I Give Thee Thanks, O Lord

How grateful can we be for this gentle, loving and meaningful way of life in which our attention gradually shifts from the visible world to the divine, and our awareness awakens and gradually expands? How grateful can we be for a life that allows us to realize the reality of who we really are, a divine drop, one with God?

The masters have taught us that we will experience the divine within ourselves and realize our true essence when our attention is concentrated at the eye centre and our body and mind have become still and pure. This inward focusing of our attention and stilling of our mind and body turns out to be the most difficult task for a human being to accomplish. Our attention is so strongly attached to the world and our mind is so full of impressions that we have difficulty resisting our desires. But we were born for it.

This is why mystics live among us: to help us lead a meditative way of life in which our attention turns inward and our body and mind become still and pure. With their unconditional loving guidance and grace, we can realize the divine. The Lotus Sutra offers a parable that explains their mission:

In this story the Buddha explains that he descended from his blissful abode to this world in human form in search of his son, who not knowing his father and glorious origin, is lost here. The son is wandering in this world, working as a menial servant and living in a wretched condition. The Buddha, depicted here as a fabulously wealthy man, comes to meet his son in the guise of an ordinary labourer and gradually wins his confidence and respect.

In the course of time, he inculcates in his son all the necessary virtues and finally encourages him to come to his splendorous palace. To the utter amazement of the son, he discovers that his labourer friend is no other than the owner of the palace, which is full of treasures. He is amazed to see that he is being warmly welcomed as the wealthy man’s own son and is the inheritor of all his treasure.¹

The mystics live among us and live as we do so that we can relate to them, gain trust in them, and build a loving relationship with them, which allows us to open ourselves to what they have come would like to teach us. A Christian text in The Odes of Solomon carries the same message:

My joy is the Lord, and my course is to Him:
  this my path is beautiful.
For I have a Helper to the Lord.

He made himself known to me,
  without grudging, in his generosity:
  For in his kindness,
  he set aside his majesty.
He became like me,
  in order that I might accept him.
In appearance, he seemed like me,
  that I might be clothed in him.
And I did not tremble when I saw him,
  because he had compassion for me.
He became like my nature,
  that I might come to know him;
  And like my form,
  that I might not turn away from him….
He who created me when yet I was not,
  knew what I would do when I came into being.
Therefore, in his abundant grace,
  he (my helper) had compassion for me,
  and permitted me to ask from him,
  and to benefit from his sacrifice (of coming here).²

Patrul Rinpoche, a Tibetan Buddhist teacher, confirms this, saying: “The spiritual teacher...is the embodiment of the compassionate wisdom of all Buddhas, appearing in the form of an ordinary human being simply to help beings.” He continues to describe the help the master offers us:

Like a navigator, he unfailingly charts out for us the route to liberation and omniscience. Like a downpour of nectar, he extinguishes the fire of negative actions and emotions. Like the sun and moon, he radiates the light of Dharma (Truth) and disperses the intense darkness of ignorance. Like the earth, he patiently endures all ingratitude and discouragement, and encompasses in the breadth of his mind the vastness of view and action. Like the wish-fulfilling tree, he is the source of all help in this life and all happiness in the next.³

All this makes it abundantly clear that the master is a divine power – the Shabd. However, in our present state, our consciousness is so limited that we are not aware of the Shabd, the Spirit. That is why true masters dwell among us in a physical form: to teach us, to guide us, and to fill us with love and devotion for the Shabd, for God.

The purpose of love for the outside master is to lead us to that love and devotion to the Shabd within. It’s a means to that end. We can always love one who is like us, but we can never love one who’s not like us…. When we are in the body, we are in love with the body master; when we are at the level of the soul, we love the Shabd because that is like us.... So this love here is automatically transferred to that love and devotion there.⁴

The masters come to help us realize the divine and thereby become like them, fully aware and one with God. They do this by guiding and encouraging us to live a life dedicated to God. A master beautifully expresses this as quoted The Cloud of Unknowing: “I want to help you tie the spiritual knot of burning love between you and your God, in spiritual oneness and harmony of will.”⁵

The masters explain their message to us time and again; with unconditional love they encourage us to practice our meditation and live in accordance with the principles of Sant Mat. They compassionately help us to stand up each time we fall, again and again. This is because they know who we are and have known from our birth what we will do and why. They continue to express their confidence that we are capable of realizing the divine. And they show us that they want to walk this life shoulder to shoulder with us in divine love.

At the same time, they remind us again and again of our responsibility; that we ourselves must take the necessary steps and make an effort if we want to discover the essence of life and realize the divine.

Yes, the masters bestow their grace, give us good advice, and enable us to experience something of the divine light within. But it is up to each one of us to be receptive, to absorb and cherish everything they give by applying their advice in our daily lives, and by doing our meditation every day. Becoming aware of the presence of God is not possible without the daily practice of meditation, without focusing our attention on the true form of the master within – the Shabd. For, as expressed in The Cloud of Unknowing: “You know well that God is spirit, and whoever desires to be united to Him must enter into the truth and depth of the spirit, far transcending any bodily thing.”⁶

Hazur Maharaj Ji further explains:

There is no difference between the Spirit or the Word and the Father…. The Word, the creative power, and the Father are one and the same…. If we are in touch with the Word within, we are in touch with God…. Worship of the Spirit is worship of God.⁷

Meditation is entering into that truth and depth of the spirit by turning our attention inward and focusing it at the eye centre, the place where the melody of the spirit resounds and its light radiates.

As indicated in the book Philokalia, it says:

Nothing so puts you in communion with God and unites you with the divine Logos as pure…prayer – when you pray undistractedly in the Spirit, your soul is cleansed by tears, mellowed by compunction and illumined by the light of the Spirit.⁸

Meditation is a transformative process of purification in which we are softened and illuminated by the Spirit. It stills our body and mind and eventually leads to awareness that we are one with the Holy Spirit. As expressed in the Philokalia,

When the soul attains spiritual perfection, totally purged of all the passions and wholly united and commingled with the Holy Spirit, the Intercessor, in ineffable communion, then, through his commingling with the Spirit, the soul is itself enabled to become the spirit; it becomes all light, all spirit, all joy, repose, exultation, all love, all tenderness, all goodness and kindness.⁹

That is why the masters ask us, urge us – sometimes almost beg us – to do our daily practice of meditation. However insignificant our effort may seem, our daily meditation is essential for purifying and stilling our mind and body. It is necessary to be liberated from everything that limits our consciousness, and to surrender completely to the divine will. This is the condition for merging into the Shabd and becoming like the mystics – all light, spirit and joy; all peace and love; all tenderness, goodness, and kindness.

How grateful can we be when remembering that it is all the Lord’s grace that we have the opportunity to practice meditation and do our spiritual work? It is all his blessing that we may learn to love God and live in his will, that we may grow in consciousness so that we can begin to realize the state we are in and will steadily experience our true self as a divine drop, one with God.

It is a great gift that we are allowed to be in the presence of the masters, to experience their love, and with their help grow in love for God and come to loving surrender.

The only way to show our appreciation is to wholeheartedly practice our meditation and live in his will, even if our efforts seem insufficient or not in proportion to his glory. It is because of his grace and love that we can even do this much.

In the Acts of Thomas a devotee expresses this gratitude to the master and the Lord:

I give thanks to You, O Lord ….
Who has shown me Thyself
  and revealed unto me all my state wherein I am;

That hast made thyself lowly,
  even down to me and my littleness,
  that thou may present me unto Thy greatness
  and unite me unto Thyself.

Who has not withheld thine own bowels (inner self) from me…
But has shown me how to seek myself,
  and know who I was,
  and who and in what manner I now am,
  that I may again become that which I was:

Whom I knew not, but Thyself did seek me out:
Of whom I was not aware,
  but Thyself has taken me toThee:
Whom I have perceived
  and now I am not able to be unmindful of him:
Whose love burns within me,
  and I cannot speak it as is fit,
  but that which I am able to say of it is little and scanty,
  and I am not fit to say unto him even that which I know not:
For it is because of his love that I say even this much.¹⁰