Do Not Fear Service

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
23 January 2011

যে দিন গৃহে ভজন দেখি ।
গৃহেতে গোলোক ভায় ॥

ye dina grhe bhajana dekhi
grhete goloka bhaya

On the days when I see devotional service taking place in my home, I feel that Goloka has manifested there.

'Suddha-bhakata-charana-renu' by Srila Bhakti Vinod Thakur

"Krishna Himself appears wherever His sankirtan is going on."

Mahaprabhu said, "I stay at the kitchen of Mother Sachi, where Nityananda Prabhu dances, at the house of Srivas Pandit, and at the house of Raghav Pandit." Wherever there is service of the Lord going on, wherever the Lord's glory and Name are chanted, the Lord always stays and plays there. The Lord's Name, Form, Qualities, Pastimes, associates and features (Nam, gun, rup, lila, parikar, vaisistya) are all nondifferent from the Lord Himself.

ভ্রহ্মাণ্ড ভ্রমিতে কোন ভাগ্যবান্ জীব ।
গুরু-কৃষ্ণ প্রসাদে পায় ভক্তিলতা-বীজ ॥

brahmanda bhramite kona bhagyavan jiva
guru-krsna-prasade paya bhakti-lata-bija

Having travelled throughout the universe and having got the mercy of Guru, Krishna, a fortunate soul receives a seed of the devotional creeper.

Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 19.151

Only the fortunate souls can get that kind of devotional seed, and it does not take just a little fortune:

অল্প ভাগ্যে সেবা নাহি হয়
কোটি জন্ম থাকলে ভাগ্য
বিষয় ছেড়ে হয় বৈরাগ্য

alpa-bhagye seva nahi haya
koti janma thakle bhagya
visaya chhede haya vairagya

Service does not come by just a little fortune. Only after ten million births of good fortune, can you leave this material world behind.

A great fortune is necessary.

Once I said to Gurudev that a brahmachari wanted to leave, and Gurudev replied in Bengali, "যাওয়া তাই সম্ভাবিত, থাকা তাই অসম্ভাবিত, yaoya tai sambhavit, thaka tai asambhavit: it is expected that people will come, but it is not expected that they will stay." It is not so easy to stay here. My duty is to engage everybody in service to Gurudev, but some do not come to me, and it has been like this since the early days. Some are afraid, "Oh, if I go to Maharaj, he will give me service"—they think it is bad, or they think, "What if I cannot do it? I am afraid." If you think you are doing it, then the burden will come to you, but if you understand that you cannot do anything and the Guru does everything, then what is the problem?

Gurudev does everything, and we must depend on him, "I have no qualification or quality, Prabhu, but you can easily take my service, you can easily accept me..."

When I was a young boy I would sing a song, and at that time, I did not understand what I was singing, but that song's meaning is that the mind always takes us away, but if I engage my mind in the Lord's service, then I will get the result.

Gurudev told it to me many times, and I have also told many times to you that if you serve Vaishnavs, if you serve your Guru, Krishna Himself will come to serve you.

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