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printA Lifelong Journey with Islam
From childhood, I've been learning about—and witnessing to—Muslims.
How should Christians who have a passion for evangelization relate to Islam? For North Americans, the question took on new urgency in the wake of September 11. But Christians in Muslim-majority societies have dealt with the question far longer. Growing up Christian in Syria gave Chawkat Moucarry many opportunities to interact with Muslims and learn about Islam. In this installment of the Global Conversation, World Vision International's director of interfaith relations describes his commitment to both dialogue and mission.
I have never understood why some people look at dialogue and mission in either-or terms. In my experience, these words belong so much to each other that they should never be divorced. Evangelical Christians (whose theology I share) have shown an unwarranted suspicion of dialogue, simply because some have used it as a substitute for mission. Not only are the two words compatible, but they must shape each other.
I have always believed in God and Jesus Christ. Growing up in a Muslim-majority society, I knew as a child that I was different, and I gradually realized that this difference implied that I had something precious to share with my Muslim friends.
I was born into a Catholic home and was an altar boy in my early teens. I attended a missionary primary school, which gave me my first opportunity to discuss religion with my Muslim peers. However, my significant conversations about Christianity and Islam started after I moved to a government secondary school, where the majority of pupils were from working-class families. I was surprised to realize that many Muslim schoolmates were very interested to know more about Christianity and Christians. And I wanted to better understand Islam. A unique opportunity presented itself when the teacher of Islamic religious education granted me permission to attend his class. I was the only Christian there. He regularly asked me to give my views as a Christian on certain topics. These discussions extended outside the classroom.
In Paris, after I graduated in Christian theology, I felt as an Arab Christian a compelling need to relate my faith to Islam. That required me to study it. The need was reinforced after I started working for the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students among Arab and Muslim students. Sometimes they would ask me challenging questions that I had not seriously considered as a theological student. Hence, it wasn't difficult for me to find research topics for my Islamic Studies dissertations at the Sorbonne.
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M. P. Hixson
Love, I am convinced, is the only vehicle by which a Muslim can be touched by the gospel. Without ever showing love how can we expect a person to embrace Jesus the Christ, who is love? So how does one show love to a Muslim? I believe Moucarry gave a wonderful example of how to love an unloved people group: dialoging. When a Muslim senses that what he or she believes, thinks, and feels is valued by us, then they are for sure more apt to be open to relationships and idea sharing. The danger, however, for me is to expect quick results. Being an American I sometimes want result very fast, but with the issue of dialoging with Muslims this simply cannot be an expectation. It takes time, patience, and lots of listening before results (and by results I mean conversion) to take root. Nevertheless, the Scriptures tell us that when love is our method, then Christ is exalted and He will make Himself know to those who earnestly seek Him. We must simply proved a way for people to begin the seeking.
Diji Ladeji
We should love the muslim and pray for their salvation, we shold also make's as our point of duty to take the gospel to the muslim since that is the only way of savaltion. we should pray that their eye may be open to the truth of the gospel. God help our friends muslims all over the world to know you trutly.
R. Bryant
In response to Telliwel Bah post on February 24 it’s true that dialogue can cause us to consider things we may have never thought of before, but is that bad? What is wrong with learning what other people believe about their religion, being forced to think of things that we have never thought of before, and then going away to study the answer? Let’s face it, most of us don’t know the scriptures like we should and if it takes a muslim questioning what we believe to force us to learn more, how is that wrong? We should always be ready to give an answer for the faith we have within us, even if that means saying that we will study it more and give them an answer tomorrow.
Michael Tripet, United States
Polemics is the idea of waging war against the Muslims by attacking their religion. As stated this does not work. This type of response creates more heat than light. So, in witnessing to Muslims we cannot attack them, because they will only attack back. So, we are to love them, just as we do all people. We need to express our love to them. This is what Christianity has to offer that no other religion has, unconditional, self-sacrificing love. This is how we will win the world for Christ. We will not win others to Christ through our persuasive augments of apologetics and philosophy, convincing others of our error. It is by our expression of love. In the book the unexpected journey, Rainer interview Christians who came to Christ from various other religions and cults. The common theme every conversion was that they saw in Christians something different. And that difference was genuine love for each other and for them as a human being and a non-believer.
Jesse Hendrix, USA
This is a response to Telliwel Bah's post that was made on February 24. In it he said that for true dialogue to happen you must be willing in principle to change/modify your beliefs. He then seemed to indicate that this should cause us to be wary of dialogue. I do not think that we need to be fearful of dialogue. If we are confident in our faith and have searched out the reasons for why we believe what we do, then we will be able to handle most objections to Christianity that come up. If an objection comes up that we have not yet encountered it will be good exercise for us to seek out a proper response, both for the sake of ourselves and for the person who posed the objection.
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