Our Mission is to Testify

Dr. Ki Hoon Kim, Continental Chairman of FFWPU North America, shared the following message at the monthly National Ministry meeting held on March 9, 2016.

Do you feel this meeting is just business as usual, or is it rather a celebration of an extraordinary outcome of this past month? I really admire all of our departments and community leaders. Your presentations today show consistent progress in our activities and our movement centering on True Parents. We are doing a great job!

If you think about it, we are doing so many things; however we were still able to offer a substantial True Parents’ birthday donation, twice as much as we gave last year. This offering is from all our families’ heart. Let’s give our American family members a big hand. A birthday is not just a celebration and a few words of, “Happy birthday.” Children always prepare a gift for their parents’ birthday. God made us like that.

I just came back from Korea, and listening to our National Ministry Team’s presentations today, I can feel that the presenters really put their energy and spiritual power in what they do, centering on True Parents. A lot of inspiration came to me this morning. I felt True Parents telling me, “Do you know where you are sitting today? This very room is where we worked tirelessly, shed many tears and met regularly with the 50 state leaders.”

This is the place where True Father and Mother called Dr. Durst and all state leaders to meet, and listened to their monthly reports. This inspiration came to me, so it’s as if True Parents are directly leading our monthly activities and coming here each month to hear about our activities and our community sharing momentum centering on True Parents. It’s a very precious time.

What I learned from meeting with True Mother this time again in Korea, is that her key word is to “testify” to True Parents for the sake of the whole world—the 7.3 billion people living on this earth. This is the mission of Blessed families: to testify to True Parents.

Today, many Christians are trying to testify to Jesus Christ; his message, his life and resurrection. At the end of this month we will celebrate Easter Sunday. However, Unificationists need to focus on testifying to True Parents for the sake of this country and the world.

Dr. Balcomb mentioned the 40-year anniversary of the Yankee Stadium Rally and Washington Monument Rally. True Mother has plans to commemorate these 40 years and True Parents’ message to America. We still remember this goal.

Many people think it’s too late to change this country and make a turning point, but True Parents think differently. The only way we can change this country is to testify to True Parents to the people of America and around the world. Without taking ownership, we would just be followers. True Parents really want us to be owners of Cheon Il Guk, who don’t always depend on someone else. We all have our own personal, family, church, community and national responsibility.

We recite our Cheon Il Guk Family Pledge on the first day of each month, and some families read it every morning, or every Sunday morning. The Family Pledge always mentions the “owner of Cheon Il Guk”, practicing true love, and taking ownership. If you don’t take ownership, God will not be able to relate with you, your family, or your church. True Mother urges us to testify to True Parents and take ownership with responsibility.

If we go back to the second point of the Family Pledge, how can we take ownership? Without attending Heavenly Parent and True Parents, you cannot have ownership. Your family—and even on the national level, world level, and cosmic level—must be owners of Cheon Il Guk. In a family, before you take ownership, you need to practice filial piety toward your parents.

We had a lot of miserable experiences among families early in our American movement. Many of our elder brothers and sisters were kidnapped by their families, but True Parents never asked us to excommunicate our own parents. True Parents always encouraged us restore our relationship with our parents. This is the teaching of True Parents. Please, practice filial piety in your family.

In our holy scriptures, True Father describes his own family tree as very nice, very beautiful, very wonderful. In his testimony he always tried to express filial piety toward his own parents. How about True Mother? True Mother does the same. She tries to honor her grandparents, and even her own mother. As a daughter she practices respect and honor toward her family, even though True Parents are the Second Coming Messiah. Even the Messiah shared about their own parents. If we cannot have this level of filial piety, we cannot become tribal messiahs.

True Father said, “I am the Messiah on the worldwide level. When you try to come and see me, you must have the same kind of title. You need, at least, to be a messiah of your family, your tribe, or your nation.” This is fundamental. The formation stage described in the Divine Principle is where we develop filial piety toward our parents. The same principle applies to True Parents’ family. The first stage of filial piety is at the family level, before one can claim any kind of messiahship. This is True Parents’ teaching.

At the recent Global Top Gun workshop, I shared with participants about absolute faith, love and obedience. At the beginning and at the conclusion of the workshop, I shared messages with this same title each time. One brother stood up and asked, “How can I have absolute faith?”

At our meeting last month, I shared about how when we have absolute faith, love and obedience to True Parents and Heavenly Parent, we will not have any confusion or struggles. You can solve all problems when you practice this. Absolute faith, love and obedience are not far away. It’s not just someone else who has all these things; it’s already in us. We have absolute faith; we just might not know it. We just might not know how to practice it. True Parents said that even God Himself needed to fit absolute faith, love and obedience in His principle of creation. These are three core elements, and with them He created all creation including human beings. It’s already in us, and when we practice this, then all problems will be resolved.

Last, but not least, True Mother mentioned to me about Vision 2020, and how crucial it is that we become owners and practice ownership. It’s not about changing our lifestyle, or our work schedules. It is a core element of all leaders, department leaders and community leaders. When you take ownership, you will have all kinds of ideas, for the sake of your family, for the sake of your community, your church, and this nation of America. Once again, thank you so much for your great presentations. You are all owners of Cheon Il Guk. Thank you and God bless you.