How the Lord Chooses

I had been waiting for weeks to have an interview with Sri Sathya Sai Baba when ‘she’ arrived. ‘She’ was called in for an interview immediately. The very next day, ‘she’ received another. “How unfair,” I murmured under my breath as I continued to wait in the hot Indian sun. Eventually I did receive an interview. But time and again after returning to the U.S.A., I thought of the young woman who had several interviews and never had to wait! “Why did she get such fine attention?” I would ponder.

I was allowed to return to Puttaparthi the following year, and as it was Swami’s birthday time and the Fourth World Conference, the ‘Abode of Peace’ was filled to the brim with devotees. This meant I was assigned to a hall, and I was living with 150 women from all corners of the globe. Rooming directly across from me under a blue mosquito net was ‘she’. Yes, it was the young woman who had received several interviews upon her arrival in 1984. I strongly remembered waiting week after agonizing week while ‘she’ was treated as royalty.

We had been roommates for three days, acknowledging each other with eye contact but never speaking. Then one day out of the blue, ‘she’ approached me and said in broken English: “I think you were here last year when I was. I remember you. Do you remember me?” I replied that I did in fact remember her. Then I mentioned that she had received several inter-views in a very short period of time immediately upon her arrival. Smiling, she said: “Yes, I have a brain tumor. Swami touched my head and told me to think only of Him and not to worry. So, I have done just that. I am back at work now and I don’t worry. I listen to Swami,” Startled by what she said, I stammered: “Did you return to the doctor? Did you have surgery?”

“No,” she calmly replied, “I never went back to the doctor. I only think of Him.” How courageous! How beautifully faithful! Aghast at my previous thoughts and judgments, I was sickened with myself. And I had to sit down. How selfish I was! How dare I question the motives of Divinity? Who did I think I was?

The ego is the most subtle aspect of man, and it can be very sneaky. We can never understand the ways of God though the ego will make us try. It will garb itself in beautiful garments to hide the truth of the lower self from the real self. It took this experience, much pain, and a lot of self-inquiry, to make me see the reality about my selfishness and judgments. Garbed as they were in beautiful clothes, I had neglected to look before at these characteristics.

The Lord is perfect in His priorities; Sai Baba is perfect in His picking and choosing. As I again sit waiting in the hot sun for perhaps another magic moment with my Lord, I often recall this painful lesson to remind me not to try and think for God.

I tell this story not to show literary excellence, but to help those who find themselves waiting and wondering. God makes no mistakes. Trust Him! Oh, I might add that after that day, ‘she’ never spoke to me again!

~Joy Ziegler, U.S.A.
Source: Sanathana Sarathi, Jan. 1986