How does God prepare the world to receive the Messiah at the first and second coming?

God prepares humanity inwardly through faith, conscience, and repentance, and outwardly through cultural, political, and scientific development. Israel's postexilic renewal and wider Axial Age traditions prepared for Jesus. Unification faith sees global developments and Korea's religious history as preparation for the second coming, while emphasizing free response, discernment, and love.

God prepares the world to receive the Messiah through long providences that cultivate faith and conscience while also developing the cultural, political, and material conditions in which his mission can unfold. At the first coming, this preparation centered on Israel within a wider world of religious and cultural development. At the second coming, this preparation is worldwide, with a particular focus on Korea. In both cases, God prepares the opportunity, but people must freely recognize, receive, and cooperate with the Messiah.

The Biblical Foundation

Paul writes that Jesus came at the appointed moment: “But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law” (Galatians 4:4). That fullness involved generations of preparation. Israel had received the law, the prophets, the sacrificial system, and the hope of God's promised deliverance. These formed a people capable of understanding the Messiah's mission: “Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith” (Galatians 3:24).

John the Baptist's task was especially direct. He was sent to turn hearts toward God and “to make ready a people prepared for the Lord” (Luke 1:17). Preparation therefore meant more than possessing prophecies. It required repentance and a willingness to act when their fulfillment appeared.

For the second coming, Jesus emphasized a worldwide witness: “And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come” (Matthew 24:14). Daniel describes a time when “many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased” (Daniel 12:4). This is connected with the modern era of global mobility and explosive growth in knowledge. Joel declares, “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh” (Joel 2:28). While this promise began to be fulfilled at Pentecost, its ultimate fulfillment is for the time of the second coming, when God's spirit is poured out on a global scale.

Together, these passages present preparation as spiritual awakening, the communication of God's word, and the gathering of peoples into the reach of God's saving work. They do not authorize certainty about a date.

Internal and External Preparation

God's preparation proceeds through two complementary dimensions.

Internal preparation concerns the human spirit: faith, conscience, repentance, moral discipline, and the desire to know God. Religion addresses questions about life's origin and purpose, good and evil, and our relationship with eternity. It helps people distinguish selfish desires from desires that serve goodness.

External preparation concerns the circumstances of life: language, education, political institutions, economic development, science, transportation, and communication. These can remove barriers to encounter, make teaching widely accessible, and provide practical means for caring for humanity.

Both are necessary because the Messiah's mission concerns the restoration of human life, not merely the communication of an idea. Spiritual conviction needs expression in families, communities, institutions, and the responsible care of creation. Conversely, material power without moral maturity can intensify exploitation and destruction.

Before Jesus, the central meeting point of these preparations was Israel and the surrounding Mediterranean world, although the spiritual preparation extended much farther. Before the second coming, the corresponding preparation is global. The goal is the convergence of inward readiness and outward capacity, so that humanity can receive God's guidance and embody it in a peaceful world.

How God Prepared Israel for the First Coming

The Babylonian exile was a decisive crisis in Israel's religious life. Jerusalem and its Temple were destroyed in 586 BC, and exile forced the people to confront the loss of the institutions around which their national and religious identity had been formed. The prophets interpreted this catastrophe as a call to abandon idolatry and return to covenant faithfulness.

After the Persian conquest of Babylon, Cyrus permitted the exiles to return, beginning in 538 BC. Restoration then proceeded through several related stages. The Temple was rebuilt under the leadership associated with Zerubbabel and Jeshua, with encouragement from Haggai and Zechariah, and was completed around 516 BC. In the fifth century BC, Ezra taught the law and promoted religious reform, while Nehemiah led the rebuilding of Jerusalem's walls and the renewal of communal life. Malachi called the restored community to faithful worship, integrity, and renewed commitment to God.

It is important to distinguish their roles: Ezra, Nehemiah, and Malachi belong to the broader postexilic religious renewal, but they did not all personally rebuild both the Temple and the walls. Together with the earlier restoration leaders, their work strengthened the foundation of faith on which the people could await the Messiah.

Each part of the restoration served a purpose. The Temple restored a center of worship. The walls gave the community greater security and a setting in which covenant life could be sustained. Public instruction in the law gave people a shared moral standard. Repentance from idol worship redirected their allegiance toward God. Prophetic correction challenged the assumption that rebuilt institutions alone amounted to renewed faith.

Ezra is central to this renewal of scriptural authority. Through the work of leaders like him, the people could receive the accumulated testimony of law, history, worship, and prophecy as a coherent religious inheritance.

Exile and dispersion also established Jewish communities beyond Judea. Their synagogues and scriptural teaching later provided important points of contact for the early Christian mission. Thus, even suffering and displacement became circumstances through which faith could reach a wider world; this does not mean that the suffering itself should be regarded as good.

Finally, John the Baptist brought preparation to its immediate point of decision. His call to repentance was meant to turn inherited expectation into readiness to receive the one who followed him.

Worldwide Spiritual Preparation Around the Axial Age

God's providence was not limited to Israel. He also worked through other peoples to cultivate conscience, moral understanding, and spiritual longing.

In a remarkable period of spiritual awakening around the 6th century BC, known as the Axial Age, God raised up influential figures in several civilizations. While they did not all live at the exact same time, their teachings contributed to a worldwide moral foundation.

In India, Shakyamuni, the Buddha, taught a path addressing suffering, craving, ethical conduct, compassion, and disciplined spiritual practice. Such training could help people look beyond immediate appetite and confront the roots of destructive behavior.

In China, Confucius emphasized moral cultivation, humane conduct, responsibility within relationships, and government by virtue rather than force alone. His teaching helped make character and relational obligation central concerns of personal and social life.

In Greece, Socrates, who lived in the fifth century BC, challenged people to examine their assumptions and give greater attention to virtue and the care of the soul than to wealth, reputation, or power. His questioning strengthened the demand that a person's way of life be accountable to truth and goodness.

In Persia, Zoroaster's religious legacy emphasized the moral choice between truth and falsehood. The influence of this tradition during that wider period was part of God's providence.

God worked through these diverse traditions to awaken dimensions of the human conscience and soul. This does not mean that their teachings were identical, that their followers consciously awaited Jesus, or that their distinctive beliefs should be erased. It means that concern for compassion, righteousness, self-discipline, truth, and the ultimate meaning of life could prepare humanity to respond to a fuller revelation of God's purpose.

External Preparation for the First Coming

Alongside Israel's religious formation, the Mediterranean world developed conditions that later facilitated the spread of the gospel.

Greek became widely used across the eastern Mediterranean through the legacy of Alexander's conquests and Hellenistic civilization. The Greek translation of Jewish scripture made Israel's religious inheritance accessible beyond Hebrew-speaking communities. Greek philosophical vocabulary also supplied tools that Christian teachers later used to articulate and debate their beliefs.

This does not mean that reason or philosophy made proclamation unnecessary, or that Greek civilization alone possessed reasoned thought. Rather, a shared language and established forms of discussion allowed the message to cross cultural boundaries.

Rome supplied roads, shipping connections, administrative structures, and periods of relative political stability. These enabled missionaries, letters, and communities to remain connected across great distances. Roman rule also involved conquest, oppression, and persecution, so its providential usefulness should not be confused with moral approval of the empire.

Existing philosophical and religious traditions offered serious accounts of life, yet many people continued to seek forgiveness, spiritual assurance, and a community transcending inherited divisions. The gospel entered this varied religious world and answered needs that many hearers recognized.

The fullness of time thus included both a people trained to expect God's intervention and a wider setting in which testimony about Jesus could travel. But the availability of scripture, roads, and a common language could not compel faith. Preparation made reception possible; it did not make reception automatic.

Worldwide Preparation for the Second Coming

The preparation for the second coming repeats the relationship between internal and external development on a worldwide scale.

Christianity spread knowledge of Jesus, cultivated expectation of his return, and taught the value of every person before God. Its history also contains division, coercion, and failures of love. Consequently, preparation includes the need for repentance and renewal within religion, not simply the expansion of religious institutions.

The Renaissance renewed interest in human capacities, learning, and the natural world. The Reformation challenged religious authority and stimulated renewed engagement with faith and scripture. These developments represent interrelated external and internal movements, though neither was exclusively secular or exclusively spiritual.

Democratic movements challenged absolute political sovereignty and widened opportunities for freedom of conscience, participation, and accountability. Such conditions can make it easier for people to investigate religious claims without being compelled by the state. Democracy itself is not God's kingdom, but freedom can provide space for a voluntary response to God.

Scientific and industrial advances greatly increased humanity's capacity to produce food, treat disease, provide shelter, and communicate across distance. Modern transportation and communication make a worldwide religious witness possible in ways earlier generations could scarcely imagine. Expanding literacy and education allow more people to examine teachings for themselves.

The weakening of some coercive political systems and the growing encounter among religions and cultures have also created new opportunities for cooperation. These developments are uneven and reversible: oppressive ideologies have not simply disappeared, and global connection can spread hatred as well as understanding.

Therefore, material progress must be balanced by spiritual maturity. The destructive power displayed in the twentieth century showed that technical achievement does not automatically produce moral progress. A world capable of feeding and connecting humanity can also wage devastating war and damage the environment.

The convergence of spiritual searching, material capacity, and global interdependence is a sign of providential readiness. It is not, by itself, proof that every necessary preparation is complete or that a timetable can be calculated.

Preparation for the Second Coming in Korea

God gave Korea a particular role as the nation prepared to receive the Messiah at the Second Coming. This providence centered on Korea for specific historical and spiritual reasons.

Korea's preparation is understood as involving the meeting of longstanding Asian religious traditions, modern Korean religious movements, and Christianity. Buddhism, Confucianism, and indigenous religious life had already shaped its spiritual culture. Modern movements then responded to social upheaval, foreign pressure, and the search for national and spiritual renewal.

Donghak, founded in 1860 by Choe Je-u, brought religious renewal into close relationship with the dignity of ordinary people and the hope of a transformed social order. Its emphasis on the sacred significance of human life could encourage people to seek more than the preservation of existing hierarchies.

Jeungsanism, arising from the activity of Kang Jeungsan around the beginning of the twentieth century, cultivated expectations of a renewed world and the resolution of accumulated grievances. Such expectations helped prepare a climate in which comprehensive spiritual and social restoration could be taken seriously.

Daejonggyo, established in its modern form during this period under Na Cheol, renewed religious attention to Dangun and Korea's sacred origins. It connected religious identity with national dignity and renewal during a period of threatened and then lost sovereignty.

Won Buddhism, founded in 1916 by Pak Chung-bin, known as Sotaesan, sought to renew Buddhist practice for modern everyday life. Its concern with spiritual development amid rapid material change illustrates the need to bring inner discipline and external civilization into balance.

These movements were distinct, and they did not all teach Christian messianic expectation. Their preparatory significance lies in fostering moral renewal, an expectation of a better world, and openness to religious answers to national and human suffering.

Christianity supplied a more explicit biblical framework. 1784 conventionally marks the establishment of Korea's organized Catholic community following Yi Seung-hun's baptism in Beijing and return to Korea. Korean laypeople played a remarkable role in introducing and sustaining the faith. Despite severe persecution, Catholic communities preserved commitment to God beyond the demands of established social authority.

1884 is commonly used to mark the beginning of resident Protestant medical missionary activity with Horace Allen's arrival. The arrival of Horace early missionaries and Henry Appenzeller in 1885 further established Protestant mission work. Churches, schools, hospitals, Bible translation, and later revival movements helped spread Christian teaching and a strong culture of prayer.

Together, Catholic and Protestant Christianity brought sustained attention to Jesus, salvation, scripture, and the hope of his return. Meanwhile, Korean religious movements cultivated hopes for renewal in language rooted in Korean experience. In the encounter of these streams, God helped prepare a people who could connect biblical expectation with the search for a restored human society.

Korea's suffering under colonial rule, division, and war was also a setting in which longing for liberation and peace became especially intense. Suffering, however, does not automatically confer spiritual superiority. The point is a calling to serve humanity, not a claim that one nation possesses greater inherent worth than others.

Providence Reaches Toward Its Culmination

The intended culmination is the harmonization of spiritual and material life, religion and science, and peoples of East and West. Religion can guide the purposes for which knowledge and power are used; science can help humanity understand and care for the natural world. Neither should be used to excuse ignorance, domination, or irresponsibility.

The goal is not the triumph of one civilization over others but one family under God. That requires more than agreement on religious language. It requires people of mature character, loving families, communities of service, and institutions that protect human dignity.

External development supplies possibilities. A heart capable of true love determines how those possibilities are used. No amount of technological connection can substitute for reconciliation, and no religious institution can perform another person's repentance or moral growth.

Why Preparation Is Necessary at All

If God is almighty, why not simply send the Messiah and establish the kingdom immediately? The answer lies in the purpose of restoration. God seeks loving children who freely participate in goodness, not subjects whose outward obedience has been mechanically imposed.

The Messiah therefore needs people who can understand his teaching, trust him, and cooperate in translating God's will into substantial relationships and social life. God prepares the foundation, but does not remove the human portion of responsibility.

This explains why preparation is many-sided. Scripture supplies a language of faith. Repentance makes hearts receptive. Moral traditions train conscience. Political freedom creates room for a response. Communication carries the message. Material resources make practical service possible. Each addresses a different obstacle to receiving and living the truth.

The first coming also shows the danger of assuming that preparation guarantees recognition: “He came unto his own, and his own received him not” (John 1:11). Yet Jesus and his earliest disciples were themselves Jewish, and many Jews received him. This passage must not become collective blame against the Jewish people.

Unification theology understands failures of reception as having altered the course through which restoration proceeded. This differs from Christian traditions that emphasize the crucifixion as God's predetermined saving plan. Even within the Unification account, Jesus' life, death, and resurrection have profound saving significance; rejection does not mean that his mission accomplished nothing.

What Follows From It

First, the decisive issue is response, not simply favorable conditions. Religious learning can prepare a person to recognize God's work, but pride, fear, and attachment to position can still obstruct recognition.

Second, God's work of preparation is not rendered meaningless when people fail. Moral insight, scriptural inheritance, faithful communities, and practical achievements can become resources for later stages of providence. Nevertheless, failures cause real loss and require a new course of restoration through indemnity; restoration does not simply resume without cost.

Third, readiness is personal as well as historical. It means testing claims carefully, seeking truth rather than novelty, and judging spiritual leadership by its fruits. Openness should be joined with discernment, not blind acceptance of anyone claiming messianic authority.

Jesus expresses this readiness through the image of watchful servants: “Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning” (Luke 12:35). To watch is not merely to speculate about future events. It is to cultivate the faithfulness, love, and responsibility that receiving the Messiah would require.

Living the Principle

1. Recognize the preparation already available. Give thanks for access to scripture, education, communication, and freedom of worship where it exists. Use these opportunities responsibly, and support those denied them.

2. Strengthen your inner readiness. Practice prayer, repentance, scriptural study, and honest examination of your motives. Let spiritual maturity grow alongside knowledge and material opportunity.

3. Learn across religious and cultural boundaries. Approach other traditions with respect, recognizing the conscience and moral discipline they may cultivate without pretending their teachings are identical.

4. Practice discerning openness. Examine religious claims patiently, consider evidence and conduct, and look for humility, integrity, freedom, and the fruits of love rather than pressure or spectacle.

5. Make restoration concrete. Strengthen loving relationships, serve people in need, work for reconciliation, and care for creation. Direct scientific and material resources toward human well-being.

6. Become part of God's preparation for others. Live so that people encounter truth through your honesty and God's love through your service. Historical preparation reaches its purpose when people freely turn it into lives of goodness.

These answers explain the Bible in the light of the Divine Principle, the teachings of Reverend Sun Myung Moon. Read about the author, Sun Myung Moon.

Last reviewed: September 29, 2026

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