SB 1.2 - Serving devotees enables one to get faith in topics of the Lord

If one sincerely repents that one has not acquired the taste for chanting and hearing kṛṣṇa-kathā, Sūta helps with another suggestion. Great service is done by serving the devotees who are free from all vice. By such service one gains affinity for hearing the messages of Vāsudeva. The demons are put into lower states of ignorance life after life and so have no information of the Absolute Truth. They can be rectified by the mercy of the Lord’s servitors. By visiting holy places, and serving the mahātmās residing there, one would gain a desire to know about the Lord. Such devotees of God are very confidential associates of the Lord and they are known as the powerful incarnations of the Lord, as the sons of the Lord, as servants of the Lord or as associates of the Lord. But none of them claim to be God themselves. These servants of the Lord are to be respected as God by the devotees who want to go back to Godhead. They preach according to time and place. Lord Caitanya played the part of a devotee and He strongly protested when someone addressed Him as God. One can please God more by serving His devotees. By such service one gradually gets the quality of such devotees, and thus becomes qualified to hear the glories of God.

Those who worship the Supreme Lord are all gurus in the sense that they are great, as are the holy places where such saints are found. Such persons no longer worship their homes that steal the essential qualities of discrimination, steadfastness, tolerance and peacefulness. Nor do they pay any regard to the contemptible happiness found in such homes. Those who even once give their minds to Kṛṣṇa are no longer attached to home and son, what to speak of those who possess pure devotion. Kṛṣṇa says in Bhagavad gītā that there are people who, though not conversant in spiritual knowledge begin to worship the Lord upon hearing about Him from others. They also transcend the path of birth and death. Thus for a good soul there is a chance for advancement by hearing. Kṛṣṇa is pleased with the preachers, His dear most devotees. By serving the great souls who reside in holy places, one develops faith in them. Then one would naturally wonder about the great taste these great souls experience when they speak about the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and this will encourage one to hear about Him to understand Him. Thus by hearing from great souls, one attains the goal of life.