Faith as a Path to Peace–How Love of God Can Lead to Peace

TRANSCEND MEMBERS, 23 Dec 2024

Rui Silva – TRANSCEND Media Service

18 Dec 2024 – We all want peace in the world, and we all want peace and happiness on an individual level. The problem is that we don’t know how to achieve peace, either collectively or individually.

The big problem in the philosophy of all those who advocate and want peace was once expressed by the Archbishop of Canterbury when he said:

‘You want the kingdom of God, but without God.’

Yes, because true peace and happiness, indeed eternal peace and happiness and not just temporary peace and happiness, only exist in the Kingdom of God. If we want peace, we have to realize that peace means living with God.

This is what is stated in the Bhagavad Gita, the oldest scripture in humanity — in fact, on 11 Dec we celebrated the day on which the Supreme Lord spoke the Bhagavad Gita to His friend and disciple Arjuna over 5,000 years ago. Unless our lives are molded to be in permanent contact with the Supreme Lord Krishna (or by any other name), we cannot have peace, as this is the actual key or formula for peace. The actual peace formula is that we must know that God is the owner of everything that exists, the beneficiary of all sacrifices and activities, and the true friend of everyone.

This is what the Lord says in the Bhagavad Gita. We can even read the actual verse where Krishna makes this statement (BG 5.29):

bhoktāraṁ yajña-tapasāṁ
sarva-loka-maheśvaram
suhṛdaṁ sarva-bhūtānāṁ
jñātvā māṁ śāntim ṛcchati

First, we have to realize that He is the owner of everything that exists. Nothing belongs to us; everything belongs to God! And it’s because we think that this belongs to me, that this land is mine, that these goods are mine, that this or that is mine, that’s why there are wars, disagreements and conflicts. We mark a border, stick up a flag and say ‘this is my country’, and the other person next to us does the same and says ‘this is my country’.

Then, because greed has no limits, we always want more and more, and we want to conquer what belongs to others, or want to possess what belongs to others, or to have more than others. Greed has no limits! Or as Mahatma Gandhi affirmed:

‘The world has enough to satisfy everyone’s needs, but not enough to satisfy everyone’s greed.’

So nothing belongs to us. We are just passing through this Earth as temporary visitors who arrived here a few days ago without bringing anything with us, and will soon leave without taking anything with us.

We must pause, and think, and realize that when the Supreme Order arrives, we will have to leave this house that we think is ours, this body that we think is us, all the properties we think we own, the family we think we belong to, the money we think we have, the bank balance, the shares or bonds we have, everything! We’ll have to leave everything behind! And the positions we occupy will become completely vacant as soon as nature calls us, in what we call the time of death.

And because everything belongs to God, everything we do must be carried out for His pleasure. He must be the sole beneficiary of everything we do. Just as when we work for an employer, who is the owner of all the goods and property with which we work in his service — everything we do is ultimately for his benefit. A bank teller can count thousands of euros a day, which are handed to him at the counter, but he doesn’t keep a cent of all that money, because he knows it doesn’t belong to him. If we know that everything belongs to God and should be used for His pleasure, we won’t covet a cent that passes through our hands, just like the bank teller. And so the Lord must be the beneficiary of all our activities, be they political, social, cultural, religious or economic, everything must be done as an offering to the Lord and for His pleasure.

And God is our true Friend. We all want someone we can trust completely and who will always be there for us when we need. Someone who will never fail us, who will never let us down. That friend is Krishna, God! And if we make friends with Him, we will discover that everyone is our friend. God is situated in everyone’s heart, and if we make friends with Him, He will dictate from within so that we are treated in a friendly way by everyone. If we make friends with God, everyone will be our friend. This is the beauty of truly living for God and with God, by His grace and intervention, everything harmonizes around us.

If everyone understands that God is the supreme proprietor, that all our actions, thoughts and words should be an offering unto the Lord, and that He is everyone’s true friend, then there will actually be peace in the world, and each individual person will have peace and be truly happy.

You see, God is our true Father. He also states in the Bhagavad Gita that He is the seed giving Father for all living entities. Material nature is the mother, who creates the body and nourishes all living entities, and God is the Father who gives life to each being. And as Father, He only wants the good and happiness of His children. Isn’t that true? Isn’t that a father’s concern? That his children are well, that they lack nothing, and that they are happy? We can also read this specific verse from the Bhagavad Gita (BG 14.4):

sarva-yoniṣu kaunteya
mūrtayaḥ sambhavanti yāḥ
tāsāṁ brahma mahad yonir
ahaṁ bīja-pradaḥ pitā

So all we need to do is understand these simple truths and apply them to our lives in order to have peace and be happy while we’re here, and then go back to Godhead at the end of this life, and live with Him eternally in full bliss and knowledge.

This is what is stated in the Vedic scriptures.

Hare Krishna!

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Rui Silva (Radha-Govinda dasa) graduated in economics and worked as an economist at Air Portugal until retiring from material activities 30 years ago to become a Vaishnava monk in the Hare Krishna Movement. He is a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace, Development and Environment, president of the Krishna Temple in Porto-Portugal, married, two children. He works as interpreter/translator and is an animal rights and human rights activist.

This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 23 Dec 2024.

Anticopyright: Editorials and articles originated on TMS may be freely reprinted, disseminated, translated and used as background material, provided an acknowledgement and link to the source, TMS: Faith as a Path to Peace–How Love of God Can Lead to Peace, is included. Thank you.

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