Jer. 17:5-10; Luke 6: 17-31       Islam – the Gift and the Challenge      E/GR Feb.11, 2007

1) Growing in faith.  We’ve looked at it many ways this year.  Today we look through the lens of another faith – Islam.  To learn about another faith is always a gift.  Shaheena Sadiqui, from the Muslim Association of Manitoba shared her faith at Selkirk Presb.  Part of the gift in learning about another faith is to learn from our neighbours about their relationship to God, and how it informs their lives.  To increase our understanding of other faiths is important, at this time in history, especially about Islam.   Where the challenge comes is in holding up the truth another holds dear, not to judge, but to bounce off it what we hold dear.  We can then ask ourselves how our faith makes a difference in our lives.

1) First of all, she told us, Islam is a faith, a way of life of peace and submission.  A Muslim is the person who submits to God and finds peace in the faith of Islam.  Allah the Creator has no gender, no physical image and no plural.  Allah is the same Arabic word for God, used by Jews, Moslems and Christians.

2) In order to understand Islam, it is important to know it is not a blind faith.  Muslims must understand, reflect, and struggle to know God’s will.  They believe in one God.  God alone is worthy of worship, alone to be submitted to.  You therefore can’t submit to other laws if they go against God’s law.  You see our faith in the action of our daily lives, Shaheena said.  In other words don’t judge Islam by me, but judge me by Islam.

1)      There is one God

2)      They believe in all the prophets.  Adam was the first, Jesus was one and Mohammed was the last and final.

3)      God revealed scripture to all the prophets.  That is in the Jewish and Christian scriptures, and the Koran their Holy Book, a direct revelation to Mohammed.   It is not a new message, but a continuation.

4)      Angels were created by God.

5)      There will be a Day of Judgment.

6)      Heaven and hell are actual entities.

7)      Everything that happens is God’s will.

1)      Prayer 5 times a day.  You can delay it till later if you’re in a class or meeting where others not praying.

2)      Fasting for the 10^th month of the Lunar calendar.  They eat nothing from dawn to dusk for a whole month.

3)      There is a Compulsory Charity of 2.5% of their annual income.  The UN tells us that 1.5% could abolish poverty.  In an Islamic Country the Government collects and distributes it.  In Winnipeg the Islamic Centre distributes it. 

4)      You will go for a pilgrimage to Mecca in your lifetime if are healthy and can afford it.

1)      Don’t eat pork

2)      Women cover their aura with loose, non- transparent clothing, except for their face and hands.  It is for modesty and their own protection.

3)      Lower your gaze in the presence of women

4)      Women do not shake hands.

5)      In the mosque the men are at the front.  Sometimes there is a screen that the women are behind.  Shaheena said, “I’m glad because when I prostrate myself, I don’t want a man behind me, also prostrate.”

6)      No alcohol, tobacco or movies

7)      Leader in prayer is a man if there is mixed company.  It can be a woman if the gathering is women.  There are no priests, as anyone can marry or slaughter cattle.

6) Jihad is NOT Holy War.  It means striving and struggling against your desires.  In military combat, if you are attacked, you can defend yourselves.  If there is persecution, one who has studied the law for many years, can call for defense.  You must use diplomacy first.  This applies whether the victim is Muslim or not.

7) Violence: One who takes the life of an innocent, takes the life of entire humanity.  One who saves the life of an innocent, saves the life of entire humanity no matter what the grievance is.  The Koran says you may either exact justice or forgive and it is better for you to forgive.  Only the victim’s family can decide whether forgive or not.

8) Martyr’s:  If you die in war under legitimate authority to end persecution, you will be raised on judgment day, and go to heaven.  This is not for criminals who blow up civilians.  Their mind was fed by manipulation, Shaheena was very clear.  She went on, “The firefighters and the police who gave their lives are the martyrs.”

9) Hypocrisy: If I say I am a Muslim and don’t know what it means or act on it.  IF we take Faith for granted, our children suffer.

10) Were there points that you saw similarities – and differences to your faith?  Our scripture from Jeremiah describes the person of faith like one planted by the water.  This solid rootedness is found in both traditions.  Attached to our source, we can be healthy, full of life, bearing fruit even in dry, barren times.  We’ve just seen Islam at its highest and best.  So the question for us – What do I believe?   

11) Let me offer my thoughts – not as the right answer, but as one view of Christianity to hold up to think about what you believe.  I believe:

i)One God, maker and mender of the Universe – continually at work creating you, me and our world.  We are created to be in close, loving relationship - to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength, and our neigbour as ourselves.  Therefore to be continually growing to be healthier, whole persons filled with gratitude and then peace that then is shared with the world near and far.  We are not required to love God or share ourselves and our possessions, but as we grow in the relationship and understand and feel God’s love, gratitude and sharing are a natural outpouring.  We are called to be co-creators with God – of the people and the world that God so loved!

ii) Jesus is prophet, teacher, friend, who became the Christ, part of the Holiness of God that puts us back in right relationship to God when we stray.

iii) The Spirit, comforter and friend has the holy power to change lives and is the resurrection power of God.

iv) I see the power of sin and evil in my own life and in the world.  I believe God’s power is much greater.  Although I sin, that is put my will before God’s, that is fail to love, share, forgive, trust, again and again, yet when I turn back to God, I am forgiven and can start over.

v) We choose to live in heaven or hell both in life and in life after life.  Just as God gives us the choice to turn again and be in relationship now it would seem that choice would always be ours.  When we feel “judged”, it is often the consequences of our own actions.  I believe God creates us to know the difference of right and wrong.  If we let it, the judged feeling can be the catalyst to bring the necessary change.

vi) God spoke and speaks through the Scriptures when we are open to hear the Word to us.

vii) I am grateful for the Church.  Although the Church is far from perfect, as am I, it is a place where I can be challenged, supported, encouraged to seek God’s will.  There I can be loved for who I am and who I am becoming.  There I can wrestle with the scriptures and their meaning for my life with other people seeking to be faithful.  There I can work for justice near-by and afar in ways not possible on my own.  We have the promise: Christ is with us in a unique way.  “Where two or three are gathered together, there am I in the midst.”

ix) God’s will is for peace with justice.  The Christ was sent that we might have peace.  That’s how his birth was announced.  We’ve just not learned how yet.

x) God’s major work is transformation of the world and of us.  Even when we cannot see it, God is at work.  We do not do it alone.  What I or we cannot do on our own – God can do working through us.

12) What do you hold dear?  May God continue to lead you in your journey of faith.