I wish all of you – the people of our country as well as those from foreign countries – a very happy new year on this Sankranti and on the occasion of Bābā’s birthday I convey also blessings to you all.
May you get worldly and divine happiness and blessings by taking those who are benefited by your services as your present gods, by giving them your services as per your capacity and by means of the divine fondness regarding Seva (selfless service). May you all live in the divine grace, with divine blessings and in divine happiness together with your families and friends in peace – by taking the path of selfless service.
Embodiments of divine love, our birth in the country of India is itself a divine blessing.
It is rare to get an opportunity to be born in a country, where divinity governs one’s own daily life. We all know that every country in the world has its special religion i. e. a country can be a Mohammedan country or a country of Christians. It is not like this in India. India is the country
of UNITY in DIVERSITY as well as DIVERSITY in UNITY. It is the capital of the whole world for the preaching of peace and spiritual sanctity of the entire world. Many great people, saints, Rishis (seers), and Avataras (God Himself) have been born in this country. We are lucky to be born along with such sacred people and we, too, get the divine blessings like them. We also have to uplift the cultural institutions and the spiritual abundance.
Yajnam (ritual), Yagam (sacrifice, ceremony), Prarthana (prayer), Dhyanam (meditation), Dharana (attention, concentration), Bhajan (praise of God in songs), Pooja (worship, ritual), Puraskara ( salutation) and many more spiritual yoga exercises are there in order to achieve divine blessings, closeness to the Lord and complete absorption into the divine essence – the merging with God. In Hinduism as well as in Islam or in Christianity the prayers are done to get the divine blessings. We get the blessings whenever one of the above mentioned practices is done.
For doing Japam (repeated chanting of a Mantra), we need to learn the Mantra from a Guru. We get the Deeksha (initiation) from a Guru alone.
Yagam is to be done with great dexterity, care and practice, but in spite of all these, we just invoke one of God’s characteristic features only.
Alankara priyaha Vishnu
Lord Vishnu is fond of adornment.
Abhisheka priyo Shivaha
Lord Shiva is fond of sacred liquids over Him and Mantras
Namaskara priyo Bhanu
The god of sun loves Stuti (recitation) and Namaskara (yogic prayers).
Associating God – who is the abundance of all characteristics and virtues – with only one of His characteristics, one feature or one virtue means to undermine Him! The only “oneness” in which He dwells is the SEVA (selfless service). SEVA is the best, highly elevated and great adornment. If you do Seva, you will be eligible to mingling with God, His association and His blessings.
God doesn’t have too much liking to “Alankara or Abhisheka or Namaskara”. His dearest of acts is SEVA.
If any human being does selfless service to any other embodiments of God, created by Him – he or she will be blessed by God’s grace then and there.
In the olden times i. e. Krita Yuga, Treta Yuga and Dwapara Yuga, people used to pray to God by performing rituals, ceremonies and prayers. In Kali Yuga – the present time – God can be reached by doing SEVA. Everybody thinks that Kali Yuga is full of sins, sinful acts and problems, but this spiritual land here will stay in safety, sanctity and happiness, whether it may be a village, a town or the country which face some difficulty or loss…
There is only one medium, through which we can reach God easily and it is the SEVA, selfless service.
If we do Japam, it will take a long time to reach Him.
Yagna Yagam, the sacrifice ceremony with the divine fire, will take our prayers to God and the blessings will return to the humans in the form of rain.
However, if we do Seva, the blessings come immediately. These blessings are for spiritual as well as materialistic needs. Seva gives freedom unto God in the fastest enactment…
If we sit in the corner and pray for long spending a lazy life, God doesn’t feel amused or happy. God is Soma Nathudu and not Somayya Nathudu (Telugu words play: God is full of glitter and charm, but not a master of lazy people).
God comes to the earth in the form of Avatar, He comes for everyone. He lives with children like a child, with the adults like a grown up person and with women like a woman. He does SEVA Himself as a role model.
If – in such conditions – we sit in a corner doing Japa or Pooja, nothing will come to us. If we bow to our own feet doing Namaskara (salutation) and wishing to live for a hundred years, this will be futile. It is also selfish to think of one’s own family only!
Here is an example:
Once, God sent an angel to the earth in order to find out the good and bad things happening across the globe. After a detailed survey, the angel returned and gave his report:
“Oh! God! There is one place, where I found great troubles. I visited a village, where all the people have bad habits, are in distress and loss prone. There are people with black marks, all of them living together. The village is in tremendous pain. I could not do anything; I can just give the information to You.”
God asked: “What did you do there?”
The angel replied: “You asked me to see and so I did, but I couldn’t act.”
God asked: “Why did you not burn the village? You have such powers…”
The angel said: “Oh! God! There is one person who is chanting your name and praying. I thought, if I demolish the village or burn it, this man would also perish. So I spared the act of demolishing and destroying.”
God said: ”You should have killed the man immediately, who is sitting in the corner, praying and doing Japa with his rosary!”
The angel asked: ”Why so? He is a good one, isn’t he?”
God explained:
“He has values and knowledge. He has the power to show the right path to everybody in the village. It is not enough to have a good nature and to be good only. Such a person, who sits in a corner instead of reforming the society, has no right to live. So, go and destroy the village and this man first!”
The meaning here is that God’s blessings are not obtained by mere prayers or recitation. The man, who wanted to achieve divine blessings, got God’s curse and had to die. He possessed all cleverness, knowledge and ability to teach and train the villagers and in spite of this strength, he did not do this noble work.
Thus, divine service is more spiritual than mere prayers. Prayers only lead to ambitions of self growth. Hence, the selfish people perish. Self growth and self saving is not growth at all and not reaching God or making Him happy!
God’s virtue is SEVA.
Only by Seva, some people became virtuous and elevated. Hanuman became a god by doing Seva to Rama. If we have any fear of devil, demons or evil spirits, we pray to Hanuman and not to Rama nowadays. Hanuman grew to a higher pedestal.
There are rivers, cows, the symbols of mother, Maha Rishis (great seers), Tapasvins (ascetics), Brahmanas and Sadhus. The sun does its work of rising and setting in a periodic manner. Every year we go for the “holy dip” to some rivers in this country. Cows give us milk and are also a substitute to mother’s milk for human growth.
In Hinduism, we give importance to Ganges, cow, to mothers and Brahmanas, to Tapasvins and to Sadhus due to their selfless service.
A Mohammedan will do prayers according to his own customs. A Christian will do prayers according to his own customs, too.
Selfless service alone is done irrespective of the caste, creed, religion, sect, breed or geographical boundaries. If someone suffers from fever and we say: “Fever, go!” it will not vanish. The patient will get well only when he is given some medicine. A small tablet with water, a glass of water with sugar and salt – and it works.
If someone is hungry, give him some food! A little feed will help him. The one, who acts in thus way, will get the divine blessings.
In olden days, people did penance in fire – with their feet or one single toe in it for long. Still we don’t know, whether they got God or not, whether they became free of worldly pain or not…
Doing selfless service, however, results instantly in worldly happiness and spiritual wealth.
I will tell you the story of a spiritual man. His name was Madhava Sharma. He used to pray to God and taught others also to do the same from his childhood. His spiritual attitude was being spread. His wish was to build a temple for God, but neither his wealth nor his earnings were sufficient to construct a temple. So he took help everywhere and finally could build the house of God. Additionally he arranged for the materials for worship and did the Pooja in this temple. Then he wanted to find a person, who would continue with this in the same way after his demise. He started observing everybody, who visited the place, for he was to find the person of his liking that would go on with the activities in the temple.
Many people visited the temple, prayed and went away. Once, a man with curly hair – just like mine – and torn clothes came to the temple. When he came across a stone in the pathway, he removed it first, as is could hurt other visitors. No one else had got this same idea; everyone had been too lazy to remove the stone. Hence Madhava Sharma asked this man to be the temple priest on the spot and handed over the temple to him.
The man asked:
“What great thing did you see in me to hand over the temple to just me?”
Madhava Sharma replied:
“You are willing to do selfless service. You can change ten others around you. Thus you are the eligible person.”
So, God took the man to be the priest and finally took him close.
Service to human beings is even greater than service to God in the temple. Doing selfless service to the fellowman is greater than the service to the unknown, unseen God. Serving the poor and the needy IS service to God!
The one, who can hear you – the one, who can be seen here – the one, whose pain you can deal with immediately – the one, who gives a smile – the one, who has a sparkle in his eyes – the one, who expresses gratitude towards your help – this person is the man in distress, the needy!
We need to share our earnings with the poor and the needy. The one, who needs the attention, is the “Deena Jana Bandhu” (Sanskrit: dina = poor, helpless, sad; jana = living being, individual; bandhu = friend, relative), as I described before. If God and a person in pain have to be addressed at the same time, then the choice to be made is the man in pain and difficulty! In turn, you can reach God easily and thus keep your family instantly in total happiness.
You must know that good words or deep listening to preaching alone don’t help. All we need to do is SEVA.
The one, who helps us to get MOKSHA (liberation or complete freedom and delight of the Supreme) by the help of little acts of service to humans, is no one else than Bālasai Bābā Himself.
Blessings are regularly required – so do selfless service continuously!
Bālasai is Narayana (the supreme God). The needy one is the “Deena Jana Bandhu”. Serve him and you will have my blessings throughout your life!
With divine blessings and lots of love to you all I conclude.”
Balasai Ram
English by Mr Deekshit and Regine H. Wolke