Yesterday I talked about how difficult it is to take care of people and gave practical guidance on how to do it. Today I'd like to talk about how Father gave services in order to help you to understand Father's attitude towards taking care of the members. When I remember how Father gave services and ministered to the members, it is very clear to me that Father was always desperate to revive the dying spiritual life of the people who were seeking new life through his ministry. This position can be compared to the serious position of a doctor who is trying his best to save a dying patient. You'll realize how difficult it is when you think of the position doctors are in. Therefore Father prayed very hard all night for those who were supposed to come to the service.

There was a small room for Father at that time, which was very cold in winter. Father prayed in that room until 10 o'clock when the service was to begin. At 10 o'clock he came out of the room and began the service. He himself worked also as M.C. for the service. Father's room and the service room were divided only by a sliding door. As Father's position was as serious as that of a doctor who was about to perform an operation on a patient, his service was very earnest and full of energy.

First, everybody sang hymns. Father shed a lot of tears during the hymns, prayers and the sermon. All the brothers and sisters who were present shed tears a great deal too. In such an atmosphere many revelations came down to them and a lot of spiritual phenomena occurred one after another, while they sang hymns and prayed. There were many people endowed with spiritual ability; even those who were not endowed with such ability could have new spiritual experiences in such an atmosphere.

When I looked at Father's Bible there were many lines and sentences in black and red and also many blots from tears Father shed.

Various kinds of people came to the church and some came just out of curiosity, wanting to know and examine what sort of church it was. Such people didn't create a good spiritual atmosphere; they were not prepared at all. On such occasions, one of the spiritualists praying stood up, even without opening his eyes, went up to the person who was not prepared and hit him on the shoulder. Then the person repented of his bad motivation with tears instead of accusing the spiritualist for what he did.

One Sunday morning, a certain spiritualist came to the church very early, around four o'clock, for Sunday service. There were some people who stayed overnight at our church for a Sunday service or who prayed all night. Although it was four o'clock in the morning, he came to the church, having received direction from the spirit world and went into the darkened room where some people were sleeping. He woke them up, saying that they were sleeping too late when it was such an urgent time for Heaven. They all got up and prayed with him. The Sunday service began at 10, but everybody came to church either the day before or two hours before at the latest so that they could prepare themselves through prayer. They had to make an internal preparation to receive God's blessing and God's word. They were criticized by the spiritualists if they didn't. So they came very early to the church, even though nobody told them to do so.

Father had been praying since the day before and came out of his room and appeared before them at ten. As they were internally well prepared to listen to Father's speech and were ready to begin give and take with Father, the service went very smoothly.

Father spoke very seriously and strongly; he was actually very excited and enthusiastic. Father found it difficult to speak if there were people who were not internally well prepared to hear his speech. In that case he found the person who was best prepared to hear God's word and spoke mainly centering on him and made a give and take relationship with him. Then this give and take action was multiplied and spread to everyone, until at last all of them were inspired to hear Father's speech. So when he couldn't establish a give and take relationship with anybody, he became thirsty and had a difficult time speaking.

It is quite apparent that everything can be multiplied through give and take action, so he sought an object with whom he could establish such a relationship. To give an example, in an athletic meeting, when one member of the audience starts shouting passionately, those who couldn't previously shout can start shouting through the power of give and take action. When one person starts clapping his hands, giving way to his emotions, those who didn't clap at first start clapping one after the other. So it is very important to find one individual with whom you can easily establish a give and take relationship. Suppose there are some people who want to drink some water. you should give the water to the one who wants to drink it most. I want you to remember that God gives His first blessing to the one who wants to receive it the most. When Father gives the blessing of God's word, it will be given first of all to the member who has prepared himself to hear Father's speech more than anybody else.

When I was in New York the other day, Father said in his speech that there were some teenage members who came to the service room one day before the service so that they could listen to Father's speech from the front seats. If they hadn't come very early, the seats would have been occupied by others. Father was very glad to tell me that there are some people who come very early to pray as a preparation to receive a Sunday service, regardless of whether it is cold or hot. Father also says he has the same attitude towards God as those people.

When we are praying at the service or offering a prayer for preparation, I'd like to ask you to think of others. A prayer opens a channel for you to speak directly to God, but if a big noise like a bang is made in the middle of the prayer, the prayer itself is interrupted at that moment. You can't concentrate on the prayer any more. Therefore I think it is very important not to disturb the people praying. It's a courtesy that shows you love God and people. When I was praying here in this room just at the start of this lecture, some members walked in and made a big noise. We should teach them clearly that they should be considerate and not disturb other people's precious time of conversing with God. To have such consideration is to love God and people.

When you're very sick, you'll see a doctor; When the doctor is very kind and consoles you and is earnest in trying to cure your disease, you feel assured and can trust him. Then you will leave everything, even your life, up to him. The doctor must have a stronger desire to save the patient than the patient has himself and encourage the patient to want to be saved. Then the patient will trust him and leave his life in the hands of the doctor.

The give and take action between the heart which wants to be saved and the heart which wants to save can produce a good result, so that the patient's life is saved. But what should we do to save a patient who doesn't feel that he is in a crisis of death? He doesn't have a strong desire to recover because he doesn't feel any crisis. What heart must the doctor have? The first thing to do is to make the patient understand that he will lose his life if he remains ill, even though the sickness doesn't seem to be fatal now. Thus the patient will come to realize that it is necessary to cure his disease. So it is necessary to give the patient who has not yet realized his sickness enough an awareness that he must recover.

The doctor must have a desire to cure the disease. When the people at the service didn't have a strong desire for God's blessing, Father first had to make them understand the necessity for blessing. Then he gave God's words on this foundation. That's why he had to make extra effort at the beginning of his sermon. The spiritual world felt sorry seeing Father having such a hard time and couldn't help but work on the participants to make them realize that they should repent and make an internal preparation before the service so as to be able to receive blessings from God. That was why people came to prepare internally through prayer before the service.

It must have been very difficult for Father to give the blessings to people who didn't make any preparation through prayer before the service. Father didn't say anything to them about coming earlier.

When Father was fulfilling the responsibility the members should have fulfilled, instead of them, the spirit world helped him. Therefore it doesn't matter how the object might be, it doesn't matter how the listeners or team members might be, but it does matter how the leader is. When the leader sacrifices himself to lead the members, by fulfilling more than his own portion of responsibility, the spiritual world is impressed by the leader's sincere heart and works to lead the team members to follow him. The important thing is how much the leader can sacrifice himself for the members.

In the early days there was no system of donating. We didn't pass a donation box among the attendants on Sundays. Originally, a donation for God is to be given out of sincere heart to God. God feels happy when we donate willingly out of our sincere heart. I just attended a service where the donation box was passed among the congregation. I saw one person who hadn't prepared any donation taking a pound out of his pocket and putting it in the box. Then he took some change from the donation box!

When you donate five pounds in one pound notes, you must arrange the notes so that the Queen's head is upwards. You should be careful not to put any of them upside down. I'll tell you precisely how to donate money.

You can't donate the notes to God in this way. (Mr. Kim demonstrates.) You should donate them in this way. When one of the notes is folded, you unfold it so that it is like the others and donate them. Your original heart wants to do so doesn't it? When you want to donate some money, do you want to donate new money or old money? If you have new money and you really want to donate, you should donate the new money. If you want to do so, you should do so. You should practice what you want to do. Things are an expression of man's heart and to donate is to donate our heart.

Similarly, there are good reasons why we should clean our bodies and dress up before God. We have to have a special dress for the service; we have to distinguish between ordinary clothes and the service dress. As you know, a priest also wears a special costume when he holds the Mass. What should we do if we only have one set of clothes? You can pray to God so that you may use the clothes as if they were new ones. After all, the essential point is our internal heart and attitude in front of God. An external form is an expression of an internal character; the external form changes according to our heart.

Even though our church was very poor in those days, Father always gave various things to those who came to the church and treated them to meals. When Father couldn't give anything to them, the spirit world worked on a person who had a lot of money, so that he would give money to Father. Such things happened. For example, there was a man who had, say, $600. That was all he had. The spiritual world told him to give all the money to Father, but he thought that he would donate $500 and keep $100 for himself. When he attended the Sunday service and was about to donate the $500, another spiritualist told him that he had $600 altogether. Then the person repented very deeply and donated all the money, as God had told him to do.

One day, our church urgently needed money. There was an old lady who had saved a large amount of money inside her chest of drawers; nobody knew that she had such a lot of money. God told her to donate all the money to the church. However, she wondered whether she should or not for a couple of days, without being able to make a decision. During these few days a robber broke in and stole all the money from her secret place.

When Father needed money to help others, the spiritual world worked on the members to donate the money to the church, even though Father himself didn't say anything about his urgent situation. The Unification Church has been supported financially in this way. Some members were moved very strongly to fund raise for the church and donate the money. I'd like you to have the conviction that the spiritual world will never fail to help you if you, as a leader of a 360 area, really want to give something to the people in your area even though you don't have anything with you.

The point is that you must have a strong desire to want to give; the desire must come before anything else. With this heart you can cause the spiritual world to help you. If you've given your meal away and you have nothing with you, yet you still want to give something, what a heart you have!

The Unification Church has been financially supported by the Heavenly help which worked on the foundation of such a heart -- Father's. I think you also have such experiences. I'd like to conclude my speech here. Thank you very much.

Download entire book in ZIP format
Table of Contents
Copyright Information