1) When are the Last Days?

The term "Last Days" originated with Christianity. A similar concept exists in many religions. Let us think about how the Last Days will occur.

The world as the absolute God plans it should be eternal. Once it starts, it must continue eternally. Accordingly the reason the Last Days are needed in the world which God created is not because God planned for them, but because of the human Fall. The Last Days are required because evil began and blocked goodness.

Adam and Eve, who were created by a God of goodness, lived in the Garden of Eden, which was also good. If Adam and Eve had not fallen, goodness would have continued eternally. However, because of the Fall, the free development of goodness was thwarted.

You must understand that even though human beings were created to believe in God's words, our first human ancestors disbelieved, causing spiritual death to occur in this world. Another master appeared, having tempted Adam and Eve into rejecting God's Word and disobeying His commandment.

Because Adam and Eve did not believe God's Word and were seduced by this master, Satan became the lord of this world. Fallen Adam and Eve became the object-partners of Satan. As a result of their disbelief, there began a world of destruction and death, which has no relationship to God.

God cannot leave this world as it is. He must make goodness begin once again by restoring this world.

When do the Last Days come? The fallen world began with evil. Therefore, the phenomena of the Last Days occur when a person of Heaven appears to cleanse the world at all levels and tries to turn it, restoring it to goodness. In other words, the Last Days occurs when a central person appears with the power to eliminate all evil, to remove all the conditions for Satan's accusation, and to transcend to a world of goodness. The time when he transcends at the individual level is the individual Last Days; the time for moving on to the family level is the familial Last Days; and so on up to the global Last Days.

Historically, our ancestors came and went. Those who attempted to fulfill their responsibility based on God's Will always met with failure. Therefore, God promised that He would send a global representative who would be victorious on behalf of the individual, family, tribe, nation, and world and who would appear before Satan with a dignified power. That one person is the Messiah.

The Lord will come when the evil world, which has existed from the beginning of fallen history, is ready to be changed into a world of goodness. Therefore, the Last Days means the end of one age and the beginning of a new age. If the literal sun, moon and earth-which God created-were to be destroyed in the Last Days, it would be destruction by Satan, meaning God would have failed.

People will not know of the start of the Last Days. When your watch strikes twelve o'clock, yesterday is ended and today starts. But is there anyone who perceives at midnight that "from this instant it is a new day"? I don't think so; yet this does not mean that the time ending the previous day did not arrive.

It is difficult to perceive clearly the end of one day and the start of the next. Soon, autumn will be over and winter will come. However, autumn will end and winter will come without anyone knowing. There are many elders here, but is there anyone who, even once in his lifetime, recognized clearly the moment the season changed from autumn to winter? Without our knowing, winter comes, and later spring. However, this does not mean that there is no end point, no division between seasons.

You must know that when Adam and Eve fell, they still did not have a clear purpose which allowed them to decide what is good and what is wrong. They also did not yet have the power of dominion or the ability to always make the right decisions. The Fall occurred when Adam and Eve turned left when they should have turned right. Adam and Eve fell in the midst of confusion, not yet knowing all the facts.

Then, when are the Last Days? The time is now. It is written in the Bible that when the Last Days come, the people of the world will be divided into sheep and goats. The sheep are the people following the Lord, and the goats are those who are not.

Communism is on the left and is the goat. The Bible says that the goats will be on the left-hand side of the Lord. A goat does not know its master when it has one. Do Communists know God? The people in the democratic world are the sheep because they know God. A sheep knows its master. The Bible writings about the Last Days describe through symbols all the phenomena of the present day.

What is the nature of the Last Days? It is the time when everything is so chaotic and confused that people cannot tell the difference between day and night or truth and falsehood. When we look at the world today, we cannot tell whether the people who believe in Jesus are good or those who do not believe in Jesus are good. Sometimes those people who do not believe in Jesus can be better. The Communist world seems to be externally more dignified and practical than the democratic world. We have entered an age in which we cannot clearly distinguish what is better from what is worse. You should know that this heralds the Last Days. It is said that history repeats itself. We are entering the age in which we will reap what we have sown.

The word "restoration" appeared because of the human fall. This is the viewpoint of the Principle. Fallen humankind must be restored. The main purpose for God's carrying on His providence is to restore human beings to their original position.

Why did man and woman fall? They fell because of satanic love. Then, what is satanic or fallen love? It is self-centered love, which separates individuals rather than uniting them.

What, then, would be the character of the Last Days? It is the time when all people think of their individual love as absolute. The fallen world's Last Days will occur centering on fallen love. In other words, in the Last Days, individualistic love will be thought of as absolute. Love for the nation, society and family will be denied, and self-centered love will be approved. Instead of love based on morality and ethics, animal-like carnal love will be rampant in this world.

Today, impure love has reached the stage in which neither parents, the nation, nor the world can stop the corrupt sexual acts of young people and solve these problems.

Why has Satan pulled humankind down to this state of corruption? It is because God has been carrying out a providence centered upon love for the whole. In order to hinder God's providence, Satan has no way but to pull humankind in the opposite direction.

What is Satan's greatest goal? It is to destroy human love completely. Conversely, God is trying to lead humanity to the original world of love.