In my last post I wrote of my sin. I guess I just want to shoot out into the electronic ether that I have such joy to have my sin completely forgiven and to know God and his eternal and unfailing love for me, that even in my wretched sin he washed me and made me his child.
Onwards, in Christ’s Name.
I battle my wicked heart. Or do I battle? Do I just go along with it?
Everything today’s about believing in yourself. I don’t believe in myself. I know my heart. I know that behind any religious or socially acceptable veneer, my heart loves myself more than God or my fellow man. And I can’t act before God. Even if I can hide my shame before others, I can’t hide my shame from him.
Thanks be to God that he has punished and taken away my shame and guilt on the cross of Jesus. That’s my hope. I stand before him in his presence as someone washed clean. Forever.
But that knowledge, that hope, must call me forward to a new life. One step at a time…
Sorry to be so ambiguous. I’ve sinned against God again. My sin saddens me. But I know the incredible love of God that’s changed things forever and so I’ve got great joy.
I don’t believe in myself. I believe in God and his mercy.
God has made me his child. Now, Lord, cause me to live like your child. I can’t do it. Amen.
I’ve been continuing to read the Qu’ran, and in the surah ‘Mary’ I’ve discovered this interesting passage:
Carrying the child, she came to her people, who said to her: ‘Mary, this is indeed a strange thing! Sister of Aaron, your father was never a whore-monger, nor was your mother a harlot.’
She made a sign to them, pointing to the child. But they replied: ‘How can we speak with a babe in the cradle?’
Whereupon he spoke and said: ‘I am the servant of God. He has given me the Book and ordained me a prophet. His blessing is upon me wherever I go, and he has exhorted me to be steadfast in prayer and give alms as long as I live. He has exhorted me to honour my mother and has purged me of vanity and wickedness. Blessed was I on the day I was born, and blessed will I be on the day of my death and on the day I shall be raised to life.’
Such was Jesus son of Mary. That is the whole truth, which they still doubt. God forbid that he himself should beget a son! When he decrees a thing he need only say ‘Be’, and it is.
It’s those last couple of sentences that interest me most. Of course God doesn’t need to procreate in order to bring forth life. God only needs to say ‘Be’, and it will be.
This shows some confusion on the part of the Qu’ran as to what Christians actually believe about Jesus as the Son of God. I think there’s this conception that God had some kind of relations with Mary to ‘produce’ Jesus, and after he died and rose to life he ascended and became another God alongside God.
But that’s not what the Bible teaches at all.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.
Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it…(John 1:1-5)
The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14)
No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known. (John 1:18).
God didn’t create Jesus or procreate him. And Jesus isn’t a god alongside God. Instead Jesus is the revealed Word of God – God’s Word given to us not simply in a book, but as a person.
It’s true that Christians call the Bible God’s Word, but that’s because the Bible is all about Jesus. We see Jesus in the Bible, and understood rightly, all the Bible reveals Jesus Christ to us.
When we read of Jesus in the Bible, we see the prefect revelation of God. His 
hatred of all sin and yet his loving, tender mercy. A love that bore the greatest cost. He who reaches out in mercy even to the sinner, the wicked – not turning a blind eye to their rebellion against God, but bearing their guilt and shame on the cross forever and calling them to a new life trusting in God alone.
His compassion on the outcast. His anger against the Pharises, those who felt they could earn God’s approval through obeying religious rules. His healing of the broken hearted and his forgiveness of the guilty. His victory through dying and rising from the dead over the final enemies – our hearts that are concerned more with ourselves than anything else, and the consequence for that – death.
Ultimately on the cross we see the heart of God – burning hatred for the world’s evil and passionate love that would go to such lengths to bring us back; and we see the way that we can know him – not by our good or religious deeds, but trusting in him.
I wanted to blog about Palestine today. But what can I say? I’ve seen images on blogs that aren’t shown in the media. I’ve seen pictures of the horror. I can’t comprehend a world that turns a blind eye to the cruelty that’s being inflicted on innocent people. That knows the sorts of things that are going on but has somehow decided that this particular people is worthy of systematic genocide.
That people use the Bible to justify the slow mass murder just makes it all the more appalling. Zionism finds no justification in the Bible.
None from him who touched lepers all others avoided.
None from him who offered love and forgiveness to the woman made outcast for her sin.
None from him who taught us to love even our enemies and do good to them.
None from him who forgave his disciples who forsook him and his enemies who crucified him.
None from him who gave his life for God’s enemies, to bring us back to God.
Will we let appalling horror continue? How long? How long will nations stay silent? How long will people be left to starve and waste away, women and children, widows and orphans?
I’m sickened, and not least at myself. How have I just coasted along in my comfortable Western life for this long? Complacent to the needs of others.
So I’m asking you out there who know more about this than me…who’ve borne this struggle close to your hearts for so long…what can we do? What action can ordinary people take?
And to all you who think there’s something ‘Christian’ about what’s happening in Gaza…don’t just look to your hearts, deceitful above all things. Look to the Word of God and the Cross of Jesus, to the heart of him who loved you and them. The cross that sees all us people in need of God’s tender mercy, and offers us all the same.
I wanted to share a psalm that I love – actually it’s two psalms, but I think originally they were one psalm – from the Old Testament, Psalm 42 and 43. The cry of a man’s heart to God, and the hope he clings to. I love it.
psalm 42
As the deer pants for streams of
water,
so my soul pants for you,
O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the
living God.
When can I go and meet with
God?
My tears have been my food
day and night,
while men say to me all day long,
“Where is your God?”
These things I remember
as I pour out my soul:
how I used to go with the
multitude,
leading the procession to the
house of God,
with shouts of joy and
thanksgiving
amongst the festive throng.
Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Saviour and my God.
My soul is downcast within me;
therefore I will remember you
from the land of the Jordan,
the heights of Hermon – from
Mount Mizar.
Deep calls to deep
in the roar of your waterfalls;
all your waves and breakers
have swept over me.
By day the Lord directs his love,
at night his song is with me -
a prayer to the God of my life.
I say to God my Rock,
“Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I go about mourning,
oppressed by the enemy?”
My bones suffer mortal agony
as my foes taunt me,
saying to me all day long,
“Where is your God?”
Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Saviour and my God.
Psalm 43
Vindicate me, O God,
and plead my cause against against an ungodly nation;
rescue me from deceitful and wicked men.
You are my stronghold.
Why have you rejected me?
Why must I go about mourning,
oppressed by the enemy?
Send forth your light and your truth,
let them guide me;
let them bring me to your holy mountain,
to the place where you dwell.
Then will I go to the altar of God,
to God, my joy and my delight.
I will praise you with the harp,
O God, my God.
Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Saviour and my God.
Obviously, if you’ve stuck around, you’ll realise I tend to blog fairly haphazardly. That’s a trend I’m trying to reverse. I want this blog to be shaped like a ‘public diary’ – but with a focus…following my exploration into understanding Islam and how it interacts with Christianity, and and my own growing understanding of and faith in Jesus Christ as a result. I haven’t really revealed much of my own heart here. I want to change that. No doubt I’ll be expressing my opinios but also asking my questions…a journey of discovery.
I have a couple of questions about the Islamic view of heaven. I’d love if anyone could help me understand this a bit better. I’ve found it hard to find out what Muslims believe about heaven, and would love to understand more!
Firstly, what is the basis of acceptance into heaven spoken of in the Qu’ran? As I read the Qu’ran, Allah seems to say that it’s the righteous, the good who will be accepted into heaven. My question is, how good do you have to be? I have spoken to Muslims who believe they will be accepted into heaven, but have heard of many more, including the 2 caliphs Abu bakar and Umar, who were uncertain whether they would be accepted by Allah. If the Islamic doctrine of Allah’s total freedom and sovereignty mean he can never be ‘pinned down’ so to speak, is there ever any basis for knowing how he wil act?
My second question is, in Islamic belief, if a faithful Muslim enters paradise, will he find Allah there? Or does Allah’s total otherness mean no one can be in his presence even in heaven?
I’m a little confused about these points, I’d love to understand what Islam teaches about them.
I love the cross of Jesus. All my hope is found in this horrible, shameful ancient tool of torture and execution. I have been writing this blog about Islam and Christianity, but I haven’t yet set out to write about the single most central, most wonderful teaching of the Bible; most loved by Christians, most misunderstood, or even reviled idea by so many others. The only reason for that is I wanted to clearly explain a few ideas that might help clarify this: the crucifixion of Jesus.
Understand the crucifixion of Jesus and you understand Christianity, whether you love it or hate it. Don’t worry about 2000 yrs of church history, of institutions and practices, or anything like that. Those things are important if you want to understand the history of the church. But if you want to understand Christianity itself you need to understand Jesus. And if you want to understand Jesus, you need to understand the cross. Some might want to write off immediately what I say. I encourage you to at least think about it.
The crucifixion of Jesus is rejected by Islam as ever happening. The reason is simple – crucifixion is such a horrible and shameful death, that God would most certainly never allow one of his prophets to suffer it.
But the cross of Jesus is the source of all my hope and joy and I’ll cling to it till death! And I want to explain why. If you want to understand Christianity then understand the cross.
God is holy. God is pure. And God hates everything evil and impure. Everything. Everything that’s sinful. Think about it. What kind of good God would accept everything in me that’s shameful, that’s evil, that disobeys him? For sin, haram, according to the Bible, isn’t simply wrong actions we do, but a wrong heart that puts ourselves at the centre of our own lives, which results in wrong actions. That’s the greatest haram of all. I know there is so much sin in my life. I know also this: that I will never be able to come before God and offer anything good of myself, that will come anywhere close to outweighing the sin, the haram, of my heart, or paying for it.
I know (although in my sin I often tell myself otherwise) that there is nothing I can be proud of. Nothing about which I can say to God, ’see, this is what I’ve done, and it’s worthy of you giving me heaven’. Nothing that could make him think I’m good enough to receive such a gift. Whether I wanted to believe God rewards people as they deserve or simply gives heaven as he pleases, I know that in fact God burned in white hot anger at all my sin, and he could never taint is beautiful holiness by allowing my corrupted, sinful self into his presence, without tainting himself and becoming unjust. Whether hell is literally full of fire I don’t know. This is what I know – hell is spending eternity away from God’s presence, and that is the worst punishment of all.
But keep reading…
Because the cross of Jesus is my hope. What I could never do for myself God has done for me in love. The burning anger of God at my sin doesn’t contradict any notion of his being merciful. His burning anger shows how amazing his mercy truly is, at loving the person who’d become such an enemy to him. And forgiving me and accepting me isn’t as simple and easy as simply forgetting about my sin (this isn’t because God isn’t powerful, but because he is holy – completely separate from anything sinful and impure). My sin must be punished, my haram must be destroyed. What good God would allow sin to go undealt with?
But in his great mercy, his boundless mercy, God the Son (read here to understand this idea better – no, God didn’t have relations with a woman!) came into human flesh, Jesus Christ, and bore the punishment due to me, due to us, on himself. He bore it on the most shameful and cruel death known – the cross. He could bear it where we couldn’t, and pass through it, because he, and only he, is the true ‘Son of God’ .
When Jesus, the pure innocent one, bore my punishment on the cross, an amazing transaction took place. My guilt was placed on him. And his innocence was placed on me. Because of hs limitless mercy and love for me, not love offered to someone who was upright, but someone who had failed, rebelled, who’d lived as unrighteous, I don’t stand before God and hold out my attempts at righteousness and obedience in order to find God’s favour. I hold out the perfect righteousness and obedience of Jesus himself, and I find God’s unlimited and sure favour. His love will never be taken from me, for Jesus’ perfect obedience will never falter. He went through all that for me even while I was a grave sinner. Because of what he has done I’m completely forgiven and have salvation
And Jesus didn’t stay dead. He rose again showing he has conquered death (as death is the punishment for sin). Think that the cross is too shameful, degrading and humiliating for Jesus? Well, it didn’t end in shame, degradation or humiliation. It was the pathway to glory. And if I trust in him and his death, I don’t need to fear death myself. Instead, I’ll spend eternity with God.
This doesn’t mean that I now simply indulge in sin because I have a free ticket to heaven. Oh, I struggle against my sinfulness, I’m not perfect…but I fight against it. And the reason isn’t in order to try and impress God, or earn anything, but out of thanksgiving and gratitude to such mercy and compassion shown me on the cross of Jesus. We receive this forgiveness, this salvation, by trusting in the cross of Jesus alone for salvation. If we try to depend on our own righteousness, our own goodness, if we offer our meagre attempts, we will be judged by them.
No. I’ll cling to the cross alone.
I was so heartbroken by the recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India. As I’m sure everyone reading this was. Another cowardly attempt to destroy and harm innocent people in the name of God. Not only will killings like this continue, but they will increase and drag our world further down into madness. I hate that innocent civilians can just be going about their lives and all of a sudden it’s all ripped apart for no purpose by mad men who’ve lost all sense of reason.
And so it’s time to talk about holy war…jihad. I know many Muslims hate violence in all it’s forms. We know that in every religion there are people claiming to follow the truth but who deny their belief by their actions. I know that many Muslims think this of terrorists. I don’t intend to make any wild 
claims about Islam and jihad, but if that’s the case I only want to ask a question (and it is a sincere question): What of this verse I’ve read in the Qu’ran? Doesn’t it clearly state that people should kill for Islam?
Fight for the sake of God those that fight against you, but do not attack them first. God does not love aggressors.
Slay them wherever you find them. Drive them out of the places from which they drove you. Idolatry is more grievous than bloodshed. But do not fight them within the precincts of the Holy Mosque unless they attack you there; if they attack you put them to the sword. Thus shall the unbelievers be rewarded. But if they mend their ways, know that God is forgiving and merciful. Fight against them until idolatry is no more and God’s religion reigns supreme. But if they desist, fight none except the evildoers. Surah 2:190-193
I find it hard to reconcile this with moderate Muslims’ claims that jihad is all about a personal, spiritual struggle towards personal obedience. And considering they’re meant to have the same message, I also find it impossible to reconcile with Jesus’ own teaching:
You have heard it was said ‘eye for eye and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.
You have that heard it was said, ‘Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you: Love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you, that you might be sons of your Father in heaven. Matthew 5:38-45
Of course this raises the question: What about God in the Old Testament? Doesn’t he order the killing of many people, even whole nations? Doesn’t this mean that the Qu’ran continues the tradition of the Abrahamic faith more than the New Testament?
It’s definitely true that God calls on his people Israel to be his instruments of his Judgement in the Old Testement. One thing both Christians and Muslims agree on is that God is holy, that he hates sin and he will judge it. The Bible is an unfolding story, and we need to read it as such. In my last post I talked about the Biblical idea of the ‘Son of God’ and how this idea unfolded and developed throughout the Bible, from Israel the nation being called as God’s son, meaning a certain type of relationship with God and role, to their failure to live that out properly, and so Jesus fulfilling it perfectly. Well, as I understand it, part of this role of being ‘the son of God’ seems to have been to be God’s instrument of judgement. God would judge the sinful world through his son. Which is why in the Old Testament Israel are called on to bring God’s judgement to the nations. But of course, Israel failed to live out their lives as God’s people without sin, and so had to be judged themselves! But as Jesus has perfectly obeyed the Father and rules as Lord, he is God’s instrument of judgement. We don’t take judgement into our own hands. At the last day Jesus will return as Judge of the world. Is it true even the Qu’ran teaches this? I can’t remember.
But there’s more to it than that. Much more. In the Old Testament God is establishing an earthly kingdom for his people. They struggle against the earthly kingdoms that are opposed to God. However this whole history is a big lesson from God of how flawed any earthly kingdom will be. This is because of sin in the human heart. We see it when we look at the mess of people’s lives and all our sin.
Jesus came to establish the Kingdom of God over the earth, but he says in John 18:36 – ‘My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jews. But now my kingdom is from another place.’
And in Matthew 4:17 he’s reported to say ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near.’
So the physical warfare in the Old Testament is a shadow of the true spiritual struggle against sin in our lives and false ideas about God in the world.
The fact is that God still judges evil – our sin and evil. But the beautiful good news is that Jesus bore that punishment on himself so that if we trust in him we will be spared God’s wrath. Jesus’ call to ‘turn the other cheek’ and love your enemy is the call to reflect to others the same kind of love that God has shown us.
And as for the issue of ‘Christian’ violence in the name of God after Jesus – such as the crusades – I’ve already written a post on that issue, and you can read it here.
Again, I haven’t written this post to accuse Muslims or Islam of anything, but to offer my explanation of how Christ’s message of love fits with the Old Testament, so Muslim readers can understand, and to sincerely ask questions of Islam so I can understand.
I look forward to some interesting discussion!
Christians are well known to think Jesus is the Son of God. But how can this be? Isn’t it blasphemy to say that God bore a son?
The answer is yes, and if Christians believed that God bore a Son, or had a son in the same way we humans do, we would be guilty of blasphemy. But we don’t believe that at all. I think perhaps that this common Islamic misconception of what Christians mean when we talk about ‘the Son of God’ goes back to the problem in Arabia that Muhhammad confronted – that Allah was believed to have several daughters who were worshiped alongside him. This pagan notion of God and God’s children that Muhammad rejected is very different to what Christians are referring to when we say that Jesus is ‘the Son of God’.
When the Bible calls Jesus the Son of God it’s referring to two things: both to his humanity and to his being God.
1. Humanity
There are a number of times people are referred to as ‘the son of God’ in the Old Testament. None of these instances in any way infer that God somehow gave birth to them or impregnated a woman with them. What does it refer to?
The 1st person to be referred to as the ‘Son of God’ is Adam. In fact, he isn’t referred to as God’s Son in the Old Testament itself, but in the New Testament, in Luke 3:38. He was the Son of God not only because he was directly created by God without human parentage. Genesis 1 & 2 say that Adam was different from the rest of creation because he was created in God’s image. Humanity was created to show something of what God is like – like the moon reflecting the rays of the sun. Really, mankind was meant to be God’s representatives in Creation. This is why, when Adam and Eve sinned, all the Creation fell into the mess we now know in our world. Adam was created to rule the world under God – to subdue the earth and take care of it.
It’s this role and relationship with God that bears the name ’son of God’. Although the link might seem a bit tenuous from this passage, it’s strengthened as we move through the Bible.
The next time God gives someone the label ’son of God’ is to Israel. It’s not that every Israelite was called God’s son, but the nation as a whole, collectively.
In Exodus 4:22 God says: ‘Then say to Pharoah, ‘This is what the Lord says: Israel is my firstborn son, and I told you “let my son go, so he may worship me.” But you refused to let him go; so I will kill your firstborn son.’
And Hosea 11:1 says (God speaking): “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.”
After all the nations rejected God and invented their own ‘gods’, God rescued Israel from slavery in Egypt and called the nation his son. In designating them as his Son God was calling this nation of people to represent him to all the nations. By following his law rather than pagan religions Israel were to show something of God’s character, his holiness, his love, to the world. But all through the Old Testament we see Israel didn’t do it. They followed the religions of the other nations, they disobeyed God, they worshipped other gods alongside him. Just like Adam, they failed to live as God’s son. They broke the relationship he’d formed with them.
At some point during their history, God gave Israel kings to rule them. The most famous king in Israel was David. In 2 Samuel 7 God speaks to David through a prophet and in vs.12-14 says: ‘When your days are over and your est with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be his father, and he will be my son.’
Again, this doesn’t refer to God conceiving this son, but that he would rule Israel under God and represent God before them and the nations. Unfortunately, David failed many times, especially in committing adultery with Bathsheba, and his son Solomon failed and turned to worship many false gods. after that all the kings in his line became more and more corrupt. All of them failed to live out the role of God’s son that he called them to.
Lastly, we reach Jesus, who was descended from David. When God says in the gospels to Jesus ‘You are my Son, whom I love, with you I am well pleased’, he’s referring to the fact that Jesus has been called to live out that role, of ruling God’s people as the Kings were meant to, and show us God in how he lived. That Jesus is called the ‘Son of God’ speaks of his truly living as the perfect human, living according to the character of God.
2. Divinity
The reason why Jesus could live the perfect human life where all others have failed, is because he wasn’t simply a man. He is God the Son. It seems to me, from what I have read, that when Muslims reject the notion that Jesus is God the Son, they are rejecting the idea that Jesus was a man who we claim has become God, thus adding to God another god. But in fact we believe just the opposite – that Jesus always was the God of the Old Testament, of the Taurat if that helps, who has revealed himself by becoming a man, and living the perfect life, and dying for us, and rising to conquer death. That is why in John 8:58 he says ‘I tell you the truth, before Abraham was born, I am!’. ‘I AM’ was the name God called himself when revealing himself to Moses’. Here Jesus wasn’t claiming to be a man who’d gained equality with the God of the Old Testament. he was claiming to be the God of the Old Testament, revealed in human form. For the one God exists as a relationship of 3 persons – all one God. Although there’s no picture to describe this, perhaps this will be helpful: I said before that mankind was to shine the light of God like the moon might reflect the sun’s light, and, I believe, Muslims believe this about Muhammad too. But Jesus reveals the light of God to us because he’s more like the rays of the sun, than the moon.
For this reason Jesus is also called God’s Son. Because he is God he perfectly reveals Gods the Father to us.
Although such an idea is rejected, not only by Muslims but many other groups, as absurd and irrational, it makes sense on a profound level that at his heart God is a relationship, and reveals himself through this relationship. This explains also why, being made in God’s image was not just about subduing and ruling creation, but existing at our core as relational beings.
Christians believe it’s fundamental to recognise Jesus as God’s Son, not to give him an honour that he doesn’t deserve, but to give to God the honour he does deserve. Think about it. If in fact Jesus was just a prophet, then to call him God’s Son is blasphemy, and giving a man too high an honour. But if in fact God has revealed himself in this way, then to deny Jesus is the Son of God is to deny God his honour. For in fact you are calling God just a man! It is also to miss the point that as Jesus lived the perfect human life he can represent us and intercede for us to the Father! Praise God!
