Divine love

Divine love is the expansion of our consciousness. The very nature of divine love is to expand, expand, expand and become one with all that it touches. The more we expand ourselves, the sooner we feel the Universal Consciousness as our very own. And when we feel the Universal Consciousness as our very own, at that time we become the Universal Self.

It is through love that we can expand our consciousness faster than any other way. So if we really want to expand ourselves, then consciously we have to make an effort to love the world. When we love the world, we have to know that God and humanity cannot be separated. No spiritual person will dare to say that he loves God but not humanity. If anyone says, "I love only God and not humanity," then rest assured that he is not really a spiritual person. A spiritual person loves humanity precisely because God is inside humanity. God was one; then He decided to play the Game of infinite forms and shapes in and through us. He is the root and humanity represents the branches and leaves. The root cannot be separated from the rest of the tree. Creator and creation go together.

Again, we have to do first things first. The owner of the world, the Creator of the world is God. If we love God first, then automatically we are loving humanity. If we love God, then God will give us the capacity to please His creation, which is humanity. If we please the Creator in His own Way, then automatically His creation will be pleased in the inner world. So it is through constant love of God that we can love mankind, not the other way around. If we want to go to God by loving humanity, there will be all kinds of problems. We will love someone, but that person, because of ignorance, will offer tremendous resistance. We will want to help someone but he will simply say, "What right have you to disturb my sleep?" Somebody near us is fast asleep, and we knock at his door and offer love and say "Get up, get up. It is high time. He will only say, "I am not going to get up." But if we please God first, then we will know the right time to knock at the door of the one who is sleeping.

Our love of God is our oneness with reality. The moment we forget Him consciously or unconsciously, at that time we are divided. Even in our own physical existence, if the right hand is stronger than the left, if we do not feel God inside us — inside our entire body — then we will hate the left hand. We will say we want to have nothing to do with the left hand, because it is disappointing us. But if we love the God within ourselves, the soul, we will love the left hand as much as the right.

In the spiritual life, our friends and relatives are like our arms and hands. They are members of our family. If we can enter into the One who is all love, then only can we spread love and offer love to the world at large. The first thing is to love God and then this love we shall carry to mankind. It is from the soul that we have to come to the physical, not from the physical to the soul. From within we have to come without. The soul has all light. From the soul we shall gather light and bring it to the heart. Then from the heart we shall bring it to the mind. From the mind we shall bring it to the vital and from the vital to the body. Then the song of love will be complete. Here the world is our body, just like our physical limbs. So naturally we have to start the journey from our soul.

We are all seekers. It is absolutely true that when we seek, we realise. When we seek God, we realise God. But when we seek, even if we do it most soulfully, we always try to get something. So God plays hide-and-seek with us. He gives us an experience today, then He hides tomorrow. He comes, then He goes away again. But there comes a time when a seeker transcends this feeling of seeking and becomes a lover, a God-lover. Today's God-seeker becomes tomorrow's God-lover. When we feel that we have played our role as a seeker, we tell God, "All right, I love You. You don't have to give me even a cent. Your existence is more than enough for me, even if it is inside my enemy's heart." If we can say this to God and establish this kind of feeling for God, then we are transformed from seekers into lovers. And when a seeker becomes a God-lover, he is well on his way to reaching his goal. So let us love God wholeheartedly. Real love means oneness. When I am one, I am not the tiny drop but the vast ocean. At that time I don't take back my existence as the tiny drop. So to all of you I am saying, from now on try to become real God-lovers.