TO MAKE UP FOR OUR HELPLESSNESS

God’s Mercy

GOD’S power is absolute; man’s power before His is as nothing. It is not true to say that the difference between God and man is one of having more power or less power; the difference is one of power and powerlessness. God is omnipotent, while man has not one iota of power.

What if one questions the very propriety of God having created man as a powerless creature? What if one claims that it was not fair of God to have put man in a world in which he has no power over himself, or over the world around him? This question can only be answered if a way is found in which man can completely make up for his helplessness.

Nothing less than complete compensation will provide a satisfactory answer. Added to this, the compensation for man’s helplessness must come from his helplessness itself. It must be the very fact that man has no power that makes up for his powerlessness, for otherwise the answer will not justify the question.

The answer to this question is given clearly in the teachings of the Quran and Prophet of Islam. God has shown us special mercy: He has made supplication sufficient to ensure that we receive. If a person makes a real, earnest supplication to God, then he will find what he seeks. Since man has no power of his own, he has to be given something in order to possess it. God has promised that one who prays for something will receive it. One who presents his helplessness before God in the form of humble supplication will receive compensation for his helplessness. In this way God gives unto man from his own presence.

The Prophet of Islam put it this way: “No prayer is ever rejected.” These words of the Prophet Jesus express the same truth:

Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find;
knock, and it shall be opened unto you:
For everyone that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth;
And to him that knocketh it shall be opened.
Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread,
will he give him a stone?
Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent?
If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children,
how much more shall your Father which is in heaven given good things
to them that ask him. (St. Mathew 7:7-11)