Hi! You've reached a page that's a hold-over from my old site. Come see my new site here!

What about Muslims?

In your LJ article about the Passion movie, you make comments about Muslims needing to see our good works and love. Do you make these comments out of experience in Muslim nations? I served for many years in a Muslim nation, and I will tell you emphatically that it is not our examples of love that melt their hearts of stone, but the clear testimony of the Word. As Jesus promised us, it is by “the word of our testimony and by the blood of the Lamb” that we overcome.

I have a good bit of experience with Muslim people, though none of it in predominantly Muslim nations (yet), so I defer to your greater experience. I am concerned not only about Muslim hearts of stone, but about Christian hearts of stone too, which is why I emphasize our need for good works and love.

In the long run, what I hope we overcome is not Muslims themselves, but sin and the systems (principalities and powers) that enfranchise sin … systems that are clearly active in the Muslim world and – though perhaps in subtler forms … in our world too. Those systems oppress everyone they touch, and I believe the gospel of Jesus is the power of God to set us free, and I’m sure you agree.