Guiding Light: True Surrender To God Requires Humility, Faith, Acceptance Of Life’s Divine Will

“If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent Him,” said Voltaire. The question arises: what sort of a God do we want?

The vast majority of men and women want God who is a sort of a store-keeper ready to supply them all those things for which they send in a requisition. So long as God gives them what they want, God is good, God is loving, God is wise, and there is none like unto Him. But the moment He refuses to oblige, He becomes a cruel God, unjust and unkind. His very existence is denied.

What we urgently require is a divine adjustment. At some time or the other this truth dimly dawns on our consciousness. But we are afraid to leave all things in His Hands for fear of what He may do. So many of us live in this fear. We do not know what God may do if we surrender ourselves to Him. To surrender ourselves to Him is to accept His Will. We are not yet prepared to do so. We still want our wills to be done.

The one thing needful is to focus the mind on God, to live in His presence and to dedicate ourselves to Him. By doing so we will not, of course, be free from all faults. Hence accept the path of humility that reveals to us what we are, teaches us that of ourselves we can do nothing: for we are nothing. All the good that is done through us is done by God. Humility, therefore, means utter surrender to God and to God alone.

The best thing that man can do is to hand himself over to God, to accept everything including disgrace and disease, trouble and tribulation, misfortune and misery, as coming from God. Therefore rejoice in every situation and circumstance of life, giving gratitude to Him whose works are ever the works of mercy.

It is love that brings a man nearest to God. Love God with all your heart and soul. Talk to Him. Think of Him. Rest in Him. In the midst of your daily work, turn to Him, again and again. These glad turnings of a loving and grateful heart are your best prayers to God as no one reached God except on the path of humility.

(Dada J P Vaswani was a humanitarian, philosopher, educator, acclaimed writer, powerful orator, messiah of ahimsa, and non-sectarian spiritual leader.)