Sermon Notes Feb 20, 2011

In Jin Moon

1) In Jin Nim expressed how good it is to be back in America.

2) Since coming back, we have many things to think about looking forward to the new year in the Lovin Life Ministry.

3) She expressed how delighted she is to have all the District Pastors who've come from all around the country. She asked them to stand and be recognized. She knows that we are all thinking, "where are the ladies in the group?" It's a work in progress. At least you have a woman senior pastor to compensate for it.

4) It's fantastic to come together at the beginning of the year to revisit the vision that we have for America -- stressing the importance of working together as one unified whole, as one body representing our True Parents (True Parents). When they (District Pastors) go back to their different regions she encouraged them to fully unite with what is happening here at headquarters. We cannot do our job if we do not have their support just as they cannot do their job to the best of their abilities if they do not have our support.

5) So, working together and appreciating each other and knowing that God works in mysterious ways all the time, and sometimes God sends you somebody to work that might not have been your image of a central figure or senior pastor or your District Director -- but In Jin Nim believes in all things -- sometimes God puts a test in front of us, an obstacle to overcome, because when we overcome it and when we grow through suffering and through trying something new, and experience something we never thought we would experience before, it just deepens our hearts and makes us appreciate the heart of God a whole lot more profoundly.

6) So here we are at the Breaking News time in history, and In Jin Nim often has said that we have to testify to our Parents, about True Parents being with us here today. We should not be silent anymore. As Unificationists we should be proud of who we are because we know who our Heavenly Parent is. We know who we are. We are those divine eternal sons and daughters who were put upon this earth to do great things.

7) In fulfilling our destiny one of the most important things that we need to do is to testify to our True Parents. When our Father first encouraged us to deliver 430 of his autobiographies, a lot of people who have been living in a cocoon of their own families and careers felt a little bit challenged. Many of them have said to In Jin Nim when they started this 430 book delivery of True Father's autobiography they were afraid. They were not sure how people would receive them. They weren't sure if they might throw the book away or throw it back at their face. But they realized that once they united with what True Father was asking them to do -- that great miracles took place. Because they believed in all the great things that could be done. They pushed aside this thing called fear.

8) When Ann Landers, the great advice columnist, was interviewed quite a few years ago she was asked, "Ms. Landers, you give advice to thousands and thousands of people every week -- if you were to tell what was the single most important problem that you spent the most time working through, encouraging people to go through and overcome and deal with -- what would that problem be?"

9) Ms. Landers said -- "that is very simple, without a doubt it is fear."

10) When we look at the Good Book in Isaiah 41:10 it says, "fear not for I am with you." Do not look around in terror and be dismayed. The Bible is incredibly profound in that what it is clearly stating is, "fear not because I am with you."

11) In Jin Nim, having gone through -- and still in the process of discovering who she is and what kind of a person she would like to be -- she is always checking herself, always asking questions.

12) When she heard this statement from Ann Landers about fear she thought about it. And being a mother and a wife and a sister to her siblings, for her, fear represents this inner turmoil that we all go through, and everybody has been through it, and everyone is going through it -- and she is no different from any of us.

13) One of the things that she always reminds herself to watch out for in her daily life and in the work that she has to do, is four points that she always keeps in mind.

14) Many times fear is one of those things that debilitates and totally incapacitates you. Many times men and women, children, teachers, lawyers, and doctors alike are overcome by this fear of failure. In Jin Nim sees, in particular in our movement, this fear of failure as parents, as children of God -- fear of failure in our movement is so engrossing that many times we become petrified, and many times we feel totally squashed with this inability to shake off this fear of failure. In many senses we experience exactly what the Good Book says. We feel this way because we are looking around in terror. We are looking, we are exercising our visual perception. But the Bible highlights the word "look." We are looking at terror and that is why we are afraid -- when really we should be looking at God instead of looking at terror. Instead of being petrified and debilitated, we need to be looking at God.

15) Instead of telling ourselves "We cannot, there is no way" we need to start saying "We can, and we will, and we do," because with God on our side we can be that great son and daughter.

16) One of the great presidents of our great country America -- is the life story of Abraham Lincoln. It is really, in one sense, a story of failure. Starting from the age of 27 he first failed at his business, he lost a seat at the legislature the next year, the next year he lost a second business, then he ran for Congress and lost -- and by the age of 37 he was elected to the Congress, but two years later he was defeated. Then he ran for a Senate seat and was defeated. Then he ran to be the vice president of the United States and he was defeated. And only at the age of 51 he got elected to be the president of the United States.

17) If we were to look at the life of Abraham Lincoln, and cut a slice of his life at age 22 when he failed absolutely at his business -- we might look at this brother and say "Whoa, he kind of looks like a loser. Not much prospects for him. He lost his business and has the gall to for the legislature the next year. This man is really insane." Then, the year after, if we were to look -- he lost again! Can you imagine what the people must have been thinking? This man is either (? out of his mind) or perhaps infused with the spirit, but these are two very, very different extremes. Either you have to give it to the man for having the courage to get up and try again or when you look at snapshots of his life, at these crucial moments when he lost the political race, when he lost the legislature's seat, when he lost his seat in Congress, and was elected but defeated two years later, on and on and on -- basically we are holding up a deck of cards that say failure.

18) But as long as the man continued, as long as he persevered -- the great way we need to understand our life when we look at the example of Abraham Lincoln, is to understand that life helps us through this thing called process. By dealing with the failures, if we can learn and deepen our faith, deepen our understanding and our conviction with our passions that we want to change the world, that we want to do great things -- then these minor setbacks become an incredible impetus to try again and to make incredible strides -- so much so that this man who was known to be a man of failure became one of America's greatest presidents.

19) In Jin Nim gets lots of e-mails as the senior pastor, from lots of parents who are allegedly pulling their hair out. They are saying, "My kids! They feel like failures! My kids are wild!" Well, let's look back 30 years when you first joined the church. You looked quite wild too. In Jin Nim got a taste of what Larry Krishneck may have looked like at the last Halloween party. He looked like something out of Hell's Angels.

20) Sometimes when we become parents we want our children to be perfect, to be angelic -- we don't expect a child to experience colic -- that incessant crying that drives every parent crazy. We don't expect our children to soil their pants, or at least they will do it beautifully (which is not the case). We have all these preconceptions and understandings of what we would like to be and what we would like our children to be.

21) This fear of failure -- the minute the child wants to try on purple hair, or the minute the child wants to listen to 9 Inch Nails, the minute the child doesn't want to come to the service -- the parents feel this incredible sense of failure. But one of the things In Jin Nim likes to tell herself and she likes to share with all the persevering parents in the audience, "Whatever we go through with our loved ones, with our children, how to move them to become that beautiful son and daughter of God will only make us better grandparents. And hopefully by then our children, having experienced the parental heart on their own, will come to appreciate the things that we try to do."

22) In a way parents -- do not be dismayed or discouraged. When In Jin Nim thinks about the words dismayed and discouraged it is interesting. When she hears the word discouraged it is almost as if God is saying to her stop "dissing" your courage. Stop it. Do not be discouraged. And do not be paralyzed by the fear of failure -- looking at a snapshot of your life. Just like Abraham Lincoln, we have a long life ahead and our children have a long life ahead of them. Just because they are trying out things and are seemingly not listening or rebelling in ways we least expected them to -- does not mean that they are a lost cause. We have to believe that they will find their way. As long as we don't allow them to fail, in that we are not going to keep them in bondage to the snapshot of the life they find themselves in, as long as we do not allow them to fail, then they will not fail.

23) Failure becomes a reality only if we accept it. Failure becomes a reality only if we accept it as an indictment or as a finality. But as long as we know that these setbacks and failures are a work in progress towards creating a better and deeper and more loving person -- then we can maintain this positive attitude. Instead of thinking "I can't, I can't, I won't" -- to the thought pattern that says, "I can, and I will and I do."

24) Just as Abraham was a symbol of failure until he became president -- and what would we do without the good Abe? We would not have the Emancipation Proclamation. He was the prevailing image of what America could be, at one of the most important and difficult times in its history. Somebody who is looked at as a total failure might actually be a work in progress -- to become a great man and a woman of God.

25) So In Jin Nim says, and she shares, and she encourages all the young people who might find themselves in a very, very difficult time with their families, with their brothers and sisters -- perhaps with their colleagues and friends -- do not be afraid. God says, "Fear not because I am with you." Do not look around in terror. We are so busy looking that many times we forget to feel, we forget to feel God in our lives.

26) Instead of just relying on our visual perception, in our auditory perception or our olfactory perceptions, we need to remember that we are divine beings and God speaks to us through our hearts. So we have to find God and we have to create a place for God, because when God is by our side there is no fear of failure.

27) The other point that we struggle with in our daily lives, is not just the fear of failure, but this fear of endless changes, life changes. Many people are afraid of change. In fact Pres. Woodrow Wilson said, "If you want to see a set of enemies pop up, just try to do something different. Do something that is different, that is changing the way things used to be done."

28) In Jin Nim remembers when she was trying to encourage our country's need and our movement's need for a love and life Ministry -- and for the need to really unite together and come together at least once a week so that we feel like we are part of one family, we are on the same page, we stand on the same platform -- there was a huge ruckus. There was a great deal of discomfort in not wanting to change, not wanting to try something different. In Jin Nim was a strange looking senior pastor. Maybe she didn't come in a three-piece suit. Maybe she had revolutionary ideas that all seemed to point to failure. Maybe they looked at the senior pastor as this crazy, crazy head coach that did not make any sense. "But the incredible thing about all of you is that at least you gave me a chance, begrudgingly or not. For that I thank you."

29) The history of religion and how the religious worship should take place is very much rooted in history and tradition. Each faith has its own set of rituals, own set of ways of doing things. So when we try something new it might not rub everyone the right way. But In Jin Nim's vision was to invigorate and really inspire the second and third generation that we have lost along the way. Our movement did not take care of our young people. We were reaching out to the outside brothers and sisters without taking care of our own. And if we don't continually do both at the same time there is going to be a vacuum when we are faced and confronted with the reality that these good men sitting here (District Pastors) are approaching 60.

30) We need to think about raising up a whole new generation of young people that are trained and ready and educated for pastoral work. You cannot just put on a three-piece suit and get up on the pulpit and start preaching. You have to have the knowledge of how it is to work with people. You have to have an understanding of how it feels to have a parental heart. So, all these changes that seem revolutionary -- In Jin Nim is not revolutionary at all. By cleaning up house, by raising up our youth for future leadership, we can maintain a very strong foundation and a house, a strong house and a Temple for God and True Parents. And then the work we do becomes icing on the cake

31) Just the fact that all we did, really, in the last year of the Lovin' Life Ministry is to clean house, is to organize the organizational structure of HSA and infuse it with a new vision to take it forward into the next millennium. But a lot of people have said, "Why is love and life not emphasizing witnessing, getting out there going door to door?" Well the world is a different place. A few years ago a lot of us were backpacking around the country. Now young people are backpacking around on the Internet. They are used to a certain visual stimulation that the older folks never had. They are used to advertising companies showing them what is beautiful, what is the thing to be, and they are inundated with all these visual images.

32) If we can't make our ministry attractive to the young people, by also employing media as well as the great message that True Parents bring to the world -- Then we are not being effective at all as a movement.

33) When In Jin Nim asked all the District Directors to really work together with her -- she thought a lot of people felt like, " If we worship with the Lovin' Life Ministry on Sunday what is going to happen to all the pastors?" This question is an interesting one to In Jin Nim. Pastoral work is not just a couple of hours on Sunday. Pastoral work takes place Monday through Sunday. All In Jin Nim is asking for is a couple of hours on Sunday when we can unite as a movement. So that there is a unity of heart in realizing that we are working as one family. There has to be a feeling of unity that, while you are here together with us, brothers and sisters in North Carolina, and in San Diego, and in Alaska -- are sharing the same message. It creates unity of heart which is fundamental [for the work we need to do].

34) So if you really think about it, In Jin Nim is not taking away your pulpit. In fact, she is unleashing you from the bondage of the pulpit. She is saying, "Get out there! I only have one body. I am being pulled left and right around the world, but you as the body of our True Parents can visit and knock on every door of your congregation. Be there as an older brother or older sister to teenage kids who need someone else other than their parents. There is an incredible amount of work that needs to be done."

35) It is like when we try to go for the change -- and our True Father has emphasized the importance of absolute obedience. When he uses the word absolute, what he is saying is take the whole package. When God wants to give you a blessing or gift take the whole package. Many times God wants to bless us and we are saying, "Yes I want your blessing, but just this part, just this part -- not that part."

36) What Heavenly Father and our Heavenly Parent is asking at this time of the Breaking News when it is our responsibility to testify to the world, is to take God's blessing as a total package, and then think about how we are going to do our work around it -- to make it manifest and substantiated in each of our districts and each of our localities.

37) It's amazing to In Jin Nim how when she looks at the different regions -- the regions that have totally taken the Lovin' Life Ministry as a package, it's a whole different atmosphere. But in regions where they've said, "Yes, this is God's blessing, we want this -- not that, maybe not this, maybe this." In a way it takes away from the full package deal that God wants to share with you and with the rest of America.

38) When the senior pastor with the True Family is asking all of you to really be united with our True Parents, because there are a lot of things going on in our movement and a lot of difficulties, especially in light of what is taking place at UCI, it causes us to think twice about what Father means when he says absolute obedience. In Jin Nim has often shared with brothers and sisters that she likes to understand the word obedience as absolutely listening to God's heart.

39) She has often taken notes when different people come up to her and say to her, "Oh, your sermons are getting better." And she wonders if you would go up to any minister in other churches and say something like that. But you feel like that because you look at the True Children as children. But they are not children anymore. They have children of their own and they have a lot of experience that they would like to share with everybody.

40) In a way this one leader confided in In Jin Nim -- "We were reviewing some of the early Lovin' Life services from earlier in the year and we realized that what you were trying to say was incredibly profound. I did not get it at that time, but I get it now." But you have to understand, In Jin Nim did not change. She did not change her approach or her heart. Perhaps it is you that have come to change your hearts and for that she is immensely grateful.

41) As we grow, going through the endless changes that need to take place -- because you know our movement was kind of like a dinosaur. It was prehistoric in that we were not really acknowledging -- we weren't honest about how we were falling short of the different ways that we needed to take care of our families, and really put this image of ideal families into practice. We have not done that. We've talked the talk. We have fantastic lecturers. But we haven't really applied it to the point where -- when people come and visit us, visit our lives, visit our movement and say, "Wow, the movement really is a living principle."

42) God gave us the Divine Principle, but it is our responsibility to make it a living principle -- in that we apply it in our daily lives.

43) Another thing that a lot of people are afraid of is this fear of being alone. We are so much engulfed in this fear of being left out, of being an outcast, of not being accepted. We are afraid to stand up, we are afraid to testify to who we are. We are afraid to talk about our faith for fear of being judged, being criticized and accused. But we need to stand with God. And just as the Good Book says in Isaiah, fear not because I am with you. God is with us.

44) Just as the Bible talks about how God will strengthen and harden us through difficulties as we work through the endless changes in our lives, and just as God has promised that he will always be there to support and encourage us -- when we are hit with fear and failure, God is reminding us through Isaiah that you are not alone. You are not alone. In fact God is working and walking with all of us every step of the way.

45) One of the things that In Jin Nim likes to tell her children is that when you deal with all these different fears, fear of failures, fear of endless changes, fear of being alone -- it is almost like -- if we were to drive a car and we are being hit by the fear of failure, it is like sitting in a parked car with ignition not turned on, waiting for the car to take us somewhere. We know we have work to do, but we are paralyzed because we are not confident eternal sons and daughters. We have so much doubt in our abilities -- we don't believe that we can succeed. We are our own worst enemies.

46) We tell ourselves we have to drive somewhere while not taking the effort or care to turn the ignition, to put the car from park to drive, and step on the pedal. These are the things that we need to do. God might give us a car but we have got to drive it. And when were driving the car down the highway in new areas that we are not familiar with -- we might be overcome by the fear of the changes and constantly shifting scenarios that we have to deal with. But if we understand that all these different scenarios and obstacles -- and why God puts them right in front of us for us to tackle with, and the Bible tells us that God does just so -- to strengthen and harden us through the difficulties -- then we realize that it is really, like going through a growing pain. Instead of fighting with the pain if we can embrace the pain, because we understand that pain is necessary, we need to go through it to become a stronger, harder person physically -- then we can overcome with still the positive understanding of what life is all about.

47) When In Jin Nim was teaching her kids how to drive, one of the things that would freak them out -- after going through a routine of learning how to parallel park, how to go in reverse, how to do the turns and hand signals -- she would get out of the car and then say, "practice." That would turn her kids into a tizzy. They would say, "No! Don't leave me in this car all by myself. I need you here with me." Again, this fear of being alone.

48) And so In Jin Nim thinks a lot of parents feel that the best way to love our children is to always be there for them -- basically keep them a captive of our home. Many times we give them a list of things they cannot do. You cannot go out partying. You cannot go out with your friends. You cannot date. But we fail to give them a list of all the things that they can do. You can work hard and become the president of the United States. You can practice your piano so you can play like Rev. Cotter. You can practice your painting so that you can be like Van Gogh.

49) Many times, (because we have so much fear as parents) a body that is stricken with fear is very closed in, the limbs are incredibly closed in. And one of the things you learn -- because two of her children were concert pianist and the teacher that worked with them day in and day out (she called it mental conditioning) -- she told them, "you have to let go of your fear. You have to do the opposite of what your body wants you to do. When you see something scary you tense up, but what you need to do if you want to become a great concert pianist or a great artist -- you need to surrender to your art." In Jin Nim understands this to mean, we need to surrender to our Heavenly Father, allow Him and Her to use us as a vessel through which different people can experience this beautiful language of love.

50) We as parents feel a whole lot better about ourselves when we restrict our kids and tell them all the things they cannot do -- we tell them, "Prepare for battle, life is a battle, life is about dealing with failure and you have to keep your dukes up high. But if we do our job correctly, and if we do the right job of taking the child -- to understand the value of the vertical relationship that we need to have with the parents and also the horizontal, then the older they get, just as the education process for kindergarten is vastly different from a high school student (you would never take a child in kindergarten and tell them now you are going to work on a tutorial with a professor). But one of the great privileges of being a great student in high school is that you get to be in a symposium or tutorial with your professor.

51) As the kids grow, if we can do our job in terms of educating them in the proper way, then we need to encourage our kids to go out, encourage our kids to go out and not always stay in under our security blanket. We should be the ones saying get out (in a good way), and meet your personal destiny. Be that great person you need to be instead of thinking, "Oh my goodness. The fear of failure. What if my child goes to college, she is so beautiful, he is so handsome, there are many men and woman out there."

52) Hello! The world is filled with beautiful men and women. But if we do our job of educating our children to the best of our abilities then at some point we have to let them go. And by letting them go it gives room for them to come back and to deal with us, not just as a kindergartner but as an adult, a dignified confident adult. Isn't that what we want for our children? We want them to be better than us. We want them to be infused by the Spirit so that they feel that they can spread their wings and fly -- not try to fly with their wings constricted or chopped off.

53) Another fear that In Jin Nim has tackled within her life of faith is the fear of making the right decision. Many times religion stresses right and wrong so heavily, and it's so ironclad, that you are actually afraid to make a choice or to decide for yourself, exercising your free will, because you are so afraid of making the wrong decision.

54) We allow ourselves to revert back to our comfort zone because we don't want to try anything new, anything uncomfortable. We don't want to try anything that we did not do before. But the incredible thing about being a parent and having kids is that you realize that you are constantly hitting up against different brick walls that we never anticipated before. Sometimes when you are so involved in making the right decision for that particular child, In Jin Nim is anxiety ridden almost to the point that she cannot make any decision.

55) This is the time when we really need to realize what Isaiah tells us -- God says, "That despite all the difficulties, that I will help you. Yes. I will help you -- yes. And I will support you -- yes." God wants to remind us, provoke us, to say yes along with him and her. If God is saying I will help you, "yes I know God will help me." If I know God is saying I will support you, "yes, I know God is there to support me."

56) This fear of making the right decision, which stems from this feeling of insecurity and self-doubt -- in a way, when we bring God into our lives, and we know that God will be there to support -- He will not leave us alone, She will not leave us alone. And when God is there to support us that means -- prop us up, maybe hold us at times, then all we need to do is surrender and listen to our hearts. Because one thing In Jin Nim noticed in the course of her life is many times the brain says something but the heart says something else. Because she thinks we have been conditioned to think things through, which is a very, very important thing -- we rely so heavily on our mind, but then we forget to feel.

57) What our movement has gone through the last two decades is -- we know this beauty of interfaith and reaching out and all these things we need to do are the right things to do, but what In Jin Nim found lacking in our movement was this ability to feel. We didn't feel that initial spark that we all felt.

58) A great thing about having the District Directors here is that In Jin Nim got to hear them perform for Open Mic. She didn't know we had such great talent. She was surprised to see Rev. Swearson with a guitar sounding like Johnny Cash. He was singing a lovely acoustic rendition of "One World One Heart" and she thought, no wonder our second generation is so talented. And when she saw Rev. Hernandez performing his own creation, a song that he wrote when he was 19 years old -- it is really quite amazing this thing called music. All of us watching him perform this song that he wrote at 19, it took us all the way back to when he was 19. She felt his heart and she experienced what he must have been feeling and going through and the whole excitement of meeting True Parents for the first time. That is an incredibly beautiful thing that we need to be reminded of -- and we need to feel that we are doing something incredibly important, not just know, but we need to feel.

59) And we need to know that when we can totally be unified with our True Parents, and know we are so lucky that True Parents have designated the youngest son to be the spiritual heir of our movement -- in a way Father is removing all the guesswork, making it very, very clear to us.

60) Some of the things that he is doing in Korea are quite revolutionary, just like the way the things we are doing here are quite different -- but if we can unite and take the blessing as a total package, not slicing and dicing because we know better, but just surrender to God and feel the heart of God that He and She wants to share with us. Let the transmission of the heart be unadulterated. Let that transmission be pure. Let that transmission be clear.

61) In Jin Nim feels that if she can have our support and the support of all the good brothers and sisters around the country -- we are just on the verge of doing incredible things this year. She can feel it.

62) Let us be the kind of movement, when we think about what kind of a legacy we would like to leave, In Jin Nim would not like our movement to be a legacy of fear. She would like all of us to leave behind a legacy of love.

63) In the Good Book, Deuteronomy, it says, "I have put before you life and death. Choose life." Here at Lovin' Life Ministry we are choosing life. We are choosing to love life. We are choosing to be grateful for the total package that God wants to share with us. And if we can receive it wholeheartedly and unite with it there is an incredible miracle that is taking place every day and will only exponentially grow to hundreds and thousands of manifolds.

64) Brothers and Sisters, in this great country of A-merica -- many times when In Jin Nim spends private time with our Father, he closes his eyes and goes Ahhhhhh -- he goes Ahhhhhh -- its like this incredible love, Ahhhhh -- a longing for your incredible love. Every time In Jin Nim here this she thinks America should be A -- merry country. We need to be happy. We need to be happy for this opportunity to love each other, to be moved and be moved by each other, to love and be loved by each other. And Father says, Ahhh -- meri -- ka. Ka in Korean means a command for go. So go merrily, go happily. God gave this country a great name so let's start embodying it, let's start living it, and let's start being grateful for everything that we have.

65) We have to decide today to be an agent of change -- to release all our fears and surrender to God, surrender to our True Parents, and with that foundation of faith incredible things are just waiting around the corner for all of us to harvest and to enjoy.

66) God Bless -- thank you.