The Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity 13-3: Swami Krishnananda.

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Tuesday 26, May 2026, 19:00.
Books: 
Bhagavad Gita
The Relevance of the Bhagavadgita to Humanity 13-3: Swami Krishnananda.
An Exposition of the First Six Chapters of the Bhagavadgita
Discourse 13: The Supremely Friendly Power:3.
Swami Krishnananda.

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God loves you, say the saints and the sages, more than you love God. It is difficult to understand. Saints and sages, devotees, weep day in and day out, shedding tears, remembering the love God has for themselves, for creation, for everybody. It is said in the Bhakti Shastras, scriptures in devotion, that if you take one step ahead in the direction of God, God will come running, taking one hundred steps toward you. God wants you more than you want Him. Your wanting Him is a great thing, but what to speak about His wanting you?

The whole universe wants you. You can imagine the whole universe wanting you. What could be that affection? Every particle, every grain of sand, every atom is wanting you. It loves you. It clings to you. It weeps for you. It is your friend. What could be the extent of that love which the whole universe will evince in respect of you if that can be appreciated and understood? And what is your puny love when you sit in a corner wanting to love God, the Almighty? Where comes your little love? You are a little, tiny dust particle, as it were, in this vast spread of God's creation, and your love for that, what does it mean? What does it amount to in comparison with the total love of the whole creation for you? God's love is immeasurable, and man's puny ego cannot appreciate it.

“So Arjuna, I am here, ready to take care of everyone, and I am quite aware when that support from Me is necessary,” said Sri Krishna. It is not necessary to call God for everything because He is not merely omnipotent, He is also omniscient. It is not merely that God is capable of doing everything; He also knows what is to be done at what time. And there is a further touch to it: He is everywhere. So there is no question of calling and reminding, etc. That which is everywhere, and also knows everything, need not be beckoned or summoned or told anything, “Please do this.” We have only to open our hearts in gratitude. What kind of gratitude can we show to God? We look like nobodies before that mighty Presence.

I shall tell you another story. God's love for man is greater than man's love for God. This is a startling feature in spiritual history. There was a great saint living in a village who was reputed to be capable of seeing God every day and speaking to Him. In the night he encountered God, and he had a daily conversation with Him. Everyone respected him so much, that this is a person who speaks to God every day. In the daytime he had devotees around him and gave instruction, but in the night he would be speaking to God.

One lady, it is said, who had some distress of her own, was coming every day and prostrating herself before the saint, keeping in his presence a little sweet porridge in a mud vessel, offering her obeisance, and going without uttering a single word as to why she was doing that. The saint also uttered nothing. Every day this was happening. She would come and prostrate herself, keep this porridge, do namaskar, and go away. It appears a year passed when neither she would say anything, nor he would say anything.

After a year the saint asked, “Why are you coming every day and doing this prostration and keeping this porridge before me?”

Then she opened her mouth, it seems, and said, “Great Master, I have heard that you speak to God every night. Would you kindly convey my sorrow to him, and speak my feelings?”

He said, “Yes, I shall.”

“I have no issue. I want one child. This is my sorrow. If possible, speak to God. If God wills, it shall be.”

“I shall speak, yes. I shall speak to God,” he said.

Eagerly the lady went, waiting for the dawn. Then she rushed to the saint and asked, “What is the message from God?”

The saint said, “My respectable mother, what can I tell you? God has said no, you cannot have an issue.”

Her heart was breaking. “If God Himself is not considerate to me, who else will help me? I shall end my life today.” Thus thinking, she did not return home. She ran to the bank of a river, wanting to die, to drown herself in the water. With dishevelled hair she ran, weeping and beating her breast. “I shall not live any more when God Himself is not willing to help me.”

On the way, it appears, she met a spiritual man looking like a crazy one with dishevelled hair, dirty looking. He accosted her. “Mother, where are you running?”

She did not speak. “I do not want to say anything. I am going to die.”

“Why are you going to die?” he asked.

“I do not want to speak to you. Why are you interfering with me?”

Then again he asked, “What is the matter with you? Let me hear one word.”

Then somehow, reluctantly, she uttered the whole story. “God has refused my request. Therefore, there is no point in my living in this world.”

“What is the request, and what was it that God denied?”

“Just a simple, little, petty thing. I want to have an issue. It is not going to be.”

“What is this? For a little thing you cry and want to end your life? How many issues do you want?”

“One,” she said.

“You shall have two. Why are you worrying? Go. I am telling you, you shall have two, not one. Go back home and be happy,” he said.

She could not easily swallow this message because how could a man say something against God Himself? Anyway, a good word is always a good word. A kind word, even from a baby, is solacing. Even if an enemy speaks to me kindly, it shall satisfy my heart. She went back home and gave up the idea of dying. She had, exactly after a year, a little child, and when another year passed, two children. Two years afterwards the lady came to the very same saint who had said that God had refused. She brought the two little babies and made them stand before the saint, with the same porridge once again.

The saint could recognise her, though she came after two years. “Oh, you have come,” he said. “Who are these two little children?”

“Yours. They are your children, Master. They are your children.”

“You have two children?” He could not understand how God could behave in this manner. “He has told me that it is not possible. Now how has this happened? I shall quarrel with God tonight. He has defamed me. My face has become black. What is the matter? Tonight I shall have a quarrel with God.”

That night he faced God. “Lord, what have you done to me? You have made me a fool.”

*****

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