A sermon on the importance of utilizing time in acts of worship.

The Shaykh : All praise is due to Allah; we praise Him, seek His help, and seek His forgiveness. We seek refuge in Allah from the evils of our own souls and from the badness of our deeds. Whom Allah guides, none can mislead, and whom He leaves to mislead, none can guide. And I bear witness that there is no deity but Allah alone, with no partner, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His slave and His Messenger. Allah the Exalted sent him to all creation, to the jinn and the humans, to the worlds, as a bringer of good news and a warner, and as a caller to Allah by His permission and a luminous lamp. He conveyed the message, fulfilled the trust, advised the nation, and struggled for the sake of Allah. So may the prayers and peace of Allah be upon him, upon his family and his Companions, and upon those who follow them with excellence until the Day of Judgment, and may there be abundant peace. As for what follows:
Allah Mighty and Majestic said: So Allah Mighty and Majestic has arranged this time in months and days, and in years and ages. These days and nights are stages that creation passes through, stage by stage, toward the Hereafter, toward the abode of permanence, toward the eternal abode, either in Paradise or in the Fire.
These days are stages from which you travel, from one day to the next, until you reach the end of your journey. And every day that passes for you, indeed every moment that passes for you, moves you further from this world and brings you closer to the Hereafter.
O my Muslim brothers, these days and nights are not empty days and nights; rather, they are treasuries of deeds, treasuries of preserved deeds. They bear witness against you regarding the good and evil you did in them. Blessed is the person who seized their opportunities with what brings him closer to Allah Mighty and Majestic, so that his ending is good and his outcome is praiseworthy. Blessed is the slave who occupied them with acts of obedience and avoiding sins. Blessed is the slave who took a lesson from the fluctuations of affairs and conditions in them, and thereby recognized the profound wisdom and secrets that Allah has in them.
O my brothers, Have you not seen this sun rising every day from its east and setting in its west? Indeed, in that is the greatest lesson. The rising of the sun and then its setting is a sign that this world is not an abode of permanence, but rather it is a rising followed by a setting and a departure.
Have you not seen the moon appearing as a small crescent at the beginning of the month, just as children are born? Then it grows slowly, just as bodies grow, until when it reaches fullness in its growth, it begins to wane and diminish.
And so is the body of man and his life, exactly so.
O Muslims, O my brothers, we are now at the end of the year. We used to look forward to these days, to the end of this year, with the longing of one who is far away. Then we find that it has come in the blink of an eye. And so is our entire life; we look forward to the last of our days in this world and see it as far away, only to find that the rope of hope has snapped and the building of hopes has collapsed.
And then the person spends his working life, then he moves to the life of accountability, then he moves to the life of accountability, visiting the graves, then he departs from them to the abode of permanence. So we ask Allah Mighty and Majestic to conclude our lives, yours and mine, with happiness and martyrdom, and to conclude us with faith and the oneness of Allah. Indeed, He is Generous and Bountiful.
O Muslims:
You are in these days bidding farewell to a past year that has witnessed you, and welcoming a new, bright year.
Oh, if only I knew, oh, if only I knew, if only I could feel what we are bidding farewell to in the past year and what we are welcoming in the new year. Let every one of us account for himself and look into his affair. If he has neglected something of the obligatory duties, let him repent to Allah and make up for what was missed. If he has been unjust to himself by committing forbidden acts, let him abandon them before the term comes and it is too late. And if he is among those whom Allah has blessed with uprightness, let him praise Allah for that and ask Him for steadfastness upon it until death.
My brothers, faith is not by wishing or by adorning oneself. Faith is not by claim or by saying it with the tongue. Rather, faith is what settles in the heart and is verified by deeds. Faith is what settles in the heart until the person has, regarding what Allah has informed him of from the unseen, as if he is witnessing it, seeing it with his eyes and hearing it with his ears. And after that, the deeds verify it. This is the faith. And repentance, O Muslims, is not merely a saying with the tongue. Repentance is not for a person to say, "I repent to Allah," while he is determined to continue in sins. Rather, it is regret for the sins he committed, abandoning the sins and defects he was upon, and turning to Allah by correcting his deed and monitoring the Knower of the Unseen.
O Muslims, I say this to you, and I am the most negligent among you, but I seek forgiveness from Allah and repent to Him. O Muslims, think about yourselves, verify your faith, and purify your repentance, as long as you are in the time of possibility. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) admonished a man and said:
Thus the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) admonished this man, and his admonition to one man from his Ummah is an admonition to the entire Ummah.