Witnessing Testimony

Thea Dickson
October 4, 2009

This week was not your typical STF week. This year hasn’t been a typical STF year. It’s been something so much more.

I came to STF 2nd year thinking I would only learn about self-discipline and grow my character. I am learning about self-discipline and I am growing my character, however, I am receiving so much more than I ever thought possible. I am learning how to truly attend True Parents. I am learning about how difficult True Families path is, and how hard they are fighting for God’s dream.

Father hardly sleeps, hardly takes time for himself, and is always thinking of God’s providence. I am sorry to the True Children, because they have always been sacrificed for our sake. At the same time, I honor them and think of them as heroes. Even though they faced so much difficulty instead of us, they are now here helping us.

For a long time, I didn’t enjoy the act of witnessing. I guess it stemmed from a difficult experience during my 40 days last year, and also my dislike for indoctrinating. Plus, approaching people with the intent of being responsible for someone’s spiritual life for all of eternity sounds like a BIG responsibility. Basically, witnessing scared me to death.

After about a week of dreading every run, I found myself doing other things, such as cooking, sharings, and anything to avoid witnessing. But, it was all with good intentions; to serve the center. I found that the way I give love best is through baking. I also don’t like public speaking, so when I volunteered to give intro after an entire week of not witnessing, I knew I had gone too far. Satan likes to make those sneaky justifications, but I didn’t want to stand for it any longer.

During this time, I was also trying to find a new internal goal that would further my growth toward my year goal (which is to develop a relationship with True Parents through attendance). My previous goal for the past month was to stay positive. I found that it’s really easy to stay positive when you’re doing things you like to do and avoiding the things you don’t want to do. However, if I want to learn the heart of attendance for my year goal, then I would have to push myself to witness. In Jin Nim wants us to bring new guests, so in the heart of attendance, I should also want to bring new guests. So I changed my goal to “do the hardest thing.” I knew I would have to go out and talk to people.

I know that witnessing isn’t about indoctrinating at all. In fact, it’s about showing people the love we have as brothers and sisters under our Heavenly Parent. So with that in mind, I courageously went forth to the front line. I oddly approached someone eating dinner, and I had my first real front-line conversation. With the love of Heavenly Parent, I hope to move forward and continue sharing this love with others.