 إن الحمد لله نحمده ونستعينه ونستغفره ونعلم تاتي من شروري أنفسنا ومن سيئاته أعمالنا من يهديه الله فلا نضل لك ومن يضل الفلا هادي له وأشهد أننا محمد العبده وعصوره وعصره بالحق بشيرا ونذيرا بين يدي ساعة أما بعد فا يادار الله ووصيكم ووصي نفسي بطب الله بطب الله في السلفي والعلانية ونتعلمنا خمساتكم الله ونقوموا بكسركم بطبه ونعلم كهذا صحيح لكي we praise Allah SWT we said peace and blessings upon his last and final and most noble messenger Muhammad SAW ونجدنا من صباحه والكاملين وانجذبوه من يجهده ونحظه ويخشبون كل من يحشبونه until the day of judgment and I enjoy you and I advise you and I advise myself ونحظهي myself to have Taqwa of Allah SWT fulfilling his commands outwardly and inwardly and avoiding his prohibitions outwardly and inwardly واحد من المساعدة التي تأخذنا من حديث جبريل، حديث جبريل و حديث جبريل هو أن جبريل عليسلام سأسأل ربنه صلى الله عليه وسلم 4 سؤال about faith, Iman, about Islam, practice of that faith and about Ihsan, perfecting that faith and about the signs of the end of time about the alamat, the signs or more precisely he first asked him when that day of judgment will come and the messenger of Allah صلى الله عليه وسلم as his famously narrated he said that only Allah سبحانه وتعالى knows he said tell me about the signs and he went on to tell him about the signs and from this the scholar said that our deen is not only understanding our faith and our practice and perfecting those two things because we could do that when we're on by ourselves in a room secluded on a mountain wherever it may be but it's also in recognizing the times that we live in because later on the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم said that جبريل came to teach you your deen and so the deen is not just theology and practice and perfection of those two but it's also recognizing the times that we live in and knowing our place in those times and so even long before the tiyama begins those signs start appearing there's minor signs and there's major signs and one of the major signs of the day of judgment that it's close to coming is the appearance of the Dajal the appearance of the Dajal who in the Christian tradition they call him the Antichrist but we refer to him as the Dajal which is more properly translated as the Imposter Christ or the False Messiah and this is a very important thing to know because if we look at what عيس علي سلام represents and what all of the messengers represent the opposite of that would be a form of extreme evil and so if a person came with the opposite of what a prophet and what a messenger came with they would be easily distinguishable easily distinguished but this person that will come is the Dajal the False or the Imposter Christ he's an imposter he's a Dajal Dajal is pretending to be something and fooling people into thinking that you're something that you're not we know when he first appears he will claim to be the Mehdi then he'll move that claim on to being a prophet and then he'll move that claim on to being a God ونريا دبدا and we ask Allah to protect us from following him because many people many people Muslims included will be deluded into following the Dajal the Imposter Christ but what happens even before that comes the Prophet ﷺ said that there will appear that Dajal there will be the Dajal before he even comes 30 Dajals and then we can infer by that that even if these minor Dajals don't show up in our lives we might have people we might interact with people who act like a Dajal they present themselves as something but in reality there's something else and so what do we have as a protecting factor as a Muslim what can we protect ourselves against these types of Dajals imposters the Dajalic way of thinking a false way of thinking because Muslims الحمد لله will never come to you and say I'm going to leave my faith it's such a strong part of our identity as Muslims and that's from the Barakah of being from the Ummah of the greatest messengers ﷺ we won't get a lot of blatant apostasy which has happened but we won't get a lot of it but what we will get is people who are going to try to attack our identity and try to make us think they'll be Muslim but just change a few things here and there and this is happening at multiple levels at the levels of sometimes critics of Islam at the level of people who outwardly may pretend to want to help Muslims as a minority as a marginalized minority but in reality they don't want us as we are they want us to become who they want us to be and so when they present they are arguments to us so why don't you do this and why don't you do that you start then you see that they will start to erode away our identity as Muslims while maintaining what we believe so that the jab does he come out automatically and say leave all those things does he come with a system that's completely opposite to what we believe in because we believe in the Mehdi and we wait for his arrival and we believe in the messengers and we know that the revelation has ended with the prophet but we know that we will come back we believe that and we are waiting for him and as an interesting note many Christians don't realize that about us I was once sitting with a man who wasn't Christian I mean who was Christian who wasn't Muslim and he was learning about Islam and we were telling him various things and then we just mentioned in passing the return of إسلام for us it's a part of our faith you mentioned it we're waiting for it he said yeah we're Muslims we've waited for him to come back it's not even something that we think about too much but he had never heard this and he said wait a minute you're waiting for it إسلام peace and blessings upon him to come back he said yes he said this is a uniting factor between us and you this is a uniting factor it was so profound to him that he said this could be we need to focus on that aside we know that the way many Christians view it he says differently differently than the way we view him إسلام but the fact is we both respect him and revere him so when the dead child comes he's going to play on those things he knows we as believers he's not going to come with blatant atheism he's not going to come with blatant coflot and just say there is no God there is no faith there are no messengers no he recognizes we have a system that we work with him a belief system that we have 100% surety that it's not a fairy tale we know this is the truth and so he'll play on that he'll first come and say he's demanding then as a messenger and then God and then he'll even he's presenting himself as إسلام he's not coming and presenting himself as something else so now what does the believer what tools have we been given to be able to distinguish between truth and falsehood what tools can we look at the scholar said that one of these things that we have to remember and it's a root of many of the diseases of the heart is غفلة being heedless being heedless but what does that mean being heedless of الله سبحانه وتعالى this is the root of many different things and if we strengthen if we strengthen our faith to realize that we need to work to get away from being heedless from having غفلة we will have that tool that when the Jal is presented to us or when the Jalic way of thinking is presented to us we'll be able to distinguish between truth and falsehood because that's the believer the messenger of الله سبحانه وتعالى described the believer as somebody who is pious and fatim who has deep reflection critical analysis we don't just take things and he also said that you should beware of the noor of the believer the inner sight of the believer because he looks or she looks with the light of Allah سبحانه وتعالى the philosophy of the woman but this doesn't mean just by merely saying the shahada that we are that believer yes we are a believer we don't believe in تكفير of a person who states the word and outwardly is not rejected necessary things of the deen we're not in the business of doing تكفير of people this is Muslim this is not a Muslim as part of our daily daily routine but we know that all believers are not at the same level of their practice and adherence to their faith and their strength of their faith so the believer that the messenger of Allah سبحانه وتعالى is talking about here is that believer who has worked on their faith and been able to now really look with the noor of Allah and look with the tools and the power that this deen has given him or her so how do we attain that the scholar said that first off that غفلة heedlessness is one of the worst diseases that we can have in our hearts and it's actually the source of all evil even جوزية and his commentary mentioned that the source of all evil and all foul things comes out of غفلة just think about it there's other things outwards sin whatever it might be we miss a prayer we backbite we take غفلة all of those things if we focus on just the sin and remove ourselves from that those things we're not getting down to the root of what's causing that well the root cause of those things is غفلة because at that time at that moment when we are commanded to do something and we forget and we're heedless of that moment that's غفلة and what's the opposite of it we forget for this forget remember we forget what's the opposite remember it's not only państwo it's not only we forget who says the greatest it's not only it's not only I know you know in terms of a form there's a discussion amongst the saber amongst the scholars لن يكون هناك أشياء أفضل من ذكره. ولكن هذا في فرمي الله عن ماذا يبقى على الوصول. ولكن هناك شيء أهمي في فرمي الله أنه يبقى في ذكره. لأن ذكر يمكن أن يكون في فرمي الله even من who doesn't believe can say لا إله إلا الله. لذلك هناك شيء في فرمي الله على الوصول. هذا ما أرامل يتحدث عنه. He said it's ذكر الله. It's ذكر الله عند أمره ونأمره. ذكر الله سبحانه وتعالى في ذكره وفي ذكره. لذلك when the prayer comes in and we look at the time and we start thinking going through that process of دوة هضوة. Where can I make wudu? Where can I pray? That process of thinking that for many of us has become second nature. We just go through the process without realizing it. That's ذكر الله سبحانه وتعالى. That's remembering Allah. That's where we're remembering because when we pick up that phone and we go through that process of saying five more minutes till prayer time or I only have ten more minutes you're going through this process of remembering Allah commanded you to believe and Allah commanded you to pray and He commanded prayer at a specific time and He commanded it in a specific way and you're going through that entire process in that moment, in that instance and that is what Allah is saying is the greatest ذكر الله سبحانه وتعالى. Now multiply that towards every instance of our life. When we're on the computer and a few clicks away and we remember I need to get out of this section there's some doubtful things or when we're about to enter into a transaction and say I can't do that because Allah prohibited me from such and such and such and such. That's ذكر الله سبحانه وتعالى. So the four ways to get into this state where we have that ذكر and that presence of Allah and that critical analysis of being able to look at a situation and not just take it in and not just move like a herd of sheep through life what is it? It's four things إستفق is the first thing to do إستفق to seek forgiveness from Allah سبحانه وتعالى The second thing is to visit those people who are in a state of ذكر and who are not in a state from what we can see they are not in a state of heedlessness role models there's a lot upon the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم the third thing and reciting the Qur'an the fourth thing إستفق visiting prayers on the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and reading the book of Allah سبحانه وتعالى and I just want to take a few moments to look at each one of these the first thing إستفق what is it? إستفق is not just on the tongue seeking forgiveness is not just saying a stuff of God it's just as a note for many people especially Arabs they assume they inherently know the language they say the إستفق with a khaw they'll say إستخفر because the محارج of the rain and the khaw are very close so we have to be careful when we say إستخفر that we're saying it with a rain not a khaw because إستخفر means I declare a breaking of my treaty إستخفر is different but when we say that إستخفر it's not just with the tongue it's going through a process thinking about this process about what we've done or maybe about what we're thinking about doing but it's getting us into this state of realizing that I have sin and what's at the essence the core of that humility we have to be humble to really do إستفق we have to be humble we have to be honest with ourselves and realize that maybe our actions on a matter maybe something we're doing right now that we justify to ourselves our opinions on a matter we have to be honest with ourselves and say is this really like عمالا said remembering a law I have an opinion on a matter whatever it might be take any matter out there and we all hold an opinion or maybe we even say I don't know that's your opinion I don't know my opinion is I don't know is that really what a law wants you to know in that instant about that matter how do we resolve that we first we're humble with ourselves we know we need to seek out seek knowledge on this matter to have a properly informed decision to our due diligence so that's the benefit of إستفع seeking forgiveness from Allah and being in that constant state of recognizing who we are because if you look at many of the major characters and by characters I mean just these people we believe they are there the stories in the Quran are not metaphorical they're not just merely a parable for life but Allah wants to tell us a parable he'll say method but when he tells us about فرعو فرعو existed and we believe he existed as a human being موسى عليسلام existed as a human being and he had a life and we're told about it in the Quran the most often recited mentioned story in the Quran but those characters in those stories that Allah سبحانه وتعالى tells us that did major things think فرعو think إبليس think أبولاد the point that caused them to do those things was given arrogance the solution to that is humility so this process of إستدفاء of recognizing our state as being sinning creatures or at least having the propensity the ability to sin that's what's going to humble us the second thing they say visiting those people who are not in a state of heedlessness now we can only judge by the outward we don't know about the reality of people inwardly and that's why as is mentioned in the hadith there will be people who on يوم القيامة they will be led into the hellfire and there will be people who learn from them who took directions from them and they said you told me how to get into jama that's where I'll be how did you get into how are you going into the hellfire they said because we didn't follow what we preach we didn't practice what we preach essentially we didn't practice so what does this mean this reminds us that just because a person is in a position of knowledge or authority or imamship or cleric or whatever term it is مودانة مفتين شيئ whatever it is doesn't mean that their reality is that they are in a state of constant ذكر الله and by ذكر I mean عماف's definition of ذكر they could be in a state of غفلة but we can only judge based on the outward as the messenger said I was ordered to judge based on the outward so we go to those people and we try to see how they're living their life and we look to them as role models and if we can't access them in real life then read their books read the stories of the Sahara read the stories of the صالحين look at how they did and look at the choices that they made in certain situations and allow that to try to help us create decision-making tools so that when that moment where we have to make a decision we say what is the ruling that Allah has commanded about this name and now how can I approach that that's the benefit that I see in visiting and there are many more but I'm just going through a short summary then thirdly the صلاة upon the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and this is not just going through it like a mechanical way of صلاة upon the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم but they say specifically صلاة upon the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and one of the things that the secrets the many secrets of the صلاة is that it reminds us of our connection to the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and it draws us closer to him and it makes us want to imitate what he did it makes us want to follow his orders it causes us to have love for the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and it creates that connection that we need so that when we're in a moment we can truly ask ourselves what would the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم in this moment so that I can have true presence and not be heedless in this moment and the last point reciting the Book of Allah again the صلاوات is creating this connection between us and the messenger of Allah صلى الله عليه وسلم and reciting the Book of Allah is creating this connection between us and Allah and not just so that we go through a road recitation of the of the Quran with not realizing what we're saying إبراعبات صلى الله عليه وسلم said that all of those eyes that were mentioned about the previous nations leaving their book leaving their book he said it doesn't mean that they just threw it to the side and didn't read it he said they read it but they didn't understand it so we're talking about reading the Quran with proper understanding and not only of the Arabic but of what Allah صلى الله عليه وسلم is truly trying to get there and that happens through a process of understanding those eyes through the guidance of the scholars understanding what is the theological rule that we get from this what is the legal rule that we get from this what is the advice that we get from this that's one of the many benefits of reciting the Quran and it's a cure for removing خفلة heedlessness from our lives and so again it's إستغفاء صلى الله عليه وسلم إستغفاء visiting those who are in a state of ذكر sinning prayers upon the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم and reading the Book of Allah سبحانه وتعالى and we ask Allah سبحانه وتعالى to give us the success to implement all of these in our lives and to be from amongst those people who are not in a state of خفلة who are not in a state of heedlessness but who are in a state of presence and who do ذكر as umar who define يعجب وشك أن شخصنا شروع ال ليعجب صلى الله عليه وسلم إستغفاء ويوفع صلى الله عليه وسلم وستفوت إمام لارام و luiصير الصغير وكلمة بكم ت首先 أرخس وسلة و근ية وقت سورة وأحذ살 إذان ب Luo؟ إذان ويطينك ويج Chryти وكلمة وفرق التالي عن الأشياء الأجهزة وقادر التالي عن الأشياء الأكثر سأبلغ مع أجهزة أسلحة على كيف نقدم الأشياء الأجهزة على حياةنا والأشياء هو أن نجعله محاولة أن نتقى فهمتنا من الوقت ونرى أن أشهر أشياء هذه الأشياء فقط في فيديو today not a huge change in our life but just today how today am i going to really do it still five for something real is still five with presence of mind and how am i really going to visit somebody either physically or in a book or reading about them or maybe and it doesn't have to be a position in society that's associated with leadership faith leadership in the community sometimes we forget that sometimes we forget we think that visiting the righteous means going seeing the chef at the masjid or the madrasa or visiting this person it might be the local butcher that nobody even thinks that he's a very good muslim because outwardly he's not wearing the outward garments in the gear but inwardly that person has a stake with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala so even if on a daily basis we just start thinking to ourselves الله puts somebody like that in my bag and i've had friends i had a friend of mine who in mecca he said oh Allah just show me some of the people here who today who are very close to you and he met some of them but he actively sought them out and looked for them in the faces of the congregation around you looked for them in the in the streets don't look at what you might think would be a righteous person look for have Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala guide you to those people and it might not be a person who's following everything there are people who pray five times a day on time in time with presence but their treatment of other people is so horrible and there's people who don't pray five times a day which that's wrong but their treatment of people is good so on this angle they don't have love them but on this angle of the prayer they have love them so be able to distinguish between those two things and that's a part of the فراسة of the believer and that's a stream that can protect us from the they are able to distinguish between the two things we don't throw the baby out with the back water and the third thing in terms of salah upon the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم they said as a recommended time 500 a day which might seem like a lot but if you just put 100 with each prayer you can get 500 a day and the same thing with the Quran the reason why the early generation broke it up into 30 parts and seven parts and six parts was to make it to where we could make it a daily part of our life so if in the beginning we make a commitment in the day we make a commitment to these four things and at the end of the day we review our commitment and in every day we try again we try again we try again الله سبحانه وتعالى it's not looking for perfection from us but he is looking for us to to try so we ask الله سبحانه وتعالى to give us the success give us the tawfiq and implementing these things and to give us the success and the tawfiq to follow his way and the way of the messenger of الله صلى الله عليه وسلم and to protect us from those the jazz that we see the the jazz and to protect us from the the jadik way of thinking and the jadik way of teaching and we ask الله سبحانه وتعالى to make us from amongst the those who follow the messenger of الله صلى الله عليه وسلم until the day of judgment and to put us in his presence in his cup in his in his fold at the حود of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم أطول القرحانة وأستغفر الله ولي ولكم أستغفر الله ولي ولكم لسائر المسلمين والمسلمات وأبن السلام