Sharing Jesus with Muslims in America—now available for Kindle

Hi all, Been a while, I know. I'm glad to share that my book, Sharing Jesus with Muslims in America, is now available on Kindle. A great resource and very affordable! Click HERE to buy it. Peace and grace be with you this Lent. —Abu Daoud

انا سعودي، انا مسيحي

Liberty to the Captives-Mark Durie

Greetings to readers of David Roseberry's Leaderworks

Greetings in Christ's name!

I really have enjoyed getting to know the Rev. Cannon David Roseberry over the years and working with him to help the larger Anglican community become more aware of a fundamental shift we are going through in the West.

The Muslim population is increasing very quickly.

That is not going to change. The truth is that Islam creates societies in which no one—including Muslims—wants to live.

Many Americans look at this and are alarmed. Now, Christians should voice their opinions on migration and security to their elected leaders in Congress. But, Congress will not and cannot stop the increase of Islam in the USA.

So what should we do? What is a Christ-centered response to this situation?

Serve them in Christ's name. Share your life with them in Christ's name. Pray of them and pray with them. Muslims are coming to Christ. It's not easy. It's not fast. But it's good. God is doing a new thing. I want you and your church to be part of it. That is why this book was published!

Don't hesitate to contact me with any questions via this blog. Just leave a comment on the latest post and I'll get back to you.

Enjoy the blog. Search for terms. There is a huge amount of information on this blog even though I only make new posts every month or so.

And do purchase a copy of Sharing Jesus with Muslims in America and check out my articles at academia.

Peace and grace!

Abu Daoud

Islamic State: We're coming back to take over Spain

New from you friends at the (failing) Islamic State:

In the recording a militant, speaking in Spanish with an Arabic accent, says: “Allah willing, al-Andalus will become again what it was, part of the caliphate. Spanish Christians, don’t forget the Muslim blood spilt during the Spanish inquisition. We will take revenge for your massacre, the one you are carrying out now against Islamic State.” 

Another man, whose face is hidden, adds: “Our war with you will continue until the world ends.” Spanish police identified the individual whose face can be seen as Muhammed Yasin Ahram Pérez, 22, from Cordoba in southern Spain. His Moroccan father is in jail in his native country for terrorism offences and his Spanish mother left Malaga in 2014 to live in an Isis-controlled area in Syria. 

But did you know that the Barcelona attacks were entirely preventable? Pray for Spain. Pray for revival in her churches. Pray for Muslims to come to Christ. Pray for Christians there to proclaim the gospel.

St Julian of Norwich on the Church and the body of Christ

“He wills that we take ourselves with great strength to the faith of holy Church and find there our most precious mother in comfort and true understanding with the whole communion of blessed ones. For a person by himself can frequently be broken, as it seems to himself, but the whole body of holy Church was never broken and never shall be, without end. Therefore it is a sure thing, a good thing, and a gracious thing to will meekly and powerfully to be fastened and joined to our mother, holy Church - that is Christ Jesus.” 

― St. Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love

Islam, Not Climate Change or Poverty, Inspires Terror

It's amazing that studies even have to be carried out. But we live in a world where few people seem to have the ability to accept people's explanations for why they do the things they do. Muslim terrorists are pretty clear about things. Yet the liberal media keeps insisting that even though it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and smells like a duck, it's really a turtle.

But this is our world today. A strange one, no doubt.

Now, you may want to site down for some shocking news. Ready? A recent study has shown that Islam is in fact what motivates Islamic terrorism.

I especially liked the comments of Raheem Kassam. Here are some choice morsels:

Indeed, the only reason that some were surprised by the study's results at all was "because we have now had decades of indoctrination in this regard," he told LifeZette. "We are continually force-fed false narratives that are built to advance multiculturalist agendas and fetishization, usually in the name of cheap, migrant labour." 

When asked about the numerous excuses liberal and Islamist apologists have provided for the root cause of Islamic terror, Kassam said, "I've heard them all, but the climate change theory is particularly galling." 

"The Left is tying itself in knots trying to excuse radical Islam while advancing its Marxist agendas elsewhere," he told LifeZette. "They haven't yet realized they sound more like The Onion than reputable sources of news and analysis." 

"It is fairly evident from the Quranic verses often cited by Islamist leaders, as well as lectures freely available online, that there isn't so much a 'perversion' of Islam going on, as establishment leaders so often suggest, but rather, a literalist interpretation of what that book and the Hadiths openly state," Kassam said. 

While "one study scarcely ever proves anything," he said, "in my estimation this comes closer to the truth than the public pronouncements of Barack Obama and Theresa May ever have."

Read it all at Lifezette.

GK Chesterton on Modernity and Christianity

Ran across this fine quote from Chesterton from his book, The Man who was Thursday: A Nightmare.

"Do you see this lantern?" cried Syme in a terrible voice. "Do you see the cross carved on it, and the flame inside? You did not make it. You did not light it. Better men than you, men who could believe and obey, twisted the entrails of iron and preserved the legend of fire. There is not a street you walk on, there is not a thread you wear, that was not made as this lantern was, by denying your philosophy of dirt and rats. You can make nothing. You can only destroy. You will destroy mankind; you will destroy the world. Let that suffice you. Yet this one old Christian lantern you shall not destroy. It shall go where your empire of apes will never have the wit to find it."

There is brilliant insight here I think. That modernity creates things that are inherently temporary and ephemeral. I suspect this is true.

No-go areas in Sweden increase from 55 to 61

So sad to see what is happening to Sweden these days.

That figure about the no-go zones is from the article "Sweden: A Failed State?" over at Gatestone Inst.

Another choice morsel about folks who fought for the Islamic State and then returned to Sweden:

Swedish news outlets have reported that the Swedish towns that receive the returnees do not even know they are returning ISIS fighters. One coordinator of the work against violent Islamist extremism in Stockholm, Christina Kiernan, says that "...at the moment there is no control over those returning from ISIS-controlled areas in the Middle East".

Hard to believe that a country would so actively and intentionally destroy itself.

Afghans and the rape epidemic in Europe

Why are Afghan refugees and asylum seekers at the forefront of a rape epidemic in Europe? That is the question that this article in The National Interest tries to address. 

Here is the author's best guess:

This brings us to a third, more compelling and quite disturbing theory—the one that my Afghan friend, the court translator, puts forward. On the basis of his hundreds of interactions with these young men in his professional capacity over the past several years, he believes to have discovered that they are motivated by a deep and abiding contempt for Western civilization. To them, Europeans are the enemy, and their women are legitimate spoils, as are all the other things one can take from them: housing, money, passports. Their laws don’t matter, their culture is uninteresting and, ultimately, their civilization is going to fall anyway to the horde of which one is the spearhead. No need to assimilate, or work hard, or try to build a decent life here for yourself—these Europeans are too soft to seriously punish you for a transgression, and their days are numbered. 

And it’s not just the sex crimes, my friend notes. Those may agitate public sentiment the most, but the deliberate, insidious abuse of the welfare system is just as consequential. Afghan refugees, he says, have a particular proclivity to play the system: to lie about their age, to lie about their circumstances, to pretend to be younger, to be handicapped, to belong to an ethnic minority when even the tired eye of an Austrian judge can distinguish the delicate features of a Hazara from those of a Pashtun.

There you go. Europe is the spoils of war. No need to assimilate, work, or do anything at all. The Europeans are soft and stupid. Sounds pretty accurate to me. 

A Prayer for Egypt

From A Sense of Belonging.

God, Five more policemen were killed today. Several high-profile militants were killed this week. And to avoid adding their number to the roll, Egypt’s churches canceled summer activities for the next three weeks. The intelligence services are finding material – warning the Christians and raiding the hideouts. Yet extremist elements are finding recruits – threatening Christians and targeting checkpoints. God, the cycle must end somewhere. May it be with the least blood. Criminals must be found, God. But give them justice greater than death. To the degree possible, help raids end in capture. Peace must be established, God. But give Egypt justice greater than security. To the degree possible, help rights end in responsibility. Death comes for all, God, when you will it. But in Egypt the past several years, it has come too soon for too many. In eternity you cancel death. May Egypt live as if you canceled it now. Amen.  

Paul Wood on Trump's Poland Speech

Loved this insight from Paul Wood at his blog, A Political Refugee from the Global Village. I think he is making a really good point--that President Trump is willing to recognize an obvious reality that neither Bush nor Obama were willing to acknowledge, or perhaps even able to see.

Here is most of the post:

Trump's speech yesterday at Warsaw was a very good one, though I have mentioned that I disliked him seeing the Assad regime and Iran as hostile.  

George W. Bush went to lengths to insist the West was not in conflict with Islam. He declared war instead on an abstract noun, terrorism, even though you can't win a war with an abstract noun. Barack Obama said the terrorist murders in Paris, several massacres ago, were "an attack on all of humanity and the universal values we share", even though values are not really universal.

Donald Trump yesterday at Warsaw declared that Western culture, not universal values, are under assault in Europe and the U.S. This is an important step forward.

Read the rest of it here. And do leave comments over there.

Jews, Muslims, and the Nobel Prize

Great observation here:

There are approximately 1.6 billion Muslims in the world, a figure that may rise. There are roughly 14.4 million Jews in total. The disparity in numbers is remarkable. So is the disparity in Nobel Laureates. Take a deep breath. There have been twelve Muslim Nobel Laureates – seven for Peace [...], two in Literature, one in Physics, and two in Chemistry. For a brief survey of how several of these Laureates have been treated by their fellow Muslims, see Gordon Fraser's Oxford University Press article. As for the tiny Jewish population, there have been 193 Nobel Laureates, equaling 22% of Nobel Prize winners overall.

Read the whole article HERE.

David Goldman: Islamic civilization is destroying itself

Very interesting and wide-ranging article here by the David Goldman (aka, Spengler) over at Asia Times.

Some choice morsels.

On Sweden:

Even in liberated, feminist, gender-neutral Sweden, there is something more horrible than rape, something horrible enough to persuade the political elite to sacrifice the physical and mental health of tens of thousands of Swedish women. That is the horror of social disintegration in the Muslim world. Sweden opened its borders to refugees twenty years before the migrant flood arrived on Germany’s doorstep, and the foreign born rose from 9% of the population in 1990 to 15.4% in 2012. Foreigners have a higher birth rate, so the percentage is higher including second-generation immigrants.

And an interesting point about the "character of the people" and the civil war in Syria:

The death of Muslim civilization is too horrible for the Germans to contemplate, because the bell tolls for them, too. And it is particularly painful for Germans to consider the possibility that the source of the terrible events that have driven millions to Germany is the character of the people themselves. Syria has torn itself to pieces not only because of the malfeasance of its leaders but rather because of the character of its people. 

Anyway, read the whole thing here: More Horrible than Rape.

Was Islam really born in Mecca? Nope. Try Petra.

Every year new research on the early history of Islam comes out. It is very exciting!

Here is a video about one researcher, Dan Gibson, who argues that the original birthplace of Islam was in fact Petra (in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan), and that the city known as Mecca today in Saudi Arabia didn't even exist at the beginning of the Islamic calendar (begins in 622 AD).

Here is a trailer, though the entire movie, The Sacred City, is at Amazon:



If you really into the topic of Islamic origins, I also note that Gibson has a newly published book, Early Islamic Qiblas. I understand that the book develops in much greater detail the argument in the movie.

Part XXIV: Terror in London, Nihilism, Islamic State

Part XXIV: Terror in London, Nihilism, and the Islamic State

by Abu Daoud

Some time ago I received an e-mail from a colleague and friend with ministry experience in the UK and Africa. He asked some questions about Islam, terrorism, and the Islamic State. I thought I would share my answers to his questions with you all. His questions are in italics.

I am (rightly or wrongly) slightly put off by some Christians who are very anti-Islam and see ISIS as the true face Islam. But I wonder if ISIS is not a Western phenomenon in many ways?

You are right in that many Christians are indeed very anti-Islam. I think it is important to not assume that ISIS is 'the' face of Islam. On the other hand, to dismiss it as 'not Islam at all' as all the pols in the UK (and many in the USA) do--that is clearly wrong too. When I share with Christians here about Islam, which I do often, I encourage them to form Christ-centered relations with Muslims. If Muslims are in fact the enemies of the Church, then we know how to treat them--love your enemy. If, on the other hand, they are merely our neighbors, we also know how to respond to them--love. The witness of the love of God in the life of a Christian is powerful and strong and is the main thing we see drawing Muslims to Christ around the world today.

As to ISIS being a Western phenomenon, I would say no. Islamic State has a very real and valid claim to trying to emulate the very first generations of Muslims, even with all their brutality and terror. Muhammad himself said, "Allah has made me victorious through terror." So why would Muslims not do this today? He, as the founder of Islam, imparted a very specific DNA to his community, and while it can mutate and change, it can only go so far. Same thing with Jesus and Christianity. Churches that become so divorced from the original praxis and doxa of the Church eventually die out (Church of Scotland, for instance) or become distinct religions (Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses). IS in killing and terrorizing and raping is following the Qur'an. They are doing it more literally than most Muslims do (thank God), but there is no question that they have a Qur'an warrant for everything they do. 

If there is one area where the IS is Western, or modern, really, it is in their use of Internet and media. They are very good at this. This is a key reason why IS has been successful in doing what Al Qaeda (another important reform movement in 20th Century Islam) was not able to do.

I am also perplexed about the horrible bombings in Europe, and occasionally in America, which are seen as expressions of Islam rather than as expressions of a nihilistic Western culture - in which maladjusted and non-practising Westernised Muslims, usually drug addicts, seem to go crazy. The Anders Breivik, Thomas McVeigh and Columbine rampage killings seem to fit into the same category of deranged young men taking their frustrations out on society. 

So the question is, can we believe people when they tell us why they are doing what they are doing? Breivik and McVeigh told us why they did what they did, and neither had to do with Christianity or the Bible or Jesus. They were motivated by nationalism or racism, if I recall the two cases. Similarly, when Muslims carry out attacks they are quite clear about why they are doing what they are doing. What warrant do we have to say that they do not in fact understand their own motives? Their answers are very clear and they cite the Qur'an and the hadith carefully. It is true that some of them (especially in Europe) are not well-educated. But many of them came from lives of frug use and morality and their decision to wage Jihad was part and parcel of their reformation as they left those things behind. In Christian circles it is not uncommon to hear of a drug-addict or criminal who had a dramatic conversion experience and went on to become an evangelist or pastor. We simply have the Muslim parallel here. 

Is it perhaps really nihilism that motivates these young men (and increasingly, women)? Nihilism is a philosophical school that asserts that all religious and moral principles are to be rejected, and that life is meaningless. Now that is certainly not what these men and women believe. It is precisely because they believe that they are called to assert the absolute triumph of Allah and his Prophet that they are called to "slay the unbelievers wherever you find them" (Qur'an 9:5) and "fight in the way of Allah" (Qur'an 2:190) "until the religion--all of it--is for Allah" (8:39). After all, as the Prophet, the ideal human and template for all human action, said, "Paradise is in the shade of swords." Whatever that is, it is not nihilism. It is rather a community of young men who are rejecting the nihilism of the secular West which can no long alert any absolute truth about anything at all. They are rejecting that nihilism and they hate it--as they should, for it is inhumane and hopeless--and then they are taking up a great and noble quest: to establish the absolute of reign of Allah over the whole earth--until all religion--all of it--is for Allah.

So, on the contrary, it is against nihilism that these men strive.

It is also incorrect to conclude that these people are doing this out of thuggery. Some do come from that background. But many of the most eminent mujahidin were well educated. All of the 9/11 men were, the men who executed the July 7 operation in the London Tube were too. The head of Al Qaeda is a medical doctor. The Caliph himself holds a PhD in Islamic Studies. Many more examples could be given.But that sword cuts both ways (it always does). If we dismiss their sincerity and devotion because they are not educated, then we must surely toss out the window most of the Apostles and that uneducated peasant girl, Mary. Are you ready to do this? Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

As to 99.9%, that is certainly wrong. Also, the word 'terrorism' is misleading. One man's terrorism is another man's struggle for freedom. What the West calls terrorism, many Muslims don't. In the UK alone there are 26,000 Muslims under the surveillance of MI5. One of the recent attackers at the London Bridge had been on that list, but there were other 'higher priorities' to deal with, so they stopped monitoring him. That doesn't equal .1% at all. 

Thanks for the questions! Very good. And let me know what you think. I'm glad to continue this conversation.

Tom Holland on the origins of Islam

Bill Muehlenberg and Reverse Creeping Shari'a

Interesting thought experiment here by Bill Muehlenberg at CultureWatch. He asks what would happen if Christians tried to flood Muslim countries with immigrants and 'refugees' who demanded rights and then shari'a and so on.

It is really worth your time. Read it HERE.

My answer is that it would never work because Muslims still believe in their culture, tradition, and society. Europe obviously doesn't Europe doesn't believe in anything at all. It doesn't matter how many of their children are slaughtered. Europe is so deeply divorced from reality that there is no turning back.

When Christians move to Muslim countries (and they do in some cases), the Christians are very clearly expected to live and operate according to Islamic tradition and law. This doesn't mean life is bad for Christians. Some Christians in the Muslim world do rather well. But Christians really are always second class citizens.

So why no reverse creeping shari'a? Shari'a can only creep in a society with no roots and no future, no vision and no appreciation for its own heritage and history. That's why it won't work.

But Bill, thanks for the interesting article!

The Qur'an and 'moderate' Muslims

Did you know that during the life of Muhammad he knew some Muslims who did' want to fight Jihad, and who just wanted to get along? They were moderate folks, you know.

The Qur'an itself addresses them with these words:

"Jihad (holy fighting in Allah's Cause) is ordained for you (Muslims) though you dislike it, and it maybe that you dislike a thing which is good for you and that you like a thing which is bad for you. Allah knows but you do not know." (2:216)

The lesson is that living at peace with non-Muslims is not okay! Allah knows what is best, and that's jihad.

Pray for Muslims to know the prince of peace. Pray for Muslims to know "the one, true God, and Jesus Christ whom [he] has sent" (Jn 17:3).

The death of the West

R. R. Reno over at First Things really knocked it out the ballpark with this new article, 'Return of the Strong Gods.'

Check this out:

Our political struggles over nations and nationalisms are best understood as referenda on the West’s meta-politics over the last three generations, which has been one of disenchantment. The rising populism we’re seeing throughout the West reflects a desire for a return of the strong gods to public life. 

Or this:

[After WW2] many political and cultural leaders assumed that restoration of a more humane way of life in the West would require softening and weakening. 

And this:

Our present-day view of the good life “has the features of lightening.” All of this is summed up in his catchphrase the “weakening of Being,” which he sees as a happy unburdening of the West, for weakening promotes tolerance, peace, and freedom. If there are no strong truths, nobody will judge others or limit their freedom. If nothing is worth fighting for, nobody will fight. 

But do yourself a favor and read the whole thing. It is well worth your time.