Abdur Raheem Green – The Amazing Story Of My Dads Shahadah

			Alhamdulillah namitha who want to stay in one istockphoto when our the villa Himanshu Rudy and
fusina women say a tiara Melina yet the healer who fell mo della when my youth little fella hodja la
shadow en la in La, La La. Why the Who? luxury killer? Well, I shall do another Mohammedan Abdo what
a solo well that
		

			we begin by praising Allah.
		

			We praise Him we seek His help and we ask for his forgiveness.
		

			And we take refuge with ALLAH, from the evil of ourselves, and from the evil consequences of our
evil actions. Whoever Allah guides, no one can misguide. But whomsoever Allah leaves to go astray,
no one can guide them I testify that Allah alone is worthy of worship, and that Mohammed sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam is a servant and Messenger. My dear brothers, and my dear sisters in Islam, may
Allah shower His mercy and His forgiveness upon you. salaam aleikum wa rahmatullah wa barakato. The
Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said,
		

			that, may his face be rubbed in the dust, meaning May he be humiliated, the one who,
		

			when one of his parents, or both of his parents reach old age, and he doesn't enter Paradise by
serving them.
		

			In another instant, a young man came to the Prophet sallallahu, alayhi wasallam enthusiastic to join
		

			the fight the battle that was about to ensue.
		

			And he said to the Prophet, he said that I left my mother crying.
		

			And the Prophet said to him, go back.
		

			And don't come back until you leave her laughing. In another instance, similarly, another young man
came, wanting to participate in the struggle with the Prophet and his companions against those
gathered enemies and forces who are trying to wipe out
		

			the Muslims.
		

			And he there he was ready to defend his Deen
		

			and the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said to this young man, do you have a mother? He said,
Yes. He said, Go back and serve her.
		

			That is better for you.
		

			So my dear brothers and sisters,
		

			reflecting upon these
		

			noble sayings of our blessed prophet muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, I decided to stay here to
spend some time with my mother, after the recent death of my father, now
		

			the death of my father is something
		

			that I would like to share with you. And the remarkable story of how and hamdulillah
		

			just 10 days before he died, Allah Subhana Allah blessed him to make the Shahada, the testimony of
faith on his lips. In fact, not only once that happened 10 days before he died, but three or four
days before he died, I spent half an hour with my father in the hospital,
		

			half an hour going over with him again and again and again. the testimony of faith, there is no God
there is nothing worthy of worship except Allah. And that Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is
His Messenger.
		

			And
		

			there is a really great lesson
		

			in my father, and
		

			his Shahada for all of us because
		

			calling the world back to Allah, of course, is all about dour. It's all about calling those people
who are not yet Muslim to Islam.
		

			But our duty brothers and sisters, as we do emphasize is not to convert anyone. In fact, Allah did
not ask us to make people Muslim. Allah told us to pass on the message. Bill Hekmati? Well, Maui
that Hill has center where Joe didn't home bility here so with wisdom, and a beautiful exhortation
of good admonition, and to debate and argue and discuss with them in the best and the ways that are
best. And so that's our duty. We are givers. We are the ones who bring warning of a terrible
punishment.
		

			hellfire.
		

			And indeed not only is the punishment consigned to the next life, there is, in reality, a punishment
and humiliation in this life as well, for those who reject a law, and our duty is to warn people
about that reality. But our duty is also to bring the good news but Shirin, the good news, the good
news, my brothers and sisters of the beauty of Islam, the peace, the tranquility, the happiness, the
joy that Islam brings to the heart. And of course, the delight and the beauty of Paradise that is
waiting for those who follow Allah's guidance, and accept His ways.
		

			So our duty is to convey the message to pass the message, to explain to the people in the best way
that we can, guidance is in the hands of Allah subhanaw taala. Allah is the one who guides, he
guides whom He wills, and he knows best who is worthy of guidance. I'll be honest with you, brothers
and sisters. I really never thought that my father would take Shahada. I mean, for me, my father was
		

			a fantastic man, I have to say he, as a father, he was amazing.
		

			Anyone who met him, he was a real outstanding personality. And no one could describe him as a bad
person, or a particularly saintly person. He was what he was.
		

			But in many ways, throughout the years, the 23 plus years that I've been Muslim, and throughout
those years, I have done many, many things, to invite my father to Islam. So how Allah when I first
started practicing Islam, of course, I talked to him, I wrote him letters, I wrote him long letters,
I gave him books to read,
		

			some handle or whatever I could do. And when I'd exhausted the realms of possibilities in terms of
giving him materials, and talking to him, I just decided that I should
		

			restrict myself to giving the best example that I possibly could, of how Islam should be how Islam
should be lived, of how Islam teaches me to respect him as a parent.
		

			And
		

			I always really,
		

			sometimes I have to say, I thought that my father was really to be honest, someone who I thought was
very closed minded to the possibilities of Islam.
		

			Actually, quite frankly, brothers and sisters, sometimes when I read the verses of the Quran
describing the people, the disbelievers, I felt as if those verses were sometimes describing my
father and his attitude. So brothers and sisters, I didn't have much hope that he was going to
become Muslim.
		

			Now, my father had been very ill for a couple of years. And there are quite a few times when me and
my mum
		

			really thought that he wasn't going to make it.
		

			And as it happened
		

			a few weeks ago,
		

			when I came from England,
		

			I arrived in the hospital and went to see my dad, and
		

			I really looked at him and I thought, you know what, it really looks as if he could die tonight. I
mean, he really was in, he was looking really rough.
		

			And I really thought to myself, you know, what, if I don't say something,
		

			I'm never gonna, I'm never gonna forgive myself. I know that I've tried. I've given him dour. I've
given him books to read. I've tried everything, but I have to make this one last effort. And I had
spent a long time thinking about what I could say, how I could say it. What was the right way to
approach him? He was already very ill. So I didn't want to distress him. I didn't want to make him
more upset. And of course, to be honest, I was also afraid that he might say, No, he might reject my
invitation, reject my offer.
		

			And then I was even worried that if he did,
		

			say the Shahada, and he did enter into Islam,
		

			then what if you got better and he came home and recovered and became even maybe more arrogant
against Islam that that was even more scary. So
		

			It's really brothers and sisters a very, very difficult thing. Anybody who is a convert to Islam,
who has parents who are not yet Muslim they can they can relate exactly to this dilemma to this
difficulty that I was going through. And this is all compounded even more by the fact that my father
was not well.
		

			Brothers and sisters Never underestimate the power of law. Because it was then when I was almost a
loss, I didn't know. I couldn't rely upon my own intellect, my own strength, it was something I just
needed the help from Allah subhanaw taala. And I just asked a lot, please, Allah Find me a way to
find something to say to my father. And so
		

			as he was laying there,
		

			I said to him, Dad, I've got something really important to tell you.
		

			Are you listening? Now my dad really couldn't speak very much. And he just nodded his head. And I
said,
		

			there's something I have to say, if I don't say it, I'm going to regret it.
		

			And then I told him that on the Day of Judgment, a man will come in front of Allah.
		

			And this man will have scrolls of evil deeds, as far as the eye can see in each direction.
		

			And Allah will say to him, you have something that outweighs all of that. And the man will say, What
is that, my Lord?
		

			And Allah will say to him, you have this piece of paper here. And on it is written a statement that
you made. There is no god except Allah. And Muhammad is His Messenger.
		

			I said, so that this is the key to paradise.
		

			This is the success in the life to come.
		

			What do you think?
		

			And he nodded his head.
		

			I said, Does that mean you want to say those words? And my dad said yes.
		

			Together. He said with me the words,
		

			there is no god except Allah. Muhammad is His Messenger, a shadow and La ilaha illAllah. Wa, shadow.
		

			Now,
		

			the truth is brothers and sisters, I had to leave at that time, because the hospital has quite
strict
		

			visiting times. And
		

			I was very confused. I was very confused. I should have been really happy and elated. And I was in
one way. But in another way, I was really confused, because I was almost expecting him to take the
Shahada. And then that will be his, you know, last breath.
		

			But some handler, he, you know, I left and I was thinking, you know, what if he gets better, and he
comes home, and he doesn't follow up with Islam, and so as it happened?
		

			Well, that's it, I just left it at that I didn't really tell anybody
		

			about it. I just sort of kept it to myself, I was really happy. He said the Shahada, he seemed to be
genuinely seemed to be sincere. But you know, I visited him the next day, and he didn't remember.
And that's how he was, he would not really remember anything from one day to the next, or even
really, from one minute to the next.
		

			But some Hannah law, that was not the end of it, because
		

			three, four days before he died,
		

			I was leaving Portugal to go back to England.
		

			For the new Muslim retreat that I era holds, Muslim now, we hold a retreat for the new Muslims.
		

			And I was going there to
		

			give talks and lectures in that retreat. So I really had to get back to UK. And the last night I
visited him. My father was very distressed, and he would sometimes lie there just going saying, Help
Help me Help. I said, Dad, what do you want me to do? You know, there's not much I can do this.
There's the medicines here, the antibiotics that doctors have done everything they can or do you
want me to do? He said, I don't know. I don't know. He said, give me something to do. I'm saying it.
I'm saying it. He couldn't really speak it was actually very, very difficult to understand what my
father said. But you know, I could make out what he was saying, to give me something to do. I said,
		

			like, what what what do you want he said something easy, give me something easy to do. Some handle
our brothers and sisters when when he said that? I remember the Hadith of the Prophet sallallahu
alayhi wa sallam where the Prophet said there was something that is light on the tongue and heavy on
the scales and it was as if he was asking me to give
		

			him something like that. So I said that, If I was you, I would just keep on repeating over and over.
There is no god except Allah. Muhammad is His Messenger. And he said, Yes, that's what I wanted to
do. And we spent half an hour,
		

			half an hour, going over and over.
		

			There is no god except Allah. And Muhammad is His Messenger. At one time, he even said, Stop, stop,
I want to do it myself, I want to remember it, I want to remember it. So hamdulillah. And the next
day I left for UK that I heard that my father had passed away.
		

			Right now brothers and sisters, I'd like us all to reflect deeply upon the lessons from the story of
my father. And for me, the lesson that I have learned and that I would like to pass on to you is
really about patience and perseverance. Many times brothers and sisters and even
		

			what we teach and I era in our one day Tao training courses, is often very much based upon the idea
that we have a conversation with someone and we try to get them to take Shahada right there on the
spot. And of course, that's, that's fantastic if we can do that. But sometimes the process is a long
process. Sometimes it takes years and years, sometimes you're facing someone who seems to be
sometimes the very epitome of copper, the very description of a disbeliever that you come across in
the Quran, yet Subhana, Allah, Allah can change the hearts. And often our job, brothers and sisters
is to plant the seeds. And it may seem right now to many of you, that you live in a hostile
		

			environment, that you're surrounded by people by society, that have a very negative perception of
Islam. And it's seems so hard to get the message of Islam across to them. But brothers and sisters,
you need to have patience, you need to persevere. You need to realize and understand that honestly,
if Allah can guide my father to Islam, and he can die, with the testimony of faith on his lips, it's
possible for anybody to become Muslim, we should always have hope.
		

			We should always have that hope and that care and that concern for our fellow human beings, that
they are guided to this beautiful, beautiful religion of Islam. And that's what AI era is here to
help you do. To help you give down to help you talk to people, engage with people communicate to
them, pass on this message of Islam, that is at the baseline, the bottom line, that is our duty,
that's our obligation, that's the minimum that we should try to do. My brothers and sisters,
remember, Prophet no alayhis salaam for 950 years. He called his people to Islam. And most certainly
Allah swore by time while also in insane lfu hustle in the Latina ama know what amilo saly hertie or
		

			tawassul, Bill hockey Ottawa so the sobra that vary by time all of mankind is in a state of loss,
except those who believe and do righteous deeds, and help each other they joined together what
tawassul been hooked. They join together in the teaching of truth, and they support each other in
patience. That's the recipe for true success brothers and sisters. And I ask Allah that He gives me
and that he gives all of you and all of us success in this dunya and success in Africa. Salaam
Alaikum. warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.
		

			Mohammed
		

			Rasulullah.
		

			There is no God.
		

			Mohammed is His Messenger.