 No believers, reflective believers, don't die without having surrendered completely to God. We begin by praising God, praising Allah. We continue to thank Allah. We continue to remind ourselves we weren't made for this world. And we view this world as a dot in the bigger picture. And then we warn ourselves that we're going back to our maker. We're going back to our Creator. We're going back to Allah, the owner, the King. There was an ant walking on a Persian carpet, and the ant was questioning and confused. Why all these bumps and why all these colors, and this is so... What is this? This is the... Why is this? Why this little this? And the ant was complaining and didn't... It's like, why? What is this? It's so ugly. And the maker of the carpet above saw the beauty, can see the beauty. And this world sometimes we're an ant. We don't see what our maker sees. We don't know what our maker knows. And sometimes being that ant is more comfortable because we surrender. We surrender and acknowledge our limitation. And we can be at peace in the hands of the maker that we know there is an all-wise maker who has a bigger picture, a bigger story, knows what's going on, is in control, has a design. And so it's comfortable to be that ant sometimes. And it's necessary to be that ant sometimes. It's necessary so that we can live in peace, so that we can accept reality, even though we don't understand that reality. Because the maker sees what we don't see. The maker knows what we don't know. And that is the essence of that submission and surrender, the meaning of Islam, right? And in the story of Moses, Musa, may Allah be pleased with him, alaihi salam, in the chapter 18, Surat Al-Kahaf, which we are encouraged to read on Fridays, a beautiful story where he met someone more knowledgeable than him, Khidr. And they went on a journey and they had three encounters. And Musa, alaihi salam, was a man of intellect, spoke to Allah, Kaleemullah. He was a man of opinion, a man of justice, a man of truth. And he went on this journey and had three encounters with Khidr. And the first encounter, Khidr breaks a boat. Even though those people on that boat were helping Musa and Khidr. And Musa spoke up, said, why are you breaking the boat? And the second, and he said, you won't be able to be patient. Khidr said, you won't be able to be patient. You won't be able to be patient with observing what's happening, what's occurring. In the second encounter, Khidr kills a young boy. And Musa speaks up, you killed a boy, how'd you kill a boy? You won't be able to be patient, Khidr says. In the third encounter, they're in a city. They need help, they seek help, but they don't get help. And so nonetheless, Khidr and Musa reconstruct a deteriorating wall. And Musa, again, speaks up in questions, why are you doing this? We can get some help, we can do this, we can get the assistance we need. And then in this journey, Khidr says, okay, let me explain to you, and this was the end of their journey. He says, let me explain to you, Khidr, he said in the first encounter, I broke the boat because there was a king that was going to take all the boats that weren't broken. So actually breaking the boat was helping them, breaking that was helping them. I want you to imagine someone stabbing a knife in the chest of another person. Imagine and focus microscope, get microscopically on that moment. How harmful, he's stabbing him with a knife, and now I want you to zoom out, and I want you to see the surgery and the surgeon in the hospital room. Oh, there's a bigger picture. God knows what we don't know, and God sees what we don't see. And so the breaking the boat was helping them, and then the boy, the boy was killed because this boy was doomed to disbelief, harming himself, harming his family, harming the community. And so dying as a boy, he was first of all saved from the punishment of the hereafter, because he's not yet accountable in the sight of God, and God replaced that boy for the parents with a righteous child, a righteous son, a righteous child. So it was good for the parents, good for the boy, good for the community. God knows what we don't know, God sees what we don't see. And in the third one, there was a treasure beneath the ground that we don't see, but God knows it's there. And that treasure was hidden for two orphans, because their parents were righteous. And when parents are righteous, the benefits come to their offspring. And so by fixing the wall, that treasure was preserved. It was preserved for the two orphans, for the two children. And so there is a moment where we are that aunt walking on this confusing planet sometimes. And in order to obtain some comfort, sometimes we need to let go and surrender and do Islam. One of the wisdoms, they say, why do we do pilgrimage and walk seven times around this cube? Why do we do that? One of the wisdoms is that, you know what? Turn off for a moment and surrender to God. Turn off a moment and surrender to God. God gifted us this amazing intellect, and we have to read and Iqra, and we have to use our akhal. And sometimes, sometimes, we have to understand that God knows what we don't know, even though I don't understand the wisdom, I know the all wise. Even though I don't understand the wisdom, I know the all wise, al-hakim. Even though I don't see the wisdom and why this happened, I trust you, al-hakim. I trust you because you're the all wise. Someone makes duha, and they make duha, make duha, make duha, it doesn't happen. It doesn't happen. They don't get what they asked for. Why? I made duha. I begged you. I thought, why? God knows what you don't know. God knows what I don't know. God sees what we don't see. And so, he can exchange that prayer, number one, by preventing a calamity in your life. Number two, he can delay it for the afterlife, and give it to you as reward in the afterlife. And number three, he can do it at a different time. So we trust the al-hakim more than we trust ourselves, and that is surrender. That is surrender. Are we going to challenge ourselves? What am I doing? What am I going to do? What am I supposed to do? Or are we going to question ourselves, or are we going to question God? Who are we? Are we going to question God, or are we going to question ourselves? What did I do? What did I do after this earthquake? What did I do after this earthquake? What did we do after this earthquake? Challenge myself. What did I do? Did I send some money? Did I pray? Did I raise my hands and pray? The question is, what are you going to do? What am I going to do? That's what we're going to be asked about. Seek forgiveness from God, he forgives all sins. And so as we ask ourselves, how are we going to respond in moments? Because we're going to be asked about everything, inshallah we get heaven without judgment. We're going to be asked, how did you use your tongue? Did you argue? Did you insult your wife? Did you talk back to your parents? Did you use foul, vile language? How did you use your ears? How did you use your eyes? How did you spend your money? Allah promises in the Qur'an, He promises in the Qur'an. You waffa ilaykum, whatever you spend, anything you spend in the way of God, you will be fully repaid to you. You waffa ilaykum. You waffa ilaykum. We will be fully repaid to you wa'antum la tuzlamun and you won't be wronged. We'll be fully repaid to you and you won't be wronged. A promise from God will be fully repaid to you. You waffa ilaykum wa'antum la tuzlamun. We'll be fully repaid to you and you won't be wronged. And so we have two responses. We respond physically and we respond metaphysically. What does that mean? We respond physically. We respond physically and we do what we need to do. We say what we need to say. We spend what we need to spend. And I know someone because we don't want to be asked by God on the Day of Judgment. This happened in Kashmir. What did you do? This happened in Pakistan. What did you do? This happened in India. What did you do? Because we're one ummah. We're one body. What did we do? We want to have our goodness, the tentacles of our goodness reach everywhere. And every calamity, because we are in a blessed, we're so blessed Alhamdulillah. We have so many privileges and blessings and luxuries that our Muslim brothers and sisters don't have around the world. And so we need to share those. So our goodness needs to reach everywhere. And it's so easy. You can go on launchgood.com and you can reach 30 countries. It'll take you 10 minutes. And you can send $20 to each place, $10 to each place, $2 to each place. I tried. I did something with goodness. I know someone because he doesn't want to be asked by God when he buys a piece of clothing, a pair of pants, a pair of jeans, a pair of a jacket, and he buys it and it says made in Mexico or made in Indonesia or made in some place. He's worried that maybe that was made by a sweatshop, not fair trade, that there was some mother or some child that was abused in the process. And so he says on the day of judgment, I don't want to be guilty for this. So I'm going to go find a charity in Indonesia, in Mexico, in whatever. And I'm going to send $15 there. I don't want to be a part of that huge system that contributes to that sweatshop. So I want to do my part. I'm going to send, yes, I got a good deal on these shoes, but I want to send $20 there because if Allah asks me, God forbid, you have, I did so, I cared. So we respond physically and metaphysically. So number one, our goodness reaches everywhere. Every issue, the Muslims, the believers, when they're asked, they give. Even if it's something, there's a right for everyone who asks of us, $1, $5, $10, we don't say no to anyone. And insha'Allah, everyone can afford something. Even if it's $1, our goodness reaches everywhere, and maybe that dollar with your barakah and dua and Taufiq will bring victory more than the $100,000. So first of all, we respond physically. We help physically. And then we respond metaphysically. And this is very important because power, dua, ad-duha, al-ibada. Ad-duha, al-mukh al-ibada. Praying. Can we pray two rukhahs for the earthquake victims? Can we, before we go to bed tonight? Each of us pray two rukhahs with the intention to alleviate those suffering. They don't have insurance when they lose their homes. They don't have insurance when they lose their homes. They don't have insurance when they lose their car. They lost it. That's it. They lost 20 years of income. They lost it. It's gone. Can we pray two rukhahs? Can we pray two rukhahs? Respond metaphysically. And this is a beautiful thing. This is a beautiful thing. And When you give victory to God, Allah gives victory to you. وَمَنْ نَصْرُ إِلَّا مَنْ عِنْدِ اللَّهِ Nasser, victory doesn't come from us. It comes from God. So you, me, each of us want to give victory to God in our small circle. In our small family. And then Allah will bring victory to the ummah. I want to bring victory to Allah in my relationship with my wife. In my relationship with my husband. I want to bring victory to Allah in my prayer. I want to bring victory to Allah with my eyes. I'm going to choose the halal, not the haram. I want to bring victory to Allah and spend in my money, even though it stings and it hurts. And then when we do that, Allah will bring victory. Allah will bring the greater victory. We take care of our stuff, Allah will take care of the other stuff. We take care of the micro, Allah will take care of the macro. There is a metaphysical impact of my little action here in San Ramon and wherever. There's a metaphysical impact to the whole Muslim ummah around the world. That's real and that's a responsibility we each carry. So all of us are responsible for the ummah. This ummah is mine, this ummah is ours. I care about that mother, about that father, about that child, about that son. And so we respond physically and metaphysically and we surrender to Allah what we don't understand. We surrender to Allah and there will come a day when we pass and we're born into the next life where things will make more sense. And ah, okay, Allah will open for us and we will see with more clarity inshallah. And in the meantime, in the meantime, we embrace, we surrender to Allah, we surrender to His wisdom and we respond physically and we respond metaphysically. So all of us give something to the victims in everywhere and don't say no to anyone who asks you for goodness because it's not your money. Allah sent that person to ask you. Allah sent that person, it's Allah's money. Allah sent that person to ask you. Allah says, I was sick, you didn't visit me. You say, how can I visit you Ya Allah? My servant so and so was sick and you didn't visit him. If you visited him, you would have found me there. So someone comes and asks you and there's someone here, the masjid has someone and whichever organizations, we give five dollars, two dollars, ten dollars, a hundred dollars, whatever is easy, whatever is reasonable for you. We're giving it to Allah. You're giving it to Allah and you're giving it to yourself because you'll find it in your reward on the day of judgment, insha'Allah. And so we respond physically and metaphysically and so all of us insha'Allah, oh two rakahs, two rakahs tonight, raise our hands and if you can't cry, fake cry. If you can't cry, fake cry, this is in our tradition and then the outward affects the inward and our hearts become soft, insha'Allah. And insha'Allah, one of our prayers will be answered. When is the help of Allah coming? Indeed, Allah's help is near. Indeed, Allah's help is near, insha'Allah. Ameen, Ameen, Ameen. Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Raheem, Alhamdulillahi Rabbil Alameen. Wa-salaatu wa-salaam wa-ala Sayyidi al-Mursaleen. Allahumma ahadina fee man hadayt wa-aafina fee man aafayt wa-tawallana fee man tawallayt, wa-bariklana fee man aatayt. Wa-qina wa-asraf anna sharra ma-qadayt. Inna ka taqtib bil haqi wa-la yiqda alayt. Wa-la yadilnum man walayt wa-la ya'zju man aadayt. Ta-baarak tarabuna wa-ta'alayt. Laka al-hamdu wa-shukru ala ma-qadayt. Nastaqfiruk Allahumma min jami'a ad-dhu nubi al-khadaya wa-natubu ilayk. Ya Allah, we turn to You and we ask You, Ya Allah, to take care of the ummah, to take care of those suffering. We ask You to give us victory over our own selves. We ask You, Ya Allah, to help those to alleviate. Ya Allah, meta nasrullah, meta nasrullah. Allah, when is Your aid coming? When is Your help coming? Al-inna nasrullahi qareeb. Ya Allah, the help of Allah is near. Ya Allah, we ask You, we ask You to take care, to take care of those suffering mothers and fathers and orphans and exchange and replace for them their homes and their cars and their families. Ya Allah, bil khayr wa-l-lutuf wa-l-afiya. And we ask You, Ya Allah, to give us all strength over the whispering devil that puts doubt in our hearts and doubt in our minds and give us victory to spend in Your way. With firm conviction, yawaffa ilaykum, it will be fully repaid to You. Wa-antum la-tudlamun, and You will not be wrong. Ya Allah, we know You are hearing us. We know You are seeing us. Ya Allah, make us that generation that brings victory to You, Ya Allah. Give us victory in our small moments, Ya Allah. We ask You to bring victory in the big moments, Ya Allah. Take care of our teachers and our scholars and our institutions.