How Much Have You Empathized With God’s Situation?

Watch or Listen to the podcast of the Richard Urban Show from May 7, 2020: Moral Posturing Does Not Improve Our Healthhttps://www.visionroot.org/2020/05/08/is-governor-justice-moral-posturing/ .

Cheon Seong Gyeong 2007

Do you know where the providence
has come to at the present time? The
first goal is to have the basis on which
we can bring about the restoration of the
homeland in heaven’s nation and liber-
ate God’s Kingdom on earth. This must
be done even if you have to sacrifice time
with your family and relatives. Even if
you end up as a refugee, this must be
accomplished. (300-309, 1999.4.11)

Cheon Seong Gyeong 1059

You should offer all your devotion in
witnessing to your parents. There is no
greater happiness than receiving heav-
en’s blessings with them, in the presence
of God’s will, and creating a protective
fence as a Blessed Family. (16-329, 1966.7.31)

World Scripture and the Teachings of
Sun Myung Moon

Part 1
God and Creation

Chapter 1
God

Divine Love and Compassion

3. God’s Loving Heart toward Humanity

When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. The more I called them, the more they went from me; they kept sacrificing to the Baals, and burning incense to idols. Yet it was I that taught Ephraim to walk, I took him up in my arms; but they did not know that I healed them. I led them with cords of compassion, with the bands of love, and I became to them as one who eases the yoke on their jaws, and I bent down to them and fed them.
Hosea 11.1-4

In the perilous round of mortality, In continuous, unending misery, Firmly tied to the passions As a yak is to its tail; Smothered by greed and infatuation, Blinded and seeing nothing; Seeking not the Buddha, the Mighty, And the Truth that ends suffering, But deeply sunk in heresy, By suffering seeking riddance of suffering; For the sake of all these creatures, My heart is stirred with great pity.
Lotus Sutra 2 (Buddhism)

Teachings of Rev. Sun Myung Moon

How hard is it to educate just one child? Children share their parents’ flesh and blood. Their hearts are linked to their mother, so when mother cries they cry too. Their hearts are naturally connected to their father, so they respond to his cares and sorrows. Even so, it is still extremely hard to teach and raise them, is it not?
Then consider the magnitude of God’s task. Today’s human beings are not God’s children. Although God cries out in bitterness, they act as if they do not hear anything. Although God weeps with grief and sorrow, they just ignore it. This is because human beings stem from Satan’s flesh and blood. They may sense God’s grief, yet all they do is praise Him. They may notice that other people are perishing, yet still they laugh and make merry.
Think how difficult it is for God, who has to train workers and raise leaders from among such people. Without a heart of utmost compassion, God would not have even a foothold to develop His providential work. Yet it is God’s heart to consider every single detail—from one to one hundred to one thousand to even ten thousand—in arranging things for you. (42:257, March 21, 1971)

God elected Cain and Abel, Noah, and many other families as He pursued the providence of restoration. At every dispensation God led of this providential history, His heart was fretful beyond description. Nevertheless, controlling His feelings, God endured with great patience.
Who on this earth today feels the fretful heart of our patient God? Who would hug God and weep with Him? Anyone who knows God’s heart like this and shed tears would understand: God rejoiced at the time of the creation of all things in heaven and earth, but due to the Human Fall God now grieves; His sorrow encompasses all in heaven and earth. (4:239, May 18, 1958)

[Until the coming of Jesus], what had been God’s heart toward humanity? He did not have the attitude to live for His own sake. Although we fallen human beings deserved to suffer and die, God poured out all of His heart and strength to save us. Persevering through the four thousand years of Old Testament history, He fought every step of the way to separate humanity from Satan. You should understand the nature of God who loved us, persevered for us and fought for us with an unchanging heart…
During Jesus’ life of 33 years, he did not try to distinguish himself before the people, but in silence he sought to experience the heart of God… At difficult moments Jesus might have felt the urge to seek his own welfare, but because he was ever immersed in God’s heart, he could not even think of doing it. Jesus knew that God had persevered for four thousand years for the purpose of finding one man—Jesus himself. Knowing that, Jesus spent thirty years preparing himself, so that he could emerge as the man of substance who could liberate God from that history.
God never made excuses for His situation or complained about His suffering, not to anyone. Because Jesus was trying to understand everything about the heart of God, when he was lonely he too persevered and never made any excuses. You should follow the example of his life. (1:78, May 27, 1956)
Even though human beings sinned, God does not accuse us, saying, “Hey, you! Why did you sin?” He knows the situation of sinners. He cares about humanity more than for Himself. He comes in sorrow to sorrowful people, in suffering to suffering people, and in sympathy with those who feel victimized and angry.
How much have you empathized with God’s situation? God comes into our sphere of life in this way. Not only that—he comes to us with His heart: “Although you betrayed Me, I am your Father. With a father’s heart I have been searching for you for six thousand years.” (9:231, May 29, 1960)

Father! We have been like pitiful orphans,
knocked about this way and that,
ignorant of our purpose, our direction, and our historical situation,
unable to grasp the center of life, pushed here and there—
still Thou didst hold on to us.
Yet we did not know that Thou wast there,
sorrowful when we were sad,
not averse to toiling day and night to seek us out,
even as we were ensnared and groaning in the realm of death. (5:337, March 8, 1959)

God Needs Object Partners

Watch or Listen to the podcast of the Richard Urban Show from May 7, 2020: Moral Posturing Does Not Improve Our Healthhttps://www.visionroot.org/2020/05/08/is-governor-justice-moral-posturing/ .

Cheon Seong Gyeong 2138

We were originally to grow up so that
men and women would meet each oth-
er to become kings and queens, and, as
heavenly princes and princesses, inherit
everything in God’s Kingdom. For this,
we must start at the bottom of hell and
work our way up through the eight-stage
indemnity process until God’s Kingdom
is established, which is possible only
through the Blessing of the True Par-
ents, who come as the Messiah.
Therefore, blessed couples should
become ‘plus’ couples who take the ini-
tiative in serving the world. To be com-
pletely reborn, we should practice abso-
lute faith, absolute love, and absolute
obedience centering on God. I have per-
sonally practiced this throughout my
life.
When creating the universe, God did
so with absolute faith. He went on to cre-
ate us to be the absolute partners of His
love. Absolute obedience means invest-
ing ourselves completely to the extent of
total self-denial. Furthermore, we for-
get about the investment we made and
reinvest; such a process continues until
reaching the zero point without any con-
cept of self. If our love were rejected, we
would continue to love even more; even
if we have already invested, we should
continue to invest everything that we
have, until we can make our enemy sur-
render voluntarily. God walked such a
path, and the Parents of heaven and earth
have also walked such a path. The person
who invests love continuously without
expecting a direct return becomes a cen-
tral being, the one who inherits every-
thing, and the child of greatest piety. In
a family with ten members including the
grandparents, the one most exemplify-
ing altruism will be its center. The same
principle applies with respect to patriots
in the nation. The more we invest with-
out expecting a direct return, the higher
we can rise as loyal citizens, saints, and
God’s holy sons and daughters.

Richard: What did God have faith in? Himself? Hardly. He has faith in us, created as His images, that we will (eventually, and hopefully sooner than later) fulfill His original ideal of creation. Doing Home Church work definitely involves having obedience (to your conscience) and pushing your own self/ego down. And what is real love. Giving and investing without expecting a direct return.

Cheong Seong Gyeong 1617

Between you and me, who is supe-
rior? In what respect? Why would one
be superior to another when all of us
are of the same mind? The only differ-
ence between us is to what extent we
put into action what our mind tells us
to do; otherwise we are no different at
all. Our minds are all the same. The
basis of the person and of the mind
is the same; the only difference lies
in the degree to which we follow the
instructions of our minds, how much
we convert our thoughts into action,
and how much we cultivate our envi-
ronment. (222-303, 1991.11.6)

Richard: Again, Home Church is all about cultivating your environment: https://inspiration.visionroot.org/2020/01/21/only-through-home-church-can-you-return-home/ .

World Scripture and the Teachings of
Sun Myung Moon

Part 1
God and Creation

Chapter 1
God

Divine Love and Compassion

1. Love: The Essence of God

Teachings of Rev. Sun Myung Moon

God knows everything. Omniscient and omnipotent, He is the Supreme King of knowledge and power. Omnipresent, He exists everywhere. What does God need? Diamonds? He can make them any time. Gold or jewels? No. What God needs is love. Dwelling all by Himself, would God say, “I have love and it’s great” and laugh? No, there is something that God needs. God is a personal God; then He should have a mouth, shouldn’t He? He also should have anose, eyes, ears, hands and feet, a mind—and a heart. Surely, God must have them, because He isa personal God. (142:30)

God is the Original Being of love, and out of love He created human beings. A solitary being cannot love. Therefore, there is one thing that even God absolutely needs: a partner whom He can love. He can only love in a relationship with a counterpart. God, the Original Being of love and heart, created the universe with love as His motivation. In doing so, He created human beings in His image as His substantial object partners, as it is recorded in Genesis 1:27, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” God is our eternal, formless and internal Parent, and [he created] Adam and Eve to be perfected as our visible and external parents. (135:10-11, August 20, 1985)

If what God needs is love, then He needs object partners with whom He can relate and share love. What sort of beings could these be? Animals? God would love beings that resemble Him. If God’s partners are indeed human beings, then we are led to the conclusion that God has a human-like personality. God, who is in complete harmony within Himself, must also have attributes that can harmonize one hundred percent with the innate faculties of the human mind and body. Hence, God must have intellect, emotion and will. (162:271, April 17, 1987)\

Love cannot be completed without a partner. Even God absolutely needs a counterpart in order to attain the most precious love; that is why He created. God seeks out a partner, so that He can experience absolute love through relating with another. In this sense, God exists for human beings and human beings exist for God. True love begins when we live for the sake of another. What is the origin of human beings? God’s love. We were born for love. Love is the origin. Life is not the most precious thing. Our life derived from God’s idea of love; therefore, love precedes life. Love is the root of life. We are born from love, grow up in love, and meet a partner for love—that should be our life. If God is the first generation, then human beings are the second generation. God always loves us, His sons and daughters, but do we experience God’s love? Human beings need to experience that love if we are to become God’s perfect partners. (143:310, March 21, 1986) 

He Who Abides in Love Abides in God

Watch or Listen to the podcast of the Richard Urban Show from May 7, 2020: Moral Posturing Does Not Improve Our Health: https://www.visionroot.org/2020/05/08/is-governor-justice-moral-posturing/ .

Cheon Seong Gyeong 487

Many people oppose Rev. Moon, the
man who goes to America to educate and
train American young people, even stay-
ing up all night and sometimes dancing,
singing, and having fun with them? I do
this in order to expand the realm of sup-
port that is connected to me.
Because the expansion of the uni-
versal realm of support starts with me,
I push forward without fear, even if I am
opposed and have to go to prison.
No matter how much you sing joy-
fully and say this and that, do you like to
live alone? When one partner of a mar-
ried couple dies, the other grieves and
weeps. Do you think a person can pre-
pare his own path? Why do we say that
a person is miserable if he is without a
spouse? It is because he cannot experi-
ence the occasion in which heaven and
earth can rejoice.
He has deviated from the regulation
of the law of heaven and earth. Clearly,
only through universal law does the for-
tune of heaven and earth turn, and are
the requirements of happiness and its
motivation determined.

Cheon Seong Gyeong 1310

After the blessing of the internation-
al holy grounds, I performed the Bless-
ing of the 430 Couples. This number
corresponds to the 430 years of captiv-
ity of the Israelites in Egypt, and also
the 4,300 years of Korean history. This
Blessing signifies the beginning of a
new history. Moreover, the 430 Couples
also represent all families in the world.
Afterwards, while I was carrying out my
second world tour, I blessed 43 couples
in the United States, Europe and Japan.
I could then connect those 43 couples to
the 430 Couples on the world level. By
doing this, I was able to connect the vic-
torious foundation I had established in
Korea to the world, including the West-
ern world.
By accomplishing all this, all the
families in the world, not just the mem-
bers of the Unification Church, could
now stand in a position to receive heav-
enly fortune right then and there. That is
why the gates of heaven are now open to
all families on earth. (52-131, 1971.12.26)

Richard: Wow! This is great news. The gates of heaven are open to all families on earth, not just Unification Movement families. See this presentation about the Holy Marriage Blessing: https://www.visionroot.org/resources/blessing-of-marriage-ceremony/ .

World Scripture and the Teachings of
Sun Myung Moon

Part 1
God and Creation

Chapter 1
God

Divine Love and Compassion

Of all God’s attributes, love is the most attractive and compelling. Most people who believe in God do so because of the mysterious moments when they felt His love, comfort and grace. It moved their hearts to faith, even amidst the mind’s doubts. Because of the Creator’s love, the creation is a benevolent place that upholds and protects life. Indeed, the good creation is an expression of that love. Love is the essence of God; it is even more than that. As Father Moon teaches, love is the very motivation behind God’s creation; it is the “why” of God. Love is also the reason God has pursued the history of salvation through many tortuous paths. Love teaches God to be patient and forgiving with us ignorant creatures who long ago lost our way and became inured to the gracious melodies of the Spirit. Despite our deafness and blindness, God never ceases to embrace us and lead us forward.

1. Love: The Essence of God

God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.
1 John 4.16

My mercy embraces all things.
Qur’an 7.156

To love is to know me, My innermost nature, The truth that I am.
Bhagavad-Gita 18.55 (Hinduism)

The Great Compassionate Heart is the essence of Buddhahood.
Gandavyuha Sutra (Buddhism)

Lord! You are the uninvoked savior, motiveless compassionate being, a well-wisher even when unprayed, a friend even when unrelated.
Vitaragastava 13.1 (Jainism)

Bright but hidden, the Self dwells in the heart. Everything that moves, breathes, opens, and closes lives in the Self. He is the source of love and may be known through love but not through thought. He is the goal of life. Attain this goal!
Mundaka Upanishad 2.2.1 (Hinduism)

Love is the firstborn, loftier than the gods, the Fathers and men. You, O Love, are the eldest of all, altogether mighty. To you we pay homage! Greater than the breadth of earth and heaven, or of waters and Fire, You, O Love, are the eldest of all, altogether mighty. To you we pay homage!… In many a form of goodness, O Love, you show your face. Grant that these forms may penetrate within our hearts. Send elsewhere all malice!
Atharva Veda 9.2.19-20, 25 (Hinduism)

O good man! Compassion acts as parent to all beings. The parent is compassion. Know that compassion is the Tathagata. O good man! Compassion is the Buddha Nature of all beings. Such a Buddha Nature is long overshadowed by illusion. That is why beings cannot see. The Buddha Nature is Compassion. Compassion is the Tathagata.
Mahaparinirvana Sutra 259 (Buddhism)

The Bull of Dharma is born of compassion;26 Content of mind holds creation together. Whoever understands this is enlightened; How great is the load under which this Bull stands!
Japuji 16, M.1, p. 3 (Sikhism)

O Son of Man! Veiled in My immemorial being and in the ancient eternity of My essence, I knew My love for thee; therefore I created thee, have engraved on thee Mine image, and revealed to thee My beauty.
Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Arabic 3 (Baha’i Faith)

The Great Tao Flows Everywhere

Watch or listen to the Richard Urban Show from April 30, 2020: What Has Happened to Our God-given Freedoms? https://www.visionroot.org/2020/05/01/nsa-surveils-all-americans-and-lies-about-it/

Cheon Seong Gyeong 2236

The conscience is God’s agent with-
in the human mind. It is not self-cen-
tered but exists for the sake of God’s
righteousness. It constantly seeks the
direction of goodness. The body rebels
against this. It only seeks comfort. It is
selfish and instinctively follows carnal
desires. The conscience chastises the
body, and tries to make it conform to
the mind. Here is where bitter conflict
and struggle always takes place within
oneself. No one, though, can conquer
the body without welcoming God in.
Only through the power of God’s true
love and truth can the mind as subject
partner take command of the body as
its object partner and realize the ideal
of oneness with God. This is the perfect
human being that religions speak of.
(219-118, 1991.8.28)

Cheon Seong Gyeong 963

If your grandparents, mother and
father, couple, and children, become one
based on true love, and inherit God’s
true love that lives for others, then even
God would be absolutely obedient to
that. In the world that strives to live for
others – a world that moves according
to the love that submits to the tradition
of living for others – the basis for peace
would surely emerge even if it resisted
being formed. (210-354, 1990.12.27)

World Scripture and the Teachings of
Sun Myung Moon

Part 1
God and Creation

Chapter 1
God

God’s Goodness

2. God’s Goodness Manifest in the Creation

God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. Genesis 1.31

He has created the seven heavens in harmony. You cannot see a fault in the Beneficent One’s creation; look again, can you see any flaws? Look again and yet again, and your sight will grow dim and weak [without finding any.] Qur’an 67.3-4

This world is a garden, The Lord its gardener, Cherishing all, none neglected.
Adi Granth, Majh Ashtpadi, M.3, p. 118 (Sikhism)

Abundant is the year, with much millet and much rice; And we have our high granaries, With myriads, and hundreds of thousands, and millions of measures; For spirits and sweet spirits, To present our ancestors, male and female, And to supply all our ceremonies. The blessings sent down on us are of every kind.
Book of Songs, Ode 279 (Confucianism)

It is He who sends down to you out of heaven water of which you may drink, and by which grow trees, for you to pasture your herds, and thereby He brings forth for you crops, and olives, and palms, and vines, and all manner of fruit. Surely in that is a sign for a people who reflect. And He subjected for you the night and day, and the sun and moon; and the stars are subjected by His command. Surely in that are signs for a people who understand. And He has multiplied for you in the earth things of diverse hues. Surely in that is a sign for a people who remember. It is He who subjected for you the sea, that you may eat of it fresh flesh, and bring forth out of it ornaments for you to wear; and you may see the ships cleaving through it; that you may seek of His bounty, and so haply you will be thankful… If you count God’s blessing, you can never number it; surely God is All-forgiving, All-compassionate. Qur’an 16.10-18

The great Tao flows everywhere; It can go left; it can go right. The myriad things owe their existence to it, And it does not reject them. When its work is accomplished, It does not take possession. It clothes and feeds all, But does not pose as their master. Ever without ambition, It may be called Small. All things return to it as their home, And yet it does not pose as their master, Therefore it may be called Great. Because it would never claim greatness, Therefore its greatness is fully realized.
Tao Te Ching 34 (Taoism)

Let me tell you then why the Creator made this world of generation. He was good, and the good can never have any jealousy of anything. And being free from jealousy, he desired that all things should be as like himself as they could be. This is in the truest sense the origin of creation and of the world, as we shall do well in believing on the testimony of wise men: God desired that all things should be good and nothing bad, so far as this was attainable. Wherefore also finding the whole visible sphere not at rest, but moving in an irregular and disorderly fashion, out of disorder he brought order, considering that this was in every way better than the other. Now the deeds of the best could never be or have been other than the fairest; and the Creator, reflecting on the things which are by nature visible, found that no unintelligent creatures taken as a whole were fairer than the intelligent taken as a whole; and that intelligence could not be present in anything that was devoid of soul. For which reason, when he was framing the universe, he put intelligence in soul, and soul in body, that he might be the creator of a work which was by nature fairest and best. Wherefore, using the language of probability, we may say that the world became a living creature truly endowed with soul and intelligence by the providence of God.
Plato, Timaeus (Hellenism)

The primary cause of the pure unity of Enlightenment and Nirvana that has existed from beginningless time is the principle of integrating compassion, the indrawing, unifying principle of purity, harmony, likeness, rhythm, permanency, and peace. By the indrawing of this Principle within the brightness of your own nature, its unifying spirit can be discovered and developed and realized under all varieties of conditions.
Surangama Sutra (Buddhism)

He Makes His Sun Rise on the Evil and the Good

Watch or listen to the Richard Urban Show from April 30, 2020: What Has Happened to Our God-given Freedoms? https://www.visionroot.org/2020/05/01/nsa-surveils-all-americans-and-lies-about-it/

Cheon Seong Gyeong 2124

As a boy of sixteen, I came into con-
tact with the will of Heaven through
prayer, and throughout my life after that
I have devoted all my spirit and energy
to accomplishing God’s will. I came to
understand that the fundamental cause
of human unhappiness is that the rela-
tionship with God was severed owing
to human beings falling into a state of
spiritual ignorance as a result of the
Fall of the ancestors of humankind.
Through this, people fell into ignorance
with regard to God, life, and the funda-
mental problems of the universe. I have
spoken publicly on more than ten thou-
sand occasions in many places around
the world and set forth a true view of
humanity, a true view of the world, and
a true view of history based on Godism.
These speeches have been translated into
twelve languages and published in three
hundred volumes. Their contents that
I teach are not the result of a compre-
hensive study of historical documents
or scholarly research, but are rather the
principles and fundamental answers I
arrived at through freely communicat-
ing with both the visible and invisible
worlds.

Richard: Here Rev. Sun Myung Moon talks about his life’s calling and work.

Cheon Seong Gyeong 1368

The Unification Church holds joint
weddings to establish a world of love. It
does not acknowledge the existence of
race. Would you say true love is differ-
ent for white people and black people?
This is what makes our members differ-
ent from other people and our church
so great. At the 6000 Couples Blessing,
I married about seventy Japanese wom-
en to black men. I didn’t force them into
it; it was of their own accord. Would
you think such a thing possible? (140-259,
1986.2.12)

World Scripture and the Teachings of
Sun Myung Moon

Part 1
God and Creation

Chapter 1
God

God’s Goodness

Scriptures of every religion praise God’s goodness. Many describe the Absolute Being’s good attributes in personal terms: God is merciful, loving, beautiful, gracious, compassionate and faithful. Yet the standard of absolute goodness is beyond the ordinary. Universal, impartial and all-embracing, it touches all people whether they are good or bad. Common metaphors thus liken God’s goodness to the beneficial influences of the sun and rain that comes down everywhere. The abundance and fecundity of the creation is yet another testimony to God’s goodness. Wishing to dwell amidst goodness, the God of goodness promotes goodness both in nature and in the minds of human beings.

1. God’s Goodness to Human Beings

The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. The Lord is good to all, and his compassion is over all that he has made.
Psalm 145.8-9

Allah is kind and loves whoever is kind; Allah is clean and loves whoever is clean; Allah is generous and loves whoever is generous.
Hadith of Muslim 913.2 (Islam)

God is not the author of all things, but of good only.
Plato, The Republic 2 (Hellenism)

God the Rescuer, God the Savior, Almighty, whom we joyfully adore, Powerful God, Invoked by all men, May he, the bounteous, grant us his blessings!
Rig Veda 7.100.4 (Hinduism)

The Lord and Cherisher of the Worlds— Who created me, and it is He who guides me; Who gives me food and drink, And when I am ill, it is He who cures me; Who will cause me to die, and then to live again; And who, I hope, will forgive me my faults on the Day of Judgment.
Qur’an 26.77-82

Always created beings He cherishes;
The Creator looks to the weal of all.
Lord! invaluable are Thy blessings;
Without extent is His bounty.
Adi Granth, Kirtan Sohila, M.1, p. 12 (Sikhism)


Lo! We have shown man the way, whether he be
grateful or disbelieving.
Qur’an 76.3

He makes his sun rise on the evil and on the
good, and sends rain on the just and on the
unjust.
Matthew 5.45

It is the Way of Heaven to show no favoritism.
It is forever on the side of the good man.
Tao Te Ching 79 (Taoism)

The Tao is the refuge for the myriad creatures.
It is that by which the good man protects,
And that by which the bad is protected.
Tao Te Ching 62 (Taoism)

I have no corporeal existence,
but Universal Benevolence is my divine body.
I have no physical power,
but Uprightness is my strength.
I have no religious clairvoyance beyond what is
bestowed by Wisdom,
I have no power of miracle other than the
attainment of quiet happiness,
I have no tact except the exercise of gentleness.
Oracle of the Kami of Sumiyoshi (Shinto)