The Bawa Muhaiyaddeen Fellowship
Online Library
What God Wants
A short talk given by M. R. Bawa Muhaiyaddeen from Questions of Life, Answers of Wisdom Volume 2.
Questioner: Sometimes I am confused about
what God wants, whether He wants me to act to make things happen or whether He
wants me to just be quiet and accept what happens.
Bawa Muhaiyaddeen: All right, let's look at it. Now, take a doctor. After medical school, if he becomes a surgeon, he will have access to all the surgical instruments needed to lay his hands on a life. What is his duty at that time? He knows that patient could live or die during the operation. So he may be thinking, "If the operation fails and the patient dies, I will be guilty of murder and go to hell. But if the patient lives, I will be praised." That might be so. But he should not think that he is responsible for the outcome.
There is a Creator who made this body, with all its nerves and blood vessels. Everything belongs to Him, even birth and death. Even all the praise and all the blame belong to Him. The doctor needs to realize that. He must reect on that and say, "O my God, this is Your work. Please come and do Your duty, O God. I am only Your assistant. I am just an instrument in Your hands. It is You who must perform the operation, protect the patient, and save his life or make him die. This is Your duty. I am merely an instrument. The instrument is not responsible for the outcome. The Doer and Protector is You. Therefore You, Yourself, must perform this operation."
My child, you must realize that you are just His instrument, and the responsibility is not yours. Remember that God is the surgeon and you are His hands. If you perform your work in that state, there will be no danger. God will do it. If, however, you say, "I am performing this operation," then the praise or blame will be yours.
If you can understand that the responsibility for praise and blame is due only to Allah, and if you hand over everything to Him, then you will perform all duties as His instrument, saying, "May the Doer be You, O God." Therefore, be the instrument and do whatever you do to the best of your ability. That is the way.