Winds of Grace
Winds of Grace, a collection of Sufi poetry and stories, refers to a passage in the Qur’an on grace as “God’s benevolent and loving glance.” God’s grace is something that is given freely, yet we often feel we do nothing to deserve or earn it. Without his grace, we would be lost. With it, this loving glance enlivens and energizes our spiritual journey, simply by giving us the strength to keep going. The author and translator Vraje Abramian quotes from the Qur’an:
As in the spring, God’s beneficial glance brings the world the message of new life and glory, and the breeze loosens that which the winter has entangled…. Just so, God’s benevolent and loving glance at the believers’ hearts raises the winds of Grace and Obedience – so they may struggle to become worthy of Holy understanding and persist in their prayers and remembrance.
Winds of Grace
This benevolent, loving glance from the Lord, which causes daffodils to bloom and trees to burst into bud, is the same divine gift that allows and motivates us to struggle and persist in his remembrance. God’s grace is not the promise of worldly success or an easy life, nor even the promise of spiritual union with the divine – at least not yet. God’s grace is the gift of a sacred opportunity to engage in his remembrance.
One of the many paradoxes on this path is that meditation is both an inner sanctuary and an inner struggle. In meditation, we discover a mind that is rearing and bucking, attempting to escape in every possible direction from our efforts to focus. The mind resists any attempt to contain it. Maharaj Sawan Singh (Great Master) wrote in Spiritual Gems:
It is a life-long struggle. Those who have undergone this struggle, or who are engaged in it, understand what it is to conquer the mind. It is son, daughter, wife, husband, friend, wealth and poverty, attachment, greed, lust, anger, pride and whatnot.
Great Master continued, with a dramatic image of how the mind is held captive by its attachments.
It is attached to the outside world with ropes, double ropes, triple ropes, and manifold ropes, and has been held by these chains so long that it does not feel the irksomeness of its bonds. It likes them instead.
Mind has completely forgotten its origin. To the caged bird, its captivity is the normal run of life.…
If it were an easy affair, Guru Nanak would not have sat on pebbles for twelve years … and Soami Ji himself would not have contemplated in a solitary, dark, back room for seventeen years.
I need not write more. You know the struggle.
Indeed, we know the struggle. Thankfully, Great Master ended this passage with a hopeful message of encouragement, reassurance, and promise: “All that I would add is that there is no disappointment to those who are attached to the current within. Sooner or later the door will open.”
Outside the eye centre, we are caught in the prison of the mind and our desires, the narrow world of the ego. But the saints assure us that the door within will open one day. There are no failures in Sant Mat. In spite of the inherent struggle, or possibly because of it, meditation is what the Master has asked us to do. It is our part to play. Only through his grace are we able to bravely and steadfastly persist on this path of God-realization, despite feelings of difficulty, frustration, or failure that the mind struggles to overcome. Yet, we are asked to continue the struggle. We are asked to persist and persevere.
The good news is that the Master’s grace sustains us at every moment, at every step of the journey, both before and after initiation. In the following passage, Maharaj Charan Singh beautifully described the lifeline that the Master freely extends to us through his grace, which is immeasurable and infinite. He packed quite a lot into this short passage:
We owe everything to the immeasurable grace of the Master. He showers his blessings on us by joining us with the Shabd and Nam, removing all our doubts, and pulling us out of this quagmire of illusion. It is our Master who puts us on the right Path and awakens in our mind abiding love and devotion for the Lord. Blessed with his infinite grace, through meditation, we seek the door, we find it, and we knock.
Die to Live
Through meditation, the Master is opening our hearts to the grace that is perpetually raining down on us. We should show our gratitude by adhering to his guidance. In doing so, he helps us navigate in this world of illusion. The masters come to this world on a mission of mercy. Putting us in touch with the Shabd – the divine energy emanating from the highest spiritual region – is their only purpose in coming to this world, their only mission in life. Ultimately, nothing can come between master and disciple.
Hazur Maharaj Ji once responded to the question: “Maharaj Ji, on the special occasions when grace and mercy are bestowed on the disciple, is that an intervention by the master?” He answered:
The whole life of a disciple is a special occasion. When the marked soul takes a new birth, the saint becomes responsible to take the soul back to the Father…. So every step, every occasion, is a special occasion for the disciple. The Lord’s blessing and grace is always there with the disciple, but it is up to us to be receptive to that grace…. Whenever we attend to meditation, that’s a special occasion to get the grace…. Otherwise his grace is always there.
Spiritual Perspectives, Vol. II
His grace is always flowing. Our receptivity grows whenever we attend to meditation. In fact, our struggle to contain the mind is the surest sign of his grace. Through the Master, the entire life of a disciple is a special occasion to open our hearts to the winds of grace. Let us lean into that grace and let the force of the winds fly us out of this world back home to the Lord.