Based on extracts from his speeches throughout his life
Earlier installments are available for reading.
True Father’s Life at the Cheongpa-dong Headquarters
True Father’s speaks about how strongly the members challenged themselves to set the movement on a new course in the mid- to late 1950s, in particular the beginning of a new tradition of 40 days of witnessing in the summer months.
Part 63
What kind of person was I in 1957 or 1958? I was a teacher who listened better than anyone else did to what others said, no matter who they were. Elderly ladies would come and talk about their lives from the day of their marriage. They would tell me everything about how much they loved their husbands. They would say everything they had wanted to say until that moment. Everyone who had visited me said, “He really listened to what I had to say.”
I sincerely listened to them all night, and I spoke from my heart. This is the key. In listening and speaking to others, be genuine. Keep sweating and pouring out your entire heart.
Worship services based on heart
I am a person who is afraid of praying in a public place. In other words, I am in a position of having to move people into the realm of life while still attending to a father who is mourning the loss of His children. It is a serious matter. Judgment, showdowns, and decisions on matters of life or death arise. One draws the final line in the sand there. Coming here and taking responsibility for that is like coming to a place where executions are carried out. I began to have the heart of a person at a place of execution.
One has to pray, therefore, for God’s sympathy and God’s compassion. Also, a person can have more abundant life when he prays for God’s sympathy, and God’s compassion and God’s mercy surrounds him.
If possible, I don’t think about the title of a sermon in advance when I appear in public. Thinking about the title just leads to a private result. It may become a yardstick by which I boast of my knowledge, my organized plan or my brain, but it fails to express my heart. Instead, I offer jeongseong for more than ten hours before giving a sermon. Let me have deep, sturdy roots before emerging through the surface. Sprouts don’t matter. I wouldn’t care if something eats the sprouts [if the root is solidly put down]. It’s okay not to speak in polished sentences. The question of how you connect your genuine heart is what decides life or death.
Sanctification by tears and sweat
I have lectured and delivered many sermons here. Since the 1950s, I have preached in tears. Was there a time when I didn’t? Tears should fill your cup and run over. They should overflow. Heaven consoles you and works for you only when you exert all your energy, when you bleed and sweat and say that the place you collapse and die will be your starting point.
In the early days, I delivered sermons even in the midst of ruthless persecution, with my sweat turning to blood. You have to make an impression by delivering a sermon at the top of your lungs. You may be more weary from today’s persecution than yesterday’s, but a way forward does exist. So invest your strength and driving force in your sermon and wear down the opposition!
Accordingly, I poured out all my energy and led members in this way. When I gave sermons, sweat flowed down my back. My shirts and underwear were drenched and drops of sweat that fell from my head as I spoke. A sincere heart is offered with sweat….
President Eu’s offering
When our church was just starting, for three years and eight months, President Eu Hyo-won lectured eighteen hours a day at Cheongpa-dong even though his health was very poor. I’m telling you that I had a sickly man continue to lecture for forty-four months, eighteen hours a day. It set a tradition and that’s why we lectured for two days, finishing both parts [of the Divine Principle] in two days.
It must have been very hard. As the lecturer, he may have felt pain in his lungs and in other parts of his body, but when he was not lecturing Divine Principle, I would say, “Hey! You are a trumpeter of Heaven’s will; you have to lecture if asked, even for eighteen hours. The spirit world is preparing to speak now. How can you possibly be like this? Get to work!” We did things in that way for all those months. It’s a record.
Do you think I slept while he lectured? I was sitting upstairs listening to him teach, and I had been fully informed as to who had come to listen. If no one came, I sat and listened to him attentively. Then, it was my turn to ask him questions. I raised him in that way. I just sat down, observed and supervised him. I corrected any mistakes. That’s how I created a substitute for myself in three years and eight months.
We had a welcoming party for people at night when the lecture had ended. When there was a party, I took charge of it. People found themselves in a party mood.
We did this while just eating boiled barley as a meal twice a day. The side dishes were not good, either. President Eu had his favorite dish, which was tiny shrimp preserved in brine…. Its smell was more offensive than that of excrement, but there he was dipping his finger in it, saying it was delicious. I still have a vivid memory of that.
How hard must it must have been for him! Even now when I visit Paju to pay my respects at the graves, I think, I could I have given you that musty, salted shrimp…. I would roast a whole cow and give it to you.
There are times when I think that it would be very nice if President Eu were alive now. After all, the increasing rate of membership is in proportion to the number of Divine Principle lectures.
Establishing a national foundation
From 1954 to 1960, we had to go over the nation-level persecution and advance. Do you know how hard we worked during that time? Originally, I started working, based on the course of Jesus’ public life, to pay indemnity within three years. Therefore, after I became thirty-seven years old, I established a solid foundation for the Unification Church and began to expand the history of restoration through indemnity to the national level. Everything proceeded in accordance with the Principle.
In those days, everyone, especially those in the Korean Christian churches, was against us. Consequently, I was imprisoned in 1955, wasn’t I? Therefore, from 1957, we established an all-inclusive fasting condition and held a proclamation ceremony. We began preparing a nationwide foundation. We began to take the offensive. We witnessed and expanded across the nation. It was a new stage in the Unification Church’s development.
At Cheongpa-dong, like a wounded lion, we had to wait for the right time, making preparations. I trained young members and created an elite group. I traveled all across Korea to prepare the foundation upon which we could stay alive. I made the foundation myself while the entire nation opposed us. I experienced every kind of persecution a man could endure.
Members offer a seven-day fast
Everyone who was a member of the church in 1957 underwent change. They all fasted for a week. All the members in Korea started the fast on the same day. We made a new beginning as a church through this fast. I fasted with them.
If you join the Unification Church, you must fast for a week. I did this, so you must do it too. I am not trying to make you go through hardship. I am just making you strike your body as a condition, fulfilled in the presence of God. One method to strengthen the power of your love is to strengthen your spiritual power. Another method is to hit your body. You cannot become a Unification Church member unless you do a week-long fast. How long did Jesus fast? He fasted for forty days.
What is convenient about fasting for a week? You don’t have to worry about eating, and you will stop complaining about your fate. Those thoughts would cease. I gave the order to do a week-long fast so that you can attain the ability to confidently move forward, ignoring material things. Those who responded to my instruction by actually doing a seven-day fast will transcend the anxieties of daily life. You have to exhibit the truth based on this standard.
Once you start a seven day fast, a day or two will pass while you think, I’m hungry! But I must endure. I must carry on.
After the third or fourth day it becomes more difficult. You really want to eat so many things. Everything you see looks edible! You will go so far as to reminisce about the barley rice cake you ate in the past. Gluttonous evil spirits are all mobilized!
After a week, there is no happier sound than hearing the clock chime on the wall. When five or ten minutes remain before the end of the fast, how desperate your heart is! When you can transcend that, you will be able to meet God. Your desperation for love should exceed your desperation for food. We cannot come into relationship with God through focusing on the necessities of life in the fallen realm.
The first summer witnessing campaign; July 20–August 31, 1957
Our first special witnessing campaign was in 1957. Through this, history moved toward a turning point. That is, Heaven came to have all the power needed to control history. God does not act blindly. He keeps pace with what is happening on earth.
We started our forty days of special activities on July 20. It is the usual date we begin on each year. It’s the hottest season, and it’s during the school vacation. We must work hard in the hottest weather, sweating to fulfill God’s will. I chose that time of year because the heat is useful in setting strong indemnity conditions.
In 1957, I chose a hundred and twenty witnessing locations. When I sent the members, I told them, “Think of yourselves as people doing your three-year military duty. Have the mind-set that you have been sold to the villages you’ve been assigned to and work as hard as you would if that were true. Go, and devote yourselves to the villages. What will you teach people? Teach them loyalty. You should not only teach but also practice it yourselves and demonstrate it to them. Then, even if you do not tell them what to do, they will definitely take up what you are doing. When many people come out, saying “Me too,” you will be able to completely settle in that village.
To be continued….