my fav.....forgiveness

That day, my nephew was writing his first ‘Eid Greeting card to give to his kindergarten teacher. He looked so cute while lying on his tummy, with a pen in his hand, writing and spelling the words out loud at the same time.Then, I asked him- ‘Have you said sorry to your teacher for all the cheeky things you did in school this year?’‘No… do I have to?’ he got curious‘Of course my dear! Now write in the card that you ask her to forgive you… and don’t forget to thank her for teaching you until you become so clever’ I said with a smile‘Ok!’ he answered cheerfully and began writing.As I looked at him writing, I asked myself this very same question- have I said sorry and seek for forgiveness from the One who has not only made me ‘so clever’, but in actually fact, He has given me every single thing that I have on me right now?

This pair of shiny eyes that allows me to see, the every single strand of hair on my head, the teeth that graces my smiles, each drop of tears that make my eyes moist, each one of the heart beats I have, all the muscle that allows me to move so easily, the skin the wrapped all the flesh, blood and muscle of my physical and the brain that is a miracle on its own, mashaAllaah.

He, the Al Mighty has given me all these to say the very least, but what have I done?I became cheeky, sometimes very cheeky; I became stubborn, sometimes very stubborn; I wasn’t grateful, sometimes very ungrateful; I disobeyed Him, sometimes disregard His instructions; didn’t defend Him, feel shy to do what He asked me to do and prefer to follow what others aka His Creations wants me to do; and so many more things I couldn’t even write here.

Really, don’t I know that I, of all people, should be the first to seek for His Forgiveness for my acts in His World?And despite all that, despite whatever that I did, or maybe what I have not done, He, my Lord, my Creator, my Perfect Planner has mentioned this to His Messenger, Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him),"O Son (& daughter) of Adam, as long as you supplicate to Me and have hope in me I will pardon you in spite of what you have done, and I do not care. O Son (& daughter) of Adam, if your sins were so numerous as to reach the lofty regions of the sky, then you asked My forgiveness, I would forgive you, and I do not care. O Son (& daughter) of Adam, if you were to meet Me with enough sins to fill the earth, then met Me, not associating anything with Me (in worship), I shall greet you with its equivalent in forgiveness.'" (Narrated by Al-Tirmidhi. And Ahmad and Al-Darimi transmitted it from Abu Dharr)Ya Allaah, Al-Ghaffaar (The Most Forgiving)…I felt tears coming down my cheek the moment I read the words I do not care, I do not care, I do not care…Ya Allaah, how Most Merciful, Most Loving, Most Kind are you…

and how wrong I have been to not even bother to ask for Your Forgiveness when You do not even care how much wrongs I have done….I remembered what he (pbuh) taught his beautiful wife, Lady Aishah (ra),Aisha radhiyallahi anha narrated that she asked Rasulullah salallahu alayhi wasalam, ‘If I happen to find the night of power, what should I say in du’a?’ He replied, ‘Say: O Allah! You are the Most Forgiving, the Most Generous, You love to forgive, so please forgive me.’ (Muslim)Tonight, I know that during the Qiyam al-Layl in the Blessed month of Ramadan with just 5 more days to go, I only want to ask for one thing from Him.

And even if I asked from Him just this one thing, I know deep in my heart that this one thing is everything to me… and that thing is His Forgiveness…

Wouldn’t you want to ask the same too?

HOPE

I was watching a documentary yesterday. It was about a man, who had lived his life simply by hanging on to a hope he had deep in his heart, a hope that one day, a cure to his illness could be found. SubhanAllah, he taught me an important lesson yesterday.

The lesson of HOPE I realized from him, that hope is such a powerful feeling that Allah has given to us, His Servant.Could you imagine a life without hope? What would life be if the feeling of hope is absent from our heart? Imagine, an ill person, a sinful person, a sad person, a heart-broken person, a financially distressed person, an emotionally distressed person, a grieving person and many more who decided that there is no hope for them? What would happen to them? Nauzubillaah…
Because of that, Allah given us this important feeling of hope, don’t you think?Feeling of believing that there is a better future for us, feeling that things are going improve for the better, believe that the darkest moment is just before the crack of dawn…

He, the Al Mighty has instructed us with this instruction,
Call out to Him with fear and hope. (Surat al-Araaf 7:56)
He said call out to Him, pray to Him, ask from Him.

I remembered once, I was asked by a friend. Would Allah forgive him for all that he had done in his life? he said that there are too many sins he is ashamed off, to many rules he had broken, too many whispers of devil that he followed…whose that huh?

As I held his hands, I told him about this beautiful hadith from our beloved Prophet (may Allah; peace and blessings be upon him),“Allah the Almighty has said: 'O son of Adam, so long as you call upon Me, and hope in Me, I shall forgive you for what you have done, and I shall not mind. O son of Adam, were your sins to reach the clouds in the sky and were you then to ask forgiveness of Me, I shall forgive you. O son of Adam, were you to come to Me with an earthful of sins and were you then to face Me, without having associated anything with Me, I shall grant you an earthful of pardon.'" [Recorded by Al-Tirmidhi, who said that it is a good and sound hadith, Subhanallah

Tantrumtots:

Isnt that hadith just like water that is much needed in the desert we are all living in? Isnt that what we are hoping from Allaah, our Lord, our Creator? His Love, His Mercy and His Forgiveness?