By I found myself sweating this week. It was to the utmost surprise of the cities surrounding Seattle that every person was helpless on the floors of their houses, trying to block out the heat coming through the window. Without air conditioning in high majority of the houses, every citizen was running from one store to another to find a fan – a rare commodity. This part of Washington, if not the others, are strangers to heat. They live in either constant rain or chilly winds so having a cooling system in the house is never considered. That was an excellent news for me since I was leaving the hot pad of Florida to go to the cool state of Washington for the summer. Little did I know that I was leaving behind a melting heat, with air conditioning units, to a place equally warm without air conditioning.
As Sheikh Hamza Yusuf notes in Purification of the Heart, “Divine order woven in the fabric of existence[….]” We live in a state of self-gratification; everything good comes from us and everything bad comes from God, or the higher power, or just bad luck, when in fact the opposite is true. We fail to realize that our carefully thought out plan can be unfurled with God’s one decree. In this case, the houses were built with an understanding of the low temperatures. And just in a few minutes, every one woke up in awe to the sun rays cascading through their windows.
Time is irrelevant, we need to prepare for the next moment rather than next week. In God’s plan, we might be made kings or find ourselves underneath the sand.
Very thought provoking post. Thank you 🙂
You are welcome! 🙂