Serving Krishna - an essential subject

Krishna is served by His devotees in so many rasas - transcendental mellows, or humor. Someone is serving Krishna as a servant, someone is serving as a friend, someone is serving as a father or a mother and someone is serving as a conjugal lover. These are five primary mellows and seven secondary mellows in which a devotee is connected with Krishna. Somebody is serving Krishna as enemy. The asuras also serve Krishna but as an enemy. Somebody is serving, giving pleasure to Krishna, by fighting with Him. So there are so many, twelve rasas. Akhila-rasāmṛta-sindhu. All the rasas that we have got experience within this world, they are coming from Krishna.

The more we are engaged in devotional service, the more our senses become pure or uncovered. And when they are completely uncovered, without any designation, then we are capable to serve Krishna. Krishna makes promise to one who is striving to serve Him sincerely that He will give such a devotee the intelligence by which he may come to Him. Therefore we should always pray that Krishna may kindly provide me the intelligence to kill all demons of doubt, and because He understands the heart of His sincere devotee, immediately He will give assistance.

Srila Prabhupada's books, lectures, conversations and letters offer a comprehensive presentation of this essential subject as seen in the Vaniquotes Serving Krishna category. An introduction from his books is given below in the following 10 quotes.

Quotes from Srila Prabhupada's books


vanipedia.org 		A living being, naturally being the part and parcel of the supreme whole puruṣaṁ pūrṇam, has as his natural function to serve the Supreme Being, just as the parts and parcels of the body, or the limbs of the body, are naturally meant to serve the complete body. Desireless means, therefore, not to be inert like the stone, but to be conscious of one's actual position and thus desire satisfaction only from the Supreme Lord. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 2.3.10)



vanipedia.org 		The Lord replied that in a family where a Vaiṣṇava like Prahlāda is born, not only his father but his father's father and their fathers—up to the fourteenth father back—are all automatically delivered. The conclusion, therefore, is that Kṛṣṇa consciousness is the sum total of all good work for the family, for society and for all living entities. In the Caitanya-caritāmṛta the author says that a person fully conversant with Kṛṣṇa consciousness does not perform any rituals because he knows that simply by serving Kṛṣṇa in full Kṛṣṇa consciousness, all rituals are automatically performed. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 3.20.43)



vanipedia.org 		One who acts to serve Kṛṣṇa with his body, mind, intelligence and words is a liberated person, even within this material world." (Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.2.187) A person who always desires to serve Kṛṣṇa is interested in ways to convince people that there is a Supreme Personality of Godhead and that the Supreme Personality of Godhead is Kṛṣṇa. That is his ambition. It doesn't matter whether he is in heaven or in hell. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 5.14.44)



vanipedia.org 		The living beings in Vaikuṇṭhaloka are never forgetful of their identities: they are eternally cognizant of their relationship with God in their constitutional position of rendering transcendental loving service to the Lord. Because they constantly engage in the transcendental service of the Lord, it is natural to conclude that their senses are also transcendental, for one cannot serve the Lord with material senses. The inhabitants of Vaikuṇṭhaloka do not possess material senses with which to lord it over material nature. (Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi-līlā 5.22)



vanipedia.org 		Bhakti, the inclination to serve the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is in a transcendental position far better than mukti, or liberation. Thus bhakti is the stage after liberation. Unless one is liberated one cannot engage the senses in the service of the Lord. When the senses are engaged either in material activities of sense gratification or in the activities of the Vedic injunctions, there is some motive, but when the same senses are engaged in the service of the Lord and there is no motive, that is called animittā and is the natural inclination of the mind. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 3.25.32)



vanipedia.org 		The Lord can be served by any ingredient, even the most common commodity—a flower, a leaf, a fruit or a little water, which are available in any part of the universe and without cost—and thus the Lord is served universally by the universal entities. He can be served simply by hearing, He can be served simply by chanting or reading about His activities, He can be served simply by adoring Him and accepting Him. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 2.9.36)



vanipedia.org 		The Lord is so great that simply by chanting His name all the great sages like Nārada can enjoy transcendental bliss. So what can be said about those queens, who were at every moment seeing the Lord and serving Him personally?" Kṛṣṇa had 16,108 wives in Dvārakā, and each and every one of them was attracted to Kṛṣṇa just as iron is attracted by a magnet. (Nectar of Devotion, Chapter 22)



vanipedia.org 		The Lord is the purest, and thus anyone who wants to serve the Supreme Lord must also be pure. Unless a person is pure, he can neither understand what the Personality of Godhead is nor engage in His service in love, for devotional service, as stated before, begins from the point of self-realization, when all misgivings of materialistic life are vanquished. (Nārada-bhakti-sūtra, Chapter 2)



vanipedia.org 		The Lord makes so many promises for the benefit of suffering humanity. Although the Lord is very compassionate upon suffering humanity, human beings are generally not very anxious to serve Him. The relationship is something like that between the father and the son; the father is always anxious for the welfare of the son, even though the son forgets or neglects the father. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 4.22.42)



vanipedia.org 		The Lord says that His external potency - Mahā-māyā, or Kālī - serves Him in the form of the internal, spiritual potency. The jīva must allow this spiritual potency to influence him freely, without interference from the false ego, which makes the him think he is the doer. Thus surrendering to the Lord is the method prescribed to reach the highest stages of devotional service. (Renunciation Through Wisdom, Chapter 5)


Serving Krishna - explore more within this category.

Vanipedia has now over 903 introductory articles compiled from Srila Prabhupada's books under the series titled Essential Subjects. All these articles can be seen in the Table of Content on the right side of this article and also here in this Umbrella Category. Browse through them to relish the breadth and depth of Srila Prabhupada's teachings - There is a subject for everyone.


   
 

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