This book opens a window onto the daily life of Gold Mountain Monastery in San Francisco during the early years of the Venerable Master Hsuan Hua's ministry in America. In the summer of 1968, the Venerable Master began a series of lectures on the great scriptures of the Mahayana, completing first the Shurangama Sutra, then the Lotus Sutra, and finally the Avatamsaka (Flower Adornment) Sutra in 1979, and the continued lecturing regularly until his gradual retirement in the late 1980's. These incomparable lectures were the first of their kind to be heard in any Western country.