Monday, September 27, 2010

"THANK GOD I HAVEN’T SINNED!"

By Adiba islam

In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
Assalamualaikum everyone.

I would like to begin by sharing a small poem (it’s the translated version of the original Arabic poem):

“I saw a man on the seashore, laying wounded by a tiger
Saying “Alhamdulillah! Alas, I have not fallen into sin.”

These two lines basically illustrate two very important lessons:

1. We should thank Allah for EVERYTHING. No matter how bad a position we are in or how awful we might feel, we must show our gratitude towards Him. And that’s what this man was doing, he was dying after being attacked by this tiger but yet he said, “Thank Allah that I did not die sinning.” Because that would have been a worse death for him. And Allah knows what’s best for us and He plans these events accordingly.
“It may be that u like a thing which is harmful for you and you dislike a thing which is good for you. Allah knows (what is best) while you don’t.” [Surah Bakarah, verse:216]

2. Death is better than sinning because when you sin, your heart dies. Who wants to walk around the earth with a DEAD HEART!!! Sooner or later we all will physically die; it’s only the soul that remains. But when you do things that eventually poison your soul, what does it matter if you have a soul or not??

Now, here I want to focus on the second point. Many times we feel that we are doing all the obligatory deeds but we are not progressing in our relationship with Allah. That’s because we’ve got an anchor called “SIN” that’s pulling down our ship. And if we don’t eliminate these sins from our lives, we will remain anchored at a fixed point and we wont move forward. Then what if we stop all sins except one or two? Well…….. If your ship has 100 anchors and pull up 98 of them, u are still not going anywhere because there are two of them still left that’s pulling you down. Then again, there are different levels of sin but we need to understand that whether it is big or small, it is something that is detrimental to our Imaan and our relationship with our Creator.

HOW TO GET RID OF THESE FILTHY ACTIONS?

-First you need to acknowledge the fact that what you are doing is wrong and if you die doing that “YOUR SO BUSTED!!” If this realization doesn’t come you will not feel the urge to stop doing evil deeds because your conscience is not telling you to do so

-Secondly, AVOID PUTTING YOURSELF IN SINFUL ENVIORNMENTS. Putting yourself in such an environment and thinking, “Nothing is gonna happen to me” is like standing in the middle of a busy road thinking , “No truck is gonna run over me”!!
U might get lucky the first time and the second time…… but the third time, its u who is going to be flattened dude!! And plus, our job is not to put ourselves in difficult situations and test whether we can stay firm on deen, but to stay away from all sinful activities as far as we can.

-And lastly don’t forget to make lots and lots of dua to Allah subhanawatala to give you the ability to stay steadfast on the right path and not be one of the wrongdoers. There was once a very famous sheikh who tried really hard not to look at things he shouldn’t and months passed away but he couldn’t avert his gaze. Then finally he made a dua, “O Allah! I don’t have the ability to resist what I am doing. But if only You give me the taufiq and help, I will be able to do it.” And later the sheikh said that from that day onwards there was no difference between a wall and a woman in front of his eyes. Subhanallah!

“Our Lord! Punish us not if we forget or fall into error. Our Lord! Do not lay on us a burden like that which You did lay on people before us. Our Lord! Put not on us a burden greater than we have the strength to bear. Pardon us and grant us forgiveness. Have mercy on us. You are our Protector and You give us victory over the disbelieving people.” [Surah Bakarah, verse:286]

Jazakallah khair for your time.
*Just to let u know, I wrote this note on the basis of a lecture by Sheikh Hussain Abdul Sattar. Those of u who haven’t heard any of his lectures might try listening to one bcoz he’s a pretty good speaker mashallah.

**Special thanks to sister Fatimah Siddiqah for giving me those lectures. :)

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