Author: Richard Urban

Make Plans for the Spring Season

1 Kings 20

22 Later, the prophet[e] went back and warned Ahab, “Benhadad will attack you again next spring. Build up your troops and make sure you have some good plans.”

Isaiah 30

This is a message
about the animals
    of the Southern Desert:
You people carry treasures
    on donkeys and camels.
You travel to a feeble nation
through a troublesome desert
    filled with lions
    and flying fiery dragons.
7 Egypt can’t help you!
That’s why I call that nation
    a helpless monster.”

The Path of Life We Must Go, Entertaining Hope

Rev. Sun Myung Moon
March 22, 1959

Romans 8: 18-21

Prayer

Please bless this day to be a holy day. Please sanctify this hour. Please credit these people as a holy throng. Please allow this audience to have only sincere minds that cannot forget the Father’s heart.

Please govern this hour, and do not let it be one in which we feel what we please. Allow our hearts to be transformed into resembling the Father’s heart. Let the sincere heart that desires to relate to the Father’s sacred image overflow within us. Please eradicate all opinions, assertions and notions that have been the backbone of our self-centered thinking until now. Allow only that which can make a connection with the Father seep out of the depths of our hearts. Father, I sincerely wish and desire that You allow us to be anxious only to adore the ideal and purpose You desire, to care for the Father’s will.

There have been numerous people who have come and gone before now for the sake of Your will. We realize that it is Your great grace to have called us and to let us gather here. We are quite beneath notice. We know that You gathered us because You want to give us commands. Father! We sincerely wish and desire that You will please bestow Your words of life and grace upon each of our spirits. Continue reading “Make Plans for the Spring Season”

What are the Core Values at the Center of the Universe?

Cheon Seong Gyeong 436

Suppose one day you leave the house
after having a fight with your brothers or
sisters. The least you can do upon your
return is to hold a party so that you
can make them happy again. Ask for
their forgiveness and tell them that you
should love one another as you love your
parents. Since brothers and sisters rep-
resent your mother and father, if your
brothers or sisters are poor, help them
and serve them as you would serve your
mother. There is nothing more beautiful
than this. The Kingdom of Heaven starts
from there. (184-65, 1988.11.13)

Cheon Seong Gyeong 2179

In the same way, a man should first
buy clothes for his parents, and then
for his wife and children, before buying
clothes for himself. He should attend and
serve his parents when they eat. Even in
the satanic world, it was the custom in
Korea for people to attend their parents
for a three-year period of mourning
after their death. In the old days, was it
not Korean etiquette for a devoted son
to be in mourning for his deceased par-
ents by building a mud hut next to their
grave and living there for three years in
order to fulfill his filial duty? Therefore,
in Korea, if people did not attend their
parents with devotion for at least three
years, then when they went to the spirit
world, they would not be able to say that
they are descendants of Korea.

Cheon Seong Gyeong 1754

You did not know what makes a man
a man, and a woman a woman? The
answer is: the sexual organs. Is there
anyone here who dislikes them? If you
like them, how much do you like them?
Even if you hitherto disdained them, you
should henceforth esteem them. What
will the world be like in the future? If
it is a world that absolutely values the
sexual organs. Will that world be good
or bad? Will it prosper or perish? This
is not a joke. When God was creating
human beings, into which part did He
invest the greatest creative effort? Would
it be the eyes, the nose, the heart or the
brain? Do not all these organs eventual-
ly die? What is the purpose of the Fam-
ily Federation for World Peace? If there
were a world inhabited by people who
transcend all fields including morality
and religion, whose sexual organs are
harmonized into oneness so as to earn
God’s welcoming praise, what kind of
world would it be?

The Path of Life We Must Go, Entertaining Hope

Rev. Sun Myung Moon
March 22, 1959

Romans 8: 18-21

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.

Prayer

In this hour, please let us feel and experience the heart of the Father, who sent our good ancestors to this earth and drove them as far as death because You loved humankind so.

We know that history has been one of continual sadness and conflict since the fall of the first human ancestors, who were not up to their task. Neither Heaven nor earth has had a day of happiness since. Father, because of this, the world is full of twists and turns. When will we become pious sons and daughters in whom You can take delight and who can praise You on this earth? We are anxiously awaiting the day when we can do so.

Since we who are inadequate have gathered before You this day, please look at us with compassion. We are feeble; please make us strong, so that we may lift the banner of victory on the battleground that remains for us. Allow us to be able to boast that we have become Your sons and daughters. Father, we pray this from the bottoms of our hearts.

Father, we realize that there have been many things in our lives of the past week that were not right in Your presence. Please forgive us. We are prostrated before You in this hour to offer our insufficient minds and bodies. Please purify us from all that is not right. We pray ardently that You allow only the things You can claim to spring up in our minds and bodies.

We know very well that You have gathered us here in this hour because You love us so much. Since we realize this is out of Your grace, please let this be the hour when we can offer our sincere hearts to You in response to that grace. We sincerely wish and desire that You allow us to be sons and daughters who can fight to the end, enduring everything for the sake of fulfilling the Father’s wish and will.

Since it is a holy day, please bless all humankind, and bless this pitiful people. There are church members who are praying on their knees before You in lonely places. Please bless them and do not withdraw Your uniform grace of protection and divine aid from them. I sincerely wish and desire that You lead, protect and guide them until we greet the Father’s eternal day.

Since we came before You in this hour, please allow us to be able to offer all of our minds and bodies. Father, we pray sincerely that You will allow this to be the hour when we abandon all notions of the world and are able to relate to You with the hearts of true sons and daughters.

Father, please govern this hour in person. Do not allow Satan to take advantage of an unguarded moment. Ardently soliciting that You will cling to us eternally with the hands of grace, and that You will transfer us to Your garden of life, I pray all these words in the name of the Lord. Amen.

 

 

The Only Fight That Will Be Left Will Be That of the Mind

Acts 17

17 After Paul and his friends had traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they went on to Thessalonica. A Jewish meeting place was in that city. 2 So as usual, Paul went there to worship, and on three Sabbaths he spoke to the people. He used the Scriptures 3 to show them that the Messiah had to suffer, but that he would rise from death. Paul also told them that Jesus is the Messiah he was preaching about. 4 Some of them believed what Paul had said, and they became followers with Paul and Silas. Some Gentiles[a] and many important women also believed the message.

Malachi 3

3 I, the Lord All-Powerful,
will send my messenger
    to prepare the way for me.
Then suddenly the Lord
you are looking for
    will appear in his temple.
The messenger you desire
is coming with my promise,
    and he is on his way.

The Heart of Heaven in Relation to Elijah

Sun Myung Moon
March 15, 1959

1 Kings 19: 1-21

Doctrines and thoughts incite you every moment today. This is an odd moment. Fear from the happenings in history drives you. Who would be the one to win in the fight against fear and sing the song of victory on a personal level? There is no one.

Which direction will history take? Where will the cry for new hope and new liberation come from at this time, when death is surging over us? No cry is yet heard. This is the problem.

Now something totally new must come out, something unimagined. You have never imagined or dreamed of that something.

People are going through the age of religious battle now. In the near future, all fights, the fights between peoples, the fights between nations, the fights in the world, the fights between “isms,” and religious fights, will come to an end. The only fight that will be left will be that of the mind. No matter what sweeps over your mind, you must be able to overcome it. We are in such a time. Continue reading “The Only Fight That Will Be Left Will Be That of the Mind”

Hear the New Voice Like Elijah Did

Cheon Seong Gyeong 2066

In the world of love, you have a spe-
cial right that enables you to make God
your own object partner. Whether you
are large or small, this is an indisputable
fact.
As you shed sweat with blood in the
field of your tong ban breakthrough
activities, laying the foundation and
creating a melting pot overflowing with
love, having been filled up totally, then
in the position of an owner ask God,
“Would you ever like to come here?”
Would you expect Him to say, “Get lost!
Go away!” Instead He will say, “Show me
the way!” Then He will ask you, “Where
would you like me to sit?” He cannot just
sit wherever He chooses. The principles
of the world work in this way.
The God who created the order in the
world knows the stages of the world that
He created. Therefore, He knows where
He should sit or where He should stand.
In Korea we have a saying for some-
one who has no common sense. We say
about him, “Does that person know how
to discern between where he will sit or
stand?” We say this, don’t we? It is the
same with God. (208-211, 1990.11.18)

Cheon Seong Gyeong 1132

If we read the Bible, it tells us that
Adam and Eve fell by eating of the fruit
of the tree of the knowledge of good and
evil, but then what does it mean that
they covered their sexual parts? If the
Christian churches had a mind to inter-
pret the Bible a little more intellectu-
ally, they would immediately be able to
understand the origin of the Fall. Why
were Adam and Eve ashamed of their
sexual parts? Why did they cover them?
They should have covered their mouths
and hands. There is nothing wrong with
sexual organs. However, since people fell
through them, these parts of the human
body became a palace of shame where
heavenly love was violated. A spring of
true love should have welled forth from
there, but a fountain of false, devil-
ish love gushed out instead. That place
therefore became the stronghold of the
worst kind of love. (202-199, 1990.5.24)

The Heart of Heaven in Relation to Elijah

Sun Myung Moon
March 15, 1959

1 Kings 19: 1-21

The central role players in history have been people who were pursued and hounded. The doctrines that have ruled history were made by such people. People enjoying sumptuous feasts, living in grand style and sitting on a lofty seat in a grand residence never made such doctrines. Those people who were pursued, trodden upon and miserable made them. They were the people who shed tears.

The people who shed tears on behalf of Heaven, holding onto the world when the people of the nation are corrupt and the world is in utter confusion are the successors to Elijah on the world level. Such people can stand before Heaven on behalf of the Israelites for whom Elijah felt concern. If you strut proudly, saying, “Elijah is Elijah, and I am I,” you will meet with destruction. We must become those who can cry and feel sorrow together with Heaven.

Heaven does not exist only as logos. He is the God of the word, of the substantial entity, of Shim Jung and of love. We have become people who do not even know the word. We do not know the purpose of our body. We do not know what our Shim Jung is supposed to feel and experience. We do not know the heavenly love we should practice. Continue reading “Hear the New Voice Like Elijah Did”

Where is the Center of Your Life?

Romans 3

1 Now we see how God does make us acceptable to him. The Law and the Prophets[b] tell how we become acceptable, and it isn’t by obeying the Law of Moses. 22 God treats everyone alike. He accepts people only because they have faith in Jesus Christ. 23 All of us have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory. 

Job 19

26 My flesh may be destroyed,
yet from this body
    I will see God.[b]
27 Yes, I will see him for myself,
    and I long for that moment.

The Heart of Heaven in Relation to Elijah

Sun Myung Moon
March 15, 1959

1 Kings 19: 1-21

If we view the phenomena taking place in this world today, they are equivalent to what took place in the period of Ahab, King of Israel in the old days. What is idolatry? It is to abandon Heaven and worship something else; to hold it in equal or higher reverence than we hold God. We must know that numerous people today are worshipping the idol called “civilization” without being aware of it.

At a time like this, if there is one who has the same heart as Elijah as he watched King Ahab, that is, one who feels the sorrowful heart of Heaven on top of his own, and if there is a throng of people who pray, “Please set us up as Your beloved sons and daughters who can bring this land to Your bosom,” comforting Heaven with the heart of Elijah, they would have to look at this age with more indignation than Elijah had. If such a set of people does not exist, we ourselves must become them. We must become the people who build an altar without others’ knowledge and shed tears all unknown, knowing that even if we are of humble birth, our ancestors established the teachings of the heavenly principles by upholding the will of Heaven. We must understand that the work of God, who tries to unfold the dispensation by setting up the providential tradition, is yet to be completed. We must not think we are inadequate, even though we are. Unless such a set of people comes forth and fights upon this earth, the eschatological phenomena of this world cannot be stopped.

Though King Ahab betrayed Heaven and mistreated the Israelites, that happened on a national level. Today, people idolize material things as slaves of civilization, and do not know the location of their center of life. They do not know the direction and location to walk toward, and they make frantic efforts without seeking Heaven. This is similar to the people enslaved by King Ahab in ancient times. Continue reading “Where is the Center of Your Life?”