Praying is the easiest and best way to take shelter from God
Sounds logical. It is. Lord Krishna illuminates in the Bhagavad-Geeta verse # 10.41. God is the Creator. He has to be logically the source of everything. The following examples will make it quite clear. Money must be the first one. In spiritual terms, it is ‘karmaphalas’ given to us for our ‘karmas’. Is it not surprising that the son of a rich man gets lots of it just by being born to him? Has the son done anything to deserve it? He must have in his previous life/lives. Because God is the source. He decides who gets what. It is the same thing upon the death of a person.
All unused money is left behind because all monies belong to God only; we only get to use some of it during our lifetime. What we will get in the next life will be decided by God – the source of it all. Not only money but all opulence is awarded by God to the deserving. Let us take beauty. Isn’t someone born with it? How else do you explain someone being born with good facial and other features and someone not being so fortunate? Yes, beauty is our karmaphalas.
The Divine Authority under the superintendence of God determines who gets what. (9.10) Power comes naturally to the son of a king. Why? Because of his past life/lives’ excellent karmas.The same is true about fame, which is another opulence. Don’t we wonder sometimes why only some actor or singer gets most of the attention, whereas others are also deserving? Because the process of determining who gets what is quite intricate and, obviously, difficult to understand. (4.17) We must have faith that it is all scientific, otherwise the Creation cannot last for millions of years. God is for dharma always, and there is never any injustice of any kind in either reward or punishment to anyone. Referring to the same verse, ‘shakti’ (strength) comes from God only. Starting from ‘atmabala’ (inner strength), God is the direct source of it. Only devotees of God are beneficiaries of it.
Other strengths like intellectual, mental and physical may appear to come from other sources, but, ultimately, God is the source. There is another strength, which is to be able to tolerate. We need to pray to God for it. Most of us lack it and lament when sufferings hit as they must as they are the results of our past bad karma. Now we come to peace. Its source is God – one and only one. Lord Krishna made it quite clear. (2.66) If money could buy peace, then, no rich person will have mental problems, because lack of peace is the main reason for them.
The same is true about happiness, as indicated in the quoted verse. Now we come to the main benefits of realising that God is the source and necessity of taking shelter from the Almighty. From what has been stated earlier, it should be clear that bad karmas bring punishment for sure; even death does not stop it; our due punishments are carried over to the next life. Can something be done about it? Yes, God is very merciful.
The solution is to get help from Him, who can only help. What God does is allow us to come through our punishments unscathed; our sufferings will become quite tolerable. Devotees of God are not sitting ducks. Therefore, let us take advantage of knowing that God is the source. Why short-circuit our lives by endlessly searching for solutions sans God? Why not go to the source, who has all the solutions? Human life gives us this chance.
(The writer is a spiritual teacher; views are personal)
