IF YOU ASK ME, THERE IS ONLY GOD'S WILL

 
Mani writes David: "I cannot answer your query, 'What did Baba say about free will?' because I cannot recall Baba saying anything direct on the point and I never thought of asking Him. We were kept busy in the depth of His Silence. And our main question has been to ourselves whether we are loving and obeying Him enough. But you have read everything of Baba's and, as you say, Baba did not mention about human beings when He said, 'the waves do not roll and the leaves do not move without My Will'.

"Baba has made it clear that the process of evolution is the development of consciousness which becomes full when human form is attained. Once the human form is attained, which means full consciousness, there is nothing to prevent him from realizing His Self, i.e. God, except the mountainous muck of sanskaras accumulated during the innumerable lives experienced in evolutionary forms. And one can be freed from that binding by binding oneself to loving and obeying the Perfect Master or try to make it by the interminably long way of self effort.

"So you see, as a human being, you do have the chance of a choice, particularly and immeasurably so when you have the rare good fortune to come into the Avataric orbit of the God-Man. When we are bound to Him, the only Reality, we are freed from illusion. Doing what we want is enjoying liberty, but doing what He wants is gaining Freedom.

"If you ask me, there is only God's Will, there is no such thing as our will, free or otherwise. We can only have free want. In the confinement of His All-pervading Will, we are free to want to do better. If it were not so, Baba would have no need to give us discourses, no need to tell us repeatedly and emphatically, 'Do your best and leave to Me the rest.'

"Travelling through the vast maze of the Divine Plan in illusion, we come to certain points where we have the choice of taking this pathway or that road. It is His compassion that again and again we are given a chance. Again and again He comes into illusion to show us the way. We generally select what looks like the easier way, or the one that we are deluded into believing is the short cut, by following after half-baked or imperfect guides, and then we do go along the predestined pattern of the way we have chosen....

"Baba once remarked that the mind is like a bird cage with its many bars imprisoning the bird. The door of the cage is the heart through which, when opened, the bird can fly to freedom so easily. But even when the Keeper comes along and opens the door, the captive bird flutters about, dashing against the cage, hurting its wings and trying frantically to get out through the many narrow openings between the bars and giving up each time. I've witnessed this a number of times with encaged birds. After a time, the bird is exhausted with its efforts and collapses, dropping to the floor of the cage, looking dazed and helpless. And then, then it sees the open door, and in a moment is out of his cage and flying to freedom.

"Now that Baba has opened the door for you, you can well afford to bypass the innumerable questions of the mind that bar you from loving Him yet more and more. But of course Love for Him is also His gift, so when you come down to it, it is really His Grace that rules over all and over-rules all will. The Avataric era is when the grace is released and the more wide open and uncluttered we keep our hearts, the more we can receive it."