ധ്രുവദീപ്തി // Divine Thoughts / The Devotion that We all Need. / Elsy Mathew, Bangalore.

ധ്രുവദീപ്തി // Divine Thoughts 

The Devotion that We all Need. 

Elsy Mathew, Bangalore-

I sought my soul, But my soul I could not see; I sought my God, But my God eluded me. I sought my brother, and I found all three.

Do something for someone every day, for which you do not get paid (Albert Schweitzer)

Devotion

Joseph Tagg had been a shepherd in the hill country of England for many years. At 86, though his sight had begun to fail, and his steps were less sure and steady, he still took his sheep faithfully out to pasture, guiding them where the best grass lay. His dog Tip was old too. For twelve years this faithful collie had helped his master herd the sheep. But now he began to hover closer to old Joseph, more concerned for his welfare than for the sheep. At the beginning of last winter it was suddenly noticed that old Tagg had disappeared. Searching parties went looking for him,  only to return sadly without having found him. After fifteen weeks of severe winter weather, two shepherds accidentally found him lying dead in the snow. Besides him was his faithful dog, weak, and hungry, but alive. The devotion of animals to those who have loved and cared for them is often a lesson to man. Each and every human being has been specially endowed by God with an immortal soul and with great attributes of mind, heart and body to assist him in fulfilling the one great purpose of his life—to serve God and his fellow man. The two go hand in hand, as the Apostle John reminds us: If someone says he loves God, but hates his brother, he is a liar. For he cannot love God, whom he has not seen, if he does not love his brother, whom he has seen. The command that Christ has given us is this: whoever loves God must love his brother also. (The Bible, 1 John 4:20).

 Love never asks how much must I do, but how much can I do (Frederick A. Agar).

Jesus taught that God is love. Love alone can reveal the Divinity latent in all. Love is man. Man is love. Man is God and God is love. Without God, deprived of God, nothing and nobody can exist. We live on and through the Divine Will. It is His Will that operates as love in all of us. It is He who prompts the prayer, "Let all the worlds be happy." For He makes us aware that the God we adore, the God we love, the God we live by, is in all beings as love. Thus love expands and encompasses all creation. Instead of recognizing this basic truth, men are allowing hatred, envy and other evil qualities to pollute their love. Love is the means of developing devotion and achieving liberation, apart from other things. Only the love of God is real love. It is the royal road for man to realize the Divinity in him and in everyone. It is love that unifies all, so develop love and live in love. Love lives by giving and forgiving; self lives by getting and forgetting. Love is selflessness; selfishness is loveless-ness. Do not waste your life pursuing the narrow interests of the self. Love! Love! Become what you truly are--the embodiments of love. God is the entity closest to man, dearest to man. Your mother and father might be a little afar, but God is right with you, in you. Even if you do not love Him. He will not depart from you or love afar. In every cell He will be in you. You can earn this awareness through intense love. What mistake can there be if one loves God? Have unflinching love for God till your last breath. Do not give scope for conflicts or doubts. --(From the book, Be like Jesus).

Most of us want very much to be loved. Perhaps we are not concerned enough about loving—Erwin McDonald.

A great Spanish writer, Lope de Vega, lay on his deathbed. His life passed before him like a film. He had had great success and been showered with applause throughout his life. He had inspired people with more than a thousand plays. He had lived only for success-should he not be content at the end of such a successful life? When his last hour drew near he suddenly saw things in a different light. But the doctor attending him said to him in surprise: “You can die happy. The world will not forget you. You will go down in history.” “Doctor,” said Lope de Vega, “I see it all now. Before God only one with a good heart is great. How gladly would I now give all the praise I have had in my whole life if I could do one good deed in exchange!” Yes, indeed! The value of one good deed surpasses all the praise we receive for the use of the talents that were lent to us by God!

In his autobiography, Mahatma Gandhi tells how in his student days in South Africa he became deeply interested in the Bible, especially the Sermon on the Mount. He became convinced that Christianity was the answer to the caste system that had plagued India for centuries, and he seriously considered becoming a Christian. One day he went to a church to attend Mass and get instructions. He was stopped at the entrance and gently told that if he desired to attend Mass he was welcome to do so in a church reserved for blacks. He left and never returned.

Do all the good you can;

By all the means you can,

In all the ways you can,

In all the places you can,

At all the times you can,

To all the people you can,

As long as ever you can.

--John Wesley

We have often prescribed love for nervous, tense, unhappy people who have come to us trying to make some sense of life. They always seem to equate love with some perfumed, scented, sophisticated Hollywoodized concept. They inevitably want to romanticize the word when actually it simply means to treat people with common decency, with the respect due to every man as a child of God or, for that matter, as a fellow human and brother. Go out and get interested in the human problems that are everywhere around us. Help to improve the human lot. This service of love is perhaps the healthiest attitude in this world. It puts one into the main stream of the human race, where the profound problems are, and as one participates and gets involved and learns to know people and they  him, one is loving and being loved and life becomes good—very good-- Norman Vincent Peale.

The best cosmetics in Life:

Truth – for lips

Pity for eyes

Charity – for hands

Smile- for face

Love for heart

Use them well and make life beautiful.

What does love look like? It has hands to help others. It has feet to hasten to the poor and needy. It has eyes to see misery and want. It has ears to hear the sighs and sorrow of men. That is what love looks like –Saint Augustine.