Yahya Rhodus – Year End Reflections
AI: Summary ©
The speakers discuss the potential benefits of Allah's "medicals in deification," including the use of "medicals in deification to indicate a superior state and hold onto it." They also emphasize the importance of experiencing the sweetness of faith in Islam and staying true to oneself and others. The speakers emphasize the need to be ready for the upcoming year, take things seriously, and not give up. They emphasize the importance of remaining optimistic and taking things seriously even in difficult circumstances.
AI: Summary ©
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man in our team and hamdulillah here but I mean also Allahu Allah
so you didn't know Muhammad and Ashraf at NBI even more setting
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salli wa salam ala Sayidina Muhammad and miftah Hey Baba
Rahman que la added MF enemy la Salatin was sentiment that you may
be the only Makayla. While he will be he will then why Allah
Alhamdulillah for the blessing of coming together on a night like
this in a halal fashion, where we experience beauty without mind
altering substances, and without doing anything that is displeasing
to Allah subhanaw taala I'm especially reminded on nights like
this New Year's Eve, what a blessing this deen is. Think about
for those of us that converted
what we used to do on New Year's Eve, think about what the vast
majority of people and the society in which we live in many people in
the world are doing on New Year's Eve. But Allah subhanaw taala has
replaced one form of intoxication with a better form of
intoxication. And there are mind altering substances that someone
can take. And Allah has prohibited that of course, and someone will
feel for a period of time, some degree of intoxication, some type
of high, something that feels good in the moment, but it's demonic.
And oftentimes, people have bad experiences in the moment, let
alone when they wake up the next day, let alone when it becomes a
bad habit, let alone when it starts to ruin their life into
ruin their health, and the addiction that takes place as a
result. And in a religious and spiritual sense. Allah subhanaw
taala has given pleasure and even degrees of intoxication for those
who work hard and struggle against their soul and start to taste the
taste the sweetness of the man Locke attackmen. Eman Eman has a
taste. And our Prophet mentioned explicitly, he has tasted the
sweetness of faith who men love to be Lyra Ben and it's interesting
to note here, the prophet will mention three things that relate
to your heart. Yes, of course you have to work outwardly. But these
traits relate to the heart. Man love the biller Robin, one who has
contend to have a law as his Lord will be a tsunami Dean and is
phenom as his dean will be Muhammadan Nubian rasool Allah,
and the Prophet sallallahu Sallam as His Prophet and Messenger
contentment with these three things. And if we have contentment
in all of its meanings, that we recognize on a night like this and
on any night, what law Allah has given us is superior.
What Allah has given us a superior we have to believe that this deen
is superior, the Quran is superior this way is superior. If you bring
it into your life, it will change you forever. It will transform you
forever. And we don't believe that we're superior because we don't
know our state. We don't know how we're going to die. We know that
people have Iman who believe in return to Allah with belief, they
will be in a superior state you'll look piano and in the final one of
the two final bows in the believers will be in paradise of
course, but we don't know who's going to die on faith. And may
Allah to Allah protect us and bless us to die upon Allah. Allah,
Allah Allah, Muhammad Rasul Allah, but we know for certain that this
way is superior and that there's nothing like it. And we must
believe in that. And we must hold on to that. And then in another
Hadith that Athan men couldn't Nephi wotja Behala with an EMA,
there are three traits. And this is when I was speaking about three
what I really wanted to point to the Prophet mentioned three
dimensions of contentment, but there are three traits and they
relate to something internally when they're in someone, someone
will experience the sweetness of faith. And the first is, is that
Allah and His messenger are more beloved to him than anything else.
Allah and His messenger are more beloved to him than anything else,
and that manifests in the choices that we make. To what degree do we
prefer Allah and His Messenger over everything else and
everything that is that we choose and do and say? And the second
trait is what it also
All relates to marhaba love. So the first Hadith about tasting,
the sweetness of faith relates to contentment, and all of its
meanings. And there's deep meanings that you could go on and
on about this next Hadith, which also talks about the sweetness of
faith relates to love.
And so loving Allah and His Messenger more than anyone else.
And then if you love another individual, you only love him
Lilla
you love someone for Allah.
And this is what we've been speaking about tonight, this
sacred brotherhood of Islam. What a blessing. I'm reminded on a
night like this again, when we're celebrating the birth of the
prophesy centum celebrating the prophets Deen celebrating the
guidance that he brought, celebrating the mercy that he
brought Salallahu Salam, and everything that you and I have
benefited from that and what we hope everyone else to benefit from
that were they only to know. And I think back to initially coming to
this Dean, that many years ago now.
And all of the blessed people that this opted for gear was blessed to
meet from all different places in the world. And I remember, the
night before I went to go take my Shahada,
one of my close friends in high school, I called him and basically
that I was calling him to say, look, I'm going to become Muslim
tomorrow. And I'm have the nature of kind of wanting to prepare and
that type of thing. So I tried during that week, that anything
that had been purchased with wealth that was not pure, to get
rid of anything that I knew, was not appropriate for Muslim to have
to get rid of. And there was a lot of things that were thrown away.
And the night before I became Muslim, I call this friend of mine
or the day before, and I wanted to tell him tomorrow is going to be
different, I'm going to become Muslim. And he was sleeping.
And I woke him up out of his sleep. And he was actually having
a dream, right as I called. And in the dream, I came to him and I
said, Tomorrow, I'm going to meet the king.
And he woke up out of the dream when I called. And then I told him
tomorrow, I'm going to take my Shahada and become Muslim. And the
showerhead here is that after becoming Muslim, on a few
occasions, I tried to spend a little bit of time with some of
the people that I knew before.
But if the love is not for the sake of Allah,
there is no real connection.
If you don't end up doing those things that you were doing before,
many of which were prohibited in Islam, there's all of a sudden, no
more love, all of a sudden, they don't want to spend time with you.
Because you can't use foul language like you used to use. You
can't drink substances that you used to drink, you can't do things
that you used to do. And if that goes in their mind, the fun goes
in is not for Allah, rather, that's all demonic. And then the
relationship goes. And some people of course, have an ability to keep
in touch with people they knew. But that's good, as long as it's
not dragging you into that. But the Shahid is I remember after
that, spending time with 60 year old men,
from countries that I never even maybe really spent time with
someone from that country. Who would have thought that you would
be a young man with 19, having a friend who's 60 years old, having
friends from Iraq that are in their 30s or 40s. Having friends
from Libya that are this, I remember meeting someone from
Libya, just before I became Muslim. And they told me that he
had memorized the whole Quran. And I couldn't believe that.
Because I don't know a single person. I don't know a single
person ever memorized the Bible. I mean, I'm sure there's a few
people that have memorized the Bible, but to have 1000s upon
1000s and 1000s of people that memorize the book of Allah from
beginning to end, and to recite it, not just read it, Allahu
Akbar, we forget these things, how powerful these things are. And
when you're reminded of it, especially as a convert to this
religion, what a blessing we have the blessing of this brotherhood,
and all these people that you get to meet and spend time with and
the diversity is just amazing. And many of these people you wouldn't
have spent time with before.
I probably wouldn't have liked if we went to the same high school.
I've done magic and I Eric cockman. But I don't think I would
have really liked him. He definitely wouldn't have liked me.
Right? He was like this skater who's just you know, you know,
kind of, you know, looking for people to like punk and stuff like
that. Probably, you know, I mean, I could see him not liking me
playing basketball and that type of thing. But now I love this
individual. And I hope what we're together eternally, after long
lives and up
is to Allah to add in Charlottetown all of our families
and children until Yom Okayama will be reunited in Sharla. To add
in the family that he married into, with Uncle Omar Abdulaziz,
Allah have mercy on his soul and reunite us with him in the highest
levels of paradise Yato and all of the other people who lost loved
ones that we know, in sha Allah to Allah the pain is temporary. We
will be reunited with them be the law, in paradise in Jannah be
isn't the light to Allah. How could it be the case someone that
converts when he converted and to remain firm upon his Sadam all of
those years. That Allah ILA, what a blessing.
What a blessing when they didn't have what we have nowadays, and
inshallah Tada, things will get easier for our children, despite
them getting more difficult from another perspective, but Allah to
Allah is merciful Subhan who went to Allah, but the brotherhood of
Assam. What beauty in what a blessing people that come together
that would not be together. We're not to be for La ilaha illa people
that some of whom would fight against each other, quite
literally before it's Anam and they come together through the
blessing of Allah, Allah, Allah we meet that mean, we all know that.
I'm not speaking of something that we all don't know. But showing
gratitude for that. And then on top of that, it's one of the ways
that our Prophet said, you can experience the Halawa of Eman the
sweetness of faith into hip elmarit latter Hibou Illa Allah
Allah, you love a man you only love him for the sake of Allah,
because he carries every human being carries the sitter in
Africa. The secret of Allah blowing the roar The Spirit into
him. But on top of that, they're aware and conscious of that and
actively affirm that in c'est la illAllah. Muhammad Rasul Allah,
what a blessing. What a blessing. And then the third trait is, and
yucca ah, and Yak Raha Aniruddha, Elan CO, Kufri, Kamiya, Crowl, and
yoke. The fifth note is that he did tests to return to Cofer to
disbelief, the way that he would test to be thrown into a fire.
Imagine right in front of you, a fire stoked, and that if you were
thrown into that fire and you goodwill couldn't get out how
painful that would be. And how that loathsome that would be to
you. We should hate to return to gopher to disbelief, more than we
would a hate to be thrown into that fire interview burnt at the
stake. Because that's the real fire is the fire of cooler than
anyone who's experienced the darkness of gopher, and the
constricted pneus of gopher, and the terribleness of disbelief,
would never ever, ever want to go back to it. When hola todos
expanded our heart to escena. This is a blessing from him subhanho wa
taala. And so on a night like this, we should really show
gratitude that he's put us in a position whereby which you and I
can experience the sweetness of faith. And on one hand, it
requires a little bit of work. But on the other hand, it's also easy.
You don't have to be a scholar, to experience the sweetness of faith,
try to be a scholar, try to learn everything that you can. But you
don't have to be a scholar, every single one of us can experience
the sweetness of faith, every single one of us can acquire those
traits that the prophesy centum is speaking of. And every single one
of us probably does, to some degree, experienced them. But the
affair really is about moving up to a higher degree and being
conscious that when we establish a brotherhood for the sake of Allah
with a particular individual, that that is something beloved to Allah
subhanho wa Taala and that is something that will lead to these
great states. And also on a night like this even though primarily,
we follow a history calendar. And for us, this is this is Jumada
lower. This is the fifth month of the Islamic year Muharram has
passed Subhan Allah Safar has passed Subhanallah or Bill has
passed review attorney four months of this year of the history year
has passed. And now we're in the fifth month. And all of a sudden
now it's like La ilaha illAllah. Ramadan is actually not too far
behind, not too far away. And the scholars used to say that they
used to prepare for Ramadan from the time six months ahead of time.
And really the whole year is preparation. But where they start
to really prepare is six months ahead. The way that someone would
train for a marathon or train for some type of
BORT that they know the season is about to that come. They've
trained ahead of time. And they don't just go that untrained into
the first day of practice, you could injure yourself, you're not
going to look good, you're going to get behind now is the training
time to develop good habits, so that we can harvest the blows
blessings in the bus in month of Ramadan. And then especially the
two months right before it is where we have to start getting
really serious, and Raja, and then in shot ban. So then in Ramadan,
that we are prepared and that we are ready. But we should start
thinking now, this is the fifth month of the Islamic year for us.
And so we're almost at the halfway point. And Ramadan is not too far
away. And labas it's okay for us also, to be aware of the fact that
yes, we're moving into a new year as well. And that No, tomorrow it
will be or after midnight tonight, it will be the year 2021 According
to the Gregorian calendar. But it is important that internally our
clock ticks, according to the history calendar. Sometimes, of
course, we have to use the Gregorian calendar, but our
internal clock should tick according to the history calendar.
And there are blessings in that. And there are deep secrets and and
the more that we can become aware of the blessing of the lunar
calendar that we've been given the Hijiri calendar, and that the way
that it relates to the different months and had the different times
of year depending upon what year it really is, then the more that
we will benefit from those very special days in these various in
some of these very special months. And in reality every month and
every moment can be special if our heart is in the right place. So in
sha Allah Tada Allah subhanaw taala will bless us that as we
move out of this year, that we want to that as we bid farewell to
2021 2020, and we prepare for the upcoming that Gregorian year, even
though we're at almost at the midpoint, according to his career,
we want to especially remind ourselves of the importance of
intention. And anything that has gone in the past is that Allah
subhanaw taala inshallah will forgive us of that, and Inshallah,
we will place our trust in Him for everything that is going to come.
And we should always remember, what our teachers have taught us
is that we should remain optimistic, despite the
circumstances, no matter how bad things get, we should remain
optimistic. And these are times where we are being forced, we are
being forced to really dig down deep. And to allow our Eman to
rise to the surface. We all know a lot of people that have suffered a
lot of people that have died. A lot of people that have gone
through difficult circumstances, this is a time in a very real way,
is not a time to play around. Because we don't know what's going
to happen to any one of us, may Allah protect all of us and ward
off all harm from all of us. But this is a time that we need to
take things seriously. And to have the right mindset, we don't know
when we're going to meet our Lord. But we ask Allah to bless us to be
able to prepare for that meeting, and to get our things together. So
that when it comes to that time, where we're take our last breath,
is that we're ready to go. And that we've worked on ourselves. So
we don't have all of these attachments, that when it's time
to go, we're ready to go. And we actually are longing to go. And we
hope that there will be test beat, that Allah will make us firm, we
can't do it ourselves. We cannot do it ourselves. If we rely on
ourselves, we're doomed. But if we rely upon Allah, you said bit
Allahu Amande, Bill COVID, devotee, Allah, that will make the
people of belief firm, with the firm word, La ilaha illa Allah and
that's what we want. We want to say La Ilaha illa Allah, and to
know, no matter what has afflicted us,
don't think that you have to understand everything about it.
Because you might not we don't always know why. What afflicts us?
Why did that thing afflict us? You always you always don't know. And
one of the things that we heard that one of our teachers say
recently as,
as people tend to say, sometimes it's better that you don't know.
Because they say, either ready for Saba bottle agile, when you know
the cause of something, sometimes you're not really that amazed by
that particular thing. And whether that thing be for good or whether
the thing before evil, in other words, is that if you learn about
someone passing away, and you learn Oh, it was because of a B,
and C, and they had health problems and whatever else so Oh,
they just didn't take care of their health. I'm fine.
No, you don't know. You could go thinking that you're healthy. And
so
Sometimes it's better not to know the cause, and to take the lesson
from what is happening around us. And so this is a time to dig deep.
And to really have a faith based perspective on how we view the
world. And to maintain a good opinion of ALLAH SubhanA wa Tada
as we transition to this new year, and to recognize is that for every
hardship there is two eases, and never will a hardship overcome to
ease as as our Prophet taught us salaallah either Salam, that
lentil zlib Ursula new strain never will one hardship overcome
to eess So we know that for every hardship, there will be two eases
and in fact in the hardship if you're with Allah, there will be
ease and so we should take glad tidings that there's going to be
ease coming to the image of the Prophet sallallahu Sallam
inshallah will extend to all of humanity be easily light to Anna
and this is something that we want, we want people to have
attained Felicity, we want people to receive mercy, we want people
to be successful in this world and the next and inshallah Tada Allah
will make us and our children and our loved ones and those that we
are connected to successful in this world in the next Milotic
without to give us Tofik and bless us and all of our affairs and may
this upcoming year inshallah to add it to be a month and you hear
of relief for the Ummah of our Prophet sallallahu Sallam in a
means for the state or states to be changed into the very best of
states. And it'd be a year of protection a year of warding off
harm, if you heighten with Afia or Salalah this evening Muhammad and
it used to be a solemn Welcome to the layerable army