs for the heart of the Father, waiting for the compassionate and loving hands of the Father and bowing our heads low. If we still possess the root of dark sins, then, Father, we wish ardently for You to remove it.
Although many people have come together in this hour, please allow us to become one in heart. Even if our bodies are many, please allow all of them to become one. By doing so, please work through us so that we can pioneer the new path according to the directions of the Father, who is directing us at this moment. Beloved Father, we sincerely hope that You will allow us to receive new power to possess the original power of Heaven and produce new actions.
Please protect us in this hour now. Please do not let Satan find room for invasion. If we have some theory, some doctrine, assertion or concepts, then, Father, please allow us to forget them and have the heart of a child who longs only for the Father. Please allow us to silently offer all that we have in our minds and bodies before Your altar. Sincerely hoping that You will create and mold us with new words, we wish ardently that You will let the direct works of re- creation emerge here so that we can be embraced in the Father’s bosom of love.
Father! Now we want to convey Your words, so please do not let the heart of the speaker and the hearts of the listeners become two. We know that the greater the gap between the heart of the speaker and the heart of the listener, the greater the opportunity for Satan to find room for invasion.
Father, please allow us to experience Your anguished heart. By doing so, Father, we hope that You will allow us to become sons and daughters who can alleviate the worries of the Father and return joy and glory to Him. Requesting and wishing sincerely that You will lay the hands of compassion on the congregation gathered here, we have offered all the words in the name of the Lord. Amen.