Pure Surrender—Key to Pure Solution

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
17 October 2018, Dum Dum Park, part 3

Why should we be afraid? If any problem comes, we cannot solve it, so always surrender to the Lord. Why do you keep your problem to yourself? You cannot solve it. Leave it to Gurudev—he can easily give a solution; he can show the way to solve it. This is what Gurudev's mercy is.

I told yesterday also that we cannot understand Gurudev without Gurudev's mercy, and we cannot understand the Lord without the mercy of the Lord; that is why we should avoid bad things, bad elements. We do many wrong things, we make many mistakes, but Gurudev is very merciful: he always engages us in the service of the Lord. It is our fortune that we have got such a bona fide Guru who always uses us for service. Gurudev always told us, "If you have service, you have mercy. If you have no service, you have no mercy." If we understand these things, then we can really understand the Absolute, we can understand who Krishna has sent to us. We must try, but under the guidance of our Guru and Vaishnavs. Gurudev can recognise a Guru, Gurudev can recognise the Lord's representative, but we have no eyes to recognise a Guru or a Vaishnav. We can only pray, we can only have a great desire. These are the main things in our spiritual life.

দীক্ষাকালে ভক্ত করে আত্মসমর্পণ ।
সেইকালে কৃষ্ণ তারে করে আত্মসম ॥

diksa-kale bhakta kare atma-samarpana
sei-kale krsna tare kare atma-sama

"At the time of initiation, when a devotee fully surrenders to the Lord, Krishna accepts them as His very own."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 4.192)

If I fully, properly surrender when I take initiation, Krishna thinks, "He is My very own, he is as dear to Me as I Myself." It is necessary to have pure surrender, and pure surrender is not possible without sukriti. There is jnata sukriti (conscious spiritual merit) and ajnata sukriti (unconscious spiritual merit). Jnata sukriti means you do some pious activity, and you know that you will get some pious merit for it; and ajnata sukriti means you are doing something, but you do not know what will come to your life as a result. First comes ajnata sukriti, then ajnata sukriti, then sraddha (faith).

'শ্রদ্ধা' শব্দে—বিস্বাস কহে সুদৃঢ় নিশ্চয় ।
কৃষ্ণে ভক্তি কৈলে সর্ব্বকর্ম্ম কৃত হয় ॥

'sraddha'-sabde—visvasa kahe sudrdha nischaya
krsne bhakti kaile sarva-karma krta haya

"The word ‘sraddha’ means a firm, determined faith that by service to Krishna all actions are accomplished."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 22.62)

There are four types of faith: kamala-sraddha (delicate faith), taranda-sraddha (fickle faith that comes in waves), drdha-sraddha (strong faith), and sudrdha-sraddha (strongest faith). It is necessary to have the strongest faith. Without having the strongest faith, you cannot understand the Guru.

Also, we should not bargain with the Guru—when Gurudev tells you something, you should listen to him properly and show with your action, with your service that you are a proper servitor of your Guru. You must show Gurudev with your actions that "I am not independent." I was just quoting Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur:

বড় দুঃখ পাইয়াছি স্বতন্ত্র জীবনে ।
সব দুঃখ দূরে গেল, ও পদ বরণে ॥

bado duhkha paiyachhi svatantra jivane
duhkha dure gelo o pada-varane

"I experienced only great distress in my independent life, but all my distress has gone away once I embraced Your feet."

(Saranagati, 21.5)

"When I was independent, I was very unhappy, I got so much sadness, but once I surrendered to you, all kinds of sadness, all kinds of unhappiness were removed from me." We should understand this.

Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur taught Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur very well, and Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur in turn gave us our Guru—without Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur we would not have got Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj. Then, even though we are fallen souls, Srila B.R. Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj presented us with a good guardian of devotion. The only problem is that if we cannot surrender to him, then we cannot understand it. Krishna has sent him for us as our Guru to preach Krishna consciousness, to preach about Chaitanya Mahaprabhu all over the world, and he did that—he gave us such a great solution. Just like Sri Sukadev Goswami who spoke Srimad Bhagavatam and gave all solution to Pariksit Maharaj, Gurudev also gave such a great solution to us: he told us what spiritual life is. We must understand this.

Everything exists for the service to the Lord. Once, a brahmachari went begging and got ash from somebody—he came to Prabhupad and cried, "They have given me ash!" but Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur said, "Why are you crying? You should be happy that you have got ash. This ash is also useful—it can be used to clean plates. We can use the man who has given you ash for the service of the Lord." Prabhupad showed in this way that everything that exists in this world is meant for the service of the Lord. We must use everything properly. That is the main thing.

Jay Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay!
Vishva-varenya Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay!
Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay!
Jay saparikara Sri Sri Guru Gauranga Gandharva Govinda Sundarjiu ki jay!
Om Vishnupad Bhagavan Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Goswami Thakur Prabhupad ki jay!
All the assembled devotees ki jay!
All the worldwide devotees ki jay!
Samagata Sri Gaura-bhakta-vrinda ki jay!
Harinam sankirtan ki jay!
Nitai Gaura premanande Hari Hari bol!

— : • : —

{ 2001  |   2002  |   2003  |   2005  |   2009  |   2010  |   2011  |   2012 }
{ 2013  |   2014  |   2015  |   2016  |   2017  |   2018  |   2019  |   2020  |   2021 }

• Download (3.1 Mb)