When you do your Home Church work, do you receive opposition? Even if someone says, “I don’t need you. I don’t need you,” you still visit them often. Even when they tell you not to come, you grab a broom and sweep their yard or garden. If it snows, you shovel the snow. You do everything. If rainwater stagnates in their gutters, you clean out their gutters. If the man of the house voices his discontentment saying, “Hey you! I said I don’t like it! Why do you keep doing these things?” and if he tries to fight against you, the people of the village will fight for you, saying to him, “What is wrong with you?” That kind of thing has happened many times. Isn’t this an amazing war strategy? Those types of things happen, right? Why is that? (105-191, 1979.10.21)
Cheon Seong Gyeong 1385
When I proclaimed that three years after blessing the 30,000 Couples, I would bless 360,000 Couples, not one person believed that I could actually accomplish this. Not one person believed in me. So was it accomplished or not? There is no one in this world except me who would take on such a mission. Who on earth except me would take on such a daunting challenge? Not even a whole nation would presume to take responsibility for such a task. It was truly a record-breaking event. We climbed to the top, treading on the families in the satanic world. Now that we have successfully blessed the 360,000 Couples, accomplishing the growth stage, we can climb to the top, stepping on the nations of the satanic world. Now all that is left for us to accomplish is the Blessing of 3.6 Million Couples. That would mean the beginning of the era of absolute authority. We are entering the era of God’s absolute authority over marriage. (275-282, 1996.1.1)
Predestination
1. God’s Absolute Predestination
Teachings of Rev. Sun Myung Moon
When God looks at a person, He sees the person’s past, He penetrates his present mind, and based on these He foresees his future. (100:93, October 8, 1978)
Do you think that I was born to fulfill a certain purpose, which predetermined the way I grew up and what I have become? Or am I the product of my circumstances and the sum total of the things that happened to me as I went about my life? My life was predestined before I was born. Therefore even the features of my face14 were predestined… I am not the man I am today because of things that happened to me in the course my life. I am the man whom I was predestined to become. I grew up holding on to the Principle; I did not go my own way unconnected to the Principle. (161:159, February 1, 1987)
God, being omniscient, foreknows who has the qualifications necessary to become a central figure in the providence of restoration. God predestines those whom He foreknows; then He calls upon them to fulfill the purpose of His providence. Calling the person is God’s responsibility, but that alone does not entitle the person to be justified before God and be given glory. Only when the person completes his responsibility after being called by God is he justified and then glorified. God’s predestination concerning an individual’s glorification is thus contingent upon the completion of his portion of responsibility. Because the biblical verse does not mention the human portion of responsibility, people may misinterpret it to mean that all affairs are determined solely by God’s absolute predestination. (Exposition of the Divine Principle,Predestination 4)
It is written that God loved Jacob and hated Esau even when they were still inside their mother’s womb and had not done anything good or evil. God favored one and disfavored the other and told Rebecca that “the elder will serve the younger.” (Romans 9.10-13) What was the reason for this favoritism? God favored one over the other in order to set up a certain course in the Providence of Restoration.
God gave Isaac twin sons, Esau and Jacob, with the intention of having them stand in the positions of Cain and Abel. They were to make the conditions of indemnity necessary for accomplishing His Will to recover the birthright of the elder brother, which was lost when Cain killed Abel in Adam’s family. God intended to realize this Will by having Jacob (in the position of Abel) win over his elder brother Esau (in the position of Cain). Since Esau was in the position of Cain, he was “hated” by God. Since Jacob was in the position of Abel, he could receive God’s love.
Nevertheless, whether God would in the end favor or disfavor them depended on whether or not they completed their given portions of responsibility. In fact, because Esau obediently submitted to Jacob, he was able to rise above his previous condition of being hated by God and receive the blessing of God’s love equal to Jacob’s. Conversely, even though Jacob was initially in the position to receive God’s favor, he would have ceased to receive it had he failed in his responsibility. (Exposition of the Divine Principle, Predestination 4)
The significance of tomorrow, the tenth day of the month, is that this number ten allows us to pass into the year 2000 from the year 1999. Then God can restore unhindered the physical world vertically from the individual to the family, tribe, people, nation and world, and connect it to the spirit world. This can happen based on the love of the ideal of Adam’s family, the original ideal of creation, untainted by the Fall. God’s original will to recover the world of cosmic unity could be fulfilled, together with liberation, at the June 14 ceremony of the Congratulatory Declaration of the Cosmic Victory of the Parents of Heaven and Earth, greeted with cheers from the liberated realm of heaven and earth. This could then form the foundation for the Declaration of the Realm of Liberation and Unification of the Cosmos by the Parents of Heaven and Earth, which has been made today. With this declaration, fortune has turned in favor of the unification of North and South Korea
Cheon Seong Gyeong 1276
The holy wine ceremony is carried out in the reverse order of the Fall of Adam and Eve. Before you can get married, you need to be engaged. Then there is the holy wine ceremony. Only then can you attend the holy wedding ceremony. You could not become the original Adam and Eve because of the Fall. Through the engagement ceremony, you present yourselves before God and True Parents, who are trying to reclaim their children, saying, “We will become a better Adam and Eve, who are better than your fallen children.” Adam and Eve were still in the state of engagement. Through the engagement, a new world is created. You must therefore understand that the holy wine ceremony establishes the conditions that restore all these relationships. (120-167, 1982.10.13)
Predestination
The doctrine of predestination provides an explanation for the fact that people have different fortunes, moral endowments, are born into different circumstances, and respond differently to religion. It ascribes these differences to the hand of God—who is omnipotent and controls all, and who is omniscient and sees the future. Someone who degenerates into a sinner does so because God eases him into sin. Someone who becomes a hero of faith can be so because God strengthens him. Absolute predestination holds that a person’s eternal destiny—to salvation or damnation—is predetermined before his birth. It is already written down in God’s ledger— along with the span of the person’s life and the day of his death. A believer who recognizes the hand of destiny never regards the occasions in life as accidental. Everything that happens, happens for a reason. An apparently chance meeting may have been decreed long ago. A sudden death or a stroke of good luck are not random events, but happen by God’s decree. Since all human plans and designs only bear fruit if they are within God’s will, Muslims commonly say, inshallah, “if it is the will of God.” Day by day we can examine every event to discern the hand of God, and make every effort to conform our lives to the flow of his destined Will. How is predestination reconciled with human free will? One answer that is consistent with absolute predestination counsels us to accept human ignorance as the context within which we strive in freedom. The omniscient God who knows everything through eternity already knows the outcome of our life, however as we can never possess such foreknowledge, we should still make our best effort. Then there are qualified doctrines of predestination, for which human freedom enters into the calculation of destiny. Such doctrines describe God as apportioning blessings and hardships as he wills, and then permitting us limited freedom to make the best of our lot. Father Moon, who rejects absolute predestination, teaches such a form of qualified predestination: God predestines everyone to salvation, but requires human responsibility as a necessary condition to realize that destiny.
1. God’s Absolute Predestination
I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will show mercy to whom I will show mercy.
Exodus 33.19
Lo! this is an admonishment, that whosoever will may choose a way unto his Lord; yet you will not, unless God wills. Lo! God is Knower, Wise. He makes whom He will to enter His mercy, and for evildoers has prepared a painful doom.
Qur’an 76.29-31
We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the first-born among many brethren. Those whom He predestined He also called; and those whom He called He also justified; and those whom He justified He also glorified.
Romans 8.28-30
The Lord is the Doer, cause of all: what avail man’s designs? As is the Lord’s will, so it happens. The Lord is Almighty, without impediment to His will. All that is done is by His pleasure: From each He is far, to each close. All He considers, watches over, discriminates— Himself He is sole and all. Adi Granth, Gauri Sukhmani, M.5, p. 279 (Sikhism)
When Rebecca had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad, in order that God’s purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of his call, she was told, “The elder will serve the younger.” As it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”
Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” So it depends not upon man’s will or exertion, but upon God’s mercy. For the scripture says to Pharaoh, “I have raised you up for the very purpose of showing my power in you, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth.” So then he has mercy upon whomever he wills, and he hardens the heart of whomever he wills.
Romans 9.10-16
Thou knowest me right well; my frame was not hidden from thee, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth. Thy eyes beheld my unformed substance; in thy book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them. Psalm 139.15-16
Allah’s Apostle, the true and truly inspired said, “Every one of you is collected in the womb of his mother for the first forty days, and then he becomes a clot for another forty days, and then a piece of flesh for another forty days. Then is sent to him the angel who breathes the soul into his body and is commanded to write down four words: his livelihood, his life span, his deeds, and whether he will be wretched or blessed (in religion). Verily, it may be that one of you will be performing the works of the people of Paradise, so that between him and Paradise there is the distance of only an arm’s length, but then what is written for him overtakes him, and he begins to perform the works of the people of hell, into which he will go. Or maybe one of you will be performing the works of the people of hell, so that between him and hell there is the distance of only an arm’s length, but then what is written for him overtakes him, and he will begin to perform the works of the people of Paradise, into which he will go.
Forty Hadith of an-Nawawi 4 (Islam)
Richard: These verses, which will be tempered by the readings from Rev. Sun Myung Moon tomorrow, which explain the crucial role of man’s portion of responsibility.
One day we will go to the spirit world. There is no doubt about that. People vis- iting Korea land at Gimpo Airport, but that does not mean they have traveled in Korea. From Gimpo Airport, where do we go? Do we go to South Jeolla Prov- ince or South Gyeongsang Province or Pyeong-an Province? From Pyeong-an Province, where do we go? To a coun- ty. From there, where next? A township. What is next? A village. From there, we must go to a neighborhood. This is not easy. If people cannot determine their dwelling place, what is the value of suc- cess in social life? That is a problem. If God orders me to come, even tomorrow night, no matter how great I may be today, I have no choice but to go. However loudly I might protest, I would have to go. I will go while pro- testing loudly, but only after speaking the right words. I must present the way that the nation and the world must go. It will be my death if I fail to do so. (177- 41, 1988.5.15)
Cheon Seong Gyeong 1231
Until now, who has completed the
payment of indemnity for the portion of
responsibility? Can you pay that indem-
nity with money? Can you pay it by sell-
ing your house and your country? Then
what should you do? There is nothing
you can do. You can only be absolutely
obedient. You must be absolutely obe-
dient until you are in your twenties.
Adam and Eve insisted on their own
way. They had a sexual encounter, thus
falling before they reached the age of
twenty. Until you reach your twenties,
you must be absolutely obedient. Before
you reach twenty, you must obey. There-
fore children are absolutely obedient.
They are, even if you do not teach them
to be like that. They know that if they
do not become one with their parents,
they will go to ruin. You will go to ruin
if you do not become one with God. (133-
136, 1984.7.10)
Exposition of the Divine Principle 3 Color Edition-The Red part
THE PREDESTINATION OF
HUMAN BEINGS
Adam and Eve were to become the good ancestors
of humanity, conditional upon fulfilling their responsibility to obey God’s
commandment not to eat of the fruit. Accordingly, God did not absolutely predestine
that Adam and Eve would become our good ancestors. The same holds for all
fallen people. Even though God
predestines someone for a particular mission, God’s ninety-five percent
responsibility and the person’s five percent responsibility must be
accomplished together before the person can complete his given mission and
fulfill God’s Will. If the person does not complete his responsibility, he
cannot become the person God has purposed him to be.
Let us next examine God’s predestination of
central figures in the providence of restoration. Yet, as was the case with
God’s creation, His providence of salvation—a work of recreation—cannot be
completed in an instant. It begins from one point and gradually expands to
cover the whole. Therefore, in the providence of salvation, God first
predestines one person to be the central figure and then calls him to a
mission. What qualifications should the person possess to merit such a calling?
First, the central figure must be born into the chosen people. Next, even among
the chosen people, he must come from an ancestral line with many good
accomplishments. Among the descendants of this outstanding lineage, he must be
endowed with the requisite character. Among those with the requisite character,
he must develop the necessary qualities during his early life. Finally, among
those who have acquired these qualities, God selects first the individual who
lives in a time and place most fitting to His need.
ELUCIDATION OF BIBLICAL
VERSES WHICH SUPPORT THE DOCTRINE OF ABSOLUTE PREDESTINATION
For those whom He foreknew He also predestined . . .
those whom He predestined He also called; and those whom He called He also
justified; and those whom He justified He also glorified. —Rom. 8:29-30
Then He calls upon them to fulfill the purpose of the providence. Calling a person is God’s responsibility, but that alone does not entitle the person to be justified before God and given glory. Only when the person completes his responsibility after being called by God is he justified and then glorified. God’s predestination concerning an individual’s glorification is thus contingent upon the completion of his portion of responsibility. Because the biblical verse does not mention the human portion of responsibility, people may misinterpret it to mean that all affairs are determined solely by God’s absolute predestination.
People such as John Calvin have propounded the
doctrine of absolute and complete predestination, which is widely believed even
in our present day. They have held to such a doctrine because they wrongly
believed that the accomplishment of God’s Will depends solely on the power and
work of God. They were ignorant of the true relationship between God’s portion
of responsibility and the human portion of responsibility in the fulfillment of
the purpose of the providence of restoration.
View slides 17 to 36 below for an illustrated presentation of the above content:
22 Some people brought to Jesus a man who was blind and could not talk because he had a demon in him. Jesus healed the man, and then he was able to talk and see. 23 The crowds were so amazed that they asked, “Could Jesus be the Son of David?”
Jeremiah 22
If you obey me, the kings from David’s family will continue to rule Judah from this palace. They and their officials will ride in and out on their horses or in their chariots. 5 But if you ignore me, I promise in my own name that this palace will lie in ruins. 6 Listen to what I think about it:
The palace of Judah’s king is as glorious as Gilead or Lebanon’s highest peaks. But it will be as empty as a ghost-town when I’m through with it. 7 I’ll send troops to tear it apart, and its beautiful cedar beams will be used for firewood.
8 People from different nations will pass by and ask, “Why did the Lord do this to such a great city as Jerusalem?” 9 Others will answer, “It’s because the people worshiped foreign gods and broke the agreement that the Lord their God had made with them.”
Exposition of the Divine Principle 3 Color Edition-The Red part
Predestination
Theological controversy
over predestination has caused great confusion in the religious lives of many
people. Let us begin by examining the source of this controversy. In the Bible,
we find many passages which are often interpreted to mean that everything in an
individual’s life—prosperity and decline, happiness and misery, salvation and
damnation, as well as the rise and fall of nations—comes to pass exactly as
predestined by God.
Yet we can also find
sufficient evidence in the Bible to refute the doctrine of absolute
predestination. Since there are ample
grounds in the Bible to justify either of these two contrasting doctrines,
controversy over the issue of predestination has been inevitable. How can the
Principle solve this problem?
THE PREDESTINATION OF
GOD’S WILL
Before discussing the predestination of God’s
Will, let us first examine what is being willed. Let us remember: God could not
accomplish His purpose of creation due to the human Fall. Accordingly, God’s
Will in carrying out His providence for fallen humanity is still to accomplish
the purpose of creation. In this sense, God’s Will is that restoration be
accomplished.
To what extent does God predestine His
Will—the ultimate accomplishment of the purpose of creation? God is the
absolute Being, unique, eternal and unchanging; therefore, the purpose of His
creation must also be absolute, unique, eternal and unchanging. Likewise, His
Will for the providence of restoration, the goal of which is the accomplishment
of the purpose of creation, must also be absolute, unique and unchanging. It
follows that God’s predestination of His Will—that the purpose of creation one
day be fulfilled—must also be absolute, as it is written, “I have spoken, and I
will bring it to pass; I have purposed, and I will do it.”
THE PREDESTINATION OF THE
WAY IN WHICH GOD’S WILL IS FULFILLED
According to the Principle of Creation, God’s purpose of creation can be realized only when human beings complete their portion of responsibility. Although God’s Will to realize this purpose through the providence of restoration is absolute and beyond human influence, its fulfillment necessarily requires the accomplishment of the human portion of responsibility.
To what extent does God
predestine the unfolding of the events in the providence? Although God’s Will
to realize the purpose of the providence of restoration is absolute, God
predestines the process of its accomplishment conditionally, contingent upon the
five percent responsibility of the central figure, which must be completed in
addition to the ninety-five percent responsibility of God. The proportion of
five percent is used to indicate that the human portion of responsibility is
extremely small when compared to God’s portion of responsibility. Yet for human
beings, this five percent is equivalent to one hundred percent of our effort.
View slides 1 to 16 below for an illustrated presentation of the above content:
