Witnessing to Muslims, Part 5 - Jesus Christ

Welcome back to lesson 5 in Witnessing to Muslims. In this lesson, we're going to take a look at who is Jesus Christ. Because between Christianity and Islam, there's a major difference in that. Islam believes that Jesus Christ was a good man, they even believe he was a prophet.

The Islamic View of Jesus as Prophet but Not Deity

But they do not accept Jesus Christ as deity, because of a false understanding of the trinity they believe that the trinity is three gods and they're strictly monotheistic. So they believe that the belief that Jesus Christ was deity violates the monotheism of God.

One thing you can do with that is explain the difference that the trinity is three persons in one God, not three gods in one God or three people in one people. But we see some things that they do accept that become interesting.

They do accept that Jesus Christ was supernaturally born of a virgin. They accept that he did miracles throughout his life. And they accept a supernatural death, but not the kind of death you might think.

See, because they believe that Jesus Christ was a prophet, and because Islam was born out of the era when you'd have victory writings, and what that is is when kings would go to war and only their victories would be recorded.

You wouldn't have any recordings of anything negative. The thought being a king can't do anything wrong. The same thing is here is that the belief that a prophet could never do anything wrong. Had this with when I was debating Joshua Evans, and he had made the claim that Noah couldn't be a prophet because he was a drunkard.

The Bible only says he got drunk once that we know of. But the Bible also never claims he was a prophet. But his point was that a prophet couldn't be cursed. And that comes out of that mindset. This is a sidebar.

It's one of the reasons we can trust the Bible is from God. Because in the Bible, we see the disciples warts and all. They don't have the victory writings of just the positive things they've done. We see the bad things they've done as well.

Something that's true of the Bible, but not really of the other writings of religions. So when we look at this though, because of that, when they see the death of Jesus Christ, they see that Jesus Christ being on a cross, they don't accept it.

They believe that Jesus Christ in a supernatural way, God had given a duplicate, a lookalike on that cross. So people thought it was Jesus Christ, but it really wasn't. And so Jesus Christ was walking around, that's fiction, and he didn't tell anyone, he let everyone believe he really was on the cross.

What they accept is that Jesus Christ wasn't on that cross, that it was a lookalike on there, and it was a supernatural death in that sense. Which, a question I'll sometimes ask, and I do this in a humorous, light-hearted way, but at the same point, getting the point across.

I'll say, you know, I just don't understand, I'm just curious. It seems that Jesus Christ had a supernatural death, did supernatural things that vindicated his deity, a supernatural death, and Muhammad didn't.

It seems like God's vindicating Jesus Christ more than Muhammad, and Muhammad's supposed to be the greatest prophet. Just saying. But one of the things we see when it comes to the deity, Muslims will say that Jesus Christ never claimed to be divine, and it's because our language has changed, and because of a misunderstanding of the scriptures.

Jesus Christ Claimed Deity in John 8 and John 10

What do I mean our language changed? If I asked you if someone was gay, you'd probably think I'm asking if they're homosexual. But if I asked you 150 years ago, you would assume I'm asking if they're happy.

Words have changed meanings. When we look at the words, Son of God, when we look at the words, I am, when Jesus says, I and the Father are one, you can look at John 8, John 10, explicit texts that deal with Jesus Christ explicitly claiming to be God.

When I was debating Joshua Evans, he wanted to ignore those, and claimed that Jesus Christ never claimed to be God. Well, the people at that time that understood the words in the language at the time clearly understood it, because when Jesus said, I am, or when he said the Father and I are one, the Jews picked up stones to stone him, and the scripture says why?

For blasphemy. That's claiming to be God. Jesus even pushed the envelope a little and asked, for what good works do you stone me? And the Jews said, not for any good works, but you being a man, claim to be God.

Clearly and explicitly, Jesus Christ claimed to be God. And they have a difficulty with that, often because of their misconception of what the Trinity is. They'll say that Jesus Christ can't be God because they're strictly monotheistic, and it doesn't make sense to them that you can have three gods in one God, or three people in one people, and it's because they've misunderstood the definition.

The definition of the Trinity is three people in one God. So, and as I had with the debate at Montclair State University with Joshua Evans, I had one person say, I don't know how you did your math, but one plus one plus one always equals three, not one.

And I explained he was doing apples to oranges. It's three people, one God. So one thing that you end up realizing, though, very quickly, is there's one thing you cannot say about Jesus Christ. You cannot say he was just a good man, or just a prophet.

Jesus Christ Must Be Lord, Not Merely a Good Man

Let me explain why. If Jesus Christ was just a man, yet claimed to be God, that puts him in one of two categories. Either he knew what he was doing, and he was a liar. Or he really believed he was God, and he was a lunatic.

But either one of those two, you wouldn't accept him as being a good man, let alone being a prophet. So that leaves us with only one other choice. Jesus Christ, if he's a good man and a prophet, must also be Lord.

And that's the point. Jesus Christ is the Lord God Almighty. I hope this was helpful for you, and go out and strive to make today an eternal day for the glory of God.