What does God want us to understand?

The following is an article from my dear friend and colleague, Maryam Reimer, who is a long-time student of Sufism and lover of God.

In my spiritual tradition, we believe that God spoke these words through the angel Gabriel (Jibril) to our beloved Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him).

I’ve pondered these words and wondered what God wanted to give us a glimpse of. What did He want us, His creation, to understand?

Was it the vastness of His creation? The shear depth and breadth of His generosity? Does it speak to God’s wisdom? Or, the limitless possibilities that exist for each of us on any given day? I believe the simple answer is yes.

It’s hard to remember the first time I read or heard these words, but I’m sure my response was something like, “That makes no sense. How can everyone get what they want and not reduce what’s available to the rest of the world? If you give 100 people new cars, there has to be fewer new cars to give everyone else.”

I’m sure everyone who reads this can see the flaws in my logic. Or, put another way, I was looking to the finite world of the creation rather that the infinite world of the Creator during the initial stages of my search to find understanding.

Once I began to approach these words with the limited understanding of the limitless capacity of Allah, I began to see the truth and could start to unpack the wisdom contained within. The real challenge is that our minds cannot grasp the expansiveness of the Divine’s world, not to mention the unlimited capacity, generosity, and abundance of the Creator.

When I began to search for understanding through my heart, the glimpses of understanding started to glimmer, and I started asking some questions.

If the Divine is the creator of all things, why can’t He merely create another 100 cars? And, 100 after that, and so on. Let’s ponder that for a moment.

It doesn’t mean that I will be given a new car. It does mean that Allah is not limited by the same constraints that limit us in this world. It does mean that the light, love, mercy, forgiveness, health and peace that we are blessed with can grow beyond any limitation that our mind can impose. It does mean that God is able to love all of us to the moon and back to quote a favorite children’s book. God loves us because it is in His nature to love us, not because of us.

Does it mean that we have the capacity in our hearts and beings to receive the amount of love that Allah wishes to give us? Not necessarily, that’s kind of the tricky part. Allah has the capacity to give us a limitless amount of love without reducing what He is able to give to our brothers and sisters, but we need to be in a state where we are able to receive it.

Our hearts, souls, and spirits have a limitless capacity to grow. I imagine that you’ve heard the expression that someone is “larger than life” – or you may have had the experience of when a certain person walks into a room that their presence just fills the room even when that person maybe 5 foot and 95 lbs.

Personally, when I’ve had those experiences, it is with people who carry an enormous amount of one or more qualities that the Divine showers on us, and they’ve opened their heart, soul and being to receive. And, it’s hard to receive a gift if your hand is closed into a fist.

Sidi, the guide of our Sufi order, often said in his teachings that you need to give to receive. As with many of Sidi’s teachings and the Hadith Qudsi above, there are layers upon layers of meanings packed into some very simple words. For the moment, I want to focus on how we can use Sidi’s words to go deeper in our conversation.

Gratitude – giving thanks to the Divine or His creation – is always a key. Gratitude can soften our fists and our hearts. With gratitude, small openings start to appear between those fingers – maybe just wide enough to slip in a piece of paper. And, then we can start to receive some of those gifts that are in Allah’s ocean.

I’ve heard it said that when we forget to be grateful, then we open the door to feelings of “not enough” that lead us away from our Source and into feelings of need.

What are your thoughts?

~Maryam

This article is from Maryam Reimer, long-time student of Sufism and Admissions Coordinator at The University of Spiritual Healing & Sufism. Maryam’s passion is to create an open doorway for students to taste from the deeply sacred teachings as they travel their own unique journey to Divine Love, Mercy, and Peace.

Photo Credits: © Vladimir Gurov | Dreamstime.com - Drop of water