Speeches of Hyo Jin Moon 2006—2008
Delivered Sunday at Belvedere Estate in Tarrytown, New York
Hyo Jin Moon Speaks on Time, Page 355

Time

October 14, 2007

Good morning, (Good morning.)

On my last trip to Korea I went and met somebody, somebody that I really didn't like. I have my reasons, but I am not going to get into it for you. But I really did not like this guy. He is in every sense of the word, 'snakish,' that's about it. But he is struggling with malignant cancer, so I went to see him. And I told him, "Hey, just drop it all." And he was repenting and was trying to say a lot of stuff. But I told him, "You don't need to say anything. Let's just end it here, forget it, and move on, and I will do my best to find more courage in me to forgive you."

When you think about time, how long do you think you're going to live, 100 years? Are you going to live 100 years, 120, 200? We all know that most people spend two-thirds of their life doing something other than work, right? Most people sleep seven or eight hours a day, right? One third, gone like that! You go from point A to point B, and that kind of stuff, waiting, hygiene, eating, gossip, whatever, taking care of business, whatever, studying, and then gone! Even if you live 100 years, you've got about 30 years to work to try to do something.

What are you going to do? Why is the concept of time so relevant to us? It is literally held to our head like a loaded gun. And we're supposed to learn about eternity, right? Love, eternal love. How do you take something that has no time constraint and put it into the frame of time? That is the greatest paradox, isn't it? So, when you think about love, what do you think about? What do you want, something that lasts forever? What is that basic stuff? To me time is about studying. It's about going to a class. Okay, whatever 101 will start at 9:30 and it will end at 10:30. It's that stuff. Time is about learning something, it's about study. That's about it. And what are you studying? As I grew older that's what I felt. The moment that I said, "Let's forget about this" when I met that guy, I realized, "Why the hell did I hold all this hatred if this was inevitable?" Without the concept of time I would not feel what I had felt, the learning that I felt in my heart. It wouldn't be something to me, it would just be a concept that would go in one ear and come out the other ear. But I felt it. Some things God wants you to feel, that's why you have time. Because it's important to feel something, and that feeling should last forever. Why, because that's the basis of what you are, what we are, what God is. And from that we can grow forever. Nobody wants to study forever! I want to enjoy myself for a million years. But, okay, I'll go to school for the next thousand years, okay two million years. I promise.

We all have somebody to connect to. And you find that somebody to love, you should pay attention to those moments. There are some things, in the end, that will be inevitable whether you like it or not, things that you must learn. I know that you don't have time, but take time, take it easy. Some things are inevitable, don't rush.

We have to learn. We're learning. Life is about learning. It's short, thank God! He just wants us to learn about the basics. The basics, if you can give, if you can take, if you can love, if you can forgive. Basic things, there are things that are inevitable whether you like it or not, you will learn before you die. And if you do, you are the fortunate one. Time, yes, it seems long sometimes, especially when you're miserable, and of course in the opposite case it's too short. Life itself is too short, and it's about learning the basics. You've got plenty of time, cause that's what I believe. Life is way too short for me here. A lot of stuff is happening, but who cares? I'm going to leave it behind. That's about it. No matter how much you build, no matter how much you do, take that time, make that moment count when you feel something.

I know some guys here wanted to be missionaries for the rest of their lives. You know that's beautiful. Giving is better than taking. We all know that. We'll try. And I will be graded, just like you. Okay, take care.