Singing the king's glory

The king needed a very, very good worker to do some special tasks in the palace. The minister found the perfect worker. This worker was very sincere, very nice looking, very honest and so forth. But he had one bad habit: he used to come to work late. So the king scolded the minister: “What kind of man is he? He is coming late to work every day. Does he not value his job in the palace?”

The minister was very embarrassed. He went to see the worker and said, “I got you the job and told the king that you were such a nice man and a good worker. Why are you behaving in this way? Why do you come late to work every day? How can you justify it?”

The man replied, “Early in the morning, I go to the temple, and there I praise God. I sing God’s Glory for hours and hours. That is why I arrive late.”

The minister said, “This is what you do? Then when you come to the king’s palace, why do you not sing the king’s glory?”

The fellow came the following day to work and started singing the king’s glory. He was extolling the king and praising him to the skies. The king observed the worker for some time. At first he was amused. Then after half an hour or forty-five minutes the worker was still going on with endless singing. He was not working at all. He was only singing the king’s praises. Then the king became exasperated. He gave the man a slap and demanded, “What are you doing?”

The man said, “What can I do? The minister asked me to sing your glory.”

Then the minister was summoned. The king asked him, “Why did you tell this worker to sing my glory?”

The minister said, “He told me he comes late each day because he sings God’s Glory in the temple. I told him that if he came and sang your glory for a little while, you would be pleased. But I did not think that he would be only singing your glory and not working at all.”

The worker said in his own defense, “God created me. That is why I go to the temple every day and sing God’s Praises and Glory.”

The minister said, “God created you, and God also wants you to live on earth, to work honestly. By praising God constantly, how will you be able to support yourself? If you wanted to praise God all day long, why did you accept this job? There is a time for everything. If you go to the temple early in the morning, you can praise God before you come to work. Then you will come to the palace punctually and work here. At the end of the day, you will take your salary and buy what you need. In this way, everything will have its proper time. Come to work on time. Before you come to work, go to the temple and sing God’s Glory. Then after finishing your work here, you can again go to the temple. But, in the meantime, you must work.”

When the king heard such sound advice and saw that this worker was going to listen, he gave a large amount of money to the minister. He was such a wise minister! The king also gave a bonus to the worker.

The minister was right. The following day the worker arrived at the palace on time. He had already gone to the temple and offered his praises to God. Then he came to work because he was getting money from the king. Before starting work, he sang the king’s praises for a short time, and then he started working.

So the king was pleased with this worker and the minister was pleased with him. Definitely God was also pleased with him because he was doing the right thing.

From:Sri Chinmoy,Life’s bleeding tears and flying smiles, part 3, Agni Press, 2001
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/lts_3