In plain words
Those who first join as ‘sepoys’: how can they win on the battlefield, taking up the sword, if they have not been trained at recruitment? Youth is like the recruitment. In it one must be trained in the right way. “When the servants of Death pull at the noose, saying ‘Come, come’, when people say ‘Out with him, quick, there is no more use’, when wife and children weep and wail, is it possible to say the name of Hari?” No. So if you say you can say the name of Hari then, how will it be possible for us? It cannot be done. So only the practice we have done in our lifetime stands by us at the end. So this youth is very holy. But it is not something that lasts for long. It too is a short time, only a little while. Youth is like a passing cloud. This youth comes in the middle and goes in the middle. Work as you must to purify your feelings.
The greatness of group bhajan
Holy feelings are found in the Sathya Sai Institute alone. But it is most necessary to make that holy principle holier still. Nothing but the name of God can save this world. It is not weapons that save this world, it is not bombs that save this world; God's grace alone saves this world. To work for that grace is man's duty. So prayer is most important. Only when feeling is joined to melody and rhythm does it become a divine melody. Otherwise a melody without feeling is like a malady. Push pride aside, keep down show, and remember the name of God with humility and obedience, with Bhakti and śraddhā. That is the true way. Recognise well what the name of God is about, and act by it. Tyāgarāja said, “Think of Rāma knowingly, O mind.” In the same way, in real life, “Look before you step; know before you bow.” When you all sing with one voice, in how many ways does the Vibration of the mind, that divine power, shine! When the Vibration of such unity spreads everywhere, the world itself is changed. When people sing one by one, that divine sound and heart stand still. That is why Guru Nānak began what is called group bhajan. So when the singing of all becomes one, it turns into something divine.
Not quantity but quality
Embodiments of Prema! Life is like a sheet of paper. But it is not a clean sheet of paper. The impressions of many births and the fruits of many births are drawn on it unseen. It is a thing unmanifest. But this paper has feeling on one side and sound on the other. If you want feeling without sound, or sound without feeling, it cannot be: there is no feeling apart from sound, and feeling cannot be drawn apart from sound. They are like the two sides of one sheet of paper. So the sound must come with feeling. With such singing and such remembering, not on “Śivarātri” day alone but in daily bhajans too, all must raise their voices and sing. Why did God give us a voice? Not to speak untruth, not to repeat the worries of others, but only to say the name of God.