Name: Ep. 20: Staying Balanced on The Straight Path | Guidebook to God
Uploaded: 2021-01-20T16:00:00.000Z
Channel: Yahya Ibrahim
Description: How do you remain planted on the straight path of Allah? Learn about the three kinds of spiritual balance in Islam.

<p>How do you remain planted on the straight path of Allah? Learn about the three kinds of spiritual balance in Islam.</p>

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The supreme deity in Islam, Allah is the One and Only God, creator and sustainer of the universe. He possesses all attributes of perfection, including mercy, justice, and omnipotence.

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Ep. 1: The Beauty of Faith | Guidebook to God

Ep. 2: The obligation of seeking knowledge | Guidebook to God

Ep. 3: When There Is a Doubt, Ask | Guidebook to God

Ep. 4: We Hear And We Obey | Guidebook to God

Ep. 5: Is It Enough To Only Be From The Righteous? | Guidebook to God

Ep. 6: The Armour of Piety | Guidebook to God

Ep. 7: Hope In The Mercy of Allah | Guidebook to God

Ep. 8: Fear Me If You Are a Believer | Guidebook to God

Ep. 9: Love For Others What You Love For Yourself | Guidebook to God

Ep. 10: The hallmark of a believer | Guidebook to God

Ep. 11: Patience: An act rewarded without measure | Guidebook to God

Ep. 12: Compassion as a Way of Life | Guidebook to God

Ep. 13: Keeping an Open Mind | Guidebook to God

Ep: 14: Optimism Rooted in Reliance of Allah | Guidebook to God

Ep: 15: Don't Let Your Anger Overcome You | Guidebook to God

Ep 16: Righteousness: A Fragrant Flower in the Desert | Guidebook to God

Ep. 17: Truthfulness with Allah, Yourself, and Others | Guidebook to God

Ep. 18: "The Best of You is The Best with Families" | Guidebook to God

Ep. 19: Distributing What Allah Has Blessed You With | Guidebook to God

Ep. 20: Staying Balanced on The Straight Path | Guidebook to God

Ep: 21: Remembering Allah Excessively | Guidebook to God

Ep: 22: Establishing the Best in Character | Guidebook to God

Ep: 23: Make The Qur’an Your Companion | Guidebook to God

Ep: 24: The Power of Forgiveness | Guidebook to God

Ep: 25: The Lifeline Between You & Your Maker | Guidebook to God

Ep: 26: Prioritizing Privacy With Allah | Guidebook to God

Ep: 27: Tahajjud: Finding Light in The Darkness | Guidebook to God

Ep: 28: Inviting People to Good | Guidebook to God

Ep: 29: And Treat Your Parents With Excellence | Guidebook to God

Ep: 30: Returning to Allah | Guidebook to God

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Yahya Ibrahim

We’re all striving to be better people and better Muslims, but sometimes the road to righteousness can be intimidating. We can leave the confusion behind by focusing our journey of spiritual development on the concepts and practices that are most beloved to God.

This series is a guide to building on our preexisting piety by learning about and incorporating the best of deeds and conduct, as described in the Qur’an and Sunnah, into all aspects of our lives.

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This section covers the core articles of faith (Īmān), namely faith in Allah, His angels, His books, His messengers, the Last Day, and the divine decree (qadr). Other related topics, often found in classical theological works, are also found in this section.

Faith

Guidebook to God

 Seeking balance in life, SubhanAllah. To be upright, to be mustaqeem, to establishing istiqama.  The word I like to use for that is balance. SubhanAllah, Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala commands  us in the Qur'an, the very first du'a that we make the Qur'an, we say, ihdina as-sirata  al-mustaqeem. Oh Allah, guide us to the balance straight path. Why do I like the word balance?  Well that's entirely what the meaning of istiqama, mustaqeem is. If you deliberate on it, you  will see that Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala wants you and I not to go to extreme. Ifratun wa  tafreet. Not to go increasing too much or decreasing too much. Not to go too far to  the right or to the left. If you notice, much of the imagery of the Qur'an is that we are  balanced on a straight path where we don't take a meandering, wa laa tattabi'oo khutuwati  al-shaytaan. Do not follow the footsteps of the shaytaan that takes you off the straight  path. That gives you an instability in life. When you think about balance, it's actually  thinking of three things. I want you to kind of consider it. The first type of balance  that you and I try to have is to remain upright. That what we're standing on, if it was to  shake and quiver, that what is standing on top of it doesn't fall down. So if you think  of Jenga blocks or if you made a tower out of your playing card, if the table is firm,  if nobody pushes it, if it doesn't shake beneath you or get moved, then everything kind of  stays upright. But if the ground beneath us shakes, if there's an earthquake in our life,  in our spiritual life, then at times if we are not balanced, we can fall over. And that's  why you hear the dua of the prophets of Allah. Allah records it often in the Quran, but most  prominently in the dua of Prophet Dawud and those who were about to face Goliath. They  said when they saw the insurmountable odds, when they knew that the ground beneath them  would shake, when they knew that they were set on a big mission and big difficulty in  their life, they said, Rabbana thabbit aqdamana. Oh Allah, make our feet firmly planted. Keep  us firmly established. Don't make us from those who fall and sway with the difficulties  that we're about to experience. Don't let the earth that we're treading upon, standing  upon firmly, that if it turns from us, shakes beneath us, that we fall down and collapse  to it. And we make this dua as well. The second type of balance is the balance of somebody  who is crossing a tight rope wire. And if you've ever seen those kind of videos where  somebody's holding that big stick and they're crossing a tight rope wire, they have this  concept of a counterbalance. Why do they hold that long staff? Well, if they begin to go  a little bit too far to the right, they throw weight or they move the stick to the left.  So it counterbalances them and uprights them. And that becomes a very important Quranic  concept that Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A'la sent us the Quran liyaquman naas al-mizan,  sent al-mizan, sent for us the balance of life so that we don't go one side over the  next and we know how to counterbalance ourselves. So if I indulge too much in this way, I know  the good deeds that can bring me back. Innal hasanat yudhibna al-sayyi'at. If I filled  my scales with sinful deeds, I have the opportunity of filling them with good deeds and they will  cancel out, counterweight my mistakes. The third type of balance is crediting and debiting.  SubhanAllah. And this happens a lot with our emotions, right? If you're a taker, if you're  taking more than you're giving, if you're not investing and increasing the amount of  your spiritual capital, emotional capital, if you're always taking, taking, taking, and  if you're not increasing and crediting and crediting, eventually you become bankrupt.  Eventually you have nothing else to pull out because you initially did not put in. You  did not put in the effort. You did not put in the work. You did not put in the time and  the energy and the love that you were supposed to get and put in so as to earn a return in  return. And that becomes a really important concept for you and I, that you and I, we  seek to have balance in life in each of those three occasions. You want to assure yourself  that you plant your feet firm in the ground. How do you remain planted upon as-sirat al-mustaqeem,  the straight path of Allah? How do you keep your feet firm? Well, you increase your knowledge  about Allah. You become aware of what Allah has written, what Allah has asked of you,  what Allah has sent to His Nabi Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. You become sure of the message that was delivered  to the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam by investigating and asking it and memorizing  and writing it and questioning it and finding answers for that which has increased you in  doubt. You become a person who has firmly established themselves because the people  in your life are also established and seeking the same path. You're all on the same road,  seeki…

Guidebook to God

Yahya Ibrahim

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