7) The Center of Hope in the Last Days
What was God's greatest hope when He created Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden? God has been searching for men and women, sons and daughters who have fulfilled the purpose of creation and whom God can eternally love. God must have put all His hope in His son and daughter, dreaming of what would develop in the future. However, this was destroyed through the fall.
In order to restore this completely through the providence of restoration, God has worked through history, which has moved from old age, to middle age, to youth. At last in this age, God has reached the class of young people, and He is watching you with the same hope that He had when He watched Adam and Eve before the fall.
In the Old Testament Age, old men like Noah and Abraham formed the tradition. Jacob was the only exception, but he was also mature. Moses was also old. When we passed from the Old Testament Age to the New Testament Age, the tradition was inherited by the young people. John the Baptist and Jesus were both young. John the Baptist and Jesus were the central figures who tried to inherit all the heavenly tradition and link it to the substantial world while in their twenties and thirties. If John the Baptist had served Jesus and realized the heavenly ideal, that would have become the eternal standard of tradition centering on Jesus and remaining for all generations.
Young people immediately take action based upon whatever they have decided in their mind. Those who immediately practice the things I teach and hope to make them accumulate in themselves are indeed good students.
It is clear that God wishes the young people, instead of the older generation, to inherit the tradition. Even on the national level, those who inherit the national tradition are the young people of that country. This was so in the past and it is the same now. If those who are to inherit the tradition and lead the whole cannot inherit the tradition correctly, then there will be an unimaginable result in the future. The whole world will move in a direction different from the heavenly tradition. This is a matter of fact.
The young generation should form a new tradition for the world and lead the whole world. Even when we took at God's providence, we can see that God is hoping desperately for the young people to set up the tradition.
In the Completed Testament Age, God has hope in the younger generation, not the older generation or middle-aged people.
Those who are gathered here are all young people. You are not corrupted yet. You have a pure heart that is not corrupted by earthly things. You should have a new determination in your new heart. You should make a new determination and have your mind and body united. You should be filled with faith. How happy God would be if you became perfected men and women who can receive love from God.
Now is the time when the Bible verse which says, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind," should be realized. Who should take part in this movement? The younger generation is to power this movement. Why? Because Adam and Eve fell when they were young. In order to indemnify and restore what made God unhappy, young people should work to restore purity with all their hearts and minds. You should know how valuable it is to dedicate all your sincerity during your youth.
Your age is the center of God's hope, to which He is entrusting everything in the Completed Testament Age. This is not limited only to Japan. Worldwide, the members of the Unification Church are all young. The average age of the members in America is twenty-three to twenty-five. If all these young people live their everyday lives with the determination and resolution to go forward for the rest of their lives for the will of God, definitely a new tradition will be set up through them. In this respect, you cannot imagine how fortunate a being you are in this Completed Testament Age.