The Life Course of the True Parents
1 You cannot imagine how many tears were shed, unseen and unnoticed, before the True Parents came. I’m not talking about a few moments of weeping. If you were aware that this struggle was not only in the past but has continued until today, you would not be able to speak of it without shedding tears. You should find that same degree of resolve within your own heart. You should not be complacent about having sinned in the past and continuing to sin in the present. You are fallen people, so to return to God you need to shed tears of repentance, followed by tears of gratitude. Without going through this process to be restored to God, you cannot enter the heavenly kingdom. No matter who you are, you should have that kind of heart. Then you will truly be the kind of people whom God welcomes. (55-163, 1972.05.07)
The course to start the providence
2 I was born during the most miserable time in Korean history. The March First Independence Movement had started the previous year and was spreading. It had been a lean harvest that year. This made it a most difficult period for the people of Korea. Many people lost their lives during the March First Independence Movement. Not only were we going through some lean years, we were also facing an internal national crisis. People died one after another. Moreover, during my twenties there was not a single day that I did not go hungry. During that period we had nothing. We missed all the things we had known. Because my great uncle fought for our country s independence, our extended family faced such severe repression that we were completely torn apart. Our family was all destroyed. We faced civil unrest, national strife and family upheaval. (125-185, 1983.03.20)
3 When I was sixteen by Korean age, I had an extraordinary experience. On Easter morning I was offering a long and tearful prayer when Jesus Christ appeared and revealed many things to me. Jesus spoke to me of profound and amazing truths. He told me that God was in deep sorrow due to the suffering of humankind, and he requested that I take on a special role for God’s work on earth. So many things happened in the wake of this. I would pore over the Bible while I continued my school- work. I continued receiving profound messages from Jesus that most people would have found hard to understand. I was arrested and put in prison on a number of occasions for teaching people those things. I was incarcerated in a North Korean death camp for almost three years. In that camp people often died within a few months. Yet God protected me for nearly three years, allowing me to survive even amid such terrible suffering. (134-145, 1985.02.02)
4 I was in the same position as Jesus, who was abandoned by his own people; therefore I could not witness to my own family or try to influence them. I did not talk about the Divine Principle to my brothers, my parents or any of my relatives. Instead I went out alone into the world at large to find people. Now that I have restored people outside my family, blessed them and formed a tribe, I can witness to my own relatives and bring them along with me. (52-196, 1971.12.29)
5 There was no one whom I could lean on, not my parents, friends or teachers. I did not have a comfortable environment. All I had was a lonely heart. All alone, I faced a heaven and earth that seemed so bleak. Nevertheless I pulled myself together and summoned the heart to call out to my Father. As I shed tears, the wind blew; that wind became my friend. The sunlight rising from the east became my friend, with whom I shared my heart. The lowly soil at my feet became my friend, as did everything in nature that I saw around me. If you ever experience such a heart, you will discover a new self. I found new value there, and based on that, you too will find a new self within you. Welling up in your heart you will feel a new determination to make a new relationship with God. With such resolve and heart, I prayed, bowing down before God. This is not something that only I had to do; you too must pray in order to release God from His bitter sorrow. You are called to shed sweat and blood for Heaven, even if it means sacrificing not only yourselves but your entire tribe and people as well. (150-170, 1960.09.04)
6 I have been wandering everywhere in search of a people that could receive God’s blessing and a land that could receive God’s blessing. That search took me to prison. It was a miserable path that left me bloodied; a path on which I often risked my life. The land of the enemy was so vast; it was like an open sea. Looking up, I saw nothing but endless sky. I had no friends, no companions and no comrades-in-arms. I even had to distance myself from my parents. But I did not despair. I was keenly aware of the path Noah had walked as he lamented and suffered, the historical path of the Israelites who collapsed in the wilderness, and the miserable historical courses of Jesus* disciples who pressed forward for the sake of Heaven, even to the point of being crucified upside down. Nevertheless, I chose to go that path. Since there had been no one up to that point who could take responsibility for this world, I felt I had no choice but to set out on this perilous road. (12-332, 1963.08.11) |