Omar Suleiman – Why Me #20 Why Is Everything Suddenly Falling Apart
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Change is inevitable.
We move through cycles of opposites,
of happiness
and sadness,
of good and bad.
But what does it mean when everything is
suddenly falling apart?
When you face the loss patiently, but are
instead faced by regression in a domino effect.
The chips of your life falling rapidly down
one after another.
What do you do when it feels like
even the blessings you were grasping onto are
now rapidly being snatched away?
Why does it feel like Allah is taking
away the little that was holding you together
in the first place?
I want you to imagine how the prophet
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam felt after the battle of
Badr. Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala just gave you
victory over your enemies in a miraculous way
that everyone could see. He sends down angels
and he particularly attributes that blessing of victory
to your dua.
And when you come home to Madinah,
you have the ansar ready to receive you
and they have more conviction now than ever.
And then as you enter into Medina,
you find out
that while everyone is celebrating the great victory,
your daughter Ruqayyah
just passed away.
And they used to call the day of
Badr
the day of great joy and the day
of great sadness.
Because as happy as the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi
Wasallam was that Allah just gave him victory
in Badr,
Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta A'la took away his
daughter Ruqayyah on the very same day.
And that's usually how life
is. You get a nirmah and then you
get a test right after the nirmah to
remind you that you're still in a place
of test.
Abdullah ibn Umar radiAllahu ta'ala Anhu narrates
that of the duas that the Prophet SallAllahu
Alaihi Wasallam would frequently make was this dua,
Allahumma innni aoothubikaminzawari
nermatik
watahaawuliaafiatik
wafujaati
nikmatik
wajameer
isaqatik.
Oh Allah,
I seek refuge in you from the sudden
decline of your blessings,
and the sudden change from being in a
state of well-being,
and the suddenness of your vengeance,
and from all forms of your wrath.
Tests are throughout our lives, but they often
tend to come in sudden bunches rather than
these perfectly spaced out speed bumps.
As regular as our prayers are throughout the
day, our tests are completely unpredictable
and unexplainable.
We're taught to seek refuge in Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala from Zawad al Ni'am,
the sudden decline of blessings.
That moment in your life where everything seems
to be spinning into chaos.
All of the tests are coming at once
and you've lost so much that your mind
doesn't even know what to process first.
With the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, this was
the state of a'amulhuzun,
the year of grief.
The worst humiliation and Ta'af,
the worst losses of the people he loved
had to preach all happened in the exact
same year.
Meaning if you took all 23 years of
his prophetic career,
the worst manifestation of each trial seemed to
all come in that one year. And that's
why it's called the aamulhuzun,
the year of grief.
That's what the state of Zawal al Ni'am
is. Now, if we find ourselves in the
grips of Zawal al Ni'am and our whole
world seems to be crumbling down, how do
we reevaluate
our approach to what's Sahib?
We start by seeing this phase in our
lives as there to either spark our repentance
or elevate our rank.
How do we reconcile this with the idea
though that gratitude maintains blessings?
There's the saying, anirmatu idashukiratkarwatwida
kufirat
farwat.
Blessings stay with gratitude
and they flee with ingratitude.
But I was grateful and I saw those
blessings flee away.
Firstly, it may be that your gratitude held
some of the blessings that were meant to
otherwise flee
or that your gratitude for those blessings caused
them to be a means of goodness for
you on the day of judgment as well.
Because if you said Alhamdulillah for them when
you had them, what Allah will give you
for the praise on the day of judgment
is greater than what you enjoyed of that
blessing here.
But Allah will test with sudden loss regardless.
You don't have to lose yourself when that
blessing is lost. And that's what's key. Compare
when Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta A'la says walastrinal
insanalafiqhus
Verily man is in loss to when Allah
says,
ma'indakumyanfadwamaindallahi
baqwala
najaziyanal
ladinasabaru
ajaraum bi
What you have will perish
and what is with Allah is forever.
And we will reward the patient with the
best of what they used to do. In
this case, you weren't lost. And the blessing
of patience you were given will yield you
far more pleasure than what you had before.
Walanabuluwanakum
bishayin minalkhawfiwaljuariwanakusim
minal amwari walanfusiwathamaraatwabashirrisabireen
And we will surely test you with something
of fear and hunger and a loss of
wealth and livelihood,
but give glad tidings to the patients.
Notice Allah didn't respond with how specific blessings
remedy specific losses. He simply said, give glad
tidings to the patient
because I will make sure that the sudden
losses are met with more than satisfactory gains.
That's why the prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said,
wama o'uthiyahahaduna
aataanhuakayru
wa'awsa'oo minasadr
And no one is given a better or
vaster gift than patience.
Imam Hassan Abbasi Rahimu Allah says, Asabruqanzun
min konozil khayr
Patience is a beautiful treasure of good. And
Allah will only give it to someone who
is worthy in his sight.
And someone can say, I get that, but
not now.
It's often that we think we're not so
upset with the loss of the blessing or
the appearance of hardship,
but it's the timing of it all.
But in reality, are you sure it would
have been better for Allah to spare you
of that loss of a loved one in
that moment?
Are you sure if they lived longer, it
would have been better for you or them?
Are you sure that staying in that job
for another year or 2 would have been
better for you? When is a good time
to suffer?
And that's why Umar bin Abdul Aziz Rahimullah
used to say, I have given up on
ever trying to overcome the timing of Allah's
decree.
And I have sufficed myself with this dua.
Allahummaraddhini
biqaddaq
wabaariklifiqaddarik
hatta lauhibba
ta'jeelashayin
akhartahu
walatakhira
shayin ajaltahu
Oh Allah, make me content with your providence
and bless me in your decree
such that I would not like to hasten
what has been delayed
nor delay what has been hastened.
Rubbamaawaradathihthhulamu
a'laika liuarifakaqadramannabihi
alaikha.
Perhaps he allowed darkness to engulf you so
that you could recognize the tremendous blessings he
was bestowing upon you.
We're used to stories giving us a happy
ending very quickly.
It always shows up at the end of
the movie.
But the reality is that your test could
last for a long period of your life.
And the blessings you seek might not come
to you in this realm of your existence.
And it won't be easy.
You'll struggle everyday.
You might feel stuck in a state of
perpetual grief, unable to lift yourself out of
bed,
or remember all the lessons you're supposed to
have learned by now.
You don't need to force yourself into happiness,
instead resort to submission,
and focus on your standing in his sight,
rather than his delivering you
from your plight.