Transcription
Uh, the darkest hour and the coming of the dawn. Now, according to the well-stated proverb, "the darkest hour is just before the dawn." Now, although this is astronomically incorrect, the darkest point is much earlier. The truth of this proverb is actually metaphoric and in no way less real.
See, we so often find that the darkest times in our lives are followed by the most precious. Often, it's at the moment when everything looks broken that something least expected comes and lifts us up and carries us through it. Now, if you think about, for example, the story of Prophet Ayub, didn't he lose everything one by one before it was all given back and more? Yes, for Prophet Ayub, the night was real, and for many of us, it seems like it lasts forever. But Allah does not allow an endless night. In His mercy, He gives us the sun.
Yet, there are times when we feel like those hardships, they don't end. And maybe some of us have even fallen, you know, so much to such a spiritual low that we feel, um, disconnected from Allah Subhanahu, disconnected from our Creator, and maybe from, you know, for some of us, it's so dark that we might not even notice that we've become disconnected from Allah. But like the sun that rises at the end of the night, our dawn has come. In His infinite mercy, Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala has sent the light of Ramadan to erase the night. He sent the month of the Quran so that He can elevate us and bring us from our isolation to His nearness. And He's given us this blessed month to fill our emptiness and cure our loneliness and end our soul's poverty. He sent us the dawn so that we can find, after darkness, light.
"That it is He who sends blessings on you, as He, as He does His angels, so that He might bring you from the depth of darkness into light. And He is full of mercy to the believers." And this is chapter 33, verse 43. And this mercy extends to all who seek it. That's the beauty of Allah's mercy. The beauty of Allah's mercy is He is, which means, you know, that His mercy, it, Allah says that His mercy, He says, which means that "My mercy expands and encompasses every single thing." Even the most hardened sinner is told to never, ever lose hope in Allah's infinite mercy. And to lose hope in Allah's infinite mercy is to limit Allah's mercy. If I think that my sins are too great to be forgiven, then what I'm saying, really, is that my sins are greater than Allah's mercy.
And Allah also says in the Quran, "Say, 'O My servants who have transgressed against their own souls, despair not of the mercy of Allah, for Allah forgives all sins, for He is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.'" Subhanallah.
And this is sometimes the hardest thing to do. See, it's very easy to believe in Allah's mercy when we're doing well, right? When we're, when we're, when we, you know, we're at the top of our game in our deen, and we're, you know, we're not, um, we feel like we're doing okay, you know, we're, we're praying, and we're, we're basically pleased with ourselves, we're pleased with our deeds. It's really easy to, you know, to, to look and believe in Allah's mercy. But it's a lot harder to believe and, and have hope in Allah's mercy when we're not doing so well. When we're, when we're, when we're maybe at the bottom of our, of our, you know, our path, you know, we're not doing so well in our, and our deen is kind of, you know, it's struggling, and we feel like, uh, you know, we've lost that connection with Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala. It's at those times when it's hardest to really, really believe and have hope in the mercy of Allah. But it's at those times when we need it the most. It's at those times when we need to never, ever forget that Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala's mercy is so much greater than any of our sins and all of our sins combined. And Allah is the Owner of Mercy.
And there is no time when the mercy of Allah is showered more on us than during the blessed month of Ramadan. The Prophet Sallallahu Sallam has said about Ramadan, "Its beginning is mercy, its middle is forgiveness, and its ending is liberation from the Hellfire." Every moment of Ramadan is a chance to come back to Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala. Whatever we are now going through in our life, even if it's, you know, it's a direct consequence of our actions, if we're humiliated or we feel low, it's our own sins which have lowered us. And it is only by Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala that we can ever hope to be elevated.
If we are consistently unable, for example, to wake up for Fajr, or finding it increasingly difficult to stay away from haram, we have to examine this relationship with Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala. And most of all, we should never be deceived, and we should never allow ourselves to think that anything in this world succeeds or fails, or is given or is taken, or is done or is undone without Allah. It's only by our connection with Him that we rise or fall in life and in our relationship with our world. It's only through our relationship with Him that that any other relationship is defined.
But see, here's the thing. Unlike humanity, our Creator doesn't hold any grudges. So imagine now receiving a clean slate. Imagine having everything that you ever regret doing erased completely. Ramadan is that chance. The Prophet Sallallahu Sallam said that "Whoever fasts during Ramadan out of sincere faith and hoping to attain Allah's reward, then all of his past sins will be forgiven." Hello.