Mirza Yawar Baig – Winners and losers
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AI: Transcript ©
My dear brothers and sisters
Allah
mentioned for us
and described for us and told us
about the true reality of this life.
Allah
mentioned in this beautiful,
he said 4 things.
The first thing Allah said
is
Allah said every living
thing, every
every life
will taste death, will die.
Complete
and total
reward,
full reward,
full recompense
for
actions will be given only on the day
of judgement.
Which refers to benefit and
punishment.
Allah said the one who has been freed
from the empire and entered into Jannah,
only that person is successful.
Allah said, and the life of this world
is only deception
and imaginary.
I want us to reflect on this because
this is the sum total of our lives.
I want to give you an example, and
then I want to give you a couple
of
draw your attention to a couple of true
stories in the Quran and the seerah.
The example I want to give you and
this is all from my own life. I
was in here I was I live here
in 1997, 98,
from 97 to 2000. And I think it
was around 98.
I was teaching a course in San Francisco,
so I took a flight
to reach San Francisco
and,
checked into my hotel with a Marriott.
And then I had the whole evening free.
I had nothing to do. I was alone.
So there was a movie theater across.
There was a big plaza there and there
was a movie theater. That movie theater had
a,
a three-dimensional
three d,
you know, movie movie hall.
So I've never seen one of those before.
So I decided to go and see the
movie. I think it was a movie.
So when I went in there, it was,
they gave us those, you know, virtual reality
glasses.
And, you sat in this, this chair, and
the chair kind of reclined back,
unlike most movie theaters.
And
then the movie came
up. And it was, for me, the first
time, absolutely,
you know, amazing experience.
Complete I mean, I was transported. I mean,
I completely forgot
that I'm sitting in a theater that this
is actually a movie.
I think if somebody had,
attached,
you know,
sensors to my
brain and so on and so forth and
measured my blood pressure, everything would have
I would have a freak. My blood pressure
would have been racing and,
what was happening in the brain? Because I'm
seeing the shot coming straight at me.
Very,
very, very real. Very real.
And then we ended,
and then we came
out.
And I remembered that this is what Allah
said about this world.
Allah
told us that Allah did not use
this word, but I just thought of, you
know, comparing.
Allah said you are sitting in a 3
d
virtual reality theater.
This is not real.
This is virtual reality.
The real the reality is out there. When
the show ends,
when the show ends,
when these eyes shut,
the real eyes will open.
When the show ends,
then you will see the reality.
So don't get stuck in this reality.
Don't get stuck in this reality. But you
know and I know what happens when we,
are watching a movie, for example. If it's
a tragedy,
we will cry. If it's a property, we
will laugh.
You will hate the villain.
You know, you will think that the hero
is a fantastic, great guy and whatnot. Right?
Emotions completely.
And if you stop the guys, you look.
I mean, this is that's an actor. Right?
Why you connect? But
that is
so real.
I remember myself. I knew that we are
living in that kind of reality, and that
reality is this dunya, is this life.
And that is why Allah
sent
again and again and again. And the job
of the was a very unpopular job. There
was no who was popular. You know why?
If you want to know why the NBA's
job, the job of the prophets was unpopular,
do this as a as a experiment.
I don't advise you to really do it
but try it.
Go into a theater and in the middle
of the of the shows,
check people. Excuse me. This is not real.
Why are you crying? Why are you laughing?
This is not real. Wake up.
What do you think they will do to
you?
Now they check you out of the just
like, get out of it. They throw you
away. Yeah?
You're speaking the truth.
You are speaking the truth. You you tell
you tell me, wake up. Wake up. The
reality is out there. People say, oh, mad.
Get out of here. Why are you here?
And that's what they did to them.
That is what they did to them.
I want to mention 3 things to
you. 2 incidents from the Quran and 1
from
the.
Tell me who is the winner, who is
the loser.
Right? 3 are all 3 are scenarios.
The first scenario is
which Allah
mentioned.
He mentioned
a city to which
a was sent. And when they denied the,
Allah
Allah
increased and sent. So there were 3 of
them, 3 in one place.
And the
said this was the city of Antioch
in present day Egypt present day Turkey.
And then various things happen, and we know
the all the of,
And finally,
all the way to the end
where
they
killed him.
They killed the man.
And the last said, first,
it was said to him enter Jannah.
The man said that I wish my people
knew
how my rub honored me.
Now think about this story. What are you
seeing here? You're seeing here a man who
was not gonna be because he's not the.
The
the ones who are being denied and so
on. He's not he's not a. He's not
a human being.
You're seeing him
coming and telling people something good. He's telling
people something beneficial for them. He's telling them,
don't make shit. Don't worship idols. Don't join
partners with Allah.
Allah is your and my creator. Why would
you worship something which does not help you
or harm you?
And because of this good advice, what do
they do? They kill it.
So
if you look at it
in this worldly context,
is that man a winner or a loser?
Did he win or lose?
He lost his life.
Right? Lost his life.
But what do you and I know about
this man? Is he a winner or a
loser?
He's the biggest winner because
when he said, I wish people would know
what my did for me, how Allah honored
me, Allah
said, I will tell the people.
Allah said, I will tell the people. And
Allah
told us the story in the
to be recited until the day of judgement.
1st heard
on the through the blessed voice of Rasulullah
So now look at it from this context
of the eye which I decided for you.
The real judgment is there, not here.
Winners and losers are not decided in this
world. They are decided on the day of
judgment. So on the day of judgment, this
man
is a winner or loser.
Second story again from the Quran, the
the people of the trench.
And this was a group of
early
Muslims who followed.
And they were the
they brought Ivan on
and again the whole story of the boy
and so on and so on. Finally,
the story is
that
the king of the time,
he ordered trenches to be dug, and he
ordered fire to be laid into the trenches.
And he told these people,
leave your
leave Islam.
Leave this,
you know,
religion or
but
you throw in the fire.
And all those people,
they chose to
jump into the fire, and they did not
leave Islam.
Finally, it was one woman, and she had
a infant in her hands. Newborn baby.
And she hesitated because, you know, I mean,
it's a mother after all, and she doesn't
want to the baby to,
be burnt.
And the baby spoke.
And there are 3 who spoke in the
cradle. That's what I said. There are 3
who spoke in the cradle. This
baby,
and one more. That's a different story, I
will tell you.
The baby spoke and the baby said, oh,
my mother, do not hesitate. Jump,
because that is Jannah.
What looks to you like fire is not
fire. That is Jannah.
And she's out.
Again,
winner or loser?
And the third one,
coincidentally, we are sitting here today.
We have fast
accept
our fast and and grant us his reward
for this.
On this day,
again, one of the
greatest tragedies
of this happened.
And that was the Shahadah
of Al Hussein
And I live in.
And it's a tragedy upon tragedy because not
only was the grandson of
and all his family, almost all his family
who were with him were killed, but they
were killed by people who called themselves Muslim.
At least you die at the hands
of strangers. You can say, Okay, these are
enemies.
But to die at the hands of your
own people.
But what do you say today?
Who won and who lost?
Who won and who lost?
It's not a she has only thing. This
is real. This is Islamic history. This
is the. Who won and who lost?
And that is why one of our great
poets in other in in India, he said,
Islam
Islam is revived after every.
Meaning, when Muslims
stand up for the truth
and are not going to give in to
falsehood,
then it revive Islam.
And as I'm speaking today, there is one
Karbala happening in a place called Gaza.
That is Karbala. What is that?
Overwhelming force.
And,
after so many months have gone past, they
have dropped bombs I mean, uncounted bombs, and
still those people are there. Still those people
are struggling.
Just today, somebody sent me a video of
a man who was
a Palestinian brother who was,
you know, imprisoned by the Israelis and tortured,
and he was starved.
And he was starved for days and days
and this.
And, eventually, the release tapes, so he he
came out. He was, of course, very weak
and so on, but he should have died.
The the the amount of time he stopped,
he should have been dead. They asked him,
how come you didn't die?
He said, because every time I got hungry,
I made dua, and I said,
This is the mother of You
said about her
when Zakariya, alayhis salaam, went into her room,
he would see food
and he would ask
Yeah, Mariam.
Oh, Mariam, where did this come from? And
she would say, this is from my rub.
So I would say, Arab,
feed me like you fed Mariam,
alaihis salaam.
And he would say, immediately, my hunger would
go away. I would feel full.
He said this is what I did.
Every time I got hungry, I said, yeah,
feed me like you fed money.
I'm saying this to remind myself.
We worship Allah
who is alive.
He's not in our imagination.
He's not a piece of wood or a
piece of rock.
He's not a theory.
We
worship.
Everything is in his control.
So never give up hope.
Never lose hope.
Focus on the reality.
And the reality is that we worship the
one to whom the whole world belongs.
These games people play. People have played games
all their life.
All of history is full of the games
people play. So so what? Somehow games they
have let them play.
And we have our history to show who
are the winners and who are the losers.
It is not the one who It's not
a question of whether you are standing or
not standing. It's not a question of who
wins the fight or doesn't win the fight.
The question is,
which side did you fight on?
They can cut off your head.
No
problem.
But they cannot make it bow before them.
We ask
Allah to enable us to
attempt to live and walk in the footsteps
of those whose examples Allah gave us.
I don't say we will ever reach there
but
we make the effort.
We ask Allah
to help us deliver a life which is
pleasing to him and which where we can
live this world with honor,
with a legacy of honor. We ask Allah
to be pleased with us and never to
be displeased.