Ousia, God's essence

Good morning, folks. 

We are coming to you from the far east.

Of course, we wanted to shoot this video a little earlier, but we could not make it due to a slight back tweak that I had during powerlifting training. Getting older, it is what it is, folks. But we are coming to you at the Sunday service today for a brief update.

Now, Pastor Regis gave a great covering of the beautiful ousia versus the Energia that we are understanding and is really helping us understand the Principle, really what it does, the reason why we focus on this so much. 

Number one, it helps contextualize the training. Very important to understand why training is important, that it is actually efficacious and that we can have communion with the immanent God. Amen. 

He is not an AI hologram. We will get into that.

At the same time, number two, we have to protect the deity and the nature of Christ. If anybody can go to Ousia and relate with the Ousia, that also means that they are of the Godhead. Then there will be no necessity for Christ. Amen. 

You see what I am saying, folks? It would just be another form of Hinduism where everybody can make God by certain practices. Of course, that leads to Satanism.

That is, of course, number two, contextualize the training. Number one, actually, is to protect the deity of Christ. Number three, or the third point, is understanding through the essence and Ousia distinction. We also can protect the Principle understanding of forgiveness of action. This is very important.

This goes to a certain point that as we understand this distinction, remember, the distinctions within Ousia and Energia do not mean division. For example, we are talking about Pastor Regis, he is a person, but he has a human nature. Those things are distinct, but they are not dividing him into two different things. Amen. 

You see what I am saying? He can still have an Ousia and an Energia, or a person, and a nature, which is distinct, but not divided. Are you with me, folks? This is very important to understand.

The same with a godhead. It can also be the persons of a godhead, but not divided, although distinct. It is very important to understand.

Now, when we go off the Thomistic understanding, we, of course, run into a certain problem.

Thomistic and Augustinian reworking of Augustinian thought in the Thomistic world being a medieval Christianity. Of course, in developing the whole notion, stronger notion of predestination. Where does that come from? If the essence and the ousia of God, the essence or Ousia, and the Energia, his activities, his operatio, etc. are collapsed into one thing, then you will have a problem.

Then there is no more distinction between the essence and ousia. Effectively, when we are talking about God's love, his grace, his sacrifice, his divine will, his knowledge, his activities, any of his activities, we are now talking about his essence. And if we do that, of course, then we have multiple essence, which, of course, then leads to multiple Ousia within the godhead, which is then a problem, because then it means multiple gods within the godhead with separate Ousia, which is very different from different distinct persons within the Ousia.

Very, very different situation. But the point is, if God's will is also part of it, is his essence, then that means it is unchanged. It predates, beyond time and space, and it is unchanged.

So thus, then, his will becomes predestined. Even with all his foreknowledge, etc., his will is still then predestined. And then everybody is, of course, decided that God has already preordained the damned and those who will be saved, and, of course, that then destroys the whole Principle of free will, which, of course, then destroys the Divine Principle.

So, understanding the distinction between Ousia the essence, and energeia, is critical in understanding how we get to free will, how we get to understanding interacting with God.

The Queen was doing a Bible study this morning and studied the different theophanies or the entrances of the presence of God, etc., in the Old Testament, or even in the New Testament with the Book of Acts with the dove and tongues of fire, etc., or Moses meeting God and the burning bush. All these kinds of things, and the Bible is referred to as seeing God's miraculous work, what we call in Korea, “Yoksa”, directly.

But, if you have a Thomistic worldview, in essence, and energeia is collapsed, and they're the same thing, well, God can't just appear, his essence just can't appear as dove and tongues of fire. That would mean everybody has access to his essence, thus everybody becomes God. So, to avoid that problem, Aquinas had to make the other point, well God actually, created these things. They're like AI holograms.

They're like holograms of dove of fire so that we can kind of interact with God that way. But the problem is that would then, that would mean God is forever distant, because that would mean even when he gives us incredible miracles like the dove and tongues of fire, or the burning bush, etc., those are not actually God encounters with God, or communion with God. These are actually interactions with a created being, or a created AI hologram. You understand? And that would put forever God forever away, and that would destroy giving and receiving action. That would destroy, in the end, it would destroy our actual relationship with God, because you could only have a relationship with a hologram.

Are you with me, folks? So, I'm going over this in a quick manner, but you understand how many problems arise if we don't understand these distinctions, not divisions, distinctions between the Ousia and the energeia. And remember, energeia is mentioned in the Bible 26 times plus, and of course it's not only activities or operatio of God, but also of the devil. The devil also has activities as well, through which he can possess, and destroy, and kill, seek and destroy, as the Bible says, the devil is trying to do, etc.

So, we must be aware of these things, and of course, that's why we're going to do our practice, our training. In our training, we can experience God, not his AI holograms, not some type of created effect or being, but God's presence, his energeia, we can encounter in his divine light, his divine power, his divine grace. These things that are uncreated energies of God, he can give us a grace of these incredible experiences, if we put in the effort of seeking after him, chasing after him, that's why training and practice is so important.

Keep your training up, folks, that's why we do it, we try to do breathing in, I am alive, breathing out, Aboji, Kamsa, we thank you for 100 times, 400 times, 4,000 times, 40,000 times per day. 

If you get to that level, your life and your destiny is forever changed because you are living constantly in repentance and but glorifying God with gratitude at the same time so you're not in depression, but you are in glory and, of course, God in those wonderful moments can give us amazing encounters with his divine energies and his activities, amen. 

At the same time, with all the things going on in America, with President Trump, right now, we got to keep praying for the President, he's escalating, etc., but at the same time, returns are coming up and we can't let, obviously, we can't let the commies win because they will literally start to build a Bush revolution, start killing patriots off because they are literally insane. 

But of course, we've got to stop that, but we got to also tell the Republican Party that we don't trust you no more and then if Thomas Massey and Marjorie Taylor Greene and Tucker Carlson and Joe Kent, these real MAGA, America First folks, are going to start stepping up that the majority of the patriots and the independents will go support them as well. 

So, we have to stand in this gap, folks, in this critical time as we are praying for the security of the world and, of course, for God's kingdom to come. So, keep praying, folks.

Pray for the President, pray for all the folks. We got to stand strong in this critical hour. We love you all.

Thank you for your prayers. We're praying for you. God bless God's people and may his kingdom come.

Hallelujah

Note

When referring to the theological concept of God’s essence, the accepted transliteration is Ousia (from Greek οὐσία).

Essence of God

The concept of God's essence in Eastern Orthodox theology is called ([ousia - The generally agreed-upon meaning of Ousia in Eastern Christianity is "all that subsists by itself and which has not its being in another"]) and is distinct from his energies (energeia in Greek, actus in Latin) or activities as actualized in the world.