A SMALL MEMBER IN A HUGE FAMILY

"God is unlimited, so are the number of His devotees."

Every morning after the morning program in ISKCON temples and every time devotees offer their respects to the devotees of Lord Krishna, it is a custom to chant the phrase - "ananta koti vaishnava vrinda ki jai". It means - "all glories to the unlimited, countless devotees of the Lord". I got to witness a glimpse of this phrase in the recent annual Vrindavan Yatra. The Yatra itself had 7000 registered pilgrim devotees along side lakhs of other devotees who flock to Vrindavan to be in the holiest of holy months, the Karthik month. It was a crazy crowd filled with devotees crazy for Krishna, not minding inconvenience of any sort. In fact, one starts to realise that being surrounded by devotees on all sides is a bliss of a different sort. Vrindavan was filled to the brim. This is only the number of countless devotees in Vrindavan. Add to it the unlimited devotees in other holy places, Tirupati, Sri Rangam, Jagannath Puri, Pandharpura and hundreds of other holy places. Add to it further, all the devotees of Krishna all over the world. And you will get a glimpse of "the unlimited devotee" concept.

But the scriptures tell us that the number of devotees in the material world is very, very less compared to the number of devotees in the spiritual world. And mind you, there are countless planets in the spiritual world. We can't even imagine, the number of devotees that are present there. The only thing we can do is offer our humble obeisances to the countless devotees - those in this world and those beyond this world by chanting - "ananta koti vaishnava vrinda ki jai". Who said that the devotees are outnumbered by materialistic people! No one can outnumber the devotees of the Lord. The family of devotees is the biggest because it is the family of God. Let us feel happy, grateful and protected to a small member of such a huge family - God's family.
- Achyut Gopal Das

Comments

THE PARALLEL OF LEAVING "THE WHATSAPP WORLD"

A few weeks ago, I exited from the WhatsApp platform after using it for years. Here are few parallels I drew between the experience of leaving "the WhatsApp world" and the experience one has of leaving this world. I WILL ALWAYS EXIST After leaving the WhatsApp world, I still exist similarly after leaving this world, one will still exist because as spirit soul, we are all eternal. Lord Krishna explains in Bhagvat-gita 2.12 na tv evāhaṁ jātu nāsaṁ na tvaṁ neme janādhipāḥ na caiva na bhaviṣyāmaḥ sarve vayam ataḥ param "Never was there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in the future shall any of us cease to be." "N" NUMBER OF WORLDS The WhatsApp world is not the all in all similarly, this life of ours is not the all in all. Exiting from WhatsApp is just texting from one platform. There are so many other platforms to operate from. There are "n" number of lit...

GOD answers "KNEE MAIL" not EMAIL

I once heard a very interesting quote which said - " The distance between the problem and the solution is the distance between the knees and the ground. " It means that - when we are hit by a problem that seems too overwhelming, we need to hit the ground and offer our earnest prayer to God . This is called "Knee mail" - it is more faster and efficiently than email. You see, many problems can't be solved by us - they are too big for us but definitely not too big for God. When we bring God into our life by sincere, heartful prayers then problems eject out of our life. That is the power of prayers. The greatest power is to realize that we are powerless and thus seek refuge in the greatest power - the power of God. That is wisdom. This is the mood in which we offer our prayers, chant our rounds and participate in Kirtans - the mood of surrender. In Sanskrit it is called "sharanagati" or "prapannam" - it is the essence of all scriptures an...

FREEDOM FROM FLAMES by FAITH IN THE NAMES

" One who has faith in the inconceivable potencies of the Lord has no doubt that God can do anything ." - Radhanath Swami, Author and Spiritual leader The night after the subjugation of the great serpent Kaliya, Lord Krishna and His cowherd friends decided to rest on the banks of the Yamuna river. In the middle of the night, a huge forest fire enveloped them. It appeared that the fire would soon devour all the inhabitants of Vrndavana. As soon as they felt the warmth of the fire, they immediately took shelter of Krsna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. They began to pray, "Our dear Krsna! O Supreme Personality of Godhead! Our dear Balarama, the reservoir of all strength! Please try to save us from this all devouring and devastating fire. We have no other shelter than You. This devastating fire will swallow us all!" These simple friends of Krishna are showing us the mood of a genuine devotee. As soon as a devotee is in trouble, he at once takes shelter of Krishna...

The Wisdom Park

Search This Blog