Open Door

12/6/2015                        Muslim man                                   about 45
In five years of outreach and many dozens of conversations with Muslims, I haven't had any refuse outright to talk about our respective faiths.  Until now, that is.  Just days now after the terror attack in California, a Muslim man from Pakistan whom I reached out to at a Walmart at first refused to divulge his faith, then refused to talk further about it.  I have learned to have positive and productive conversations by asking essential questions, being a respectful and active listener, finding common ground, avoiding unnecessary rabbit trails, teaching the Gospel and pointing out key differences with other religions, calling people to repentance and faith, and relying on the Holy Spirit to change hearts and minds.  None of this can happen, however, if we can’t even engage in conversation and relationship in the first place, and I hope the heated rhetoric against Islam in America doesn’t close the open door we have to sharing Jesus with Muslims from all around the world who need to hear about Him.  Biblical Christianity (as opposed to its political counterfeit – “Christendom”), has not been and cannot be spread with the sword, but rather through the lives and words of Christians living out our faith and reaching out to non-Christian neighbors of whatever faith or lack thereof.  Much as we may reject false teachings such as Islam, we are not called to reject Muslims, but to love them enough to reach out to them and tell them the truth about Jesus they so desperately need to hear.