 One of the worst things about modern times is ingratitude is cultivated in people. They're ungrateful for the police, they're ungrateful for government, they're ungrateful for their educations, they're ungrateful for everything. People just complain all the time. And Allah SWT has declared, if you're grateful, I will increase you in blessings to be grateful for. But if you are an ingrate, if you lack gratitude, in fact if you show ingratitude, I will give you more reasons to be ungrateful. I will give you more reasons to be ungrateful. This is a metaphysical equation. Gratitude equals increase in blessings. Ingratitude equals decrease in blessings. This is a qaida, it's a law. It's a metaphysical law that's as true as the Newtonian physics that you learned in high school. If you're ungrateful, then Allah will give you more to be ungrateful about, more to whine about. You think it's bad now? You have no idea how bad it can get. Read history to know how bad it can get. You think Syria is bad? Read about the Mongol invasion. They didn't have any place to flee to. You think the Muslims are having tribulation in America? Read about Nazi Germany and what happened to the Jews. We have to be grateful because if we're ungrateful and always complaining, Allah is going to give you more to complain about. I was in one of the Gulf states and somebody was complaining about the price of gasoline, the taxi driver, 25 cents at the time. Now it's a lot higher. Why? Because they keep complaining. Go ahead, complain all you want. Because if you love to complain, Allah will give you plenty to complain about. But if you want to show gratitude, Allah will give you plenty to show gratitude about. They did a study at Davis. It's called the gratitude study for depressed people. They had them write down every day, every morning, 10 things they were grateful for. Over a period of a month, people's depression started being lifted. If you start counting the blessings of Allah, you'll never come to an end. And you can count blessings like just eyelashes. People don't have eyelashes. They fall out. Eyelashes are a wonderful blessing. Or some people have dry eyes. So if you have moisture in your eyes, what a blessing. If you have teeth, what a blessing. If you don't have teeth, if you have dentures, what a blessing. There are people that don't have dentures. If you lose one arm, what a blessing. You didn't lose both arms. If you lose both arms, what a blessing. Now they have prosthetic devices that enable you to do things. Even Abbas said in every tribulation in dunya, there are three blessings hidden that you have to recognize. The first is that it could have been worse. The second is that it's in your dunya and not in your deen. And the third, in your world, the affairs are not in your religious effort. And the third, it's in this world and not in the next. And you should be grateful for that. People now are complaining. He's going to try you to see who of you are the best in actions. We're going to try you. You will be tried in your wealth and in your lives. You're going to hear all these people telling how horrible you are and how terrible your religion is. Allah said that. What does He say? How's our response? What's our response? We intasbiru. And if you show patience, what tataqu and show piety, restraint, control yourselves. This is our deen. Allah swt said. Allah strikes a similitude for you to think, a similitude. Allah strikes a similitude for you to reflect. A township, a city, a hamlet that was peaceful. It was tranquil. It had provision in abundance coming from every place. Like we have today, we eat berries from Chile and we drink tea from China. And we have rice from India, basmati rice in your homes from India. You get all this blessing from all over the world. So what did they do? Instead of saying, Alhamdulillah wa shukrillah. They were ungrateful. This is the meaning of kufr. Kufr is ingratitude. You can be a muslim and be a kafir in the meaning that you're an ingrate. This ingratitude, that's the essence of kufr. The essence of Islam is gratitude, shukr, a feeling of blessing that Allah has given. The biggest blessing is that we exist. The ijad and the imdad, the blessing of giving us our existence and then sustaining our existence. He could take away that sustenance at any time. So Allah says that He enveloped that city in hunger, look at the blessing of food, in hunger and terror. Hunger and terror. Why? Because of their ungratefulness. And this is what we've lost an understanding of our religion. We look at all these events and we don't see the real source of these events, ingratitude. If we want to change the world, we have to change our state and our attitude about all these blessings that we've been given. Government is a blessing. Even the worst form of government is better than anarchy. Even a tyranny is better. This malik ibn Anna said this. These weren't ignorant people. These were genius people because he lived through civil wars. He saw what happens when things break down. The people of Damascus six years ago were eating beautiful food. They had good clothes. It was one of the few countries on the planet that was actually self-sustained. And now all of this tribulation, and if you say, you know, why is it happening to them and not us? Maybe because Allah loves them more. Because we know Ahlus Sham have a maqam. So Allah will put all of the the the torment of the Akhirah. He'll put it in the dunya for a short period and then they go back to Allah completely free of any tribulation or punishment. Maybe it's the places that aren't being afflicted that deserve to be afflicted that should be worried. This is the way Muslims traditionally looked at things. When the maqaw came down, when the mongols came down, they didn't say these evil mongols. They said, had the adab, b'athu allah, adena li dhunubina. This is a punishment God has sent to us because of our wrong actions. That's how they looked at. Muslims don't look at that anymore. Evil America, evil Israel, evil. Okay, good. Allah put them in power. He says, He gives power to them ever. He pleases. Muslim had it. If Muslims had nuclear weapons right now with the idiots that we have, we would have nuclear congregations all over. Allah knows what He's doing. Allah knows who He gives power to. Yes, they abuse their power, but to what degree? Who would be worse? People want the destruction of America? Well, let's see what happens when China gets the world power. See if there's going to be an Abu Ghraib that you hear about. See if there's going to be any way, recourse to redressing any wrongs. Allah ta'ala alam, I don't know. But sometimes the worst things are answered prayers. We don't know. There's a different way of looking at the world. People don't want to look at it that way, but I read the Qur'an and the Qur'an, it comes back to me. Where did this calamity come from? Allah says it's from your own selves. It didn't say, oh, it's from those evil Quraish. Those evil Quraish. No, Allah wanted the Quraish to become Muslim. Ahun kareem, Ibn al-akhun kareem. You're a noble son of a noble. You're free today. I forgive you. He said what, Yusuf said to his brothers who threw him in a well and left him to die. Because that's the state of believers. When they get angry, yes, we get angry. But they realize, what am I really getting angry at? At a test that God sent me? Whom am I really angry at? See, you can be humanly angry, but who are you really angry at? If everything is a test from Allah, then who are you really angry at? That's a question. This is, these are days of shukr. You have two joys. He has a joy when he completes, he breaks his fast because he's completed the ibadah. And then the light of the food, most of the big ulama said it's it's mom, it's completing that. That's the farha, it's not the food. It's actually finishing the ibadah. As imam know it, high maqam. Allah SWT says, right? The Prophet was shakor, but he told us to be shakr. One of the Arafin said, Haad al-Tamiru that's, Ha'ula ibadu that's, huna ka ibadu al-asma? So that's a high maqam. It's where you're always grateful. This is what all the ulama taught and Muhammad al-Musawi said is the meaning of shukr, real shukr. Shukr is to utilize what God has given you, to utilize what he's given you out of gratitude. He gave you an eye to see, not to look at pornography. He gave you a tongue to speak the truth, not to lie, not to cheat, not to backbite. He gave you a hand to work and not to steal or to embezzle or to take things that aren't yours. He gave you feet to walk in righteousness. The servants of the merciful who walk, tread lightly on the earth. You know they talk about carbon footprints now, carbon footprints. Ibadu al-Rahman don't have a carbon footprint. They tread lightly on the earth. We reveal this book on Laylat Al-Qadir and what will convey to you what Laylat Al-Qadir is? Laylat Al-Qadir, it's better than 83 months of worship. The Prophet was, because he was so covetous about solicitous for his ummah, he was concerned that his ummah would not have a lot of rewards when he knew that the ancients had much longer lifespans. So this is min khasaisi rahmati wa min khasaisi ummati. This is a specific gift to this ummah, that they have a night that is worth months of ibadah. And so in a lifetime, you can literally get years added on to your ibadah. This is a great gift from Allah. And this is why Allah SWT said, من قام رمضان إيمان و احتساباً وغفر لهم تقدم من ذنبه. Whoever stands doing extra acts, تهجد and ترويح stands doing extra acts, he has his sins forgiven of what passed. ومن صام رمضان إيمان و احتساباً وغفر لهم ما تقدم من ذنبه. And whoever fasts the month of Ramadan, believing in Allah and believing that the reward is from Allah. Fasting is my own and I reward it myself. That's what Allah SWT says. ومن قام ليلة القدري إيمان و احتساباً غفر الله لهم ما تقدم من ذنبه و ما تأخر. Or as Allah SWT says, whoever stands on the night of the Qadr in belief and expecting a reward from Allah, he will have his sins forgiven. The Prophet SAW said in the hadith الصلوات والجمعة إلى الجمعة ورمضان و إلى رمضان مكفرات that your prayers each day you pray as long as he avoids major wrong actions. The prayer, the five prayers that you do and then from Juma to Juma Friday prayer to Friday prayer and then Ramadhan to Ramadhan. These will remove your sins. They will remove your sins. As long as you avoid major wrong actions that needs a specific type of tawba. صغائر get removed from wudu, from prayer, from fasting, from Juma, all these things. But the major wrong actions and the Udumah differ on them, but the major ones are well known معلومين الدين طرورة drinking, stealing, cheating, lying, fornication, adultery, all those things that Allah has declared foul. So this Ramadhan is a great gift of this Udumah. It's a time of special gratitude. One of the hallmarks of gratitude is that you share your blessings with others. You share your blessings with others. كان رسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم أجود الناس و أجود ما يكون في شهر Ramadhan كان أجود من ريح مرسلة The Prophet ﷺ was the most generous of men, always. But he was even more generous in Ramadhan. Why? زيادة الشكر The sense of blessing. The gift is a great gift. أقول القوري هذا أستغفر الله ليورك مرسائل المسلم