Sharanagati

Nietzsche says that God is dead, but we believe that He never dies. He is dead only for those, who do not believe. But for those, who have faith in the eternity of the soul and the Supreme there is no death. Therefore when a devotee, a vaishnava dies, leaves this world, we shouldn’t say: „Farewell!” but maximum: “See you soon!” He reasons ill that vaishnava dies, because we are ever united in the holy name. This is our immortal nectar.

How to approach God and how to be closer to the living entities – this is the question. Through devotional service! Everything begins with shravanam, giving an ear to the message. So first give your ear to Krishna. As Krishna can perform all the activities with His different limbs, you can also drink nectar with your ears. Usually we use our ear for listening but you can use it for drinking.

If you have accepted something through your verbal reception, then you can reflect it just like the echo, give it back. What does it mean in the proper sense? This means kirtanam, preaching: something comes to you and you distribute it. Therefore it is said: If you don’t have faith – preach until you get it. And when you get it – preach, because you have faith! This is the way to have more faith. This is the key. Tell it to others: the miracles are living! This is just like the translation of the good news. These are good news: God is living, He is close to you.

And if you have heard something and you have repeated it – what will be the result? The result will be that you will remember. You cannot get it out of your mind. This is visnu smaranam – remembrance of Lord Vishnu – Krishna. This remembrance helps us especially in the difficult moments, because our spiritual life is more or less like a struggle: our better part struggles with our not-so-good part. We understand what to do but we cannot. We hold very strong to our material desires and then we cry: “Maya  please let me go”. But still you should remember that this maya is the energy of Krishna Himself and it functions with double face: helps you to forget, it is very difficult to remember; but if illusion understands that you are strong enough, that you are serious, sincere enough, she will help you. She will give so much trouble to help you to come to your senses. This is the helping function of illusion. You have to work hard to progress, but to go wrong is so easy. You don’t have to work for it, it just comes by itself. So better we struggle for progress.

To remember Krishna is very easy, He is so sweet. It is impossible to understand Him, but it is so easy to admire Him and to join Him. This is the secret of bhakti marga, the path of devotion. At the first place this is not philosophy, this is feeling. But of course we should go deep in our studies to understand that Krishna is our Lord. Always remember! Krishna is so active – it is very easy to remember at least some of His jokes and plays.