South Korea
The Arise & Shine Global Bible Seminar for University Students 2019 was held at the New Jerusalem Pangyo Temple on a hot summer day of July 12. More than 2,200 people, including young adults in the capital area of Korea and overseas university students who study the truth with great fervor, attended the seminar where nine university students from New Zealand, Ukraine, U.S., Finland, Mexico, Mozambique, India, and Chile made presentations.
“Seven billion people, living today with uncertainty, don’t have the faintest idea of what will happen next. On the contrary, we’ve received the teachings of God Elohim and sure answers to our past, present, and future. Let’s arise and shine the light of truth (Isa 60:1),” said General Pastor Kim Joo-cheol in his opening address.
With presentations titled The Newest Name, Bystander and the First Penguin, God’s Providence in the Honeycomb, With the Crowd or With the Truth, etc. grounded on their majors such as mathematics, accounting, and social science, the speakers intelligibly explained the existence of God. They used various ways to demonstrate the teachings of the Bible, for example, experiments, statistics, videos, and historical cases, and inspired senses of ethics and duty as Christians and intellectuals.
“People and companies have their names and each name has a big influence. The name of the Savior who is directly related to the life of our soul is of utmost importance and only the Bible can teach us the name. Since we’ve received the Savior through the Bible before others, we have a mission to preach the Savior’s name to the whole world,” said Ilona Elisa Inkeri Suominen, who studies social sciences at the University of Helsinki in Finland.
“The debt cancelation system to relieve desperate debtors with enormous debts and interest appears in the Bible. It is the law of the new covenant. God established it by sacrificing His life to save spiritual sinners in danger of eternal death due to their sins. Just as God who is love has saved us without cost, let’s lead seven billion people to the way of the forgiveness of sins,” said Elias Americo Massicame, who studies accounting at the Universidade Politecnica in Mozambique.
Whenever presenters made conclusions with sound logic and confidence, the audience cheered and clapped. “The Bible teaches not only the existence of God but also life lessons. One of my dreams is to become a teacher. I want to guide my students so that they can go through a stormy period of adolescence safely,” said Brother Mun Seong-min (studying English education at Hongik University in Korea) after the seminar.