The Love Of Allah

We cannot love Allah SWT unless we know who He is. Allah has ordained a certain format and structure in our lives; it is very similar to the way we deal with each other.

In order to love someone, we have to know the person; you cannot claim to love someone without knowing him or her! The more you see, feel and understand this person's qualities, the more you will get attracted to him/her. Their good qualities will make you love them. No one loves a person who has a bad character with negative qualities, unless the lover is really sick in the heart. But based on normal human fitra (natural instinct we are created with) people love goodness, beauty, kindness and generosity. We love those who help us, and those who are considerate towards our feelings. The more someone cares for us and does things for us, the more we will love this person.

Love is something that is not generated overnight; at the same time, no matter how much goodness you do, some people will take the goodness for granted and give you evil in return, and will never recognize what you did for them. Once you see this, you should know that they are blocked by Allah SWT because of the sickness in their hearts, and there is nothing you can do about it. But here, we are talking about the normal fitra, pure hearts without diseases Insha Allah, or sick hearts with minimum diseases. Such people are naturally attracted to those who are good to

Allah SWT has commanded us to love Him and has praised those who do so. He has given us qualities that if we inculcate in our character, will make us gain the love of Allah. He tells us in the Qur'an that He loves those who are patient, and those who repent to Him after committing sins. Repentance gains Allah's love because when we repent we are in fact recognizing our mistakes and going back to Allah SWT believing in His quality of forgiveness; but at the same time, we have to promise Allah that we will not repeat our mistakes.

Allah opens His door according to the amount of love we have for Him, and no one knows about this amount except Allah himself. We can fake it and show off but we cannot pretend with Allah. Qualities are like links of a chain; if you cut one, you break the entire chain and if you bind one, you bind it all. Who gave us our eyes for vision, our ears for hearing, our bodies, etc? It is Allah that gave us everything without us asking for them. In Sura Al-Mulk, verse 23 Allah SWT says:

"Say: "It is He who has created you (and made you grow), and made for you the faculties of hearing, seeing, feeling and understanding: little thanks it is you give."

Are these gifts that we are provided with, not enough to thank Allah for? When Allah SWT calls us toward Him, how many of us respond to His call? He is the one who has created us, fashioned us, made us who we are, and has given us everything we have. He is the one who cures diseases and saves us from all evils. Usually when someone gives us a gift, we try to show gratitude or we try to pay it back. Do we give thanks and show gratitude to the one who showers us with His mercy day and night? Everything that we see around us has been created for our benefit. Air, trees, wind, birds, fish, all the food we eat, whether out of necessity or for the fulfillment of our desires. But sometimes because of our arrogance and blindness we do not see these gifts that are provided for us by Allah SWT. Allah has given us a heart, a brain, and good qualities; now it is up to us to utilize these gifts.

We try to utilize them by recognizing them as bounties, trying to learn, and trying to think about them. Allah SWT in many verses in the Quran tells us to go and travel on His earth and ponder. In other verses Allah questions us about something or shows us the wisdom. He recognizes these people in the form of the following words, 'those who have hearts and minds, those who think and wonder about the glory of Allah, those who are patient, kind, and humble.'

We cannot really get to know Allah unless we try to build good qualities in ourselves. When you know someone who has good qualities, can you meet him/her with bad qualities and manners? Or do you try to show good qualities to attract this person towards yourself? Even if you fake it at the beginning, sooner or later the person will recognize your reality and break the relationship. The relationship between us and Allah SWT is similar and we should give more importance to this relationship than anything else.

Study the qualities of Allah SWT, and you will fall in love with Him. Ask yourself; is there anyone with better qualities than the Creator of all qualities? Usually when we spend some time with people who have good qualities, we get them in ourselves. Shouldn't we aspire to get good qualities? But the fact is, unless Allah allows us, we cannot have them, and why would He allow us unless we honestly inquire them? An example of this is the story of a group of villagers who were on their way to meet a king to present their requests and needs to him. They were discussing amongst each other as to what they were going to ask him. A young man who was amongst them was quiet. When they asked him about what he was going to ask the king, he replied "nothing. I just want to be near the king so I can take care of anything he might need." The villagers asked him the reason for that. He answered, 'If I try to get close to the king and take care of all his needs, he will notice me. Once he notices me and appreciates my service, he will take care of all my needs without me having to ask for anything'.

What about Allah SWT? Doesn't He deserve the respect and treatment that this simple villager was willing to provide for the king? If we give Allah the attention that He deserves, wouldn't He out of His generosity and love, take care of all our needs?

A man went to Abu-Darda RA and said to him "I am an old man I cannot do too much; teach me something that will make me closer to Allah SWT; something very small but big in reward". Abu Darda RA was quiet for some time and then said, "Make a Muslim smile". The old man replied, 'I came to you expecting a certain amount of worship and dhikr, and you are telling me to make someone smile? What benefit will that have?" Abu-Darda RA relied: 'if you go and make one Muslim brother or sister smile, then Allah SWT will smile at you, and if Allah smiles at you He will forbid your body to be in the Hell-fire".

Allahu Akbar! If only we understood the benefit of this. But it does not mean that we go to someone and make them smile by joking around or taking them out to the movies. What it really means is that you find someone who has a need and you fulfill that need, because if you do so Allah SWT will love you. There are many ahadith about this topic which you can locate under 'loving your brother' or 'fulfilling the needs of your brother' in any hadith book. We should always ask Allah... 'Oh Allah, give me your love, help me to love you, allow me to love those who love you, and help me to spread your love; without you I cannot do anything oh Allah'.

A man was walking one night and he sincerely said to Allah' Oh Allah I want to be for you, show me how to love you Oh Allah'. He was passing by a village and overheard a conversation between a boy and his mother. The mother was talking very harshly with her son because he disobeyed her. She threatened the boy saying that she will kick him out of the house. The boy begged her and said, "Mother you cannot do that. It is a cold night and it is raining! And some animal might eat me!" His mother said, "You have no respect for me, you do not love me, neither do you obey me so it's best that I throw you out." Initially the boy was arrogant as he walked out of the house, but he soon realized that he has no shelter from the rain and no food to eat. Once he started hearing animals making noises, he got very scared and felt very insecure. Now that he had lost everything, he did not know what to do and he realized how valuable his mother was, and how arrogant he was to not recognize this before. He knew that his only choice was to go back to his mother but he was not sure if she would accept him back. He went back to his house and started to cry and beg his

The man who was watching all this cried saying 'This boy cried for just a few minutes and his mother became so compassionate, then what about our relationship with Allah the most compassionate, the most merciful?' Who can answer the prayers of the desperate one except Allah SWT? Allah will never leave us alone if we are desperate for His closeness.

We should replace the love of material life with the love of Allah in our hearts. Think about Him; call Him in whatever way you like as Allah knows all languages. Call the most generous lord who listens to, and provides for all! Sometimes Shaitan (Satan) makes us forget the generosity of Allah SWT. He makes us forget the forgiveness and love of Allah. We call so many people in order to fulfill our needs, but what about calling Allah, the one who owns everything? Allah is the greatest, He hears without us saying anything and He can take care of everything! Do not listen to the whispers of Shaitan since he makes us feel poor and helpless. Allah is able to do everything; all we need to do is call Him with sincerity. The generous Lord does not deny any of His servants.

What else can really benefit us if we do not see all the things that Allah has provided us with? If we ever feel that Allah has deserted us, it is truly Shaitan who is making us disbelieve in his way. Allah SWT has showered every one of us with unlimited goodness, most of which we take for granted. If we believe that Allah is not generous towards us, or Allah is not giving us enough, we cannot reach Him. If we want to reach Allah we have to thank Him for all He has offered us. We have to thank Him all the time and we have to be in a state of contentment. We also have to think about Him, remember him, and praise Him all the time because Allah SWT deserves all of our attention and devotion.

Who deserves to be praised more than Allah SWT? Who deserves to be known more than Allah? Who deserves to be loved more than Allah?

You can call and praise Allah any way you like, including the following: Oh Allah, you have created me; you are the one who gives light; you are my supporter, my fashioner, my sustainer and my provider; you are the one who has given me knowledge; you gave me my soul, and you allowed me to be who I am; I do not have power or strength except what you have given me. If I do not call on you, try to recognize you or know you, then who would I call and know oh Allah? Oh Allah, fill my heart and soul with your light.

If someone obeys and tries to reach Allah, Allah calls Angel Jibreel and says "O Jibreel bear witness, I love so and so (Allah calls that person with beautiful names), so love him". Then angel Jibreel announces it to the kingdom of angels and they all start to love that person. After that Allah puts the love of that person in the hearts of others on earth. May Allah SWT make us all among those of whom He loves! Ameen!

My dear brothers and sisters, if you want Allah to love you, then try to recognize him as the giver and always stay in a state of contentment and humbleness. Do not say I have such and such, or I own such and such; instead say Allah has allowed me to have such and such or Allah has given or provided for me... because this is the truth. Even if you do not recognize this, Allah will continue to provide for you the way He has been doing all your life as He provides for those who disbelieve in Him. Can you find someone who is more generous than that? Allah's kindness and generosity is not affected by the behavior of his creation. He is always generous to those who love Him as well as to those who do not; but His way of generosity towards them both is different. Allah extends

Once you study and recognize who Allah SWT is, it becomes your responsibility to invite others towards Him. Why? It is because when a person recognizes the good qualities of someone, he spreads the news of this to them. So what about Allah? Who is more deserving of this recognition than Allah? The more you learn about Allah, the more you will know of His qualities; and the more you know of His qualities, the more you will love His qualities the more you will try to implement those qualities in yourself.

Inviting towards Allah is not just to give away a collection of books and tapes to others. This is the attitude of a lot of people where they go, 'here take it! I know and you do not know! I am going to paradise and you are going to hell fire!' This is an arrogant attitude which Allah does not like and it shows that a person is in a state of blindness. Allah wants us to deal with others the way he deals with us, which is with mercy, patience and compassion.

The first element for inviting towards Allah SWT is to love Him, to have a connection with Him, and to ask Him to make you an inviter to His path. You have to ask Allah to open the hearts of others for you. The second element is that we have to work hard to clean ourselves (internally and externally) to build up good qualities; have good conduct and behavior, Akhlaq according to the teachings of Prophet Muhammad (SAW). Once you have these elements established in you, Allah will choose you as a worker for Him. Therefore if you are not successful, you cannot blame anyone except yourself. Do not say it is because of this person or that person, instead we should say, 'I do not have the right quality to be the one'. If I had the right quality, then the person who I am giving da'wah (inviting towards Allah) to will enter Islam right away.' When we study the lives of the companions of Prophet (SAW) we see that they did not give out books or video tapes; they had Akhlaq, (good manners and conduct), they used to forgive, they used to be good even with those who wronged them for the sake of Allah, and this is what made them beloved to people and earned their respect.

According to some reports, a few Muslim men went for trading and business purposes to Malaysia and Indonesia. One of them was selling some food and fruits etc... A non-Muslim customer came to buy from him, but before he took the money the seller said to the buyer, "Some of the fruits might be damaged because of the rain that occurred last night, so when you take them home and find any damaged ones, please bring them back and I will return your money back to you." So the man took the merchandise and left. But this seller felt bad about what he had sold and had a doubt that he had sold spoilt goods.

The buyer remembered and was shocked to hear that the seller had stayed all these months just to return the money to him for some damaged goods. He asked the seller, "What made you stay all these months to wait for me?" The seller replied to his incredulity saying, "I am a Muslim and our Prophet and messenger (SAW) taught us that an honest merchant will be close to him on the Day of Judgment." Meaning an honest merchant will be a companion of the Prophet (SAW) in Paradise. Someone asked the Prophet (SAW) if there would be a lot of merchants like that. The Prophet (SAW) replied by saying, "No, there will be very little". This merchant wanted to be among those people. The merchant did not worry about leaving his family, money, and home behind; instead, his thoughts were about him being with the Prophet (SAW) in Jannah (Paradise). Where are we from these people? Do we even try to think like this man when dealing with our non-Muslim neighbors, co-workers or non-Muslim wives?

Do we even know who among us will die as a Muslim or who will die as a non-Muslim? If we are in this state of thinking, would we just throw the message to others or we will spread the truth with generosity, kindness, and good manners? This is why it is very important for us to have good conduct, good manners, and kindness towards others.

Do not judge/announce who will go to Paradise and who will go to Hell-fire, because we really do not know who will end up where! We, ourselves, might be hypocrites and we wouldn't even know it. Someone who is known to have done a lot of bad deeds must have done something good that pleased Allah SWT right before he died, and thus will enter Paradise.

So the first thing we have to do is to build a connection between us and Allah, build our good manners, and obey the commands of Allah. You cannot be in a state of hypocrisy and yet want Allah to be good to you and open the doors for you to work for Him. Prophet Muhammad (SAW) said "If Allah SWT uses you to guide one person, it is better than the whole earth and what it contains".

Therefore we cannot wish our children to become practicing Muslims when our life is the opposite of what Islam teaches. We have to be a Muslim first; follow Allah's commands; have good manners; and only then can we teach our children. We have to show mercy to our children and cry to Allah SWT about their ending. The invitation to Islam should be in a state of mercy, love, and care. Our wives and children are our responsibility on the Day of Judgment; we cannot gain any thing by forcing, pushing, shoving books at them, and by showing bad manners and a corrupt conduct. These are low characteristics which will never work or have good outcomes.

We all should ask ourselves, 'am I an oppressor?' There are many Muslims who cheat, lie, abuse other Muslims and non-Muslims. They do all kinds of mischief and after that they invite them to Islam. Muslims act like pure hypocrites in front of them and then they invite them to Islam. What do you think the effect is going to be?

Dear brothers and sisters in Islam, go back to Allah SWT. He deserves to be recognized, and known by all. Get closer to Allah by seeking His knowledge. Once you gain the knowledge, commit to obey Him and try to please Him. He will love you and you will love Him; this is the quality of a believer according to the Quran. Allah mentions the companions in the Quran by saying that Allah was pleased with them and they were pleased with Him. May Allah make us among them!

Oh non-Muslims! Please do not look at us, instead look at the pure message of Islam. We Muslims have become sick and dirty. Many of us are far away from Islam and we are drowning in our own spiritual and cultural diseases.

You might ask: "How can we become like this when Islam teaches otherwise?" It is because we do not sincerely struggle to gain our own salvation. We only have the title of Islam, All we have inherited is our Islamic names, and Islamic clothing, but we never really built up our connection with Allah SWT; except for the very few among us. Do not look at the way people pray nor the way they dress... rather look at their manner and conduct. A lot of us today make people go far away from Islam with our tongues and bad conduct, and give the

If we call ourselves Muslims, we should care; we should be organized, clean, and neat. Why? Because these are the teachings of Prophet Muhammad (SAW). We should study and learn our own Islam before we invite someone else to it. Study the Sunnah, learn about what Allah SWT wants from us; study the characteristic of Muslims, their manners and their behavior before we ask others to be a Muslim. If we start behaving and dealing with others like how a real Muslim should, others will also enter Islam right away. But we are the ones who block them from Islam. May Allah SWT save us from this!

Today, we are generating great mischief on the earth by our conduct and behavior. On the Day of Judgment we will be responsible for all the mischief that we have done; because we are representing Islam. We are a mirror of Islam. But who would like to come near a dirty, ugly, deceiving mirror? We have to try to learn and cry to Allah to clean us inside out. This is the main element of making dawah (invitation) to Islam. After that we have to know the person and try to understand the mentality of that person and be kind and not make mistakes while talking to him.

It is not how much knowledge we have, rather it is the opening from Allah SWT that matters the most. We also have to remember that people enter Islam by the will of Allah, in the way and time He wants. Once we deeply inculcate this in our hearts, only then will Allah open for us. We have to consistently try all the time; we have to feel for others; we have to cry for their goodness the way our beloved Prophet Muhammad (SAW) used to cry for his Ummah (Nation). Once a Jewish funeral procession was passing by; upon seeing it Prophet Muhammad (SAW) started to cry. When people asked him the reason for it, he said: "One of the sons of Adam slipped from my hand into hell fire, and I can't

Following the sunnah of the Prophet, we have to have mercy for others... and according to how much mercy we have for others, Allah SWT will be merciful to us. We have to be generous with our tongue, our heart (cry and pray for others), our hands (by giving to the needy). We have to have good conduct, patience, and behave with complete faith that Allah SWT is the doer. This is the moment when Allah will open for us. In order to do this you have to be steadfast; you cannot be a part time Muslim and ask Allah to give you the greatest gift--the treasure of Paradise.

Why would Allah give us these gifts? We have to ask ourselves, 'Do I deserve the gifts from Allah SWT?' Do we really, honestly connect our hearts with Allah so He can open for us? We have to stop complaining and blaming others. Most of us are occupied with complaining about others: Husbands complain about wives; wives complain about their husbands; parents complain about their children, and the children complain about their parents. Did we ever stop to think and complain about ourselves? Did we ever realize that we are the problem and we need to wake up before it's too late?

Only sixty four Muslims went to Spain and the entire Southern Spain became Muslim. Look at the amount of Muslims we have in America and how many people are becoming Muslim? People used to come close to the companions of the Prophet, whereas now a day's people run away from Muslims. What is the reason? Islam is the same. It is because of our bad, hypocritical conduct of cheating and lying. We have to wake up quick since we are in big trouble with Allah SWT. If we want Allah to love and support us, how can we spread mischief, instead of spreading love, mercy, and goodness?

1. The punch in the face: This is to show good manners, and good behavior. People are attracted to goodness.


2. The punch in the stomach: This is to be generous; with food and other things. We need to show people the true generosity of Islam. We should deal with the people according to the way Allah wants us to. In America today, if every Muslim implements one hadith, the majority of Americans will become Muslims tomorrow.

   The rights of neighbors; If people truly understand this, they would be crying. Abdullah bin Umar (son of Umar bin Al-Khattab R.A) was slaughtering an animal and he told the people that after cleaning the animal, they should take the best piece of meat and give it to his Jewish neighbor. They asked him the reason for this; he replied, 'I saw the one who is better than me and all of you did the same thing, so I am following him' (that is Prophet Muhammad (SAW).

   While studying the life of the Prophet (SAW), we come across the story of a Jewish woman who used to throw trash in the way of the Prophet. One day the said woman did not throw the garbage on him. Upon inquiry he found out that the she was sick. So the Prophet went to visit her and took care of her needs; this led her to embrace Islam. These are the teachings of our Prophet (SAW); consideration even towards the aggressors and abusers. Do we even try to act like this with our neighbors? No, we are actually the opposite. We keep our homes dirty and damage the rented property instead of saving it.

   Instead of spreading Islam we make people hate us, and run away from us because of our bad conduct. What will happen to us if Allah SWT does not send His Mercy to us in this life and on the Day of Judgment? Do we even believe that we will meet Allah?

3. The punch in the heart: This is the main fundamental part of inviting to Islam. The spinal cord of spreading Islam. It is to call Allah in the darkness of the night and ask Him to allow you and use you to spread Islam. Deep down in your heart you feel the burning desire to help others to see the reality of life. You can ask Allah, 'Oh Allah send your mercy, oh Allah open the heart of so and so'. This way you are returning everything to Allah SWT, because He is the real owner of everything. You cannot say, 'I gave him/her this book, I gave the message, I taught them this, therefore I cannot do anything else for them'. Can we meet Allah with this kind of attitude? People will believe in our conduct more than the books because once they open the book, they will realize that either the book is wrong or the person is a hypocrite. We cannot force teachings of Islam on people, we need to invite them to the truth with care and love in our hearts.

We need to spread the true message of our creator, spread His mercy, His qualities and spread the reminder of death… no one can deny this reminder. We have to spread the real message of Allah SWT and not focus on the rulings, because rulings are for the believers, not for the people who do not believe, to begin with. Therefore burdening anyone with rules and regulations before developing the reality of Iman (faith) in their hearts will be futile. Allah SWT gave rulings to the believers saying, "Oh you who believe". Are we as Muslims implementing these commands from Allah us as an individual, or as a family.

As a Muslim implements the verses referring to 'those who believe', how can we tell someone else to follow these regulations when they do not even believe? Why do we push the women to put on Hijab (Veil) when they do not even have faith in Allah SWT? We push each other to build the outside but our insides are not clean. Islam is supposed to be inside out, not outside in. Not to say that outside is not important, but we need to set apriority. For this we need to ask the people who have knowledge and who have walked this path of an internal journey, and if we do not find any one then we should call Allah SWT. He will lead us if we are sincere.

The message is the oneness of Allah, so go back to it. Focus in the message; do not go back and forth and debate about different topics because the majority of non-Muslims do not really know the truth and essence of Islam. We should tell the non-Muslims loud and clear to not look at the actions of the Muslims, rather to look upon the message and teachings of the Creator.

People watch us; our clothing, the way we conduct ourselves amongst others, and the manners with which we carry ourselves more than how much knowledge we possess. It does not mean that knowledge is not important, it is important but the majority of the people in this world are very simple and they want a simple message. They hardly study about religion, regardless of the fact that they go to churches or synagogues. They hardly have knowledge about their own religion. The majority of the people believe in the Creator and it is our responsibility to teach them about Him slowly and with good manners.

May Allah SWT allow us to reach the level of delivering His message. There is no way of reaching it unless we get closer to Allah; since Allah is the only one who can open the way for us, put the words in our hearts, and open the hearts of others for us. We can talk but our words cannot penetrate into someone's heart unless Allah takes these words and puts them in the heart of others. So if we are not steadfast with Allah, do not have good manners with Him, neither do we respect nor obey Him, why would He use us to guide others? Why would Allah open the heart of others for us if we are not for Him? It is not our eloquent speech, and books that can guide others, but rather only Allah who can Guide. Books and speeches are just tools that Allah can accept and let people benefit from them.

In order to reach this level we have to deny ourselves, be humble, be considerate and helpful to our families in the house, be neat and not make our surroundings dirty, let fresh air come into our homes, clean our bodies even if there is no one around and make sure we smell good because angels do not like dirt and we need their presence in our homes.

Our Prophet SAW was clean, neat, and he taught us to be clean. We have to always keep to our commitment; never say Inshallah to something while we do not plan to do it since Inshallah is a Qasm (swear). Where are the qualities of the Muslims? The Prophet (SAW) said the signs of a hypocrite are three: If he speaks he lies; If he gives a commitment, he will not fulfill it (if he makes a promise, he brakes it) When he is given a trust, he betrays it. These are the signs of a complete hypocrite, now I have to ask myself if I am among these people. We should study about the good character of Muslims and cry to Allah to give us this conduct.

'Oh Allah clean us from our bad habits and customs, from our bad conducts, and diseases. Oh Allah, make us truthful, pure, and sincere. Bless us and put your blessings in whatever we do for you. We need you, ya Allah! We need you in our lives, in the moment of death, and in the grave where there will be no one else with us except You, Ya Allah. Please accept our prayers, O' Lord of the Worlds". Ameen.

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