Floyd McClung writes:
| How would Jesus respond to Muslims? We know how. He would treat them like he treated the Samaritan woman at the well, the Roman centurion who came to Him for help, and the tax collectors and prostitutes. Jesus would treat Muslims like he treated Simon the Zealot – the Zealots were urban terrorists of the day – he would invite him to follow Him! Jesus would treat Muslims like he treats you and me. With love, respect, and huge compassion and amazing grace.
One of the greatest challenges we face as followers of Jesus in today’s world is how to respond to Muslims and violence in the Middle East. Some believers are fearful that Muslims are our enemy and are “out to destroy our way of life.” Should we circle the wagons in alarm and fear? Should we warn everyone how bad Muslims are and alert people of their plots to “destroy our nation,” as one American believer said to me? No fear! No hatred! No, none for us who follow Jesus. We have a calling from God to love Muslims. They are not our enemy. The real enemy wants us to see people as our enemy. |
He’s right, of course.
But will the average Christian accept that?
I do not agree. I believe the Musilms and especially Islamic extremeists are our enemy. Should they be hated? No. We should do as Jesus told us to do for our enemy. Pray for them, and bless those who persecute you.
Those Christians who fear or hate Islam have no idea of the power of the One God. Islam is no threat to the truth. No Muslim is any threat to a Christian. We lack faith and hope, and because of that we lack love and loving concern for our fellow humans. Jesus had those who would be his enemies, but he made himself enemy to no one because he spoke the truth to them for the purpose of good. We must have the faith and confidence in our God which enables us to have enough courage to love those who are not yet in the truth. Military aggression is not a tool of the Christian, and let us never support such murders, on either side, even passively in our own thoughts.
Who profits from Christians and Muslims, Jews being enemies, murdering each other and not able to speak peaceably together? Not Jesus. Not the Kingdom for God’s glory. Few, few Muslims should we consider as our enemies, people who purposely have turned against God to pursue evil. Even many Muslim extremists, for all we can know, are but Pauls waiting to see the light and receive correction of their path, so that they might be on fire with love serving God according to true knowledge and be no longer under deception and sin.
How badly do we desire these souls for God? What if we knew the future of Christianity would not be in the West that has so largely by choice written God away, and what we have known for centuries as European/American culture, but in the Arab lands and into India, where these “enemies” of ours carry on so barbarically? Do we desire them, as God must desire them? They love God, but are zealous in errors and not according to truth. They need Jesus and they need our love in action. Turn the other cheek, like many other things is not just a physical behavior but demands a certain condition of the heart as well. And this submission of self and notions and preferences to God works miracles that change the world.
If and when the US as a country passes away into time, we Christians and our children and descendants will continue on and do not know where on this planet and among what people this future may be. Muslims fight for many of the same things which the separated Christian cherishes and believes, though without Jesus Islam is as bad or worse than Christianity has been when it does not retain and obey Jesus’ teachings. By God’s grace we know truth; let us pity and love our brothers and sisters who do not yet know. They will know, and let us pray and work that their eyes may be opened while yet on this side of judgment.
The difference between the Muslim god allah and the hebrew/Christian God Yahweh/Chirst is this: allah requires his followers’ sons to die and martyr themselves for his cause, the hebrew/Christian God sent his son to be killed and martyred for our sins. One religion’s foundation is rooted in hate, the other religion’s foundation is rooted in love. Fundamentally these two religions oppose each other. I will go one step further, and I am not the only one who believes this, allah is an evil spirit and has been revealed as anti-Christ.
I too believe that the false religions are created and run by evil spirits. The people who follow these religions, however, these precious human souls, are most often deceived and are certainly not out of reach of God’s amazing grace. I know many Christians who were formerly in polytheist or Islam religions. The spirits of deceit and wickedness are the true foundation enemies, not the individuals remaining in these false religions, most of whom sincerely love and serve God as best they have been taught. We are all descendants of pagans like these, who have not sinned that they were born into geographic regions and cultures where generations pass into the ground with none ever seeing the truth and Jesus. Thank God someone reached out to us and our ancestors with the love of Jesus and God who gives true life. This is our burden as Christians in truth, and it begins with love from clear eyes that take courage from God to love all these who do not yet know truth, as sincerely as we love and pray salvation for our own blood families.
We know that only a minority of people ever respond to the Kingdom message, so it has always been. But if in all of Islam there were only 10 righteous people who would respond, let us be willing to let them kill us and send us to glory rather than see the godless and violent governments under which we live murder them and seal their fates to darkness forever. This is the love I see from Jesus and the apostles and martyrs. Though Muslims are deceived through Muhammad, God knows the level of sincerity directed from each one’s heart. But when we fight and believe we are enemies with one another, this inhibits the truth of Jesus finding a way in. The fighting of men goes on for centuries and who can stop it? There is always some excuse for it. If we made a greater peace with the Muslim world, many of them would see truth and their hearts would incline to it for salvation, and God’s name would be glorified far too much for the liking of the great deceiver. What man is really an enemy for the Christian?? When they are oppressed under spirits of deception, even then let our hope and love for them never falter until the last breath of life leaves their body or ours. Our forebears in the faith did as much for us, and praise God truth is still alive on the earth.