Yusha Evans – Khatira 28-06-2024
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A heart that is steadfast. A heart that
is steadfast.
And this
this principle of is
so important
because a lot of us think, right, we're
going to go to the grave,
all of us. That's a guarantee. You'll all
be in the grave.
And when we're in the grave, we know
that we will be questioned. There's an interrogation
of the grave. This is the first thing
that will happen to you. When all of
your family leaves you, you will hear them
by the way. You'll hear the family or
whoever comes to your grave. You hear them.
You hear them crying for you. You hear
them making dua for you and then you
hear their footsteps walk away. And when they
all walk away, guess what? You will be
alone. You'll be alone. And then the interrogators
will come and they'll ask you,
who is your lord?
Then they will ask
you, what was your religion? What was your
prophet? And a lot of us think we
know these things. These are basics. Right? Children
know these answers to these questions.
The scholars tell us that you will not
be able to answer those questions very easily
on that day.
These questions will only be answered by those
whom Allah has given
who has given a steadfast heart, who will
be able to answer these questions
correctly.
Because even if you think you know, these
angels are going to interrogate you. When you
say,
if Allah gives you that steadfast heart, they're
gonna ask you, how do you know this?
What is your evidence for this? Where is
your proof for for it? They're not going
to just take a simple answer for you.
So is so important but it's gonna allow
us to have this principle and
And
along with Ibn al Qayyim's advice of how
to obtain istakarma, he also gave us 4
advices on things that will do that will
destroy istakama. Things that will
destroy you staying on the straight path and
having this uprightness and this character that we
talked about today of not being able to
swayed very easily, not being able to be
shooken or shaken.
Because 1 thing that I
ask Allah to give all of us insha
Allah is a heart that never wavers.
1 thing that I've done
and people have asked me, you know, like
after I accepted Islam,
you know, they think they're like, oh, that
was it. I just, you know, completely stayed,
you know, studied started studying Islam. No. I
still continue to look
at other things that were brought in front
of my path because
I wanted to be 100%
sure that the decision I had made was
the correct decision.
And I have still for
26 years studied into other religions simply so
that I could help other people from those
religions
except Islam because it's hard to bring someone.
I talked about it in our workshop
that you're trying to build a bridge from
where someone is to Islam. It's hard to
build a bridge if you don't know where
the bridge is going. Right? You don't know
where they're at. You don't know where to
start, the starting point.
And the more I have looked into other
religions
and the more I've I've still I've I've
studied Christianity longer as an as a Muslim
than I did as a non Muslim.
But as a Christian I mean. But the
more I've looked into other religions, the more
Islam has become sound to me. The more
these other ideologies
become
so clear
in their bottles, so clear in their deviance.
And it has made it to the point
to where I have no fear
sitting down with anyone
who says, can I tell you about my
religion? No problem. Let's go. Sit down. Tell
me. Because there's nothing you're going to tell
me that's not going to do anything but
give me more firmness in my heart about
my deen. This is this is something that
I've I've I've been grateful to Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala 4.
This comes from
this understanding of knowing that Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala is al Hadid. He is the 1
who guides and if he puts your heart
in the right place, nothing can shake it.
Said that there are 4 principles
that will affect
can harm your steadfastness.
The number first number 1 he said
sins. Sins can affect
and he mentions
sins that are not accounted for. What he
means by not being accounted for is means
that you don't make tawba for them. You
don't repent for them. You don't try to
correct them. Sins that are just left unchecked
because we know the prophet
said that whenever you commit a sin,
it puts a black spot on your heart.
Puts a black spot on your heart. And
the more sins that you commit that are
unrepented for, the more those black heart those
black spots accumulate on your heart until the
heart becomes completely covered and it becomes hardened
and it becomes hardened. And we know that
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala in the Quran says
in that
whoever's heart is hardened, they are doomed. They
are doomed. So a hardened heart will deviate
you from the straight path. It will keep
you from having istakarma. It will cause you
to be very weak in your faith and
to be very wavery. So
that are not accounted for. And I've said
it so many times, you commit a sin.
It's part of
who we
are.
Repent for it. Repent
for those sins.
The next principle
that he said,
hold on. Let me it's a late it's
I've been going all day long. Let me
double check and make sure. Yep. That's what
I thought. The second principle he talked about
was
SSHRC. SSHRC,
if committing acts of SSHRC is a principle
that will destroy your
committing acts of shirk. And we're not talking
about the major acts of shirk all the
time because a lot of us know this.
A lot of us know we're not gonna
go worshiping trees and rocks and sticks and
stone. And the prophet, peace be upon him,
warned us of the hidden shirk. The hidden
shirk. The small things like is a form
of hidden shirk. Being arrogant.
Being a person who thinks way more highly
of himself than he should. There's a difference
between being confident.
I'm a confident person. I try to be.
And being confident, there's nothing wrong with that.
You can be confident. I am confident in
who I am. I am confident in who
I am not. I am confident in my
abilities. I am confident in my own skin.
I am confident in the way Allah created
me, etcetera. But
riya means that you do it in a
way that you think you're better than other
people.
I don't think I'm better than anyone in
this room. Probably the worst of you. I'm
probably the least qualified person to be sitting
here. I know my own self in that
way. So be aware of that. And he
even told us in the farewell sermon
that Chet Von has given up on you
and the big things.
He's given up on you and the big
things. He's not gonna get you to worship
sticks and rocks anymore. He knows this. So
beware of him in the small things. If
he cannot stop you from praying,
guess what he'll do? He'll steal from your
salah. If he knows that you're a person
who is going to pray regardless
and he's just given up on the fact
that he's gonna get you to stop praying,
He'll come and start stealing from your salah.
He'll start taking from you. He'll start messing
with your head. As soon as the imam
says, you
start thinking, okay, wait a minute. Did I,
Where's my keys? Did I lock my car?
Is the stove on? Did I unplug the
iron? All these small things, Shaitan will start
stealing from you. When it comes time to
give,
you
might be willing to give, but then you
might start thinking, oh,
you know, this is is gonna harm you
know, he'll start stealing from you. So beware
of him in these small things. The third
principle he said is will steal away from
your,
in both,
in your worship and in your actions.
And worship is
the worst 1. And worship is the worst
action.
And worship is basically the the definition that
you
feign Islam outwardly but you don't believe in
it inwardly.
You feign Islam outwardly meaning that you profess
to be a Muslim while in your heart
you do not be. That is the true
essence of nifaq,
and and
that is something that will put you in
the lowest parts of *. These are the
people whom Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala warned
and gave so much severe warning to in
the Quran. These were the people whom he
talked about at the time of the prophet
alaihis salatu wa salam,
and they were all known to the prophet
salallahu alaihi wa sallam by the way. They
were all known. He He had been given
an entire list of them and there was
a companion. I can't remember his name off
the top of my head, but he actually
had the list,
of all of the
of Medina at the time. So this is
nifak and worship. Nifak and action
is something that we do way more often.
Hypocrisy in action is that you do things
that you don't mean. Meaning that
like you tell a brother, oh, I love
you for the sake of Allah or you
help your brother and it seems to be
like he's genuine. But in reality, there's a
hidden agenda. Right? That's we we know that's
that's the normal of humanity. There's a hidden
agenda behind almost anything.
We we live in a world now where
if people are nice to me,
I worry about them. You know, if I
don't know you and you're nice to me,
I'm a start being like,
okay. What do you want? You know what
I mean? Like, what do you really want?
Because people are just not genuine like this
anymore. This is nifoq in action, and this
is the world we live in today. People
are especially strangers.
And here in the and and it's hard
for me because I was born and raised
in the south. Right? And people are just
genuinely
nice to each other. I don't know if
you've lived in Texas long enough, but southern
people, there's something called southern hospitality.
I will say this without a shadow of
a doubt that the south is the last
part of America that has culture. Real culture.
The south is the last part of America
that has real culture. Yes. There's some bad
parts of it just like there's bad parts
of every culture that is out there. But
the South, of the United States
is 1 of the last place bastions in
America for real culture. For for for real
culture of of what it should be in
shawl.
I was just used to that. People being
genuinely kind. Like you when I grew up,
if you saw a woman walking towards the
door, you ran in front of her and
opened it. It was just the way things
were. You open the car door for your
for your missus. You greet people. You ask
them how they are. If you see an
old lady coming out of a grocery store,
you go and ask her to help. You
do that today, they start looking at you.
You know what I mean? Like you might
get pepper sprayed. You know what I mean?
They're not thinking to rob you. Like, we
just don't have trust in in in human
beings anymore. This is because of of action.
This is because of people having hidden agendas
Bida.
Bida.
Innovations. Innovations will destroy your istakama because the
prophet
you hear it every Friday.
The worst action that you can commit is
to put something in this religion. You have
to understand the gravity
of that sin. You have to understand the
gravity of that sin
because what you are doing when you put
something into Islam
that was not legislated by Allah or his
messenger, you are placing yourself above Allah and
his messenger.
That is the reality of what you are
doing. That's how serious it is. When you
say that this is something that is
better than what Allah and his messenger have
revealed, that this is something that can add
to this religion that will make it better,
you were saying you know better than Allah.
You were saying you know better than the
prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam and that in
and of itself is a that's why the
prophet said it is the worst action you
can commit because Allah says in the Quran,
this day I have perfected your religion for
you. You cannot improve upon perfection. In fact,
if perfection cannot be improved upon. What Allah
has perfected
cannot be improved upon. And I know that
I told you that the prophet sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam said that I have left you
with everything you need. If there was anything
that would bring you closer to Allah, I
gave it to you. If there is anything
that would take you away from Allah, I've
told you not to do it. So just
stay on the path that I left you
on. It's as simple as that. This deen
has been made very easy.
That is 1 thing that I do know
about Islam. That it is Its depths are
as deep as the ocean. Like its depths
are as deep or deeper than the ocean
when it comes to if you wanna study
Islam and look at the Quran and look
at all of its meanings, it's very, very
deep. But to follow Islam
on a path that takes you to paradise
is actually very easy. Allah has made it
very easy for you and Allah says this,
I wish to intend ease upon you and
not to intend burden upon you. I intend
ease for you and not burden. To make
it to paradise
is actually a very simple principle. Stay upon
the Quran and the sunnah.
Follow what the Allah tells you. Follow what
the prophet tells you not to do or
what the prophet told you to do and
not to do. When you make a mistake
and commit a sin, repent for it, and
you can be a person of gender. It's
a very simple fact. For women, it's quite
it's it's it's it's even easier. And I
know
sometimes, you know, there's a there's a I
don't even like to use the word feminism.
Right? We're gonna talk about this 1 day,
by the way. We're gonna talk about feminism
and its flip coin.
I don't toxic masculinity, I think is, is
an overused word and it's been framed to
make men not be men anymore.
But I told I've told you guys, I
think I said this very early on, the
red pill movement. Yeah. How many of you
heard the red pill movement? Raise your hand.
Yeah.
Red Pill Movement is the flip coin. It's
the other side of, the coin of feminism.
Literally, it's the other side of coin of
feminism.
Islam, by its very nature, is masculine for
men and Islam, by its very nature, is
feminine for women and women, actually, there's no
such thing as gender equality in Islam
because then the 2 are not the same.
The 2 can't be treated the same. They're
not. But there is equality in terms of
how Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala looks at us.
All of us will be judged equally equally.
But when it comes to responsibilities and rights
and obligations and rewards and punishments, they're not
the same. They're they're just not the same
between men and women. And women actually have
the most 1 of the most easiest path
to Jannah in reality and
said that a woman
a woman
can do her fara'id. Meaning that she prays
5 times a day. She fasts the month
of Ramadan. She pays her zakah if she
owns jewelry and stuff like that.
She
she she makes All she has to do
is the the mandatory acts of Islam that
are responsible for her, and if her husband
is pleased with her, then she will be
told to enter into Jannah through any gate
that you wish.
She will be told, you can go to
Jannah through any of the 8 gates that
you choose. Just choose 1. Go ahead. Just
choose. Just for that simple act,
which is not truly simple in its form
because I know now dealing with counseling in
men and being married for a very long
time, we men sometimes are very difficult,
individuals to live with. We are very difficult
creatures to live with. But if a woman
can stomach us
and and still keep us happy, then Allah
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala will grant her Jannah. For
the men, we have a whole other list
of responsibilities and things that will be questioned
before we are able to enter into Jannah.
A man is an imam of his home.
He will be dragged in chains in front
of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala on the day
of judgment and be questioned about his household.
He'll be questioned about his wife. He'll be
questioned about his children. He'll be questioned about
everybody who is under his affair and his
control. That's the the that Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala has given to men. So there's no
equality
when it comes to that. We have a
bigger burden to bear, but
we have to make sure that these few
principles that we talked about in the khutbah
today, in this 1,
we stay away from them. Masha'Allah. Bidda'ra is
1 of those ones that are killing the
Ummah today as well. Adding things to this
religion that don't belong there.
If the prophet didn't do it, Subha Nahuwa
Sallam,
he didn't allow it to be done in
his presence.
Just don't do it. Just don't add to
this religion. So
will
take us to Jannah. Insha'Allah.
Is that path. That is the straight path.
That is the path. We have to keep
going. We have to keep fighting. Some days
is gonna be easier than others. Yes. Some
days will be easier than others. The last
10 nights at Ramadan is to come as
an easy thing. Right? You and Shaitan, you
you feel like if Shaitan was
around, you'd be like, I wish you weren't
locked up today. You know what I mean?
I'll deal with you myself in the last
10 nights. Or if you were standing at
the Haram in Mecca or standing at the
masjid of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
in Medina, your iman is so high, you
wish Shaytan would try you on that day.
What happens 6 months after Ramadan? What happens
after you've come back here and you're back
with your family? You're trying to avoid Shaytan
in any ways necessary.
So there will be easy times and there'll
be hard times. The point is, we make
it to the end and We finish the
race. It doesn't matter how we run it.
It doesn't matter how we start it. It
matters how we finish it and if we
get to the end. And if we get
to the end, then when we make it
to Jannah, we can all sit around and
talk about how crazy this life was and
how how many things you had to go
through, but no 1 will care about how
we got there. Nobody will care about how
did you get to Jannah. We as long
as we made it, that's all that will
matter. I've told you. I don't care if
I end up as the last person, if
Allah deems it to be so, the very
last person to enter into Jannah and I
sleep on a park bench outside of 1
of your guys beautiful property, I'll be a
happy man inshallah.
So
stay steadfast. Do not give up. Do not
give up. That is should be the the
dying principle of a Muslim
is that we will not quit. We might
do many things, but we won't quit. We
won't give up.
And many people are entering into Islam right
now because of our brothers and sisters in
Gaza based on this very principle. They have
been demonstrating
istakarma
on its highest level. They have been demonstrating
istakarma
on its highest level,
And this very principle of their istakarma
has brought 1, 000 and 1, 000 and
1, 000 and 1, 000 and thousands of
people to Islam since October 7th.
Simply of people looking at what is it
about these people
that can allow them to go through some
of the most horrible atrocities
we have witnessed in our lifetime
and yet they still remain steadfast. Their religion
is still front and center. They're still praising
the 1 who created them. They're still praying.
They're still thanking Allah for their
for the for the death of their whole
entire family, etcetera. What can make a person
be like that?
So they have shown it for us. They
have exemplified it for us. Let us follow
in their in their footsteps.
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