A customary act becomes worship when it is performed solely for Allah’s sake:
It is well known that building one’s behavior upon the primary objectives of the Law turns every deed of the legally accountable person into worship, whether the deed outwardly belongs to the sphere of devotional rites or of everyday habits. When a person grasps what the Lawgiver intends for the maintenance of worldly affairs and then acts in accordance with that understanding, he acts only where he has been commanded to act and refrains where he has been commanded to refrain. In consequence, he is constantly assisting creation in securing their interests—by hand, by tongue, and by heart.
• By hand: through every form of practical help.
• By tongue: through exhortation, reminding people of Allah, commanding what is right, forbidding what is wrong, and supplication.
• By heart: by harboring no ill will toward them, believing good of them, acknowledging their finest qualities—even if only that they are Muslim—and regarding himself as insignificant in comparison to them, along with other inward states that pertain to Allah’s servants.
Whoever acts upon these primary objectives does so within himself in obedience to his Lord and in imitation of His Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace. How, then, could actions carried out on such a path be anything but worship in their entirety? By contrast, the one who acts for the sake of his own share merely looks to that share or to whatever serves as a means to it. Such conduct is not worship at all; at most it is something permissible—provided it does not infringe upon the right of Allah or the right of any creature—and what is merely permissible is not, in itself, an act of devotion.
A deed is neither sound nor accepted unless, even in the subsidiary intention, one seeks Allah’s Face:
As for the primary intention: when the legally accountable person pursues it, he thereby aims at everything the Lawgiver intended in that deed—whether attaining a benefit or repelling a harm. The doer’s sole purpose is to comply with the Lawgiver’s command, either after understanding what that command seeks or simply by obeying it; in either case, he is aiming for what the Lawgiver aimed for.
Once it is established that the Lawgiver’s intent is the broadest, the foremost, and the most deserving of all intents, a pure light unmixed with ulterior motive or self-interest, then whoever receives it in this manner has grasped it fully and completely, without diminution or deviation from the Lawgiver’s purpose. Such a person is surely entitled to the reward that follows from it.