A Response to Fact Check FRI 9/25: Written by Paul Leckband

NOTE/WARNING/DISCLAIMER WHATEVER:  

This is Paul Leckband's blog post for FRI 9/25. It is NOT Nathan Leckband's Fact Check FRI 9/25 blog post.

• You NEED to read Nathan's Fact Check FRI 9/25 blog post before you read this blog post.
• I'm not going to make this easy for you. You're going to have to read closely, follow some links, and/or have your own Bible handy.
• If you think I'm wrong in any of my responses, conclusion, whatever, you would be doing my readers & me a disservice if you did NOT offer your comments & corrections.
• My scriptural quotations are are the Gospel of John not by coincidence but because for most of this month my daily "quiet time" devotions have included scriptural readings from this New Testament book. They are fresh in my mind.

A point made in today's Fact Check FRI 9/25

"Do you want God to hear the prayers of people of different faiths & work through those prayers to bring those people to a saving faith?"

MY RESPONSE:  Of course I would want that for people of different faiths, but it's not about what I want. It's about what scripture tells me. Sola fide, sola gratia, sola scriptura. *(I hope I spelled that correctly. I had a choice between Latin & German in high school. I chose German. A lot of good THAT did me.)
* What can I say? I am hopelessly Lutheran. Don't just take my word for it, since I am "only" a "Minister of Religion-Commissioned." Check out what I believe to be a thoroughly Bible-based, Lutheran-confessionally ** based sermon about these three "solas" by Pastor Daniel Habben of St. Peter Evangelical Lutheran Church. ***
** Do not assume that I identify with the label "Confessional Lutheran, as it is commonly associated w/a certain group within the LCMS. If that's the group that immediately springs to mind, I do NOT associate myself with that group. If you don't know what I'm talking about, that's a topic for another time & place. Maybe.
*** I am really, really going out on a limb here, because I am not bothering to find out the synodical affiliation of this congregation, nor am I bothering to find out which seminary this man graduated from.

Another point made in today's (9/25) Fact Check FRI 9/25 blog:

The writer uses as facts incidents in scripture where God came to non-Christians, i.e. "the entire Old Testament." Job is used as an example of someone "apart from any organized worship of God." 

MY RESPONSE:

• I'm not sure Job is a good example, especially since we have no proof that he was or wasn't part of any organized worship of God. He certainly believed in Yahweh.
• What about Melchizedek? A lack of information does not make for good scriptural proof texts.

Another point made in today's (9/25 Fact Check FRI 9/25 blog:

"I'd like to think that in those five times a day that Muslims pray, the voice of the Holy Spirit can whisper to them that salvation comes through Jesus' work on earth--not ours. I pray that in the meditations of Buddhist monks, the Holy Spirit can enter in & tell of a desire that is pure--the desire for a saving relationship with Jesus."

MY RESPONSE:

• Christianity is all about a saving relationship with God in Jesus Christ based in faith, not works. SEE Eph. 2:8-9. 
• A Muslim's prayers are an act of works righteousness--something he or she is compelled to do. It is a requirement of the Islamic religion, & failure to do so means punishment. 
• Ditto the meditations of Buddhist monks.
• No "religion" outside of Christianity offers a path to God other than works righteousness, i.e., something humankind must do to earn God's favor or make the relationship work or come about. 
• Christianity take that human logic & turns it on its head. God reaches out to me, since I can't on my own, & He does so through His Son Jesus Christ. What other religion involves a God who sends His own Son to save humankind?

One more point made in today's Fact Check FRI 9/25 blog:

"I like to think that a God who 'desires all people to be saved' can work through the prayers of all His children--Christian or not."

MY RESPONSE:

• I would like to think God can work through the prayers of all people, too. After all God is God, and I am not.
• One again, I don't have the luxury of "thinking" my way to that conclusion. I'm going to have to use Scripture to inform my thought process. 

AND WHAT DOES SCRIPTURE SAY TO ME? I'LL LET JESUS SPEAK FOR HIMSELF.

• John 14:6-7  Jesus answered [His disciples], "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. If you really knew Me, you would know My Father as well. From now on, you do know Him and have seen Him."
• John 3:16  [Jesus answered Nicodemus], "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life."
• John 8:31  "To the Jews who had believed Him, Jesus said, 'If you hold to My teaching, you are really My disciples. Then You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.'"
• John 8:39-41  "'Abraham is our father' [the Jews] answered. 'If you were Abraham's children,' said Jesus, 'then you would do the things Abraham did. As it is, you are determined to kill Me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. Abraham did not do such things. You are doing the things your own father does.' 'We are not illegitimate children,' they protested. 'The only Father we have is God himself.'"
• John 8:42-47  "Jesus said to them, 'If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I came from God and now am here. I have not come on My own, but He sent Me. Why is My language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe Me! Can any of you prove Me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don't you believe Me? He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God."

MY CONCLUSIONS

1. Jesus Himself declares that He is the ONLY path to the Father, i.e., the only Way to a saving relationship with the true God.
2. My  understanding is that Muslims accept & respect Jesus as a great prophet but certainly not one who is equal to Muhammed.
3. My understanding is that they also teach that Muhammed is not God. Therefore, Jesus cannot be God. Therefore, anyone who confesses Jesus as God is guilty of blasphemy.
4. My understanding is that in the Muslim faith, blasphemy is punishable by death. It doesn't matter whether every individual Muslim accepts this as the truth, just like it doesn't matter whether every individual Christian believes that those who die in their unbelief are condemned to hell. It's what the religion teaches, based on its sacred scripture.
5. Not everyone is a child of God. This seems obvious since the words came from Jesus' own mouth as a pronouncement against the Jews who HAD believed in Him.
6. Back-up to John 8:31, where Jesus said to those who HAD believe in Him, "If you continue in My teaching . . . " Some translations use "Word" instead of teaching. Since I don't know the original Greek, I don't know which is the better translation.
7. I do hold with the Lutheran Confessions that God the Holy Spirit uses the Means of Grace--Word & Sacrament--to work faith in the hearts of humankind--since "I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, or come to Him." That is found in Luther's explanation to the 3rd Article of the Apostles' Creed. *
8. Once again, check out Eph. 2:8-9.
9. Muslims may not be children of God, but He still loves them & wants them to be saved. SEE 1 Tim. 2:4. 
10. God calls on us to love others. That means we are called upon to love Muslims & pray for their salvation, too, regardless of their persecution of our Christian brothers & sisters. **

* There I go again, being Lutheran. 
** I'm not sure that will make me popular with some people.

ENGAGING A MUSLIM *

• If you have any kind of connection with a Muslim, I think a good starting point would be talking to him about a common denominator. 
• Both of our religions believe in God the Father. 
• When he prays to God the Father, he prays to Allah. When I pray the "Our Father," am I, in his opinion, praying to the same God? 
• What's his opinion of Jesus? Does he even know anything about Jesus or what Jesus says about Himself in Christian sacred writings? 
• If Muslims truly respect Jesus, what does he make of Jesus' own statements about Himself? Was Jesus a false prophet? A liar? A lunatic?

I think that's enough pontificating ** on this topic. Obviously I have strong feels about it. I don't mean to steal any thunder from my son's Fact Check FRI 9/25 blog entry, but I just can't bring myself to let some of those thoughts go unchallenged.

* In my humble opinion
** Just so you know, being a pontificator *** does NOT make me a Catholic, in case you haven't caught on by now.
*** Pontificator, get it?