A moving testimony about Christian Seeburger, interviewed by the Queen, Yeonah Moon
Hello, good to see you. It was a long day for both of us, but you know, thank you so much for agreeing to do the interview together with us. Can you please introduce yourself?
Yeah, my name is Christian Seeburger. I will be 70 years next year.
70 years?
Yes.
Oh, my goodness, I never imagined that. I've been knowing you for forever, I feel like.
And I'm born in the beautiful mountainside of Bavaria, grown up in the paradise, in nature, but in very poor circumstances. I was the first son, and had two brothers and two sisters, and another, my niece grew up in my family, so we were a big family.
And yeah, I got to know Reverend Moon's church at the age of 18 years.
Wow, so you yourself have four children.
I have four children, three sons, and one girl, the eldest is a daughter, and I have 13 grandchildren.
13 grandchildren, my goodness, I don't see too many people who beat me, beat our family, but you definitely beat our family.
And two on the way.
Two on the way, my goodness, are you kidding me? So all your children are blessed, and yeah, that's beautiful.
My grandfather was one of 19 children, from one wife, and 11 survived. So there's a discussion whether I had been 19 or 17, at least 17, because some died in their childhood, but it was a big family background. And I grew up in a kind of such big family background.
Wherever you go, you meet your relatives. I always ask this question, because for me, I'm Asian, I speak the same language as True Fathers, and then I was like, my parents were in faith, so I was introduced to faith naturally. But in your case, True Father looks radically different, right? The different languages, the Asian man, and how were you able to follow True Father as a Second Adventist? Can you tell us about it?
Maybe I have to explain a little bit longer story, because for a young guy growing up in the 70s, we had the student revolution in 1968. It was very uncool and naive to have faith or be conservative. Every modern young guy was leftist.
I actually did not know that also Europe had that phenomenon as well.
It came from USA, and it was swept over here, the sexual revolution. So I was a very critical, maybe sometimes cynical, logical young guy. I come from a very small village. In my class, there were only six boys my age. And to come to believe in a Korean Messiah is God's miracle.
You never saw an Asian man while you were growing up, for sure.
Never saw.
They don't love believing in a Messiah.
So, I mean, the battle of my life was the battle about my faith.
I was born in a Catholic village, which has 800 inhabitants. Half of it is men. And one third of the village was killed in World War II.
And I was born ten years after, just after the war had, the worst thing was over, and the baby boomers started. I grew up in a Catholic surrounding, and I became an altar boy. I walked to the church with 800 citizens.
Every day at 7 o'clock in the morning, there was a service. And I had to walk a mile by foot to be at 7 o'clock church to do the altar service. And then after go to school.
There was a mass every day. And maybe there is three or four visitors. But there's a priest and two altar boys.
And in the winter, in the snow, completely dark, walk one mile through the heavy snow.
How old were you at that time?
I think nine years, between nine and twelve years old. And I walked alone through the night to be at 6 o'clock.
You said your mom was devout Christian. I guess she was devout Catholic, as you explained your family before.
You know, on the countryside, it's not a faith that has a theological backing. It's just natural faith. And my mother was a very simple woman. She could not explain her faith. We just could see that she was very faithful. And she was a very, how to say, selfless woman. And just from being with her, she's a stable element in our family. And through her, I think I got this faith foundation.
And on the other hand, there was my father. He was sent to war when he was 18, 19 years old. He was a traumatized Second World War soldier.
A lot of his friends died.
He was a kid when he was sent to war. They have this trauma, which I didn't know as a child. There were occasions when my father was under stress. He had this uncontrollable anger. And he was beating up the kids. And after the war, a year after the war, he came back healthy, but he had an accident and he lost his left arm. So, he had prosthesis from wood and metal. And sometimes with this, it was uncontrollable. So, he was a good father. And after such events, he felt very repentful about it. He never expressed it, but we could see it with him. But still it happened.
So, he was fighting against the PTSD (Post-traumatic stress disorder)
Yeah, yeah. So, there was this conflict within me. My mother, a very peaceful woman, who endured all of that for the sake of her children. She dealt with all of that.
And then my father, when he was stable, a very good father. He was an orphan. His father, he never really knew. So, he didn't know how to raise children. He was given to different families. He had a twin brother and they were separated. And given to different families when they grew up. So, he didn't know how to be a good father. But he wanted to be a good father, as I could see.
And then I saw the demons in my life. And I saw the very selfless woman. My mother didn't need any law. She was just a moral person. And she was a very, how do you say, she was not so much outgoing, but she was always serving and always wanted to have relationship. And always stable. So, she was the stable element in our family. And maybe through our mother's stability, our family was safe.
But I really saw demons in my life. There were occasions when she had to defend our children against our father. And then of course, 50 minutes later, he was very sorry about what had happened. But he couldn't control. So, and he had difficulty to believe in God because of that, his life, hardship that he experienced.
Everybody believed in God in the village somehow. And we went to service, Sunday service every Sunday. So, he wanted to raise us in faith. But we saw he could not have a simple faith. Somehow, he knew, I think God protected him in the war. He knew there is a God, but maybe in between he doubted. He could not help us in faith. He could not. But I got this, how do you say, fighting and survival spirit of my father. He made it through all this incredible, crazy life.
And he brought us up. But I had to solve this conflict in myself.
And in the village, in my school, this was all farmer boys. So, with 12 years old, they were driving the tractor. We didn't have a farm, but the neighbor, my aunt, was our neighbor, and sometimes we had to drive the tractor when the farmer was not around, with 12 years old. And in school they had difficulty, but for me school was very easy and nice. We grew up free. There was no, how do you say, no ideological influence in the school. It's just after the war.
And among our class, our school, I was one of easy to learn and one of best. But also, we had no farm. So, in a farmer society without a farm, you're basically the lowest class.
I see.
And after the war, my father had lost an arm. So everything was building up by hand.
He had five kids and no arm. So, it was hard to even make a living. But somehow, I felt very blessed.
It's amazing that you were able to survive.
Nevertheless, I had a doubt because when I became 14 years old, I was in school and we had science, and I read the book, “Club of Rome” book. It came out in 1974. The title was The Limits of Growth. This was the only scientific book available about the future of the Earth's development. So, it made a massive projection how the population grows and how the resources decline exponentially. And there will be a crossing point in 1974. The crossing point is expected to be 2010. And there is no solution and humankind is doomed to disappear.
And I believed, because it was very scientific, and I wanted to understand about the future and life, and I believed a lot of the things they wrote. And I tried to discuss with people, but there was nobody who would give me an answer. And I thought, how can you ignore there is a scientific proof that by 2010 to 2020 the world is going to end and we don't even talk about it.
And I became very desperate. I was 14, 15 years old, and I became very doubtful and also very cynical through this. And I could not believe in God anymore.
I believed in Jesus, that Jesus was a very, how do you say, brave and heroic and loving man. And I admired very much Jesus, but I thought believing in God, I'm not sure, and I could not have a simple faith. I wanted to study, I wanted to become a doctor, not a medical doctor, but it was so easy for me, but I couldn't go to higher school because there was not enough money and it was far away. So, life felt like a dead end for me.
And if it's going to be doomed, then what does it matter? We end it now or end it a couple of decades later.
I understand all the young guys that take their life, they have such a question. And I said, what shall I live for? What shall I live for? This was a serious, dead serious question for me. And if there is no purpose in life, why should I live? But somehow, I thought about suicide, but then I thought about my mother, and that always protected me. I tended to protect the good people like my mother.
And I saw there's an evil world, I didn't know it's demons, I only saw a very evil world, and somehow, I grew up in this conflict between so much goodness and so much evil in my own circumstances, I saw. But I could not just believe in God, and I was very desperate, and I said, what should I live for? These are things that happened in my mind. There was nobody who really could talk about. And I had hidden in my shelf a Bible, because I was in the Catholic Church.
And that's not cool to have a Bible.
It's not cool, it's very uncool.
If somebody finds out that you're reading the Bible, then you're in trouble.
And I didn't read it. The Catholic Church doesn't encourage to read the Bible. But when I was so desperate, and so there is no purpose in life, and the world is going to end, and I just took the book from the shelf, and I opened it. I did not know what the Rema is, but I opened it, and then I just read there, and Jesus said: “They asked him, what is the most important law? And it said, love God, and love your neighbor as yourself. This is the first and most important law”.
And I said, wow, that makes sense. You know, it's a spiritual experience, like the heavy burden fell off my shoulders, and all negative thoughts left me, and I said, okay, that's the reason to live for. So now I have a purpose.
But then came the next question. What the world is going to end? Even if you live and try to love other people, I realized I don't have the ability to love, because so much negative things. But through this, through this faith, somehow, I didn't, I only believed it's Jesus. It was not God, Jesus saying it. So, I said, okay, I believe Jesus. I did not yet believe in God.
I believe in Jesus. And I thought, but I cannot do nothing, and the people don't even take care of that. And maybe there was a, I was fighting with that frustration in my life, maybe for eight to ten months.
And then, for some reason, when I was very desperate, and I had no other hope, then was this book. And I had a book, I looked in that book, and I opened it, and it says, there is, Christ will return, and when he returns, he will, after a big battle, he will solve all problems of the world, and he will end all suffering, and wipe away all tears of the eyes. And again, maybe I was already 17 years old back then, and I thought, wow, there's a solution.
So, you wrote a book of revelation?
Yeah, I did a book of revelation. It is very unscientific, and it's not logical, and it's not nothing that conflicted with my brain, but it released all the heaviness from my shoulders, and all the burden, and I felt light and hopeful, and through the faith, I realized, oh, I can, Jesus promised that, and I trusted Jesus, and then, through that faith, I got hope. I said, oh, there's a future, hope, even if humankind cannot solve the problem, God will intervene.
And I said, okay, I don't know how to deal with all the problem, so I just work hard, and I study hard, and wait what God is doing. I cannot solve it. And, you know, I could make a certain higher school. I worked on holidays, and made the money, and somehow found a source, apart from my family, to finance that school, and went to this school. It was a technical school, even I wasn't, I didn't like so much technology, but this was the only school available.
And I said, okay, I will go to school, and because I was always fighting with my elder brother, we were like Cain and Abel, we were fighting to the death, you know. And of course, he was stronger than me, and then I learned martial arts.
I see, that's why you learned.
To be able to compete with my elder brother, 14 years old, but there was no martial arts available in my village. And I found in the next city, maybe 10 miles away, but there is no bus, and I convinced my father, his brother was living there, I said, you bring me please to the training, and you stay with your brother, until training is finished, have a coffee, and then bring me home. And then I became so excited about martial arts. I was 100% involved.
And you know, when I finished training, my heavy judo suit was wet. So you were really into it. Really into it, two times a week, a lot of stress in school, but still I did it, and we went to competitions, and I became two times silver medal in Upper Bavarian Championship.
So my weight class was 63 kilos, and later 70. I was very skinny, but it gave me so much technique, and from the moment on, I developed that technique, took me maybe two years, and then I stopped fighting with my brother.
Yeah, because your brother understood, okay, he's serious. I better not mess with him.
My brother did wrestling. So he believed that he's stronger through wrestling. But before it was a competition, but after going to judo competition, and I see I could win the medals, I knew my ability, I said, I don't need to fight with my brother. I know I could defeat him, but I don't do it.
So, you guys respected each other.
We respected each other.
You don't have to prove that judo is higher than wrestling.
But still, I could not have... I thought believing in a God is like manipulating yourself.
It would be too stretchy.
Too simple. And that's the way, but I was asking myself questions. I said, if Jesus would be... If I would have lived at Jesus' time, 17 years old, what would I do when he's crucified? The disciples didn't defend him. I said, okay, what would I do? And this was a... Nobody asked me my inside question. And I said...
The Holy Spirit was asking you that question.
I didn't believe in the Holy Spirit. I did not believe in the spirit world. I did not believe in God.
But he was already working on you.
He was already working on me. Heavy. And I thought I should defend Jesus. I wouldn't betray him. I came to the clue. Even if it costs my life, I thought I should do that. So, this was my... This was my... How do you say? Teenager years. And around me, free sex, and student revolution, and being very uncool to be religious. So I had all the bad things I saw. It was all in my spirit, in my heart, in my emotion. Nobody... I shared about it.
But still it affected me a lot. And then my school was going to be ended. And I saw there's no people around here in the village where you can... Share your struggle. And solve the problems of the future. So, I said I have to go to Munich. This is the biggest city.
And my cousin, she helped me to find... I had to go to the army. But I... How do you say? In the army, there's a big alcohol problem. You have to drink alcohol. And I thought I cannot join the army and have being under such pressure and killing people because of other people. My father was a returned soldier. So, I knew what happened to him. He had to fight. If he doesn't fight on the front line, he would be killed from the back.
And back then you could not do civil service. You had to go to court and reason why you don't want to join army. And nobody helped me to explain that. And I went to court. And they asked me, you are doing martial arts. So, you are not against force. Being against force would be a reason. Why you don't go to army if you are applying force yourself?
Is Germany mandatory?
It was drafted mandatory.
Mandatory.
Until my two sons, it was mandatory. Never knew that. 18 months.
And I thought about it in a moment. I said, yes, I am not against force. But if we have to kill, I don't want to kill on somebody's command. If I have to kill, I want to decide whether I have to kill or not. And I said, okay, that's okay. And they permitted me to do civil service. I went to Munich. And as soon as I got to Munich, I was witnessed on the streets. So, at that time there was the global team. And within a mile, a shopping street, there was a church center. One side of the shopping street and a church on the other side of the shopping. 1975, you could not pass the street without being... But...
So that's how you met the church.
But I saw this religious guy. I had heard about Scientology. And I thought, you have to be careful with those sects. And I thought, ah, here are these strange guys again.
They asked me on the street, do you believe in God? And what is the purpose of life? And I said, yeah, it's a difficult question. They said we have very interesting suggestions. And I said, yeah, but I'm busy.
I don't know. I don't know…
And they said, but you know, it's very science and religion to unite. This is very unique, new truth. I said, okay, listen to the guys. And they made a condition at that time, 10 minutes lecture. And every lecture there were about 10 guests. So, it was very active. And I was there, and the lecture explained in 10 minutes, there is a new truth on this earth, and this can unify science and religion, which I could not unify.
So as a scientific person, religion is, you cannot believe. They said there's a way, and the reason why this is possible is because the Messiah has returned. And I was shocked when I heard this. And I thought, what he just said.
That is a pile of clay …
And he said, if you want to know more about it, you come for the weekend workshop, and we explain. And I was very doubtful. I had, you know, I had long hair, a bit curly, I had a beard, and I looked very cool. And these young guys had all cut hair, and wearing a suit, and I said, what kind of strange people these are.
But their claim was like this, and I was waiting for the Messiah. So, they said, is there any question? And I raised my hand, and they said, I have only one question. And I said, what's his name? Because I thought, they're making up a story. Somehow. And they said, yeah, you know, you have to come to the workshop, and study The Principle, and then we'll explain. And I said, if you are true, and if you don't trick me, and if you say he returned, then tell me his name.
And they said, yeah, please come on weekend, and we'll explain. I said, okay, thank you, I'll go home. You are fake guys. And then he realized, it was strange for them, because there were other guests, and they didn't know what's going on, these guys were discussing. And then he said, he said a name, he said, Sun Myung Moon. And I didn't remember the name, but the moment he said that name, I was elevated to the other world.
It is an indescribable experience. The, how do you say, the shower of God's love embraced me, and I was, my soul was released of every burden, and I felt embraced by love, which I never had in my life, and I just didn't know what happened to me.
His name had a power…
And then I said to Sam, thank you very much, now every problem is solved, I go home now. He said, yeah, you have to come again. I said, why do you have to come again? The Messiah has returned! I told you the name! And I didn't still trust the guys. And I went home, and all the way home, I did not know how I came home, I was in that cloud. It was a miraculous experience.
It's almost like the Holy Spirit lifted you up.
But I didn't believe in the Holy Spirit, and I didn't believe in the spiritual world, but still I was embraced by blessing and love. And then again, I went out, and somebody witnessed me, another guy, and said, ah, do you know about the purpose of life? I said, ah, I've been at your church, I know already everything. I said, I don't need to come again. And he said, but you have to come to the workshop. I said, we discussed it, and I know everything. But he convinced me to come again, and they said, you have to come to the workshop.
I had so many questions. My question was, why, if God exists, why is there so much suffering in this world? In that age, between 15 years, and maybe, I was 18 years then, and maybe the first year in the church, almost 20 years, between 15 and 20 years, you could never see me smile. I trusted that it's very serious, and, how do you say, difficult. I had to learn to love.
Because I thought, in that age, there's so much suffering in this world, and you have no right to be happy. This was my... And I have to do something to release that suffering, but I don't know what. And I could not, you could not see me loving, also in the first workshops, in the first year in the church, nobody saw me loving. And then I went to the workshop, it was before Christmas, and it was, I think, a three-day workshop, and on the... I heard the Divine Principle, and the Fall of Man, that was like a revelation for me, I thought, wow, this was as if God had opened my spiritual eyes, it was like a hammer, and I thought, wow, all in this world comes from a sexual problem. And then he explained about the Restoration Principle, and the Cain and Able, and Jacob and Esau and Rebekah, and I said, this is a description of my family. It's my brother, and me, and my mother. Jacob and Esau and Rebekah. Is my brother, and me, and my mother. So, and I could see how to deal with my brother. And from that time on, I never, until this day, I never fight with my brother again. Never, never ever.
And it was so, so shocking, you know, I wanted to study and make my doctor's degree, and I was studying English, and French, and Russian, and I chewed, my whole day was planned out, and I did the social service.
Your life was like, all planned out, like a teacher.
I was running, I felt like running with 100 miles per hour, running on the highway, and then a big heavy wood came and hit me on the head, and said, go this way, please.
it was Christmas Day 1975, which is my birthday, and I understood the Lord has returned, and I said, yeah, that's what you have to do. And I realized, oh, Christ doesn't do everything. There is a suffering God, and we have to do something. And then there was another heavy load for me, because...
Yeah.
I was so happy that the Messiah has returned. Still I doubted God. Because my brain and my logic is in the way.
And my father's ancestors and my mother's ancestors have not found a solution. So, I had this, I felt somehow God opened my spiritual senses, but I didn't believe in spiritual senses. I thought it's only my thought and my intuition. And I could not pray, and I could not believe in the personal God so easily. So, this was my struggle. And then I made a deal with God. I said, okay, you have to show that you exist. I cannot just believe. But I don't know if you exist. But I have to find out. So, I said, I do as if you exist, and I pray. And the answer I receive in prayer, I will apply and see what the result will be.
And whenever I prayed, there was a very clear answer. It was very clear what I should do.
You experienced the Heavenly Father's love…
Yeah, so heavily. And then because I thought, I don't want to trick myself. You know, I had a difficult life, and I didn't want the religion to be like an opium for me.
Yeah.
To make my life easy. It must be true or not.
This was a dead serious question to me. So sometimes when I prayed, for instance, I prayed that I cut my hair. My hair was my most important symbol of my identity.
The long hair.
It was like this. And you know, cutting my hair is killing myself. Because all my friends knew me like that. And it was the most ugly thing in 1975 was a man with short hair. You can hide behind your hair, you know. But if the hair is uplifted, you can't hide behind your hair. So I prayed to God and the answer was clear, cut your hair. Sometimes I asked God, what should I do? And then I got an answer.
I always got an answer. But by purpose, I didn't do it. I said, I want to know if I don't follow my intuition, and I don't do it, then what? And always very strange things happen. Very bad result. There is always a conflict. Some problem. And I observed myself on the way to faith. You know, my father had difficulty to have faith and how to explain. But it kept repeating whenever I followed my prayers. It worked well, and I felt in peace, and I felt well. And if I did not do what I felt I should do, I got in conflict, I got stress, I got struggle. And I kept doing this, and by this I realized oh, there is a God.
And once I went home to my family, who didn't understand what I was crazy about. I cut my hair. They said, who did this to my son? I said, how could he cut his hair? And I went on the very beautiful nature on the river and I had read the Bible before, and it said when God created the universe there was chaos and God divided the land and the water, and the spirit of God hovered over the water.
And I looked at the river and the water, and God somehow was there. So I thought, yeah, okay. Seems I have to put my have a deal with myself to make my life more easy, because everything, every problem, every critical point, I always made difficult for myself. So I said, okay, it seems to be that there is a God and there is an intuition, and I had read through Father's words, he said the biggest gift of God is your intuition. And I said, okay. So I put my logic in my brain second, and I follow my intuition, because God works through my conscience.
And so, when I pray, there's always God in there, the living God. So I said, okay, so I believe in that guidance, and I just use my brain to check myself. I said, it looks like walking up the stairs, and the intuition, the presence of God gives me power to walk the stairs, the very steep stairs, and the brain is the rail. And the brain keeps me, so I dealt with myself like this, and I said, from that time on, I said, okay, I made a deal with God, I follow whatever you tell me to do, and my brain just makes sure that I don't do stupid things.
You don't fall out from the cliff.
I made a checklist. I said, the checklist for me, you know, following Reverend Moon, the Asian man, is completely craziness. And everybody said, this Korean guy is brainwashing you, that's a new Hitler. When I first saw fathers speaking, I saw this is like the appearance of Hitler.
When I showed my father a video of a father speaking in Bergen-Bergau, he said, yeah, this is so, Hitler spoke to us, and we fell for him, don't believe these guys. But I had all of this experience, so I made a deal, whenever I have to do strange things, you know, I had to leave my family, I had to end my studies, I had to end my judo training, I had to end my language training, all my dreams, all my career, everything, we, I, you know, we didn't even know about the blessing, the divine principles, that there's a fall, and there's a restorational principle. So, with 19 years old, I came to the conclusion that fall is the cause of all evil, and there's no solution, so I have to become a monk, and live as a monk to the end of my life.
And that's, you know, this is a very difficult decision for a young man. So, I went through this, and I made up my mind, to make such, make such a decision. And, this is, sounds very stupid thing, like my character is, if I decide like this, I will do for my life, you know, I don't change in 5 or 10 years. And, to make sure that my decisions are not stupid, I say, number one, is it from God? That's what I feel. Number two, does it bring peace to me, or conflict in my heart? Does it make me peace, or does it make me stress? Number three, is it in accordance with the Bible and the principle? Number four, is it to the goodness for others? Is it for the greater good, or is it for my personal benefit? And then, if I clicked every decision just for points, I said, OK. Then, I do like this, and if I find out I'm wrong, then I can correct any time.
This is the most stupid and most wrong thing you could do in my situation, to follow an Asian Messiah, a sect with young people who have cut their hair and wear suits. I gave up all my ambition. So, for me, it felt that I am dead. I am dead. And my life is over. And there is no more joy. It was not joyful joining the church. There is no more joy. And there is indemnity to be paid for all.
Since there is indemnity to be paid, somebody has to do it. And in my life, it has shown that God has protected me and blessed me. So, I have a responsibility in front of my ancestors and brothers and sisters. So, I have to do, even if it's the most hard thing in my life, join the church center.
We lived in one flat. It was the flat of King Louis II of Bavaria. There lived maybe 50 brothers and sisters in one flat. We slept on the floor and we did business every day after work. one night I had, you know, I could see, I could see spiritually, but I didn't believe what I saw.
And I had this crack within me, within my intuition and God's love, my soul and my logic and my father and my mother still fighting in me. And then in one night, it was not only a dream, it was a spiritual experience. A hand came and gave the medicine, called the Balm, the spiritual balm and healed that crack in my soul. And I woke up and I felt healed. It is very difficult to describe.
So that was the healing hand that came down to heal your illness.
And several experiences by that and now and there was one voice in the back of my mind whenever I sit in the workshops and I heard this and I thought, oh, this life is going to be tough. I gave up, I donated all, I had a car and a guitar, and I gave everything away and I became a monk. But in the back of my mind, there was a voice telling me, don't be, how do you say, don't be sad, there is a time of indemnity and when you get old, you will be blessed. This voice accompanied me and comforted me and that's how I kept going. So, I made my life.
You love your guitar, you love your car, I'm sure. Some people might say that's a position for people, for a person, a poor balm boy who did not have a balm in your family. And having those little possessions is so precious. For you to giving up those things, you're giving up your entire property.
I gave up my property and my old self, my ambitions, everything.
And then you had a good news, good news, you could get blessed, you don't have to be a monk.
Yeah, maybe after six months, between six and ten months, there were some people with ring, and they said there is a blessing and there will be. So, I thought, okay, maybe I have to be a monk for the next seven years or so. There is a blessing. So, step by step through this experience, my burden became light and I became God showed me and I became more light and joyous.
You also had an experience seeing True Father as the Messiah. You had that confirmation. Can we also hear about that too?
Yeah, I mean the first thing, you know, this experience when hearing father's name, it is an indescribable and you cannot erase that impact. That struck my soul and my whole being. And, you know, coming from that kind of suffering background to having that kind of hope, it just filled me up and whenever there was all the negative media, 1976, this was the peak and we hear bad news about Reverend Moon every day. And I wanted to not follow a false Messiah.
So even I believed in the Messiah, still I had to clarify all these points. Is it true? And it just, you know, maybe after two years or so, I said, how stupid am I? God blessed me so abundantly and this blessing came through Reverend Moon, and he healed me and he gave me hope and he gave me faith. So why do I continue to deny or follow every criticism? Why should I trick myself like that? And I made a deal with myself and I said, I believe in my own experience.
I had other kinds of experience when I was going to work. You know, we weren't sleeping much. We were working and then we did witnessing and we had everyday program and went to bed at 12 o'clock and get up at 6 and go to work. It was very hard, so I felt always very tired and I went with the subway to the work, to the hospital. And during drive, I fell asleep and every station I wake up. Like this, going for two minutes, wake up. Fell asleep, wake up. And I had this question in my mind. Reverend Moon is brainwashing us.
He is a businessman and he is brainwashing us and stealing our money. And I had this question. Why is it true? And when I fell asleep, this thought in my mind became a person talking to me. Reverend Moon is a betrayer. He is he steals your money. He manipulates you. And there was another person that answering him, but that is not true. You learn the faith through him. And the two people were fighting.
And in the process of waking up, it became my own thoughts again. And then I fell asleep again and my thoughts the two people discussing or five people discussing is fine. And then I fell asleep and these people discussing. And then next station I wake up and it became my own soul. So I had all this kind of experience and said, oh, I am tricked by the spirits. And I don't let myself be tricked.
And I learned to do the witnessing with joy and participate in all programs, and I thought it's the joy of the life to serve the Lord and just had actually some wonderful brothers and sisters who saw me suffering and helped me a bit. So, in that kind of all my difficult experience could be resolved.
You can talk about your struggle. Before you had nobody, right?
But even in the church there were brothers and sisters when I talked to them and tried to talk about the seriousness of what is the Divine Principle and about faith and my struggle of faith then there was some sister who said, you know, it's true, I believe it. And I said, wow, what a gift to have a simple faith.
We struggle to have that simple faith.
But I remember my mother and I admired her very much. I always respected my mother and I felt my strength, my spiritual strength comes from my mother's ancestry and my battle, my fight comes from my father's burden. So, I said, okay, there's some work to do. And in this sense, I grew and became, for me this whole decision because all the conflict about our church, all the experience of bad leaders leaving the church, that didn't affect me. Because I said, it's not the leader because I'm here. It's not the leader I'm doing that. It was my own decision.
Of course, my goodness.
So I made my life very complicated, myself. But through making it so complicated, it became very strong. Nothing could shatter me. Whatever happened, all the bad things you hear about Rev. Moon, I studied everything, I checked the background, and I compared it to how God guided my life, and there are points in the Divine Principle and with True Father that cannot be answered by logic.
There's moments of faith. Now when the father asked him about the negative people asked him about six marriages. The father's answer is I never acted against God's law. He did not explain. So this is only based on faith. In our church, in the Unification Church, you don't talk much about faith.
You talk about the logic of Divine Principle and the Restoration Principle, but not about the importance of faith. But from my experience, I realized there is an element of faith and there is nobody who can help you. You have to make that faith decision, not only once, but there are several crossroads in your life, and you are completely on your own, and you have, in the end, it's a question of faith.
So there are points I didn't understand about what Rev. Moon did. I met Father the first time at my blessing after four years. I'd never seen him before.
But there have been through the experience of God in my life, it is proof this only happened because I checked everything around Rev. Moon and whenever I checked it, according to those points, it confirmed. So, I said, OK, in the moment of difficulty to believe, I said, Ok, I believe until I know. The faith is covering the time in between not knowing and experience and knowing. And the faith is the means to make the bridge between the not knowing and the experience.
For instance, when my father taught me swimming, I thought I will sink in the water. And he said, you can swim. And I believed my father. And through the faith and trust in my father, I learned to swim. And so, I learned the faith is the element to bridge the thing you don't know.
And that's what we need to understand in a life of faith. And I think that's maybe a struggle I went through as a typical German guy and maybe many other young men will have such similar questions and struggles. And that's what carried me and what helped me.
So, did you get the answer for following True Father for 40, 50 years? So, what's your answer?
Yeah, he is the... I mean, Jesus Christ was my first saviour. And True Father is the completion that returned Christ. So, it is absolutely clear for me that my life was saved by True Father. If I wouldn't follow him, I knew what kind of guy I was. And I would make many wrong decisions in my life. And I think I would have run in a lot of conflict in relationships. Maybe in my marriage it would have become difficult, or with my children it would have become difficult, or in my work it would have become difficult because I was, I inherited the trauma from my father and I was a person easy to upset and very angry to see such things, and then I fight. And this I completely put aside and I found another way to deal with that.
The church you like to provide. It shaped you.
It shaped me.
And then you were able to smile.
Yeah.
You found a logical way why you have to smile.
You know, I had one big regret in the church. I was an ambitious young guy and I liked to learn other languages and I wanted to travel the world and through father I always made this international team. But for some reason I always had to stay in Germany. I was always the one who was left to do the duty because there were a few Germans. And I regretted those people who have met father many times and they had all these wonderful experiences and I met Father maybe seven times in my life and it was that was maybe only four or five years ago when we celebrated in Pennsylvania and there was I think it was Shigeru's mother she was explaining about the time in the seventies being with father and I just sat there and thought, oh I didn't have that experience. I was the guy who did the duty on the backside. And then at that moment True father came to me and said, don't worry you didn't need to be with me, because I live in you. And that in that moment that dissolved all regrets I had and I was very released, you know.
You know, when you have, when we have a Holy Spirit experience like that you know, it's only those voice can be explained as a Holy Spirit because we were in like a totally so sure about our emotion or whatever state we are in, but as we heard that voice I became completely washed from my negative state and then he just changed it right away instantly. So, you know I had several experiences like that and then I realized this can be only explained by Holy Spirit.
It's the Holy Spirit; it's the God touching our heart and touching our soul and that is what I try to explain my children when they have difficulty or when they are struggling. I understand that life is difficult and they live in this society. I know what I went through, so I know what they are going through and I just to try to convey this experience to them.
Thank you so much. I've known you for a long time, but we never really had a chance to talk about this issue and seeing you always like very focused and very like meticulous and always planned and you have ABCD to Z and all figured it out and then I've known you like that for so many years. I know I know how difficult it would have been to follow your Father as Messiah but at the same time God is so good and He really, He really met you and He really was with you.
I made a book for myself. The book says, “Prayers fulfilled.”
Oh, I love those.
It's a long, long list and I just feel so blessed and even I think nobody if I explain about my life nobody wants to have my life but still, I wouldn't change anything. I think God's blessing is incredible and now I'm old and I feel very, very blessed and so many miracles happened in my life and even with my children going that way I cannot do but maybe my children sometimes we have our fight about logic and I'm not good in apologetics because I focused solving those questions with God and not with logic but the young guys want to have a more logical explanation and they complain, some of my sons complain to me, why you cannot explain?
Why are you so hokey pokey? What's wrong with you?
And then I understand I have to learn about apologetics and I have to use my logic and fight I understand and I listen to them and they work hard on me and sometimes I fight them but then I think about it and say oh my sons are right I have to improve in that field but nevertheless and I felt I see how difficult it is to experience the living God in your life and then I feel so humbled and so thankful that God gave me such a life and that's the only thing that I can pass on to my children sometimes when they have a difficult discussion and they doubt certain things in our approach, they don't doubt God they don't doubt True Father but they doubt our methods and they are right our methods are sometimes too old fashioned they don't fit the new time this is right but I ask them, do you really think you can defeat the devil alone with a method? Maybe we need something beyond the method we need to be willing to pay a price to be allowed to receive God I think God cannot reveal himself to us if we don't pay a price and that willingness must come from the volunteer heart, it cannot come by duty or by push that's why I raised my kids I tried to raise them as free as possible I did not push anything I just try to explain about my life and observe their life and discuss with them the difficulties that are on their way and I think I am very incomplete in that there is a lot for the next generation to convey what our true Father and God and Christ gave us it needs much better explanation and much better methods and I try to work on that.
In the end in the end I love that metaphor in the end you have to jump to God in the end you can build up all your logic whatever, whatever, whatever but in the end I think it's a slightly different expression but I think in the end we are talking about the same thing, you know you have to make that final jump you don't know, you are not sure 100% but you continue to go on because you know what I know this was the God's hand, otherwise I would not be here, that experience carry you on and that only can be explained this was the Holy Spirit God's hand who helped me and then that's why I continue in the end I think that's true make us keep going right?
But I think it's a gift you know, that we didn't earn by ourselves, when I still am in good contact with my brothers and sisters we gave the blessing to all of them and my parents and my relatives but I can see how difficult it is and I just think a lot of indemnity that was paid, my father had a terrible life and I received a gift and that was not, God was not able to fully give to everyone and that that is our responsibility to preach that and be willing to share that blessing, so as long as my brothers and sisters and my relatives don't fully understand I keep going and pray that God can touch their heart and they will find their way and the same with the kids and in the end it's not me and it's not my…
That is so true, a lot of parents ask me, oh, you know, it's amazing, all your children got blessed and many times my answer is, you know what it was purely God's grace that I have not done what I deserve I can only say just God's blessing there is nothing I can take the credit for.
And sometimes God sends other people, like the apologetics of the king or even what's the guy Alex Jones, you know or the political or this French philosopher the king meant what's his name so God sends other people that help our kids and that I think we need to be just humble and pray that God can protect them.
Amen. So you've been sharing so many miracles I would not have to ask this question, but the next question will be, how has your life changed before you met your father as a Messiah?
I think the obvious thing is I learned to be joyful
Oh
I would be very serious I think much more serious, he wouldn't see me smile so much I learned to control my thoughts, you know before I just lived in the world and I dealt with every thought and every idea and everything I saw, and I learned to protect myself and I don't want to see certain things I disciplined we didn't have the Buddhist training we didn't have the internal guidance it's just by necessity I said, I don't need to deal with this negativity, I don't need to deal with this issue so when I'm through the divine principle so I call it a sword, to the sword of truth, I can save my energy I would much lose a lot of energy dealing with a lot of unnecessary things so I consider the most element that inspired me about True Father beyond that spiritual capacity and that spiritual experience was his strength and his power I said, oh, he doesn't allow the negativity to bring him down I watched, observed him from the distance I saw all the negativity, all the media and I always watched him, how he responds, and I said, that's something I want to learn from him that's such strength and such power and I had a lot, you know I'm 69 soon and I feel physically very healthy, but I had a very all kinds of sickness and problems, and my physical health, I think is due to that strength that is given by Christ and True Father, and who gave me the ability to to, how to say differentiate, discern what comes to me.
You are such a divine person
My last miracle maybe I want to mention once I had severe cramps in my prostate maybe 40 years old the prostate can cramp and it's super painful and I had those cramps and it's very, very painful and at one night I fell asleep and I saw a demon catching my prostate and squeezing it and in that dream I was able to push the demon out of my body just out of my skin it stayed here, but out of my skin, and from that moment on I never had any cramp in my prostate and it was healed so this is all I think I would be much weaker I would have all kinds of physical problems
So, God literally came down and healed you.
As we do the closing of the interview is there anything any closing remark you want to do to our audience?
I just would encourage everybody to not be afraid what's ahead of you and take fight for your face and through the face you will find hope, and through the hope you will find the ability to love this is my experience and don't be discouraged by the difficulty the difficulty is God's blessing or the prize God gives you that allows him to bless you.
And difficulty come, rejoice
for me the pain that I learned in civil service I worked with handicapped people who were handicapped from the head on so they did not feel any pain in their body and in the night when they slept they had one leg on the other and there was they hurt their own leg because they didn't feel the pain and I realized, oh, the pain is the gift of God to protect me so of course we forget that but I try to live with that don't shy away from pain and from difficulty because the pain is God's gift to behave so that you can be blessed and I'm very thankful to Jesus Christ and to Father and everybody who supported him I want to create, I said a gallery of ancestors of faith okay thank you very much you are surely in there the second thing is very precious what he is doing and he helps us again to discern more and don't fall for this stupid manipulation of this world it's not only Father's doing it's his lineage the lineage is a thing that the western person has no concept of and I learned this through working with Kook Jin Nim and the second king that in the book of Revelation it says, when the battle is done then God will come down to his people he will wipe away all tears and there will be the stream of living water which nourishes his children and the stream of living water I realized that his lineage.
It's all about lineage, you actually know bible
So, I'm very grateful thank you for inviting me and I hope it can help someone who is struggling with some of these questions.
We'll leave it up to Holy Spirit but I'm sure there is somebody that your words can be the voice of the Holy Spirit
Thank you so much once again.
Thank you for being able to share our interview now we'll see you again with the next interview thank you so much, bye bye,
Thank you very much.
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