When the Quran speaks directly to you: Tests from Allah and His reassurance

Have you ever opened the Quran and felt that Allah was talking to you directly through its words?

Have you ever wondered about something only to find the same subject addressed in the verses of the Quran you are reciting?

Have you ever felt shaken to the core when you read a verse of the Quran and realize how it fits your situation perfectly? That this is Allah (swt) talking to you? That He is reminding you, reassuring you or giving you comfort?

Allah communicates to us in different ways. Sometimes it is through something we ‘accidentally’ come across. Sometimes it’s a verse of the Quran we are reading. And sometimes it is something someone else says to us that feels like a big ‘coincidence’.

The week before I lost my baby girl, a couple of friends and I had just read these verses in our weekly Quran class in the sequence of verses of Surah Al-Baqarah we were reading since we had started the Quran from Juz one:

O you who have believed, seek help through patience and prayer. Indeed, Allah is with the patient. And do not say about those who are killed in the way of Allah, “They are dead.” Rather, they are alive, but you perceive [it] not. And We will surely test you with something of fear and hunger and a loss of wealth and lives and fruits, but give good tidings to the patient, Who, when disaster strikes them, say, “Indeed we belong to Allah, and indeed to Him we will return.” Those are the ones upon whom are blessings from their Lord and mercy. And it is those who are the [rightly] guided. (Surah Al-Baqarah: 153-157)

Fully pregnant and busy with preparations for our upcoming addition to the family, I hadn’t really given these verses a second thought except that they were part of the lesson we were reading.

When I went past my due date and wanted to strengthen my trust in whatever Allah had planned for me, I was reading articles online about trusting Allah’s plans and I came across one in which a sister wrote about her miscarriage and how she said the words: “Innalillahi wa inna ilayhe rajioon (Indeed we belong to Allah, and indeed to Him we will return)” when she was given the news that her baby had passed away. I skimmed through the article which I had just come upon by ‘chance’ but I didn’t really think much about it. Because, to be honest, who wants to think about miscarriages and babies passing away when pregnant? That’s not even something anyone expects, let alone prepares for.

Fast forward one week and I was at the hospital and the ultrasound technician made a confused expression, stepped away to call the obgyn on duty and those fateful words were said to me that brought my whole world crashing down on me: “I’m sorry but this baby has passed away. There is no heartbeat.”

In the confusion and whirlwind of emotions that I felt, I remember saying a lot of things. I remember saying I couldn’t believe that and that I knew Allah was All-Powerful. He could make everything alright. He could give me my baby back. I didn’t remember but my husband told me later that the first words I uttered when I heard the news were: “Innalillahi wa inna ilayhe rajioon (Indeed we belong to Allah, and indeed to Him we will return)”. Alhamdulillah.

I read a lot of articles and listened to a lot of lectures in the days and weeks following this episode about tests, trials and difficulties in life. And these verses were mentioned in so many of them. I wasn’t reading these verses for the first time, but I certainly had a different perspective reading them now.  Yet I still did not really remember that these were the verses we had done as part of the lesson in our class just a week before I got the fateful news.

We did not have a few classes that month because of my delivery and recovery, but when we finally had our class and I revised the verses we had done in the previous class, I was shaken. I felt like Allah was speaking to me. I felt like Allah had been preparing me with these verses and the articles I had read for what was to come. And when I read them again in this class after the incident, I felt like Allah was reminding me and reassuring me: this life is nothing but a test and we will all be tested with something of fear, hunger and a loss of wealth, lives and fruits. Nothing in this life really is ours to begin with. Everything that we have is an amanah (a trust) that belongs to Allah. We all belong to Allah. What we have and do not have – all of it is a test. We will all be returned to Allah. True success is recognizing this. True success is success in the Hereafter.

The Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ) said: “Trials will continue to befall the believing man and woman, with regard to themselves, their children and their wealth, until they meet Allah with no sin on them.” (Tirmidhi)

May Allah give us the strength and patience to get through the tests He puts us in, in the manner that pleases Him. And may the tests we go through bring us closer to Him and help build a home for us in Jannah. Ameen.

Have you ever had a similar experience when you felt the verses of the Quran you were reading were completely about your situation, directly addressing you or a specific incident? Please share your stories in the comments!