Cheon Seong Gyeong Ⅱ - 182. The Life of a True Person
1 A life of true love simply means living for the sake of others. It is a life of giving to others first, for their sake, before want wanting others to give to you, for your sake. It is giving to others and then forgetting what you have given to them. It is not a matter of wanting something in return for what you have given. Rather, you feel sorry that you were not able to give more. It is a life of taking a humble position, even as you give to others and live for their sake. That is the love of parents and the love of an owner. Such is the heart of God, the True Parent of humanity. (433-179, 2004.01.27)
The philosophy and practice of living for the sake of others
2 If you love people as much as you love God, people will love you just as God loves you. This is why in the Bible Jesus said, “Everyone who acknowledges me before others, I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven.” (Matt. 10:32) It is the same principle. That is why I am telling you to love people just as you love God. When you invest in something, do not think about it. Do not spare anything, and then do not remember what you invested. You have to become a leader with the heart of a parent, with the heart that if you have something to eat, you would want to save it for others rather than eating it yourself, or you would not eat by yourself, because you think of your members first. (70-166, 1974.02.09)
3 You should always be in the position of a subject partner, centered on God’s love. You should be able to influence others. How can you influence others? By giving. When you give, how should you give? You should not give leftovers. If you give leftovers from your meal, even if people eat them, afterwards they will spit them out in disgust. Let’s say you have five rice cakes to give out to people. If you pick up one, put it down and then pick another, wondering how much to give, it is worse than not giving at all. Without any hesitation you should just pick up a handful of them and give them out. Then people will thank you. But if you hesitate in giving, people will criticize you even after you do them that favor. Thus, when you give, you should do so with God’s parental heart. (060-170, 1972.08.17)
4 When you act centering on yourself, it brings evil results, but when you act for the sake of the whole, it brings advancement. When you act for the sake of the whole, every door will open to you. The doors of the individual, family, tribe, people, world and heaven will open; the doors to every path, including the way of love, will open and welcome you. From this viewpoint, the Unification Church teaches the heavenly principle that we are born for the sake of others. So we choose the path of living for the sake of others and actually live our life that way. (133-016, 1984.07.01)
5 If someone truly invested his or her life and sacrificed everything so you could receive a benefit of 100 percent, would your original heart tell you to repay 50 percent and put 50 percent in your pocket, or would it tell you to pay back as much as you can? Our original heart tells us to repay even more than we received. If we truly know that someone gave us everything with a heart of love, our original heart will tell us to give back more than 100 percent. It is by this process that the concept of eternity is established. It is how eternity originated. The principle of total investment was established in the very beginning. Advancement and prosperity flow from that point. (73-326, 1974.08.10)
6 Parents’ love is good, but if the parents give it for their own sake, the children will not want it. Children’s love is good, but if it demands that the parents live for the sake of the children, the parents will not want it. If you gave ten with love for the sake of others, it will return as eleven. Love for the sake of others works that way. If your partner loves you and lives for your sake even in a small way, you want to give back more than you received. This cycle will continue to expand. If the cycle of giving continually expands throughout your life, this sacrificial way of life will extend itself beyond the nation to the world, the heavenly kingdom, and the entire eternal spirit world. When you demand that others live for you, however, your benefit will diminish more and more. If you live like that, what is ten at first will the next time be reduced to eight. If you demand night and day that others live for you, your heart will shrivel up. Since love comes from the other, only when we follow the way of living for the sake of others can pure, ideal love flow back and forth between us. (119-326, 1982.09.26)
7 There should be no such thing as selfish individualism. The union of Eve and the archangel was based on a self- centered consciousness—the idea that the self should live for its own sake. That is why we have to deny that path. Up to this point we have been talking about living for the sake of others, but not anymore. From now on, we need to talk about living for the sake of others and the self at the same time. Who are others? “Others” includes “me.” We say we have to live for the sake of the Cain world, but that is not exactly so. We must bring them to us because those others and I are actually one body. This is no longer the time for teaching the principle of living for the sake of others; rather, we should teach living for the sake of “others and me.” We have to bring our partners to the point that they become one with us, and in so doing, we make something greater—“us.” Then we can go to the kingdom of heaven together. Those who think that they alone are the best will not be able to enter the kingdom of heaven. This is a principle. If there is one model at the center, then everything for 360 degrees around the center must be divided into equal parts. There should be no barriers, only equality, peace, unity and freedom. Thus we are not merely living for the sake of others. Our heart and body have to be united based on a greater heart through the principle of “others and I.” In this way, we have to bring Cain to voluntary submission. (409-282, 2003.06.29)
8 We have to repay our parents who have lived for our sake. Therefore we must be filial children. Life did not begin from us; it came forth from the Origin of the universe. The entire universe exists in the position of living for the sake of others, and any being that denies this is bound to perish. Such a being would have no origin and therefore no basis for existence. Human beings are born to live for the sake of others. This means we must live for the sake of those who love us. We live for the sake of our father and mother until we die, because we need to make their love grow after we first receive it. If we live for their sake until the day they die of old age, our family will grow bigger. In order to inherit the nation, our family has to grow to the level where its love for the nation exceeds the love between the husband and wife. Then it will become a family that the nation can embrace. We must live for the nation, which is greater than the family, and live for the world, which is greater than the nation. Then we must live for heaven and earth, which are greater than the world, and finally we must live for God, who is the greatest of all. (435-176, 2004.02.04) |