Hyung Jin Moon
January 5, 2008
English Service Headquarter Church, Seoul
Yeon Ah Nim's Message:
When I was young, I really thought that True Father was God. When my father was a minister, I was used to bowing in front of a big picture of True Parents on the wall. After about 10 years of being very close to True Parents, I once again thought, that True Father is not really a human. I thought as a human being, no one can pour that much love to people.
When I think of True Father he truly doesn't have the time for himself. He always shared his time with the public. After the 2008 God's Day Ceremony True Father were eating lunch with the True Children and as we were eating, True Father briefly talked about his ministry life. He said, if he did not make his congregation happy, he feels down and he literally said, he went around crying with guilt until his next time to meet with them comes.
When I heard that, I felt, "Ooh True Father is really human, yes that is right, he's a human, who really tries to actualize God's word." And strangely enough because of that I could appreciate him more deeply as my True Father. Brothers and sisters, they are our True Parents and they love us and they love you and they believe in you...Aju!
Interesting Story (Hyung Jin Nim)
I heard a story about a man who was walking in the forest and he decided to have a conversation with God. He said, "God, what is a million years to you? And God said, "Well a million years is like one second." Ah, that was interesting. "Well God, then what is a million dollars to you?" God said, "Well a million dollars is like kind of a penny to me." And so the man walks in the forest, he said to God. "So God could you give me a million dollars?" And God said, "You just have to wait a second." (Laugh).
Hyung Jin Nim's Sermon:
I'd like to talk to you about today's topic "Learning to Work with Your God Given Abilities." You know, for us to really live a blessed life that the True Parents blessed us to live with, it is important to learn to work with the abilities that we were given. And sometimes we need to understand what we can and can not do.
I heard a very interesting quote by an interesting author that says "The fastest way to failure is to try to do everything and please everyone." You may resonate with that. It is most important in our life to find our God zone, that zone in our life where in God is working through us to actualize what it is he is doing.
And let's remember that in our own life, when we really examine ourselves, that we have a world class person within us. There's something in our life that we are world class at. It maybe some field, it maybe even a subfield within a field, particularly in a discipline. But to find that zone where God can work through us, becomes so important.
We may, for example be adept in biology, but more specifically microbiology as opposed to a marine or business -- marketing as opposed to accounting. It is important to start identify where is it we have our strength zone. Let's remember it is hard to become successful and please everyone and make everybody love you and agree with you and wish for your success.
Unfortunately, the reality is that when we do become more blessed, when we do become more successful there are people who don't wish for us to continue to succeed. And so it's important for us to keep the right focus in our lives. To learn to remember what our work is and our responsibility is. If we are leaders, it's important not to do everybody's job, but to learn to let people try to succeed where they are, allow them to grow and be accomplished with their roles, their respective roles and contribute to the organization.
If we're not a leader, then it's important for us to be the best in what we do and in our position, as well as helping others to do well in their positions. If we do that, we will show real leadership potential and show them we were not only here to compete but where here to complete, to help others, to complete their God given destiny.
There's a story of David, the son of Jessie in Bethlehem and he was the youngest son, he always tending the sheep. And one day while the Israelites were fighting the Philistines, of course as you know, there was a giant, champion within the Philistine camp, his name was Goliath. He was two to three times taller than David.
David was very skinny, he tended the sheep, and he practiced using his sling shot. But when the Israelites were in this battle with the Philistines, David felt something resonate internally in him. He knew that it was time to step up to this task. Everything in him was calling out saying "David you have to step out now; it is your time now; it's time to go forth.
And David went forth, unfortunately in this situation his father didn't believe in him. Even his elder brothers didn't believe in him. They said, "David what are you doing? Stay and tend to the sheep, those sheep need you; there's no way you can face Goliath. He is two to three times bigger than you. He's the champions in all the martial arts, in all the warrior arts.
There's no way you can defeat him." But David had something within him. He had the anointing of God. He picked up a river stone and with that sling shot that he practiced so often, so diligently with it; he tossed that stone, and the scriptures say that it sunk into Goliath's forehead and he collapsed and fell over, dead.
It is that very small inner voice that compelled David to move forward. And he didn't slay the giant based on his own strength but because God had placed that ability, that He had anointed that river stone that flew and directly struck that target.
It is important that in our own life that in this year of 2008 we recognize that maybe there are obstacles we have to face, maybe there's a fear that we have to overcome but just like David on the internal side of us, it's important for us to start getting up and start realizing that. Yes now it's my time, it is now the year of Jubilee; it is the time of celebration and blessing.
If we are parents, it's very important to do unlike David's parents did. It's important to remember to support our kids, to know that we can not do everything for them, to know that we can not actually live through our kids. But to love the kids, empower them, and let them learn to do things more and more on their own. In other words to teach them how to make steps towards independence; to step towards to maturity; to step towards increasing in their own life.
In the Greek tradition whenever young people were being trained there were three different modalities through which the instructor would teach. The first would be to teach intellectually -- to explain it. The second would be, to show how it is accomplished. The third would be, to help the students teach somebody else, so that the lesson will really become embodied in the child; that child would truly understand what they are trying to learn.
It's important to our own life not to do everything for our kids. Sometimes, when we're frustrated and tired and our children can't get their homework done… even this morning my boy was saying "I can't do this math." But it is important to let the kids work through the homework. We can stand there, we can support, we can give them help to do the right thing. But doing their work for them doesn't help them in the long run. It's so important that they learn to build confidence and also to start enjoying having the freedom to start excelling on their own, excelling using their own talents.
Maybe our children want us to buy something for them and maybe instead of just giving it, it is important for them to learn how to earn it, maybe something we do in our family, when my boys come and say "Oh I like this, then Appa can I have it?" -- "Of course you can get it but let's set a goal first." So what we do is to set a goal perhaps, "On three quizzes, get a grade over 90% and then you can have it."
So in the other words, allow the kids to really feel that they earn it, to feel that they really own this, that they are learning to strengthen their independence. Then one day they can really truly find their God zone. It's important that when we're raising them and when we're pushing them and helping them through their time of growth to empower them.
It is important to do such a thing because research has shown that kids who are given the power to do things on their own to learn to be independent; they have more initiative; they have more confidence in their decision making; and they have more self esteem. So it's important that in 2008 as the song said "We are children of God," -- to let our children also realize that they are children of God, to let them excel and give them the right tools that they will need to succeed in their life.
So how is it that I find my God zone? How is it that I will discover such a place? What's important is to ask ourselves such questions as: "What comes naturally to me? What can I that this is exactly what God has designed me to do? What is it that I can excel at? What is it that I'm good at, at first?" Good at in the sense that you loose track of yourself and loose track of time while we're working on it.
It's important to identify what it is we're good at. I've learned that on a scale of 1 to 10 we're only able to move about 2 to 3 points. For example; starting at 4 in a certain field, we might really want to do things in that field or because our friends or our brothers are doing it we want to do it too. So let's say that we start at natural ability of 4.
So we may be able to bring it up from 4 to seven if we give it a lot of effort. But we can take the pressure off ourselves by looking at our lives. We will see what we are good at; see what comes naturally to us. Then we may be able to start at 7 or 8 and naturally through effort and practice and repetition we'll be able to increase that until we reach 10. Then we'll become world class in that field, in that particular zone.
It's important to know that not everyone can be the leader of an organization, not everyone can be the president of a country. And it's important to ask ourselves, "Why am I doing this? Why am I choosing this career? Am I trying to do this because my friends are to do it or because my parents are pushing me to become a doctor when my calling is to be a school teacher?"
Are we doing it because it looks glamorous or maybe just because it's very attractive? It's very important to look into our minds. Look into the silent witness that absorbs our life and sees our internal state, our mind and ask ourselves, "Did God create me for such a career? If I choose this task can I fulfill it with real sincerity? Can I continue on this path for more than 2 years, even for more than 30 years? Can I do it in 40 years? Can I have a longer commitment towards this?"
I really see this embodied in True Father's life. He was anointed at 16 years of age. That was so many, many years ago. I'm afraid to do math because I might get it wrong and I'm doing it on stage, but he continuously presses forward doing his mission, even at the age of 89. He is keeping is promise. When he made the promise at 16, he didn't say I'm going to do this for 2 months or maybe I'll do it for 2 years and I'll see how it turns out. No. He said "I'm going to do this continuously, I'm going to do this for the rest of my life."
And it's important in our life, when we ask such questions; we may not get a verbal answer from God. But we may start to feel that it is the right choice. Now we may say, "But you know if I do the same work for the rest of my life, when I get bored, I'm loosing my potential." And let's remember that any career or work we do has constant change.
We can not anticipate everything that will happen in the future. But it's important to take the pressure off ourselves and say "You know what? That's Okay, I'm going to leave that up to God. I'm not going to figure out everything at this instant." And you know, we maybe asked to do something else in the future. But right now "Am I making the right decision? Am I making the right commitment, the right promise?" It's so important in our lives that we reflect and listen to our inner voice about such important questions.
I was speaking to the CEO of a construction company and he told me how he teaches the people under him to do construction. He was saying, "You know when I instruct them I tell them, 'don't have a temporary mind set.'" In construction they do a work for a day on a project that will last for years. He gave that kind of guidance. For me that really was important; especially when we move to Headquarters from Mapo Church.
It was important for us not to continue to say: "You know what? We have one or two services left, and then it's over. And we going to move to a bigger church, we have to prepare for the new church in Old Headquarter now." We could have said that. But we have to constantly train our minds to do what is right. We are here for the next two weeks we have to act as if Mapo is our permanent place. We have give everything. I felt, because we were able to do that, we were able to end at Mapo with such a good spirit.
Personally when I started ministry, I really had to sit and reflect for many days. I said, "Is this really right for me? Is this the thing that I have to do? Can I do this for 20 or 30 years? Can I do this for the rest of my life? Can I improve from this dimension continuously?" And I had to ask myself and honestly I didn't get a verbal answer from God -- boom from the heaven -- that told me "Yes this is correct."
But everything in me said, "Yeah I think this is right, this is right for me. I look back on my life and see how it is moving along and see. I studied religion and have friends within different traditions, Buddhist tradition, Catholic tradition, that are also ministers, pastors, or monks. And it felt natural to me, to reflect a lot on spiritually on such things, religion, etc.
I really came to the affirmation that ministry -- that one does not choose ministry, but that ministry chooses the person. And I feel that, that's the same way in our career, the same way in our lives; that we don't necessarily choose our work but naturally that work chooses us. That it somehow attracts us into it. I feel that God is leading us and helping us to be His hands in the world.
When I was on the plane I saw a documentary on extra sensory perception and the abilities that humans have that we're not aware of. Princeton University and Stanford University were doing continuing research on such things. I saw one very interesting experiment that they did which really got me thinking.
The experiment was that on a computer screen they flash images, they flash two different types of images. One image was very peaceful, it was very calming or maybe beach or beautiful sunset, this kind of thing. But the other images, other type of images were very disturbing, maybe an image of the Holocaust, or images that were really illicit.
Their findings were very remarkable. Whenever the participants saw a negative image, a very scary image, emotionally charged image -- of course as you can imagine their heartbeat would rise, their brain waves changed, and their skin temperature changed. All these things happened. But what's fascinating is that all these changes did not happen after they saw the negative images.
They happened before they saw the negative image. And what's very striking about this is that the images appeared randomly, which means that the participants have no way of telling whether the next image would be a negative or positive image. But somehow within the people, the thousands and thousands of participants in this experiment, somehow every single person was able to sense prior to negative images that a negative image was coming.
They didn't know in their mind that their body temperature was rising, their heart beat was rising, almost as if they could see into the future. And what the researchers are showing is that, this is statistically significant. They are able to show that people have the ability to feel into the future. It sounds very hi-tech and very mystical but what researcher have shown in this particular field was that we can do much more than that meets the eye.
When I saw these, I thought about the Principle model. In the Principle it says there are four human dimensions or elements. We have a heartistic element, an emotion element, an intellectual element and we have a will element. Because we are made in the image of God, often we may begin to think that there are reasons that our intellect guides our will and action.
What such research is showing is that human beings have the ability to feel, to know that something is coming even before the intellect knows. It actually shows that the Principle Model is more correct than today's science in understanding the ideal world. Our emotional sense has the ability to feel the almost super senses and is be able educate us about God and the ideal world.
When I thought about that, I thought that in our life, when we're making decisions as that are critical... when God is preparing these decisions that really change the destiny of our life, it is very important to learn how to be in tune with such super senses -- to learn, to really start going inside and ask is this right for me? Is this the right way? When we do that, we start trying to listen to that very small voice inside, that inner witness that guides us through our lives.
Let us remember, that our career, is not just the salary thing, it is somewhere we can actualize our God given ability. It is somewhere we can actualize God's light into this world. If our career matches God's plan, then it will turn out okay, we'll be happy, we'll be rich, we will help others through our career. But unfortunately, if it doesn't match what God wants us to do, no matter how much we want to pursue that, it will eventually come to a close.
I can speak personally about this. I wanted to play college football when I was in the university. I was playing with a team. We were playing football and I hadn't played football in high school, so there was no way that I could compete on the college football level. But I was really passionate. Well, you know I really wanted to play college football.
I really wanted to pursue this dream that I had. And I remember I continued to pursue it and then one day the coach called me and said, "You know what?, I don't want you to pursue it anymore, I don't want you to come out into our practice." I said "You know I'm devastated, this is terrible. I gave all my heart. I was training so much. I was eating so much. I was almost 235 pounds."
I tried to really work for the team, but God decided to close that door on me. I remember, feeling totally defeated, totally devastated, I thought that my dream was shattered before my eyes. I will never be able to play college football now. But as I reflected it inside of me, I realized it was one of the greatest blessings of my life, because what I realized was I didn't want to play college football because I really WANTED to do it.
I was trying to impress my brother who played football, who always was a good football player, etc. in middle school or whatever. I realized that I actually didn't want to play football. I just wanted to impress my brother. I really realized that I was so free and I really thank God for closing this door because now I'm free. I'm liberated. Now I can move on and find my own path in my life.
Remember that in every job, even in one that God has called us to do, we will have our up and down days. But in total, when we absorb that work, when we see it, we can say "it's good, it's a good sign. I'm happy I'm doing this work." It's important to feel really right with what you're doing. It's almost like an antenna.
An antenna is a device that is able to gather many various frequencies and collect them into cohesive bits of information. And so in the same way when we feel out our future, when we feel the right way -- more than an intellectual design or plan which changes all the time... It's important to learn to get in touch with that gut feeling, the inner witness; the inner compass inside that points us to God's way.
To learn to feel, "Yes this is my God zone. This is the place where I can excel" If we can do that, I do believe that we will have more victory, more illumination, and more peace. If there's something we can learn today let us remember that in finding our God zone, the place that we're given the ability to know which way to go, we will be able to actualize God's work in this world.
Remember our talents will not always be the same as somebody else's. Our close friend might have a totally different talent -- something totally different. But that's something that we have to find out, that maybe there is a path that God has designed for us to walk, for us to excel at, for us to be world class at.
So let's learn to empower those people around us, to learn to give our children the steps towards independence, so that in the future they can become interdependent with us. In the future they can be successful. They can return back what we have given, and like David, in this year 2008, if there's an obstacle, maybe there's that fear, maybe there's that decision that you have to make, maybe there is a new change that you have to go towards. In 2008, let's step up like David, really let's turn in and ask ourselves, "Is it the right path?"
Try to sense like an antenna. Know that this is your time. This is your moment to slay that giant obstacle in front of you. If we do that and keep an eternal mind set, like Father's -- we keep that life; we keep a fulltime that kind of a permanent mind set in whatever we do, I'm going to give it my all. Even in these two months at Mapo I'm going to live it as I'll be here for 88 years. I'm going to do that as if it's a 100 years. I'm going to give everything.
If you do that, I do believe that we'll have more VIP -- more Victory, more Illumination and more Peace.
Brothers and Sisters can you receive this today?
Thank you very much!