Well, I lied. I thought I was going back to my regularly scheduled thoughts on what I’m reading in the Bible in today’s post, but I’m just learning so much that I want to share.
Not actually a lot, but I’ve been going through Nabeel Qureshi’s book “No God But One: Allah or Jesus?” and it’s been quite fascinating. A few months back, I went through Qureshi’s other book “Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus” and was touched by his story of coming from an Islamic background and then converting to Christianity.
It was not an easy process and he went away fighting for Islam, but at the end of the day, there was evidence and conviction that he could no longer go against in his own mind. This was not an easy thing to do, and he destroyed family and friend relationships through his conversion that may never be the same. But he couldn’t compromise on what he knew to be right.
In his first book, it’s mainly his story going from Islam to Christianity and debated he had with his friend David Wood, a Christian friend from college. In this second book, he dives into more of the evidence. It’s so inspiring listening to people who are so clearly smarter than myself giving arguments for what they believe in, and knowing that those things are some of the same things I believe.
One of the things he mentions in his book is that every person he meets somehow has a tendency and desire toward thinking their religion is the best religion. Imagine that? The meaning behind this is that when he was a Muslim, he didn’t even consider that the bible or Christianity could be true because he was taught from such a young age that Islam was the only correct truth and Christianity was a perversion. In the same way, most others will be raised with that thinking. That what they believe is truth and others couldn’t possibly be true.
I don’t believe this is all bad, but it does bring forward questions and challenges to us who believe in…whatever we may believe in. Do we believe in it because we have always been told it, or have we studied to see for ourselves that it is true?
Coming from one of the worst studiers in the world, I almost never study, but this causes me oftentimes to “believe” things simply because I heard someone I respect say it. But I may never have gone into scripture to see.
One of the things that resonated with me most going through this book is that we all have our own biases, and it’s important to go based on the actual evidence and resources we have at our disposal and know why we believe or stand for something if we are.
If you believe that the Koran is corrupt, you better be able to show why you believe that and not just say it because you’ve heard it before. If you can’t, you shouldn’t be expecting those in the Muslim world not to discount your Bible without evidence also.
Truth often takes more work to figure out than lies. Do the work.