 We begin in the name of Allah. We thank Him for creating us, we thank Him for bringing us into existence. We thank Him for the blessings of Iman and for the renewal of that blessing in every moment. We praise Allah. We seek His aid in every moment. We ask for His forgiveness and we seek His protection. We bear witness that there is no God but Allah alone. He has no like. And Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, the man of praise is his final messenger. And we praise Allah as well for gathering us on this day of Jama as we know is a day of reminder and a day of warning. A reminder of that first gathering. On that day Allah asked us, Al-Asdubi Rabbikum, am I not your Lord? That day when we were brought out from the loins of our forefather Adam alayhi wa sallam. And so we all bore witness. And that bearing witness was the basis of our creation on earth. It was when we took the covenant with Allah that we remain faithful. And it is on Yom Kriyama when we will be gathered again that we will be asked whether we remain faithful to that first covenant. And so we know that our life in this dunya is defined by these two points in time. We know that through all the trials and tribulations of life, the ups and downs, the ups and flows of life is defined by Yom Kriyama and Yom Mithaq. As Allah tells us, These are the days that we cycle around people. Allah tells us that time in this life is cyclical. In order that Allah may come to know those of you who believe and to take from you martyrs. And verily Allah does not love the wrongdoers and oppressors. And so time in this life is cyclical. There are times when we feel at a loss when we are in a state of deprivation. And then there are times when we are in a state of expansion and everything seems to be going well and we seem to be on top of the world. There are times when we seem to be rising. There's hope. There's times when we think that things are getting better, that we seem to be rising up in life. And there are times when we are in a state of fear, when everything that we have seems to be going wrong and that we seem to be losing everything. We begin life as we know at the bottom and we end life at the bottom of the cycle. Allah says that He creates us His clay and then from that clay He creates sperm and then from that sperm He creates a lump of flesh. First it is without shape and then He shapes us and that He protects us in the womb until we come into this world and we come into this world screaming, afraid, completely dependent in a world that we do not know at all and we've just been ripped from this caring womb, this Rahim, this place of mercy that is our mother. And we also end life in that same state, completely dependent on our caretakers, unable to walk, unable to feed ourselves, unable to clean ourselves and forgotten this world as it seems like the world has gone by and moved on. And there are times in this life that we return to that state, a state of helplessness, a state when the world turns against us and sometimes it's not us that we see in those states but our loved ones are our community members or our fellow Muslims. Obviously we know this is a state of our fellow believers in Palestine, may Allah grant them strength and victory and aid. But we also have moments in our lives like this although to a lesser degree. When we lose our jobs, when we lose our families through divorce or through death, when we think that there was a breakthrough coming in something we were struggling with in life but all we are met with is disappointment. These are days that Allah promises us. With تلك الأيام و نداولها بين الناس these are some of the days that Allah will circle about us. These days will come. و لنبلوانكم surely indeed have no doubt we will try you. بشيء من الخوف. We will try you with something of fear. Fear that the enemies of Allah, that the enemies of Islam will come and will conquer and take over. Anxiety about what Allah has in store for us tomorrow. Worry about what will happen with our families. Worry about our loved ones. و لنبلوانكم بشيء من الخوف والجوع and hunger. We can say more broadly he will test us with some a loss of some basic necessity. نقصمين أن أموالي و أنفوسي والثمرات and a loss of wealth or a loss of lives and a loss of blessings. We know that the horrors that are committed against the people in Palestine right now. These are all on our minds. These are in our hearts right now. But as horrific as the scenes and videos that are coming out of the right now, we should not forget to see how the Palestinian people are themselves dealing with the aftermath of this conflict just as we are saddened and horrified by what we are seeing. We should not forget to see the elderly man who when his son's body was brought to him upon seeing it, he grabbed him and cried out, Give our salams to the Prophet. It's Allah who sent them. We should not forget the woman who said, I know that the Muslims all around the world are praying for us praying for our difficulty to be removed and lifted. But if you were here with us, you would be overjoyed. We see the skies filled with angels. They're coming and seizing the souls of our martyred ones, of our friends and our families. What you see right now in Gaza is a bastion of iman. Gaza is a proof of Allah's words. They are those when people say to them, the people have gathered against them. So fear them that this only increases their faith. And they say, we find enough with Allah how excellent a one to trust. These are people who are going through the worst of times, but their faith is not something to be doubted. Their children are not leaving this religion. They're not engaging in a number of different degrading things. No, they're increased in faith because there are people who recognize the purpose of trials and tribulations. They know that everything that they're going through that the prophets themselves went through, their lives were also riddled with hardship, but that hardship was initiate them into a state of humility with their Lord. There's no one who loses their parents without knowing that the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam also lost his parents. There's no one who loses their children without knowing that the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam also lost his children. There's no one who is exiled from their homeland, but they know that the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam was exiled from his home, and as people turned their back on him. There's no one who cannot find, there's no one who undergoes a struggle in their faith except that they find the example of Sayyidina Bilal Rabu Allahu An, when he was a slave, that he was laid out in the heat in the mid-summer day and his masters came and placed a massive boulder on his chest and they asked him, do you accept that this idol that we have created? And he said, Ahadun Ahad. Do you accept Uzza? And he said, Ahadun Ahad. Do you reject Muhammad Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam? And he said, Ahadun Ahad. This is the patience of the heart. This is the patience to find stillness, to find calm in Allah. When the world does everything it can to agitate you and to agitate your belief. Ahadun Ahad. Qalur Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. Ashadun Nasi Bala'an Al-Ambiyah Uthamal Amthal Fal Amthal. The most tried of people are the prophets. The most tried of people are the prophets and then those who are most like them and then those who are most like them. What you're witnessing in Uzza, what you're witnessing in Palestine is a prophetic tribulation. They're being treated as the prophets were treated. And Allah tells us about this. He will test us. He will test us according to our capacities. He tests us to reveal, are we Saleh? Not Saleh in the sense of just being righteous. Saleh in Arabic also means are we suitable? Suitable for what? To be khulafa fil aludh. To be divine representatives on this earth. To be divine representatives as the prophets and messengers were divine representatives. As the angels asked Allah, will you place therein one who will sow corruption and shed blood? The angels were confused. Why? But Allah says, Inni a'lamu ma'ala ta'lamu and verily I know what you do not know. Yes, there will be men and people who will fail the test, who will bring about ruination, who will bring about corruption and death. But there will also be people when Allah tests them, they will excel in the test. They are the ones who will bring back righteousness on the earth. They will bring that order and life and justice. And it is they who inherit the earth from the prophets. Bismillah wal-hamdu lillahi wa s-salatu wa s-salam ala Rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam Allah is the greatest. Allah is the greatest. You give the kingdom to whoever you want and you forget the kingdom from whom you want and you worship whom you want and you give to whom you want with your best hand. You are above all things. Allah says in the Quran telling his prophets, Allah says, O Allah, you are the master of dominion. You give power to whom you will and you take power from whom you will. You elevate and raise whom you will and you debase and lower whom you will. In your hand is all good. In your hand is all good and verily you are most capable of all things. We know that Allah tries us in these different ways that if the people of Palestine are in a state of loss and deprivation and that is a state for which Allah asks patients, then we on the other side of the world are in the opposite state. We're in a state of blessing, in a state of opulence, in a state of luxury and it's for that state that Allah asks gratitude that in shakartum la azidannakum wa la inkafartum inna adhabid la shadeed. Verily if you are grateful then surely I will increase you but if you are ungrateful then surely my torment is most immense. We know that here in the East Bay we live and maybe not all of us but many of us live in a state of extreme wealth, extreme. We live in perhaps the richest region, the wealthiest region in the wealthiest country in the wealthiest time that humanity has ever lived. We live in homes that would be the envy of kings and queens, palaces that would and comforts that people could not even imagine a few hundred years ago. We live in extreme luxury but we also live in a world that encourages greed. We live in a society that tells us we need to have more and more and more. We're raised to believe in capitalism not in a sense of being not in a sense of free trade but capitalism in the sense of unlimited profits. More and more and more without any sense of civic duty to give back to our community. We live in a time when we are shown images of people who have more. We're shown false advertisements. We're shown unrealistic standards, impossible standards on Instagram and TikTok and all these social media platforms and they keep telling us more and more and more. In other words, be ungrateful for what you have. Be ungrateful for what you have because it's not enough. You could always have more. And so it's because of this that we in the state that we're in that in a state of such blessing that the blessing is so enormous that Allah's sign that we should not have any doubt about Allah's signs that we find that it's in this place, in this time, in this country, in this region that you find the most doubts about Islam. You find the most doubt amongst the believers. You find that you find the most doubt about God. When you ask people, people are asking where is God? God is all around you. You just don't see him. Well, in Khartoum, in Adhabi Lashadeed, if you're ungrateful, then virally, my torment is most intense and most severe. We live in a world that tells us that we should work and work and work until we get more and more and more. But sometimes we work so much that we leave our families behind, that we leave our communities behind. You find people in this community where they're working but their children are leaving the faith or their children are dating or going to parties or going to whatever else and they're not practicing and you wonder what went wrong. What went wrong was that you chase after the dunya. What went wrong was that there is no investment in the community because this is what true faith means. The believers, remember this is the hadith about community. The believers, their likeness and their love for one another and their mercy for one another and their compassion for for one another are like one body. If one member, if one limb of the body becomes sick, then the rest of the body responds with sleeplessness and fever. We all feel the sleeplessness and fever, the discomfort and the pain for our people in Palestine. But sometimes we have to wonder what about our neighbors? What about our fellow community members here? Do we know what's going on with a person next to us? Do we know the troubles that are going on in this in this community and is it bothering us? Are we doing something about it? Where is the investment? The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said, اتق الشحة فإن الشحة أهلك من كان قبلكم Beware of greed. Greed destroyed those who came before you. In other words, they destroyed the communities and nations and civilizations that came before you. Why? Because greed, when someone's privileged with many blessings, all they care about is attaining the finer things of life. They seek things at the expense of others and they do not care about what their community members need. And so the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam ends this hadith by saying and by explaining. حملهم على أن سفقوا دماؤهم وستحلوا محاريمهم It led them to shed their own blood. They will attack one another. They will be envious of one another. They will have infighting amongst each other. They will shed their blood and they will seek access to their to their maharam to those sacred things that they have. And so just like we feel pain and suffering and difficulty with for the part of the ummah that is in Palestine, we should feel the pain and suffering for the part of the ummah that is here. Faith begins in communities. Faith begins with care and love and concern and compassion for your fellow believer. Faith begins with helping your neighbor. Faith begins with hosting guests with graciousness. It begins with forgiving one another and for standing for justice when we see wrongs being done to each other. Faith begins with love for Allah and his messenger, not just a conceptual nominal belief in them. Love for Allah and his messenger and for what he brings and to practice this practice this example of the prophetic community until that resolve cannot be be uprooted. That is where the strength of nations comes from. That's where the strength of civilizations come from when they're strong in a heart that they can overcome oppression in the world. Allah says in his noble scripture, Allah and his angels pray to the Prophet, O you who believe, pray to him and send him peace. Allah will pray to our master and my Qur'an, Muhammad, his family and companions, and those who follow him in the day of judgement. Allah forgives the believers and Muslims and Muslims for their lives and their deaths. Allah will help the people of Islam and Muslims. That is for the shirkah and the polytheists. Allah says in the Qur'an,