God empowers His devotes to do extraordinary feats, which benefit the creation/mankind, writes AJIT KUMAR BISHNOI
In the verse 18.65 of Bhagavad Gita, Lord gently states, “Develop My consciousness; become My devotee; make scarifies for Me; and offer obeisance to Me.” In the verse 12.8, He is cajoles, “Fix your mind in Me only; engage your intelligence in Me.” In the verse 11.34, God instructs Arjuna to do His bidding when He states, “You fight; kill; do not get disturbed; you will conquer.” Then, in the verse 18.62, He goes direct when He states, “In all respects take shelter of Him, meaning Himself,” And in the verse 18.66, He leaves us no choice when He states, “Take My shelter only.” He couldn’t be more direct, leaving no ambiguity.
Complete surrender is required for the proper functioning of the system. Can any company survive for long if its employees do not obey the employer? What does the employer do when they don’t obey? He fires them for the sake of the health of the company. Similarly, God or His system would not tolerate indiscipline for long; the divine authorities will punish by demoting the offenders to lower species.
There are innumerable examples of taking shelter of higher authorities in our daily lives. Then, why not do the same in case of the Almighty, who is everything vis-à-vis this creation?
Fortunately for us, many do. The whole system, that is, this creation cannot function unless there are good people and, more specifically, devotees of God. They are the bedrocks of the system. And such persons benefit immensely by doing what the Lord or the system expects them to do. The Lord realises that the small soul is very limited. To be both good in the conventional sense and do what God expects us to do is extremely difficult, because it goes against the deeply ingrained natures of us souls. Still, it can be done and millions are able to do. However, the number of people who are just good and are not God’s devotees is much larger.
Obviously, benefits accruing to devotees will be much greater. These benefits are duly delivered, otherwise who will choose this difficult path. Of course there are various degrees of being good and the extent one is linked with God, and their rewards are also likewise graded.
Briefly, good people are mostly rewarded in these ways. Their good ‘karmas’ entitle them to many material benefits like sufficient resources, welcome attention and the most important support of the system. As far as benefits to God’s devotes, these are very wide in scope. God guides because this is crucial to stay on the right course, and God, being omniscient, always knows perfectly. God protects; gets devotees out of trouble. God supports; maintains and provides all the needed resources for a satisfactory existence. God helps in many other ways as well like He warns His devotes; gives them mental strength; gives them intelligence — the ability to make the right decisions; the strength to tolerate; the ability to transcend the difficult to deal with ‘maya’ — the illusory energy of the Lord; and helps them overcome ‘tomoguna’ — the dark mode. God empowers His devotes to do extraordinary feats, which benefit the creation/mankind. God forgives; he gives peace — the only source who can. He forgives, i.e. releases from sins and, ultimately, liberates when a particular soul has attained a certain degree of enlightenment. Is God wrong in insisting that we take shelter in Him?
Bishnoi is a spiritual writer and can be reached at spiritual@ajitbishnoi.com
