Chandan Yatra - A Festival of Sacrifice

Radhanath Swami

Krsna is feeling so satisfied by being covered with so much wonderful expensive sandalwood, so much labour and devotion we put into it by so many other devotees and when Krsna sees that we are all happy to see Him enjoying, our happiness increases His pleasure. That is the nature of love. So why have we come today? We have come to use our eyes to show Krsna how joyful we are that He is happy. Why? Because by doing that we make Him more happy. “Bhakti is completely a process of personal relationship and the personal relationship between the devotee and Krsna is developed by following the instruction of the spiritual master and by purifying our hearts. So, therefore this is a day of sacrifice. But is the day when all the devotees are consciously sacrificing everything to make Krsna nice and happy and cool. According to the proper principles of deity worship, you are not even supposed to ever put any type of heavy clothing on Krsna during the summer season. And if you go to Vrndavan in the winter, you will see that Krsna wears wool hats and wool mittens and wool socks. Because the devotees, they understand that this is the body of God and He is accepting the position of being subjected to the all the elements just like us, so that we have the chance to serve him and offer our love.