Be a Lamp unto yourself and to the world…
Wednesday, January 21st, 2015
Moses came first and then arrived Jesus…both of them were sent as Messengers to save ‘the world’ from peril. How about humans, in general…??? …Are they something less…less potent??? Answers The Supreme Source, Bhagawan Himself, urging the messiahs in each one of us to arise and awake and be a lamp unto ourselves and to the world at large. An interesting account by a Westerner connecting the message of Lord Jesus and Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai…from Sanathana Sarathi archives…
Through God’s Will I came into this life in a Jewish family, and so I was brought up as a Jew, the same religious tradition that Jesus and His disciples were brought up in. Jesus, symbolically, chose the Jewish festival of Passover for His last days on Earth. I remember as a child how on that Passover holiday we would sit together in the evening before the meal and tell the story of the Exodus of the Children of Israel from the land of bondage. Jesus and His followers must have also recited that biblical story on the Passover Eve, which was His Last Supper. And for His disciples it must have had enormous significance since Jesus had announced Himself to be the Messiah, or Christos in Greek, who, like Moses in more ancient times, had been sent by God to save His people.
In the Passover story it is told how God came with wondrous miracles and signs, and directed Moses to bring the people out of captivity into the desert. There God gave them His Commandments and Law. Then after 40 years in the wilderness He brought them into the Promised Land. It is a story of trials and deliverance. Whenever the people came into difficult times, the prophecy was that God would send the Messiah, the Saviour who could deliver them from their suffering.
In the family in which I grew up, this story of the Exodus had special meaning, for at that time we were living through the dark days of Hitler in Nazi Germany. We would sing with great feeling the songs which prayed for the Messiah to come and rescue us, and sometimes we would sing King David’s heart-wrenching Psalm from the Old Testament, “Oh God! Oh God! Why have You forsaken us?” But God had not forsaken. He had come and was present here on Earth in human form. Many years later, after coming to Bhagawan and hearing so many stories of long, miraculous treks out of the darkness into Sai’s Light, it became clear that we had all been rescued and were being brought by Him to the Golden Age, the Promised Land.
Last year (1981) the opportunity came to say to Him, “Swami, we are all so grateful to You. We were lost and You found us, and now You have brought us here to You. Dear Lord, You Are The Messiah we have been waiting for and praying for, so long.” But Baba answered, “No, No. It’s not like that. Not just The Messiah. You are also Messiah. You are all Messiah. You have the strength to rescue yourselves from bondage and help others to do so also.”
Swami’s message was clear…”Do not look for the Saviour outside of you. Like Moses and Jesus you are also the chosen of God, the Son of God. And in time you will even realize that you are wholly Divine, that you yourself are also God.”
It is a powerful and truly revolutionary message which must be deeply pondered over by all of us who have been brought up to think of ourselves as individuals, rather than as Atma, One with God. We cannot believe and we won’t trust in ourselves as the Divine Spirit, that That is our true essence, our Reality. So in life after life we have gotten lost in the world, dwelling only in our lower natures. But our souls cried out for Freedom. When finally the agony and suffering became unbearable we prayed for deliverance. Like children we cried for the All Knowing, the All Powerful Heavenly Father to come and rescue us, to love us and guide us, to reassure us that we are of His same blood, made up of the same Divine substance, and destined to reach Him. In His infinite Compassion and Mercy He answered that call. First, He sent Jesus, the perfected man, to serve as an example to us of the ideal human life. And now He Himself has come to guide us home.
Last March I started to ask Bhagawan a question about Christ, but before I could ask, He repeated a statement which most of us have heard before with wonder and awe. He said, “Jesus announced to His followers that this Age, this Kali Yuga, will become so wicked and man will become such a danger to himself, that The One Who sent me, The Father Himself, will have to come and save mankind. His Name will be Truth. He will wear a red robe and a crown of black hair. He will be called Baba.” And here Swami added, “My Name is Sathya which means Truth. This is My robe and this is My hair. This is ‘The Baba’ that Jesus announced.” He was The All Loving Father as He said this. He was not making a pronouncement. He was just speaking very softly and gently and naturally of a simple truth that we can’t properly talk of Jesus without at the same time talking of the Father. The two are inseparable. Sai and Jesus Are One. Truly Sai and all His children Are One.
As we grow up spiritually and begin to understand the magnitude of our great fortune to be born as human beings on the Earth at a time when our Divine Father has come as Avatar … as we delve deeper into His mystery, His wonder, His magnificence…as we strengthen the bond of love between us…as we follow His teachings and do His work, seeing all mankind as our family and brethren…we are naturally raised to the full expression of our own innate Divinity. Our Prema and Bhakti directly call forth God’s grace, and He multiplies our efforts a hundredfold. He says, “Be a Lamp unto Yourself,” and step by step we are led onwards to our own upliftment, coming closer and closer to our Divine Father Sai, until finally we realize that we and He Are One. SO HAM; I am He; The Father and son Are One.
That in essence was the path that Jesus trod and revealed to us. And that is our own path as well. Let us pray to Bhagawan for His Blessings that we may one pointedly proceed on that holy path, and soon reach His Lotus Feet.
II Samastha Lokah Sukhino Bhavantu II
Posted in Sai Spiritual Showers |
