Specific Purpose

All of creation, including man, was made by God for a specific purpose. He did not create all things just to look at; His specific purpose was the fulfillment of His love. Even though God exists, without His love His very existence is meaningless. In order to be a true God He must be a God of love, and for this reason God wants to fulfill His love in His creation.

What is a true man? He is a man who is able to receive God’s true love. The desire of all things surrounding mankind is to see the day when they can receive true love from the true men who are recipients of God’s true love. All things of creation exist to receive true love from man, while man exists to receive true love from God.

Due to man’s fall this perfection never came about, and since fallen man was never able to fully receive God’s love, God could never fully give His love and thus fulfill perfection Himself. Man was never perfected, and as a result all nature has been unable to receive perfect love from man. God wanted to have a reciprocal relationship between Himself and all things and man, yet even though His creation was completed, no relationship of true love ever emerged. In that respect, neither God nor man has ever been perfected.

People talk about love today, but is that a true God-centered love? No, the love in existence now is far distant from the true love of God. Today many parents love their children, but because God has no part in it that love cannot be acknowledged by Him. The same is true of relationships between brothers and between nations. All are still on the level of imperfection, as is man’s love for all things.

Through the work of religion God has been striving to restore man; He began on the individual level and expanded to the worldwide level as man spread all over the world. The Divine Principle tells us that restoration starts with one man and God has been looking for one man of perfection through whom He can restore one woman of perfection. This is the concept of the Messiah and his mission.

Why is the Messiah needed? The Messiah is needed in order to elevate man’s imperfect love to perfection. Since love was stolen by Satan, the Messiah comes to restore and sanctify that lost love into the holy love of God. Since man became the prisoner of Satan, the Messiah comes to give mankind the true love of God. To be eligible to stand in the sight of God, restored man must establish a standard of love higher than the highest standard of the satanic world. The mission of restored man is to demonstrate a higher quality of love than ever existed in the satanic world.

In the truest meaning of love, the Messiah cannot embrace the people of the satanic world as they are. God cannot say to the Messiah, “Let them stay where they are. We can love them as they are and they can easily be restored.” If that were the case, restoration could have been done instantly and such a long period for man’s restoration would not have been needed.

The role of religion is to teach people to set their standard of love higher than the satanic world’s standard. The religious man is one who demonstrates higher love than anyone in the world claimed by Satan. For the sake of God he can then deny the value of anything in the satanic world and thus recreate the value of everything in relation to God. As religious people, we must be triumphant in this way of love.

God’s love will begin after we demonstrate our love, which is the very reason that Jesus said, “He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” This is the true heart of God’s Principle. We must become people who can demonstrate a greater love toward God and toward the Messiah than toward anybody else in the world, because at that point God’s love will begin. By loving the Messiah, men and women can surpass the point at which man fell and reach the level of perfection.

For this reason, we in the Unification Church must fulfill a seven-year course of totally giving up everything to the love of God and the Messiah.

Fallen mankind has always worked hard, but due to their disregard for God their hard work has not gone to God’s side.

As you strive to stand above Satan and advance in the direction of God you will have to confront Satan’s realm on all the different levels: the family, tribal, national and worldwide levels. On every level Satan will always attack and try to stop you. This confrontation with Satan cannot be avoided. This is the reason that religious work has always been persecuted, and why religious people must have the unshakable determination to overcome any difficulties and go on further and further toward God.

We can conclude that if there is a totally unselfish group of people, its goal will be nothing but the service of God and humanity. The entire world will not understand or accept them, and that will be the sign that God and the Messiah can be met through that group. Furthermore, it is obvious that such a movement is already working on the worldwide level if it has aroused worldwide opposition.