Baba says, ‘In every situation, according to the Father’s shrimat, continue to say, “Ji Hazoor, Ji Hazoor” (Yes, My Lord). When children say “Ji Hazoor” to the Father, the Father says “Hazoor hajir” (The Lord is present) and He becomes present.’ 

To obey is a sign of love. There is obedience on the path of bhakti too but that is blind faith and blind obedience because I don’t know the One Whom I am obeying. Therefore, there is little attainment from that obedience, more labor.

On the spiritual path, God is not just my Father, He is also my Teacher and my Satguru. Complete obedience is to obey the directions of all three. Sometimes, the direction can be scary like when He asks me to step out into unknown territory and do something I don’t have the training for or experience in. All I can think of is: ‘what if I fail? what will everyone think of me? I will end up looking like a fool, no one will ever trust me with anything again…’. Sometimes, He asks me to do something I don’t understand and frankly, I don’t like. Maybe He is asking me to forgive someone that has done me very wrong, has hurt me, betrayed me, abandoned me. Maybe He isn’t just asking me to forgive but actually asking me to help them with something they need and all I can think of is: ‘What, God?, what do you want me to do again?’, ‘am I hearing Him right? is this my Father telling me to do this…after all they did to me?’ Sometimes, He asks me to submit to authority, to a boss that’s way my junior both in qualifications and experience or He asks me to leave my plush, comfy job and move to a different location to take up a much smaller role in a much smaller company. All I can feel is a sense of indignation and my mind only has one loud scream of a question: ‘why Baba, why?’, ‘why are you asking me to do this?’.

Unlike the path of bhakti, here, I do have knowledge. I do know who God is, I know all His titles and His praise and all the rest. But knowledge alone isn’t enough. Baba says, ‘knowledge is the seed but love is the water’. Unless I have a deep love for God, I will find it extremely hard to obey; I will be plagued with the questions of ‘why?’, ‘what?’, ‘how?’. But where there is love, I simply am merged in the Ocean of Love, there are no questions, just trust. This is the praise of Meera! She was put through one impossible trial after another but at no point did she ever question God and ask: ‘why is this happening to me?’, ‘why me?’, ‘how can I do this?’ etc. She didn’t have to ask, she knew what she needed to do. She knew to forgive because like her Beloved, she only felt mercy for those that had done her wrong. She didn’t have to fight it, or ask God about it. She knew to make the pilgrimage to faraway Brindavan to seek her Beloved and so she did. She didn’t ask: ‘how can I do this? will I be able to do this? but I don’t have any money or food and neither do I know the way? what if….’. She simply went on her way because she knew Who her Companion was on her journey. When she had to leave the palace and live like a commoner, she didn’t have the attitude of: ‘look at my plight!, why do I have to live like this’, it was more important to her to live her life with Her Beloved, not live her life in the palace. She passed every test of obedience, not feeling like a lamb being taken to the sacrifice but she passed the tests being full of attainment. She didn’t obey feeling drained, like she’d just been run over by a truck but rather she experienced being full of power.

And so the foundation for obedience to God is love for God. For such loving souls, Baba says, the one Father is their world. They always experience the hand of shrimat on their forehead. And it isn’t just love in words but love of a true heart. It is sung: ‘the Lord is pleased with an honest heart’ If, together with knowledge, if the love of a true heart and a clean heart for the Father is even a little bit less, Baba explains, you have to labor, everything feels like hard work. You then have to battle with your own effort. This is why a soul who has constant remembrance and is always merged in love is one who makes a mountain into a mustard seed.

Where there is love, there is unconditional trust. Where there is unconditional trust, there are no questions. It is one thing to trust and praise God when everything is going well, but the real test of my faith in Him is during the trials. It’s those times that reveal to me how much I really trust God- is it enough trust to step into the unknown? is it enough trust to be merciful to those that have done me wrong? is it enough trust to turn away from name and recognition? Do I trust Him as my Father or is that just a relationship I know of intellectually? my eternal Father has come to this impure world in an impure body just for me, to liberate me, to return to me my lost sovereignty. I know this, but do I believe it? He is the Purifier, do I believe it? do I relate to Him that way because then I know what’s going on. When I come face to face with unforgiveness, with dependence on limited name and fame, I know that He is showing me the strongholds in my mind that I need to break.

Where there is love, the two words that don’t go together are: ‘No, Lord’; there can only be: ‘Yes, Lord’. This is what Meera said; this is also the praise of Hanuman, of Brahma baba and Mama. God never asks me to do anything alone. He is longing to be part of my life, every tiny aspect of it. He is the Father, the Ocean of Love and the Ocean of Help- but He cannot work in my life unless I have faith and am willing to take that one step of courage in obedience. When He sees that step, the Lord becomes present, then nothing, and that means nothing, can stop me from attaining the fullness of my destiny.