The Creator will send his worshippers mishaps to test their reactions – and the best are those who receive them with patience, worshippers will be told today.
“Allah has created human beings to test them in this life,” the sermon will say.
“Lo! We create man from a drop of thickened fluid to test him; so We make him hearing, knowing,” it quotes from the Quran.
Allah has ordered and prohibited, so whoever obeys was promised paradise, and whoever disobeyed was warned with hellfire.
“And He made the road to heaven surrounded with undesired things, and the road to hell surrounded with desires, and the human being cannot overcome what his self loathes except with patience, and he will not be patient until his heart is filled with the love for Allah,” the sermon explains.
Patience is preventing the self from complaining and rebelling: “Patience is a high ethic, and Allah has made it a fort that cannot be destroyed.”
Moreover, divine rewards for patience are endless.
“Say: O My bondmen who believe! Observe your duty to your Lord. For those who do good in this world there is good, and Allah’s earth is spacious. Verily the steadfast will be paid their wages without stint,” says a verse from the Quran.
Allah Himself has named Himself with this beautiful characteristic to highlight its honour and value, as one of his 99 names is “Al Sabour”, meaning “The Most Patient”.
He has also praised his prophets for their patience and mentioned them in the Quran, such as the verse describing Prophet Ayoub: “We found him steadfast, how excellent a slave! Lo! he was ever turning in repentance [to his Lord].”
And another verse that says: “And [mention] Ishmael, and Idris, and Dhu’l-Kifl. All were of the steadfast.
“And the happy one is one who sought the wisdom out of the crisis and acted with patience,” the sermon will conclude.
hdajani@thenational.ae