What to Ask Allah
By Nouman Ali Khan | 2026-01-08T18:57:58.041256+00:00 | Topic: Allah
What to Ask Allah - Khutbah by Nouman Ali Khan
Opening Prayers and Supplications
"All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds, and prayers and peace be upon the most honorable of the prophets and messengers."
"O Allah, make us firm at the time of death, there is no god but Allah."
"And make us among those who believe and do righteous deeds and advise one another to truth and advise one another to patience."
"My Lord, expand for me my breast [with assurance] and ease for me my task and untie the knot from my tongue that they may understand my speech."
Introduction: The Fundamental Need for Divine Help
One of the most fundamental relationships we have with Allah is that of asking Him things. We need His help. We need His help in our matters of religion, we need His help in our guidance, in committing to the right way, staying away from evil, of getting forgiveness.
We need His help in spiritual matters, for our iman. But we need His help for everything else in life too. We need His help for our family matters. We need His help for our health issues. We need His help for our financial issues. Many of you are stuck in impossible situations that nobody else understands.
The only one who understands is you and Allah. You even try to explain it to somebody else, they don't get it. They don't understand it. Only Allah can know what it is that you're going through and the trouble that it's causing you. And so, all of us are in one state or another in some kind of difficulty.
The Reality of Human Existence
Allah Himself describes the reality of human beings:
"We have certainly created man in hardship."
We created the human being in exhaustive labor. Either you're mentally exhausted, emotionally exhausted, materially exhausted, workplace exhaustion, you're physically exhausted, tormented, your health is exhausted, your age is exhausted, you know, your wits, you have a problem, you can't find it, you try this solution, this solution, this solution, no solution is working, your creativity is exhausted. We're constantly in a state of كبد.
We're stuck in one place or another or another. This is what preoccupies much of our mind. A lot of the time, you have to force yourself to think positive. Because if you don't force yourself to think positive, and you're just driving around or you have a few moments to yourself, all your mind runs in your head is all the negative things that are happening. Every problem that needs solving, everything that hasn't been done yet that needs to get done. This is what we are preoccupied with.
The Secret to Successful Supplication
And of course, part of our relationship with Allah is we want to be able to ask Him to solve our problems, to ask Him for the things that we need, that we want from Him. What I wanted to start with today is actually the, one of the most important secret ingredients that you and I need to be able to ask Allah successfully whatever we want. And we all have things we want.
And those are secrets between us and Allah. But if you're really gonna be able to ask in a way that you're truly hopeful that Allah (عز وجل) will respond to what you're asking for. There are some things that have to be in place.
And one of the most important things that the Quran keeps highlighting that has to be in place is that you and I have to ask Allah to forgive us first. You have to ask Him to forgive us first. Before you ask Him anything else, anything else that you want or I want, we need to be able to genuinely ask Allah to forgive us.
The Universal Solution: Seeking Forgiveness
And I'm saying today, you know, you might, people ask, which dua can I make for forgiveness? Or what are the best words I can say for this dua? Or you know, people have duas for separate occasions. So, when a woman is expecting, she'll email me or she'll come up to me and say, look, I'm gonna have a baby, which dua can I make right now? Or somebody will say, I'm going for a job interview, which dua can I make right now? Right? There's always this, give me the special dua for the special occasion. Let me tell you, those words are important because they're sacred and they're revealed.
But the dua for all occasions is actually seeking Allah's forgiveness. The dua to open up all of your problems, get rid of all of your problems, the one dua that takes care of everything is genuinely seeking Allah's forgiveness.
The Example of Prophet Nuh (Peace be upon him)
Nuh (عليه السلام) invites his people, you know, for over nine centuries. He's doing constant dawah to them. And at the end of that career, he looks back and he summarizes the message that he was trying to give them. Of course, he didn't have one speech with them.
He didn't talk to them once or twice.
"I called my people night and day."
Night and day, he didn't even take nights off. He's constantly inviting them, constantly inviting them.
And in a surah dedicated to his name, surah Nuh, the surah of Nuh (عليه السلام), he himself summarizes the entire message he was giving his people this whole time. What is it that I want from you?
"Every time I was inviting them, I was only inviting them, calling them to this faith, so you could forgive them, ya Rabb. So you could forgive them."
And then literally he says, here's how I invited them. This is what I exactly said to them, over and over and over again.
"I said, seek forgiveness of your master. Certainly Allah is someone who keeps on forgiving, and keeps on forgiving, and keeps on forgiving. And he does it repeatedly."
The Worst Nation Offered the Greatest Hope
But what he says after that is so remarkable. He said, you people, and I need you to understand who he's talking to. He's talking to one of the worst nations in history.
Nuh (عليه السلام) is described as one of the worst nations of all the nations. Places like Surah Al-Qamar, where Allah describes different nations, or even Surah Adh-Dhariyat, Allah describes different nations of the past that rebelled against Allah, that rebelled against the prophets, and were destroyed. When he gets to Nuh (عليه السلام)'s nation, what does he say?
"And the people of Nuh before - indeed, they were most unjust and transgressing."
The nation of Nuh from much before, they certainly were more wrongdoing, and more rebellious than everyone else.
Like he has the worst condemnation of the people of Nuh. It makes sense, they had a messenger not for one generation, like every other prophet. They had a prophet, three generations, four generations every century, every two decades, there's a new generation of kids, that have grown up.
And he's seen that century, after century, after century, after century. He's seen 40, 50 generations of people, and they've all rejected him. And he's making the same invitation to all of them.
The Divine Promise: When You Seek Forgiveness
So I'm not, the reason I brought this up is for a purpose. He's talking to very, very bad people. He's talking to the worst of the worst.
What offer does he make to them? He says,
"(71:10 Quran) Seek forgiveness of your master. He keeps on forgiving over, and over, and over again. You guys have been messing up over, and over again. Allah keeps forgiving over, and over again. But his offer doesn't stop there. He says,"
"(71:11 Quran) It's actually جواب الأمر here, what that means is, if you seek his forgiveness, then Allah will open up the sky for you, and it'll start pouring on you."
Now that could be a reference to rain. That could be a reference to rain. And ironically, it's not a reference that you'll get flooded. They did get flooded, right? They did get flooded. But Allah is talking about a different kind of rain now. If you seek forgiveness, that same rain that destroyed them, will be the rain that brings them life.
They didn't pray for rain. They didn't ask for rain. Allah just asked them to make dua to be forgiven. But if you ask dua to be forgiven, the sky will open up and start pouring. Now Allah did not say water will pour. Allah did not say water will pour.
He said the sky will pour. Because the sky has a lot more than water. The sky has forgiveness that comes from the sky. The sky has peace, tranquility, faith, your provision, the solution to your problems. They come from the sky. He will open the floodgates, and everything held from the treasures of Allah that you haven't been getting because you haven't been seeking forgiveness is gonna open up.
The Material and Spiritual Blessings
Just ask for forgiveness. You're asking to solve problem A, problem B, problem C. There are problems you don't even know you have. Allah knows that you have them. If you and I just became genuine people of seeking forgiveness, then those problems would start getting solved by divine intervention.
"(71:11 Quran) even enough. You're asking forgiveness. For who? Yourself."
"(Quran 71:10) Seek forgiveness for yourself. He says,"
"(71:12 Quran) And He will extend you by giving you money and giving you children. He will further your good legacy with money and kids. It's not even money that will lead you away from Allah. Because it's in the context of you seeking forgiveness."
He'll give you good money that will lead to you doing more good and benefit you in this worldly sense and in the akhirah sense. And He'll give you good children that will give you goodness while they're alive. They will respect you, show you love, obey you, make you proud.
They will give you happiness when they're alive. And even when you're gone, they'll continue to do good deeds that become a continuous investment for you after you're in your grave. Allah will give you all of these things.
By the way, this is the same two words, money and children. Later on,
"(71:21 Quran) They disobeyed me. And they only follow the people whose money and kids do nothing but cause them more loss."
Money and kids are a means of loss. But when money and kids come from Allah, after you seek forgiveness, they become gain. See, it's the same money and kids. It's the same money and kids. The only difference is, now they have the blessing of Allah's forgiveness on top of them. It's like they were contaminated until Allah purified them with His forgiveness.
The Complete Package of Divine Blessings
"(Quran 71:10) And look, seek Allah's forgiveness, what doesn't open up? The sky opens up in ways you can't imagine. Guidance opens up for you. Understanding opens up for you."
Your personal internal problems start going away. You know, anger for example. Anger is a very hard thing to get rid of. Some people live a miserable life because they can't get rid of their anger. Something is eating inside of them and they're just not able to fight it. So much so, that they recognize, I cannot get rid of my anger.
And I bet Allah will not forgive me because I'm such an angry person. I'm not able to forgive. Sahaba were really angry at the occasion of Hudaybiyah. What did Allah say about the removal of anger? He said,
"(48:4 Quran) He sent peace, calm, tranquility down from the sky into the hearts of the believers. Calmness doesn't come from you. It doesn't come from you and we can't calm ourselves down."
Musa's mother was dying of nervousness, of fear when she was putting her baby in the water. And Allah says,
Had we not tied her heart and kept her strong. Allah made her heart strong. She's not capable of that herself. She's too scarred for that. She's too traumatized for that.
There is such a thing as divine intervention that will help you heal. There are sins that you have, tendencies that you have. Some people are very tempted by fahsha. Some people are very tempted by their anger. They can't control their anger. Some people are overrun with greed, constantly thinking about money.
They can't even help themselves. The solution to these problems comes from Allah. This is how the sky opens up. The sky opens up for things that are deep inside you and it comes and it solves that problem inside you. It cleanses you just like the water cleanses the earth. So
"(Quran 71:12)"
But that's not enough.
He says,
"(Quran 71:12)"
He'll put in place for you gardens and He'll make rivers flow for you. This is Allah's way of saying what will I not give you if you just ask for forgiveness. You and I think when we ask for forgiveness the only thing we're getting is forgiveness.
Allah is telling us when you ask for forgiveness there's nothing I don't give you. It's almost like you can ask for other things or you could just ask for forgiveness and everything's covered. Everything's included.
The Connection Between Hajj and Seeking Forgiveness
What's left? Money, children, the sky's opened up for all of your problems, gardens, rivers, all of it's ready to go. And by the way, seeking forgiveness we're learning now, you would think normally a person would think when they're asking Allah's forgiveness then it's gonna help them in their akhira. It's gonna help them in their afterlife.
These ayat are telling us no, Allah is not only going to help you in your akhira He's gonna help you here in this dunya. Think about hajj. The biggest motivation you and I have for going to hajj and getting our hajj accepted is that our past sins are forgiven.
We get a fresh start. That's the reason you go. You literally go in the clothes you're supposed to be buried in. Even in hajj itself, when we're gonna make the march
"(02:199 Quran)"
Go where people go, follow the people, follow the crowd and seek Allah's forgiveness and seek Allah's forgiveness. The essence of hajj is seeking forgiveness.
That's the purpose of it. That's the fundamental goal of it. And even in that, at the occasion of hajj what do we ask Allah?
Same dua, the dua from Quran that describes what you should do at hajj. Give us good in this life and the next life. In other words, give me a quality of good in this life that guarantees the good of the next life.
There is such a thing. And you can get all of it when you and I are genuinely seeking forgiveness.
The Difference Between Artificial and Genuine Forgiveness
Now I've taken this much portion of the khutbah just to highlight the benefit, the purpose of you and I seeking forgiveness. But we still haven't gotten to how do you do it? Like, what do you do when you seek forgiveness? There is the artificial kind of seeking forgiveness (أستغفر الله أستغفر الله أستغفر الله), which for some people is so artificial, like Ali (رضي الله عنه) who saw somebody doing it and said to him, your istighfar needs istighfar. Right? Because that's just, it's just rolling off your tongue.
I want to tell you there are some things that keep you and me from seeking Allah's forgiveness. It has to do with expectation. Some people deep in their mind have internalized that I have done way too much messed up stuff. Allah probably doesn't like me very much.
Some people even go as far as to say, I've heard them say, Allah hates me. Allah hates me, Allah doesn't like me. Allah is angry with me, I've done a lot of bad things. Allah told me, I knew Allah doesn't want me to do this, this, this, and I did it anyway and I did it over and over and over again. So I'm basically off of Allah's good books. My prayers don't mean anything.
Overcoming the Trap of Hopelessness
And when people internalize that, you know what they do? I'm a bad person, could you make dua for me? Because I'm disqualified already. So you need to make dua for me. Because I'm hoping at least Allah will listen to you. Maybe I have a chance. Because there's no way He's going to listen to me. You seem to have a much better connection with Allah than I do.
Let me take you back, short reminder. Who was the offer made to by Nuh (عليه السلام)? Did Nuh (عليه السلام) made this offer to people that spend their entire night in the masjid and go to hajj every year and fast? And Nuh (عليه السلام) was making this offer to one of the most rebellious nations on earth. Continuously rebellious.
And he said, if you can just come ask forgiveness, not only will Allah give you forgiveness, He'll open up the world for you. In other words, you don't get to write yourself off. You don't get to say about yourself, I'm too far gone.
Seeking forgiveness is not for you, maybe for somebody else, but I'm a lost case. I'm a terminal case. I'm beyond hope. I'm already done for. If anything, my mom will make dua for me. Or this one will make dua for me.
The Danger of Despair Leading to Shirk
And this is where shaitan comes. Shaitan uses that. When shaitan, he takes advantage of the hopelessness of people, and that's one of the doors to shirk. You know that? One of the doors to shirk. Why? Because then religions come, false religions come that say, you're too messed up, let Jesus forgive you. You be good to Jesus, He'll take care of God for you.
You know? He'll be in between. Or somebody will also come, they'll place somebody else in between. Somebody said, this saint, go to his grave. Go ask him, be good to him, put some chocolate in front of his grave, and he'll ask Allah to take care of your problems. Because you're too messed up. You can't deal with Allah, he's too angry with you.
He however was in Allah's good books, so you go through him. This is how shirk opens up. In other words, the essence of our direct connection with Allah, which is what iman is, which is what tawheed is, which is what la ilaha illa Allah is.
The essence of it is, you get to ask Allah directly for what you need, and I'm telling you, I'm reminding myself, the thing we need the most, because it will take care of all of our needs, is seeking forgiveness.
The Heart vs. The Tongue in Seeking Forgiveness
Now, there's a seeking of forgiveness by the tongue, and there's a seeking of forgiveness by the heart. Human beings tend to be defensive.
If I criticize you for something, hey, I saw you said that, why did you say that? I didn't mean it like that. You don't understand what I was going through. Excuse me, you don't even understand the whole story.
Hey, I noticed that you did this, this, this. You get defensive immediately.
"(Quran 75:14-15) بَلِ الْإِنْسَانُ عَلَى نَفْسِهِ بَصِيرَةٌ وَلَوْ أَلْقَى مَعَاذِيرَهُ"
Human beings have good view of themselves, but they make lots of excuses. They keep throwing excuses. If you're gonna seek Allah's forgiveness, you have to find a time, and it doesn't matter if you don't know Arabic, and you only know Punjabi, and you only know Bangla, or Bahasa, or English, or Urdu,
it doesn't matter. You speak to Allah, and you genuinely admit to Him what you've done wrong, and don't make excuses.
The Vulnerability Required for True Repentance
It's really hard to do that. Because even when you stand in the mirror, you lie to yourself. You tell yourself, I'm not that bad. I have reasons for what I did. I have justification, I've been through a lot. But when you're gonna come in front of Allah, you have to forget about justifying.
Because all of your justifications, He knows them already. He knows what you were going through, He knew it was a tough time, this was overwhelming you, that was overwhelming you, I was under a lot of stress Ya Rabb, that's why I drank. Don't give Him the reasons, He knows your reasons better than you do.
You need to come to Him, openly, without any filters, without any hesitation, with no guard, with no shame, like you're embarrassed to even admit this to anyone, but until you completely, openly admit to Allah, how messed up you've been, and how you've messed up, completely openly. And as you do it, let me tell you, as you start verbalizing those things, I would be hard pressed to think, tears are not gonna roll down your eyes. It's impossible for a human being to open up so vulnerable, before Allah, before anyone, and especially Allah, to open up so much, and then not believe, not have tears roll down their eyes.
Because it's a moment of weakness. To the world, you have to show yourself as strong, and confident, and you're just fine. Everybody sees you, and thinks everything's okay. But the only one who gets to know, nothing is okay, there's a lot of problems, is Allah. And you have to open up to Him completely, and then you're gonna be in a position to ask for forgiveness. Then you get to beg in sajda.
Then it turns into something else. Then it's not just astaghfirullah, astaghfirullah, astaghfirullah. It's a real conversation with Allah. It's a real confession with Allah (عز وجل). That's a powerful, powerful thing. Try it for yourself.
Creating the Right Environment for Sincere Repentance
You have to find alone, time alone to yourself. You have to make sure nobody else is listening. You can't even do it in the middle of the night. You get up from the bed, the wife is still in bed, you sit on the side of the bed, Ya Allah, forgive me, and she's listening. You can't do that. Be in the car by yourself, doesn't matter.
Be somewhere alone. This is just your time with Allah. Your alone time with Allah. And verbalize it. Hear yourself say it. There's one thing to just whisper it.
And if you're just gonna memorize a bunch of duas in Arabic, and you don't even know what they mean, and just recite them, if you're gonna keep doing that, and those duas are beautiful, they're powerful, but
if your heart isn't speaking them, your tongue is speaking them, then you're not seeking istighfar yet. May Allah reward you for the dhikr that you're doing, for every harf that you're reciting, but that's not istighfar. Istighfar is something else.
And when these tears come down, when this starts opening up, then the sky opens up. That's when that opens up. There's a connection between those two things.
The Greatest Gift: Allah's Love and Forgiveness
The last thing I wanna share with you, just having hope with Allah. For some people, it's very hard to accept that Allah will actually listen. They've been going through a problem for a long time, and they start assuming Allah is not listening, Allah doesn't care, what's the point of making dua anyway? The first thing is, the greatest gift you will ever get from Allah, you know what it is? Forgiveness.
That's the greatest gift you'll ever get. Whether you realize its price or not. Everything else that Allah says He will give you is an added benefit. Everything else. Now, let me give you an example. I have kids.
Let's say one of my kids made me very upset. He did something wrong. I got very angry. You should not have done that. You should not have spoken like that. I can't believe you did that.
And I scold him. Now that I scold him, he goes home, he goes back, and he was drawing something for me. He was making me a card. A, I love you. And here's a house I drew, or something. He drew something beautiful for me.
And when he drew it for me, who's he supposed to give it to? Supposed to give it to me. But he crumpled it up and threw it in the garbage. And before he threw it in the garbage, his other brother asked him, hey, why didn't you give it to Aba? Why did you throw it away? Aba's so angry at me, he doesn't care about that.
He doesn't really care. He doesn't love me anymore. If I knew that he felt that way, what would I do? Yeah, that's right, you better throw it away. No, I'd be in tears. How did you think I don't love you anymore? Yeah, you messed up. Yeah, you did something bad.
But you're my baby. You can mess up a million times, I'll still love you. Even if I'm angry, I'll still love you. Give me that paper. I'll frame that paper. Forget putting it on the fridge.
I'll put it behind the glass. I'll take it out of the garbage. I'll cherish it forever.
Why? Because I love my child despite their mistakes. Even when they make me upset. That's just me and my child. I'm not talking about me and my child. I'm talking about me and Allah. I mess up with Allah.
I make mistakes. Allah doesn't even scold me. He didn't strike lightning from the sky. He didn't push me into hell. He didn't make my heart stop beating. Every time I lied, I didn't develop an inability to speak.
Every time I ate something haram, my hand didn't become paralyzed. It didn't happen. Every time I looked at something haram, I didn't go blind. He still kept giving. He still kept providing. And I start thinking, well, Allah doesn't really love me anymore.
We used to be good, but now that I'm bad, the love is gone. So what's even the point of making dua to Allah? Nobody will love you like Allah does. Every ounce of love I have for my child, every ounce of love you have for your child or you have for your parents, that love is only a fraction of something Allah put in you.
You're not capable of loving anyone. The love we have is actually revealed from Allah. It's a gift from Allah. And if that's a little fraction of the love between two of Allah's creations, we can't imagine the love Allah has for us. Don't let anybody tell you otherwise.
The Example of Adam and the Path Back to Allah
The only one who believes Allah hates him, and that's it. Their story is over. It's shaitan. He believes it. There's no reason for him to ask for forgiveness. Because he's a lost cause. He's accepted that about himself. If you accept that about yourself, whose footsteps are you following? Think about that.
If Adam (عليه السلام) was in Jannah, you couldn't have a better home than Jannah. And he made a mistake. And Allah (عز وجل) put him on the earth. If he starts believing I have been given such a huge demotion. Allah is so upset with me. He brought me all the way to the earth. How can I ever speak to Allah again? After I've disappointed him so much. One of the first thing, Allah taught him what to do.
How to fix his heart.
You could be in a really good place and you fell to a really bad place. Compared to Jannah, Dunya is nothing. He went from Jannah to Dunya. And as far down as he came, he's still just as close to Allah. Just those words are enough to connect him to Allah.
The Promise of Ramadan and Divine Response
Don't give up on Dua. Make this month, this coming month, even from now preparation, how you're going to make genuine, genuine Dua to Allah. Know that Allah will listen to every one of your Duas.
Is an announcement of Ramadan. I immediately respond to the one who calls on me whenever they call on me. That's the promise of Allah.
And the number one Dua you make, the number one Dua I make is going to be for forgiveness. May Allah (عز وجل) make us a people of genuine forgiveness. May Allah (عز وجل) make our hearts feel the desire, the earnest desire to seek His forgiveness.
May Allah (عز وجل) bless our hearts to move our eyes to tears. And may Allah (عز وجل) open up the doors of His Rizq and His solutions to all of us that seek His genuine forgiveness.
The Protection of Nations Through Seeking Forgiveness
One last thing I'm reminded of, I know I'm over my time. Allah says about nations that He won't destroy. You know? There are nations that deserve to be destroyed and Allah wouldn't destroy them. You know why? Because among them there are people who still seek forgiveness.
Just because there are some people who still seek forgiveness, Allah wouldn't destroy some people, the entire nation. Become people of istighfar, may Allah protect all of us.
Closing Prayer
اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ