Testimony of a STF Member in Witnessing

Hyo Mi Kim
Sophomore,Sun Moon University, Pure Love

Hyun Jin Nim listened to a second year STF member Hyo Mi Kim's testimony when he visited the Jangan CARP center on the fourth day of the Korean speaking tour on November 28, 2005. He was touched by this testimony and gave a direction to spread it not only to the CARP members but to all Unification Church members.

Hello, my name is Hyo Mi Kim. I am taking my second year off from the Pure Love Department in Sun Moon University, and I am currently a part of the STF witnessing program. I feel I am inadequate to give a testimony in many ways since I am still in training, but I would like to share a story from my witnessing experience.

"Love" and "sacrifice" were the two words that rooted deeply in my heart after finishing one year of the fundraising course. I realized that there is no vision unless I make a culture of love and sacrifice inside myself first. I started STF witnessing with the determination to make a foundation of substantial love and sacrifice within myself and within all of us. I felt that this was the start of a path I must take in order for me to create a true family. I started with the conviction that this period was a gift from Hyun Jin Nim.

"Tong-ban-gyuk-pa" [1] is accomplished when I feel that other person's pain and suffering as my own and try to resolve them. I kept these words of Heung Jin Nim in my heart as I looked around at my surroundings. Everywhere I went, I saw people who were hurt and feeling apathetic in waves of individualism and selfishness, asking for love. True Parents and Hyun Jin Nim have set the substantial foundations of the "Culture of Heart" and the "true love culture of living for the sake of others" and are asking for us to fulfill them. As I saw those people suffer, I deeply felt that it is this "Culture of Heart" and the "true love culture of living for the sake of others" that is urgently needed in this world right now. I came to realize that my mission and our mission, as members of STF Korea's witnessing team, is to build a substantial Culture of Heart within the realm of second generation and to raise a wave within ourselves, lighting a flame that will never go out.

I was setting conditions to meet a prepared person when I met "Mi Ok Ji" during an outreach program of service activity. Because Mi Ok was majoring in Japanese Literature, she showed a great deal of interest in our witnessing center which had many Japanese members. As she spent more time with us, she felt warm love that she could not easily experience in school or from outside. She opened up her heart and told me not only how she was not feeling much love and affection from her family, but also how she was also disappointed in her relationships with her selfish friends; she had no expectations for her school or family anymore.

When she told me how she could not find true joy in her life, I became confident that the key to witnessing to her was to move her heart by giving her unconditional love of a parent. What Mi Ok needed was the culture of true love that True Parents and Hyun Jin Nim speak of. I tried again and again with other members in the center to invest all my love into Mi Ok with the determination and resolution to create a culture of love no matter what. At every prayer meeting, I reminded myself of the True Parents' words and the Core Values that to love is to give continuously, freely without regret, and unchangingly.

I reminded myself of the principle of how to witness successfully: I need to be an example of living for the sake of others for that person and at the same time strive to become the embodiment of True Parents' words and the Core Values to change myself. I tried hard to practice it. However, the more sincere my heart, the higher the boundaries became. It was so painful to see how much I lacked and to see my fallen nature coming out.

I kept on asking myself, "Can I love Mi Ok enough to sacrifice my life and not regret it?" "Can I take responsibility for Mi Ok forever?" and "What does it mean to live for the sake of others?" However, I could not answer any of them. Those were questions my limited capacity of love could not manage. Even though Mi Ok was unusually good-natured, I did not want to love her anymore when I could not understand her or when I saw her fallen natures. It was actually strange how it was so hard for me to get rid of that mentality. I could not understand why I had to suffer so much and why I had to love in this difficult way; I even wanted to give up on witnessing.

However, I realized that this is the original love that God had created and that true love will be created inside myself when I could love that person to the point of embracing their shortcomings and investing in their possibilities endlessly. This hope prevented me from giving up. I fought with myself everyday, saying "Please let me go over this wall," and "I can do it," but the courage to love did not appear. I was so sorry about how I treated Mi Ok. I promised myself that "I will do everything I can to treat her better." I hung on to God believing that love will develop if I kept on practicing love, even if my mind did not follow my actions at the moment.

As I experienced this difficulty of the heart, I came to realize how our True Parents bore all the responsibilities for humanity and sacrificed everything to love them. I learned the suffering and tears behind them, and I could not hold back my tears. I reflected on how much love True Parents have invested with blood, sweat, and tears to raise me up to this position. I kept on crying because I was in deep repentance about the times when I made mistakes without knowing anything and because I was so grateful to God for not giving up on me. I most deeply became aware that the reason was love and what that love was like. I did not want to hurt God's heart again anymore, and I wanted to return true joy to True Parents. I engraved in my heart that my lifetime mission was to create a Culture of Heart, to complete a true family, and to find and raise people who will establish Father's nation with us. I vowed myself to be the daughter of God, and only His Will remained within me. I could finally say to myself with confidence that God's dream, True Parents' dream, and Hyun Jin Nim's dream were my own dream.

As I thought of the love my mother gave me in place of God for me to work for the Will and the love she gave me as a parent, I promised myself to become Mi Ok's God and understand everything about Mi Ok and to put myself in her situation. When I started to let go of myself with this commitment, my heart finally changed, and genuine love sprung forth within me. I talked to her with an understanding heart, made conditions, and though I was inadequate, I tried to love her without reservation as God would. Then Mi Ok and I started to become one. Despite all of her shortcomings, she seemed beautiful. She gradually began to notice my love as well and was growing deeper in her faith and life as she overcame her difficulties by herself. My love for Mi Ok grew deeper, and she was changing in many different ways as well. Every single day was so precious and I was thankful for the love and understanding she gave me. I thanked God again and again. I swore to hold on to Mi Ok's hand all my life and to establish Father's nation.

I always thought I needed to live for the sake of others, but how to put it into action was always vague to me. As I remember back to when I was discouraged and suffering from my limitations, I can now understand what it means to live for the sake of others, what true love is, and why Hyun Jin Nim emphasizes the Core Values and the STF course so strongly. I was also amazed at how much I have changed. As I tried to practice the Core Values, I sincerely felt that Hyun Jin Nim created the Core Values with all his effort so that we could easily understand True Parents' words and practice them. Beloved Hyun Jin Nim, I will become the owner who creates the Culture of Heart by all means and return joy to True Parents and Hyun Jin Nim. Thank you Heavenly Father, True Parents, Heung Jin Nim, and Hyun Jin Nim, and I love you.

Notes:

1 Tong-ban is the smallest unit of a town in Korea, and gyuk-pa means to smash into very fine pieces. Tong-ban-gyuk-pa means to pull out the satanic lineage settled in the land and change it to God's lineage.