SB 5.3.19 Speak the Lord’s glories not to remind him but to remind ourselves of them and to express our faith to him

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 8.3.19 yam dharma-kāmārtha-vimukti-kāmā bhajanta-iṣṭaṁ gatimāpnamanti kim cāśiṣo rātya-pideha-mauvehaṁ karo tu me adhapradayo vimokṣu yam dharma-kāmārtha-vimukti-kāmā The souls who come to this Lord for any of these things, they may come for material gains or for liberation from material existence.
Still, gatimāpnamanti, the Lord, gives them their destination, whatever is their iṣṭaṁ, bhajanta-iṣṭaṁ, they come and worship Him and He gives it to them. And in fact, the Lord often gives more than what they ask for also. kim cāśiṣo rātya-pideha-mauvehaṁ Some of them, He may even give the deha-mauvehaṁ, He may give them the eternal destination.
And that Lord, karo tu me adhapradayo vimokṣu To that Lord who is unlimitedly merciful, adhapradayo, the Lord’s mercy knows no end. It is simply unlimited. vimokṣu Let He grant me liberation.
And Prabhupāda explained that the liberation is not just from the present danger of the crocodile, but also from the overall danger of material existence. yam dharma-kāmārtha vimukti-kāmārtha So the point is, anyone who approaches the Lord, that person is not disappointed. If that person does bhajan, that person gets.
It may take time, but the Lord bestows. And He is thinking of Dhruva Mahārāja over here, who came with artha-kāmā, but then what he got was deha-mauvehaṁ. A Lord is so merciful that He gives more than what is asked for.
And for one who is so extraordinarily merciful, who is adhapradayo, unlimitedly merciful, please, O Lord, give me liberation. So actually, here, Gajendra is remembering the past mercifulness of the Lord and thereby is gaining impetus to ask for similar mercy upon himself. So generally, when we talk to the Lord, prayer is basically nothing but talking to the Lord.
So we ourselves remember how the Lord has been merciful in the past. By that we remind the Lord of His exalted devotees or His merciful nature. Of course, the Lord knows it, but the whole dynamic of relationship is what every person in the relationship brings into that relationship.
So when the Lord sees that we are remembering His devotees and we are reminding Him of His devotees, that pleases Him. And when we remind Him of His merciful nature, that expresses our faith to Him. The Lord knows His merciful nature.
But when we glorify Him, it is not flattery. It is actually a reminder to ourselves and a statement to the Lord that we remember His merciful nature and we have faith in His merciful nature. So by such glorification of the Lord of all the past occasions when He has shown mercy, our inner conviction to apply ourselves in the process of devotional service increases.
So the glorification of the Lord is not to remind Him of His glories, but to remind ourselves of His glories and to express our faith to Him. And by these two things, we go closer to the Lord and we attract His mercy. And then His mercy is, Krishna Prabhupada explained that the devotees are not flatterers.
Actually, they glorify the Lord because that is the way they express their devotion. Or in our case, even if we feel we don’t have devotion, then our aspiration for devotion we express. And in this way, we move closer and closer to the Lord.
So the whole purpose and principle of bhakti is to deepen the relationship. And sometimes we may feel I am repeating the same prayers which so many devotees have spoken, the same points. But no, we try to internalize them, we realize them and then we speak them.
It is our heart’s offering to the Lord and that is extremely pleasing. So the Lord has been merciful in the past and He will be merciful to whoever approaches Him. So that way, even when we chant the Holy Names, meditating on the glories of the Holy Name and speaking out those glories in prayer form, it convinces us to take shelter of the Holy Name and expresses to the Holy Name and to Krishna, who are one and the same, our faith in them.