My Mother is in Kuwait

Assalamu alaikoum wa rahmatAllah,
I am not the only Muslim in my family anymore. :) AlhamdulEllah. My mother and I are very close and she was my greatest teacher growing up. From the time I was old enough to walk, I remember listening to her singing Hamd to God and sitting with her as she read parts of the Injil and Taurah and finding her in her room with her head covered on her knees praying and crying. She was so good with all people, and welcoming. She was always helping others and so loving for the sake of God. She rarely missed church to hear the sermon and to go to bible school and only invited me, never pressuring me to follow her examples.

When I became a teenager, the bible became alive to me. What was once a book of stories with morals, and difficult words, became a live manual for my life. It was what I opened to find comfort and peace when tormented by one problem or another. It was what I opened when I needed to learn how to act in different situations and it was what I opened to learn more about God and how I could love him more and serve him better in my life. But something was off. I became very committed to attending church and bible school yet the more I learned and grew spiritually, the more I felt like we were missing the mark on something.

Most parts of the bible taught me so many good things, yet I began asking myself why do we need to be saved by Jesus when the bible clearly states we have forgiveness from God if we just repent and believe in Him? Even Jesus himself taught this. I felt strange and confused worshiping both God and Jesus. I had no problem understanding the logic based on faith for seeing God and Jesus as one, but I just didn't see why this had to be. I began worshiping God alone when others would be worshipping Jesus' name in hamd, I would focus on just the name of God.

When I would worship Jesus, I felt as though in a way I was offending Jesus and taking away from the message he was brought here to give. Even when I had read the bible many times and reflected on Jesus' words, the idea of ascribing others to God just seemed unnecessary and only seemed to further confuse the concept of worshiping one God. It was so much easier to just focus on one name on one complete entity of God, not a trinity.

When I began praying directly to Allah and worshiping him without worshiping Jesus, it gave me so much peace and allowed me to grow spiritually more than ever. I loved Jesus and it was great to give him his honor as a prophet of God. I loved Jesus and felt I was dishonoring his name by worshiping him as God. It was the message of Jesus that first brought me to the right path, and what motivated me to keep asking the hard questions, and pursuing truth and justice and complete submission to Allah.

When people would ask me later on, if I was the only Muslim in my family, I would tell them I was not the only, I was the first. I was hoping of course that others in my family would someday also find Islam. However, never did I imagine that so soon on of them would do it, and for it to be my own mother was the greatest gift I have ever had. I had a feeling in my heart she might, just because she loved God so much and wanted so much to submit to Him.

What is interesting is that she converted to Islam when I was halfway across the world from her. When I was back home we used to study the Quran together and she used to ask me questions so I gave her a Quran. When I was in Kuwait, we would save part of our phone conversation for talking about Islam. One night, a month ago, my mother told me that she was thinking she might convert to Islam when she would be in Kuwait with me for winter break. But when she was thinking that, she realized she already believed in one God and that Mohammed was also a messenger of Allah. So she converted on her own. AlhamdulEllah.

When she came to Kuwait for winter break, she prayed Eid salat with me for Eid Al-Adhah. It was a beautiful experience to be able to pray in the mosque with my mom and for it to be her first time. We went to Dr. Mohammed Al-Awthy's home and my mom met his family too. He wanted to interview her for his show for Ramadan.

I am sooooo happy for her. I don't have words to express how happy I am for my mom. There is no word that can do justice for what I feel in my heart. AlhamdulEllah. May all of us find the straight path.