 The second major battle that the Muslims fought was the Battle of Uhad and we know that one of the most significant things that happened in this battle was the death of the Prophet ﷺ's uncle who was very beloved to him, Hamza radiallahu. Now Hamza was not just the uncle of the Prophet ﷺ, rather they were like brothers because they were very similar to each other in age. And after this moment happened, Nabi A.S. was greatly struck with grief to such an extent that he ﷺ said, whosoever finds the person who killed my uncle, that person has the right to kill him on the spot. He has like a shoot, you know, just a shoot to kill order, it doesn't matter where you find him. So who was this individual? This was none other than Wahshi ibn Harb. We've heard this name time and again. Wahshi was a slave at this time and he was given the opportunity to earn his freedom. All you have to do is kill one person on that battlefield, no one else. Kill Hamza and you're free to go. So Wahshi waits and he waits for the right moment and as soon as Hamza radiallahu turns his back, he takes a spear and he drives it to the back of Hamza radiallahu because he couldn't face him face to face. There's no one there who could defeat Hamza radiallahu in a one-on-one battle like that. And so he kills Hamza radiallahu and the moment that he strikes him down, he flees from the battlefield. He doesn't fight anyone else, he only came for one mission, he completed his mission and he left. And he runs away, flees from the battlefield and goes into hiding. And from then on the Muslims have a command from the Prophet ﷺ. If you find this man, take him out right away. And this command stays standing for years and years and years until eventually the Prophet of Allah ﷺ does something only the Prophet of Allah could do. What is that? He sends someone to give da'wah to Wahshi ibn Harb. And he's also forgives him and he sends somebody. And he sends somebody. Now imagine, by the way, Wahshi is hiding out in Ta'if. He's hiding out in the city of Ta'if and we have heard a great deal about it most likely in this week. And so then the Messenger of Allah ﷺ comes to him. He says the Prophet ﷺ is inviting him towards Islam and Wahshi is just as shocked as you and I are. And so he responds and he says, okay go and tell Muhammad ﷺ this, go and tell him this from me. Ya Muhammad, how are you inviting me towards Islam? You mean to tell me you're inviting me towards Islam when your own Lord, your own book says the person who does zina, the person who does shirk, the person who commits murder, a person will be thrown in hellfire, he'll be humiliated on the day of judgment and be punished severely forever. That's what your own book says. And so Allah ﷺ, the Messenger comes back to the Prophet ﷺ and he says this is what Wahshi says. And so then Allah ﷺ tells the Messenger who goes all the way back to Wahshi ibn Harb and he says that Allah ﷺ has said something else. He says, إلا من تابة و آمنة و عمين صالحة فأولائك يبدل الله سيئاتي محسنات و كان الله غافورة رحيمة. And he says that Allah ﷺ says this applies to everyone except the person who does توبة and the person brings إيمان in Allah and then they do good deeds after that. If you do that, Allah will turn all of your bad deeds into good deeds. I mean that's a pretty good deal, right? Wahshi ibn Harbih hears this and again, Wahshi ibn Wahshi, look at how he responds. He thinks about it for a minute and he says, hold on. He says, okay, go tell Muhammad this, this is a pretty strict condition that you have placed on me here, right? إلا من تابة و آمنة و عمين صالحة He says you want me to do توبة and bring إيمان and do good deeds. لعل لا اقتر على هذا I don't know if I can do all of this. I got to do all of these things to get your God's forgiveness now and now. This is too much for me. I'm a simple man. I can't do all of this. And so the messenger goes all the way back to the Prophet ﷺ. He says this is what Wahshi said. And then Allah ﷺ reveals another ayah. And so the messenger goes, the messenger of the messenger goes all the way back to ta'if again. And he talks to Wahshi ibn Harbih. And he says Allah ﷺ has said that just for you. He says that Allah ﷺ is willing to forgive a person. So long as they do not, commit shirk. إن الله هدا يفروا أن يشرق به و يخفروا ما دون ذلك لما يشاء. As long as you don't do shirk, Allah will forgive. So it doesn't matter what you have done. Don't worry. You don't even have to do anything. Just don't do shirk. And he says, come on like, there's no other better deal than this, right? So don't do shirk. That's all you have to do. Wahshi hears this and he thinks about it for a minute. And he says, هذا أرابعد مشيئة. I said okay go and tell Muhammad ﷺ. He said this depends on if Allah wants to forgive me. Because Allah says لمن يشاء. What if Allah doesn't want to forgive me then? So then it won't apply to me. So now I don't know if I don't think this is good enough for me either. Is there any other verse in your Quran that your Lord can give me? And the Messenger goes back for a third time. And Allah swt reveals another ayah. And the man takes it. And he goes all the way back to Wahshi ibn Harb. Again for another time. And he says that your Lord has revealed. Subhanahu wa ta'ala. He says that all my slaves and servants who have transgressed on themselves and you have done sins that you feel regret for and remorse over. Don't worry. Allah forgives all sins. All sins. Wahshi he hears this and he says. This is what I've been waiting for. Travels all the way to Madinah and accepts Islam. Wahshi ibn Harb. Now imagine a person like, hopefully I don't think any one of us has done anything like Wahshi ibn Harb did. And yet Allah swt forgiveness and the mercy of the Prophet ﷺ is so vast that he was waiting for them. It just took time. And eventually Wahshi ibn Harb himself opens his arms for him. Opens the Masjid of the Prophet ﷺ for him. And he welcomes him in. And now he is considered from the Sahaba of the Prophet ﷺ. Imagine how Allah swt can turn a person's leaf. New chapter in their life. All the sins are forgiven. And now we know that that person will be with the Prophet of Allah swt in Jannah. We have no idea what future is waiting for us. All you have to do is turn towards Allah swt. Let Allah write your final destiny. It is all in his control. Take this moment to make tawba to Allah swt and ask him for forgiveness. I want to make mention of the story of one other Sahabi and then insha'Allah we will conclude. Story of Sayyidina Amr ibn al-Aas, who was another illustrious companion of our Prophet ﷺ. And actually I want to mention the very final moments of his life. Very final moments of his life. He is on his deathbed. And his son comes to visit him and he brings some of his friends with him. Now imagine this is an illustrious Sahabi. Amr ibn al-Aas, he was 53 years old when he accepted Islam. He was very elder. He was not like a young man. He was older. And he had opposed the Prophet ﷺ for essentially the entire 20 years of his da'wah. Up until Fatimaqa, that's when he accepted Islam finally. And before this he was a man of great wealth, great influence, great popularity, well known in his community and in his society. And then eventually he accepts Islam. And then the Prophet ﷺ says that you are a man that Allah ﷻ will bless in your wealth because Allah ﷻ has given you so much wealth and he's given you intelligence and ability. And then we know that he would go on to become one of the greatest commanders of the Muslim Empire. Then he would go and conquer numerous lands. He would become the fatih. He would become a conqueror and millions of people would accept Islam as a result of his conquest. This individual who gave, we can't even imagine the amount of wealth that he gave in the path of Allah ﷻ. His children became Sahaba. His children became illustrious individuals themselves. This person, he is laying on his deathbed. His son comes to see him, Abdullah. Abdullah ibn Amr ibn As. He comes to see him and people are with him. And the father now, he is in his 80s, very elderly. He sees his son and he turns away. He turns towards the wall. He doesn't want to look at them. Fatimaqa taweenan. He begins to cry long tears. And people are like, he's a little bit strange. You know, don't you want to basically, aren't you ready to go? You've lived a great life and you don't want to go back to the Prophet ﷺ. Don't you want to be with Allah ﷻ at this moment? Bida'u al-Di'la and when he was passing away on his deathbed, his wife is over him. And she says, What great sadness I have. Bida'u al-Di'la is only 60 years old. Like my husband is leaving me at this age. She's greatly grieved at this. And he says, No, no, this is good news. Tomorrow we meet our loved ones. I'm happy to leave this dunya. And yet, Amr ibn As is on his deathbed and he's sad, crying. And so his son stands over him and he begins to remind his father about all of these things. He's like, Dad, look at all these things that you have accomplished. You spent three decades as a Muslim with the Prophet ﷺ, you spent a few years and then you conquered all of these lands. You donated incredible amounts of money in the path of Allah ﷻ. How many people except that Islam at your hand? You are such an amazing person. You're this, this, this, this. Amr ibn As is on his deathbed. Amr ibn As is on his deathbed. Amr ibn As is on his deathbed. Didn't the Prophet ﷺ give you glad tidings of this, this, this, all of these things? And then he turns back to face his son. And he says, my son, the only thing worthy of merit that I consider having done is saying the shahadah that's it. And then he begins to tell him, let me tell you my son, remember a father will tell his son about his life. So he says, I spent my life in three stages. He simplifies 80 years of his life in three stages. Spent it in three stages. He says the first stage was one where I hated the Prophet ﷺ more than anyone. There was no one on the face of this earth that I hated more than Muhammad. And he said, all I desired, all I desired was to get close enough to him so I could kill him. That's all I wanted. And if I had done that, I would have been the happiest man in the world. He said, however, had I died on that stage, at that first tabaqa, that third stage, I would have been from the people of Hellfire without a doubt. And then the time came, when Allah ﷻ expanded my chest for Islam. And Allah ﷻ put the light of faith in my heart. And after that, I came to Medina. He said, I came to the Prophet ﷺ, and I accepted Islam in his hands. And he said from that moment on, there was no one more beloved to me than the Prophet ﷺ. And he said, no matter how much I looked at him, it was not enough. If you asked me to describe him, I would not be able to because I never got my fill of looking at him. That's how much love I had for the Prophet ﷺ. And he said, I had hope that if I died on that second stage after my Islam, I had hope that I would be from the people of Jungna. That's what I hoped for. And then the Prophet ﷺ left this dunya. And then we, and then, remember, people are talking about all these accomplishments. And I even mentioned some of his accomplishments. Look at how he summarizes accomplishments, three decades of accomplishments. You know what he says? He summarizes three decades in three words. ثم أولين الأشياء. That's it. And then we were given some responsibilities. That's all he says. He doesn't mention that I conquered this many lands. I was the commander. I donated hundreds of millions. All these people converted Islam and accepted Islam in my hands. He doesn't say any of that. He just says, Allah gave us some responsibilities. That's it. لَانَدْرِ مَا هَلُنَ فِيهَا We don't know how we did. After everything Allah gave me, I don't know. Did I do what Allah wanted me to do with those things, with those responsibilities, obligations and rights? And then he tells the son, my son, after I leave the Zunia. And then he tells him how to bury him because he's like, I don't know what's going to happen to me. After you put me into the ground, stay over my grave and pray for me. Make dua for me. That's what he tells the son. Now, you and I need to think, what stage are we in our life? I don't think, hopefully we're not at stage one. But definitely, you might be at stage two when a person has Allah's guidance and then they start following the sunnah of their Prophet SAW. And you feel you're on stage two and you're at iman hai. You love that feeling. You're like, I'm ready to go. Allah, I'm ready. Let's do this. But then, after a little while, things become a little bit monotonous. It becomes repetitive. It becomes routine. You just come to the masjid because you have to. You come to Juma because you've always come to Juma. You pray because everyone prays. You fast because, yeah, that's what Muslims do. You give charity because, yeah, of course, I got to get a little bit of my money to charity. Allah has given you all those things that you made to offer. Allah has opened for you all of those doors that you had sought to open. And now, the question is, how did you fare in those affairs? How did you and I do with all the things that Allah gave us responsibility over? That's a question we have to ask ourselves. How are we doing? We have to reorient ourselves and reprioritize those things that actually matter. But the month of Ramadhan, just a month away, just one month away, Allahumma balliqna Ramadhan. With just one month away, we have to actually reorient ourselves that this Ramadhan is going to be something that changes my life again and again and again. So I feel like I'm starting stage two again and again and again every single time. May Allah's