Realize God Through Pure Love

All the objects in this visible universe are
Extremely beautiful, attractive, and pleasing.
The Divine is immanent in the entire cosmos.
The cosmos is filled with love.
The Supreme Self is the embodiment of love;
Hence if love encounters love they merge;
Hence if you develop your love
You become eligible to achieve
Oneness with the Divine.

Love exists for love and nothing else. It is spontaneous and imparts delight. Everything is permeated by love. Love sees with the heart and not the eyes. It listens not through the ears but by the tranquility of the heart. It speaks not with the tongue but out of compassion. Compassion, kindness, and love are separate words that mean the same thing. Love has many synonyms.

Love can emanate only from the heart and not any other source. Love is immortal, nectarine, blissful, and infinite. A heart filled with love is boundless Just as rivers with different names and forms merge in the ocean and become one with it, love in many forms enters the ocean of the heart and gets identified with it.

True love has no beginning or end

Love can conquer anything. Selfless, pure, unalloyed love leads man to God. Selfish and constricted love binds one to the world. Unable to comprehend the pure and sacred love, man today is a prey to endless worries because of his attachment to worldly objects. Man’s primary duty is to understand the truth about the love principle. Once he understands the nature of love, he will not go astray. The various contexts in which the word love is used today have no relation to the true meaning of love. The affection between a mother and child or between a husband and wife is incidental to a certain temporary relationship and is not real love at all. True love has neither a beginning nor an end. It exists in all the three categories of time—past, present, and future. That alone is true love that can fill man with enduring bliss.

One’s thoughts, one’s words, and looks should be filled with love. This is divine love. One who is saturated with this love can never be subject to suffering. Men today are affected by praise or blame. But one who is filled with divine love transcends praise or censure. He is unaffected by criticism or flattery. He treats alike joy and sorrow, profit and loss, victory and defeat.

It is not easy to experience such love. It is easy to blame God but difficult to realize God. Men today prefer the easy path to the rough one. They should realize that there can be no pleasure without pain.

The mission of Jesus

It was to teach mankind the greatness of divine love that Jesus came. His father passed away when Jesus was ten years old. Thereafter, with the permission of His mother, He embarked on His ministry of service to the people. He resolved on three tasks: one, to be filled with divine love and to share it with others was the main purpose of His life; two, He should not succumb to praise or censure in carrying out His mission; three, to inspire in others the conviction that the divinity within is omnipresent. Jesus considered spreading the gospel of love as His foremost task. He encountered many ordeals in carrying out His mission, but He regarded them all as challenges to be overcome. He was determined to treat pleasure and pain, sickness and failure with equanimity. He could not bear to see anyone suffer. He was opposed to the traffic in bird [sales] going on in the temple in Jerusalem. The affected persons turned against Him. But Jesus carried on regardless of their hostility. In the end He sacrificed His life for the sake of others and out of His love for all.

Every human being is potentially a messenger of God. But today men have become messengers of the Lord of death. They are traitors to their true human state. Humanness demands that everyone should manifest the divinity within him. Everyone should be a real messenger of God and strive to promote-peace and security in the world. There is no other path to be followed. God’s message is sacred and totally free from self-interest.

When Christ was born, three kings came to see the infant. One of them declared that the child would be a lover of God. The second one said that He would be the beloved of God. The third one declared that He was God. A lover of God is a messenger of God. The one whom God loves is a “Son of God.” When one experiences both of these, he becomes one with God — “Father and Son are one.”

Therefore, at the outset you must prepare yourselves to be messengers of God. This means that you should live up to the message of God. The message calls for service to all. Compassion, morality, and integrity are essential elements in the message. In propagating this message, faith in God should be promoted. Love should be the watchword. The absence of love gives rise to hatred. Today there is no unity among the people. Without unity how can there be bliss? Without bliss how can anyone experience God?

Men should lead selfless lives. This may seem difficult. But in reality there is nothing easier. It is selfishness that creates all kinds of difficulties for mankind. Selfless love will give no room for any evil. Unselfish love may meet with opposition from one’s kith and kin and from worldly persons. But one should not be deterred by such opposition. Love should be cherished as one’s life breath.

The elements and the Divine

It is essential to have faith in God. The five elements are manifestations of God. They are earth, water, fire, air, and ether (or space). In earth God exists in the form of prajna (awareness). In fire God is in the form of jagrata-swaroopa (wakefulness). The Vedic warning is, “Be awake”. In air God exists as the prana (vital breath). In ether (or space) God pervades it as the primal sound, Omkara. Every element thus proclaims the manifestation of one aspect of God.

All beings experience the presence of the Divine through the five elements, the five senses, and the five life breaths. Some may ask, “When the Divine is omnipresent and is in all beings, why is He not visible to us?” If investigation is made on right lines, God can be perceived. Some human effort is essential to get this perception. Just as the reflection of the sun can be seen in all its purity only in clear and still water, though reflections may be noticed in ponds, wells, and oceans, God can be perceived only when the heart is pure and unselfish. How can God be expected to appear before a person whose mind is wavering and whose outlook is self-centered? The wavering mind will experience only a hazy figure. In a steady mind, God will present a clear image.

Mind is the cause of man’s bondage

The mind, according to the scriptures, is the cause of man’s bondage or liberation. The mind has three qualities: tamas, rajas, and satwa. The tamasic quality makes the mind ignore the truth, pursue the false and impels man to indulge in what is unholy and improper. It is necessary to correct this tendency of the tamoguna. The rajoguna is responsible for a person living in a kind of dream-state and treating it as real. The satwic quality makes a person see good even in a bad person or object. The satwic person sees God in the whole cosmos and fosters the godly approach to creation.

Today people all over the world are racked by fears of various sorts. There is no peace anywhere. But people should not give way to despair. They should face the situation with courage, without bothering about the results.

Make love the basis for all your actions. The Gopikas prayed to Krishna to play on the flute and fill their barren hearts with love so that love may grow and ripen in their hearts. The love of God should be free from any desire for favors. God judges the devotee’s love by the intensity of the feeling and not by the number of ways in which worship is offered.

Love of God does not mean giving up your normal duties. In the performance of these duties, every action should be done as an offering to God—Bhagavata preetyartham (for the sake of pleasing God). Look upon the body as a moving temple wherein God’ resides. Recognize that God is always with you and around you.

Messengers of Sathya Sai

The Messengers of Sathya Sai are doing excellent work. They are helping to build dwellings for the poor in the villages. They also arrange for the marriages of poor villagers, raising the money from among themselves. Many old students of the Women’s College (at Anantapur) are living in overseas countries like Germany, U. S. A, Australia, and Japan. It is an index of their devotion to Swami that they have come from these distant places for this annual meeting of the “Messengers” at great expense. I asked the president of the association why the members are wasting money in this way. Why should they not use it for helping some poor people in their places? Every trip costs about a lakh of rupees per person. Her reply was, “Swami! We are not concerned about the expense. We come to Swami to get our spiritual batteries recharged so that we may render better service. Money comes in one way or another. But we have to develop our spirit of sacrifice. It is for this reason that we are coming here. Even the money we earn is not really ours. We are merely agents. We are a kind of trustees for our incomes.”

This attitude has to be appreciated. People should regard all wealth as coming from God to be used for sacred purposes. No one brings anything with him at birth and carries anything with him at death. All relationships in between are transient. Treat all alike. Even bad people will be transformed if you treat them with love.

Show love to those who dislike you

St. Paul was an example of one who originally hated Christ but later became His foremost apostle. When you show love toward all, even to those who dislike you, God will love you. Then you become a “Son of God.” You earn the right to inherit the Kingdom of God. You can become one with God.

Among the Messengers of Sathya Sai, consisting of men and women, it is the women who are carrying on more service activities. This is all the more commendable because of the handicaps they labor under as housewives with in-laws and others who dominate over them. Nevertheless, they are persuading their husbands to come to Swami. This is true seva because they are converting skeptics to believe in God.

The old male students have more freedom but are not equally zealous in rendering service. They should realize the true meaning of freedom, namely, carrying out the dictates of the spirit.

As a nation we have achieved freedom, but we have not achieved unity. Unity can be achieved only through love. This was the message of Jesus.

Make yourselves worthy of being called ‘Sai Devotees’

Students! When you are observing today the birthday of a Divine personality, you have also to follow His teachings. You have to remember what constitutes the greatness of the person whose birthday you celebrate. We celebrate Sri Rama’s birthday, but how many respect the words of the father as Rama did? How far are you prepared to sacrifice position and power as Rama did? People insist on rights to which they have no claim. How can they call themselves devotees of Rama? You should follow the ideals of Rama.

What is meant by calling yourselves devotees of Sai? You have to foster love and develop unity. You must consider yourselves as members of one family, the children of one God. Only then you are entitled to call yourselves Sai devotees. Whatever others may say, do not bear any ill-will toward them. Welcome everything as for your good.

The more you serve God, the more the bliss you will experience. Hence, fill your life with love, grow in love and end your life in love.

Source: Sathya Sai Speaks, Vol. 28