You Must Be Benefited

by His Divine Grace Shrila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Maharaja

Hare Krishna, my dear devotees and honorable gentlemen and ladies who are following my lectures, I am very happy with you. Actually it is not a business to give some lecture and fulfill some desire of someone, not like that. We must be serious about our spiritual life. And for that I am engaged by my Guru Maharaja to preach Krishna consciousness. The fundamental basis of this is surrender to Krishna. Everyone knows it. No problem. Krishna Himself told, "I am Lord." Nowhere you will hear - so many scriptures in this material world, descended - but nowhere you will see the Lord Himself telling, "I am Lord". But here we will see Krishna Himself is telling, " I am Lord, you surrender to Me."

If there is no chastity, there is no faith, if there is no sincerety then in which way can I say I am surrendering? I am not getting the result. Why am I not getting the result. I must search it. Scripture said, Krishna Himself said, "Surrender to me." You know this famous verse: "Sarva dharman..." No one said, "You leave your religion." But Krishna said, "Nothing give for your own self, your own account. Give everything, your whole account, merge to My account. I want to see that. Then I shall take care of that." And if we have chastity, we have sincerety, and the basis of faith that we have, what fear is there of illusion? The illusory environment cannot control our situation, because we are under guardianship of the Transcendental. Krishna He Himself ... who is the cause of all causes, who is the creator, He is telling, "You surrender to Me." Faithfully with chastity and sincerety, if we surrender to Him, whatever difficulty comes to us we will not be fearful.

This morning I read some advice of Guru Maharaja. I have seen there, I can tell to you also that you have no problem, you are not to fear the illusion. You are not to fear anything from any quarter because you have given your whole life to your Lord and your whole energy you are spending for your Lord. You must be sure of that, what you are spending. Your whole energy for the purpose of the service of Lord Krishna, then you must be benefited. If the benefit will not come, do not be fearful of that; it is a time and space question.

Here in this material world time is always passing and taking all our energy. Sometimes in a good way, sometimes in a bad way we are spending our energy. But if it is not within my account, then no problem will come to me. Krishna said, "I know what is good and what is bad for you. You do not know what is your religion, but I know what is your religion." And for that Krishna said, "Spend your whole time for My service. It is not necessary to engage yourself for your purpose. Give up everything to me, I shall see you." And with that knowledge, with that consciousness and with that conception you try to proceed in the way of Krishna consciousness. You must be benefited.

The standard is not with the insane but it is with the saner section; they all will welcome the movement that was inaugurated by Swami Maharaja Prabhupada all over the globe. And our Guru Maharaja began that attempt to attack maya this way, not by their own self. Krishna will be merciful to me if I surrender to Lord Krishna. Maya is the illusory energy of Lord Krishna and Krishna said in Shrimad Bhagavad Gita... Maya is so powerful no doubt and we are seeing that. Life after life we are spending within this illusory environment but we have not gotten relief from this. Death and birth, happiness and sadness etc., this is always with me and I am suffering from this illusory environment. And Krishna said, "Come to me, give up everything to me, I shall see what is your good and what is your bad.

Don't fly away from this Maya, if you fly, Maya will not give relief to you. "But if you come to Me, Maya will give relief to you. I'm giving assurance to you... Who will surrender to me, Maya will not touch one hair." Then you be really surrendered to the Lord, that is necessary. Everywhere, all the Scriptures, I have read almost all the Vedic Scriptures, but nowhere have I seen any hopeless position. So many rules and regulations, but there also we have seen so many things can give us relief from disturbance. But the fundamental basis is faith and our sincerity. If we are sincere to our own self we must surrender to Lord Krishna. Maya is misunderstanding. What is what we cannot understand, and for that we are suffering. Ultimately it is misunderstanding, but you want reality. So why should you be afraid of Maya, when you are surrendered to the reality, and that is Reality the Beautiful?

You want love, you want affection, you want eternity. And it will come to you. One book of Shrila Guru Maharaja I have seen named The Search for Shri Krishna, The Search for Shri Krishna; Reality the Beautiful, but when you will be established within Krishna consciousness, at that time it is not necessary to search for Shri Krishna. At that time you will see, Krishna will search for you. Loving search for the loss servant. If you are sincere, you have sincerety, you have chastity, to your Lord, the Lord will search you. You do service for the Lord and the Lord will look after everything. And what will be good for you, what will be bad for you, more than you the Lord knows that. And for that Krishna told to Arjuna, after telling so many things, after showing so much opulence, and His position, finally Krishna said... "Oh my dear friend, you do not know, if you cannot choose, I am telling the truth. Be surrendered to Me, I shall see your interest. You don't worry for that. Don't be afraid of Maya, don't be afraid of anything from this material world. Bad or good, anything will come to you, you can avoid that easily if you are chaste and you are sincere to Me."

Then if the result will not come, we must try to search where is our fault. And fault is there, surrender. We are not really surrendered to the Lord. We can say many things but our ego is disturbing us and for that we're not getting the result... Ahankar means ego. I am this, I am that. This is mine, this is yours. This type of differentiation of conception and knowledge. My English is not good no doubt, but you must forgive that. But you try to understand my heart because it is a transaction from heart to heart. This is my advice to all my friends: please try to be sincere, please surrender to Lord Krishna and get the opulent result in your spiritual life. When we are telling it is spiritual why we forget the spiritual procedure? If we follow that procedure we must be benefited. What can I say more today? I want to finish this lecture. I apologize to you all if anything hard I told to you. But you must be merciful to me to follow my advice. Jai Shri Krishna. Jai Shri Shri Guru Gauranga.

Shri Chaitanya Saraswat Math

Navadwip Dham, India

June 29, 1999