The Words of the Stallings Family
|
|
The Words of the Stallings Family |
Thank you. Kamsahamnida. Arigato gozaimasu. Toda. My beloved brothers and sisters, there is a spirit of peace, shalom, salaam, in this place today. There is a sense of unity, of oneness. There is a spirit of true love. And this gathering did not happen by coincidence or happenstance. It did not even happen because we really desired it to happen. But it has taken place because of the life and the eternal love of a man who has forsaken all else in order to bring God's people back home. [Applause]
When I think of God and what heaven must be like, I think this is the closest manifestation of God's kingdom here on earth that we have ever witnessed in our lifetimes. And it is because of an individual who has completely forsaken himself, and even at times the demands of family life, in order to live for God and to liberate the heart of God, in other words, to relieve God of all of the pain and suffering of seeing his children scattered and going in opposite directions, one from another, and not really creating this sense of unity, this sense of oneness. I often ask myself, What would the Savior, the Messiah and the returning Lord look like? Obviously all of us would want him to look just like us--our color, our race, our language, our nationality, our religion. Oh my God! Especially, he has to be from our religion in order to be the Messiah that we would embrace.
But even when Jesus came among his own, when the historical Jesus came some two thousand years ago, the people did not recognize him. They did not receive him. In fact they did not embrace him. I would dare say that if the returning Lord, the Savior, the Messiah would come into our midst right now and would not look like us -- if he did not have a bald head like I have, or didn't have your hair, which makes you happy [because it's] nappy or your hair, which is "dyed, fried and laid to the side" -- that if he didn't come looking like you, you would say, It cannot be!
But the beauty of it all is that the returning Lord, the Savior, the Messiah, is not coming on a cloud, is not going to say Abracadabra and jump out of a box. No, the returning Lord is going to look like us -- a human being. And yet there is going to be something substantially different from all of us about him, whose life is so centered on God -- wearing the mantle of the Christ, being the anointed one.
The anointing on him is going to be so powerful that he will be able, along with his spouse, to transform humanity and to truly make us one family under God. That's what the returning Lord does! That's what the Savior, the Messiah does! It goes beyond religion -- goes beyond the borders, the barriers, the confines, the limitations of religion and allows us to embrace that oneness that brings us all together as brothers and sisters. The returning Lord, the Savior, the Messiah is going to bring about a world of peace. The hope of all ages is a unified world of peace. [Applause] That's what the returning Lord does; he works for peace, he works for unity, he works for oneness.
The returning Lord does not see color. Thank God, the returning Lord doesn't see color or I wouldn't have a Japanese wife.... Neil Bush!' [Laughter] I'm glad the Messiah can come and bring enemy nations together, bring people together and heal the brokenness and the division that is in our world. That's what the returning Lord does.
And the returning Lord is in our midst. Yes, the Savior, the redeemer, the healer is in our midst if we would but open our eyes. In the Gospel of John 17:21, Jesus prays to his Heavenly Father that they all may be one as you are in me and as I am in you, so that they also may be one in us so that world may believe and be convinced that You have sent me. I truly believe that God has sent the True Parents of Heaven and Earth to bring us back home and to make us one family under God. This is one family, this is one nation, this is one people, and we are blessed to see him with our own eyes and to breathe the same air that he breathes. Hallelujah!