Hyung Jin Moon
August 15, 2009
Headquarters Church
Transcribers: Colette Takigawa, John Theriot, Regina Shin
Proofread: Karen Katayama
Opening Prayer by Reverend Michael Brazil:
Our Heavenly Father and our Heavenly Mother, we want to thank you so much for your love, your guidance, your love that not only makes us sing but also dance with joy, dance with gratitude for all that you have showered upon us. We really want to welcome you here today. We want to invite you to be here with us. We want to feel your spirit and we want you, Heavenly Father, to feel our spirit. We want to lift up our hearts so that we can lift you up, we can inspire you. Heavenly Father, we really welcome you here, we really invite you. We ask that you help us to open our hearts to receive your message today. Please speak through our speakers today that they may truly inspire us, that we can be fired up for the week ahead, and that we can give even more joy and more fulfillment to you and to our brothers and sisters throughout the world. We offer all of this humbly as your precious sons and daughters, as blessed brothers and sisters from around the world. Aju
Opening Remarks by Yeon Ah Nim:
Good afternoon brothers and sisters. It’s really great to see you all, especially I guess, Hyung Jin Nim is really happy to see you all. It feels like a month since we saw you all last time. That is why we are especially happy to see you all and we are especially grateful to our Heavenly Father and our True Parents for letting us have such a blessed day. Brothers and sisters, we earnestly hope and desire that you have a blessed day and a blessed week and here in this sanctuary, today. Let us pray and worship our Heavenly Father and our True Parents. Aju
Opening Remarks by Hyung Jin Nim:
Good afternoon brothers and sisters! Good afternoon. Oh, oh! Whenever I see the joy on Pastor Kyle’s face, something inside of me just gets on and up! Thank you so much!
Brothers and sisters let us manifest the Principle, Give and Receive Action, Four Position Foundation. May I inherit the true love of God! Aju! Thank you so much!
Let’s start with Cheon Seong Gyeong, page 331 today. It is beautiful!
“How shall we describe God’s love?”
Father says. I want you to close your eyes, close your eyes! Father says,
“Imagine a warm spring day with white clouds floating gently in the sky, the air shimmers above the ground, insects and ants scurry about, exploring the world. Beside a flowing stream, catkins blossom and frogs sing new songs of spring welcoming swarms of bees and butterflies, and there you are, enraptured in that atmosphere, in that twilight state that we experience when drifting peacefully off to sleep, and yet we are awake in a happy mood, rejoicing forever. God’s love has such a flavor.”
Brothers and sisters let’s give it up for almighty God and his incredible love! I hope at this service we can return that kind of amazing grace, that kind of amazing love we receive. I hope that during this service we can return that beautiful spring breeze back to heaven. I know that the summer breeze is kind of sweltering outside but inside we have people filled with the joy of God. Tell your neighbor, “I am filled with the joy of God!” Oh I feel it, I feel it today! Oh, you are doing quite well today!
Meditation Practice:
Let us visualize not this place but let us visualize a beautiful forest path. We are walking on this cool day in spring, very cool, refreshing. We can feel the beautiful soft grass under our feet, the beautiful bird moss that grows along the roots of the trees. We can feel the warmth of the sun on our skin, we can feel the touch of the sun and we can see up into the heavens. We will notice a beautiful canopy of leaves, we will notice beautiful flowers that bloom around and let us walk forward rejoicing in that incredible creation. In our hearts let us feel the pulse of nature, of creation, the creative spirit that is imbued in all of creation. As we look forward we are going to see a beautiful stream. Let’s walk up to that beautiful stream. Let’s hear the glorious sound, the singing of the stream. Let’s see the translucent waters as light sparks shimmer. Let’s feel the coolness of the water and as we stand before that beautiful scene, as we imbibe on all the glorious surroundings, let us gently close our eyes. In that image, let us close our eyes and let us lift our hands up towards the heavens. In that image we are stretching towards the heavens in that beautiful place and as we breathe in, in our hearts let us rejoice saying, “I am alive” and as we breathe out let us rejoice and say, “Thank you.” I invite you to feel this incredible warmth of the sun upon us, the incredible love and compassion that covers us and as we breathe in again, in our hearts, “I am alive,” as we breathe out again, “Thank you.” One more time, with great rejoicing in our hearts, “I am alive” and as we breathe out in our hearts let us say, “Thank you.”
Let us all gather our hands together. Let’s manifest the Principle, Give and Receive Action, Four Position Foundation. Lift it up! May I inherit that amazing love of God, that true love! AJU!
Thank you, brothers and sisters. Let’s take this time to pray. I want to ask you to pray particularly for those who are in the spiritual world, anybody you know in your family that is close to you in the spiritual world. Let’s take some time for them, for somebody in your heart who needs prayer, for somebody, may be a loved one, who is sick, for somebody who needs a little blessing or who is studying for a test. Let’s pray for these people.
Hyung Jin Nim’s prayer
... Father, we know that you can move mountains. Father, we know that you can touch our lives. Just one touch from You, and our lives will change. Father we pray for these incredible Abel spirits who are protecting us. We want to give thanks to them. We pray that our Unification movement can come together, Father that we can show unity, that we can show that we are one, that we can come together with one heart, that we can return immense and magnificent joy to you. We thank You very much for this day. We want You to bless every single one of our brothers and sisters here and those who are joining us through internet as well. Father, please be with their families. Father, begin to create that miracle in their lives so that we can see a new re-birth, a new resurrection power that’s coming up and welling up on the inside of us, Father. We want to be able to live in your light. We thank You so much and we offer all these things in our own names, as blessed central families we pray, Father, as one family we pray. Aju.
Brothers and sisters it is so important to recharge in prayer, and now it is time to stand up and reach out to the person next to you and give them some encouragement. If you came with your daughter, your spouse, give them a big hug. Tell them you love them at least 3 times.
Interesting Story:
We always start in a something a little interesting. One day St. Peter saw a street gang, a group of gangsters coming towards the Pearly Gates. And St Peter said, “Oh my God. I have to go and report to God.” He ran and said, “God, we have a big problem! There’s a whole bunch of gangsters coming towards the Pearly Gates. What should I do?” And God replied, “Just do what you normally do with that type. Just re-direct them to the other world.” And St. Peter went back to carry out the problem, so he want back to the Pearly Gates.
But he suddenly came back running and yelling, “God they’re gone! They’re gone! And God said, “And so that’s good news. So they’re gone, so that’s good!”
St Peter said, “No, no. The Pearly Gates are gone!”
Main Sermon:
Brothers and Sisters, after the Seven Deaths and Resurrections Revelation, a lot of things really changed in my life. I need to ask all of you to help me today. You have to help me. Can you help me? (Yes!). OK, this is what I want to ask you: I have a problem looking at my notes up here while I am speaking and I have been given the feed back: "Hey, will you move away from the podium sometimes?" So today I would like to try something new. It is a very big step for me. I do not want to use the podium a lot today. I want to carry these notes and walk around like a crazy man, OK? (Laughter) But I want you all to help me; you have to help me, because if I come back to the podium you have to say, "Get away from the podium!" You have to tell me to get away from this podium. This is the devil today. (Laughter)
Let us start with the world scripture, Christianity today. Let us read this together from Isaiah 7:9
"Unless you have believed, you will not understand."
Here we understand the value of faith.
Let us take a look at Buddhism today. This is the Sutta Nipata. Let us read together verse number 1146.
"By faith you shall be free and go beyond the world of death."
That is the world of suffering. You will be set free by faith.
Let us take a look at Islam today. This is the Qur'an 8th Sura, 8th chapter, second verse, let us read it together:
"The true believers are those whose hearts are filled with awe at the mention of God."
Oh, I love that. Tell your neighbor, "I am filled with awe!" Tell the person next to you -- tell them! (I am filled with awe!) Yes, there you go. You are filled with awe that I am not at the podium today! Thank you, thank you, so much.
Let us take a look at Unificationism together.
"Where there is hope, there is development. Where there is no hope, at least there is retreat, if not utter cessation. Therefore, whether there is happiness or unhappiness is determined by hope. If there is no hope in a man of faith who should march toward tomorrow's hope, he is an extremely unhappy man, his faith is only superficial."
This is talking about the incredible power of hope in our life.
Brothers and Sisters, before I received the revelation of the Seven Deaths and Resurrections, there was something I was really struggling about. I have been studying world religions, living with those traditions. I have seen the incredible love for Jesus in the Christian communities, the awesome power of the Agape love -- the sacrificial love of Jesus. Of course in the Buddhist communities you find the incredible compassion of the Buddha, they call that Mahakaruna. It is one of the saintly virtues. It is compassion for all beings. When we pray in the Mosques with our Islamic brothers and sisters, we feel their incredible faithfulness towards God. You feel the tremendous powerful love that is portrayed in their prayer life.
So this struggle was a major thing for me. This was really a big thing for me. What is it that we as members of the Unification Movement have that is really incredible in terms of our teaching? Is it true that our teaching is the highest, or do we just say this? Can we really articulate it? This was a real big challenge for me to answer. Why is it that we are Unificationists? Why did we choose this path? There are so many great teachings of love and compassion in the other religions. Are they all the same? If we are the same as them, then there is no point in you all coming to church, no point in praising our identity and our tradition. This struggle was with me even while I was doing ministry. I had a big sense of frustration even in my own heart.
We know that Jesus' teaching of love has really elevated humankind for the last 2000 years. Jesus taught that God is not a God of judgment, that he is not a God that will condemn. He is a God of love and forgiveness. Jesus taught this to the world. He taught this to his disciples.
Jesus said in John 15:13, “No greater love is there than this -- that a man lay down his life for his friends.” He said in essence, that there is no greater love than this incredible sacrificial love that is embodied in the life of Christ. This is the amazing love that Jesus taught. It is incredible, an amazing type of love. If you can feel that type of love, it really has an impact on you. Christians really have a lot of impact through the powerful love of Christ, living and walking in his footsteps. That love is powerful.
We know that Jesus came as the second Adam to fulfill the ideal of creation. He came to inherit God's true love. He came to be the parent of all humankind and inherit that parental heart. But when you look at that statement -- Jesus says there is no greater love than this, that one lay down his life for his friends -- you realize that he was still operating in relation to friends and had inherited "friend's love", this incredible agape love, this sacrificial love that you would lay down your life for your friends is much like a comrade in a war that would lay down their life for their brother. It is an incredible type of love.
What I realized that day is that Jesus needed to establish his family and only then would he be able to inherit true love. We know this through the Principle; we have heard it a million times. But on that day it really came to me.
We as Unificationists have all the explanations of what is True Love. True Love is an unending love. True Love is living for the sake of others. True Love is a selfless love. True Love can subjugate Satan. We had all these explanations, but I could not FEEL what this love was. I could not imagine it. I heard that it is selfless, that it lives for the sake of others, but I could not imagine what that kind of love would be. Is it just doing charity like doing clean up on the streets? Am I actualizing that type of love when I bring someone a glass of water? Is that the level of love we are talking about? Or is there something greater in what the Unification Movement considers when we talk about True Love? Is there something more powerful than the love that Christianity has taught and that has moved the world the last 2000 years?
I realized this after two years of doing ministry, while I was in prayer and received this kind of dream in a vision, so to speak. We talk about the suffering of True Parents. We talk about how they were imprisoned. We talk about their torture. We know that it is a fact in the physical. We know they endured physical torment and suffering. Look at the Apostles' Creed. Christ was crucified and descended into hell to save those in the bottom of hell so that they may see light in heaven. Unless we open up our spiritual eyes, just like the Christians did, the way Christians see Jesus, then we will not understand. Unless Christians open their spiritual eyes, they will not understand what Agape love is. Unless WE open our spiritual eyes, we will not understand what True Love is.
That day, I saw this in the vision. There True Father was: he was being beaten and tortured physically, but in the spiritual, he was descending into hell. He was down there seeing his children being tortured and tormented. He was seeing his children being torn apart. Father proclaimed, "These are my children, I take responsibility for them. Take my body, take my soul instead." He offered body and flung it to that creature and it began to make him suffer.
When I saw that, I realized: My God, we need to open up our spiritual eyes to understand what our True Parents have endured through those Seven Tortures, we need to see what kind of love is manifested, what kind of love it takes to go into the bowels of hell and say, “These are my children. Do not torture them anymore. I am their parent and will stand in their place. You take my body."
Then I realized that he did this not just once, but seven times. They did this seven times for me. They did it seven times so that one day I could see a land of glory, a land of peace, so that one day, even though I have sinned, I could be free and be forgiven of that sin, so that I and my family and my tribe and my spiritual world could enter into a greater land -- a land that maybe I do not deserve to be in -- but a land that is given to me nonetheless.
Then I realized: that is what a parental heart is. That is what we are talking about when we talk about True Parents' heart and True Love: a love that will die for the sake of the children. True Parents will sacrifice for us with an amazing love that says, “I will die again and again for you.” Not once, like Jesus, but again and again and again so my family and their children and their spiritual world can be free. And what I realized is, My God, this is what True Parents actualized in their life. This is what we were talking about when we were talking about the parental heart.
I realized that what the Unification movement is teaching about True Love, what we understand True Love to be is even greater than the love that Jesus Christ spoke about. The love that we are talking about says that the True Parents will die and die again for their children, for their families, their tribes, their society, nation, world, and cosmos, for their spiritual world, so we can see that better day. They will take on that burden of death over and over again for their children. Then I realized that there is no greater love than this.
Even in the Buddhist tradition there is compassion for all sentient beings. They train hard to become a Buddha and then to save all beings by giving enlightenment. True Parents not only trained themselves to become great persons, but sacrificed their life for their children, even for the Creation which they see, from a parental heart, as their own child. Then I realized there is no greater love and that I did not know that there was this type of love.
In Matt 9:20-22 there is a story about Jesus. He is returning to his hometown. When he crosses the river, there is an official, a nobleman. The nobleman comes to Jesus and says, "Jesus, my daughter is sick. I know if you pray for her, she is going to be made whole. So please come to my house and pray for her. You are the only one who can save her life. So please, I beg you to come pray."
So Jesus followed but someone else enters the scene. We do not know her name. All we know is that she was sick and had a disease that she had been bleeding for the last 12 years. Her body was weak and feeble and she couldn’t move so well. The woman made an incredible commitment that day because she heard of a promise that a person by the name of Jesus was coming into her land. She determined to see this man, "I know if I just I just touch the hem of his cloak, I will be healed." You can imagine this woman, bleeding everyday, having to change her clothes and bandages everyday -- change and wash them in that feeble state. But she has something that gets her out of the bed. She has a faith that if she meets the Lord, she will be healed. So on that day she gets up, she is limping, shaking as she walks, trying to go at her fastest speed because she knows that he will not be there for long.
She gets there and there is a huge crowd. Jesus is there but he is totally unreachable. There are hundreds of people standing between her and the Lord or the promise. This woman, who for 12 years was losing her blood, her life, her dream, losing her purpose, her family, everything, was crumbling. She is just totally collapsing. But she makes the commitment out of faith, out of a belief that says, “If I meet Jesus, then I can be healed.”
What we have to understand about faith is that faith is a power. Faith is not an accessory, it is a power. Faith attracts things. Faith attracts blessings. It attracts gifts to the believer, the person with faith. It attracts hope into the heart. It gives one a sense of purpose and the sense of prophesy. Looking into the future is to prophesy. It gives one the sense of destination and direction. Faith is power. Faith is attractive.
What is happening here? This woman is hobbling, she is terribly sick. There are hundreds of people around Jesus. In the “natural” there is no way she is going to be able to move through them. But she is not operating in the natural. You see, when we have faith, we are operating in the supernatural: a land where there is blessing and abundance, where there is provision and fruitfulness. We do not operate with only what we see, and this is the difference.
So what happened is that Jesus started walking towards her! What did we say about faith? Faith is attractive. Faith attracts the promise. It attracts the Holy Land. It attracts the Temple, the High Priest. Faith attracts the Blessing. So there she is thinking, "My God, there is no way I could have done this on my own. I tried to push these people -- no way -- I am bleeding. But now Jesus is walking right towards me." He passes her; he does not even see her. She just reached out and touched the edge of his cloak.
She tried to shake his hand. I am sure she tried to do a pound. You know how we do a pound, right? (Fists together) She tried to pound him! In a good way! That is a happy, blessing pound (Laughter). So she wanted to do that, but reached out and could only reach the edge of his garment, the tip of his cloak. Not even his fingernail, just the tip of his cloak. Then Jesus turned to her. He did not feel that but he turned to her and said (in Matt 9:22), "Your faith, my daughter, has healed you." And from that moment, she is made whole. She receives new life. The person from whom life was draining is now restored. The person from whom hope was draining, purpose was draining, is now restored. Now she has a new promise in her heart -- that God's blessing and abundance will be in her life in a real way, in a manifested and prophetic way. So she is never the same.
When I heard this story, I could not help but thinking about the Unification Movement. We have been like the sick woman. We have not grown so much in the last 30 years. Our life has been draining from us. We have been losing a sense of purpose. We lost thinking, "Yes, we are important, we are meaningful, we are relevant, we are excellent for this world." We have been losing this sense of urgency and expectancy that we will actualize our dreams and the promises and desires that God has placed in us. All of that has been draining away, unstoppable, continually losing life. But one day, just like that woman, there was news that a promise was in town. One day the Unification Movement felt, "Hey, wait a minute...I am not going to go down like this!" One day the Unification Movement said "We were meant for more than this; more than to be made fun of, mocked and chastised continuously for generations. That is not our destiny. We were made for more than this. And I want to touch this.” We started getting faith in our hearts.
You know what? God has made us to be extraordinary. He has given us something not in the “natural.” He has given us something in the supernatural. And we have that incredible something. We started believing again. We got up out the sick bed and said, "I am not going to stay in this sick bed anymore. I am sick of lying here. Lying down like a sick man is making me sicker! I am getting up today!" And we got up. With faith we got up, and I believe we are moving towards our promise. I believe we are moving towards our destiny that is before us.
We cannot see it just like that woman could not see Christ. She just knew he was in the vicinity. There are so many people, so many obstacles, so many things to get the way between me and that destiny. But she had something that all those others did not have. She had something called faith, faith in her promise that she would be healed and be made whole and find new life and be a new creation -- to find something great inside herself and to be able to manifest it and actualize it in this world. That came to life. And what did that do? That faith attracted the promise. Jesus came by her way. And I believe this is what is happening to us.
When we start believing in our potential as the Unification Movement, when we start renewing our faith and saying, "You know what, we are more than this. We have truth about True Love, about Parental Heart that the world has never known of -- a type of love that is so great that it goes beyond the grave, victorious over death and evil. We have this." When we start having that kind of confidence and start moving forward, then we feel the anointing, we feel that we have eternal life. No longer am I bound by the chains of fear of the future, fear of death, fear of failure, fear of myself. I can move in freedom. I can move in the joy of knowing that I am in the kingdom, knowing that I have eternity inside of me, knowing that I have power beyond the imagination of others. This is the resurrection power that happens when we understand what True Love is, when we understand what a Parental Heart is, when we receive True Parents in our life, accept that love in our heart and try to inherit that. And then we get a resurrection power inside us that no obstacle can confront. Even death cannot make us lose that resurrection power. That is something incredibly amazing and powerful.
It is said that when we believe, when we have faith, one of the natural products is another element that comes with faith. I really felt this during the 21,000 bows. It took ten days. It was really good training. I think I lost a little weight. I think I lost 5 pounds! (Laughter) No, I did not. I am just joking. But I lost a lot of hair. I am trying to grow it back.
During the 21,000 bows, the first day was absolutely torture. I was so faithful and energetic. I said, "I am going to do 7000 bows in this day, 7000.” I had done a couple thousand bows before and I was going to do 7000 today, in one day. So I said, "No problem! I am going to do 4,000 in the morning and 3,000 in the evening. No problem, I had done 2,000 before. No problem, I can do it!" So I start going, I am moving, I am excited -- got the Holy Spirit in me. I’ve got Holy Fire coming from Heaven. I am moving, going fast, fast, fast. I finished 1,000 in one hour and ten minutes. You can imagine how fast we were going. The next 1,000 I did in an hour and 55 minutes, a little slower. So in about three hours, I did 2,000 -- no rest. Just keep going...no problem...I can do it.
But when I got around 2,000 with no water or rest, something happened, very wonderfully (smile) in my left leg. All the muscles began to cramp up, began to knot and tie and twist and began to come alive (Laughter), so much so that I had to fall down. So I am on the floor holding my leg. It hurts and I am not straightening out. I am telling it to straighten out and it is not listening! So I am laying there and people are watching, so I am trying to keep cool and calm and trying to look somewhat honorable while I am lying on the floor grabbing my leg (Laughter). And there I am. The doctor came and gave me a little acupuncture and tried to knead it out. So that day it was a miracle...I was able to do 4,000! Usually, even for Buddhist monks, 3,000 is the number. But for Unificationists -- we did 4,000 (Laughter and clapping). I LOVE my monk friends, but I did 4,000 in a day! (Laughter)
The next day I was so tired. After you do even 3,000, your legs are totally dead the next day. After you do such a huge workout, you have the feeling that you cannot use them again. But we had to keep going because there was a time limit. Everyone was giving devotions for about a week. We can't let everybody down. So we have to keep going. So my legs were completely dead but I did 2,000. Keep going…
The next day was the problem. Everything began to cramp. Everything! That day we were doing one bow per minute. Really slowly... we broke it down into many stages. We would go down on the knees first, then one hand down, then another hand down. Then slowly, slowly descend. And it went on like this.
But I realized something incredible during that time. While I was doing those bows, the Hoon Sa Nims, the Unificationist monastic practitioners -- you sometimes see them in the white and blue robes -- were there with me singing this song: the song of the Seven Deaths and Resurrections and the Eight Stage Completion. You are going to hear it today during the final meditation. We are going to play that piece. We are going to have a very special altar call prayer today where we are going to try to pray like that. So they were singing this wonderful song about the Seven Deaths and Resurrections, Eight Stage Completion Victory of True Parents, and Victory of True Love. They kept on singing this and the next verse.
They kept on singing this, and the next verse says, "I am alive, thank you." I love that; it gives me so much strength. I felt so tired, I felt so beaten. I am moving so slowly and everything is hurting. But I remembered, "My God, I am alive. Yes, let me sing that song, I am alive. I am alive. I am alive. Thank you. Thank you.” And I got power. But then they put a new part in that song, another line. And that line said, "Be Victorious! Be Victorious!" As soon as they sang that, all my strength just went away. I suddenly became so weak! I said, "Can you please stop singing that part, you are giving me pressure! (Laughter) I have 17,000 more to do, so can you please stop singing that par?” (More laughter)
I realized something that day. I realized that I believed I can do it. But something was incredible. We were singing "I am alive... thank you." While you are bowing, you are tired and beaten up. But once I started saying, "I am alive! At least I am alive!" And "Thank you, I am alive! My leg is cramping, but thank you, I am alive!" then I kept moving and I felt strength. I realized why that was happening. When they were singing "Be Victorious, Be Victorious" all I had in my mind was, "Yeah, I have to be victorious. I have to show everybody I can do it. I got to show my monk friends I can do it." Do you know? It was all about ME. Be victorious! That is why I felt all this pressure. When I released that, when I let the ego go, “It is not about me, God." When I was bowing I realized I was dying going down. "It is not about me, it is about You. It is not about MY victory, it is about YOUR victory. It is not about ME wanting to be glorified, it is about YOUR glory." When I realized that I realized that that was the power that was lifting me up even though my body was breaking down. That was the power that was helping me back up. That was the resurrection power, when I let myself go, when I let go of all being about me and when I started saying, "No, it is about You."
I realized on that day that when we have faith, something happens when we can sustain it. If we have faith, we need to have praise and thanksgiving IN THAT FAITH; we need to offer songs of praise. We used to frequently turn on the Two Rivers music and all sang together, “We will overcome, we will overcome.” "I am victorious in God," all that kind of beautiful thing, just like the songs we were singing today, that overcoming song, "We are the winning side." We were there doing kyungbaes singing, “We are the winning side!" And then we really felt the incredible praise power, taking our minds off from how painful this is for my body, and starting to focus on the goodness of God, "Thank you God for allowing me to live!" Then, all of a sudden, I received this resurrection power in me through faith and through the gratitude that sustained that faith.
When we have faith but we do not have thanksgiving in our hearts, then that faith becomes like a duty: Work that we have to do, not joy. Then that faith becomes not wings but weights in our life. Then faith is something to DO, as opposed to something to live and rejoice in. When we have faith and we have praise and thanksgiving, it is different. When we are vacuuming and we do not want to vacuum, then put on that Two Rivers CD and put that praise music on the inside of you. Glorify God in His goodness and His kingdom! Then you will see that this little room is not going to defeat me today. At least not today! You get that resurrection power inside of you. And that is what happens with faith.
When faith is alive and it is filled with thanksgiving, it is not weight, but wings. It allows one to fly, says Isaiah -- allows one to soar like the eagles, says Isaiah. It allows one to run and not tire. It allows one to walk and not faint. Faith has a power and it is attractive. It attracts the promise. It attracts purpose. It attracts power. It attracts potency. This is what faith is all about. Once we believe in the power of this kind of incredible faith and love that the Unification Movement has and that we are teaching, then the world will come to know that most incredible love.
I declare that just as the world for the last 2000 years was changed through Christianity and through Jesus and the amazing love that he taught to the world; the Unification Movement and our teaching of True Love will bring the world to the next level -- to the completion stage! If you believe it, let's give it up for the Unification Church! (Cheers and clapping)
When we believe in this miraculous power, when we have faith, then we get that power. We receive that kind of love that True Parents have manifested in the Seven Deaths and Resurrections. We not only receive that love, we bring that resurrection power into our life. Then those obstacles in our way, the children that will not listen, those problems that are in our path, those mighty mountains in our path that look huge... none compare to the mightiness of the love that we are teaching, the love that we are inheriting. This, I realized, was really the key.
One may say, “How do we know that happened? We don’t know that happened. How do you know that that kind of love exists? How do you know that it is possible?” And we can ask that same question to Christians. “How do you know that Jesus died for you and he atoned for your sins? How do you know that?” How do you scientifically prove that the Buddha, after enlightenment, the davas from heaven came down and begged him, “Buddha, please teach your enlightenment, the Buddha dharma to the world.” How do you scientifically prove that a big black cobra came over him when it was raining and shrouded him like an umbrella? How can you prove that Mohammed received the word of God in the text of the Qur’an? How can you prove that at the dome of the rock, Mohammed ascended with the angel Gabriel up to heaven? How can you prove that?
That is what faith is all about. When you look into the eyes of those believers who have felt the love of Christ and who have felt change through the power of the resurrection spirit, when you see the transformation and rebirth in their lives; for us it may seem impossible. But for somebody who received that kind of love, somebody who received that incredibly valuable gift, that is like a treasure buried in the ground that only one person saw and everybody thinks he is crazy because he wants to buy that land now. Faith believes in something greater than ourselves. Faith believes in a power, a purpose and a hope that is larger than our human potential. Faith believes in something that not only is natural but is supernatural, that is divine and has divine connection and purpose and connects us to an incredible cosmic plan. That is why faith has power. That is why faith gives us attraction.
You see brothers and sisters, that day I realized that when we do actualize this in our own hearts, when we do receive the incredible power of the Seven Deaths and Resurrections, when we know that they did not only happen in the natural but in the spiritual and that they give us the receiving power, that they give us the prophetic power to bring the power of God into our lives, then we as Unificationists do not look at ourselves the same way but we see ourselves in the resurrected light. We see ourselves in a prophetic fashion. We see ourselves playing a providential role with a purpose. We see ourselves as valuable.
This is the real power of faith because when there is faith with gratitude and thanksgiving, when it fills our hearts, then there is nothing in the world to stop you. You know the scripture: “Greater is he who is within me than he who is in the world.” Nothing can stop you! That is the power of that incredible faith. Brothers and sisters, I believe now is the time for us as Unificationists.
You know I had a huge transformation in my life because this is something I had really been struggling about. And I see that my life is turning around. I feel myself more confident as a Unificationist because I know the Parental Heart that is manifested in the Seven Deaths and Resurrections. I finally know what True Love is all about. I am not perfect at it but at least I know what it is about, what kind of texture it has. When I study other religions I am inspired but I am also confident because I know that the Unification movement has an extraordinary teaching, a teaching that will bring the world to the next level and will bring that amazing, oh so amazing, wonderful land of Cheon Il Guk, that land of peace and harmony where we can dwell as brothers and sisters. Not because we deserve to be there, but because out of that amazing parental grace we and our families and our spirit worlds and our nations have been given the opportunity to be there.
Brothers and Sisters let us all bow our heads and enter into our final meditation practice…
Call to the Altar by Hyung Jin Nim:
We usually pray and we end up our service but many brothers and sisters came up to me and said, “We want to pray together.” Today we have some guests from Hong Kong. Let us welcome our brothers and sisters. Let us stand up! Anybody who needs some kind of prayer, anybody who needs the power of resurrection, I am going to come down. Our brothers and sisters from Hong Kong, from New York, please come to the front. Anybody else who wants to come, come down to receive prayer. We are going to pray together. Come on, yes, come on. Let’s give a big round of applause for these courageous brothers and sisters. We want to pray for the glory, to receive the power of resurrection that comes into our lives. It is an offering. We want to offer it as a gift. I am going to ask you to close your eyes. I am going to ask you to raise your hands up, to touch the face of God. Let’s lift our hands up and touch God!
Hyung Jin Nim's prayer:
Heavenly Father, thank you so much for these brothers and sisters. This is our family. Today we have brothers and sisters from Hong Kong. I pray that they may live with your anointment, that they can live with your spirit. Father we have brothers and sisters from New York, from Africa, from Taiwan, from Singapore, from the Philippines. Father, this is our amazing Unification Family. Your true love has brought together this diverse group so that we may come together in your amazing love.
Father, we know that You have portrayed and given us the most amazing kind of love that we could have known, Father, a love that can transcend death, go over the grave, a love that can be victorious over sorrow, over tears, Father, that can change our tears into tears of joy. Father, You gave us a new life, a new birth, resurrection. Father You have shown us that the power of Your true love is greater than any other force in the world. No torture, no prison, no hell can stop the power of Your love, of Your amazing grace, of Your unending true love.
Father we want to touch the center of the universe, the center of the cosmos which we know is Your heart, pulsing with true love. We know that True Parents have come before us. They have been physically tortured. They have gone to the prisons, to the death camp for us and Father they have gone in the spirit to take our place so that we would not have to suffer in the lower realm, so that we would be freed, so we would come directly come to the eighth stage, Father, that we may walk hand in hand with them into these incredible gates Father, the gates that You open for your children.
Father, we pray that You can be with our brothers and sisters today, Father we pray that you may come down and descend upon them, that we may have a rebirth experience that we may resurrect in this sanctuary, Father. We pray that we can have new life in this sanctuary today, Father. All the hope and the life that we have been dreaming away in our lives, we pray that they may be resurrected, Father, in Your incredible glory. Father, we pray that we may understand that it is not about US, let us understand that it is about YOUR glory, Your victory Father. Let us offer ourselves so that You move us in an almighty way, an almighty way Father that You will bring us into the next level in our lives, the next level in our family. Father, we pray that we may see that because of a certain problem in our lives that is always stealing our hopes, we are getting stronger, we are getting more victorious and be healed inside and made whole in the bosom of the Lord. Thank you so much!
We want to pray to You today as an offering. We want to sacrifice our hearts just like True Parents did in the Seven Deaths and Resurrections. We want to offer this as an altar call offering to you, Father, as your children coming together in love and in unity, in devotion, in gratitude and in hope Father. We want to leave this up to you and we want to give you strength, we want to give you more joy today.
Thank you so much for blessing the Unification Church, Father. Thank you so much for anointing the Unification movement, anointing the footsteps of all the members in the world. We pray that wherever they may be, their feet and their footsteps can be anointed, that their lives may shine, that they may show the light of God into this land of darkness. Please Father, we pray that we may be able to offer this today, we pray that you may receive this heart today, Father. We thank You so much, we feel your presence today as we lift our hands and close our eyes. As we touch your face, we know You are reaching down to our hearts and resurrecting the dreams that have been stolen by the enemy. We know that You are reaching to our hearts and resurrecting the potential that we gave up, the projects that we gave up. We pray that we may now resurrect those dreams and those desires and that they may be used for your glory Father. Thank you so much.
We pray that our brothers and sisters may return to Hong Kong, to Singapore, to Malaysia, to the U.S., all over the world and that your light, the new dawning of true love, can touch this world in a magnificent and mighty way. We pray that we may be able to move and shake this world with the power of the Principle and the power of the true love that is behind the Seven Deaths and Resurrections, Father! Thank you so much. Please, Father be with these brothers and sisters today and we want to offer all these things because united we stand and divided we fall. We thank you so much and offer all this to you in your glory and for your victory. In the name of True Parents we pray and in the name of central blessed families we pray. Aju.
Offering Prayer by Mrs. Tokiko Richardson:
Dearest Heavenly Father! Abonim, Omonim, Thank you so much for Your love. Through our 6000 years of history that was full of struggle, war, hatred and misuse of love, True Parents came to this earth, finally. They are guiding us to a true way of life. Now True Parents are showing us what a true family is through our beloved Hyung Jin Nim and Yeon Ah Nim. Father, we have no words to say other than Thank you.
Heavenly Father, we will go forward, carrying these beautiful words of Hyung Jin Nim with us today. We want to have a strong determination to support, participate and unite with Hyung Jin Nim’s heart and love. Please guide us and connect with Hyung Jin Nim and Yeon Ah Nim.
Heavenly Father, we offer this and please give us Your blessing. Thank you! We pray all these things in the name of the central blessed families from all over the world. Aju!