We are at the beginning of a New Year and hopefully a better year than last year. There is hope with the vaccines and boosters, that this virus will finally come under control and life can get back to normal, Insha’Allah (God willing). But as more and more cases are increasing, we must take every precaution to stop it spreading. May Allah always be your protector, Amen.
Whatever are our circumstances and difficulties, we must always keep in mind why we are here, why Allah, the One God, created us. Trials and tribulations are a part of life, as everyone faces ups and downs, but whatever our circumstances, we must always remember the worship of Allah. We need to keep striving to win Allah’s pleasure and ensure that we are firmly on the right path.
The Holy Qur’an relates in Chapter 16, verse 90:
And remember the day when We will raise up in every people a witness against them from amongst themselves, and We will bring thee as a witness against these. And We have sent down to thee the Book to explain everything, and a guidance, and a mercy, and glad tidings to those who submit to God.
This verse reminds us that we will be answerable for everything we do and that everyone will have a witness and of course the Holy Prophet Muhammad, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, will be the main witness over us all. Are we following his teachings, are we following what Allah has sent down in the Holy Qur’an? For those who have not accepted the Holy Prophet, still the same question arises, that person of God you have accepted, will become the witness over you, so are you following his teachings of God? For those who have rejected all the prophets of Allah, then still you will be answerable to Allah for what you have done, and your own body will be a witness over you. Therefore, it doesn’t matter whether you believe in God or not, we must realise that we will be answerable to God for what we do.
We can blame the difficulties we face, the hardships, the preventions etc., but nothing can stop us always following and acting upon the Holy Qur’an, following God’s teachings and being submissive servants to Allah or making the choices we make. For instance, if we are stopped from going to the Mosque, then Alhamdulillah (All praise is due to Allah), you can still pray at home. If we are stopped from going to work or school etc., then Alhamdulillah you can still be a good Muslim and strive to win Allah’s blessings. Nothing can stop you from this…only yourselves.
Therefore, as we are celebrating another New Year, it is a time to look back and reflect on the previous year, and then look forward and keep improving ourselves. This is the beauty of this time of the year, that as one year ends, so a new one begins. That becomes a fresh start for us, based on previous experiences. But it is important that we keep reflecting over what we been doing and learn from our mistakes and then keep striving to improve ourselves.
You are your main witness against yourself, in fact, every night we should be doing this self-examination, thinking over the day we have spent, and ensuring that it has been pleasing for Allah. Then as we go to sleep, we awake to begin a new day, a fresh start to strive to win the blessings of Allah and attain His Nearness. This is the real life. Everything else is just a distraction. We need to keep striving to attain paradise, in this life and the next.
The main way to improve ourselves, is to bring about a holy transformation in yourself and strive to be regular in worship. This should be your main aim for this next year. Look back of the previous year, how regular were you in your prayers? Did you miss any prayers? Did you pray alone or in congregation? How have you been conducting yourself, have you been striving to do good, etc.
For Muslims, we have been stressing for you to try to do as many prayers as possible in congregation, whether at the Mosque or in your own homes. That should continue and you must aim to always be regular in your prayer and strive to do your prayers in congregation and get the full reward of worshipping together.
One companion of the Holy Prophet, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, used to pray at this time of the year
O Allah! Let this (year) bring for us security and faith and wellbeing and peace and protection from Satan and pleasure and contentment from the Gracious God
The best way to spend our time is in Prayer. Prayer is a one to one relationship that you have with God. We all express ourselves differently; we all have our own ways to show our love, for this reason we know that Allah has different kind of relationship with every one of His followers.
The Holy Prophet, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, relates:
Allah says ‘I treat My servant in accordance with his understanding of Me. I am with him whenever he remembers Me.’
Allah is more pleased with the repentance of a servant of His than one of you would be if he were to lose his camel in a barren desert and then find it unexpectedly. Allah says:
Whoever moves towards Me by the span of an open hand, 1 move towards him by half an arm’s length. And whoever moves towards Me by half an arm’s length, I move towards him by the length of an arm. When he comes walking towards Me, I run to meet him.
The most important thing to remember is that God is always there waiting for you and that real peace can only be obtained through our love and our worship of God. Therefore, we should look back over the previous year, did you reform yourself? Are you a better person today, than a year ago? And now what about next year, are you going to keep striving to improve yourself?
Allah says in the Holy Qur’an:
As to those who believe and do good works, they will surely have a reward that never ends
Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, the Promised Messiah and Imam Mahdi has said:
If there is anything that reaches God, it is the righteous deeds. And it is essential to perform them after one has believed.
Hazrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad, the 5th successor of the Promised Messiah has said:
From now on let us endeavour to excel in virtues and use them to nourish the seed of faith. But on the other hand, we would be earning Divine displeasure if we nurtured worldly greed, harmed one another and violated other people’s rights, whether in the context of business partnerships or family and matrimonial relations. Those who have not been able to reform themselves during the past year should try to so in the new year through righteous deed and raising their standards of worship.
This is main purpose of a religion – to build and develop you as a person and as a community. We fortunate that to help us achieve that we have the Holy Qur’an as guidance, the example of the Holy Prophet and his companions and even the example of the Promised Messiah and his companions. Now we must make sure that we use this guidance.
The most important thing in life is to develop your relationship with Allah. We all have the means, the time and the ability, but we still neglect this basic duty.
The Holy Prophet, may peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, has said:
Safeguard the commandments of Allah, you will find Him before you; remember Him in prosperity, He will remember you in adversity. Be sure that that which has led you into error will not lead you aright, and that which has guided you to good will not lead you astray. Remember that help comes with steadfastness, there is prosperity after adversity and that hardship is followed by ease.
The only thing that really matters in life is your relationship with your maker, Therefore the best way to spend our time in this New Year is in Prayer.
The Holy Qur’an relates in Chapter 40, verse 61:
Pray unto Me; I will answer your prayers
God enjoys the time we spend in worship with Him. God enjoys how we express our love to Him.
Finally, Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, the Promised Messiah, has said:
It is completely true that if a person believes in Allah, the Exalted, with true intention and purity of heart, and makes spiritual endeavours and remains engaged in prayers, ultimately his prayers definitely be answered.