The Words of the Ablong Family
|
|
The Words of the Ablong Family |
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Thank you so much for your support to God's Providence in the Philippines though our church ministry in Japan. We have just entered the last two months of 2011. We still have a lot of expectations to meet and desires to accomplish for Heaven and True Parents as we move closer to January 13, 2013. It is a never- ending cycle of prayer, education, tradition, and mission. It has always been like this when True Father started his mission and so it is for all of us.
Brother Joseph Navalta, Philippine UPF President and lecturer of the Original Divine Principle seminar we had in Mie-ken, reminded us that it is essential to witness to ourselves first before we can witness to our family, brothers and sisters and outsiders. The same words are applicable to Jesus' disciples thousands of years ago. Had they not listened to Jesus and followed his words, they would not be inspired to educate the people around them and propagate Jesus's teachings of love and forgiveness to other lands. The reason why Christianity became the strongest religion on earth is because the Christians witnessed to Jesus as the Messiah even in the most difficult and impossible situations.
Divine Principle is revealed and inspired. It is what it is as 2 Timothy 3:16 tells us "it is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness." It is also the sum of truth (Psalm 119:151). If we abide by it, then we truly are disciples of the Living Messiah, the True Parents, we shall know the truth and the truth shall make us free (John 8:32) to go anywhere we please in order to spread the good news to all kinds of people especially those in our tribe.
I believe that this memo from our International Church President did not surprise all of us. We have been reminded by True Father many times about the importance of this mission, especially now, that we are building the heavenly nation. We, surely, cannot ignore or leave our tribes behind as we enter the land of promise. We need to take care of them as their elders of the church and ministers of the faith.
Being in Japan is also a blessing for both our church brethren in the Philippines and our respective tribes. We can make use of this blessing if we just get out there and spread the words about True Parents. We won't lose anything if we tell our tribes honestly about how we feel for True Parents and how justice will be sweetest to them when we give (or sell) them the book and have them read it so they will understand, feel and truly appreciate the value of True Parents.
Tribal messiahship is about fulfilling the biblical vision of us as "a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation" (1 Peter 2:9). True Parents' blessed couples are a people borne out of love and total sacrifice. We are we are a "love race," blessed and fully ordained by True Parents', the Lord of Second Advent, to witness to the great multitudes of unbelievers or onlookers especially our tribes and friends so they too can enjoy the blessings, happiness and pride of building the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth during True Father's time on earth. True Parents have basically called upon us to become "a royal family of God" to represent the True King and True Queen of Peace. So we should truly grab this opportunity and do what we need to do even when our individual situations seem difficult to handle.
We get more blessings when we share a few of our own. We gain life by losing it as Jesus said in the book of Luke 9:23-25 "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it."
Let us not be those who merely follow a religious leader. Let us make the commitment of our entire being to the embodiment of the True Parents' way of life through tribal messiahship. I think that most of us, like me have been touched by what True Father said, we "must not stand before life in a position to only receive. We must also stand in the position to give. That's why we struggle sometimes to accomplish our responsibility. Most of us are in the same situation of desiring and hoping to accomplish something but are hindered by stark realities of life.
I strongly believe that our desire, hope and effort to keep on trying our best to help becomes a good condition for God and the Good Spirit World to work with other brothers and sisters better. Just as the book of Romans 12:4 says, just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, we all have a role to play even if we are not able to substantially accomplish what we want to do for God. Let us read this new memo of our international president, Rev. Hyung Jin Moon and let us think about how to accomplish it before January 13, 2013. Thank you.
For and in behalf of Rev. Dante Negre,
the National Executive
Minister of PUCMJ,
Rev. Rafael E. Ablong
National Vice-Executive Minister and
Western Regional Minister
Philippine Unification Church Ministry
in Japan