Strengthening bonds is something very important in Islam. Allah Almighty has created us in a way that we are related to people.
When Allah has kept a relationship of blood between you and someone, biologically, you’re connected, you need to know lineage in Islam is sacred. Sacred means it cannot be tempered with.
Because Allah has kept so many rules and regulations, each one of them connected to our success in this world and the next. The ultimate contentment and victory, happiness and success relies on understanding what the Almighty has said and adopting it to the best of our abilities.
Allah Almighty wants us during this beautiful month to achieve a reward by going to those whom we don’t have a relationship with, starting with our family members, the closest from amongst the family, and either apologizing or extending a hand of goodness, a hand of forgiveness, a hand of solidarity, a hand of building the bonds.
Very important for us to develop a big heart, as we say, and to extend the arm and to be the first one to extend that arm of reconciliation.
So to go out of your way to mend relations is an act of worship.
The biggest charity, the biggest donation you can ever make right now is to resolve the matters with those who are right around you.
This month, there are special gates that we need to know about. They are the gates of paradise. There are so many gates.
Allah Almighty makes mention of but eight gates of paradise. One of them is a specialized gate known as Ar-Rayyan.
Ar-Rayyanis a gate through which those who fasted dedicatedly shall enter through by the will of Allah, because Allah says, Whoever fasts correctly in the month of Ramadan with full conviction in Allah, hoping for a reward from Allah, all their previous sins will be forgiven.
Allah says, breath of fresh air, we give you a spirituality. Beautiful days that are filled with such amazing ambiance that it’s not felt in any other month outside of this particular month of Ramadan. We will give you some amazing opportunity to soften your heart. If you don’t soften it during this month, when would you like to soften it?
If you don’t repent in the month of repentance, when are you going to repent? If you don’t turn to Allah during the month of turning to Allah, when are you going to do that?
We must be thankful to Allah (swt) Almighty for accepting us to be from among those who worship Him alone. We should always look into our acts of worship and purify them for the sake of Allah alone.
If you come out of Ramadan and your Salah has improved, you have succeeded. If you come out of Ramadan and you have a new love for Salah, you have succeeded.
Young people don’t realize true success is when Allah loves you to pray for Him because Allah puts it in the heart.
You want to succeed? Success is depicted by how you fulfill your Salah.
You can have the millions and the billions and maybe in this worldly life you have everything, luxury. It is nothing in the eyes of Allah.
Allahu Akbar, If Allah helps you to get up early for SalatAlFajr, to make wudu and to come and fulfill your two sunnah.. It is better for you than the whole Dunya and whatever it has, this whole world and whatever it has.
It is time to purify our heart. The diseases of the hearts are plenty. The heart is the seat of government of your entire body.
The Hadith says, In your body there is a piece of flesh. If it is pure, the body is pure. If it is dirty, the body is dirty.
The most important things for us to note is why the fasting was prescribed in the first 1st place;
O you who believe fasting has been prescribed upon you, just like it was to those before you, in order that you achieve Taqwa- the consciousness of Allah, the fear of Allah.
One of the primary things you and I need to understand is the consciousness which means to know that He is your Lord. He made you. He is in control of everything on Earth. And you are going to helplessly go back to Him.
So Allah says, I have prescribed fasting so that your relationship with Me can be on the highest level. You need to value the Lord Who created you so that you can achieve consciousness of Allah.
I can never imagine putting my head on the ground in that position or posture for anyone or anything besides my Maker.
If you have a connection with Allah, you will realize that the same Allah I’m trying to impress made this guy here sitting next to me or this person sitting on the other side, the same Allah made that person.
So if I want to impress Allah, I got to just be good to what Allah has made people. Reach out to them, speaking with respect to a creature of Allah would probably earn you paradise.
This Deen, This religion is so beautiful. It teaches us goodness, kindness, compassion, closeness to your Maker, a very high level of morality, a beautiful level of character and conduct.
Every year, Allah (Swt) gives us a chance to earn His forgiveness, to purify our souls and to gain a position in the hereafter, that was before that impossible. That is the chance and the opportunity given to us in the month of Ramadan.
One of the duas the early Muslims used to read when they would sense Ramadan approaching, they would say, “Allahumma Ballighna Ramadan” which means oh Allah! Deliver us to Ramadan.
Allow us to live to witness Ramadan, allow us to be living and breathing and able to reap the rewards that are offer in Ramadan.
The Prophet (Pbuh), he told us. He said, When the the month of Ramadan enters, then three things happen: Number one, the gates of Paradise are flung wide open, and number two, the gates of Hell fire are closed, and number three, the Devils are chained up.
It is as if the prophet (Pbuh) is saying that this is your chance to give up your bad habits And it makes sense because In Ramadan, you’re fasting and you’re thinking about Allah more often because every time you’re hungry, every time you’re thirsty, you remind yourself, Why am I doing this? Why am I suffering?
I’m suffering for the sake of Allah. And if I can say no to basic things like food and drink, I can say no to watch indecent things. I can say no to waste my time. I can say no to being rude to my parents. If I can control my hunger, I can control anything in my life. And that is a Ramadan becomes like a training program to nurture your soul and to make you more disciplined person.
Of all the things that Ramadan is known for, it should be known as the month of the Quran. That is the month in which the Prophet (Pbuh) received Revelation when he was inside the Cave of Hira and the angel Jibreel visited him, and revealed to him;
Read [O Muhammad!] in the name of your Lord who created. (96.1) the first five verses of the Quran that happened in the month of Ramadan. In fact, the night that that occurred is known as laylatul qadr.
The Prophet (pbuh), he said, The most beloved good deeds to Allah are the ones that are regular, even if they are small. So this Ramadan plan to run the marathon, not a race. Every day, set yourself goals that you know you can achieve and slowly build up to greater goals towards the end.
Because the Prophet (Pbuh) said, The good deeds are judged by the ending. So if you start great and your end poor, that’s not good. But if you start steady and slowly increase your stamina and your worship and you end big, in sha Allah, this is a sign that Allah has accepted all of your Ramadan.
Although we are short distance away from Ramadan, there’s no guarantee we’re going to make. Life itself is very fragile.
The Prophet (pbuh) says, Keep these two behind. Don’t forgive them, Make them wait until they reconcile, They fix the problems between themselves and the prophet (Pbuh) repeated it three times.
The end of the relationship that is between us and our family members, the wombs that connect us and we cut those ties because of what? wealth than anything else in this world that was their life.
So the Prophet (Pbuh), he says, Two slaves of Allah, They come,Yawm al-Qiyamah, and they are on their knees in front of Allah, the Majesty, the Lord of all honor And might, Then the prophet (Pbuh), he continues, and he says, That one slave, he says To Allah Oh my Lord| take for me, my right from my brother. the right he took from me in Dunya, take it for me this day; judgment.
So then Allah tells the slave, and He says, What are you gonna do with your brother, Since there’s no good deeds left for your brother, what are you gonna do with him? So this slave, he says to Allah, Let him carry my sins then. So then after the slave says, this, Allah says to him, Raise your eyes, Have a look up there. Look in Paradise. Look in the gardens. So the slave he looks, and he says, I see palaces of gold.
And he’s astonished at the beauty, the richness, the wealth that he sees by any human being would be. So he says to Allah, Who do they belong to? And then Allah says to him, They belong to the one who’s given the price, who’s paid the price for them. So the slave asks, What’s the price for these? Allah says to him, A price that you own. You have this price to purchase these cities and palaces that you can see. He says, What is it?
Allah says to him By forgiving your brother, by forgiving your brother, you will own all of these.
Then the Prophet (Pbuh) finishes the Hadith by saying, he says, Fear Allah, And this is the moral; fear Allah and fix the problems between you.
The Prophet (Pbuh) says to the Companions, Shall I not tell you of that which is greater in status than extra prayer, extra fasting and extra sadaqah. What did the prophet (PBUH) say?
He said, fix the problems between yourselves; The prophet (PBUH) says that these problems that destroys the religion.
Because of these problems, you don’t care what Allah said, what His Messenger (PBUH) said, what the guidance is. You just want what you want. You want to fulfill your desire, take your vengeances. Take whatever it is you possibly can, and you cause so much harm. That’s what the prophet (PBUH) meant that it destroys the Deen. It destroys your Deen and can destroy the other person’s deen, ruin families, And this is such an enormity in the sight of Allah.
All of us have issues with people. Are we going to allow Ramadan to come And these issues still remain amongst us, Is it not time for us to let these things go? But you know why there’s so much rewarding it?
Because when you try to let these things go, what stops you? Your pride, your ego, you have to lose out on a bit of wealth maybe. you have to eat a bit of humble pie sometimes, it’s very hard on nafs/ the soul, the inner self doesn’t want to lower itself.
But Allah is saying, lower yourself for the sake of Allah, and as the prophet (PBUH) said, whoever humbles themselves for the sake of Allah, Allah raises them. This is why there’s so much rewarding it.
Sometimes we dislike someone. So we say things that are unfair and unjust simply because we’ve disliked them. That is unfair. Allah subhanahu wa’ta’ala tells us
Yes, when you are in a crisis when you’ve had someone who’s wronged, you when you dislike someone for a certain reason don’t let that lead you to be unjust with that person. Remember the exact parameters of dislike; don’t let it go beyond that at all.
Allah is telling us to stand up for justice Even if it is in favor of those whom you disagree.
it is important for us also to realize on a totally different note that our duty as human beings is to look out for the other human beings. They are all the creatures of Allah subhanahu wa’ta’ala. It is unfair for us to want to survive at the expense of others.
As human beings we must be concerned for all life. Allah tells us in Surat al-ma’idah that if you saved a single soul, a single person it is equivalent to having saved Humanity because you’re following a good teaching.
At times when we are going through difficulty, I’m sure you and I have tasted. How listening to the Quran, reciting the Quran actually helps so much. It brings us to tears, especially when we’re emotional when we’re feeling low and we hear the verses of Allah (Swt).
Allah speaks about these tears and He praises the tears, the tears of those who cry when they hear the verses of Allah.
Imagine you’re in a crisis, imagine you’re going through hardship and difficulty and then Allah subhanahu wa’ta’ala’s verses bring about a comfort, a soothing feeling.
Sometimes life becomes so difficult and sometimes the challenges in our lives begin to overcome us due to our weakness of some sort SubhanAllah. Allah knows this people begin to think of the worst and sometimes people start thinking of suicide.
people want to take their lives away not realizing that by taking the life away We’re not going to solve the problem, many people who were in Greater hardship than you are have come out of it after a year, two years or a few years or a decade in such a way that they would have never believed to see the success They saw later on.
Allah subhanahu wa’ta’ala says there is no way that you should ever think of consider or take your life away, because Allah is far more merciful than what you think.
That’s a very clear-cut verse.
You’re a Believer, you believe in Allah. These challenges will come to pass, live a day at a time go, through it because Allah will never allow you to go through that which you cannot cope at all. There is always a way out. Find the way, look for it. Speak to someone, confide in those who are trustworthy. Make sure that you have confided in Allah to begin with, He knows your problem, but you keep on praying to Him and Allah subhanahu wa’ta’ala will open your doors.
So this was a clear-cut verse telling us suicide is prohibited. There is no way you should think about it. No matter how big your problem is, no matter how big your disaster is. There is no scope for this as a Muslim and as a Believer because Allah’s Mercy is far greater than the problems and the issue that you’re going through.
There are other ways of resolving the matter, be strong, be steadfast, be firmed, Allah will show you a way.
Ramadan is going to be over very soon. Please repeat these words which have been mentioned in sahih bukhari in other books as well from the prophet (saw) that these words are very heavy on the scales on the day of judgment, the very light on the tongue and then make the Ar-Rahman, the most merciful one very happy.
– سبحان الله و بحمده – Subhaan-Allahi wa bihamdihi [Allaah is free from imperfection and all praise is due to Him]
– سبحان الله العظيم – Subhaan-Allahil-Azhim [Allaah is free from imperfection, The Greatest]
Say these words again And again in these last days of Ramadan and gain as much reward as you can.
The All-Loving 