In 1974, our major project was traveling to Dallas, Texas, to open a center and prepare for True Father’s American speaking tour. I took a team of 10 members and we rented a house in an exclusive neighborhood. We quickly found out why this house in such an exclusive location was available for rent.

When we walked through the house, all the members felt “cold spots” in three different 2-foot square areas.  A few of the members were spiritually open and would not sleep in the house that first night. The five of us that did had violent, evil dreams all night long.

Dr. Sheftick’s team arrived the next day with about 25 members. Within a few hours many were arrested and the vans confiscated. We were in the wrong place, at the wrong time. When we were released, we retreated to a seminary on the outskirts of Dallas in which we worked from in preparation for TF’s speech.

When the national level advance team arrived, the leader asked who the state leader was. When I raised my hand, he told me I was fired, along with my assistant state leader. The humiliation and treatment I received was very challenging to my life of faith. If it had not been for Daikon Onuki taking me out for a meal and buying me a suit, I might have left Dallas.

When TF arrived a few days later and learned that first night I had been fired, he demanded I immediately be called to join the evening meal. He then chastised the regional and national leaders for their treatment of me and said they had been wrong. He reinstated me. I felt so deeply touched by the fact that Sun Myung Moon was so open spiritually and connected to HF that he could know and see through “false” accusations. Of course, this knowing of my innocence and my inner spiritual world by TF bound my heart and loyalty ever so tightly to him as my caring, wise, personal father. He cemented his fatherly care later the next day when I was riding in a car with him sight-seeing and he reached back to lock my car door for my protection.

Well, the spirit world progressively told me she would make a good wife for me and I, in turn, told these beings they were wrong. Over time, however, they convinced me that she had very special qualities that would be good for my wife to have.  After being in training under Rev. David Kim for about 8 months, Nanette and I found ourselves leading a team in Albany, NY. After I had settled the team in their rooms, I went and brought dinner for them. When I brought the food to Nanette and set it on a table, I went into a spiritual state of infinite peace, which progressed into a feeling that I was in the presence of my wife who I had already been married to for a great many years. After some time, I awoke from this euphoria and realized I was in the room of a sister and quickly left. I kept this experience to myself.

The next day, I received a call from Belvedere that Nanette and I needed to quickly fill out application forms for the matching that would be held in Korea soon. We helped each other fill the forms, encouraged each other to smile for instant photos at Kmart, and we mailed the forms in the same envelope. Shortly after, we found ourselves on an airplane bound for Korea.

I was in a confused state of mind whether I should tell TF that God and the spirit world had been telling me Nanette should be my wife, but that she was not my personal choice. Later, in the matching room, when it was soon to be my turn to be matched, I kept raising my hand halfway up and then down repeatedly, not sure what to do. David Kim saw this and asked me what was up, and then TF questioned what was happening. I explained what I had been receiving and that it was not my will. TF looked back and forth at Nanette and me three times and then said, “Very busy” regarding Nanette’s character, and then said, “Good match.” 

We went into the matching candidates’ conference room and she asked me just one question, “Can you John, promise me you will never leave the movement?” I answered, “Yes!” Well, later, after the blessing ceremony I learned from Nanette that she had heard the voice two years earlier in Maryland saying, “there goes your future husband.” She had forgotten it until just then. From that point, we became as two lovebirds deep in romantic, mystical love, although we were the opposite in so many ways. She would never consider going fishing and putting a worm on a hook. She had an extreme fear of water where my entire childhood centered around the ocean. I would have never considered wasting my time in an art museum, which is where her teenage years centered around.

“Marriage supper of the Lamb”, only it was a gigantic cake for hundreds of couples getting married at the same time.She called my mother and found out about our being in Korea for the, mass wedding. My aunt did not know at the time I was getting married or of our movement’s mass wedding ceremonies.

All of the 1800 American couples that were going out as foreign missionaries as part of the blessing condition spent 120 days in Barrytown being mentored by True Father each morning and the rest of the day by Rev. Sudo. I was just in heaven receiving love from both True Father and my love mate until near the end of the 120 day workshop when it was announced a workshop photo would be taken.

Frankly, I did not understand many things True Father was explaining and the meaning of brothers being in the Archangel position before our three day ceremony. For the workshop photo, we were asked to gather with our team. I did not want to do this. I wanted my picture with my beloved wife standing beside me so when I was alone in the foreign mission I could see a visualization of our love. Nanette united with the direction to join with one’s team for the photo and my pleas were rejected. I got filled with the Archangel’s feeling of rejection, loneliness and selfishness.

After the photo session, I ran into the surrounding woods, filled with rage, hitting trees and bushes. I was basically possessed, and so began my course of the archangel’s feelings I would face and its restoration. To my comfort, at the end of the missionary training a group picture was taken of those who graduated the workshop and who would be going out as missionaries. It was then I was able to get that historic photo beside my blessed wife.

When we drew lots for the country we would pioneer, I was devastated when Nanette and I drew countries on the complete opposite sides of the earth; Nanette picked the Bahamas and I picked the Philippines. Because of this, I used “connections” to re-draw my country out of the ones not taken yet, and God pulled a “”Jonah and the whale” restoration providence on me. I was put into the whale’s belly for reflection and repentance, or should I say the fire and desert of Kuwait, until I could change my archangelic-hardened heart and seek only Heavenly Father’s Will rather than receiving love from my wife. I then found books to read on Islam, Arabs and Kuwait, and prepared for the worst, having acquired a stereotypical Judeo/Christian view about the mission country I was headed to.