Jaya Pataka Swami tells a devotional story about Lord Jagannath to show how humble service invites divine mercy. The Lord gives freely, but sincere willingness to serve and use that mercy responsibly opens the door to higher blessings.
So I sent a message that my daughter won't marry a sweet girl. So then the Guru Maharaj took it. Or this is an insult against Jaganna. Not sweeping the road. Mystical super. He's sweeping, humbling himself before the Lord. And they went on a big sale, declared war against that king, defend the honor of Jagannath. So the whole army was marching against the other army. And they were going to meet in some place for a fighting. On the way, there was a lady selling yogurt, an old lady, village lady selling yogurt. And she saw two young generals, princes riding on horses came by and they said, how much for the yogurt? We want some yogurt. He says, well, you have to pay me so much. We don't have any money. Give us the yogurt. King Indra Dunna is coming. You can give him this ring and then he'll reimburse you for the yogurt. He said, okay. People were so Arnestan, if somebody got a gold ring, who's going to get it to get a few paisa for that nowadays? But she was such an honest lady that she's supposed to give the ring to the king and then get what she was due. She didn't want to take more than what she was due. She's trying to see the king, but people say, well, you can't see the king. Were you. You're just telling this? No, I have to give the king this ring. You know, I have to get my money and the king, what's going on? Bring her over. And she said, two of your princes came and they gave. They took my yogurt and they gave me this ring and said that if I give you, you pay me for the yogurt. So let me see that ring. When he got the ring, he almost fell off his chariot. So this is Jagannath's ring. What did these two princes look like? Someone really dark color, got a bluish tint riding on a white horse. The other one was white color riding on a grey horse. The one with the dark color had a peacock feather in his hair and the other one had a white feather. So then the news came to the holy army that Ka Balaram had come and given their blessings. So then they knew they were going to be victorious because more you never know what's going to happen. So then after this, the whole thing was worked out. Finally they didn't have to fight when they were facing each other. Somehow the thing was negotiated. It was such a big issue. So this tradition was being Followed by Pratapuram before Krishna sweet. And here somehow Lord Mayor got inspired. Actually the king, even though I saw him poured us for about five minutes. But what this did was because he humbled himself before Krishna. That impressed Lord Caitanya. Lord Chaitanya was inclined to give him mercy. So by doing Seva we can get more mercy. You can see how Prabhupada, he was very happy over the London Rathyatra and used to go to Trafalgar Square. For many years we were going to Balsi Park. But now since the past few years they're going back again to Trafalgar Square and Prabhupada. Like that they were comparing here that from the ground I looked like rats were my compared to mounts Sumeru London they compare to the Nelson Monument. So here our rough was towering because of Mr. James Abel's storage ship. Somehow the rocks could squeeze through the narrow streets and then smashing the car. So like this. If we want to place a Lord, it's not so difficult. We should do something. We can get worshipped on his mercy. If we do something to serve Krishna, we should thank God in our life. We can do something for Krishna. Or how we can regularly do some service to Ka without difficult thing. We can get Loshatana his mercy. Lord Sheetanu gives His mercy very freely. At the same time, if one really wants some higher blessings, we shouldn't expect just a total freebie. We should be willing to do something for the Lord. We got the opportunity of devotional service. Now what are we going to do with it? Somebody gets your money, say your father gives you some money. You want to see how you use it, how you invest it, how you use it wisely. Sometimes in a rich family we see how the children are being responsible to see that they won't squander all the hard earned wealth of the parents when they inherit. So we're all children of Krishna. So we all inherit mercy. But before we can cash in on that, the Lord wants us to give us the mercy and sees how we use it. This is a devotional service. And how do we use that freedom to do that service? So doing devotional service is the greatest mercy. Because when we do such service to Ka, that is an opportunity to become really intimately united with him, connected to Him. And then through that connection we can transcend all kinds of obstacles and we can achieve his perfection.
