Ten days ago I received a message from a Manufacturer and business colleague, Dr Guissepe, that he was coming to the UK to visit me. It was going to be on Saturday and I was saddened immediately, I could not go on Harinama! What could I do? It was like a blow to the chest, I felt very sad inside. But Dr. Guiseppe had arranged to stay with me to set up one of his record decks and I had been waiting patiently for it for years. I couldn’t say no. I am normally quite apprehensive of others staying with me, but fortunately I had cleared one of the spare rooms and it was only for a couple of nights. But I still was sad about missing Harinama.
Dr Guissepe is from Italy and is quite a character with a tremendous brain and understanding but is far from the world of the devotees. I reflected on this, then started thinking how ultimately the Lord resides in everyone’s heart and that his intelligence comes from Krishna himself. I decided that I should see this as a positive rather than a negative, and take this as a great opportunity. After all, we can learn from others despite their background and beliefs. When Guissepe arrived, hr said straight away, “I want to serve you.” as he had come to set up and install one of his creations, a complex air-bearing turntable that I had him build to my specification. Guissepe remembered straight away he had seen me at the manor on a video call and asked me how is everything at the temple? He speaks very little English but was able to communicate this well. He said, “Your temple is very beautiful.” I asked him how he knew, he replied, “From the video call.”
He went into my living room and saw my deities and pictures of Krishna. He asked me if this was my God, I said, “Yes.” I explained to him who Krishna and Lord Jaganath are. He looked at their lordships on the altar sincerely and after a minute, from no where, I saw him fold his hands and close his eyes in prayer. I was taken aback by this, really taken aback. He said, “Now I have the energy to get to work!”
I was taken aback, as he seemed to have found sudden strength to start the heavy work of setting up the record deck after the flight. It is very heavy and it seemed Krishna had blessed him. After many hours of assembling the heavy components and setting up it was evening. Guiseppe sat down and started staring at the picture of the divine couple. He asked me, “Why is your god so beautiful ?”
I said, “Krishna is the all attractive and this is his consort Radharani.” I was really taken aback by his interest in Krishna, as I never mentioned anything. I meditated on how I could take this opportunity to introduce the Lord to him. After all, I had missed Harinama – a big blow to be with him. Then Gusseppe said something interesting. He said that when he was doing his work for me, he felt God was directing him and was telling him to do his best for me. He kept saying, “I want to serve you, because you are God’s man”. I was touched, this is someone who I thought did not had any devotional qualities, yet he had the mood to serve and thats what he did. He continued working untill 2am.
The next morning I was chanting my rounds, the door to my bedroom was shut. When I opened the door I saw Guiseppe on the step listening to my chanting. He said, “This is very soothing, I loved hearing the mantra.” He asked if he could he repeat it after me. I said, “Of course he could”. He then started repeating the mantra with me. He said he had been feeling very stressed and this has been very calming to him. He said that he felt God had bought him to me, I felt very humbled. I was saddened I missed a Harinama, yet the Lord bought someone to me you had touched them with his holiness. It felt quite electric hearing him chant the Lords names with me.
The next day I phoned Viswambara Prabhu to see if he had any books in Italian, but sadly he had not. I decided to give him a Gita and SSR in English anyway. Guissepe embraced the books and hugged them. He said, “This is the best gift I could have given him,” it was very powerful to see how touched he was.
I then sat him down and showed him videos on what I would be normally be doing on a Saturday – chanting on the street. He told me that he had never seen anything like it. I replied, “What? You’ve never seen a Harinama?”
He said, “No” and watched videos of various Harinams with me. You could see his heart being instantly touched, he was mesmerised and what happened next was certainly quite amazing. Guissepe went in front of Lord Jaganath and paid obeisances as he had seen me do the day before. It was truly emotional to see. This spirit soul from no where felt the love of the Lord. I then paid obesiences to the Lord thanking him for bringing Guiseppe’s precious spirit soul to me. Guiseppe then asked me if I could send him videos of the Harinama which I did.
I reflected on how kind Krishna is. Even though I could not go out on the streets, he allowed me to introduce this sincere soul to the world of spriritual practice, no opportunity is wasted, we never know who we will meet and what effect we will have on them.
Source: http://www.dandavats.com/?post_type=post&p=106582#
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