Fatima Barkatulla – Teen Session 3 – Three Lessons From Ibrahim
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You made me seem invincible.
invincible.
You're the one that gives us power. we're
invincible.
You love when no one is close to us. And hamdulillah
La
Mancha to LA I don't need a production machine. I'm sure everyone's familiar with her and her work may allow her to continue to rise according to his way and allow her to be a beacon of light for us as women. So a follow up. Okay, this will learn 100 Allah wa salatu salam ala rasulillah sisters a Salam alaykum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.
I know that brother Omar, like for so many years has been and his team have been working hard, you know, really putting a lot of effort into talking about and focusing on youth. And it's amazing because actually the story of Hajj and the story of Ibrahim alayhis salam reminds us that one man, and his vision and his daughter and his efforts can bring about can move mountains can do amazing things, you know, because Ibrahim alayhis salam, if you think about the beginning of his story, or the beginning of his story with a smile, and the story of Hajj that we know,
he took his baby son, and his wife harder, his only son at the time, and left them in the middle of a desert where there was nothing, right. So sometimes, you know, when I think about when, like, today, when we're seeing this beautiful, you know, youth club, and in Sharla, when it's renovated, it's gonna get even better. And who knows, one day, they might even be a whole building, there might even be a whole, you know, set of buildings focused on the youth, right? When I see all of this, I think Subhana Allah, you know, how something can begin as an idea, or as a speck, just in somebody's mind, you know, and due to their bars due to their efforts, amazing things can happen. And sometimes
we look at society, we look at amazing institutions. You know, you might have heard of amazing, famous institutions like Oxford University, or Eton College and these types of places. And when you and even like some of the biggest hospitals in London, when you look at their history, they started off with maybe one person or two people, setting up a little school or setting up a little, you know, little hospital, a little place to help poor people. And then slowly it grew and grew and grew until it becomes like a massive institution that, you know, people are in awe of. So all great projects begin like that. And I think the story of it, Brian melisande reminds us of that, that
today, that same place where Ibrahim alayhis salaam left that little baby and his wife, which was in the middle of the desert, no water, nothing. Today, that same place is a city that is the most visited city in the world. It has the most amazing supply chains, when it comes to, you know, its economic center, sopran, Allah, you know, every type of product, every type of business exists in that city now, right. And millions of people, it's the most visited place on earth.
And at the time of Ibrahim alayhis salam, when he left his baby there when he left Roger that, he could not have imagined what it would become, right. But that's the thing people have imagined people have taught kulani man, they don't need to see the results in front of their eyes. In fact, they don't even need to see the fruits of their efforts in their own lifetimes.
They know from these stories from the example of these great people that Lost Planet Allah has given us in the Quran, that something that you could start today, you might not see the effort, the fruit sorry of that effort in your lifetime, you might never see the fruits of that. But many generations later Subhanallah the fruits of that effort will bloom in Sharla. There will be progress, they will be fruits.
And so let's look at the story of Ibrahim alayhis salam. And I want to draw really three major lessons from that story. So the three key lessons I want to share from the story of Ibrahim and he's Salaam
Number one,
sacrificing something today
is essential for our success tomorrow. Sacrificing today is essential for our success tomorrow. In fact, sacrifices are actually just investments. You know, sometimes we think I, those of us who are mothers, we think we're sacrificing so much sacrifice so much time, or you might do something for someone, and you might have to lose out on something that you wanted to do. And you see that as a sacrifice, as if you've almost like you've lost something. But no sacrifice is actually an investment into the future, either into the future in this world, or in the future. In the next world. It's never just one sided. It's never that you've just lost something. And it seems to be a
motif throughout the Quran throughout history, that Allah Subhana Allah expects from human beings, some kind of sacrifice. And so we see that Allah subhanaw taala, asked the Prophet Ibrahim Alayhi, salam to sacrifice on so many levels. The first was, he told him to leave his wife and his baby in the middle of the desert, as we mentioned. And you know, as he was walking away from them, and remember, mica was nothing, there was nothing there. There was no place called maccha that time.
And as he was walking away from them, we know that Tiger asked him, you know, or you can leave us you just leaving us here. And she was panicking a little bit. But then she asked him, did Allah commanded you to leave us here? And he said, Yes. And so she said, Then Allah will not let us you know, be lost, alone will not leave us.
And so she had to work, even though she couldn't see anything tangible in front of her eyes, that would make her have to work, right. And that's an amazing lesson for us, that we might have to sacrifice something. And we can't even imagine or see the effects of that, the benefits of that. But because we know Allah commanded us to do something, right, whatever it is that Allah has commanded us, there's something good in it, and we will get some benefit from it, whether we can see it or not. And whatever Allah has forbidden us from, there's something evil in it, even if we can't see it, even if we can't tell what that evil thing is.
One day, we will realize one day we'll see the fruits of our living that thing that a lot forbade.
So Brian Malik Salam made a sacrifice that day, in that he left the most beloved people to him, and especially his son, who had he had been wanting a son for so many years. He left them in the middle of the desert, imagine the amount of a man that it takes to do that. And imagine the amount of email it took for her to say, then Allah will not forsake us. If Allah commanded us to do something, he's not going to forsake us if we OBEY Him.
So sacrifice on that level. Then again, Ibrahim alayhis, Salam had to sacrifice when his son came of age, when his son came of age. And Allah commanded him to through dreams, he commanded him to sacrifice his son to literally sacrifice. Right. And Ibrahim alayhi salam, even though it must have been so difficult, he walked with his son. And his son said to him, he told his son about his dream, and his smile, look at the image of his smile, he said to his father,
do as a lust do as you have been commanded, do as you have been commanded my father. So Pamela, and then when he got to the point where he was about to literally sacrifice his son, okay, which is to, you know, basically swore to him?
Allah subhanaw taala, prevented that from happening. And
he told him to sacrifice a sheep or a ram instead.
And so still, until today, that motif, that symbol, that symbolic gesture of sacrifice, giving up something that you love today, it still remains with us, doesn't it? Because sisters, even apart from the sacrifice that we do in, you know, and we give the food to the poor, or we give it we eat from it, we give it to others, apart from that sacrifice of one of the kind of things that human beings love the most right, which is meat. Eating meat is like seen as a luxury right? Apart from that, in every single area of life. Isn't it true that we have to sacrifice something today in order to have
Something for tomorrow. Right? So for example, if you want to be fit and healthy, we have to sacrifice our impulses today, right? Yes, we feel like eating chocolate cake every day. Yes, we feel like you know, drinking fizzy drinks. But if we want to have good teeth, if we want to look after our health, we're gonna have to control ourselves and make a level of sacrifice today, in order for success tomorrow, if you're a student working hard at uni, or school or, you know, college,
you might feel like watching TV all day, right? You might feel like just playing or going out with your friends or whatever it is social media, but you're gonna have to sacrifice that impulse today. By studying, right? Doing things that might not be very easy doing things that might take a lot of focus a lot of effort.
Why, so that you can reap the benefits of that tomorrow. And you can think of that in every area of life. Any anyone you see who is successful, they've had to sacrifice something, something of their impulses, you know, they had an impulse to do something now to be lazy to do waste time. You know, to procrastinate, whatever it is they they sacrifice that and they worked hard and strove against that impulse in order to gain something tomorrow. So the first lesson from the story of Ibrahim alayhis salam that I want to focus on is sacrifice today
for success tomorrow, we can all reflect what is it that I could
give up today? Or what is it that I could control my impulses regarding today, in order to have success tomorrow.
The second that I want us to focus on is
making the law and obeying a lot today can change everything for you and your family and your community tomorrow in the future.
Ibrahim Alayhi Salam
as he left
hotjar and his son in the middle of that desert, he made the sapan Allah He said Robin in a scan to mean Luria TB word you know ATVs that are in, in the basical, Mahara robina loopy masala Tata fudge, I'll have a determiner na Sita, who Elaine was up who Minister marotti la la home, yes guru, our Lord, I have settled some of my children, my descendants, my family in an uncultivated Valley, near your sacred house. So it was in he knew that this was the spot where the ancient sacred house that other many Salaam had, once built had been.
And then he said, robina Our Lord, so that they may establish the salaat.
So make the hearts of people inclined towards them, and provide for them from from your fruits that they may be grateful.
So even then, Ibrahim Alayhi, salam, he made this beautiful day.
And just think about this boy, he's saying, this place that has nothing, Oh Allah let, first of all, he said, I want my family to establish the Salah. In other words, I want them to be people who obey Allah and worship Allah.
And that should be our primary concern. The sisters in our lives in the lives of our families, the establishing of the worship of Allah, which is the purpose of our creation. So he said to Allah, the whole reason why I've left them there is for them to to obey you and establish the Sala. And then he says, so a lot, make some hot people's hearts inclined towards them and provide for them and look at the result of the dua of Ibrahim and a Salah that today
Subhana Allah,
our hearts are all inclined towards Mecca. the hearts of a billion people in the world are inclined towards them towards them in answer to that desire. And in history as well. Throughout history, we've had that right. The most visited place, the most visited place of pilgrimage in history is Makkah. And even at that time, you know, the tribe of Judah home, or some Arab tribes were passing by and their hearts inclined towards them.
So look at how Allah answered the door of Ibrahim, that that became the most beloved place on earth.
And secondly, he said, Let our law provide from your fruits and so very soon after
At that time, you know, within a few generations, maca became a flourishing city, it became the center of Arabia, the most important kind of place where the economy of that whole area relied on, right, relied on the caravans of Makkah. And even today, the supply chains, the economic supply chains of Makkah amazing, are very advanced. Everyone wants their products to be there, because the world comes to Makkah, right? So look at the answer to Ibrahim alayhis. Salam, and realize from that, the outdoors are very powerful, or the other very powerful that the US we make today are very, very powerful.
For tomorrow, even in things that we can't imagine, and I'll share with you that one of the two hours that I've always made that I've always had amazing results from this
is
and I made this to our when my son was a baby, and I wanted him to be a half of grant and we didn't have any health teachers, or any mosque that had any hidden costs. And I was not here for them myself. I couldn't really see how I'm going to do this, okay, in the middle of London, Northwest London. But I made this door and hamdulillah I just saw that the doors started opening. And the other I would make is, Oh Allah. And then I would tell I would say to Allah, the thing that I want, the thing that I'm dreaming of, I want my son to be a half of the Quran, oh, I want this thing to happen. I want to have a wonderful marriage, I want to have this or I want this to happen. And I
can't see how I could achieve that. But nothing is impossible for you. Yeah, Allah, nothing is impossible for you. You know how to make this thing happen. So Oh, Allah, allow me to achieve my goal. Allow me to achieve my goal. And you see within that door, there is so much in Charlotte so much imagine in that door, because what you're saying to allies, I don't know. And you know, you know more than me, I am weak and you are strong Allah, you you can make, you can move mountains if you want. And I am weak and needy, and I need your help in this big vision that I have for myself or for my family.
So my sisters, I want us to realize the importance and the power of our to us today, for tomorrow, and also the power of obeying Allah. You know, when we obey Allah, at the time, it might seem difficult, you know, when we were, hey, job on a hot day, when we pray, even though you know, we'd rather be doing something else. We've got loads of other things that we could be doing. When we, when we fast in Ramadan, even though we've got exams, and it's hard. All those things that we do when we obey Allah. It's as if Allah is keeping a note of that, that my servant did all of these things. Then one day in the future, you will reap the benefits of that, you will reap the benefits
of that. Because Allah Subhana Allah never forgets. Even if nobody noticed, the good thing that you did, your parents didn't notice. Your family didn't notice. Nobody gave you any appreciation.
A lot is appreciating it. A lot is noticing.
And Allah subhanaw taala. He knew and he he knew the sincerity of Ibrahim alayhi salam. And he saw his obedience, constant obedience, his willingness to sacrifice his son, his willingness to obey Allah even though it's so difficult.
And because of that loss of Allah made millions of people around the world now, every single day, we make dua for Ibrahim that way. And we say along my son, Mohammed, Allah, Allah, Mohammed kamasan, later, Ibrahim, Ali Ibrahim, Mohammed Ahmed, we make dua for Ibrahim, we mentioned Ibrahim Alayhi Salam
that shows you how much I loved him that he caused a whole nation of people
to praise Ibrahim and to make glorify Ibrahim and his progeny until the end of time. So Pamela, that so the second lesson is making go out and obeying a lot today can change everything for you and your family and your society in the future. The third lesson that I want us to focus on when it comes to the story of Abraham is
when we set out to do something good shaitan will try to stop us. He will do whatever he can to try to stop us by telling us not to. Okay, and we must fight actively against
His whisperings. So when Ibrahim Alayhi Salam set out with a smile to sacrifice him in a particular place, we know that shavon came in three different spaces, three different places to try and stop them, right? To try and avert them from being alone. And what did they do? They picked up stones and they started throwing them at shavon. So that was physical shaytan was physically there, trying to stop them, for us so panela every single day, when we want to obey Allah, or when we have a dream, when we're trying to do something for the sake of Allah, when we have something, some goal that we want to do for Allah shaitaan will come and he will constantly constantly speak to us and say to us,
don't do this. You're gonna miss out on this, you're gonna miss out on that. You know, Allah is merciful. You don't need to do this low forgive you. So many excuses. Shaytan will put in our minds and so many tricks to avert us from the straight path. So we have to through the story of Abraham become alert. The first thing is to be alert that Chopin is there, right? he is, he has that nature. He wants my downfall as a human being. He doesn't want to see me successful, he doesn't want to see me abating Allah.
So be aware of that, and then fight shape on actively, because it brought about Islam, he fought shape and actively right by by actually stoning shape on. And that's why we do the stoning of the jamara. Figuratively, right?
How do we fight shape on actively the way that we in our everyday lives which fight shaytaan actively is to put up as many doors as we can, between us and sinning? Right? Just think about for example, Allah Subhana Allah has forbidden for his right is forbidden illegal relationships. It's forbidden Zina.
In order to prevent us from falling into that. And some of us we might not ever be able to imagine how can somebody fall into that?
Allah Subhana, Allah put so many guidelines, so many rules, that would prevent us from even going close to Zener. So if a person feels afraid of falling into a sin, they should put up as many batteries as they can. And that is how we fight shavon. So in the example, I gave illegal relationships, we don't we're never alone in a room with somebody of the opposite *, right? We don't have chitchat, you know, relaxed relationships and chit chat with somebody of the opposite *, we avoid
being in mixed gatherings, right? We observe a job, we lower our gaze, right? We,
we get married, right in order to protect ourselves. So there's so many things that we can do. We don't look at her arm things. We don't read about her arm things, you know, even reading about people doing her arm things. It has an effect on our heart, it desensitizes us to those evil and sinful things. So to find shavon, if that is your weakness, or if that is something that you're worried about, to fight shaytan in that department, you have to put up the barriers, to stop yourself from coming anywhere near that.
It could be something else, whatever it is, whatever the area is that you need to find a bond with, you need to put as many barriers up as possible. It's a little bit like, you know, when they say when you're trying to lose weight, right? They say just don't have
things in the house, don't just don't have, you know, foods that are bad for you in the house. If it's not in the house, then you're not going to be tempted, right? So as Muslims, we don't believe in having temptations in front of us and then preventing ourselves from those tend to be temptations. We believe in avoiding having those temptations near us in the first place. Right.
So that's one way putting up as many barriers as possible. Another way is to surround yourselves with good people. You know, the company we keep affects the way we think affects the way what we're willing to do, and what we're willing not to do. And it affects the way we connect with Allah subhanaw taala if we're around people who love Allah, who connects with Allah, then we will do that as well. We're more inclined to doing that. If we're around people who are constantly thinking about this world dunya you know, looks beauty or all the kind of superficial things and that's what we're gonna be
MSDN and that will never give us happiness.
So those are two just two ways that we can fight shape on putting up the barriers, strengthening ourselves and having good company. Another way to protect ourselves from shaper is then whatever shavon is trying to tell us to not do that we should be doing.
put even more effort into doing that good thing, put even more effort into doing it and doing as best as you can do it excellently. So that tripod has nowhere to go.
So, dear sisters, those were three lessons key lessons that I wanted us to focus on, on the story of Abraham, I'm going to repeat them again the three lessons number one sacrifice today for success tomorrow. Number two, make making the law and obeying a lot today can change everything for you and your community tomorrow. And number three, when we set out to do good shaytan will try to stop us by whispering and we have to actively fight against his whisperings in order to be successful. inshallah, I hope that that has benefited you. I will leave you with with those thoughts so prodigal lahoma will be handed a shadow Allah ilaha illa and does have to be like you can be whatever you
want to be.
never listen to those who kill your dreams.
He will set you free.
He will put it by and make you feel invincible.
You