The most loving thing you can tell a Muslim is that God loves them, and that his son Jesus Christ died on a cross for them and then rose again that their sins might be forgiven and they might have a restored love relationship with father God.
Of course almost every element of that statement is violently opposed by Muslims, but it is truth which they desperately need to hear nonetheless. They regard Jesus only as another prophet; do not believe God has a son; vigorously deny that Jesus died on the cross and rose again; and do not look upon Allah as a loving father.
So the gulf between Islam and Christianity is great, but it is our job to preach the gospel to Muslims anyway. And as I often have said, we must hold simultaneously onto two responses to Islam here. In terms of creeping sharia and stealth jihad, we have every right and reason as Christians to resist this, and defend the blessings of freedom, democracy and genuine tolerance.
These goods are primarily the result of the Judeo-Christian worldview, and are well worth fighting for. But when it comes to our Muslim neighbours, we are called to love them, befriend them, pray for them, and preach the good news to them.
Thus the mass immigration of Muslims into Western lands is a mixed blessing. In terms of them not fitting in, and seeking to subvert our culture, our values, and our way of life, it is bad news indeed. But in terms of God bringing them to us so that we might share the gospel with them, it is a very good thing indeed.
After all, we are not free to share the gospel openly with them in Muslim-majority countries, so God is allowing them to come here so that they might be exposed to the gospel of Jesus Christ. But tragically most Christians in the West are not taking advantage of these opportunities.
And worse yet, many have fallen for the deception of the interfaith dialogue movement, where everyone is told we all basically believe the same thing, and we just need to get along. Sorry, that is not what we are called to do – we are called to tell them that ‘Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, and that no man comes to the father but by him’ (John 14:6). But I discuss this elsewhere: https://billmuehlenberg.com/category/interfaith-dialogue/
Here I want to finish with more good news. As many of you would know, more Muslims are coming to Christ today than at any other time in their 1400-year history. And many of these conversions are due to dreams and visions. God is working in the Muslim world, and many are finding new life in Christ.
One recent article details this, and is worth sharing portions thereof: “Testimonies of dreams and other encounters with Jesus can’t always be verified because by definition spiritual experiences are personal. Further, in countries where owning a Bible is illegal, Muslim converts are subject to persecution and even death, so their stories are not always documented. But believers who work among Muslims tell of life-changing conversions resulting from dreams. Like martyrs from antiquity until today, believers who have had profound, unexplainable encounters often develop profound, unshakeable faith.”
Here are some of the stories: “Karima, a Muslim, dreamed she was in a car when it crashed. She was knocked out, but when she opened her eyes (in her dream), she saw that Jesus was the driver. ‘Come to me,’ He told her, ‘I am with you. I love you.’ That experience led her to seek out a Christian church, where she responded to the gospel.
“Omar had been locked up and tortured for years in a jail cell in a nation ruled by a dictator. One night a messenger visited him in a dream, telling him he would be set free. Within days he was released from prison and traveled to America where newfound friends reached out to him. When he was given a book with a picture of Jesus on the cover, his eyes lit up. ‘I know him,’ he said. ‘He came to me in a dream.’
“Yasmin was fearful and anxious. She cried out to Allah, asking him to help her, but she remained unchanged. One night while visiting friends in the U.S., she was awakened from her darkness with an epiphany. ‘Walking around the house of my friend,’ she now explains in broken English, ‘suddenly I felt that I was blind, [but] now I can see.’ That terminology, though cliché to most believers, was foreign to Yasmin, who was born in an Islamic nation and was never exposed to ‘Christianese.’
“‘It was very obvious,’ she recalls, describing it as a feeling as if something literally changed inside her head. ‘I felt that it was Jesus who did something to me.’ She later learned her sister—a Christian still living in her home country—was praying for her. Yasmin received a Bible, was baptized and began to grow with her new church family. (Her sister, now in ministry, has also had supernatural encounters, saying that she’s heard the voice of God seven times, ‘like a man beside me, talking to me. Whatever He says to me, it happens to me,’ she describes.”
And another story: “One man in a nation hostile to Christianity says he heard a voice telling him, ‘Find Jesus, find the gospel.’ He didn’t know what Jesus was—a chair, a tree, an animal? But the voice told him exactly what city and house to go to, so he traveled for two weeks, arriving directly at the door of one of only three believers in the city.”
The article finishes with these amazing stats:
“Iran: At the time of the Islamic Revolution in 1979 there were only about 500 known Muslim converts in the country, according to missions almanac Operation World. By 2000, there were a reported 220,000 believers, including Muslim converts. Even children of government ministers and mullahs have been converting to Christ, missions agency Open Doors reports.
Iraq: It’s estimated that before 2003 there were only about 600 known born-again followers of Jesus Christ in the country. By the end of 2008, Iraqi Christian leaders believed the number had risen to more than 70,000. Meanwhile, millions of Arabic New Testaments and Christian books have been shipped into Iraq since the ouster of Saddam Hussein in 2003.
Egypt: Revival is reportedly widespread among nominal Christians within the nation’s historic Coptic Church, whose members number about 10 million. Yet Coptics are under severe attack, according to Voice of the Martyrs. Also, the USCIRF’s list of ‘Countries of Particular Concern’ now includes Egypt, where since January 400 Christians have been murdered, hundreds more injured and multiple churches burned.”
Please keep praying for our Muslim friends. And please keep sharing with them. The interfaith hacks will try to tell you it is “offensive” and “un-Christlike” for us to do so. But just forget them – they are wolves in sheep’s clothing. As I said, there is nothing more loving than sharing the truth about Jesus with our Muslim neighbours. Many will be eternally grateful if we do.
http://www.charismamag.com/spirit/evangelism-missions/14442-when-musiims-see-jesus
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