Bhakti Wisdom

In the Bhagavat Gita Krishna explains reasons why he appears in this material world, namely to destroy ignorance, protect devotees and establish dharma .Beside this he also comes as Lord Gauranga to experience love of Radha and give pleasure to his devotees.

Krishna also promises that he will provide all necessities for his devotee so devotee can fully focus on his service without worrying about other things.

Acaryas encouraged us to take up the deity worship and practice personal service to Krishna. Although the holy name is nondifferent than Krishna and can grant us all perfections, still deity worship is very much essential for the conditioned soul to remain pure and develop personal relationship with the Lord .

From the very first day I became a devotee I was very much attracted by deity worship and the idea of having personal exchange with the Lord always attracted me . 

I started to engage in deity seva from the moment I joined the temple,first by washing the pots from the lord, assisting in the deity kitchen and gradually learning other aspects of the worship which include dressing, mantra recitation,arati, abhishek etc.

I always felt reciprocation from the Lord whenever I sincerely offered prayers to him. Never was the time that he didn’t respond to my prayers through different channels, sometimes through devotees, sometimes through classes that I heard or things I read and sometimes through dreams or even non devotees. There is no limit for the Lord to reciprocate with the service and prayers from his devotee.

I’m very much attracted by Salagram worship and I have few Salagram silas that I worship daily. Salagram silas are considered to be non different then the Lord himself and it doesn’t require installation to invoke the presence of the Lord. 

There is a famous saying that once you start with Salagram worship there is a big chance that many more Salagrams will come to you if your worship is done properly and with devotion. I never had much worry that more salagrams will come because I know that my service is not of the top quality and definitely lacking devotion.

Lord sometimes changes his own rules to facilitate devotees to serve him….

Couple months ago I had a dream that somebody was giving me Salagram sila in my hand and the moment I received Salagram I woke up.

Dream was so real and was definitely not a regular one. I revealed it to a friend.

He responded saying;”That’s a great dream, if you want I can ask my friends and they can give me a Salagram for you.”

I kindly explained to him that I prefer if Salagram comes on its own and that I already worship Salagram so i did not feel the need to worship more than what I do already.I just tried to understand what is the message the Lord wanted to tell me through this dream. 

I had a feeling that it would be revealed in due course of time. I continued with my daily service.

Two days passed by but I still kept thinking about the dream and then one morning after I completed my morning worship at the temple I went to look for some tools to fix a few things on the altar. Whilst looking at different drawers for the tools I found one small bag that looked like an old jewelry bag. I opened the bag, expecting to find a ring or something similar inside but instead I found a small Salagram sila!

I felt blessed and worried at the same time. “What is my duty? What should I do now? Should I start with worship?”

Whilst thinking what to do I quickly got a small bottle of pure oil and massaged the Lord carefully to give him relief from uncomfort he experienced whilst sitting in the old drawer with tools.

My rule is that whenever I make major decisions in life I will always ask three senior brahmanas for opinion and advice . I didn’t wait even a minute before I called the first one. I got approval to start with worship. Second senior devotee gave the same answer. 

“One more left”, my mind was enthusiastically saying.

I called a third devotee and he gave a positive answer as well;”Lord decided to come to you and accept service from you, please start with worship.”

My dream a few days before that now made sense. The Lord wanted to engage me in his service and he made arrangements for me to find him.I brought the Lord and placed him on the altar with other Salagrams that I worship and offered my first puja.

I felt blessed but at the same time aware that the Lord came with the mission to teach me lessons and prepare me for further progress on my spiritual journey.

As we mentioned in the beginning, the Lord appears to protect devotees,remove ignorance, and establish dharma. 

In other words Lord appears to give intelligence how to overcome challenges, help us to destroy anarthas and engage us in his service.

When Lord appears our only duty is to engage in his service and learn how to depend on him for everything else.

Your servant

Ananta gopal das 

25 August 2020