We indeed sent many Messengers before you and We gave them wives and children; and no Messenger had the power to produce a miraculous sign except by the command of Allah. Every age has its own (revealed) Book. 38 Allah effaces whatever He wills and retains whatever He wills. With Him is the Mother of the Book. 39 Whether We show thee a part of that We promise them, or We call thee to Us, it is thine only to deliver the Message, and Ours the reckoning. 40 See they not that We gradually reduce the land (of disbelievers, by giving it to the believers, in war victories) from its outlying borders. And Allah judges, there is none to put back His Judgement and He is Swift at reckoning. 41 Those that were before them devised; but God's is the devising altogether. He knows what every soul earns. The unbelievers shall assuredly know whose will be the Ultimate Abode. 42 And those who disbelieve say: thou art not a sent one. Say thou: Allah is a sufficient witness between me and you, and also he with whom is knowledge of the Book. 43