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The Living Life Series is dedicated to Lord Bo Tien (武天菩萨). The doctrine is in His image. The image is the doctrine. He who sees, understands and effects the doctrine sees and knows Him. He who does not see, know and effect the doctrine sees not and knows not the saint even if the saint or His image is beside him. The far may be near and the near may be far. Let the doctrine and the saint be part of our life. The lord saint in your life can be any heavenly saint of any religion, sect or school. The doctrine of truth is behind all and this is the Inner Truth that leads all (regardless of their religious affiliation or even if none) to inner peace and heaven on earth here and now and not just in the after life. The ideal worship and devotion is to know and effect the doctrine of God and the saints. The best gospel is the gospel of life. We learn from our life and the lives of others. The true temple is the world we live in. The sky is the roof of the temple and religions and sects are the pillars of the temple. All under Heaven are in the temple. Needless to say that all the saints we know are in this temple. Ji Gong Posat too is no exception. The whole wide world and web is the temple and must be regarded as a sacred place --- a temple for living and learning. It is more important that everyone that counts plays a role in this universal temple if due focus is to be given to the Mission of Heaven. Men must not be distracted by the agenda of men and end up serving the mission of man. That would be a far cry from the Mission of Heaven. We worship God and saints, not man however good that man may be. There should be no hero worshiping or idolizing of man whether he is a charismatic pastor, priest, monk, medium or lay leader. We don't even idol worship the image of any saint but reflect on what the image stands for. - the doctrine in the image. Omitofo 阿弥陀佛!.

Tuesday, November 7, 2017

Why service before self can go wrong?

No 1542 of Living Life Series 1

While we may want to rise above self interests in life and in religion, there is still no doubt that we must do things for ourselves first before we can even consider doing things for others. 

 We need to live. We cannot live by helping others to live and forget about living life ourselves. 

 The issue is to what extent we must do things for ourselves and take care of self interests. 

 We must ensure that when we live life we do not do so at expense of others. Then that will be sabotage to others. 

 At the same time, we must not help others to live and sacrifice our own life. This is service before self. We can consider this as sabotaging our own life. 

 There must be a win win situation. In old China, the sages refer to this as yin yang balance. 

 A ruler in old China would have to take care of his own interests. But if he was ruthless and enslaved his subjects and caused hardships in the process, such a ruler or emperor could not last long and the dynasty he belonged to would fall and be replaced. 

 Religion too cannot enslave followers and cause fear and be threatening. Religion must not threaten hell fire to impose itself on followers and to bring in more followers. Such a method will not last long. 

 But the opposite that followers can do wrong but will not have to face consequences because of divine grace is the ultimate opposite which will lead to moral rot and followers will be able to climb over God and saints. God and saints become their servants to serve them. 

 Bo Tien 武天 refers to the need to balance yin and yang in life and in religion. This principle is true and applicable to any religion, sect, temple, race, culture or nation. 
His mission is to bring out the inner or underlying teaching of goodness that is in any religion so that everyone will be better in the religion he or she is in. Of course, there must be balance between two types of service, religion serving them and they serving religion for the good of themselves and for the many. 

 Help others to live but need help ourselves to live too. No service before self but when we serve, we will be served somehow. Many who talk about service before self end up serving their own big egos when they proclaim service before self. They do some good which is still good but wants a big name for themselves - a good standing in society. That poses a big question of sincerity.
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