WORSHIP : THANKSGIVING, NOT BEGGING

[amandeep]

WORSHIP means an effort at establishing some kind of devotional
relationship with God or the Creator or the Super Soul. Different
religions or sects establish different types of relationship with God,
and their modes and methods of forging this relationship are also
different. The Sufis consider God as a Beloved-the devotee thus
becomes the Lover. The Hindus, the Jewa and the Christians consider
God as the Father-the devotee thus becomes the Son. The Nirankaris
consider God as the Master (Sahib)-the devotee thus becomes the
Servant, the Slave or "Dass". The most important feature of this type
of relationship is the complete surrender of pride or ego on the part
of the devotee. It is this type of relationship, of the master and the
slave or of the Sahib and the Dass, that is characteristic of the
Nirankari faith.
One of the most important and outstanding part of worship in the
modern times consists of begging and wish-fulfillment. This type of
practice is held valid on the plea that there is no harm in a lover's
begging from his beloved, or a son's begging from his father. The
votaries of this practice may justify their action regarding begging,
but the reality of the matter is that begging is a reductive action.
Even in our own day-to-day life we see that people are quite keen to
give when you are in need but don't beg or demand. However, the moment
you start begging, giving starts losing its pleasure for the giver; it
becomes a type of compulsion and hence something unpleasant. We are
directly or indirectly breaking away from the person we beg from. In
spite of all this, all our prayers are full of begging or at the most
begging combined flattery. Whenever we approach God, it is always with
a charter of demands. When we suffer from some disease, we look upon
God to be our physician. When we need money, we ask Him to heal us, to
enrich us, to bless us with children and then to help them in passing
the examinations and then to provide them with good jobs. We treat Him
as if, like an exceptionally faithful servant, he is always at our
beck and call; always ready to serve us and thus to fulfil all our
wishes and desires. The most interesting thing is that He never fails
us and always helps us and comes to our rescue. In fact, the more you
beg, the more He gives; rather He gives you more than you beg, but, at
the same time, the more you get, the more you are going away from Him.
A demand can never be a prayer. A prayer is always a thanksgiving. God
has already given us more than we deserve or need. We, on the other
hand, tend to forget what He has given us, but continue to demand more
and more. It seems that by nature the human mind is demanding. There
is a story: Once a beggar went to a king and extended his begging bowl
before him, requesting the latter to give him alms. The king ordered
his men to fill the beggar's bowl with gold coins. To the greatest
surprise of the king, the beggar's bowl remained unfilled even after
all the gold coins in the king's treasure had been poured into the
beggar's bowl. The amazed king asked the beggar the reason for this
unusual happening. The beggar told the king that his begging, bowl was
no ordinary container but was made out of an actual human skull. That
was why it remained unfilled, how so much you may put into it.
Dear readers, the only prayer or worship that you can offer to God is
the expression of your deep feelings of thanksgiving and indebtedness
for all that He has given you. Is it not ridiculous that when it comes
to the matter of offering on our part, our behavior becomes most
shameful. We boast of having given food, clothes or shelter to many,
but it hardly ever occurs to us that all that is there in the world
belongs to God alone. All that is with us has been given by Him. You
are only its custodian or trustee. All your prayer or worship to Him
can consist of is neither any worldly offerings nor any wordy praise
or flattery. You can worship Him only by being deeply full of the
feelings of gratitude that He has given you so much. The feeling of
happiness and satisfaction should spontaneously overflow your heart:
this overflow of speechless gratitude can be called true thankfulness.
And for such a thanksgiving it is not necessary for one to go to a
temple: the whole cosmos is His temple. In fact, the whole Existence
is His own spread. He is so big that no temple can contain Him. At the
same time, He is so small that even the smallest of this Existence
contains Him. Since the whole Existence is He Himself spread all over
whomsoever you are serving only He is being served. In this way,
service becomes worship. The more you devote yourself to the service
of His creation, the nearer and dearer are you to His Heart.
Please allow me to sound a note of caution here. Service to His
creation is service to god, no doubt. But there is a difference
between the two. There is a stage when service to humanity becomes
worship of God, so long as you are rendering service to humanity, the
poor and the weak, the needy and the helpless or any of His creature,
you are doing a social service -not a worship of God. Service becomes
worship when your whole existence is full of the feeling that you are
serving God; when you are full of gratitude and thanksgiving that the
served one obliged you by giving you an opportunity to serve. This is
why it is customary among the Hindus that when they invite some saint
to take meals at theirs, they offer him some "Dakhshina" (cash or
kind) as a token of their feeling of gratitude for having obliged them
by accepting their meals. Similarly, when some Niraknari saint or
preacher visits places away from his home, there is always a scramble
among the Nirankaris to get an opportunity to render some service to
him. Every Nirankari is keen that he or she should be given an
opportunity to serve breakfast or lunch or tea or dinner or even an
opportunity to wash his clothes or polish his shoes. It is this
keenness to grab an opportunity to serve the saint and to feel blessed
by rendering some service to him that service becomes worship
In brief, being religious is an attitude towards life. It is a way of
living in which you remain in constant touch with God. Do whatever you
may, go wherever you please, you have a constant feeling of His
presence everywhere, in all things, at all times. When one reaches
this stage, the very act of living becomes worship. It discriminate
between pleasure and pain, because you recognize that the hand that is
giving these is the same and hence everything given by Him is welcome.