Worship...

To make God a reality is the real object of worship.

Bowl of Saki, by Hazrat Inayat Khan

Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:

The first and principle thing in the inner life is to establish a relationship
with God, making God the object with which we relate ourselves, such as the
Creator, Sustainer, Forgiver, Judge, Friend, Father, Mother, and Beloved. In
every relationship we must place God before us, and become conscious of that
relationship so that it will no more remain an imagination. ...

The work of the inner life is to make God a reality, so that He is no more an
imagination; that this relationship that man has with God may seem more real
than any other relationship in the world; and when this happens, then all
relationships, however near and dear, become less binding. But at the same time,
a person does not thus become cold; he becomes more loving. It is the godless
man who is cold, impressed by the selfishness and lovelessness of the world,
because he partakes of those conditions in which he lives. But the one who is in
love with God, the one who has established his relationship with God, his love
becomes living. ...

To him all things appeal, everything unfolds itself, and it is beauty to his
eyes, because God is all-pervading, in all names and all forms; therefore his
Beloved is never absent. How happy therefore is the one whose Beloved is never
absent, because the whole tragedy of life is the absence of the beloved; and to
one whose Beloved is always there, when he has closed his eyes the Beloved is
within, and when he has opened his eyes the Beloved is without.

His every sense
perceives the Beloved; his eyes see Him, his ears hear His voice. When a person
arrives at this realization he, so to speak, lives in the presence of God; then
to him the different forms and beliefs, faiths and communities do not count. To
him God is all-in-all; to him God is everywhere. If he goes to the Christian
church, or to the synagogue, to the Buddhist temple, to the Hindu shrine, or to
the mosque of the Muslim, there is God. In the wilderness, in the forest, in the
crowd, everywhere he sees God.

Of all the millions of believers in God perhaps only one makes God a reality,
and that is because the picture man makes of God is as limited as himself. The
knowledge of God is beyond man's reason. Man only perceives things he is capable
of perceiving. He cannot raise his imagination above what he is used to, and he
cannot reach beyond his imagination to where the being of God is. The secret of
God is hidden in the knowledge of unity. ...

True life cannot be ours until
unity is achieved. It is the work of religion to promote the spirit of unity, in
the knowledge and love of God to whom all devotion belongs. Man often seeks for
psychic, occult, and magnetic powers. This is not the purpose of religion; these
developments come of themselves. Where there is life and love, there is
magnetism; love itself is the healing power and the remedy for all pain.

All
occult powers belong to the divine life, but man should live a natural life and
realize the nature of God. The only studies which are worth accomplishing are
those which lead to the realization of God, and of unity first with God and then
with the self, and so with all. It is not necessary for us to be told that we
have progressed; we ourselves will know when our hearts go forward; and by
loving, forgiving, and serving, our whole life becomes one single vision of the
sublime beauty of God.

One might say, 'How can one love God, God whom one does not know, does not see?'
But the one who says this wants to take the second step instead of the first. He
must first make God a reality, and then God will make him the truth. This stage
is so beautiful. It makes the personality so tender and gentle. It gives such
patience to the worshipper of God; and together with this gentleness and
patience he becomes so powerful and strong that there is nothing that he will
not face courageously: illness, difficulties, loss of money, opposition -- there
is nothing that he is afraid of. With all his gentleness and tenderness,
inwardly he becomes strong. ...

If a friend comes to meet him, to the Sufi it is
God who is coming to meet him. If a beggar is asking for a penny, it is God whom
the Sufi recognizes in that form. If a wretched man is suffering misery, he sees
also in this the existence of God. Only, the difference is that in some he sees
God unconscious, in others he sees God conscious. All those who love him, who
hate him, who like or dislike him, who look upon him with admiration or
contempt, he looks at with the eyes of the worshipper of God, who sees his
Beloved in all aspects.