Dear\nbrothers and sisters, the Salah is the first thing we will be asked about on\nthe day of Judgement. The prayer itself is a worship of Allah SWT and its\nbenefits in this life also are many as is mentioned by Allah SWT in the\nGlorious Quran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The imam mentioned\nSura Baqara, ayat 43 which says:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Establish prayer, pay zakat and bow down with those who\nbow down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Imam\nalso spoke of the following hadith in which the Prophet SAWS is reported to\nhave said:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe first thing for which the Muslim will be brought to\naccount on the Day of Resurrection will be the prescribed prayers. If they are\ncomplete, all well and good, otherwise it will be said: \u2018Look and see whether\nhe has any voluntary prayers.\u2019 If he has any voluntary prayers, his prescribed\nprayers will be completed from his voluntary prayers. Then the same will be\ndone with regard to all his obligatory deeds.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dear\nbrothers and sisters, we live in a time and a place where it is becoming\nincreasingly difficult to carry out Salat. The temptations are ever present and\nthey tempt us to spend our time away from this important act. How many of us\nsay to one another that there simply isn\u2019t enough hours in the day. And yet, it\nis a question of priority and this is to be placed at the top.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We ought to\nremind one anther that the first step to rehabilitation from the temptations of\nthis life comes from returning to the Salah. This is the SOS that our souls are\ngiving out being answered, it is the mechanism that our Creator has given us to\nkeep steadfast on the right path and to both avoid evil and leave evil if we\nhave fallen foul to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dear\nbrothers and sisters, the prayer is vital to our success and happiness in this\nlife and the next.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However,\nthere is another part of salah that needs to be addressed in this reminder as\nit is something that people, especially those born in the west, are part of and\nthat is the quality of prayer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For a lot of\npeople who pray the act of prayer is a tick in the box and it is a cardio\nexercise but it lacks a secret ingredient and that is the \u201ckhushoo\u201d in Arabic\nwhich is humbleness in prayer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And for\nthose unsure whether they have khushoo or not in prayer, it\u2019s one of those\nthings that if you don\u2019t have it, when you are in salat, your mind does not\nswitch off and your worldly thoughts still continue as you pray. This causes us\nto lack focus in our prayer and thus risking it\u2019s validity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This\nreminder concludes with 4 practical tips we can all take away to help us gain\nfocus in prayer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Preparation.\nGive yourself 60-90 seconds before the start of each prayer to flush all your\nthoughts out of your head. Whether this is about work, wife, kids or something\nelse, your brain is one of those things which betrays you in prayer so get into\nthe habit of leaving no thought outstanding before prayer begins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Visualisation.\nAlways try to remind yourself that you are standing in front of Allah SWT.\nAnother way to look at this is, if you are standing in front of your boss or\nyour teacher then you don\u2019t fidget, yawn or mindlessly think of anything else\nbut the meeting you are having. You give that person the respect because they\nare a position of authority over you. The same applies here. You are stood in\nfront of your Creator, the Creator of everything you know and He can see you at\nthat very moment and is aware of your Salah. Use that knowledge to maintain\netiquette and focus as you recite in front of Him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Persistence.\nDuring the salat, you are in a constant battle with your mind to remain focused\non what you are doing. It is the role of Shaitaan to distract you away from\nthis focus so counteract this by doing things that keep your focus. One example\nis staring on the ground in the same square inch roughly where your head\ntouches when you are in sujood. Don\u2019t close the eyes or let them wander onto\nwhat coloured socks the brother next to you is wearing. Another is learning the\nword-for-word meaning of Sura Fatihah and at a minimum the couple of ayats you\nread after Sura Fatihah so that when you read each and every word, you can hear\nit\u2019s meaning in your head and again visualise what you are saying to your Lord.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And lastly,\nyou should pace your recitation, it\u2019s not a race to the finish and by the way\nthe difference between the fastest recitation of salat and the normal-paced,\npleasant and focused recitation is only a minute or two, surely your time isn\u2019t\nthat precious outside of your meeting with Allah SWT that you can\u2019t spare that\nextra minute to recite with a good pace and focus? <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dear\nbrothers and sisters, Salah is the mechanism through which we connect with\nconnect to Allah SWT. By perfecting this correctly we can impact the rest of\nour lives and be a testimony to the call to prayer which testifies \u201ccome to\nprayer\u201d and \u201ccome to success\u201d insh\u2019Allah.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dear brothers and sisters, the Salah is the first thing we will be asked about on the day of Judgement. The prayer itself is a worship of Allah SWT and its benefits in this life also are many as is mentioned by Allah SWT in the Glorious Quran. The imam mentioned Sura Baqara, ayat 43 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_regular_price":[],"currency_symbol":[],"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermon"],"blocksy_meta":[],"post_slider_layout_featured_media_urls":{"thumbnail":"","post_slider_layout_landscape_large":"","post_slider_layout_portrait_large":"","post_slider_layout_square_large":"","post_slider_layout_landscape":"","post_slider_layout_portrait":"","post_slider_layout_square":"","full":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/salahadeenmosque.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/salahadeenmosque.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/salahadeenmosque.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/salahadeenmosque.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/salahadeenmosque.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2841"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/salahadeenmosque.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2841\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/salahadeenmosque.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/salahadeenmosque.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/salahadeenmosque.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}