SB 01.15-22-23 – Krishna can integrate into his spiritual masteraplan disasters, even self-induced disasters – always choose faith, not doubt

Transcript

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Thank you.
Shri Nirbhagavatam 150, 22-23 Here Arjuna is now responding to Dishtara’s query you had asked about what had happened to our relatives so those who were in the abode of our Suruta Krishna so they were all our Surudham and what happens with Prashapavimudhana Samba and Yadu princess played a dare devilish joke trick with the sages Narada and others they dressed Samba as a woman and put an object in the belly area and said oh sages please tell whether she will be having a boy or a girl she has got angry seeing their facetiousness and replied that whatever she will have that will become the cause of your destruction so Maharaja Ugrasen when he came to know about this he had Vishwachandra Thakur explained that he made the error of not consulting Krishna but himself deciding that that iron ball should be crushed into powder and then thrown into the ocean so that was done but that same iron powder actually swept on to the coast and it was absorbed by the weeds that were growing over there on the coast and those weeds became as hard or harder than iron rods and Varunimadhirampitva so the Yadus who had come there drank Varuni and they became Matta, they became intoxicated mad and they fought with each other and Ajanatama as if they did not remind each other they slaughtered each other so this sort of situations may cause great drought these are Krishna’s associates and Krishna is also present how can they have such terrible calamity generally when somebody is practicing devotional service we expect that person should have a peaceful departure from the world where surrounded by devotees one is remembering Krishna and one is being helped to remember Krishna by others so if some devotee dies in an accident or in some sudden way like heart attack that can be disturbing to our faith but if somebody even worse dies in a self-induced disaster somebody drives recklessly and then goes off a cliff or something like that, that may be even more disturbing now Krishna always challenges our faith because often it is through challenging of faith that the faith grows so this question of how the Yadus could have killed themselves and Krishna allowed that even participated in that may disturb our faith but then we have a choice Krishna has before that through logic through philosophy and through demonstration in his past times explained unambiguously about his supremacy and the supremacy of the loving relationship between him and his intimate devotees so on the path of life Krishna always gives us choice and those choices involve choosing whether to doubt or to believe so we can either choose based on everything that Krishna has taught and done prior to this incident, we can choose to believe in Krishna or based on this one incident we can choose to doubt and even disbelieve reject, how can Krishna be God but devotees recognize that this is just a Leela of Krishna meant to test our faith and they understand that Krishna has some higher plan and as Krishna explains to Gandhari when Gandhari curses her that your family will be destroyed in 36 years, he says that the Yadus were a burden on the earth and they couldn’t have been killed by anyone so you have helped me to complete my mission so Krishna knew it and Krishna accepted it and Krishna incorporated it into his plan for delivering for unfolding of the spiritual plan in the world so similarly when some disasters happen in a devotee’s life certainly we don’t want those disasters and we can do what is in our power to avoid them but when those happen we should know that Krishna has the expertise to integrate even our disasters including our self-induced disasters into his plan for our spiritual evolution and redemption what is important is that we always maintain faith in him and persevere in our devotion and especially when we are praying, chanting, meditating at such times instead of dwelling on pastimes which causes doubts and dwelling on those doubts we can turn instead to pastimes that inspire us invoke the devotion within us, strengthen the faith within us and thereby make the choice of faith and then when we look at these kind of pastimes which seem to cause doubts because we have taken shelter of Krishna we have internally experienced and confirmed the reality of Krishna and his love and therefore by that experiential confirmation we can go beyond the doubts which are caused by such bewildering and distressing incidents because we understand that ultimately whatever happens in this world Krishna will take everyone to a reality which is beyond bewilderment and beyond destruction and the path to that reality remains open to us even now when we are facing bewilderment and distress because the holy name is always there and the opportunity to remember Krishna is always there we just have to tap that opportunity