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I soon realized why Sai Baba had directed me to home and family. My father became very ill, and the entire family helped care for him. My beautiful and loving mother had died 10 years earlier without accepting Sai Baba’s presence in our home. She felt our love but couldn’t tolerate the incense, the large pictures of Baba on our walls, and our worshipful aitude. Aer a while, I stopped explaining and defending Sai Baba and simply expressed my love for her.
My father, on the other hand, struggled to have faith in God. He was a good man and a student of life, and he tried to understand the mystery. He knew much of the Jewish liturgy, yet as he grew weaker, he soly lamented, “I’m talking to God, but he’s not answering!” We gathered around his bedside and sang to him, our daughters massaged his feet and legs, we shed a few tears, and we knew that God was answering him through our love. Near the end, he whispered weakly, “Family is the most important thing,” and finally, “I love you.”
I suddenly remembered that 18 months earlier Sai Baba had materialized some vibhuti for me and had quietly said, “Later.” I had taken the ash home from India in a small envelope and stashed it in a drawer. I collected the ash and returned as my father was slowly slipping away. Sprinkling the ash into my father’s open mouth and upon his forehead, I whispered soly in his ear, “Dad, this vibhuti was made just for you. Don’t be afraid. We love you, and God loves you.” My father passed away peacefully soon aerward. Sai Baba had taken loving care of him and made his passing a deeply spiritual event for our family. We knew he was with God.
Be born in love; live in love. That is to say, emerge from God and merge in God; be the wave on the ocean of love. You should not die; you should merge and fulfill your self. That is the destiny; that is the destination. (SSB, Voice of the Avatar)
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