Question: Since everything will happen at God's Hour, why bother to aspire?

Sri Chinmoy: Here you are making a mistake. At God's Hour everything will come, true. At God's Hour everybody will realise God. Cats, monkeys, dogs, elephants — all will realise God at God's Hour. But if we follow this philosophy, then human beings are in no way better than monkeys. If we wait for that kind of God's Hour, then God-realisation will take a million years. But if we have conscious aspiration to expedite our spiritual progress, then God's Compassion comes down and illumines us.

Everybody will eventually realise God, that is true. Tom, Dick and Harry will one day realise God. We believe it; this is our human faith in God, which is wonderful. This is the certainty that faith will give us. We know that we will realise God one day. But if we want to realise God today or tomorrow or the next day, then aspiration comes into the picture. For aspiration, a spiritual Master is required.

Mere faith in something is not enough. I have a disciple who is a good driver. I have faith in his driving; it is so wonderful that I have faith in his driving. But just by having faith in him, do you think that I will be able to learn to drive? Millions of times I have sat beside him, but I will not be able to learn how to drive just by sitting beside him, even if I have faith that he is a wonderful driver.

So our human faith in God's Promise is also like that. One day we will realise God, but that day is no day at all if we don't aspire. God knows when that day will dawn, in the bosom of Eternity. If we aspire, if we sincerely want to learn how to drive, then we will find someone to show us how to drive. Similarly, in our inner life, the spiritual Master can show us how to approach God. Aspiration is required in our spiritual life in order to get the best results in the quickest way.

From:Sri Chinmoy,Inner progress and satisfaction-life, Agni Press, 1977
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/ip