# Can I Escape The Outcome of My Sins? | Why Me?

**Author:** Dr. Omar Suleiman
**Series:** Why Me
**Published:** 2024-03-31
**YouTube:** https://youtu.be/6BDGhex_9vI
**URL:** https://yaqeeninstitute.org/watch/series/why-me/can-i-escape-the-outcome-of-my-sins-why-me
**Topics:** Afterlife, Faith

## Description
When your sins pile up, it can be easy to feel despair. But Allah is always waiting to welcome you back to Himself. No matter what you've done, no matter how long it has been, don't let anyone tell you that you cannot find healing in repentance. Remember the verse in Surah az-Zumar: "O My servants...

## Transcript
**[0:01]** Are your past mistakes coming back to haunt you? Did you mess up too many times to ever hope to escape the consequences of your deeds in this life?

**[0:16]** You know Allah forgives in the hereafter.

**[0:33]** But are you stuck for now with what you've done here? Adam (عليه السلام) cried for 200 years after being expelled from Jannah.

**[1:04]** Yunus (عليه السلام) was almost consumed by the enzymes inside the belly of the whale in moments in which a day could have felt like a hundred years. The burden of sin can be difficult to bear. And the moment that a sin occurs, our destiny can take a turn for the worse in so many different ways.

**[1:21]** For one, we can be deprived of rizq. The Prophet (ﷺ) said, That verily, a man may be deprived of provision by a sin that he commits. And it could be a sinful lifestyle from years ago that you never sincerely repented from

**[1:37]** that's now starting to catch up to you. When Imam Ibn Sirin (رحمه الله) found himself in debt, he became worried and he said, That perhaps these worries are a result of a sin that I committed 40 years ago.

**[1:57]** Sins can even affect our relationships. Some of the Salaf used to say, "Inni la a'si Allah fa ara dhalika fi khuluqi dabbati wa imra'ati" That I transgress against Allah, and then I see the consequences of that sin in my riding animal and even in my spouse.

**[2:15]** What does that mean? That means that things start to not work out at home. Your car starts breaking down. Your work troubles grow. Because the sin is choking those places of blessing.

**[2:32]** Aisha (رضي الله عنها) wrote to Muawiyah when he was the Khalifa, That verily, if a person sins, even those who previously used to praise him will turn against him.

**[2:49]** And Abu Darda (رضي الله عنه) said, Let a person be careful not to cause the hearts of the believers to curse him without him even realizing it. He was asked, Who are these people? And he said, The person who insists on sin, even the ones just between him and Allah.

**[3:08]** And Allah causes the believers to have hatred in their hearts towards him. Now there are times when our sins involve other people directly and have to do with some sort of deficiency in our character.

**[3:23]** Sometimes when you're used to responding to the hardships in your life in a certain way, you get stuck in a cycle of that negative response. So for example, you're used to responding to someone else's emotion with cold silence, or to someone else's disappointment in you with your own anger and frustration.

**[3:44]** And then when you have to deal with the consequences of your previous actions, you may realize that your mistakes had more of an effect on the people around you than you previously thought. And that creates a divide, or it puts a barrier between you and those who are closest to you,

**[3:59]** or it sends you spiraling into other sins. And interestingly, there's something powerful that Umm Darda (رضي الله عنها) narrates about Abu Darda (رضي الله عنه).

**[4:18]** She said, I remember him one time spending the entire night in qiyam al-layl, and he was making one singular du'a, and that was for Allah to beautify his character. So she said, I watched and I watched, and then I waited until Fajr, and I asked him, why is that the only du'a that you made?

**[4:35]** And he said, Oh Umm Darda, if a person has good character, they naturally affect so many people in beautiful ways in a way that they can't be seen. And if a person has bad character, they naturally affect so many people in a way that they would make du'a for that person,

**[4:50]** and he'd enter Jannah as a result. Whereas if a person has bad character, they would hurt so many people without even realizing it, that they would make du'a against him and end up leading him to the hellfire. But sin, even when it involves others, is also just another test.

**[5:08]** And there is a path to redemption here and in the hereafter. And as far as you might have fallen, tawbah is the closest door to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that the believer can enter through. Ibn al-Qayyim explains that the station of tawbah as an experience is incomparable to any other spiritual station.

**[5:28]** Why? He says, that there's a special type of brokenness that happens in the heart of only the sinner, and that brokenness is not brought out with anything else, not with the pain of hunger or intense spiritual training or even the love of Allah alone.

**[5:49]** Sinning and finding Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala again creates something special in your heart. And Allah describes himself in response to the act of repentance in a way that he does not describe himself with any other act of worship.

**[6:09]** He is even more joyous with the repentance of his servant when he turns towards him than one of you would be finding your lost camel with all of your possessions on it. Ibn al-Qayyim (رحمه الله) said that Shaytan was pleased at the expulsion of Adam (عليه السلام) from Jannah,

**[6:27]** not realizing that the diver goes to the bottom of the ocean only to rise up again with its precious pearls and gems. And after Yunus (عليه السلام) literally sunk to the bottom of the ocean in the belly of a whale, Allah said,

**[6:43]** that at that point Allah chose him and made him from the righteous, meaning his rank was even higher than before the ordeal. And while the consequences of our sins are a necessary part of the treatment, we don't have to feel trapped by them. Adam (عليه السلام) enters Jannah in an even higher rank than before,

**[7:02]** and he ends up with all of us as his children. Yunus (عليه السلام) goes back to his people who once rejected him and was shocked to find them rejoicing at his return, ready to finally accept him. And in the acceptance of the righteous is a sign of the acceptance of Allah.

**[7:17]** "Idha waqa'a minka dhanbun fa la yakun sababan li ya'sika min husul al-istiqamah ma'a rabbika fa qad yakun dhalika akhir dhanb quddira 'alayk" When you commit a sin, let it not make you despair of attaining righteousness with your Lord,

**[7:34]** for that may be the last sin that Allah ever destined for you to commit. Just like you may have hurt someone who made du'a against you,

**[8:14]** don't forget that you also had people making du'a for you, and they may have been specifically making du'a for Allah to forgive you. Part of the repentance to Allah is acknowledging all the times you forgot him, and with people all the times you hurt them,

**[8:29]** even if unintentionally. And sometimes out of their love for you, they were hurt by you when you hurt yourself, but Allah and your family are happy when you turn back. And when you start to see the many ways in which your sins have burdened others,

**[8:46]** you may also start to realize that it wasn't just the people closest to you that waited for you to turn your life around and become the best version of yourself. It was also your Ummah.

**[9:40]** Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd. Wa lillahi al-hamd. Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd. Wa lillahi al-hamd. Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd. Wa lillahi al-hamd. Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd. Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd.

**[9:56]** Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd. Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd. Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd. Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd. Allahumma ameen wa lillahi al-hamd.

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