Turning your "Waste" Into Rewards

Turning Your "Waste" Into Rewards

We bear witness that there is none worthy of being unconditionally obeyed except Allah, and we bear witness that Muhammad ﷺ is his final messenger. We ask Allah to send his peace and blessings upon him, the prophets and messengers that came before him, his family and companions that served alongside him, and those that follow in his blessed path until the Day of Judgment. And we ask Allah to make us amongst them. Allahumma ameen.

Dear brothers and sisters, before I begin my khutbah today, I wanted to mention — especially for those that are watching online and those that have benefited from the sign language interpretation of our sister Rebecca, who of course is not physically next to me but who, alhamdulillah, right on the side is always translating our khutbah — that her husband was afflicted and is in the hospital. We owe it, inshallah, to our sister and to our brother to make du'a for his healing. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala cure him and comfort sister Rebecca and her family and make it easy for them. Allahumma ameen.

This Is Not a Khutbah About Recycling

This is not a khutbah about recycling — as the title might suggest. When we talk about waste, and you might notice that "waste" is in quotation marks — but there is a rich body of ahadith from the Prophet ﷺ that seem to speak to a different time, and things that we often find ourselves unable to relate to because of the nature of how the world operates today.

I came across this beautiful hadith from the Prophet ﷺ that got me thinking about this subject. It is an authentic hadith from al-Bara' radiyallahu ta'ala anhu, where the Prophet ﷺ said:

(Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 1957; also reported in related narrations in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim)

He said: whoever lends an animal to someone so that they can benefit from its milk — keep in mind what I'm saying, because it's very specific for a reason. I want you to think: in that society, if you own a goat and you are not someone who has the means by which you can actually donate entire animals — you can't give away your entire animal — but you have a neighbor, and that neighbor wants to benefit from the milk of it at least, and you say, "You know what, I'm going to lend you this animal of mine so that you can benefit from its milk for however many days, and then you can give it back to me." Think of it in our times — you'd read this hadith and say, "Well, that doesn't apply." But think of it as maybe — and Allah knows best, of course — if you lend someone a car. You don't have the means to donate a car, but you lend them a car to get around for a few days, or something of that sort. Some means by which you are able to benefit them, even though you can't give them what you possess — they can still benefit from what you possess for some time.

So the Prophet ﷺ said: man manaha minhata laban — whoever lends an animal to someone else so that they can milk it for some time. Aw minhata wariq — or lends them a few coins, lends them some money. And wariq here — usually the scholars mention silver — so it's not even the best of currency, but lends them some money, some coins, so that they can benefit themselves with it. A small loan so that they can get through something in the immediate term. Aw hada zuqaqan — or guides someone who is lost. You can't give them a car, you can't pick them up, you can't house them, but you can at least guide them along the way so that they don't waste the time and energy and effort of being lost.

The Prophet ﷺ said: ka itqi nasama aw raqaba — it is as if you are freeing a slave. It is the reward of emancipating a slave. And of course we know the great reward in Islam for purchasing the freedom of someone who is enslaved. So the Prophet ﷺ said that if you do any one of these three things, then you would have the ajr — you would have the reward from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala — of the freeing of a slave.

Three Levels of Selflessness

Now, again — you read that hadith and you think: first of all, it's like when people talk about "back in the day." Generations will talk about the differences of how we used to interact with our neighbors. The idea of lending someone sugar next door, or some salt, or something small — these are things that are unheard of because didn't they just have Amazon Prime? Couldn't they just drop off your groceries within an hour? These are things that become even more foreign to us as time goes on. But think about that society, and relate yourself to these categories, and you'll find that there is a connection here.

What I want to speak about today is a different reflection of the famous hadith:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 13; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 45)

That the Prophet ﷺ said: none of you truly believes until he loves for his brother what he loves for himself. We usually talk about this hadith — as we should — with the greatest aspiration of ithar, of selflessness, and how to be selfless. The ulema have broken this selflessness down into three categories.

The First Level: Give What You Don't Need

They say that the first level is that you give away what you don't need. You give to your brother what you don't need — the extra stuff. The stuff that's laying around in your closet, the leftover food, the leftovers of your garden. SubhanAllah — the amount of ahadith about, for example, letting the water flow to your neighbor, not cutting it off at your garden, letting it flow to your neighbor so they can irrigate their crops as well. You don't cut off the extra from your brother or from your sister. That's the first level of selflessness.

And remember — the first group of people that Allah made an example of in terms of warning, in the Quran, were the people of the garden. Who were the people of the garden that Allah spoke about? A people that inherited a garden from their father, and their father used to leave the crops out, let the poor come later on and pick what they could — their share of the crops. And so what did his children do? Not realizing that it may have been the barakah — the blessing — of that small act that the father used to do, they said, "Let's go out there early and pick everything before the poor people come and try to take it." So what happened? The whole garden was destroyed.

So this level of selflessness — the first part — is just: let the extra go. At least give to your brother or your sister what you don't need. Not even the best of what you have, not even the best of your income, the best of your food, the best of your blessings — give them the extra. That's the first level of selflessness.

The Second Level: Love for Others What You Love for Yourself

The second level — ma yuhibbu li nafsihi — what you love for yourself. You take things into consideration exactly as you would for yourself, for your brother. So you try to give them everything that you want for yourself. And mind you here — Imam — we don't need to lose sight — that brother here is not talking only about your Muslim brother; he is talking about your brother in humanity. So you give to your brother in humanity exactly what you would give to yourself, what you love for yourself.

The Third Level: Preferring Others Over Yourself

And then the third level — which is the greatest level of selflessness — is that you give to your brother even what you yourself would prefer. This is the level of the Ansar, the level of the people of Medina, whom we will be talking about in great detail starting this Tuesday night inshallah. They preferred others to themselves. They actually preferred the Muhajireen — the migrants from Mecca — to their own selves. They gave them the better share of the house, the better share of the crop. And that was the greatest level of selflessness.

Don't Zoom Past the First Category

Now, here's the thing. When we talk about this hadith, we always go to — as we should — the level of the Ansar, the most aspirational level. However, what I'm going to argue today inshallah — in just a few minutes — is: let's not zoom past the first category. There is a spectrum here. There's the zakat — 2.5 percent of your wealth — and then there's Abu Bakr radiyallahu ta'ala anhu, who says, "It's all for Allah; I'm giving it all away." There is a whole bunch of levels in between those two, where you are sinful because of neglect if you don't meet the first part. The Prophet ﷺ would not even let the other companions reach the level of Abu Bakr radiyallahu ta'ala anhu because they did not have the iman, the faith, of Abu Bakr. There is a lot in between there.

And so this first category — the food, the extra food, your leftovers, the extra wealth, your used clothes — these things that people literally consider waste and throw away could actually sustain the world as it is today. The things that we waste could actually sustain the world as it is today. And so I want to speak about this from a mindset perspective. The extra things that we have, that we've gotten so used to being destructive with — and let's forget about "saving the world" right now as in the great aspiration. Let's just talk about the way you approach what you have. The way you approach the gifts that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has given to you.

A Practical Mindset Shift

I said this khutbah was not going to be about recycling — I mean, not entirely about recycling. But even that: you're not going to reverse climate change and everything that's happening, but at least you have a connection, you have a mindset of thinking very deeply about the consequences of your small things — the consequences of the small actions.

So it's a mindset. If you go to your closet and you see things that you haven't worn for a year or two — that means you don't need it. Give it away. And don't just throw it into a bag without bothering to iron it or make it look nice and presentable. Give it away as a gift; do the best that you can with it. You don't have to perfume it, but you could iron it and get it cleaned up and present it in the best way. SubhanAllah — the discrepancy when we asked people to bring blankets for those people that literally freeze to death in Dallas during the winter outages. Some people threw their blankets in, and you could have just cleaned them up. Some people went and bought the newest ones — the weighted blankets. And I can tell you, subhanAllah — the look in the eyes — I'll never forget when one of the workers in the convention center saw a weighted blanket. He said, "Well, this is a weighted blanket!" He started telling the other workers what it was, as if it was the most precious asset in the world. And you might not even be thinking about that when you're just throwing things. But think about it.

Those things that are in your closet — it's actually an assignment for you. I say khutbahs aren't practical — go to your closet. If you haven't worn it for a year or two, give it away. It's time to go. Teach your children that if it's a toy they haven't played with — I don't care how much they love it, what the game console is — if they haven't played with it for a long time, give it away. Let's package it, let's give it away, let's make something special out of this. Your old phone — I know that people try to keep up with the models, and you try to get your trade-in value. You take it to the store and you get this much in return. Your old iPhone could be a new iPhone for somebody else, and it could mean something to them much more than the trade-in value that you get. Do something with it. Your old car — mashallah, we have both Ignite and Ma'ruf taking our old cars, cleaning them up, getting them ready for the refugee population that is here. Give it away. Think about it. If you can afford to do so, make it a mindset that these extras — for us — have a lot of potential in the sight of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and can mean a whole lot to somebody else.

The Memories We Hold On To

And then the last one I want to mention here — what about the memories? You get sentimental. Your old wedding dress — I know I'm getting a little personal now — your old suit from your wedding, your old tux, this old dress, this thing that meant a lot, this little thing that was passed down. Brothers and sisters, subhanAllah — someone mentioned this to me once about the weddings in Gaza. May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala make it easy for our brothers and sisters in Gaza and Yemen — these places where the things we take for granted... There is a practice of having group weddings because people can't afford to do weddings as individuals. So what do they do? You have 50 people get married at a time — 50 grooms, 50 brides. It's really a sight to behold. And someone was saying: you know what, if we took our old suits and our old wedding dresses, steamed them up nice, got them clean, and found a way to send them to one of these places — think about that. Maybe it's an idea that will settle in someone's heart or mind inshallah, and you take it up as an initiative.

The blessings of Ramadan — the leftover food, when it's packaged up properly and gone and delivered to the homeless every single night — it means something special to your brothers and sisters. I want you to think again about your memories, those things that you have that are laying around — the potential of those things, what they mean to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala when you give them with sincerity, and what they mean to the people that you give them to. Turn your occasional memory into an eternal reward with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Take that small thing that you look at every few years and say, "Oh, this was great" — let it be something that you get to stare at with pleasure on the Day of Judgment, eternally and in Jannah, because it is one of the means by which you qualify for the mercy of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.

The True "Trade-In Value"

When you're trying to trade in your car, you think of trade-in value. Pawn shops — even that, at some point, will probably go away. What's the trade-in value? What can I still get out of these things when I've lost interest in the extras anymore — the extra leftovers, the extra food, the extra used clothes, the extra things?

There is a hadith from the Prophet ﷺ — an agreed-upon narration from Aisha radiyallahu ta'ala anha — where he gives this scenario. The Prophet ﷺ said:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 1425; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 1024)

If the woman gives away the extra food in her home — and the ulema mention here that this is just like the first hadith I mentioned: this is not the super valuable stuff, this is the extra stuff we're talking about, the first category — and the assumption here is that she was not the one that earned it. She's at home and she's eating it, and the husband was the one that earned it. So the Prophet ﷺ said she will have the ajr — this woman, in this scenario, would have the reward of what she gave away, even though she did not necessarily earn the income for the food that was there. But she'll have the full reward. And the Prophet ﷺ said the one who earned it will have the full reward as well. And even the khazan — the one who keeps it, the one who preserves it — the one who puts the food in a box and says, "I'm going to be the one that delivers it." The one who stores it away has the full reward.

The Prophet ﷺ said: la yanqusu ba'dhum ajra ba'din shay'an — not a single one of them will take from the reward of the other. One person has the reward of the kasb — the earning. The other person has the reward of the infaq — the giving. The other person has the reward of the hifz — the preserving and transferring of that charity. And Allah counts each particle of it for each one of them fully, without taking anything away from them.

Even Half a Date

That's what it could mean to you, and what it could mean to that person. Another hadith from Aisha radiyallahu ta'ala anha, where the Prophet ﷺ said to her — to set up a barrier between herself and Jahannam:

(Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 1413; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 1016)

Even with half a date — fa innaha tasuddu minal ja'i'i masaddaha minash shaba'an — it settles the hungry in the place of the full. And what that means, according to many of the scholars, is that the sweetness of that date — someone who's very hungry — that half a date is not going to fully fill their stomach. It's not going to fully fill their stomach. But the nutrition of it, the sweetness of it, would at least make it more bearable.

You know, in the Syrian refugee camps — many of you, mashallah, donated what you donated. Those toys that you give out there in those Syrian refugee camps — the kids are not asking what color it is or whether it's the latest model. It's a toy. They will line up and take the toy because that toy to them is the same as an Xbox or whatever it is for your child over here. It means something else to them.

And so that leftover meal for them, that leftover used dress or clothing for them, that leftover blanket, that extra food — think always about the hadith of the Prophet ﷺ: if a person would even take an animal over to their neighbor and say, "Benefit from its milk for a few days" — that is the reward of freeing a person from slavery. And the Prophet ﷺ said to free someone from slavery is to free your entire body from the fire. SubhanAllah — Allah writes it down.

The Mindset of Detachment

So let's take the mindset of the Prophet ﷺ and learn through that — detachment from this world, detachment from greed — and increase inshallah ta'ala in that focus on what these little things could be. May Allah make mountains of reward for us on the Day of Judgment, and may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala allow our hearts to be connected to Him and towards that which benefits us. Allahumma ameen.

Aqoolu qawli hadha wa astaghfirullaha li wa lakum wa li sa'iril muslimeen, fastaghfiruhu innahu huwal Ghafoor al-Raheem.

Du'a

عِبَادَ اللَّهِ، إِنَّ اللَّهَ يَأْمُرُ بِالْعَدْلِ وَالْإِحْسَانِ وَإِيتَاءِ ذِي الْقُرْبَى وَيَنْهَى عَنِ الْفَحْشَاءِ وَالْمُنْكَرِ وَالْبَغْيِ يَعِظُكُمْ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَذَكَّرُونَ، فَاذْكُرُوا اللَّهَ يَذْكُرْكُمْ وَاشْكُرُوهُ عَلَى نِعَمِهِ يَزِدْكُمْ، وَلَذِكْرُ اللَّهِ أَكْبَرُ.