This Then Is Bhakti

In her book In Search of the Way, the late Flora Wood describes many wonderful experiences she had with Maharaj Charan Singh at the Dera in the 1960’s. Here she shares her thoughts , and some of Maharaj Ji’s words, on devotion:

We will slowly, by ardent and assiduous practice, learn to discriminate and begin to see, in some small measure, the path our Satguru is trying to show us. At first, due to the jangle of our worldly life, we cannot discern the full glory of the harmony within us; but it is there, just as surely as fire is latent in wood, which, on being rubbed in the correct manner, springs to life.

[The Master said:] “The whole secret lies in devoting ourselves so wholeheartedly to our Master’s instructions that we not only resemble him whom we love, but literally become him!”

Yes, I thought, this is what is meant by bhakti – true devotion. It is to love one’s Master and all for which he stands, so devotedly and tenaciously that all intervening material forces are dissolved and one automatically merges in him. This, then, is bhakti! Sach Khand is here and only my will stands in the way. …

But the trouble is, I thought, that I cannot hold this idea in my mind all the time. I will get up from here and the world will flood in and the glory of this thought will be dissolved like sunlight in the little boy’s jug. What can I do to keep it?

Scarcely had I thought this when the Master’s voice again reached my consciousness: “Man himself is utterly helpless, like a feather blown by the wind and is only given a sense of direction when God smiles on him. We are all beggars at his door and only by continually begging can we obtain his grace and then in his compassion he will hear and give us all.”