Love Your Spouse Centered on God

No matter how much we practice religion while living for the sake of others, we notice that there is such a resistance to the good activities that we do.

Haven't you noticed this conflict within ourselves?

This is because each one of us as an individual has a mind and body that is in mutual conflict.  Thus, we should unite our good mind as the center where God can come and dwell.

When a man and woman become a couple, they have many hopes and dreams for their future.

What couple comes together desires divorce, conflict and separation when they finally find each other?

Even if it is not their hope, the more we look into the society of relationships, we see such division and conflict.  There seems to be no solution to the problems between man and woman relationships.

Some people have a clear-cut answer and that is to never marry.

But could this be the original ideal God had planned when He beheld the first two beings on earth?

God made it clear that He wanted humanity to be matured in love and then prosper and multiply.  Since we are not living in the original way God intended the purity of a man and woman uniting has been turned around in the opposite direction.

Instead of two people who matured into perfect individuals uniting centered on God, the world is filled with billions of fallen individuals who do not fully mature in love or center their lives or marriages on God, therefore, conflict is sure to rise.

So what was God's original purpose for creating a union of man and woman?

A perfect man and perfect woman were to marry centered on God's will thus fulfilling God's whole purpose for creating the world.  Thus the three would enter a spherical relationship where God could govern all of creation through His perfect objects man.

When such a man and woman receive the marriage blessing directly from God sharing their perfect love and delighting in joy, in God's eye this is like a flower that has blossomed on earth for the first time.

All the forms of harmony that unfold through their love are like a fragrance to God.  Therefore, God will come before them because He wants to live amid such beautiful flowers and fragrances.

Even God is Enraptured in the Love of a True Couple

God can love only in the place of a true couple's love.  This is where all things in the universe harmonize.  This is the teaching of the Divine Principle and it explains such ideas and the path to follow.

What sound and melody do you think God would like to hear more than anything in creation?  It is the sound of laughter coming from an eternal married couple that likes each other and rejoices with one another.

When such a couple understands and embraces the world and lives a life with a heart that can love the entire universe, then this laughter becomes natural.

This sight is of such a loving man and woman before God is like a flower to Him.  This is not a simple idea, this is speaking about the original world which God intended for His children to live.

When you look at a mountain, a husband and wife ask the mountain for whom it comes into being.  Also, for whom does the universe come into being?

They would answer saying that they come  for me and at the same time for you.

This is the same for what a married couple is like.  The husband and wife unite through fulfilling the purpose of the universe and valuing the central purpose.

When the husband and wife speak to one another it should be centered on heart, personal character and love.  Even if a lady is a country bumpkin, what will her status be if she marries a government official or minister?

They go the same way.

Although that country lady may only have an elementary school diploma, everyone will bow their heads to her because she is the minister's wife.  This is the way for a husband and wife to go together.

Would their love be separate for her and him?  For them, love is both your love and my love at the same time.  It is your love and my love.

True love is that with which you love with your entire bodies as one, and with your whole hearts and blood vessels as one. 

Who could such people be that can love like this?

It is the love of a husband and wife.  If there was no such thing as husband and wife in the world, would life have any appeal?

When you watch the conversations between a loving couple, their words are more beautiful than any poem or painting in the world.

Moreover, how beautiful and splendid are the words, "Just between two people in love" and "Just by ourselves," and "Just the two of us"!  These are all good phrases, but what do you think is the best among these three spoken?

If I call my partner and say, "Hello!", she will answer in a corresponding manner, saying "Hi!" and if I call her saying, "Hey," she will answer, "What?" and if the husband uses cute phrases such as, "Hello, Dear!". But if he speaks to her bluntly she will answer in like manner, "What's the matter?" This is just like the mountain echo, everything is reciprocal.

Everything is reciprocal when people are intoxicated with love.

For instance, when a man laughs, he opens his eyes even bigger and when a woman laughs, she gently closes her eyes.  If the husband's eyes get bigger and bigger and the wife's eyes get smaller and smaller we can say that they are a happy couple intoxicated with love.

The More a Husband and Wife See Each Other, the More They Want to See Each Other

When does a man and woman feel happy?

They feel happy when they become partners and share love.  If a man were to relate to a woman by swinging his fist with physical force, this couple would never be able to attain any happiness.

When the man embraces and protects the woman with his strength and loves her, she will be able to feel true happiness.  The love between a man and woman does not work just with strength or just within the mind.

The woman will be able to experience a real feeling of happiness when the man affirms his loving heart with his strength.  Then when she returns love to him with her body and mind they will be a truly happy husband and wife.

A person always needs stimulation. Happiness does not come without stimulation. 

Stimulation is necessary in a relationship.

Just as eating meals everyday is better when it is fresh only when you are hungry each time you eat, the same with the love between a husband and wife should always be new and fresh.

The more the wife and husband see each other, the more they should desire to see each other and long to be together all day.  Love has value when two people long for each other.

In asking for love, if you have a mouth, you should open it, and if you have eyes, you should open them. Only then, will the giver of love be happy.

If you just remain silenced and dumb, love would run away on its way to you. You should know this.  How would you feel if your lover was not serious and behaved half-heartedly toward you in their affection?

Would you rather be together or separated from your beloved?

The closer you are to each other the better everything is.  Why is this so?  It is because everything works together.

What is the thing you like the most?  Is it food?

If you see some food when you are hungry, of course you will eat it with more joy than if you were already full.  But this pleasure is only temporary.

If someone gives you more food, even after you have become full you would not like to eat it so much.
But this is not the case with the one you love.

Is there anyone who says of his lover, "I want to forget her?"  Even if you have seen her over and over again, you still want to see her yet again and again.  Isn't this so?

Even if you have just seen her, you want to see her again, and even after seeing her again.  This way, you first stand one in front of the other, and alternate like a wheel of a cart.  This is the place where unification begins.

A wife that knows love sometimes gets the impulse to bury her head in her husband's chest to enjoy an afternoon nap as he watches television.

This is because she is drunk with happiness.  Before marriage, the man appeared ugly and strange, but after the marriage, she misses him and has to see him many times in a day.  This is how the hearts change.

Therefore, sometimes she will ask him to come home during the lunch break for a quick visit.  This is the same for the man who has come to know love.

Whenever he has a chance, he would like to sleep using his wife's knees as a pillow.  He will run home whenever he has a free moment, regardless of whether it is lunchtime or for a short coffee break.

If he wants certain things done, he will not hesitate to do things for her, even if he didn't like doing them before marriage.  He'll do things that he probably complained and said, "This is a woman's job.  A mighty man shouldn't do it."

These changes come about in men and women because of love.

When God created humans and blessed them, He did so in such a way that the husband and wife would be happy and experience joy.

A husband and wife that that have opened and entered such a gate of blessings will be lost in whispers to each other.

This kind of couple only says sweet things to each other.

For instance, "I have been waiting like this in order to meet you.  My whole life will reveal its value like a blossoming flower through you.  I was born to love you, and I have been waiting for this day."

There is nothing in existence that is as sweet as secret words of love.  The secret words whispered by a husband and wife, even when together in bed, will be a refreshment to dissolve all the fatigue and hatred of the world.

How Conjugal Love Develops

A man and woman who meet through the mediation of God would express their love through the process of the development of love.  The first is the lips, the second is the breasts, and the third is the sexual organ.

It is through the lips that a woman when she first meets a man feels shy and will hide before starting to love him.

A woman covers her lips with her hand because of this.  It is because of love starts with kissing.
When love matures, sons and daughters are born as its fruit.

For a woman, her sexual organ is the holy place of love.  So, should she have several keys for many men to explore this place?

She should have only one key to open that gate held only by her husband.  If a husband has two or more keys to a woman's holy place of love, he is Satan.

Also, if a woman's holy place could be opened by any key other than her husband, she is also Satan.

Once the husband holds the key of love to his wife's holy place and enters there, the most precious sons and daughters in the whole world will be born.

The value of sons and daughters is such that they are an encapsulation of love, not exchangeable for anything in the world.

Parents will experience the heart by which God created the first human ancestors through loving their sons and daughters.

This is the reason why parents rejoice when they look at their children, singing, "You are my love, whether, I look at you this way or look at you that way."

No matter what your baby does, who is born through love, you never hate him, but simply love him. This is because he is part of your body, made of your own blood and flesh and your love.

Whether he pees, takes a poop, has a runny nose, he will still be simply cute and lovely to your eyes. It is because love is dissolved into such things.

In a husband and wife relationship, if their love is joined through a strong force, they must be joyful and feel their partner is lovely, no matter what that partner does.

When a wife complains about the way her husband smells or the husband thinks or feels that he hates the way his wife looks, they behave this way because they have not established perfect love between them.

This married couple is only joined together for some superficial purpose or interest.

In your own family life during marriage, in order to feel true joy, you should bring God into the center and have a relationship where you can love each other where you see God rejoice together with you.

A man and woman getting married and making love is not something you should be ashamed of.

The act of the husband and wife consummating their love is something that is most dignified, holy and beautiful.

However, because the first human couple violated God's commandment on the time period for them to enjoy their sexual organs, the history of love has been a sinful one.  This is why shame has become attached to exploring the sexual organs.

You should think that even though there are many men and women in the world, that there is only one for you.  You should devote yourself completely to this one woman, with the thought that she is devoted to you.

This is the Principle.

In the very beginning God didn't make two sets of men and women for them to pick and choose whom to mate, he created only one man and one woman.

Therefore, if God placed Eve with Adam and she didn't like certain qualities about him or thought that God was wrong in His choice, then there would not have been creation of a family or such a thing as the human race.

True happiness can be found in the place where you can laugh, sing and whisper together with your beloved with both of you intoxicated with love.

I would say that the one who is able to listen to the whispers of his beloved is a happy person.  


It is because having such words whispered into your ears can give you a feeling of joy as if you were dreaming.

Return for Tomorrow's Post: God Resembles More Than a Man

This post was rewritten and derived from the textbook Cheong Seong Gyeong Book Four-True Family, Chapter Seven, Section 4-6

Principles of True Love

Welcome to a new week, and the last week of posts for the year of 2012, the Chinese symbol of the Dragon. Let's get started!  Does anyone think that love has rules or principles that are absolute?

True love happens in relationship with others. Even God required an “other” to fulfill His love. He created human beings as love partners, to whom to share the glory of His creation. He needed an object—someone to share with. He needed a relationship in order to experience love fully.

True Love Is Principled
 

Modern cultural notions have it that love is a spontaneous feeling in one person’s heart toward another. Yet, in fact, ethics weighs prominently that in successful and loving relationships. Examination reveals that ethics and morals enable true love.

Love based on feelings alone can be dangerous.

A man may feel he has fallen in love with another woman and desert his wife and children for her, leaving emotional devastation in his wake. A teacher may feel aromantic attraction toward a young student and wind up psychologically damaging the student for life with sexual approaches.

Psychologist M. Scott Peck points out, “Many, many people possessing a feeling of love and even acting in response to that feeling act in all manner of unloving and destructive ways."

In order to benefit the other, true love adheres to ethical principles.

Based upon principles, a truly loving person will behave benevolently toward a person he or she does not feel benevolent toward in the moment. To be kind to a spouse even when the spouse is being surly means a person believes in kindness, even when the other is not evoking it. It means a person believes in preserving and protecting marriage itself. To help the homeless man on the street means a person believes in treating one’s fellow human beings with compassion, even when that fellow human being is disreputable. To love those who have done a person harm means belief in the ultimate redemption of all, including the reprobate.

 

Ethics Enable a Life of True Love
 

Principles help stiffen the will to love the unlovable. They provide the impetus to enact the prodding of the conscience, which tells a person to act caringly even at his or her own expense. Mother Teresa could not have overcome her natural revulsion at the sights and smells of the diseased and dying in Calcutta had she not believed that the image of Christ was alive in each person. When she saw filthy people being gnawed on by rats in the gutters, it did not cause her to turn away, leaving them to the trash pile. Instead, she saw them as Jesus in a “distressing disguise” and asserted their eternal value as children of God. Adherence to a strong belief system enables a life of true love.

The necessity for ethical principles in love may be noted in the visceral reactions people have to violations of right and wrong in their relationships. For instance, learning that a spouse has been unfaithful is always an occasion for great anguish and pain. Marital love is bound up with expectations of loyalty, and these expectations are not just culturally conditioned. The emotional pain—the rage and hurt—that adultery causes is testimony enough to the deep affective content of the principle of fidelity in married love.

 

All other forms of love depend upon principles, too. You may have sensed these principles even in relationship with your friends.  In the love between friends, ethical violations are felt keenly as personal betrayals. The friend who lies, the friend who talks behind one’s back, the friend who passes one over in favor of another,the friend who is always willing to let the other pay the check - all of these kinds of ethical shortcomings cause friendships to flounder.

Ethical expectations accompany every human interaction and relationship—even fleeting ones. A person expects the clerk in the store to be polite and helpful. A driver expects fellow motorists to drive in a safety-conscious way in order to prevent injuries. Passengers on buses expect other passengers to make a minimum of noise, to say “Excuse me” when brushing past, and to move their things out of the way when the seat is needed.

The other-centeredness of these ethical expectations is clearly discernible. In fact, all virtues may be seen to be other-centered in perspective; all vices may be seen to be self-centered. It may be said, therefore, that “living for the sake of others” is the most all-embracing and all-encompassing moral principle.

 

True Love Is Serving and Sacrificial

True love is active. It involves enacting through willpower the promptings of beliefs and principles. Author and Christian philosopher C. S. Lewis noted that the more one feels without acting, eventually the less one is able to feel. This echoes the Book of James:

 

If anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his own face in a mirror, he sees himself, then goes off and promptly forgets what he looked like.

 

But the one who peers into the perfect law of freedom and perseveres, and is not a hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, such a one shall be blessedin what he does.

Many faith and ethical traditions emphasize service and self-sacrifice.   The great disciplines require fasting, prayer vigils, caring for the poor, the sick, the imprisoned, working to bring others into the light of truth, lengthy periods of silence and contemplation, and the giving up of worldly goods and pleasures in order to direct the mind toward God and others. It is as if in order for love to come down from Heaven, service and sacrifice must create a vacuum on earth.
 

Sacrifice in service to others creates a pocket in the usual maelstrom of selfishness—an empty space where God may dwell. As Reverend Moon has said, “God is creator and the originator of the two basic principles of service and sacrifice,” and when those principles are put into effect, God’s true love moves in.

The touching story of Shay shows how sacrifice and service to others creates an open place for heavenly love to come down to earth. Shay was a young, learning-disabled boy. He and his father were walking past a park where some boys were playing baseball.

Shay wanted to play, and his father reluctantly approached one of the boys on the field. The boy said, “Well, we’re losing by six runs, and the game is in the eighth inning. I guess he can be on our team.”

Oddly enough, Shay’s team started to score until they had a chance to win the game. But Shay was up next. Knowing it meant they would lose, Shay’s team still gave him the bat. He didn’t even know how to hold it. Thoughtfully, the opposing pitcher moved forward to throw Shay easy soft pitches. When Shay managed to hit a grounder, the pitcher instead of throwing it to the first baseman, lobbed it in a high arc out into right field. Everyone started yelling,

“Shay, run to first!” Startled, eyes wide, Shay ran to first and past it.

The right fielder then deliberately threw the ball way over the second baseman’s head, and once again, everyone shouted for Shay to run to the next base. The shortstop from the other team even turned him in the right direction. Another wild throw over the third baseman’s head had boys from both teams shouting, “Run home, Shay!” Shay ran home and was cheered by all as the hero who had hit the winning home run.

“That day,” the father said, with tears rolling down his face, “The boys from both teams helped bring a piece of the Divine Plan into this world.” They did so by their willingness to sacrifice their own interests for the sake of a little boy who needed a win more than they did, and who would always remembers the day other created a special space for him to belong.

It is hard to give things up that are in a person’s own self-interest.  Yet when a person does so to serve others, a window seems to open in the heart. It is a window through which the warm sunlight, gentle breezes, and the pure oxygen of the love of God may be seen and felt. For a moment, heaven comes to earth, and the whole world breathes a little easier.


Return for Tomorrow's Post: Second Chance at First Love

Photos courtesy of : freedigitalphotos.net

Today's text was taken from Textbook: Educating for True Love, Explaining Rev. Moon's Thought on Morality, Family, and Society.