And if not for a word that preceded from your Lord, punishment would have been an obligation [due immediately], and [if not for] a specified term [decreed]. 129 So be thou patient under what they say, and proclaim thy Lord's praise before the rising of the sun, and before its setting, and proclaim thy Lord's praise in the watches of the night, and at the ends of the day; haply thou wilt be well-pleasing. 130 And do not extend your eyes toward that by which We have given enjoyment to [some] categories of them, [its being but] the splendor of worldly life by which We test them. And the provision of your Lord is better and more enduring. 131 Enjoin on your people service to God, and be yourself constant in it. We do not ask you to provide: It is We who provide for you. The reward is for piety and fear of God. 132 They ask: "Why does he not bring us a (miraculous) sign from his Lord?" Has there not come to them a Book containing the teachings of the previous scriptures? 133 Had We destroyed them with a punishment before this, they would have said: 'Our Lord, why did You not send us a Messenger so that we could have followed Your verses before we were humiliated and degraded' 134 Say, "Each [of us] is waiting; so wait. For you will know who are the companions of the sound path and who is guided." 135