Date: 23 September 1997

STRENGTHEN YOUR FAITH IN GOD


Embodiments of Love!

By giving up his ego, a man becomes lovable. An egoistic man cannot command love of others. He may be affluent, occupying high position or very intelligent. Even his wife and children will not love him. Once he sheds his ego, he is assured of universal love.

By giving up anger, a man will be free of suffering. All men desire to be free of suffering. They undertake many spiritual pursuits like penances, yagas and yagnas to be rid of sufferings. But none of these efforts is of any avail, so long as a man is under the sway of anger. Ravana was a great devotee. He was the embodiment of valour and courage. He could conquer the entire world. But he was not free of suffering because he was full of anger. An angry man can never be successful in any attempt. He will face a number of problems and gain a bad name.

Desire is detrimental to the attainment of wealth. A man of excessive desire forgets himself, becomes arrogant and turns mad. The Goddess of wealth, Lakshmi will never be near him. Once he exercises ceiling on desires all wealth would follow him.

Greed and happiness never go together. Duryodana and Duchasana were cut off from pleasure. To realise happiness we have to give up greed and develop the spirit of sacrifice. Thus it is seen ego, anger, desire and greed have to be given up to experience true happiness.

This tumbler is full of water. To fill it up with milk, we have first to empty the water in it. Similarly, the human mind is stuffed with ego, anger, desire greed and such other weaknesses. It should be emptied first, to fill it up with spiritual knowledge.

Time flees like the wild wind. The life span of an individual keeps shrinking like the melting ice. Man lives ignorant of the aim of his life and dies before realising it. He is put to suffering and restlessness, mainly because he is blind to its value and purpose. Everything in this world has its value. So too is human life. It is a privileged state. Everyman should make efforts to know its purpose and realise it. To waste it, without realising its purpose is disgraceful.

God is one, but he manifests in various forms and names. The scriptures declare that truth is one, but scholars interpret it in many ways. There is only one sun, but its reflection in water kept in different vessels seems to be different depending on what the vessel is made of -- gold, silver, brass, earth or wood. Similarly one God assumes different names and forms -- Rama, Krishna, Govinda, Narayana and Sai -- depending on your feelings and sentiments. Names and forms are many but God is one.

And the same God dwells in every human body. He is the indweller, the charioteer and the human body the chariot.

Human life can also be explained through the analogy of a car. The car has four wheels and tyres. Human life has four objectives called the Purusharthas -- dharma, artha, kama and moksha. The tyres are filled with air and human life with faith. The wheels are controlled by the steering wheel and human life by the mind. Human intellect is comparable to the switch, the stomach to the engine and food to petrol.

Human Body is the chariot and God is the charioteer driving the chariot. When we realise this we will reach the destination, the fulfilment of our lives.

Dr.Gadhia in his talk explained Bhur Bhuvah Suwaha as Bhooloka, Bhuvarloka and Suwarloka. These three are not separate regions. They are within us. Bhur -- the earth and the human body stand for materialisation. The body has ingredients like lime, lead and soap. But these are of no great value. The next one is Bhuvah. To make the body work we require energy or power. It is vibration. And the third one is Suwaha. Life is the source of the energy and it is connected to the energy. It is radiation. so, materialization, vibration and radiation are aspects that represent the body. They are all - pervasive and interrelated. We forget their vastness and their connection and go by the externals, and so we suffer.

Let us imagine that a borewell is dug for water supply in a village. They must install pipe lines to connect the well to the storage tank and the tank to the supply points. Imagine a situation where a minister is invited to inaugurate this drinking water supply. A silver vessel is set under a golden tap. The minister opens the tap, but no water flows. The reason is that the tap is not connected to the tank.

Similarly, many of us chant the glory of God for any length of time, without knowing its connection to our heart and its feelings. It will be a futile exercise. Ravana circumambulated the temple of Lord Shiva, and chanted his name thousands of times. It was more of a mechanical exercise and had not been connected to his heart's feelings. Therefore he remained a demon through out. Hru + daya = Hrudaya. Heart is the seat of compassion. But the heart of Ravana was rough and hard like a stone. Those who sing the glory of God without wholehearted feeling, resemble Ravana in this practice.
We should fill our hearts with divine love. Our only aspiration should be to be worthy recipients of God's love. If we pray for material gains, the attachment still remains on external things. To redeem our life we should turn inward and change our feelings. It is not enough if we change our personality. Our mind should be transformed.

The other day Bhagavan narrated the story of Ramananda Theertha. He decided to be a renunciant. He settled down on Chitrakoota mountain and began to propagate his spiritual principles. His teachings were so attractive that many from the neighbouring regions were drawn to him. One day in the large gathering, his wife was also present. When Ramananda looked at her, he turned his eyes away from her. At the end of the lecture, his wife came to him and said, "I came to you considering you to be a noble soul and renunciant. But your feelings do not seem to have changed; you still look upon me as your wife." Ramananda realised his mistake and decided to have a thorough mental transformation worthy of his role of an ascetic.

Life-long spiritual endeavours may be of no use, if they have not brought about a change in inner feelings. Sitting in the congregation like this, if you are worried about your family, what is the use? You should direct your mind on God, then your spiritual pursuits would be fulfilled.

You have to discipline your senses properly, or they will remain permanently drawn to things of the outer world. Our mind is a mighty elephant. You should have the God's name as the strong Ankush -- the iron rod -- to keep it under control. We should have strong faith in the efficacy of God's name. Sometimes you have faith and at others you have it not. When you breathe in air you live, and when you breathe out you die. You do it 21,600 times everyday. This is not the right way to live. You should lead an ideal life that is in conformity with what is approved by our sacred texts, receive admiration of everyone and satisfy your own self.

All the sufferings you undergo are not worthwhile if you are satisfied with a very ordinary life. No, you must aspire to lead a true human life. In everything you do, your conscience should be your guide. You must maintain the harmony of thought, word and deed. When you do a ritual or sing God's name, do it wholeheartedly. Offering flowers to God with hand, you allow your mind to wander around the market. That is no genuine prayer.

Therefore, worship the Feet of the Lord, the padhukas with full concentration. Bharata, receiving the sandals of Sri Rama, went to a village, built a hut there and worshipped the divine sandals with wholehearted dedication for fourteen years. That was his effort to realise the objective and purpose of life. Such efforts are sure to be crowned with liberation.

Everything that happens, is God's will. Good and bad are God's gifts. But your broad-mindedness will give you positive results.

Annamacharya sang that how one lives is more important than how long. God's grace is sure to manifest with reference to your efforts. A small vessel cannot take the entire water of the river Ganga. You can carry water only to the size of the vessel you bring with you. So your understanding of divinity will be proportionate to your broad-mindedness. The mind is all-pervasive and can expand to the extent of the universe.

Though the mind moves around the world, it has not learnt the secret of the world. It thinks of the creation and not the creator. You see the diversity of creation and get lost in that. What avails? You go to different pilgrim centres Badrinath, Kedarnath, Amarnath, Tirupati, Puttaparthi etc. Such pilgrimages are undertaken for mental satisfaction. They do not result in the realisation of the truth. So give up the mind or withdraw from it. You will realise the bliss. Think steadily on what you should achieve and nothing else. In the Mahabharata, we have an episode that illustrates this point. Dronacharya was the preceptor of the Pandava and Kaurava princes. After having taught them for sometime, he wanted to test the proficiency each had attained in what he taught them. One day he wanted to test them in archery. He tied a bird up on the branch of a tree. He asked Duryodana what he saw. He replied, " I see the tree, the branches, the leaves, the sky and everything else."

The same question was put to the rest of them and all of them gave more or less the same answer. It was Arjuna's turn. He said, "Except the bird, I don't see anything else. " Concentration on the target gave him all the titles he won in life. So concentrate on what you want. Realising God is your aim. God is the embodiment of love. When you develop love within you, you will find him. He is with you, in you, around you, above you and below you. He is here, there and everywhere. So, you need not go anywhere in search of him.

Develop the vision of love; you will be able to see him. In order to get a good harvest, you should have good rains and sow the seeds. One in the absence of the other will not result in good cropping. Both should be there together. In the same way, sow the seeds of God's name and have the rain of love for God realisation. Gopikas sang, "Our hearts are barren without love. O, Krishna sow the saplings of love and irrigate them with the rain of love." The hearts of Gopikas were pure, and steady.

They prayed, "O Krishna, sing for us with your nectarine words. Converse with us and make us happy. Extracting the essence of the Vedas, transform it into melodious music of your flute." This is full of symbolic significance. Our body is the flute. It has nine openings as the holes of the flute. Once it is offered wholeheartedly to God, we can become his supple flute whence he could blow soul-animating strains.

If every individual has such an attitude then the whole society will be in tune and it would result in fine music. In other words, they will experience fulfilment in life.

The body of man is gifted to him by God to serve others. Service is the most important thing. Love All. Serve All. That is the best way to serve God. We should render service to everyone, without any likes and dislikes. It is natural for us as human beings to have likes and dislikes. But we should change. Even if someone hates us, we should not carry any ill will towards him. We should respond with love and greet him as a friend. Then his hatred will come to an end. With this sort of love, we can transform our mind. Chanting of the names of the Lord, singing of bhajans and hymns and worshipping should all be preceeded by the change of our heart.

For wholehearted love of God, Thyagaraja would serve as a good example. The kind of relation he expressed towards Rama is that of an intimate friend. Only with an intimate friend we can take liberty and address him in informal language in singular number. On finding the idol of Rama in the river, Cauveri, after a long period of separation, bursts forth into an ecstatic song of welcoming him home. So, Rama to him is a long time friend. God is your only true friend. Other friends will think of your money and position. But God thinks of your sacredness and love. The relationship between God and you is internal.

There is no necessity to search for Him in the outside world. Turn inward, you will find him there. As a matter of fact everything is latent within you. The whole universe is a big text, your own heart your teacher and the all powerful time is your preceptor. If you turn your torch in front of you, you will see the person on whom you direct the light. If you turn it towards you, you can identify yourself. So long as your look is external, you will see the world. Once you turn your vision inward, you will identify everything within you.

The cosmic form of the Divine is the human being himself. Such a powerful person considers himself weak. Let us sanctify and make every limb of our body sacred. Tulsidas protested to Rama, for having rendered him crippled. His disciples were surprised at this self-denigration, as they found every limb of their master in perfect condition. Tulsidas explained to them, "Having hands, I am not able to serve Rama. I have eyes but I am not able to see Him. I have ears in vain. They don't listen to the melodious music and divine words of God. Therefore am I crippled in every limb."

It is with such strong inner feelings that a true devotee approaches God with all humility. Because of the effect of the Kali age, many proclaim themselves to be great devotees. Even Saint Thyagaraja suffered from such an illusion. In a moment of despair he cried out that either his Bhakti or the Sakthi of God was deficient. Otherwise would not Rama manifest in front of him, he thought. On further enquiry he was confirmed of his own devotion. He had to argue within himself, before he was convinced that there was no limitation to Rama's powers. With His blessings the monkey could cross the mighty ocean and fight against a mountain. Goddess Lakshmi serves him always. Intelligent Lakshmana and Bharata serve him with great devotion. This enquiry made him realise his folly in doubting the power of his Lord and he craved forgiveness.

At the moment of diffculty man becomes weak. He may be weak in other respects, but he should never be weak in his faith in God. He should resist the temptation and proceed with strong faith as a true human being. Then he will be victorious and he will become the recipient of divine power.

Embodiments of Love! Develop faith in God more and more. Faith in material things will betray you. But your faith in God will help you cross the ocean of life, and you will become a model for others.