Shincheonji lesson 32: figurative treasure and rich

Where SCJ’s reading conflicts with the Bible

This lesson defines treasure as “The Word,” selling as teaching, and buying as listening. It opens by saying “There’s only heaven or hell depending on your actions,” maps out students’ 24-hour day for spiritual duties “every day of the week,” and says accepting “the words of the one sent” turns you into gold, while losing that word turns you back into clay. The talents become people brought in through evangelism, including “inviting someone to a seminar.” “Poor in spirit” becomes poor in “their own thoughts, so that they can receive,” and the man who sells everything for the treasure “gave up all his previous teachings and accepted the one who holds the true Word of God.” SCJ’s The Explanation of Parables (p. 43) says God’s treasures at the second coming are “God’s true shepherd who received the word, and the congregation members who belong to the shepherd.” God’s word is precious (Psalm 12:6; 19:10), and that should be affirmed. But Scripture names the treasure, and it is Christ.

1. 1. “Heaven or hell depending on your actions”

   The opening thought says, “There’s only heaven or hell depending on your actions.”

   • “by grace you are saved through faith … it is not from works, so that no one can boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).
   • “he saved us not by works of righteousness that we have done but on the basis of his mercy” (Titus 3:5).
   • Good works follow salvation as its fruit (Ephesians 2:10), but they aren’t what decides heaven or hell. (See Lesson 31.)

2. 2. God’s treasured possession is every believer

   The lesson uses Exodus 19:5-6 to say those who keep the covenant become God’s treasure, and that at the first coming, Jesus and the twelve “were the only ones who had the truth.”

   • Peter applies Exodus 19 to every believer he writes to: “you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own” (1 Peter 2:9).
   • At the first coming, many others had faith: Simeon, “righteous and devout … and the Holy Spirit was upon him” (Luke 2:25); Anna (2:36-38); Zechariah and Elizabeth (1:6); Joseph of Arimathea, “looking forward to the kingdom of God” (23:50-51). (See Lesson 26.)

3. 3. 1 Peter 2:4-5: Living stones come to Christ

   The notes say, “When you accept and understand the words of the one sent, you become gold.”

   • Peter says: “So as you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but chosen and precious in God’s sight, you yourselves, as living stones, are built up as a spiritual house” (2:4-5).
   • The living stone believers come to is Christ. “The one sent” in John’s Gospel is Jesus: “Jesus Christ, whom you sent” (John 17:3).

4. 4. Lamentations 4:2 is a lament over Jerusalem’s fall

   The lesson uses Lamentations 4:2 to say those who lose the word “revert to clay.”

   • Lamentations mourns the destruction of Jerusalem by Babylon. Verse 2 grieves that Zion’s precious people, once “worth their weight in gold,” are now treated “like broken clay pots” (Lamentations 4:2). It’s a lament over suffering in the siege, not a teaching about losing a teaching and becoming worthless.
   • “consider how valuable you are becoming to God” paired with “if they lose that word, they revert to clay” ties a student’s worth to staying in the course.

5. 5. The talents: Faithful stewardship, not a recruitment count

   The lesson says the servant with five talents “gained bountiful understanding of the Word and evangelized, bringing 5 more people to God—that’s profit!” The Explanation of Parables (p. 125) says “Jesus counts how much each saint evangelizes.”

   • In the parable, a master entrusts his money to servants “each according to his ability” (Matthew 25:15) and returns to ask what they did with it. It teaches faithful use of everything God entrusts to us until Jesus returns.
   • Jesus doesn’t define the profit as recruits. The next passage describes what he will look for at the judgment: care for the hungry, the stranger, the sick and the prisoner (25:31-46).
   • Sharing the gospel is good (Matthew 28:19-20). But “inviting someone to a seminar where they might hear about Jesus” without saying who runs it isn’t the “open proclamation of the truth” Paul practiced (2 Corinthians 4:2).

6. 6. The twelve thrones and the twelve foundations belong to the apostles

   The teacher speaks of sacrificing “over ten hours per week” and says the thrones of Matthew 19:28 are “Worth it! Worth it!” Revelation 21’s twelve gates and foundations are drawn on the board.

   • Jesus promised the thrones to the twelve apostles specifically: “you who have followed me will also sit on 12 thrones, judging the 12 tribes of Israel” (Matthew 19:28).
   • Revelation 21 names them: the city wall “has twelve foundations, and on them are the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb” (21:14). The gates bear “the names of the twelve tribes of the nation of Israel” (21:12).
   • These names are fixed: the first-century apostles and Israel’s tribes. They aren’t positions to be earned by modern students through hours of study. SCJ later organizes its own members into twelve tribes, but Revelation has already said whose names are on the foundations.

7. 7. The camel and the needle: Impossible for people, possible for God

   The notes explain the needle as a city gate: “It’s easier for a camel to squeeze through a needle gate than a rich person to humble themselves.” The Explanation of Parables (p. 45) says “The physical rich cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.”

   • The “needle gate” is a later legend. There’s no evidence of a Jerusalem gate by that name, and Jesus’ disciples didn’t hear it as “hard but doable.” They were “greatly astonished” and asked, “Then who can be saved?” (Matthew 19:25).
   • Jesus’ answer: “This is impossible for mere humans, but for God all things are possible” (19:26). The point is that salvation is God’s work, not human effort, including the effort to humble oneself.
   • The book’s claim that the rich “cannot enter” contradicts Jesus. Zacchaeus, a rich tax collector, received salvation (Luke 19:9), and Joseph of Arimathea, “a rich man,” was a disciple of Jesus (Matthew 27:57).
   • The lesson notes and SCJ’s book disagree with each other here as well.

8. 8. “Poor in spirit” doesn’t mean emptying your thoughts

   The notes read Matthew 5:3 as “poor in spirit, meaning their own thoughts, so that they can receive.”

   • “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to them” (Matthew 5:3) describes people who know their spiritual need before God. Isaiah says God shows “special favor to the humble and contrite” (Isaiah 66:2).
   • The kingdom belongs to them now. The verse doesn’t tell people to empty out their own understanding so they can receive a teacher’s.

9. 9. The treasure in the field is the kingdom, and it’s found in Christ

   The lesson says the man in Matthew 13:44 “gave up all his previous teachings and accepted the one who holds the true Word of God.”

   • Jesus says “The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure, hidden in a field,” and the man sells everything “because of joy” (13:44). The treasure is the kingdom itself.
   • Paul uses the same idea: “I now regard all things as liabilities compared to the far greater value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Philippians 3:8).
   • In Christ “are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:3).

   The treasure is Christ and his kingdom, not “the one who holds the true Word.” (See Lesson 20 on Paul’s “rubbish.”)

10. 10. Isaiah 55: “Come to me” at no cost

    The lesson uses Isaiah 55 for “Buy = Listen.”

    • Isaiah 55:1: “Hey, all who are thirsty, come to the water! You who have no money, come! Buy and eat! Come! Buy wine and milk without money and without cost.” The offer costs nothing.
    • God himself calls: “Pay attention and come to me. Listen, so you can live” (55:3).
    • The promise is “the reliable covenantal promises I made to David” (55:3). Paul quotes that very line and applies it to Jesus’ resurrection (Acts 13:34).

11. 11. The 24-hour day and “every day of the week”

    The teacher maps students’ days, asks for dedication “every day of the week,” and models “over ten hours per week.”

    • Daily devotion to God is good. But Jesus describes following him differently: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest … my yoke is easy to bear, and my load is not hard to carry” (Matthew 11:28-30).
    • He told his own tired disciples, “Come with me privately to an isolated place and rest a while” (Mark 6:31).
    • Being asked to account for every hour, with heaven or hell at stake, is a heavy load Jesus doesn’t place on his followers.

12. 12. Jesus’ return “could be happening already”

    The lesson says Jesus’ return “could be happening already and we just do not recognize it.”

    • Jesus said his return would be as visible as lightning, and warned against anyone who says he is “in the inner rooms” (Matthew 24:26-27). (See Lessons 9 and 18.)