Let's Embark on the 'Three Years, One Thousand Days' Season with Enthusiasm and Energy (3)

Supporting Spiritual Growth

Nonetheless, we generally find it hard to make quick progress along the path of spiritual growth. We can only move forward if we continue our steady efforts to inquire into the teachings and implement them in the course of our daily life. There must be those who are at a loss how to work with someone they have guided to the path or how to encourage and support the further spiritual growth of someone who has become a Yoboku.

It is for this reason that preparations are now under way to construct an instructional system that will support people's spiritual growth through various stages. An overview of this system was published last November.

In April, we will start by launching Tenrikyo Basics Course, which is intended for those who are just beginning to learn about Tenrikyo. This course can also help them work on their spiritual growth prior to attending the Besseki lectures. We are planning to make further courses available next spring and the spring after next over this "three years, one thousand days" season in order to expand and improve the opportunities we provide for people to study the fundamental aspects of the teachings and to learn how to implement them.

I hope that all of you will make full use of these new opportunities for both seeking the path for yourselves and conveying the path to others.

Connecting the Mind with the Jiba and Spreading the Teachings to the World's Communities

The "three years, one thousand days" period leading up to the 120th Anniversary of Oyasama represents a season when we are to implement the teachings in our respective parts of the world while keeping our mind connected with the Jiba and our heart focused on Oyasama's Divine Model. That is to say, we are to connect the mind with the Jiba and spread the teachings to the world's communities.

Looking back on the "District Lectures for Yoboku: Action and Progress," which was held following the announcement of Instruction One and attended by 378,000 people, and Tenrikyo Hinokishin Day and Nioigake Day, both of which were in their 70th year, I see that we were riding the momentum built up by those events when we received Instruction Two. We may say that we have now been given a chance to take a further leap forward.

I hope that each and every Yoboku and each of their families will fill themselves with joy so that they can create a whirl of salvation work in their communities. To allow this to occur, I hope all followers will help and encourage one another and make one another ever more high-spirited. Each community serves as a school and provides us with opportunities to implement the teachings during the course of our daily life.

I would like each church to embrace such high-spiritedness and try to make it double or triple. To Yoboku, their churches are like their families, with whom they can share their joys together when something has brought them delight, and on whom they can depend for help when they are sad or going through a difficult time. Moreover, churches can provide a dependable guide to help each and every Yoboku recognize their Origin and reexamine the way they are pursuing their spiritual growth.

I hope that our regional activities and church-led efforts will combine in a coherent whole to powerfully advance our pre-anniversary activities. I now want to end this message by adding that the central role in that endeavor is to be played by each and every Yoboku.

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