BLOG 9/13/15. A WORD ABOUT THE CHRISTIAN FAITH AND ISLAM
Anyone who has been hanging around the Christian church for a while has probably heard the classic old hymn: “God moves in a mysterious way his wonders to perform . . .” We are probably watching that “mysterious way” unfolding before us right now in God’s passion to reach the Islamic world. As those who study the missionary mandate to the church (missiologists) have been telling us now for some time, one of the largest unreached people groups in the world is that of Islam. Islamic nations have a way of making it difficult if not illegal to publicly profess Christian faith, and frequently engage in severe persecution of Christians.
Ah! But from minor news sources comes the leaked word that as the situation in Syria and its neighboring nations has become more and more violent, due to the extremism of ISIS, and of the Assad regime, . . . there has unfolded before us this enormous migration of folk into Europe, Scandinavia, and the UK—and as our own president has opened this nation to receive sizeable numbers—to escape the un-livability of their home countries. These refugees are primarily Islamic. And what this minor news source reports is that thousands of them, as they come into Europe and out of Islamic domination, . . . are converting to the Christian faith!
Add to this the word from other well-researched missionary sources that even within the heart of the Islamic culture, that those Islamic teachers/imams, who are students of the Quran, have discovered that the Quran says more positive things about Isa, son of Mary, as a prophet than it does about Muhammad, and have become somewhat contagious with this (though secretly) and in some cases have even instituted study groups, which opens a positive response to the gospel. So it is not at though the current flood of refugees are totally ignorant of the basics of the Christian faith since their own Quran contains clues.
God moves in a mysterious way. It is God’s ultimate design to cause the gospel of the Kingdom of God to be heralded into every people group. Think about it. The refugees are one interesting potential, … but then also most of the world has some connection to the Internet, or to the social media, and therefor have access to the Christian message.
Consider also that Islamic people are not any longer halfway around the world. They live next door. Here in Atlanta, Georgia there has been constructed a large and handsome Islamic mosque right next to the Georgia Tech campus. (We also have Hindu temples scattered around the metropolitan area.) Islam has its radical and destructive elements (ISIS and other extremists) but they are in violation of the teachings of the Quran, just as we have those extremist proponents of a distorted version of Christianity who are also a contradiction, or oxymoron, and who miss the point of the redemptive and reconciling grace of God for the whole human community.
My point here is that this is important for those of us who profess faith in Jesus Christ, and who are to demonstrate God’s love for the world, to have on our feet the shoes of the readiness of the gospel of peace (cf. Ephesians 6:15) so that when Islamic refugees become our neighbors we are able to be those hospitable sons and daughters of the Light, and welcome them into the household of Christian faith. The world becomes very small in this present day, but the whole purpose of the church’s calling and mission is to speak the words of Jesus: “Come unto me, you weary, and I will give your rest, . . . cast your burden on me for my yoke is easy and my burden light.”
“God works in a mysterious way his wonders to perform.”
