Once you find lasting happiness,
then you can begin to think about contributing to making others happy.
Everyone as an individual is born and raised in
the love of our parents. You go through kindergarten, primary school, high
school and the university, and eventually your view of life is broadened to a
wider scope. You want to see what the society is like and what the people
around you are doing. You find yourself belonging to one of the many
nations of the world. You will want your nation to prosper more than any
other nation. You want to be successful, and you become interested in the
opposite sex. You want to have a sweetheart, and you desire to get married
to that person and build a home of your own. You want to give birth to
your children, and in the parent's position you want to educate them as your
parents have educated you. In order to raise your family you must have a
job. To most people, success means to be able to make more money for the
happiness of their family. In this way you grow old.
In the worldly sense, there are happy and unhappy people. Some are
unhappy because they have no children, and some are unhappy because their
families are being broken up. Still others are unhappy because they have
been discharged from a high position or because of the bankruptcy of their
company. Kings, presidents and other responsible officials in each nation
feel unhappy when their country is defeated by other countries. We can
well see that in the world there are people who are happy, but there are more
people who are unhappy. There is not a single man in the whole world who
would choose to have unhappiness or misery; everyone wants happiness.
However, some things are not within our reach. We cannot always do what we
would like.
What is happiness in the true sense? In a word, happiness can be found
in the position where we have things which other people do not possess.
You are elevated, elated; you are happy when you can give to other people.
You are happy when you can enjoy a position higher than other people's. By
giving and taking with other people, you feel happy. On the other hand, if
you cannot give out to others, they cannot receive, and they feel unhappy.
You are happy when you can give things to other people, when you can share the
position, wealth, knowledge, and whatever you have that is virtuous with other
people. If you are satisfied with what you are, with the position and
everything else you have, then you can call yourself "happy." If you can
share love wit h each other, that makes you feel happiest of all.
Comparing yourself with successful people, you often ask yourself, "Can I be
that way? Can I ever be that kind of person?" You find yourself limited by your
knowledge, your position, your authority, and many other things; but your desire
and ambition have no limit. When you have limitless desire and limited
circumstances, how can you find the balance between those two? This is what
gives all of us agony. Thus, we find there is only a small difference
between the commoner and the prince. Everyone has to solve this problem.
There seems to be no solution. That's why people look for the key in
philosophy and religion. In philosophy you search outwardly, and in
religion, you look for the key inwardly, or spiritually. Motivated in this
way, people have developed philosophy and religion, and today we experience the
maturity of this history of search. In the external sense, in
the political philosophy of democracy, freedom-loving people have
grown to a certain level in their cultural tradition.
Our standards of what the family, nation and community should be are all
broken down. There is only darkness, and we have no idea what direction to
take or how to evaluate things. We are faced with the ruin of our view of
value. In the former days we esteemed love in marriage and in the family,
but now love has fallen far below the standard of past tradition. In the
democratic world people say even of their leaders, "Well, he is just another
man, no different from myself." Everything of virtue has been leveled.
There remains no high view of life for future generations to pursue. But still
we cannot abandon our human ambition and desire.
Is there any religion in which we have not been disappointed? People
have become disillusioned by all of these. Democracy, Communism, and even
religion have failed people. They feel that now everything has been tested
and all have failed. We have come at last to this point on the way of life.
Now what should we do?
There is natural law ruling in human society. We cannot change our
sexes. Men must remain men, and women must remain women. Their natures and
desires are different. But what do they have in common? They have the
desire to enjoy something virtuous. However far-ranging our human thought,
or however varied life around the world may be, we must be set truly on one
common goal. We have got to find the ultimate goal which both man and
woman are headed for. If we find that goal, we will be the happiest
people. People may think that happiness is something that we only wish
for, but which can never be attained. Who can give us happiness? Can
our nation give us happiness? Can any ideology or "ism" bring us
happiness? We can only be scornful of past ideologies which promised to do so.
When you are born in a small country, you feel so limited, and you dream of
coming out of that country to the United States. But when you come here,
you don't find so much difference from your own nation. Even though there is
tremendous wealth here, even though dreams are realized here, you are not going
to be contented. You will want to go further. In the world, people are not
contented with what they now enjoy. Their missions and desires are always
far ahead of them. Isn't that true? That means that what we already have
is not the ultimate happiness.
A boy may want to marry a girl and at one point that is the goal. After
it is attained, are the two happy? No. They want to have something
more. They have learned about each other, and not so much remains there
now. Real happiness is something that we can never exhaust, something we
can enjoy forever.
So what is the source of such happiness? Can any individual be the
source of happiness? Can another person give everlasting happiness to you? After
thinking about it, we can come to the conclusion that if there were no God, we
would have to create one. We must have God at least in our imaginations. Even
though we might be deceiving ourselves, if we had that God in our imaginations,
and if by serving Him we felt that we were given ultimate happiness by Him, then
we would be happy. Because no other human being can give us that. We have got to
have God transcendent of human life, or life has no meaning. At this
point, if we discover that God really does exist, how happy we must be! We
should feel as if we could turn the whole world upside down. If a group of
people can really know God and work in the love of God and for the cause of God,
society will be attracted to that group and will watch it and be anxious to see
the group successful. We have to put this into practice, and we are happy
to carry out our mission.
People of the world go to school and get married, and they seek position and
status; but they are never satisfied. Here we know God is above us, leading us
and working through us. So everything we do is very meaningful to us, and what
we say and what we do is of higher dimension than what others are saying and
doing. People generally are doing things that have limited scope. But we are
doing things without limitation. We have a super-existence above us - God, our
Father. So we do everything in accordance with His will. We eat and
sleep for the great task which He would have us do. We always seek to act in
accordance with God's will; that is our standard. We marry to bring the family,
society and nation into accordance with God's will. We marry because we
want to come closer to God. We do everything because we want to be near
Him. We want to restore the family, the nation and the whole world because
we know that by winning these things back to God, we as individuals can come
closer to God. We Want to go to a meeting point with God, where we can
reach Him and win Him for ourselves.
In the world of higher dimension, the more we struggle the more valuable the
achievement. In the love of God we will enjoy everlasting happiness. So it
is only too natural for us to reach the conclusion that we can attain the goal
of human happiness in a higher dimension, and that it will last forever. Since
learning about God we are strong and happy people. We know only too well
that God is love and that we will enjoy God's love in doing everything. In
going through education and enjoying even high positions and wealth, we know how
to return all things to God, and we can enjoy things as having been given by
God, our Father. Compared with all people we are the happiest.
That's what makes us happy. We said that when people possess things other
people do not, they feel happy. Since we possess things of greater value,
we are happy.
In giving, too, we must not be narrow-minded; we will not draw small circles
around ourselves. We must be generous people. We want to give out
things not only to our family members, but to friends and neighbors and the
society around us. We want to give out not only things, but our whole
being to the last man alive, stretching ourselves until we can reach the other
end of the world. There is no limitation according to East and West in our
life. Nations which have long been enemies can come together in our movement
and love each other. We can enjoy things among ourselves, sharing with
each other what we have cherished. Since there is no barrier whatsoever,
there are no enemies whatsoever; we can safely say that we are the happiest
people. In human society some people want to possess more than other
people, and they want to invade others' ownership to possess more people, more
land, and so on. That's what makes people fight each other. But here
there is no such thing. If you want to possess things with self-centered
motive, we know you are liable to ruin.
Here we say that everything belongs to God. Only God owns everything. What we
have belongs to God. We feel that we have to return everything first to God and
then be given what we need by Him. In that way, we exchange what we have
with God's love. We want to return to God everything we have, and in
return we want to receive God's love, which is greater than anything else.
Then we want to share that love with others.
Husband and wife are proud of the love between them. The man is not
proud because of the build of his body, and the woman is not proud because of
her femininity, but they are both proud of there being love between them.
The family, as a unit, cannot be proud of its wealth or position. It can
only be proud of the love of God abiding within the family. Neighbors,
relatives and friends will be envious of the family that really enjoys the love
of God. Such a couple says to God, "We will return everything to you: What we
have is yours - our family, our children, our nation, and everything is yours.
In return we want to have your love. In your love of the family, we will
love our family; and in your love of the nation we will love our nation; and in
your love of people of the world, we are ready to love the people of the world."
What we want to do next is to return the whole cosmos, the whole spirit world,
to God and receive God's infinite love. What we are doing here is for the
sake of God. We eat for God's cause, we work and do things and say things
all for God's sake, and to receive God's love.
In love your trials and your struggles are not painful. Suppose there
is a girl who wants to marry a very handsome man, a righteous man. She
could sit up the whole night embroidering something which would please her
future husband. She would never feel fatigued no matter what long hours
she worked. When you work for the love of God, you cannot be made to feel
tired. Therefore, however hard we have to toil and labor, we are happy to
do it. This is the secret to possess love. The more you labor for the person
you love, the more love you will receive from him.
Love is something precious that you want to keep deep inside yourself like a
secret. This secret between you and God will make you great. In
giving out the love of God to other people you are sharing your love with them,
and your love rather than being diminished, will be multiplied. You will
be proud of what you have given. Only by giving can we receive. So we want
to give out our whole being. We want to give out our family, our clan, our
nation, and our whole world to God. In return He will fill our hearts with such
love that can embrace the whole world and the whole cosmos. We are rich;
we are the happiest people. Then, are you going to be really generous
givers? In giving to others, never expect to receive anything directly in return
from them. But let them return what they have received, to God. You are
returning everything to God through those people, so God will be sure to return
something to you. That something is His love, which is greater than
anything else in the world. You will receive things of more value than
those you have given out. Through the love of God you will be in the
position of God's son or daughter.
Now that you have learned the way to go in life, the more you labor for the
love of God, the more you can receive love from Him in abundance. When we
live in God's love, we have nothing to be afraid of. If you know that you
have been doing all things for the sake of God, you are not afraid of being
caught in any kind of disaster, because you know that God will keep you and
protect you. If you are sacrificed in carrying out your mission because of
your love for God, you will be a martyr who will long be remembered in the
history of the providence of God. In the Roman Empire when Christians were
persecuted and martyred, they suffered for the sake of the spiritual kingdom
they expected to enjoy when they died. With the thought that they wanted
to go to the heavenly kingdom of God, they endured martyrdom.
But in this world we are going through all difficulties and hardships and
persecutions in order to build the kingdom of God on this planet while we are
still alive. Even though we may have to be martyred here, we are
struggling for the love of God. We a re going to be the children of God.
Knowing this, you must carry out your mission with gratitude and you must return
joy to God.
