I am back in South Asia researching how Muslims respond to illness and the need for healing. Part of my research includes how Muslims view the miracles that Jesus (as) performed by Allah’s (swt) leave. Do some Muslims pray in Jesus’ (as) name? Are they willing to receive prayer if a Christian prays in his name? What are some of the misunderstandings that Christians and Muslims have held about praying in Jesus’ (as) name? These are some of the questions I’ll be investigating and will be sure to post some of the answers I discover.

Often in interfaith dialogue, Christians use the miracles and healings of Jesus (as) as evidence that he is more than just a prophet, but that this is conclusive evidence that he is in some way divine.

From the Muslim perspective, usually the miracles of Jesus (as) are not discounted, but rather are understood in light of God’s permission given to Jesus (as) to perform them.  It in actuality is not Jesus (as), but God acting through Jesus (as) that is bringing healing and other supernatural occurrences.  Often Muslims can be found rejecting prayers offered in Jesus’ name because of the response and beliefs that Christians hold, and the concern that by praying in Jesus’ name, is the pray-er in some way acknowledging a partner in heaven with God?

So far all I’ve given is examples of how Christians and Muslims have viewed this issue, but what do our Holy Books say about Spiritual Healing?

In this series, we’ll be looking at various Islamic and Christian topics regarding intercession, healing and miracles, and how we can better dialogue about these issues among Muslims and Christians.

See here for news article: http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_16026/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=WDo8QTdD

As a Spirit-filled Christian, I have a difficult time reading this news article and reconciling the passion this pastor must feel that he is doing the right thing with my own conviction that Muslims and Christians both need to encounter the Creator and know His perspective on humanity. We need to know God’s love and see Muslims and Christians from His perspective.

I also read Scriptures such as 1 Peter 3:15-16 and wonder why Christians aren’t applying this to how we treat our Muslim neighbors. I think fear has indeed replaced love as the overriding force that governs our interactions. Fear has prevented us from realizing His great love for us and His great love for “the other.”

We all, Muslims and Christians, need to encounter the one true God and know experientially the great, fierce, passionate love He has for us and the true destiny He has designed for us if we will surrender ourselves to Him completely.

I leave you with my own theme Scripture for how I ought to interact with my Muslim neighbors.

1 Peter 3:15 But set Christ apart as Lord in your hearts and always be ready to give an answer to anyone who asks about the hope you possess.
1 Peter 3:16 Yet do it with courtesy and respect, keeping a good conscience, so that those who slander your good conduct in Christ may be put to shame when they accuse you.

Day Eleven

Today I met up with Ali, his wife, and a few others.  We decided to go back to Little India and follow up with people we prayed for last week.

The first store I go with them into we are revisiting the Muslim woman and her family who we prayed for last week.  She was the one who had a hurt back.  Well, today we find out that she actually took off her brace last week because her back felt so much better.  Today we prayed for her neck and also found out the source of her accident.

It turned out that her husband in a rage had thrown her down onto the ground.  So we began to pray for her to have full restorative healing.  Soon, God touched her again and even her neck pain went away.  She was feeling much better.  But, Ali’s wife thought we ought to pray for her emotionally as well, since she had shared how she had received the injury.  We began to pray that God would soothe over this hurt that had been done against her by her husband.

As I prayed for her I got this image of a heart with all these weeds that were encircling it, squeezing it, and trying to destroy it.  I began to pronounce freedom from these weeds, that God would free her heart to feel again, that He Himself would heal her heart.  After we finished, we gave our salaams and left, but I really sensed that she had experienced God’s presence in a more powerful way.  It was great!

Next, we crossed the street and found a blind man who was being led by his son.  We asked the man if we could pray for his eyes to be healed.  He said no.  He stated that God was punishing him for something that he had done wrong in his life.  Ali and I both told him that that wasn’t true, that God loved him and wanted to heal him.  But the man said no, that for some reason he was made this way and he walked off.  I think this was probably the biggest surprise of the day for me.  I don’t think I’ve ever met someone who believed so firmly that God was punishing them and that there was no way that God would want to heal them.  Most people I’ve met so far are willing to do anything to get healed.

As we were preparing to leave a white man dressed in a kurta payjama (Muslim garb for men in South Asia) as well as a prayer cap came up to us.  He said that though he was dressed like a Muslim, he was actually a Christian.  He was handing out tracts explaining the Gospel.  He asked for prayer so we all prayed for him.  I however, wasn’t so sure I wanted to be associated with him since I didn’t know what he was doing.  So after the others left I began to ask him some questions.  Basically, I told him just to be himself.  He doesn’t have to dress in Muslim garb in order for people to listen to him.  But, he wasn’t swayed.  He was certain that he would have more of an audience if he dressed this way.  So, I let him be, but realized just how different our approaches were.

My friends are I were going around asking if we could pray for people and we were seeing people healed.  We weren’t trying to push our religious persuasion on anyone, nor were we trying to be someone that we weren’t.  But I really felt like for the most part, people were receptive to this.  However, as I thought about the Christian evangelist in Muslim garb, I wondered if in today’s world people will listen to him.  I definitely don’t want to knock his boldness, but I wonder if really what we all are hungering for (Muslims and Christians) is an encounter with God not one person’s theological perspective over another.  Although, even as I’m typing, I do think sometimes someone’s theological perspective may keep them from an encounter with God such as the blind man we had met earlier.

And possibly, it is when we encounter God that all our theologies find their place as important, but not superlative.

All for now.

Day Four

Today I met my friend Ali at his home.  We spent some time praying at his home, asking God for specifically who we should pray for and where we should go.  One name I heard God speak to me was “Kumar.”  So, off we went to a place in Artesia called Little India.

We went to a number of stores.  Ali, the more vocal of us, would ask the shop owners if anyone wasn’t feeling well or had some sort of pain in their body.  If there was anyone, Ali, his wife, and I would offer to pray for them.  At the first store there was a woman who had knee problems who after we prayed for her, she felt much better.

Another store we visited, there was a Muslim family working there.  We prayed for the shopowner’s back which was in pain.  She felt much better.  As we were leaving, Ali saw her mother sitting down with a walker next to her.  He asked the owner if her mother had a stroke.  She replied yes.  He then asked her if her mother’s pain was on the left side of her body.  Again she said yes, but now she was looking very surprised.  She asked if we told the future and read palms.

Ali told her he was willing to pray for her and I mentioned to her that the power she was seeing today is not from us, but from God, Khuda se.  He began to pray for her again, asking God’s Spirit, RuhAllah to speak to her.  After we prayed, we said our goodbyes, Khudahafiz.  And made our way to the next store, but as we left I sensed that those in the store had encountered God today in a very personal way.  They knew they were loved by Him.  That’s at least what I could see from their eyes.  It was a great moment.

Right before we were to leave, Ali and his wife stopped at a grocery store to pick some things up for later.  As we were waiting in line, Ali asked the shopowner if anyone needed prayer for healing.  He responded, “Do we have to need healing in order to receive prayer?”  Ali asked if he’d like prayer anyway and he said yes.  Ali then asked him his name, “Kumar” he said proudly.  Wait a minute!  God gave me that name during our prayer time.  So, Ali, his wife and I all prayed for Kumar.  I felt God impressing on me that Kumar is a strong man.  He has a lot of human strength, but that God wanted to give Kumar His strength instead of Kumar just relying on his own.  So I began to pray that for him.  Then I prayed the same thing for Kumar to have God’s love so that anyone entering his store would encounter God’s love.  By the end I and Kumar were both very touched to have met and prayed with each other.  What a great day!

As we left Little India, I remarked to Ali that so many Americans have a naturalistic worldview that makes no room for the supernatural.  It is really hard to offer to pray for these people because they don’t believe in God.  But, what I have found in India is the exact opposite.  Most people believe in God/gods, and so they are open to being prayed for, just as long as you’re not trying to push your religion on them, which we weren’t, so people were more receptive than I had expected.  What an interesting and fun day.  What if every day could be like this one?

Day Three

Yesterday was a little better than the first day.  Still have a splitting headache, still feel very hungry and weak, but sense that I’m on the way out of this stage.  Last night was the weirdest part.

We get home, I’m watching my eldest daughter head off to get ready for bed when I hear my wife fall really hard and then hear our youngest daughter crying hysterically.  It turns out that the dishwasher door had been left down and caused my wife to trip.  She was pretty hurt and shook up afterwards as was our daughter.

Finally we are all ready for bed and I start to sleep.  I have this crazy nightmare that someone is in our house and he’s hiding along the side of the bed.  In my dream I come over and expose him, he looks frightened, but still has an evil look in his eyes.  As I’m having this nightmare my wife starts to hear me and then wakes me up.  She tells me that a few minutes before she thought she heard footsteps in our house.  What’s going on?

I get up, suspicious that maybe my dream wasn’t so far from reality after all.  I inspect the entire house, but when I get to the living room I sense a strong presence of opposition.  I begin to pray and worship God in the room.  I go room to room turning on the lights and just welcoming God to come and make His presence known in our home.  After sometime I sense the presence is gone and I go back to sleep.

After about fifteen minutes, my wife is having a nightmare about some sort of spiritual presence coming over her and overwhelming her.  I wake her up, then we pray and again welcome God into our home and ask Him to dispel any evil spirits (jinn).

About an hour later I am awoken again, this time to a police helicopter that is flying circles over our area.  At least three or four times their floodlight enters our backyard and even illumines our window.  Okay, now I’m wondering if there really is someone in our area and my sensitivity to spiritual things is starting to warn me of potential danger.

So finally after about 15 minutes of the helicopter I get up and take a look outside.  It’s then that I see two police vehicles parked side by side on the street in front of our house.  What is going on?  After some time they drive off too and now I’m left to wonder what this is all about.  Was someone trying to break into our house?  Was my dream a warning or was it something spiritual?

I am really tired and a bit shook up from the night before.  I also realize how often I struggle with fear.  I think this is something God wants to free me from during this time of fasting.  The dreams, the feelings I had in the living room, the police helicopter and vehicles outside, it all adds up to something more than the puzzle pieces we were left with. I’m thankful that God is our protector, our sustainer, and our provider. It is in Him that we trust, not in Man. This reminds me of a great verse from the Holy Books by prophet David (Dawood) (as).

Psalm 121 (NET)
¹ I look up toward the hills. From where does my help come? ² My help comes from the Lord, the Creator of heaven and earth! ³ May he not allow your foot to slip! May your protector not sleep! ⁴ Look! Israel’s protector does not sleep or slumber! ⁵ The Lord is your protector; the Lord is the shade at your right hand. ⁶ The sun will not harm you by day, or the moon by night. ⁷ The Lord will protect you from all harm; he will protect your life. ⁸ The Lord will protect you in all you do, now and forevermore.

Blessings!

Day Two

I have to admit that already there have been tests.  Looking back, I should have stopped all caffeine drinks a week before this fast.  So, not only was my stomach adjusting to the lack of food, but I also had a splitting headache all day from the absence of caffeine.  It was almost too much!

Usually when I’m busy with my studies, I just hole up in a room somewhere and I never come out to see the light of day until my work is finished.  However, yesterday, I needed some books so I made the trek over to the library.  However, I ran into people who know me and are rather on the side of being “chatty.”

All to say, I had to wrestle with all that was within me to be polite and give my greetings, show interest in what they had to say, all the while choking back my fear that I was going to get off track from all these little side conversations during the day.

When you have a full stomach, these types of things don’t really matter.  We have extra resources from which to draw to be polite, manage our emotions and responses, etc.  However, with no food and a headache, my ability to live out patience and grace felt much more diminished.  This is a good reminder of the well-spring from which I draw.

Do I draw from God’s source of power, love, and grace, or do I instead draw from my own?  Which one is deeper?  Fasting is a great mirror of the source I daily draw from.  It’s a constant reminder and call to go to God rather than oneself.

God, this is why I’m doing this fast.  To have your heart, your love, your power, not mine.  I ask that this fast would be a process of me letting go and letting you do what you want through me!  Amen.

Day Two, here we go!

Day One

Beginning today, I will be observing a 21 day fast in my desire to grow closer to God.  I hope that this will be an amazing 3 weeks of discovery.  I plan to share on this blog all that I’m learning and experiencing.  I also sincerely hope that what is learned will be relevant to the topic of Muslim Christian Relations as we move beyond interfaith dialogue which typically is more theologically based and enter faith dialogue which rests upon our actual experiences of relating with our Creator and Author of Faith.

Some of the things I’ll intentionally be sensitive to during this time are: dreams, visions, Holy Book studies, sensations, and any “aha!” type moments.  I hope to be as honest as possible, so please give me a measure of grace as I try to share in an open format what I sense God is showing me.

I hope this will be encouraging and stimulating for others to also embark on similar journeys–not in a legalistic manner–such as seeking to control God or seeking to gain additional favor from Him, but rather in genuine pursuit of a deeper, intimate, and powerful connection with the one and only God, for it is He who has created us all, and has designed us to seek Him and His affections.

Blessings!

What is the purpose of Muslim and Christian friendship?  If we both believe in an eternity of paradise for true believers and an eternity of punishment for unbelievers, then isn’t each of our perspectives on this issue one of the most important things we seek to communicate with each other?  I welcome Muslims to respond.  I hope others don’t mind if I share my own convictions.  But I do welcome dialogue on the matter.  Might we even ask God together if He would clarify right now these questions so that all those who seek Him would find Him?

God, right now we ask for clarity, Your clarity on who You are and what You have done for us, humanity.  Would you open our eyes to see as You see.  May we know You and may we find favor with You.  May You receive us as those who are faithful and righteous in Your eyes.  Ameen!

Prophet Adam and Eve/Hawa

From my understanding of the Torat, Zabbur, and Injeel, God’s plan begins almost as soon as His creation is complete.  After Adam (as) and Eve listen to Satan’s lies and turn from God, they are covered in shame.  Only God is able to cover their shame even as they try to cover it themselves with leaves.  But God provides them with Garments of Righteousness.  These Garments cover them adequately and they are restored.

Prophet Noah/Nuh

Prophet Noah/Nuh (as) lives during a time of great wickedness on the earth.  God gives Noah (as) a sign, the Ark.  Noah (as) builds it, then he and his family enter it and are saved from the flood.  Except of course for Noah’s (as) son who tries to save himself by climbing a mountain.  In the end, only God’s provision saves, not Man’s attempt to save himself.

Prophet Abraham/Ibrahim

Prophet Abraham (as) is about to sacrifice his son in obedience to God when God stops him and provides a ram as a substitute, this ram or goat is called a Momentous Sacrifice in the Qur’an.  Again, God provides salvation, not Man.

Prophet Moses/Musa

Prophet Moses (as) is given a series of Signs to show Pharaoh that he needs to listen to God and let the Jews leave for the land God is leading them to.  It’s only upon Moses (as) showing Pharaoh the final sign, called the Great Sign, that Pharaoh finally agrees to let them go.  This Sign was that each Jewish family was to sacrifice an unblemished lamb or goat and spread its blood on their doorposts, then that night an Angel (farishta) of God was to come and slay all firstborn sons of those who did not have the Sign on their doorposts.  All of the Egyptians’ firstborn sons were slain, including the Pharaoh’s.  This is the Great Sign that leads Pharaoh to finally capitulate and let the Jews leave.

Prophet Jonah/Yunus

Prophet Jonah (as) at first did not obey God’s command to go to Assyria and preach to them to repent from their evil ways.  So, God sends a whale that swallows Jonah (as).  Jonah (as) is in this whale for 3 days and 3 nights before he repents and God then sends him on his way to Assyria.

Prophet Jesus/Isa (as)

Prophet Jonah (as) is referred to by Prophet Jesus (as) in the Injeel.  Some Jews who don’t believe in Jesus (as) come to him and ask him for a Sign.  Jesus (as) says that he will only give them the Sign of Jonah (as).  What does he mean?

Did you know that Jesus’ title in arabic is al-Masih?  Does anyone know what Masih means?  It means annointed or smeared.  In Jewish understanding, the king is to be anointed with oil as a sign of God’s favor and choice.  Jesus (as) was suppose to be the last of the Jewish kings, but what happens?  In a Jewish plot, he is framed, and then the Romans, not the Jews crucify him.  Remember, that if it was the Jews that had done it they would have stoned Jesus.  Stoning was the Jewish form of capital punishment in these days.  Crucifixion was a Roman form of capital punishment.

After Jesus’ death, he was placed in the belly of the tomb for 3 days and 3 nights before raising from the dead where he appeared to many of his disciples/hawariyun, then God took him up until the Day of Judgment when he will return as king and bring the world unto submission to God.

Jesus (as) is also called a Sign in the Qur’an.  It is my conviction that this is God’s provision for humanity to find favor with Him.  Jesus (as) lived a sinless life and it is his righteousness not our own which God sees if we receive by faith God’s provision of salvation.  On Judgment Day, God will see Jesus’ righteousness on my life, not my own because I’ve received God’s provision for me.  This means I don’t have to work for God’s love, He gives it because of my faith in Him and His provision of Jesus (as) as the ultimate Qurban.

This provision doesn’t mean I am allowed to continue to do wrong.  Absolutely not.  Actually, because salvation is given by faith instead of through works (sawab), I am inwardly compelled to live righteously because of God’s love and favor that He has given me.  It’s almost too unbelievable to be true!  But it is.  And once a person accepts this provision, something happens in the heart and mind.  God actually gives us His mind and His heart so that it actually takes work and effort to do wrong.  There is power and experience to live rightly in the world today.  I am now ruled by a higher power than fear of punishment, I’m now ruled by a loving relationship between God and myself.  This is offered to Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Atheists, you name it!

From Dream to Reality

Last Monday, May 24 I had a dream where I was driving through a city in what I thought was the U.S.  As I was driving I saw this building that looked like an Islamic Center, it had Arabic writing on a sign at the front as well.  I then looked next door to the Islamic Center and saw another sign which said, “al-Najashi.”  I couldn’t believe it!  Then God showed me the inside of the office where there were two rooms, one for the office and another  I sensed He was releasing freedom for me to choose what this second room should be used for.

So a number of ideas came through my mind (in my dream), but sensed His pleasure in using this second room either as a library or an art studio.  Wow!  I awoke from this dream feeling so encouraged and excited about its significance.

I liked the idea of being next to an Islamic Center since our goal is to build bridges for Muslims and Christians.  I also liked the idea of having a library in the office which would contain books where Muslims and Christians seek to explain their faiths as well as to understand their counterpart’s faith.

Supernatural School of Abrahamic Faith

More importantly though would be if this library was connected to a school–a place for Muslims and Christians to go deeper in understanding one another and relating with each other.  If there were no restrictions or complications, it would be amazing if this school could promote praying for each other, asking God for healing, learning how Muslims and Christians can do development projects together, possibly develop curriculum using the Holy Books that would be for character formation and peacemaking among the Christian and Muslim youth, and of course a school where people from both faiths learn about each others’ faiths so that we can take what we’ve learned and experienced to our own community of faith to help them further understand the other.

Faith Art

Lastly, the art studio was also a surprising aspect of this dream because a month ago during a time of worship, God began showing me visions of paintings He wanted me to paint all having to do with the idea of not propagating a specific religious tradition, but rather sharing my own experience of God and how He is relating Himself to me.  This vision I had during worship was so strong that I actually could smell paint as I was experiencing it.

So, all to say, I’m continuing to ask God how and what He would like me to do in this new season that is upon us.  We feel like we’ve been in a waiting pattern and things are starting to gain clarity, al-hamdulillah (praise God)!