(13/16) Bhakta-Seva Pravritti

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Sri Ganga Sagar, evening class,
11 January 2019, part 13
Translated from Bengali

Why must we serve or worship the Lord? Why must we take shelter in the Lord? We must understand this. Our main goal is to take shelter in our Gurupadpadma and enter the family of the Lord to serve Him. We must always have faith in the service to the Lord.

'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

'Sraddha is a firm, determined faith that by serving Krishna all actions are accomplished.'

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 2.22.62)

Those who have faith in the Lord do not have any debt to their mother, father, sages or demigods.

Atheists can read or hear all this, but they do not believe it because they consider themselves God. That is the problem. You must keep far from such people's association. Many gurus also consider that they have become God and give blessings to others as if they were God. But devotees of Mahaprabhu (if they are genuine devotees of Mahaprabhu) are always humble, considering themselves part of Mahaprabhu's or Radharani's circle. They are always humble, tolerant and give honour to others. Always remember this.

I keep telling you, keep explaining to you that you must always stay engaged in service to the Lord. If you clean the temple of the Lord, your heart will become cleansed. Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj often said this. You know, there was one sannyasi in our Mission, his name is Sripad Siddhanti Maharaj (he has left his body). You can understand what service mood is if you remember his mood. He would always come from America by plane at the time of Gaura Purnima. He would come to me and ask, 'Maharaj, do you have any service for me that I can do?' Do you know what service he did (out of his own accord)? Our temple in Nabadwip is very big, and he would clean all public toilets. He would take a rickshaw to a shop to get all the toilet detergents and brushes and then he would put on a gumcha and clean the toilets. One time, he came a little later, so I had some sweepers clean the toilets – when he arrived, he was unhappy, 'You have taken away my service!' He took some detergent and cleaned all toilets again. Such was his service.

When I went to South India, I also saw the devotees' service mood there. On some days, our train was coming late, so the devotees had to wait many hours for the train to come. Even ladies came there, too. They would come bringing so many things to the station to welcome us. When we got off the train and met all the devotees (so many devotees came!), they would take us to the house with kirtan. They do not know how to cook Bengali dishes, but they still adjusted their cooking. For example, I cannot take atop rice, but they eat a lot of atop rice – they would make parboiled rice specially for me. I do not even know where they got it because it is not sold in South India. They would also make sambar with green mangos. They serve with faith and devotion, they have that kind of service pull in their hearts. They do not serve for their own happiness. They think, 'How can we please and make Gurudev and Vaishnavs happy?' They served me so much that I felt I could not do any service to them. I feel I am unfit, I feel that I have many faults. When I saw their service, I felt humbled. I spent six–seven days with them, and they did so much service to me that when I thought about it, I felt that I could not do any service to them. I felt bad.

If you do not understand what it means to serve devotees, how can you get devotion?

You saw Nabadwip, Nrisingha Palli, Ekachakra – my duty is to make sure that devotees are served properly. I always think what devotees need, what problems they can face, what I can do to make their stay comfortable, and so on. We must always think about this. This is actually my sadness. There are not many of you staying at the temple, so you all have your own room: it is not a problem, but when devotees are coming, how much can you give up for them? How much can you do to serve them? You must understand, 'I live alone in the room, so I can take in two–three people. I can stay alone all year long, but they are coming here for a few days, they can stay with me.' This kinds of mood, or feeling, must come to you. This is how service mood comes. 'I am staying here!', 'I am the master!', 'I am serving here!', 'I am doing so much here!' – why do such thoughts even occur? I must think, 'I have not been able to do anything! I have not been able to do any service for the Lord.' People write and say many things, 'Oh, he has opened so many temples', 'He has done so many things,' but I think that I have not been able to do anything for the Lord.

Actually, this is the blessing I pray to you for: may I keep serving devotees until my last breath. I do not want to be a big Vaishnav, I do not want to be big anything. Many people say, 'Acharya Maharaj has become a great acharya, but he still goes to the market himself and goes house to house to invite everyone to festivals.' What problem is it for me? If Mahaprabhu can serve prasad to everyone with His own hand and if Mahaprabhu can personally go begging for Haridas, then why cannot I do that? Mahaprabhu is the Lord Himself, but He hid Himself in the garb of a devotee and went begging for Haridas Thakur. He distributed prasad with His own hand. So, if I go to the market and do shopping myself, what is so shameful about that? Does that bring any dishonour to me? I am not doing this for myself. I do it for the Lord. This is my pride, or ego: I have become a servant of the Lord's devotees.

— : • : —

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Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Keep Trying
2) Highest Realm of Devotion
3) Bribing and Increasing Stool
4) What Is a Soul?
5) Service with Faith and Love
6) Core of Devotion
7) Set Your Heart for Govinda
8) Think and Learn
9) Think about Your Soul
10) Sadhya-Sadhan-Tattva
11) With Faith and Surrender
12) Surrender and Learn
13) Bhakta-Seva Pravritti
14) See Good and Do Good
15) See Through It
16) 'Lord Exists for Those Who Have Devotion'