Date: July 19th, 2010 (Monday)
Lecturer: Master Zheng-Yan
Subject: Life Made Rich by Giving 勤耕福田心富足
Our planet is ill. The human beings living on it are likewise ill (spiritually).
A suicide bombing in Iraq has taken lives.
As I often say people are scared of demons but people are scarier than demons.
To speak of demons, the demons are actually in our hearts.
All of us should open the window to our hearts so that the sunlight can shine through.
This sunlight is the light of wisdom.
Let us use this light to educate and enlighten others.
This volunteer has donated more than NT$1 mil (US$31,000) to Tzu Chi but he lives so frugally that he uses natural lighting to conserve energy.
Such is the light of his heart.
By conserving energy and water, he saves a lot of money which he uses to help others.
His name has the word “tian” (which means “field”).
He truly creates fields of blessing for others.
With his firm convictions, he is able to create a lot of blessings for others.
It is all because of the wisdom in his heart.
In his earlier days, he endured a lot of hardship.
He had started his own business from scratch.
Then, many years ago, other’s actions forced him into bankruptcy.
But he felt no resentment.
He has always lived very frugally.
A volunteer, Zhuang Dan-Tian said:
“When I think of all the students who can’t afford a lunch meal, it reminds us to lead a frugal and simple life”.
Huang Bao-Lian said (Zhuang Dan-Tian’s wife):
“When we watch Da Ai TV, Master tells us that there’re many people leading a hard life.”
“So, we need to be frugal and I don’t buy a lot clothing now”.
Chen Pei, Ru (Zhuang Dan-Tian’s daughter-in-law)
“They live very frugally”.
“But when they hear that Tzu Chi is calling on people to help the needy, without hesitation, they would participate in the aid work”.
Look at what little material desires they have.
Yet, spiritually, they’re very rich.
Their hearts are rich with love.
See, to do good, we don’t have to wait until we have a lot of money saved up.
They are continually donating the money they save by living frugally.
But, he thinks donating money isn’t enough.
He wants to contribute his labor also.
This is in Taiwan.
In Penang, Malaysia, there is also a person like this.
At one time, this woman had thought that she’ll start doing charity only after she has enough savings.
But one day, she was robbed on the street.
A volunteer Chen Syuan-Sin said:
“When I was robbed, my body got dragged a distance, causing injuries to my head and the right side of my body.
On the way to the hospital, I lost consciousness twice and was completely unaware of anything.
After I regained consciousness, I really appreciated what Master says about how our life is shaped by, the karma we’ve created.
All the bad and good deeds that we’ve done will manifest as events happening in our life.
After I recovered from the incident, my outlook on life completely changed.
I feel that I have a mission to give of myself to serve others.
I need to be very diligent and use my time to do good deeds.”
That experience made her realize the impermanence of life.
No one knows if he will live to see tomorrow and when we die, the only thing we bring with us is our karma.
So, we need to seize the present.
We also saw a news report about a couple in the USA.
They live in Atlanta, Georgia.
One day in 2006, their daughter, who was then 14 years old, saw a Mercedes stopped next to a homeless man sitting on the curb.
The homeless man looked very hungry.
When she saw this, she felt very upset because she thought that if the man didn’t drive a Mercedes, he could help a lot of people to have food to eat.
When she got home, she was still feeling upset so she told her parents about what she had seen and her thoughts on it.
That night, they had a family meeting with the parents, the daughter, and their son.
They discussion they began that night continued for several months.
Seeing the unhappiness of her daughter, the mother asked her daughter:
“What do you want to do?
Sell the house?
And give the money to charity?”
The daughter replied:
“Yeah, that would be good.”
So, knowing the deep lesson that their children would learn from it, the parents sold their mansion and donated half of the proceeds US$800,000 to charity for building clinics and schools (in Africa) and helping the poor to grow food, etc.
Don’t we often speak of being loving, compassionate, and giving to others?
So it’s not just in Taiwan that this is being done.
We can also see stories of selfless Great Love in other countries where people have reduced their material desires and raise the quality of their lives because of their spiritual richness.
Seeing this is truly toughing.
Indeed, in life, we must live frugally and be hardworking.
I often tell people that having come into this world, we must have a sense of mission to serve and benefit the world.
The value of life lies in giving and serving others.
It’s important that our world be healthy.
So, besides our won health and the health of our families, we need to help our greater environment be healthy.
Nowadays, people are realizing that eating vegetarian isn’t just for religious reasons.
It’s for the health of our planet.
At the same, we also need to protect our environment.
For over 20 years, Tzu Chi has been promoting environmental protection.
Starting last year, our Tzu Chings have been very mindful in promoting environmental protection activities to reduce carbon emissions and keeping our planet healthy.
We also saw an news report on an expedition team climbing Mt. Everest to clean up the mountain.
At the higher elevations, there is a lot of garbage everywhere.
The garbage was left by mountain climbers.
Man brought garbage to this pristine mountain.
This is very worrisome.
So, how can we keep our planet clean?”
The only way to do it is to educate people not to produce garbage.
Instead, do recycling work and reduce the amount of unnecessary garbage and please don’t go traveling about to sightsee which creates a lot of carbon emissions.”
After climbing to the top of the mountain, people even leave garbage there.
It is quite unfathomable.
If they have the free time and the stamina to climb the mountain, why don’t they instead do good deeds to benefit the world?
It has do with the way they’re looking at things which is based on their values.
So, we need to instill correct values.
(Source: Da Ai TV 人間菩提)
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