Tests of Love :) June 6, 2009 at 7:30 pm
I had an epiphany today and I only have a few minutes to post, so I shall be quick:
When we love somebody, sometimes we test that person with difficult situations to see how much they actually love us. Like a girl might say, “What if I had leukemia/cancer, would you still love me then?” Sometimes the girl might pretend to be going through a predicament (or might actually share a real one) just to see if the guy is caring enough to help her through it. If the girl wants to join Doctors without Borders or pursue an outrageous ambition, and the guy refuses to compromise on that basis (and the ambition is halal), obviously he doesn’t love her enough to allow her the time and space to do what means so much to her. Maybe the girl will display her weaknesses, to see if the guy is willing to overlook them. And what if the girl got into a car accident, lost her ability to walk, and has to use a wheelchair permanently…would the guy still love her then? What if the girl’s father is unbearably impatient and will not allow the guy to marry his daughter until he has a stable career and house? Will the guy be willing to wait? This works vice versa in the perspective of the guy, as well.
Parents test their children, teachers test their students, and married couples test each other throughout marriage.
So what does this mean? I realized that God does the same to us! He sends tribulations and trials to test our love for Him and how much we are willing to sacrafice for His sake. If we give up on God and faith, it’s like the guy who gives up on the girl because she has an impatient father…he is not willing to wait and be patient for good later.
Each person has their own struggle, their own tribulation. Some are longer than others, some last years, some last seconds. Some fall into the trap that God is angry with us, or doesn’t care, or is being unmerciful. Yet we forget that God is sending us these trials out of His LOVE for us, and His willingness to test how well we return love back to Him.
Few minutes is up. Back to work. I pray Allah shortens our tribulations and lengthens our pleasures. :)
On another note, my friend Jafrin told me something really interesting. Imam Abu Hanifa had a student…Abu Yusuf…who used to pray Asr (mid prayer of the day) during the earlier time period…the same earlier time that the followers of Imam Shafi pray in…interesting, eh?
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