Part-1

If I am judged personally by My good qualities, I am the lowest of human beings. I am rich in bad qualities. It is indeed all of you are gold and silver wires, I am an iron wire. But in this iron wire, electricity, named Lord Datta, entered and did many miracles. “You left the deserving and selected an undeserving like Me. Why did You give such miraculous power to the undeserving?” That is what I asked Datta today during early morning. Swami (God Datta) smiled at Me. I said, "You really are mad!". Swami felt as if He has been hit by an electric shock. This was His immediate reply.

“A bad boy joins a good college. He achieves good results soon. Similarly, a good boy joins a bad college. He soon fails the exam. Even though You are a bad boy, You recognized the true God and entered the true path. This is the result. You have recognized that I am Parabrahman and You have entered into the service of propagating knowledge and devotion to earn My grace. Since Your goal and Your path are true, You have gotten the good result. Although the rest are good students, they could not choose the true goal and the true path. That is why they are not getting good results.

Even if it is a bitter neem, I will eat that which has fallen into the Ganges. But how can I eat even a sweet fruit that has fallen into a mud pond? Datta means donation. "Tyāgenaikena amṛtattva mānaśuḥ", says the Shruti. It means that salvation can be attained only by sacrifice. Whether You know it or not, You are preaching knowledge and devotion to others without selfishness in mind. You are concentrating all Your energy on the upliftment of others. Even though others are personally better than You, all their actions are selfish, aspiring for self-upliftment alone. That’s why I left everyone else and chose You. The king emitting bad odor is inferior to the poor man emitting good odor. Sacrifice is a good odor. Selfishness is a bad odor. “Evaṃ puṇyasya karmaṇo dūrād gandho vāti”, says the Shruti. It means that service with sacrifice can spread the fragrance upto My world and it brings Me down here”.

Human form of the absolute God should be worshiped with sixteen modes of worship (Shodasopacaras). An invitation must be extended to Him to come over here. By saying ‘Āsanaṃ samarpayāmi’, you are asking Him to sit on a higher seat. Bathing (abhisheka) and sacred offerings (Nivedanam) are offered only when the God comes in the form of an individual human soul. Bathing and sacred offering are the important modes of worship. This bathing is called as ‘Abhisheka’ and the sacred offering (Naivedyam) is to offer the best cooked food to God. This is called the ‘Yajna’. Only these two worships are main and important in the Vedas. But, both these activities are being performed to inert objects by rejecting the human form due to human jealousy. As soon as the bathing of the inert idol and the burning of food in the inert fire begin, the inner meaning of the rituals is lost. Idol worship is not wrong. The human form of Shri Krishna is not present now. However, there is so much love exists for Shri Krishna in this world.

Therefore, the idol of Krishna can be worshipped. Whatever modes of worship (upacāras) are required for the idol, they should be attended to. If the dirt on the idol is removed, it will look clean, so the Abhisheka can be done to it. Now, decorate it with flowers. Put a vermilion mark (tilak). Now adore the idol with joy. The Shruti says "Draṣṭavyaḥ", which means that one should perceive it well. Imagine, your beloved son is in a foreign country. You will see his photo and be happy. The above explained process of worship is similar to this. You will wash and clean the photo similar to the idol. But, the worship of sacred offering (Nivedana upacāra) and fanning (Cāmara Vījana) are unnecessary. To see the idol clearly, if necessary, illuminate the place with lighting a lamp and camphor, i.e., do it when it is dark. These are the contextual services relevant to the time.

In worship, burning incense sticks is to repel mosquitoes only. In this way, all these modes of worship i.e., burning incense sticks, offering food, fanning, etc., should be performed to the human incarnation of Swami. However, the human incarnation is difficult to recognize in this world. Some human beings are also deceiving devotees by claiming themselves as Swami. In such a situation, you may say that you only serve idols to avoid deceptive God-men. True, but offering food, etc., are unnecessary to the idol. But if you think that I should give food to Swami and make Him happy, then there is another way. Give food to the person suffering with hunger (Ārta) and do the worship of the offering of food (Nivedanam). He will be very happy. His joy reaches Swami, who is the real form of complete bliss (Ānanda Svarūpa), If the needy hungry person is happy, Swami is happy. This is the way of offering food instead of giving it to an idol. If you offer the same food to the rich, he doesn't enjoy it much because he is not in need of food. That rich man is hungry for knowledge. He is in poverty of devotion. If You sacrifice knowledge and devotion to him, he will be very happy.

Therefore, whatever a person doesn't have, if that item is donated to him, he will be very happy. That bliss, when it reaches the Parabrahman, who is the basis of all the individual souls, then the Parabrahman enjoys it thoroughly. The service relevant to the context (Kālocita) and necessity is important even to the supreme God came in the human form. Let us say, Swami caught with cold. If You force Him to take a head bath, Swami will unnecessarily suffer due to an increased cold. Swami is coughing now. You lit camphor (nīrājana) and wave it around Him (ārati), the smoke emitted from camphor makes Swami to cough more. But, when Swami is suffering from mosquitoes, You can light camphor and do that service. Unfortunately, you are not offering these services to Him. Swami is weak due to illness. If You prepare a healthy food and give it to Swami, He will eat it and gain some energy. Again, you will ignore it here too. Therefore, the real service to Swami is to offer whatever is needed at that time contextually.

Part-2

Indeed, it is called true donation. Participating in the work of Swami gives more pleasure to Him than attending personal service to Him. While Swami was sitting on the seashore for the construction of a bridge, the person who carried a stone and threw it into the sea became dear to Swami, but the person who did not participate in the work of Swami and performed worship with sandal paste and flowers to Swami, would not make Swami pleased. Your Guru came to your house in need of a thousand rupees. If You offer Him even pickle rice, arrange the money even by begging from door to door, give it to him and send Him off, he will remember you for a long time. In case, you did not put any such effort to meet His present need, You sent Him off after feeding him with a grand meal (panchabhakshya paramannas), that gives him temporary happiness only. After reaching home, at night, when the food you have given is digested, that happiness disappears.

Therefore, what makes us eternally dear to Swami is to participate in His work and and His service. Both Vibhishana and Hanuman chanted Rama's name continuously. But Lord recognized Hanuman’s service by His selflessly participating in Rama's work. Then, Swami gave Him control over the entire creation and made Him the future creator (Bhavishya Brahmā). In the case of Vibhishana, Swami gave only His own property. Swami will create obstacles to test Your interest and determination in serving Swami. In fact, He is the controller of obstacles. So, never doubt Swami's work; serve to the best of Your ability. Swami will test that whether your service is proportionate to your energy levels or not. But He does not see how great Your service is. When the monkeys threw the big stones in the sea, they sank and so the monkeys stopped the service, doubting that Swami’s work cannot be done. That is why, Swami did not pat on their backs. A squirrel did not stop its service of carrying small grains of sand and throwing them into the sea. Swami is very much pleased and patted on the squirrel's back.

In fact, we should really serve the rich more than beggars. Lord Christ said that “A camel can pass through the eye of the needle, but a rich man cannot reach God.” Rich people should not get angry at this statement. The underlying truth in it should be investigated. The bonds with spouse (dāreṣaṇā), children (putreṣaṇā) and money (dhaneṣaṇā) are called the Eṣaṇātraya. So, these are very strong worldly chains binding the soul with the world. In other words, it is the attachment to the wife, children and money. Because of the over-attachment to the wife and children, though enough money is available to satisfy the basic needs, the desire to earn more and more money leads to continuously focusing on money only, which is Dhaneṣaṇā. Vashishtha asked Rama (Dhanamārjaya kākutstha!) to earn money as it is needed to procure the basic necessities like water, food and clothing. Same time, both the flood and drought like action is not recommended in this context. Wife and children cannot save anyone in their last moment. They will not even recognize him in the upper worlds. Due to the blind fascination, for the pleasures of such people, the one who uses his energy and time to earn more money but doesn’t spend time and energy for God, will fall into the well at the end. Now, imagine how poor those rich people are. They are the ones to be really sympathized with! A kind Guru focuses His attention only on those students who are stamped as those who never pass. Therefore, by giving them the wealth of knowledge and devotion, they should be made to sacrifice their excess money for hungry people and also in the service of propagation of knowledge and devotion to other fellow rich people. By doing so, the rich people are uplifted.

In order to propagate spiritual knowledge, you should do the necessary deeds to earn food, drink and clothes. For the rest of the time, you shold be involved in the service of God. The reason being, in the knowledge propagation if you beg whoever you visit, you will lose your value and they won't care for your words. This is the characteristic of Kali Yuga. Therefore, Samnyāsa, which is to engage fully in divine service, is forbidden in Kali. It is also wrong to engage in earning money all the time without doing any divine service. Those who are engaged in this service, can do Karma Phala Tyāga, i.e., sacrifice some of their money for divine service and they can get same fruit of those who have done such divine service already. This is the concept of Karma Phala Tyāga mentioned in the Gita. Some say that ‘worship is work’ which is like a flooding and some say that ‘work is worship’ which is like a drought. Neither of them is correct. The best path is to do the necessary work up to earning food, clothing and spend the rest of the time in the service of God.”