Calling to Faith in Christ

The Necessity of Faith in the Creator and the Problem of Neutrality

Word is to you, if what I said to you tonight is true, if Jesus is the one by whom all things are created, if he is your creator, you cannot be neutral about him. If every breath you take comes from his hand, you cannot be neutral about him.

What if what those sacred writings said is true? Those sacred writings that existed long before the Quran ever came into existence. What if it's true? What if Jesus Christ is the creator of all things?

What if it is not to divide your worship, but to recognize that your creator has entered into creation to bring about redemption for his people? And he's glorifying himself in so doing, generation after generation, and causing men and women, boys and girls, to bow the knee in faith to Jesus Christ,.

All the glory of God the Father.

Think about that. That is the Christian message. But we need to focus upon who Jesus is. Some Muslims, I think, think that we're just way too focused upon this Jesus. But once you realize what we really believe about him, once you realize that, as the Apostle Paul described it in a very early letter, written within just two decades of the death of Jesus, he wrote to the Church of Colossae, speaking of Jesus Christ, he said, whether in heaven or on earth, visible or invisible, whether principalities, powers, dominions, or authorities, all things are created by him and for him, and he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

And my friend, that means he's the creator. And that means every heartbeat that you take, every breath that you breathe, comes from his hand. You cannot be neutral about that kind of claim. I confess to you that he is my creator, that everything I have I owe to him, and that I bow my knee to him.

I do not engage in shirk in so doing, because I am a strict monotheist. He has eternally been God. I'm ascribing no partners to Allah. If you understand the doctrine of the Trinity, you know that we do not ascribe partners to Allah.

But the point is that I do believe that it is only in a relationship with him that I can have peace with God. And the peace that I have with God is not based upon how many times I've prayed. It's not based upon any of the righteous deeds that I may do.

I do righteous deeds to glorify him, but my relationship with God is because I have the righteousness of Jesus Christ. That's why I have true shalom, peace with him, as Romans 5 -1 says. And so the Christian message is, if you want to have peace with God, he has provided the way.

But that way is only in Jesus Christ. And that's why we proclaim him to others, and because of our love for the Muslim people, we proclaim him to them as well. We engage in dialogue. We do so because we desire to glorify him.

Christ, the Scriptures, and the Witness of the Resurrection

Thank you very much for being here this evening. But I would refer you, in our closing moments together, to the words of Jesus once again. We have been given no reason to disbelieve this. In fact, I would say to you, if you simply read the Koran from what it says, I don't have any reason to believe that the author of the Koran would have told you to disbelieve something like this.

He believed that God spoke. And here in these words, as Jesus has appeared to the disciples after his resurrection,.

He said,.

Then he said to them, These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled. Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.

And he said to them, Thus it stands written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance with forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in the name to all nations, his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.

You are witnesses of these things. I choose not to reject their witness. I have no reason to call them false teachers or cowards. They were witnesses to these things. They were willing to stand before the hatred of men for their witness to Jesus Christ.

Many grieved and imprisoned and killed.

Stephen was stoned.

And they are witnesses to these things.

To what?

That Jesus Christ has fulfilled the Scriptures, and that therefore repentance and forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in his name to all nations. Do you realize that we are a living fulfillment of that this evening?

Look at how far away we are from what these words were originally saying. And yet, this evening, repentance for the forgiveness of sins has been proclaimed in this place through Jesus Christ, through his atoning death.

That person who recognizes his sin death before God, recognizes his unholiness in God's holiness, and recognizes that God's law demands a sacrifice, that God cannot simply wink at sin, but instead he has provided the way of salvation in Jesus Christ.

Why was it only Israel? Why is it only Jesus? Because it was through Israel that the Messiah was to come. And there is only one way of salvation that has been given to man. And that is why what we've done here this evening is so important.

That's why the prophecies are important. That's why believing what God's word says is important. I submit to you that Jesus Christ did not use Scripture the way that Shabir Ali does. Jesus Christ, very plainly, when he quoted Scripture, that was the end of the story.

He didn't fail in his prophecies of his coming. If you simply allow all the Bible to speak, he's very clear about how he's going to come, what must needs take place first, etc., etc. You see, when you believe that E .P. Sanders somehow has the divine, infallible, errant understanding, and he starts with the assertion that you can't harmonize these things, well, then you're never going to hear what Jesus actually said.

Again, Jesus said the Scriptures cannot be broken.

Who are we going to believe?

I thought Jesus was a true prophet. And if the true prophet says the Scriptures cannot be broken, why has the entire thesis of the presentation from the Islamic side been that they can be, and they were?

That is a question we have to consider this evening. To the Muslims here, I ask you to read Surah 616 and 7157. And they tell you you will find Muhammad. But I think in your honest moments you will recognize that you have to stretch those texts completely out of shape.

You have to do with those texts what you would never allow to be done with the texts of the Quran, to come up with anything about Muhammad. So what does that mean? Shabir has talked about how he can become an agnostic, and then he can wear an agnostic hat or something along those lines.

All I've been saying is you have to use the same standards. And when you do, you discover that the New Testament presents Jesus very different from the Jesus of the Quran. My prayer is my hope. It has been my hope in each one of the debates we've done.

I notice my opponents are here this evening. They're chatting with each other, but they're here this evening. I have debated earlier in the week, and I'm ready. My purpose in engaging all of these gentlemen in debate fundamentally is not because of who I am or who they are or who Shabir is.

I very much appreciate all of them taking the time to engage me in these things.

I don't matter.

Who I am does not matter. But the issues that we have addressed here in London over this past week are eternal issues. And I hope and pray that you will not simply allow for a surface-level answer. You will go home.

You will consider. And my prayer is that God, by His Spirit, will reveal His Son to you.

Thank you very much.

The Need for Spiritual Illumination to Understand Scripture

Now, do I think that just tomorrow evening the bare announcement on my part of the fulfilled prophecies of Jesus is going to be enough to change anyone's heart and mind? No, I know exactly what verse 45 says.

Then He opened their minds so they could understand the Scripture. And said to them, thus it stands written that the Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day. Am I saying that the only way that we can look at the Old Testament and find fulfilled prophecies of Jesus is if we just have some sort of a spiritual experience?

No.

But there's a difference between coming to recognize the content of the Scriptures and being ready to be obedient to what the Scriptures say.

Something had to happen.

Jesus had to minister to His people. He had to open their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. Indeed, when some people speak to me and they say, I just don't understand. Well, then pray that God will open your heart, your mind to understand the Scriptures.

We need to remain biblically balanced. We have those on one end who become so focused solely upon rational thought that they become the cold, dead orthodoxy. On the other side, we have those that have to be excited into fits of passion and then it goes away.

And then they have to do it again the next Lord's Day and then it goes. The Bible tells us that God has made us His image. That we are to love God with our minds. That we are to search the Scriptures.

We are to study and we are to handle them right. But we can never ever truly understand them, embrace them, love them, see them as they are until God by His Spirit is pleased to open our hearts and our minds.

This is what Jesus does. And when He does so, we see who the Christ is. And so obviously it is my prayer tomorrow evening that the Spirit of God would do in the debate that I'll be doing what Jesus did for the disciples in Luke chapter 24.

But that for all of us, even in this hour of this day, I know that many of you, most of you have always, as far back maybe as you can remember, have heard about Jesus. And many of you have bowed the knee to Jesus Christ and you've followed Him.

I don't know, there might be some visitors here this morning. And you don't know about this Jesus. You really don't know about the background of all these things. But let me say to you that as Jesus said, thus it stands written that the Messiah, the Christ, would suffer the rites of the dead on the third day.

He did so because that is how God brings about the salvation of sinners. Sin separates us from God. His wrath abides upon us. There is nothing we can do once we even recognize our sin. There's nothing we can do about our sin.

We stand condemned and guilty before Him.

So what must be done?

There will never be injustice in God's world. Every injustice will someday be righted. Every sin will be punished. Your sin will be punished in one of two ways. One, it will be punished in you. In your eternal separation from God and judgment.

Or it will be punished in Jesus Christ. For the wrath of God fell upon Him in perfection on behalf of all those who believe in Christ. All those who would be united with Him in His death, burial, and resurrection.

So I say to you, my prayer for you is that God by His Spirit would open your heart and your mind. That you would see Jesus as He is and see yourself. Understand your sin and understand that by faith in Him you can have as a present possession eternal life.

That was His promise. His promise remains just as true and just as valid today as ever. Let us pray together. Indeed our blessed Heavenly Father, we thank you and praise you for your scriptures. That these scriptures record for us this blessed event where in your providence you ministered in such a personal way.

Through Jesus Christ to these disciples. Take us back to Emmaus, Father. Take us back to that road. Cause our hearts to burn within us as we consider your scriptures. May Jesus Christ be to us our all in all.

And if there be some amongst us within the sound of my voice who do not know Jesus Christ. Do not know their own estate and His perfect work as Savior. May your Spirit once again work that mighty miracle.

Opening hearts and minds and to see Jesus as He is. We do thank you for the freedom we have yet to gather together. May we use these freedoms we have to your honor and glory. Indeed may you be glorified in all that has been done here.