Before We Truly Return Home

The sun slowly leans towards the horizon.

The best day of the week is drawing to a close.

The sounds of life can still be heard around us, but somehow, on an afternoon like this, the heart finds it easier to be called home.

Home to oneself.

Home to an awareness of age.

And, above all, home to Allah.

Friday comes every week, but none of us has any guarantee that we will still meet the next Friday.

Perhaps that is why Friday afternoon is a beautiful time to pause from counting what we have acquired, and begin to ask:

What have we actually prepared for meeting Allah?

That question brings us to a story attributed to Imam Ibn al-Jauzi, a great scholar whose life was filled with knowledge, preaching, education and writing.

Through his gatherings, thousands of people received guidance. Many people repented after hearing his counsel. Hundreds of works were born from his hand and became a legacy of knowledge for later generations.

But the most touching thing is not those numbers.

Not the number of his students.

Not the number of his books.

Not the breadth of his fame.

What makes the heart tremble is a sentence attributed to him when speaking to his students:

“If you have entered Paradise, and you do not find me there with you, then ask about me. Say: ‘O our Lord, Your servant so-and-so once reminded us of You.’”

Then he wept.

An Ibn al-Jauzi wept.

A scholar whose life was spent on knowledge wept.

A preacher through whose tongue many people returned to Allah wept.

A writer who left behind hundreds of works still feared how his own journey would end before Allah.

Then…

what about us?

If a scholar said that about himself, then what can we say about ourselves, people full of sin and negligence?

If that was the state of Ibn al-Jauzi, then with what do we feel safe?

We whose prayers still often lose their focus.

We who read the Qur’an, but whose hearts sometimes do not read along.

We who utter istighfar, while still nurturing old sins.

We who find it so easy to see the faults of others, yet so difficult to weep over our own faults.

We who feel sad when people do not appreciate us, but rarely feel sad when our hearts grow further from Allah.

We who want to be known as good people, even though in places unknown to people, only Allah knows who we really are.

We who may have spoken so much about religion, but have not necessarily spoken that much to Allah in solitude.

We who give advice to others, but sometimes that advice has not fully penetrated our own hearts.

If an Ibn al-Jauzi still wept, where does our courage come from to feel that we have done enough good deeds?

Truly, the more a person knows Allah, the less he should feel great because of his deeds.

For he knows:

how much worship is tainted by showing off,

how much goodness secretly desires praise,

how much knowledge is not put into practice,

how many beautiful words about Allah leave the tongue while the heart is far from Him.

Perhaps people know us as good people.

Perhaps they call us by noble titles.

Perhaps our names are mentioned with respect.

Perhaps people praise our knowledge, works, preaching, position and service.

But when night comes and all people have gone…

we know there is one reality we cannot hide:

Allah knows us more deeply than anyone.

Allah knows the sincere tears and the manufactured tears.

Allah knows the deeds truly for Him and the deeds that secretly hope for human recognition.

Allah knows the wounds we hide.

Allah also knows the sins that no one else knows.

So how can the heart still feel worthy of pride?

That is why the righteous were so afraid of praise.

When people praised what was visible of them, their hearts would say:

“O Allah, do not punish us for what they say about us. Forgive what they do not know about us, and make us better than what they suppose.”

O Allah… How heavy this prayer is if we truly contemplate it.

“Forgive what they do not know about us.”

For indeed there are many things about ourselves that people do not know.

There are sins that only Allah knows.

There is negligence that He has covered.

There are defects of the heart invisible to anyone.

There are prayers without focus.

There are hurried prayers.

There are unguarded glances.

There are words that once wounded.

There are rights of others that may not yet have been fulfilled.

There are sins that we have even forgotten.

But Allah never forgets.

If Allah were to expose all our faults to people, would they still praise us as they do today?

If Allah were to reveal the entire contents of our hearts, would we still dare to lift our faces with pride?

So truly our honour is not because we are without sin.

Our honour is only because Allah still conceals our sins.

This Friday afternoon…

perhaps we do not need to ask Allah for too much of this world.

Perhaps for a moment, it is enough to say:

“O Allah, I am tired of carrying myself.”

I come with prayers that are not yet perfect.

I come with a heart that is still diseased.

I come carrying sins that I am even ashamed to mention.

I come with an age that continues to decrease, while my provisions are still meagre.

I come not because I feel worthy of receiving Your Paradise.

I come because I have no other door but Your door.

If You reject me, to whom else should I go?

O Lord,

We do not come to You with deeds we can boast of.

We come carrying shortcomings.

We come carrying regret.

We come with hearts sometimes broken by their own sins.

But we come carrying one thing we do not wish to let go of:

hope in Your mercy.

Did You not Yourself say:

Lā taqnaṭū min raḥmatillāh — “Do not despair of the mercy of Allah.”

So even if our sins fill the pages of our lives, we still knock on Your door.

Even if our steps repeatedly stray, we still want to return home.

Even if we once promised and then fell again, we still want to say:

Yā Rabb, lā taruddanā ’an bābik — “O Lord, do not drive us away from Your door.”

In the end, perhaps it is not the quantity of deeds that saves a person.

For who among us can pay for Paradise with his deeds?

We worship with the body Allah gave.

We prostrate with the strength Allah bestowed.

We remember Him with the tongue Allah created.

Even the ability to say “Astaghfirullah” is a blessing from Him.

So with what can we boast?

Nothing.

We are poor before Allah.

And perhaps when a person truly realises his poverty before Allah, that is when the door of servitude begins to open.

There is one more thing that makes the story of Ibn al-Jauzi so touching.

He did not ask his students to one day say:

“O Allah, he was a great writer.”

No.

He did not ask them to say:

“O Allah, he was a famous scholar.”

No.

He also did not ask to be mentioned for how many books he had written.

All he wanted to be remembered for was:

“O Allah, he once reminded us of You.”

Subhanallah…

How simple.

Yet how magnificent.

Perhaps this is the true measure of success in life:

not how many people know our name,

but…

how many people know Allah because they once met us.

Not how many people praise us,

but…

how many people silently pray for us after we are gone.

Not how high a position we achieved,

but…

is there one heart that became closer to Allah because of our presence?

Imagine…

One day our body is beneath the ground.

Our phone is no longer active.

The chair we used to sit in has been occupied by someone else.

Our name is slowly no longer mentioned.

Our photos become mere memories.

Children and family continue with life.

Friends one by one remember us less and less.

Then one night…

in a distant place…

a person raises their hands and says:

“O Allah, forgive him. Through his advice I came to know You.”

How we need a prayer like that.

When our own hands can no longer give charity.

When our tongue can no longer remember Allah.

When our feet can no longer walk to the mosque.

When all our connections to the world have been severed—

it turns out there is still someone sending a prayer to us.

Perhaps because of one piece of knowledge we once taught.

One orphan we once made happy.

One student we once guided.

One sinner we did not humiliate, but gently led back to Allah.

One heart that was nearly despairing, and we said to it:

“Do not give up. The mercy of Allah is still vast.”

And that small sentence became the reason it returned to its Lord.

So, on this Friday afternoon…

do not only ask:

“What have I achieved in life?”

Ask something deeper:

“Who has become closer to Allah because of my existence?”

If no one yet…

then as long as breath remains, it is not too late.

We can still begin.

With one piece of advice.

With one act of forgiveness.

With one act of charity.

With one piece of knowledge.

With one embrace for a child.

With one prayer for parents.

With one message to someone:

“I love you for the sake of Allah. Do not stray far from Him.”

Who knows, the deed we consider small may be what Allah makes the cause of our salvation.

And if this Friday afternoon your eyes begin to moisten…

do not rush to wipe it all away.

Let a few tears fall.

Perhaps these eyes have cried too long over the world.

Cried over loss.

Cried over people.

Cried over disappointment.

Cried over not getting what we wanted.

So how beautiful it would be if this time we cry because of one question:

“O Allah, how will my life end before You?”

Tears do not always mean sadness.

Sometimes they are the heart’s way of clearing its path home to Allah.

O Allah, cover us with Your mercy and grant us ḥusnul khātimah (a good end to life).

O Allah…

If during this life we have been known more by people than by our righteous deeds in heaven, then forgive us.

If we have ever felt great because of knowledge, shrink our ego before Your greatness.

If human praise has made us forget who we really are, return us to the sincerity of a servant.

If our sins have blackened our hearts, wash them with tears of repentance before these eyes close forever.

O Allah…

Do not punish us for the praise people give us.

Forgive what they do not know about us.

And make us truly better than what they suppose.

O Allah, conceal our faults.

Forgive our sins.

Mend our hearts.

And when the time to return home finally comes…

do not take our souls except in a state where You are pleased with us.

If this Friday is indeed one of the last Fridays of our lives, then make this afternoon the moment when our hearts truly return to You.

And if You still give us the chance to meet the next Friday, then do not let us return as the same people.

Make us a little gentler.

A little more sincere.

A little more tearful for Your sake.

A little less in love with human praise.

And far more longing to meet You.

For in the end, we are all walking home.

Some go home carrying a great name.

Some go home carrying wealth.

Some go home carrying titles and positions.

But at the door of eternity, all of it will be left behind.

Our only hope is this:

when we come with empty hands, many sins, and meagre deeds—

may Allah welcome us not because we deserve it,

but because He is Most Merciful.

O Allah, we do not pin our salvation on our deeds. We pin it on Your mercy.

So do not turn us away from Your door.

Do not let our hearts die before our bodies die.

And do not let the world become the last love that fills our chests.

Let love for You be what remains when everything else has gone.