Following
Orders

You know,

there are all sorts of things that humans can't do on their own,

but which they can do when they work with other people.

One person may be best to use a wheelbarrow,

but to carry a stretcher takes two people.

And sometimes it takes a lot of people,

like pulling on ropes to hoist a sail,

or to raise a circus tent.

Sometimes lots and lots and lots of people

need to work together to be strong enough,

like in an army.

But when lots of people are trying to work together,

how does each person know what is best for them to do?

How can they stop things from just being a mess,

as everyone tries to do what they think is best.

Usually humans are at their strongest when they all act together

following the orders of a person in command.

Of course not everyone needs to be in an army,

but there are lots of things that we do better as teams,

and usually it is better if a team has a captain.

That way everyone doesn't have to agree about what is the best thing to do,

which might take too much time.

So we pick someone

to make decisions for all of us

and choose what we should do.

So we don't have to be forced to follow a leader,

sometimes we can choose them,

because it makes things easier for us to work as a group

when we have one person in charge.

But sometimes we still don't want to do as we are told,

because we think it would be better for us to do something else.

So we need to learn how to follow orders,

from our parents and families when we are small,

and then orders from teachers and police officers as we grow older.

But the world is full of people who think they should be in charge.

So how do we know who else to follow?

Who can we trust?

Well, that depends on who they are and what we need them for.

We take orders from a lollipop lady because we know we can trust her to get us safely across the road,

but that doesn't mean that she knows the best ways to act to follow the Deen.

And we trust those who tell us how to follow the Deen,

when their example follows the guidance of the Qur'an,

and the example of Muhammad the Messenger.

But, of course, for that we need to learn

as much from the Qur'an and the Way of the Messenger as we can for ourselves.