Meeting Muslims

I've met many Muslims from pretty much all Muslim countries in the world during my traveling in Malaysia, Turkey, Singapore, etc. and during the time in Cambridge, England where I helped out with a summer outreach a few years ago.

Yesterday I met a couple of Muslim guys, Rashid and Tareq from Kuwait, as we were on the train between Krakow, Poland and Kiev, Ukraine. They were from rich families and were traveling around Eastern Europe. Rashid spoke fine English after having spent six years in the United States, and naturally we talked about Kuwait, the Arabic world in general and of course about Islam and Christianity.

I have a special heart for Muslims. So devoted, so serious, so fun-loving and caring and kind people (this is true for approximately 85-90% of all Muslims...all those who don't attract the big headlines in the news...:-(), yet so misguided in what they believe. Yet so bound by laws and regulations. Yet so foreign to freedom, (eternal) security, relationship to God and knowing him as a loving Father!

I have studied Islam some and know some of the Arabic terms for the things Muslims believe, and this always helps in conversations with Muslims.

Rashid was telling me how he tries to be a good person all the time, and how he doesn't know if he'll go to heaven. Only Allah knows. I shared how I know that I can't live up to God's demands and that I know that I go to heaven the day I die, because Jesus lived the perfect life and paid the price of sin that God required.

Rashid shared how Muslims emphasize that it doesn't matter how much you pray and how much you think about Allah, if you don't do good deeds. Without good deeds, Allah won't be pleased. I agreed that it's important to do good things that God tells you to do, but that God loves me just the way I am and will love me just the same if I don't do a single good thing the rest of my life.

Rashid shared how he hopes that Allah will be merciful to him on Judgment Day, I shared how I know that God is merciful and that I will share eternity with him.

Rashid explained to me that he thought Allah could force anybody to become believers in him if he wanted to, I thought to myself that I'm delighted that God respects free will and gives us a choice to make.

I explained to Rashid how Jesus came down to save us, where all other religions (humanity, atheism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc.) is about us coming up to God through our good deeds or ourselves being gods. He heard it, but he didn't see the wonder, the joy, the gift.

Sadly Rashid has met many narrowminded, legalistic Christians so me talking about freedom, joy and life sounded strange to him.

I pray that God will let me meet many more Muslims. There is 1.3 billion worldwide. God loves them all. Jesus died for them all.

Don't be afraid of Muslims, don't walk away from them, don't believe the stories the media tell you. Love your neighbor, even if she wears strange clothes and even if he has a funny hat on his head. They are not that different from you anyway.

Torben