Cham Bumo Gyeong: Episode 68

Cham Bumo Gyeong
Book 3: The Beginning of True Father's Public Course and the Founding of HSA-UWC
Chapter 3: Founding the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity
Section 3: Conditions of Devotion and Guidance on Faith, Paragraph 09 - 18

9  In 1957, I prayed individually for about 400 members every day. These days I no longer pray like that. However, in those days I needed to pray for them in order to help them transcend a certain level. When I prayed, I could understand their individual spiritual situations. When I prayed, God would teach me because the members were connected to me like branches.

You too should pray for your members, offering your utmost devotion. When you pray for them, if any of them is spiritually injured, God will show you glimpses of their spiritual situations in all kinds of forms: they might be downcast, or have their face covered with a cloth, and so on. When good things are happening to them, you will see them smiling; when they are sad, you will see them with a sad appearance.

10  Always take the time to offer sincere devotions, prayers and other conditions. Offer them when you get up at dawn, when you are on the borderline between the spiritual world and the physical world and your optic nerves are just starting to function after a restful night. The spirit world will show you something spiritual. Through such experiences, you will be given foreknowledge. Then you will be able to predict, “Today this or that will happen in the church,” or “today such and such a person will come.”

A capable doctor can tell what kind of illness their patients have just by looking at their complexion, or by seeing how their patients walk. Likewise, your spiritual antenna must be long and have the sensitivity to appraise things. For this to happen, you need to offer conditions of devotion.

Prayer is truly powerful. Prayer allows you to be in complete control of your environment without having to say a single word. Before I go somewhere, I always pray for 24 hours focused on my goal. I pray even while I am eating and resting. I do not pray for my own sake; I pray for the sake of humanity and for God.

Once after I offered such prayers with a single resolve, I visited all our churches throughout the nation. By doing so I brought the churches into a sphere of equilibrium. My prayers elevated the churches into a realm under heavens sovereignty, where conscientious people could be pulled to them. That is why when they met you, they were drawn to you without knowing the reason. That is why I say that you always need to offer conditions of devotion

A church with fervor and love

In the 1950s, True Father personally guided members with zeal and passion. He listened to members’ stories all the way to the end, even late into the night, and then gave them guidance. When he stood at the pulpit, he preached with tears. Because of this, the members always longed for him and visited the church to see him. Once they came they could not tear themselves away to go back home. In such an atmosphere filled with truth, love and the divine spirit, the church overcame hardships and established a firm foothold for the next stage.

11  The most enjoyable time in my life was when I was personally raising members. I spent time with them until late at night. Even though some members wanted to leave after midnight, I continued speaking because I was immersed in the joy of helping them grow. I would speak to them until 1:00, 2:00, even 3:00 a.m., even as some of the members dozed off.

How different it was then than it is today. The time did not matter; I was so intoxicated with giving advice and encouragement. As I spoke I was often in tears. I was thankful and I was deep in thought. Once I gave them an injection of truth, even those who were on the way to hell would turn around and come back. How exhilarating! Since heaven was with us, a huge electric current was present. A strong power like a 100,000-volt current flowed in us, and we could feel it shaking the entire world. What a delight! After experiencing it, I could not fall asleep even if I tried. Even while sleeping, my eyes would suddenly open wide.

12  How much effort have you made to save people, representing God’s heart and His role as Creator? This is a serious issue. I have given so many lectures and sermons. In the 1950s in particular, there was not a single day when I did not speak while shedding tears. There was not a single day that I did not cry out in tears. Heaven consoled me and worked with me even as I kept my resolve to move forward, even though those times when I collapsed on the verge of death, shedding so much blood and sweat that I was about to lose consciousness.

Whenever you witness, pray for the people in your area. Pray for them every night before you go to bed. If you are responsible for a district, go up to the highest mountain in the area and pray for the people there. If you cannot do so, go down to the deepest valley and pray there. Don’t stop praying. Afterward, go to the holiest place, the church sanctuary, and pray there. Do not let the church sanctuary remain dry without tears.

13  What remains in history is not ability, but results, not the preparation, but the foundation we lay. This is true; these are not simply my own words. It applies at school and anywhere.

So when you speak, do not just speak words. You have to live by your words and bring your own result; then your words carry weight. When you lecture, you must touch the hearts of your listeners by connecting your words to experiences that bring forth tears.

In the early days of our church, I gave sermons with my blood and tears amid harsh persecution. I invested all my heart and soul, speaking at the top of my lungs in order to touch the hearts of my congregation. I did this even though the persecution grew more and more each day. We still had a long way to go, and I had to invest my whole being to keep the members on the path. It was exhausting, but I gave them all the energy I had. I led the members that way because we had to bring results.

14  In 1957 and 1958, what kind of person was I? I was a great listener who patiently heard the stories of every member, young or old, who wanted to share with me. People recognized me as someone who would listen to their stories, perhaps better than anyone else in Korea. When elderly ladies came to see me, they would talk about their marriage life from their wedding day, even telling me exactly how they loved their husbands. They shared everything they kept in their hearts. Anyone who came to see me said, “Father listens to all my stories.”

When they had nothing left to say, I started to speak. If you want to fill a bowl with something new, first you have to turn it upside down so that everything is emptied out.

That is why I listened to them, putting myself in the position of enjoying what they had to say more than anyone else, even staying up all night to hear it. It is all about genuinely listening to others and then genuinely talking to them. That is the secret. That is how you give and receive.

15  When I was doing my outreach work, I treated even an 80-year-old woman who visited me with the same regard as I gave to young people in the prime of life. Is there anyone in heaven or on earth who wouldn’t like to be treated with such a heart?

So if such a woman comes to you, welcome her, rejoicing as if she were your ancestor come back to life. Welcome her more than you would your own grandmother. Your ancestors cannot come from the spirit world unless you make such conditions with other elderly people. Therefore, you should treat them with such heart. It is heavenly law that you must treat elderly ladies well. To treat the elderly well is like building a bridge according to the order of heaven. In fact, the oldest grandfather is God.

16  The members who followed me in those days built a deep bond of heart with me, and many shed tears whenever they thought of me. Even though they had their children, grandchildren and spouse, they still shed tears when thinking of me. You also have to be like that. When I had something to eat, I kept the food and waited until I could eat it with them. I only wanted to bring them joy by helping them with their difficulties and uplifting them whenever they seemed down. That is why, when they faced persecution from their villages, and even from the nation, they still followed me. In the early days of the church, we lived in such an atmosphere.

Once new members joined the church, they wanted to see their spiritual parents and came to the church to see them every day. That was the atmosphere then. I told the members to create such an environment in order to guide their spiritual children. I also educated the new members to do the same. So, to them our church was better than their home, their school or their workplace, and they preferred to come to our church. That became a problem for society.

17  In the early days of the church, the female members were dying to come to the church. Their hearts kept shouting, “I want to go!” I could hear their inner voices. When I began listening to them, they began speaking in the language of another world. They entered into a spiritual state of mind. If I liken God’s love to electricity, it was just like they were connected to that love through an electric cable.

Once they entered that state, they could see things in spirit. Even while at home, they knew what I was doing at any given time. They knew specific things like, “Today Father is not in a good mood, so I’d better not go to the church,” and they tried to stay away from me. Yet even with that determination, they still could not help but come to the church.

The Cheongpa-dong Church is on a hillside, and that hill had spiritual power to attract people. Who can block the magnetic needle of a compass from pointing south and north? Even if they were determined not to come to the church, they would soon find themselves leaving their room and walking around in circles in the courtyard of their home. Finally they would open the gate, catch a bus and arrive at the church, despite themselves. The Unification Church on that hill had such mysterious power. If you have never had such experiences, you do not yet know true love.

18  Unification Church members in those days were the most miserable people. They were persecuted and chased out. I know members who were kicked out of their own homes on cold, snowy winter nights. Having nowhere to go, all they could do was keep on praying and try to keep themselves warm by leaning against the wall of a neighbor’s house.

My heart was filled with bitterness and sorrow over how they were mistreated, but because I knew that heaven endured such hardships again and again, I forgave their families who opposed them. I did this because the families did not know what they were doing. Truly, I have gone through so many situations and have so many stories to tell. Yet, who knew that I lived with the indescribably bitter sorrow of heaven and earth within my heart? While walking this path, I swallowed countless tears.