GUIDANCE—A GIFT FROM GOD

There are so many gifts from God in our lives. We have to try to remember to be thankful for each of them. I think sometimes overlooked is the ultimate gift that makes everything else possible—and that's the gift of guidance.

How does an American woman raised in the Episcopal church find her way into an exotic religion like Islam?  My mother asked me that once, assuming I would name some person who brought me into it, but at that moment I realized without question that it was God who brought me here. The Christian tradition in which I was raised doesn't really allow for God's involvement in our day to day activities. So this was an alien concept to my mother. But with this gift of guidance comes the understanding that God is doing everything; He is running every moment of my life; He is with me continuously. Without His guidance to that understanding, I would have continued blundering without knowledge.

God is so incredibly merciful. He doesn't just tell us we have to worship Him or we won't make it to heaven. He spells out how to achieve this. Then He sends scripture, messengers and individual guidance. He told Adam and Eve and their descendants:

“Go down therefrom, all of you. When guidance comes to you from Me, those who follow My guidance will have no fear, nor will they grieve.” (2:38)

God offers this guidance to everyone. There are many moments in our lives when we either recognize that guidance, accept it and follow it, or ignore it and carry on in darkness. God then enhances that choice. In our contact prayers, 17 times a day, the one thing we ask of God is:

Guide us in the right path, the path of those whom You blessed; not of those who have deserved wrath, nor of the strayers. (1:6-7)

We were all of us in darkness until God guided us into the light, into understanding and knowledge. He tells us at the end of 2:198:

You shall commemorate Him for guiding you; before this, you had gone astray.

Being thankful for that guidance is an important thing for us to remember.

God guides those who seek His approval. He  guides them to the paths of peace, leads them out of darkness into the light by His leave, and guides them in a straight path.(5:16)

Very early in Sura 2, God describes the righteous:

This scripture is infallible; a beacon for the righteous; who believe in the unseen, observe the Contact Prayers (Salat), and from our provisions to them, they give to charity. And they believe in what was revealed to you, and in what was revealed before you, and with regard to the Hereafter, they are absolutely certain. These are guided by their Lord; these are the winners. (2:2-5)

If we are guided by God, we are winners. Therefore, guidance is a gift without price. In many verses, God reminds us of the power of this gift.

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