Mustafa Khattab – Story Of Brother Gary

Okay. I know today is the Q and

A session, but,

we have, brother Gary, our

guest speaker today. Inshallah, we'll be talking to

you for about 10 minutes on his story,

how he became to how he became Muslim,

and,

and the challenge he faced, and how he

is trying to adjust as a new Muslim.

So please welcome brother brother Gary, Zakhal.

Okay. I'm not really prepared because he kinda

surprised me. I was coming here to pick

up a book and then he said, by

the way

and, I didn't realize there were so many

of you, so it's a little crazy.

I can talk in front of adults, but

when I get in front of children, I

get a little nervous. You guys scare me.

Oh, yeah.

So, to be quick, because,

I, accepted Islam when I was, about 35

years old. So that was in 2007.

So I do I don't look that old,

so people kinda get surprised by that. I

have a son who is 17. I have

a daughter who is

14.

I have another daughter who is 13, and

a son who is 6. And, the 6

year old is Yusuf. He accepted he was

born after I accepted Islam. So he's the

first in our family to be

to be, born Muslim.

So, I come from a Christian background.

Catholic is I don't know if you guys

know much about that, and, you should focus

on Islam anyway, but in if you get

older, you might take some religious studies and

learn about other faiths.

And that's one that is the biggest religion

here in Canada.

Or the biggest religious group, and I come

from that background.

I had a a bit of a difficult

life,

because I can see

is that closer? Is that right? No stairs.

For some of you guys, the older brothers

here, I I understand some of you are

about 14, in that range.

So for me, when I was your age,

I moved out of the house.

So I had to I had to grow

up very fast.

So when all of my friends were in

school learning, I was out working.

I had to live on the street for

a while, sleeping in parks and things like

that.

And, you know, what it's like in Canada.

It's very cold. Even in the summer time

you'd be surprised sleeping out in a park.

It's very very cold.

So, these are just things that happened to

me.

And a lot of other things. I got

into a lot of trouble. Because

the beauty of Canada is that it's very

open, it's very free, we can practice our

religion,

but it's also very easy to get into

trouble, right, if we don't pay attention to

what we're doing.

And so for me, I got into a

lot of trouble. And I did a lot

of bad things. I got in trouble the

police and I got in trouble with my

parents and my family.

But then eventually when I got a little

bit older I realized

something was missing. I didn't have even though

I had a belief in God, I wasn't

really connected with with Allah.

Right?

So one day I prayed and I said

if you're up there, please guide me. And

I started to learn about Islam.

And I had a couple of friends

that were that I worked with who were

Muslim.

And

as I started to learn about religion, going

back to Christianity

and, the things that I knew, I started

to look out at other things. I didn't

know anything about Islam.

I thought it was just about camels and

curved swords and desert and but I I

didn't know. So I started to ask questions

and alhamdulillah, they were there and they they

taught me a lot of stuff.

And, after a couple of years I decided,

you know what, this makes sense to me.

This is what I need.

Because I got into so much trouble,

I realized

at that point, as an adult, 35 years

old, I realized how important

the rules that Allah

had set. And if I had been following

these rules

much sooner,

all I know is I may not have

gotten into so much trouble.

And, that was really the main reason why

I accepted Islam, was because I needed those

rules

and those guidelines.

Right? We come and we pray 5 times

a day. There's a there's a routine that

we develop. There's a habits that we develop

that are really good for us. And I

didn't have that.

Being 14 and moving out, I had to

figure things out on my own. So,

I didn't even finish high school until I

was 38 years old.

I had to go back to school.

So,

the decisions that we make, for the younger

guys you won't understand so much now, but

for some of the older guys, 14, 15,

and the sisters,

you realize that you guys are getting into

that stage where you guys are adults, you're

young adults.

From

our from our Dean, you are adults. When

you start to get to 14, 15 year

old, you're you're you have to start making

decisions.

The things that you do, that your parents

are going to let you do, make more

choices. You're going to be going to college

in a few years, in university.

And as I said, in Canada, there's so

much that we can do, but at the

same time we have to be very, very

careful about the decisions we make.

So, Abdullah accepted Islam at 35 and,

I came home about a year later

and I had just finally learned salah. So

when you guys say, Assalamu Alaikum,

you know, that took me a long time

to learn that. We're talking a couple of

years to say it, right?

I I've been working on my recitation and

so on. So after a year, I came

home and,

my wife had said to me that she

wasn't the man I was that she had

married. She was kind of upset. Things were

changing.

I accepted Islam for me. She was still

doing what she was doing as a non

Muslim.

But then she said to me, she says,

because of Islam, I see you becoming the

man I've always wanted you to be.

And she said to me, I wanna accept

Islam.

So this is how my family, my wife

and I, became Muslim.

So I accepted Islam and she saw the

changes and the good choices I had made.

Prior to that I had made a lot

of bad choices, as I said.

So it was because of Islam that I

started making good choices in my life. I

started listening to Allah. I started following the

prophet.

The sunnah, the things that he did, the

things that he said, and it really changed

things for me.

And,

Alhamdulillah,

9, 10 years later, I've been very active

in the community.

I try to to do these types of

things.

Usually with a little more notice. It helps

inshallah.

But,

but I think it's very important. And you

guys will learn this as you get a

bit older. Alright. One of the things I

had difficulty with was my parents.

I wasn't always very respectful with my parents

and that was part of the reason why

I had to move out when I was

14.

Alright. And this is something that's very important

for us. You may not understand now, but

you will in the future. My parents are

getting older now. And our Canadian culture

is not,

as caring towards our parents as we should

be. So you guys need to learn this

as well. It's really important. So if your

parents say no, they don't want you to

do things,

you know, there's usually a reason for it.

Right? You have to trust him. Just like

we trust him Allah. We don't always know

what Allah is telling us to do, but

we have to trust in him

and we have to, you know, realize that

there's a reason why he's telling us. We

may not know now. We may never know.

But, eventually, we may get to know, okay,

well, Allah had told me this

then because now I need it today.

Does that make sense, guys?

So, you know, it's the same thing with

your parents. You have to trust your parents,

the decisions they made, the things that they

say.

And if you can benefit from any of

the things that, you know, I've done a

lot of things and not not,

you know,

just things, bad choices that I made. So

inshallah, may Allah protect you guys, help you

make good choices,

have good,

have a good path in your future. And

don't be afraid to practice your Islam. I

know there's a lot of things, especially the

older brothers and sisters, you realize there's a

lot of stuff going on. Just try to

remember Allah

It's gonna be hard. Don't let the things

in the world shake you. You always have

to come back and think about Allah, and

it will it will get better. It takes

time, and this is the one of the

beauties of Kanyog.

You know, some bad things happen here, but

we do have one of the best countries

in the world where we can practice art

Islam.

So, Salaam Alaik.

Brother

Gary,

he is visiting from Waterloo,