(2) Life Worth Living?

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Preaching programme in Hooghly district,
26 February 2019, evening, part 2
Translated from Bengali

There are people who serve every single day. You can see the arati offered here today, and if you come to this line, you can do arati of the Lord yourselves every day – you can keep a photograph of the Lord's Deities and offer arati to Them every day, offer bhog to Them every day.

Because we are proud, we think that everything in this world belongs to us. Whatever is created in this world – it does not matter if you are the one who is doing the farming, running a business or working in an office – everything is for Him. The Lord has given us wives, children, grandchildren – everything you have is given to you by the Lord – but the Lord may not have given it also, and even having given it all to you, He can also take everything away. Then why do we forget Him? Why do we not serve Him every day? What is the problem? What stops us from doing it?

The problem is only one. There are many gurus in this world who teach wrong things and steer people down the wrong path – they say, 'Eat whatever you want', 'Do whatever you want', 'Do whatever your soul wants.' You think that whatever you want is what your soul wants, but the soul is part and parcel of the Lord! Remember this.

If you take a drop of your blood and compare to the blood of your parents, you will see that it is the same blood. So, our parents have given us these bodies, but they did not produce us. We are souls, and our actual, real position is that we are parts and parcels of the Lord. So, the Lord knows what the soul wants, and the soul knows what the Lord wants. The soul never wants to eat anything.

If I were to tell you today, 'Eat anything you want', 'Do anything you want', then you would be cheated. Gaudiya Vaishnavs and genuine sadhus cannot cheat people like that, that is why people are afraid to take initiation from them. People worry, 'Oh, I will not be able to eat fish or meat', 'I will not be able to smoke', 'I will not be able to do illicit things', 'I will not be able to do any bad things.' But we are only telling you what is written in the scriptures – we do not take the things that cannot be offered to the Lord. You must think about it and understand it.

সংসার সংসার ক'রে মিছে গেল কাল ।
লাভ না হইল কিছু ঘটিল জঞ্জাল ॥

'samsara' 'samsara' kari' michhe gela kala
labha na haila kichhu, ghatila janjala

'Time has passed as I have been busy with my material life, and the result is nothing – only garbage.'

(Sri Kalyan-kalpataru, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

How many families we have had before! But all that is of no use – you only end up with garbage in your life.

কিসের সংসার এই, ছায়াবাজী প্রায় ।
ইহাতে মমতা করি' বৃথা দিন যায় ॥

kisera samsara ei chhayabaji praya
ihate mamata kari vrtha dina yaya

'What sort of world is this? It is only a trick, a show. While I affectionately take it as my own, days pass by in vain.'

(Sri Kalyan-kalpataru, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

Days are passing as we are so busy with our lives, but what kind of life is this? It is all a sham! You think that people who chant some Holy Names at the market celebrating some festivals and what we do are the same Holy Name, but it is an offence to think like this. Some people worship Durga, Kali, Laksmi or chant some Holy Names at home, and you may think that what we are doing here is the same as what people do elsewhere, but it is not! If you bring some people and pay them fifty rupees or five thousand rupees for singing some kirtan – such contract singing will never give you any devotion, even if you listen to it for millions of lives; what you will get is false, hypocritical, deceitful devotion, and this is just some devotion for one day, after that you will forget everything. People worship Durga for three–four days, after that they threw away the Deity, enjoy and forget everything. The same with Laksmi Devi – people worship Laksmi for two days, then throw her Deity away and carry on their lives. This is how we turn God into our servant...

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