Posted on: 07 Feb 2010
The only one point that hinders the fall of God’s grace on you is the instantaneous desire of the human being, which is always directed towards selfish end. The love on God is expressed as devotion by most of the human beings. The intensity of the devotion of these devotees is also of very high order. You think that the intensity of devotion decides the generation of God’s grace. You think that the highest intensity of the devotion will bring the highest fruit from God. God is not pleased with the intensity of the devotion. He is pleased only by the purity of devotion. Purity means lack of any trace of desire in the direction of selfishness. The moment you think about your need from God, the impurity of devotion begins. As long as you think about the need of God from you, your devotion remains pure. Of course, God does not need anything from anybody. But this point is hidden by the tactics of God by which the need of God is created and appears clearly before you. The statue of Rama without any shelter was seen by Ramdas. He felt the need of shelter for the statue. In fact, an inert stone carved as statue does not require any shelter since it is a non-living object. Atheists thought like this and rejected the idea of shelter for the statue. Even theists, who thought that the statue is God, also neglected the need of shelter because God being the shelter for the entire creation does not require any shelter. But, Ramdas took the statue as living form of God and worked for constructing the shelter for God. In that case, how much need is there for the actual living form of God? If you think that no need exists for God, it is only a clever way of escaping the service to God.
Often, people avoid service to God stating that God does not require any service from anybody. Ramdas constructed the temple for the sake of the statue of Rama. This love in the form of service is pure, because Ramdas did not aspire anything in return from such service. There are several kings, who constructed bigger temples than the temple constructed by Ramdas. Such huge temples may be bigger in construction, but all these temples are smaller than the temple of Ramdas, because the temple of Ramdas is the only one that was constructed without any aspiration in return. Therefore, the temple of Ramdas may not be the biggest, but it is the purest. No doubt, the size of the temple shows the size of service to God, which is proportional to the intensity of devotion on God. Therefore, I say that God is not pleased with the size of service and corresponding intensity of devotion. He is pleased only with the purity of the service, which is nothing but lack of any desire to be fulfilled with the help of God. The devotion of demons shows wonderful depth and intensity. Ravana cuts all his heads and offers as flowers to the lotus feet of the Lord. Kannappa, the devoted hunter, plucks his eyes to be offered to God. One can live without eyes, but not without head. Hence, Ravana should be a greater devotee than Kannappa. But, the truth is otherwise. Ravana cannot stand even at the feet of Kannappa. The reason is that Kannappa plucked his eyes without any aspiration in return. Ravana offered his heads to please God in order to get some selfish boons. The sacrifice of Ravana is far higher than the sacrifice of Kannappa. But, the devotion of Ravana is impure and the devotion of Kannappa is pure. Arjuna used God in his service. But, Hanuman used himself in the service of God. God is pleased with Hanuman and therefore, Hanuman has several temples in which he is worshipped as God. There is no single temple for Arjuna, who is never worshipped as God. Arjuna worshipped God for his selfish victory. Hanuman worshipped God by participating in the war for the victory of God. This single aspect is the life of your entire effort to please God.
Samskara of Millions of Births
From millions of births, the human being is so much involved in the fulfillment of his personal aspiration that even the bones of the human being after death, shall ask for the fulfillment of some personal desire, if an opportunity is granted. Shirdi Sai Baba told that after His death, the bones of His body will speak and clarify the doubts of devotees. This is true because He was spiritual preacher from millions of births and hence, even His bones have the habit of answering the doubts. Similarly, any human being is a beggar for the fulfillment of personal desires and therefore, the bones of any human being after death shall ask for the fulfillment of some desire. Buddha, the human incarnation of God, concentrated on this single aspect of destroying the desire. The Gita also preaches nishkama karma yoga only, which means doing the service without any personal desire. If this one aspect is achieved, all the spiritual effort ends. Without this achievement, there is no need of any type of service, which is always impregnated with the impurity of fulfillment of selfish desire. Due to the desire, even the practical service becomes useless. In such case, there is no need of speaking about efforts like penance, meditation, recitation of prayers etc., which are not even the practical service. First [of all], you must leave all these theoretical services, which are the clever tricks of selfish and miserly intellectual devotees, trying to fool God. Then, you must come to the line of practical service and practical sacrifice. Then, you must clean your practical service by eradicating the aspiration for fulfillment of any selfish desire. This is the essence of all the scriptures and without achieving success in this aspect, God cannot be pleased by any trick since God is Omniscient.