The Words of the Kim Family Before 2008
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The Words of the Kim Family Before 2008 |
Sun
Myung Moon, May 5, 2011
President Young Whi Kim is one of the very first followers of our Father. For several years he was leading the Church Headquarters in Seoul and is at present the leader of Europe. Almost every Sunday after pledge, Pres. Kim delivers a message to brothers and sisters. The following two speeches from October 1, and 9, 1983 we'd like to share with our readers around the world.
For Adam and Eve to reach perfection they had to follow a certain path which was decided. They could not go as they wanted to. By receiving God's words and His love they had to follow only one direction. If the first man and the first woman had gone this path, they would have passed on a good example to their children by going the right path all the way to the end. Then it would have been very easy for their children to also follow that path and reach maturity. However, because Adam and Eve fell, mankind lost its example and couldn't receive God's truth and love anymore. The result was chaos and confusion; mankind didn't know which way to go. This is the reality of fallen people until today.
Last night I watched television, and I heard that in America 11 year old children are taking drugs. And they not only use one hut several kinds of drugs at one time. Why are these young people taking drugs? They are introduced to it by some other children who say: "We are taking these drugs to become happy."
Actually this desire to become happy was given by God. And it should have been satisfied by receiving God's love through the love of parents and of neighbors. But since these children are not receiving this kind of love they are not receiving good guidance and truth. So consequently they want to find their happiness in their own way, by taking the easy road. The children say: "If our parents are not showing us a good example...," and more and more children are going to drug abuse.
All this does not refer only to the American situation. In many other countries, similar things are happening. Now morality is going down. In some cases, students beat their teachers and sometimes even kill their friends.
This is exactly the time when we have to reconsider the meaning of freedom and the meaning of education. For young children who do not understand what life is, who don't understand the consequences of their actions, there cannot be freedom.
Animals cannot be given freedom as well. If you put lions or tigers in the street, what will happen? No one would do such a thing, because in the animal world, another principle of life is governing, which is that the stronger one controls tilt weaker one. Therefore, in such a world there cannot be freedom.
If we consider man as an animal as well there could never come out any concept of freedom. The weaker ones must be subdued by the stronger ones. That's why there is no freedom in the communist world; they do not allow man to be free. Even their principle of life doesn't contain any concept of freedom.
What is the difference between animals and man? Animals have no conscience, no reason, whereas man does have a conscience or original mind and reason. Because of these things man is different from animals. Even though someone has the external appearance of a man, if he does not have reasoning, conscience, or an original mind, we cannot consider him as a true man.
Many people say that the Communist world is the resultant world of materialism and the free Democratic world is the resultant world of idealism. But that is not true. Actually this free democratic world is the resultant world of half materialism and half idealism. It's a mixture. Actually there is quite a contradiction that has to be pointed out.
Many people argue for human rights or human dignity, but in many cases, those people who ask for that believe in material things, that is, man emerges from an animal. Therein lies the contradiction: If they believe in materialism, they cannot claim human rights or human dignity. For animals have only animal rights. And animals cannot be granted freedom. Imagine what will happen, if you give a dangerous weapon to a crazy person? Materialists think that man is no more than an animal and that man doesn't have conscience or reason. Therefore, their morality is different.
Why is morality in democratic countries steadily declining? With free sex, and so forth. It is because the people think that man is an animal. Among animals there is no morality. Low morality therefore comes from the materialistic ideology. For that reason, without destroying the materialistic ideology, we cannot create a moral society, a true world of freedom, a true world of human dignity. Materialism doesn't provide any foundation to claim human rights, dignity, freedom, morality or goodness. Because for materialists, power is goodness, power is righteousness and power is justice.
This is why the communist world mainly concentrates on building up military power. Many people are trying to solve problems, but they don't understand this. This is the most important point.
Therefore, we have to return to God and restore true ideology and idealism. The old idealism was not the right one. The Medieval Age was an age of idealism, but people didn't understand God and His truth. That's why their idealism was blind and foolish. But with God's truth and a true picture of God, we can have true idealism. And with this we can bring about a new ideology. There is no other hope.
For these reasons we don't say that Capitalism is the solution for the world. First of all, people must change. With the same people and the same system as we have now, we cannot succeed in bringing true happiness.
In our Church we have a certain path to go. We ought to understand, though, that we are not mature and perfected people yet. Being children we must go through the growth stage via a certain path to reach perfection; we also must follow the same path until we reach perfection. When we have reached perfection, without being told we know what to do, what kind of life we have to lead, etc. But if we don't know this yet, that means that we are still far away from perfection.
For children there cannot be true freedom. The same thing for us: we cannot have true freedom yet. Of course, in the future we will have it, but not at this time. Therefore we have to learn, and we have to see an example to follow. The examples are our True Parents. Our Father is over sixty, but still he is going day and night. Of course, he cannot do the same as our ordinary members do; because of his position, he cannot go out fundraising or witnessing from door to door. But instead of this he is doing something else, and he is putting even more energy and heart into his work than any of us.
This is just to show us a good example we can follow, not because he likes it. When Father is suffering, the children cannot go out and drink or dance. When Father is praying very hard, he cannot laugh and just go out and do what he wants to. If the father does 100% the child cannot give 100%, maybe 50%, even 30%, may be okay. But anyway, the children must follow the same direction. When this happens we can say, "I am your child." If there is nothing like that between us, then we cannot claim that God is our Father and we are His children.
We hear from many old members these days that they worked for many years, that they were always told to do something. Therefore they say, now they are tired of hearing this. Well, if they can do what they are supposed to do, no one will tell them to do this or that. But if they don't fulfill their part, someone has to tell them. Otherwise all their hard work of the past will become nullified. When we watch how crops grow, we can see that from the beginning they need sunshine, rain and water, etc., but the most important time is the last stage, the ripening time. And in that last moment, if the plant does not get enough sunshine or wind or it falls down, then it ruins and cannot become a good crop.
Especially now, many members are blessed. We have to show our children a good example to follow. If the parents don't show a good example, how can they ask their children to follow the good way of life? They can't say anything. This is the source of tragedy. If our old members or blessed couples do the same thing as in the outside world, then the same thing will happen in our church as in the outside world. Truth is good, God's love is good, but if we don't show a good example, there will be no future. This is really a serious problem not only for us but also for the next generation.
So without speaking, we have to let our children follow the right path. And we have to make our children proud of their parents, their father, their mother.
Many members think, the Blessing is the end; no, that's not true. Blessing is a new start. By receiving the Blessing we are coming closer to God. Therefore our life should be closer to God's life, not closer to fallen people's life. They are thinking in a contrary way. The more blessing we receive, the more responsibility we have to feel.
May everyone become more mature and take over more responsibility and control themselves. Then they can find their own ways to follow and show a good example to younger members as well as others.
We say this is the time of the Children's Age. When do you think it started? (1981) When the time changes it does not happen all at once. It takes some time, so we call this the transitional time. We've been sharing often about this Children's Age. Before the Children's Age was the time of the Parents' Age. What is the difference between these two ages? Did something change after we received the Children's Age? When we look back at our church life, what really changed? Can you notice any change? (Not much change) Not much, I also feel almost the same. We say that this is the Children's Age, but actually we did not change anything.
What should this Children's Age be? How can we make the Children's Age real? If I explain it in short, the Parents' Age was a time when God and spirit world could work with our True Parents. Therefore, to bring God's providential age, the Children's Age, we have to make the foundation that God and spirit world can work with God's children. Without making this foundation, the true Children's Age cannot come. So from 1981 to 1983 is a transitional period.
Because of this we have to change in our hearts. This means inheriting the parents' heart, the position of parents in our hearts. This is the first condition for us to make. So when we look at the world's people or the world situation we should feel that this is our responsibility, as our True Parents felt when they saw the world situation of fallen people. We have to feel the same feeling they had. But if we think and feel, "This is my parents' responsibility, not mine," we cannot bring about the Children's Age at this time. Instead we must have a strong feeling, a strong sense of responsibility and mission: to restore fallen people is MY mission, MY responsibility. Above all we have to try to put this into our practical work; just words are not enough. When we do these three things, then we can make this Children's Age OUR age. The Children's Age is not an easy thing.
After I came to Europe I talked about many things, mostly concerning how to cleanse one's past life, or to overcome resentments, and many similar things. But I cannot continue to speak about those things all the time. We have to make some change. In order to create a new atmosphere we have to jump sometimes! And to be able to make a jump we have to lay a certain foundation; without a foundation we cannot jump. As of 1984, almost three years will have passed since the beginning of the Children's Age. So from 1984 we have to make the year a new year: internally, in our hearts, in our sense of responsibility, and in our practical life. We have to change! Today cannot be the same day as yesterday.
We say that we cannot change our past life because it is already gone; we cannot do anything about it. But this is not true! Some people had a very difficult life in the past; some had an easy life. Some people had a good life; some had a bad life. You cannot change the content of your past, but you can change the VALUE of your past. Even if you had a bad past life, that past can motivate you to make a new determination for your present and future life. If you use you past as fertilizer for your new future life, and because of that miserable past you decide to change, get new determination, and actually start a new life, your bad past will come to have good value. On the other hand, even if you led a good life in the past but because of that you continue with an easy life in the present and future, then maybe your good past will come to have bad value. Therefore, the value of your past life can be determined by your present and future life.
We should not always be thinking, "Oh, I had this kind of life in the past," or those kinds of things. We have to step up! Stand up on that foundation of the past, and use that for a better life in the future. This is what God desires us to do. So don't always blame your past for your problems. Forget all those things. Think that those things were needed to start a new life -- at the present time and in the future.
So we should think of our past life in a positive way, not a negative one. You don't want your past repeated, but if you can use those experiences for new development in your future then they become worthy experiences. So we should change our thinking to this positive way. Then everyone can build a good life. You can learn many things from your past experiences. If you had a bad life, that can be good encouragement for you to not repeat the same life in the future. Because of your sufferings in the past, maybe you can change your attitude and way of life, and can become better than other people who did not have all those experiences.
Since Father declared the Children's Age, all the spirits in the spirit world want to cooperate with us. They want to come and help us as they did with our True Parents in the past. The Children's Age already started but we were not prepared to receive these spirits. We don't have enough confidence and we don't know the real meaning of the Children's Age. If we have the same heart as our True Parents and feel the same responsibility as they do, then we can command the spirit world and it will work for us.
So far, many evil spirits came and caused much hindrance to us. In your individual life many evil spirits came and disturbed you in many ways. But if you have strong confidence and if you command them, you can chase all the evil spirits who will help you instead of disturb you. And by working with good spirits and good ancestors' spirits you can get good results.
So as individuals we are preparing to receive the Children's Age, in our heart, in our sense of responsibility, and in our practical life. And at the same time let's try to bring new people. But we cannot abandon the old members while trying to bring new members; we have to bring back the old members to do God's work. A small number of people cannot make this goal successfully. All the members must work together; all must participate in God's work.
To have a new start we have to have a new heart and a new determination. We have to be changed, otherwise spirit world cannot work with us and we know that without the help of spirit world we cannot achieve anything. Father always made this foundation. So we need to have this confidence: "When I do this, spirit world must come and work with me." This confidence cannot be given by other people; no, this confidence must be gained by yourselves, by your prayer or work, or by your determination, your will power. I want everyone to have this confidence so that the Children's Age can be the age for all members, not only for some. Of course, it may take time for the new members, but especially the old members must make this Children's Age their age.
All national, regional, and center leaders, and all members must feel the same way, that to have new life we must be able to give life to other people. So we have to become the source of life. If you are dead you cannot give life to others. So first we want to be alive, to show that we are not dead people but living people, people of life. We have to clearly show this. The spirit world is promising many things, so we have to make this a new Europe and world, not an old Europe or old world.
Many times we see the IOWC coming to England or Germany or going to America. We see their activities. Of course when we need help we bring in foreign members, but the best way to restore one nation is by the effort of the people of that nation. So to restore Germany it is best for the German members to do this work. Foreign members can help but they cannot be the major elements of that nation's restoration. For the restoration of England, English people must stand in the front. For the restoration of Germany, German members must lead the way. German members must feel that this is their mission and that the foreign members came to assist them. Therefore we want to raise many Germans as staff members. They must become center leaders, regional leaders, national leaders. If we fail in raising German members as leaders then the future of the German movement will be pessimistic. So we have to raise up many German leaders and they need many kinds of experiences, education. We don't have many German members in Germany; many went away, but anyway let us bring more people.
To me the new age is coming as a reality, not merely words. Because I experienced these things, they are real. If I did not have these experiences, I could not say this. I could not tell you that you can have this experience. No, it is only because I had this experience that I can promise you the same. Spirit world is really eager to help us. It may take you time to understand this but please try.
I came back yesterday and I heard that you worked very hard during my absence, and I would like to thank you for your hard work. Let's pray together.