Iran, Israel and The Gospel of Jesus Christ | EP 13

Number one, Israel is still the specially chosen people of God. They are in rebellion as a nation by and large.

They are in rebellion against that God. And yet God, faithful to his own promise, has brought them back into the land.

And this is a sign of the times. That when you see Iran trying to destroy this particular people, it's not just some random geopolitical thing.

This is the Israel of God. As he has ethnically brought them together as a people.

And it shows that the time is near. And welcome to Tearing Down High Places.

My name is Average Joe. Pastor Tim. Pastor Jeff. And we're very excited today to talk about something.

Well, we're excited because we had a little bit of a chat beforehand.

And there's so much to talk about. We're talking about Muslims today.

And witnessing to Muslims. But we're doing it in the context of things that are happening in the culture right now.

Iran recently attacked Israel. There's been the Palestinian conflict going on for months and months.

And it's on people's minds. And we think we can bless people by really just talking a little bit about Islam.

What it is. We're going to ask Pastor Jeff to give us a little primer on Islam.

So Jeff, what is Islam? What do we need to know as Christians about Islam? Islam is not just another worldview that is valid in our culture.

You're Islamophobic unless you acknowledge that there's good in it. Islam began with the demonic oppression of a man named

Muhammad. And he knew he was being oppressed by a demon. Until his wife Khadijah said, no, this is not demonic oppression.

This is actually the angel Gabriel. And so what he received from this angel Gabriel, which was demonic oppression, were surahs that were like recitations, poems sort of, that came from Muhammad, but were demonically inspired and were exactly against the word of God.

So what is the gospel of Jesus Christ? First Corinthians 15, that Christ was crucified according to the scriptures, that he was buried, that he rose on the third day according to the scriptures.

One of Muhammad's surahs says, it is supposed that Jesus was crucified, but really they crucified him not.

It only appeared that way to them. So what happens is Muhammad believes these surahs, recites these, and begins to teach this to others against the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And he advances by gaining followers and advancing his territory by the edge of the sword.

So there was one particular battle in which Muhammad was fighting against the

Banu people, and a Jewish tribe didn't support Muhammad in that battle.

They kind of let it play out. And when Muhammad was victorious, he brought that tribe, that Banu tribe of Jews out, and asked

God, what should I do with them? And one of the people he consulted said that you should kill them all, all the males.

And he agreed, oh, this is the word of the Lord. And then brought out all the men of that Jewish tribe and beheaded them.

This is Muhammad advancing by the edge of the sword. He kept the women and children alive, and many of the women became wives to his people, who would take multiple wives.

Muhammad had many wives. One of those Jewish girls became his wife, and she was actually the one that ultimately poisoned him.

So he died from poisoning. But if you look at what's happening in Iran and their desire to completely annihilate

Israel, they've been trying to do it through proxies, right, through Hezbollah in the north, in Lebanon.

But now they've directly launched missiles at Israel. Where does that hatred come from?

It comes from Islam itself. So in our culture, people would say that Islam is just, you know, good people, right?

Many of the Muslims in our culture are not genuine, authentic Muslims, true to what the

Quran, the Hadith, and the Sunnah of the Prophet actually teach. So most of them are not radicalized, as they would say.

But what it really is, so if Tim was like a young convert in the faith, the more you read the

Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the more you would become like Jesus, and you would become more filled with the fruit of the

Spirit, loving, peaceful, patient, kind, etc., right? What ends up happening is that there are many

Muslims in the world, most of them in the western world are just westernized, and they have Christian values that they gain from the culture, because that's the water they swim in.

But how does a Muslim become quote -unquote radicalized? This is what people don't understand. That's what we need to know.

It's by them becoming more authentically Muslim. So when they actually dive into what their book says, and they read

Surah 929, fight those who do not confess Allah, fight them, it says, until they pay the jizya, until they will pay you to live peacefully in this

Muslim territory, you fight them. That's what Surah 929 says. So as they begin to read, not just the

Quran, but then the Hadith, and there are different levels of authority. So Sahih Muslim or Sahih al -Bukhari, these are considered authentic, and all

Muslims believe that you can trust that Muhammad really said and did this. Well, the things that are in there are awful, and it leads to violence, and to trying to subjugate a people in the name of Sharia law.

So this is how Muslims become more authentically Muslim. But my good friend who's a dentist or a doctor, he would never ever be radicalized like that.

He's such a good person. You're likely right, because he likely will not become authentically

Muslim. He's not likely to go read the Quran. So if you're growing up in Pakistan, you can probably recite the

Quran, but you do it in Arabic, and you don't even understand what you're saying, because they don't speak

Arabic in Pakistan. So your friend who's a dentist in America, maybe will read the

Quran, and probably does, but will not study and understand everything about the

Sunnah of the Prophet, the Hadith, or they'll change what actually was written there to make it more westernized.

But the point is, if he really begins to take seriously the example of the Prophet, the Sunnah of the

Prophet, and what the Prophet says, he becomes more like his Prophet. So how do you have the

Saudi terrorists that flew into the buildings on 9 -11?

Smart guys, well -established people. In fact, I know that the reason I brought that up was because I know that there have been terrorists that have left their very successful medical practices in a couple of the instances that I heard about.

And the reason they went was because they have... Islam does not give them any confidence in their salvation.

Their ultimate destiny could be on the whim of Allah. It's arbitrary. It's an arbitrary religion, isn't it?

Yeah, well, but if they're martyred, then they do have that promise. Right, there's the promise. That's their eternal security.

And they want that promise. The promise that we have from Christ, the promise that we have from our

Gospel, that religion does not have that. They do not have it, yeah. Yeah, these are not just different paths up the same mountain to God, as our culture thinks.

But they do take their books seriously. And I think one of the problems with Americans is we don't, because American general doesn't take our holy books seriously, we don't have a conception of how serious they are about what's in their book.

Yeah, many of them are. So, when in the 1970s the

Shah was ruling over Iran, he was friendly with the United States of America, you know?

They were an ally, almost. But then with the Islamic takeover and the Islamic revolution in 1979,

Iran becomes an Islamic republic. And so that's what we're facing now.

This is why you have that militant attitude there. Yeah, well, that Shah in Iran, that's when

I started getting into politics. I remember I was in 5th grade, coming home, and every day there was another...

Why are the hostages still in Iran? Why are they... Ah, man, that was intense.

Yeah, so this is what you have. And what do you think is happening with Israel? So, there are many people that think that Israel is just a political state, a modern invention, and has nothing to do with the

Israel of the Old Testament and up until the time of Christ and the Diaspora. What do you think?

Ah, man, I think that if you look, two nations wrestling in the womb, right?

Yes. Israel and, I think, Muslims have always hated each other.

And I think the hate really comes from the Muslims. Israel might not even hate them that bad.

Israel just wants to be killed by the Muslims. I mean, that's what I see. The surrounding countries in Israel, why is it that they hate

Israel so much? And why is it that they can't push little Israel into the sea? Why is it?

It's because God has a plan for Israel. And Satan and whoever it is that hates

Israel, and demonic overflow inside the Hamas or whoever it is, is hating

Israel because they just hate Israel. Yeah. I mean, they're hateful to people.

It's demonic. It's demonic, yeah. Demonic thinking. You've got to look further into the spiritual realm of,

Satan wants Israel dead because Satan is just relentless going against God's plan.

I think all Christians have to recognize God's blessings for Israel and God's desire to use

Israel in so many ways, and we have to pray for them. What I might think we need to consider as well, though, is the actual state of Israel versus the state of the

United States. Are we called to take up arms for that? I mean, really, are they?

This can go down. We've got to talk about just war theory. Is our military right now even a just defender of the world at this point?

Really, should we be? Is that their goal? Is that how they're built? It's very hard to trust the current military industrial complex of the

United States because of who the commander -in -chief is, and also the generals have shown themselves in many ways to be much more about the diversity, equity, inclusion than defending the interests of the

United States. I mean, even nation building, going back to the last couple of conflicts.

We haven't had a legal war since World War II. The Congress is supposed to declare war.

That is their authority, but we've got conflicts after conflicts. I mean, even the

VFWs on their T -shirts, I was in the conflict of fill in the blank.

It's not veterans of foreign wars, it's veterans of foreign conflicts. Oh, wow. Also, I don't think that people know what they're up against when they're up against Israel.

I mean, they're going against God, and it never works out for those going against Israel trying to destroy

Israel. It never works out. Like, you think of Haman in the Bible. He got hung on his own gallows.

And, I mean, Israel becoming a nation in 1948. I'm pretty sure the first day they were a nation, they had war, and they still survived.

And it always works out for Israel. It's really miraculous, I mean, that they came back together again.

I mean, I think of the Dead Sea Scrolls showing up and all the just amazing stuff that happened, and you've just got to love watching what

God does. But I never presumed that God's even going to keep them. I presumed that, hey, I mean, after their recent conflict with the

Palestinians, surprise attack, they attacked a homosexual bar or something?

Yeah, it was some kind of music festival where they had a giant Buddha statue. Well, I want to be clear that Israel isn't kept because Israel is good.

Right. That's a good point. Israel is kept because God loves Israel.

No one is good, neither is God. And Israel was never really that good.

I mean, there was times where they were probably more wicked than the other nations around them. Well, they never tore down the high places. That's the theme of our show, right?

Yeah, I mean, because they never tore down the high places is really why they have a lot of conflict to begin with, but God still loves them and protects them.

I mean, they got exiled and scattered all over the world. What other nation in the world has had a nation like that scattered and then called back to their nation?

That's right. Why is it Israel? Faithfulness to the world. That's the only way. Faithfulness to the world. I mean, it's an amazing thing.

I have a boss, 95 years old. He served in World War II. He was 17 or 18 at the time.

And he was serving in Germany. And he was there, and there was a bunch of Jews there that were leaving to get on a ship called

Exodus. They go back to start Israel in 1948. That's an amazing thing to me.

It is, but see, one of my heroes is James White. James White has helped me with knowledge of Islam, like we're talking about today.

Debates that he's done have just been so helpful. But I've heard James White kind of make a mockery of the idea that this current

Israel even is Israel because now James White is Post Mill. That's a new thing, right?

The last couple of years he's become Post Mill. That's new. And listen, I love James White. We can differ on eschatology, right?

But I think this is a huge point. Let me just read Romans 9, the first couple of verses.

Paul says, He's talking about his ethnic people.

They are Israelites. Now, they weren't faithful. They killed Christ. They persecuted every apostle.

They persecuted the early church, and Paul was one of these persecutors until he himself was untimely born.

They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises.

God is faithful. When you talk about faithfulness, it's God faithful to his own promise. They're not good, but God is.

To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the

Christ. Well, Paul will just expand on this. 9, 10, and 11, Romans 9, 10, 11, are about what's happened, this partial hardening for a time.

But Romans 11, 25 says, The fullness of the

Gentiles has come in, and in this way, all Israel will be saved.

So God still has a plan for this ethnic people, this race of people, and miraculously, like Tim said, for these almost 2 ,000 years, they were preserved as a people.

They were circumcising on the eighth day. They were following the Old Testament law. And persecuted from the beginning.

You know, slavery in Egypt, and then countless other things, and then even the Holocaust. They tried to kill these people when they weren't even in the land.

Hitler, this guy Hitler, rises up to try to exterminate the Jews. Why is it that the devil wants the

Jews dead? Because God still has a plan for them, and they're in the, you know, some of them, sure, they went south, but mainly they were in north, in Europe, and then they probably mixed with Europeans, or whoever was living there, and then they came back.

It is ethnic Israel in the land. Many people say they're not. That those Ashkenazi Jews are not actually the

Jewish people. I even heard Dr. Brown, Michael Brown, debated one of those Hebrew Israelites.

And they claim, no, we are the true Israelites, from Haiti and South America.

And they have a chart where all 12 tribes are identified with a particular nationality.

Like Mexican is, I don't know. Oh, that makes so much sense. Oh, how come

I didn't see that before? No, it doesn't make sense at all. But it's just this arbitrary claim.

Yeah, no. Whereas the people who are now in the land of Israel can trace all the way back to the land of Israel, the

Diaspora, and they've kept the traditions, and they've been persecuted and suffered for it. They kept the traditions. All along.

Exactly, they kept the traditions. No one else was keeping those traditions. Just Israel. No one else out there can say that they were keeping traditions.

Maybe they tried, and something happened where they lost their identity. I don't know. But there is a group that God preserved, at least a remnant, that went back to the land that is ethnic

Israel. Yeah, and it is hopeful that those people are going back there and realizing that those traditions are what kept them as a people.

And the prayer has to be that they get back into the Word and really study the

Word. Because when I see them having Israeli flags with the gay pride, it's really sad.

Not only that, I think of all the Jews. I live in a very Jewish neighborhood. I've got five synagogues and walking distance.

And when I chat with Jews, I normally just say, look, I just want you to read your Bible. Because they don't know

God's Word. And they used to be known as people of the Book. They're not really people of the

Book anymore. They are one generation away from losing it. And you won't have that.

I mean, they've got some sort of ethnic tie, but if they're not tied to God's Word, God's not going to bless that. Yeah, it's tough.

Yeah, if they reject the traditions, they do blend. Individuals will just blend off into the nations.

They'll lose their standing as Jews. If they're not circumcising their boys on the eighth day and continuing on as a people, as an ethnic people, they lose that and just integrate into the nation.

So individuals do that. We're sort of transitioning from Islam to Jewish, but I mean, the

Koran itself, it talks a lot about Christians. It talks a lot about Jews. And the

Jewish people now, are they even still looking for a Messiah? Because there's evidence in the

Scripture that the Messiah had to come already. And so they're not.

And they're not doing sacrifices either. So what the heck do they believe?

Do they even believe in sin? Do they have a doctrine of sin? Not around us. Like if you were to go to this temple right up the street, these are

Reformed Jews, right? And they're just ethnic, identitarian, but they're not keeping the traditions and they don't look for a

Messiah and they don't keep the sacrifices. So yeah, it's a very just modern, liberal,

Western adaptation and I think the partial hardening has a lot to do with it too.

That's right. They were always kind of a stiff neck group, but God still was patient with them and loved them.

And by a partial hardening, it means that not all will be pardoned. Those who are hardened, are hardened against Christ and against the

Gospel and the morality even of God's Word because they've all gone astray, right? Romans 3 describes everyone who's without Christ.

So by partial hardening, it means not all. There's a remnant of believers. So if you were to go to Israel, you'd find a ministry called

One for Israel. And it's very effective in reaching Jewish people for Christ.

And that's the way of salvation. I was just going to ask that. I mean, you know, so sometimes when I hear about that some people lift up Israel so much,

I say to myself, but isn't the thing that we want to do is share Christ with them more than anything else? Yes. We don't, we, you know, maybe we're not in control of that, obviously, but we witness we're planting seeds and God will do the increase, but we want them all to come to Christ, right?

Yeah, when it says in Romans 11, 26, all Israel will be saved.

That's referring to the terminal generation after this dispensational period of hardening, right?

But all along, anybody who rejects Christ dies and goes to hell. It's not that like, oh, well, they're ethnically

Jewish. I think John Hagee almost seems to create two ways of salvation at times. When you listen to him, he's a famous Texas preacher.

San Antonio. Jiggly chin, you know, he's fiery, he's just great. Hello, John Hagee. But it almost seems like he doesn't think that, or he implies that the

Jewish people are fine without Christ. That's, that's, and that's where our slander comes from the post mills.

Because they hear that and they say, I can't believe that. And I may have slandered John Hagee.

I don't have a quote, like if I can't quote him directly, let's take his name out of the hat.

There are some dispensationalists that make it sound that way. Right. Yeah. And that's why others will attack it for that reason.

I wonder if Jonathan Edwards didn't believe that. No, he was post mill. All the early generation of Puritans were post millennial.

But to bring it back to Muslims, because we said we were going to talk about Islam. Yes, we did. Thank you. Let's be clear that Islam is a mockery of Christianity.

It is. It's a mockery. They believe, I mean, I feel bad for them because they believe that Jesus wasn't crucified.

They believe that he didn't rise from the dead. That's the very thing that you need to be saved. You're not saved because you reject, and you,

I mean, you're further away from the real thing than you think because you're making a mockery of it.

Another mistake people make is they go, well, it's still an Abrahamic God. You know, the world comes from Abraham.

I've heard that a lot. And it's close enough, and they, you know, oh, and now, right now, they won't tolerate transgenderism.

Right? That's because I think a lot of secular people are like really upset about transgenderism. Not so much about homosexuality because they don't equate the two as being the same.

Like T .K. Rowling, she's all about anything gay or feminist, but now she's against the trans thing because it's like, well, that undoes our feminism, which it does.

She actually has the logic to see that. Keep pumping that logic. She's going to become a believer, maybe. Maybe so, yeah.

Well, they have Abraham, Ishmael, and Muhammad, and our God is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Right. So from the beginning, they just have it wrong. Right. And it's a mockery even from the start of it.

Yeah. And they, I mean, let's talk a little bit about evangelizing to a

Muslim. Yeah, very good. Because, I mean, when we talk to, at least the Muslims that I meet, the first thing they want to tell me is like, well,

I believe in Jesus too, and I believe that he was a prophet. It's almost like you have to beat them to the punch of saying like,

I know that, but you're not believing in the right Jesus. The right Jesus is the one that died on the cross and rose from the dead and is the

Son of God, who is God. So, and then they'll say, oh, well, show me in the Bible where Jesus said,

I am God, worship me. And then it's like, well, okay, he really did say that in John 8. He says, before Abraham was,

I am. But they're not willing to even think of, you know, sound logic and actually see the evidence.

But I feel bad that they, they're way further away than they think because they, you can't think that anyone's better than Jesus.

Don't they believe that Muhammad is a greater prophet than Jesus? I mean, we're not talking about the same

Jesus. This is eternal life, to know the one true God and his Son, who he sent.

Yeah. Muhammad is not anyone we need to know to have eternal life. There's a big difference between Jesus and Muhammad.

And he's straight up contradicted all the earlier prophets, right? Contradicted, yeah. So in Islam, they have five great prophets, from like Abraham to, they'll recognize

David by name in the Quran, and I think Isaiah. They don't use the term

Isaiah, but it's a derivative of that. And then they have Jesus and Muhammad. So these great prophets that they acknowledge.

But all of these prophets before Muhammad spoke of the, Isaiah chapter 53 is about Jesus as the

Lamb of God dying, and then rising, right? David, Psalm 22.

Abraham, the sacrifice of Isaac, not Ishmael. And that God withholding that, prefiguring the death of the

Son of God. And then Jesus himself said that the Son of Man must be handed over to the Gentiles and tortured and crucified, and then raised on the third day.

So if the prophets all said one thing, that Jesus must be crucified, and was crucified, because he's the

Lamb slain before the foundation of the world. This is God's prophetic word. They come along and say that Muhammad is a prophet, and yet he completely contradicts all earlier prophets.

And he says, Jesus was not crucified. I think that's the point where you need to just drive in evangelizing

Muslims, is go to Surah 4, 157. Show them that Muhammad says that Jesus was not crucified, and that this is against the very prophets that went before him, which makes

Muhammad a false prophet. He contradicts at the very point, the center point, of God's revelation.

That is a contradiction. Yeah, a little bit. So, and then you're left with, did

Jesus die on the cross, or did he not? That's it. And then you figure that out. Then you build up to the Trinity from there.

Look at the evidence of, you know, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, they were with Jesus. They saw

Jesus risen from the dead. They wrote about Jesus in the same century that Jesus was crucified.

And then Muhammad is by himself and receives the Quran, and he couldn't read or write.

Sixth century. Everyone's ready to put their faith in that. Why? Yeah. It doesn't make any sense.

Well, you know what? So the other big contradiction is in the

Quran, the Quran, and I don't know where, maybe Jeff knows, I don't know where this is, but the Quran says that the

Jewish and Christian scriptures are true. It attests to their validity. And if those scriptures are true, they then say what?

They say that it's been corrupted. Later they started saying that. But you're right. Muhammad was not aware of even what was written in the quote -unquote

Injil. He called the Gospels the Injil, or the Jews. He said, ask the people of the book. They know. They talk about me.

But then they don't know. And that's why Muhammad is not accepting of them and wants to kill them because they're not willing to bend the knee to him and follow his leadership.

I have a hesitancy to bring up the founders of different cults because, like, you're picking on them.

And I think there's always some illogical thing that you can go after better. But I think

Jeff was saying, no, you should go after that. Well, we were talking about that. Like, so James White is an apologist to Muslims and he takes that a little bit more tactful approach.

Yeah. But I think that David Wood is a more effective evangelist to Muslims because he's so direct.

Like, you're not going to find a more direct like, apologist than David Wood. He'll just attack the snake to crush it on the head.

You know, like, heel to head. The god of peace will soon crush Satan underneath our feet.

Yeah. David Wood charges in and he's seeing people come to faith all the time. You see it on YouTube in the comment section and just people getting saved and he will attack

Muhammad at the point of his marriage to Aisha. When Aisha was only seven years old and consummating that marriage when she was just a little girl.

That exposes the morality of the so -called prophet. And I think that is fair game.

Because the truth is you can't do the same thing to Jesus Christ. No. Because he is blameless.

He's blameless. You cannot find anything wrong with that man. Don't the Muslims actually attribute a significant number of miracles?

They'll attest to Jesus' miracles but the only miracle they attest to Muhammad is the Quran. I'm not 100 % sure on what they attest.

They attest other miracles like him cracking the moon or flying in the night from Mecca to Jerusalem so they could claim the holy site there.

That's how Muhammad got there in this supposed flight on a beast in the middle of the night.

They believe in miracles. This is not in the Quran as much as in the Hadith and the Sunnah of the prophet.

But they do believe that. Yeah. They're quick to believe the miracles that they didn't even see. Fanciful things.

Oh man. Okay. But Jesus was doing it in front of people. And even his opponents could not deny it.

They could only, like Matthew 12, all they could do is attribute it to Satan rather than saying that God was validating him.

But those who were opposing him acknowledged that yeah, that blind guy who was blind and mute and demon possessed,

Matthew 12, he was healed but they attribute it to Satan. That's never the case with Muhammad.

This is just stories. Yeah. Well, how is it that we actually have a claim on the

Holy Mountain in Jerusalem? Well, Muhammad flew there. And God got him there.

Like, it's just another way for them to advance their religion by force.

Where in our Bibles does it talk about Satan and demons bringing up false religions, creating false religions?

So, doctrines of demons in James 3, 2 Corinthians 10, 4 and 5.

When we're to tear down strongholds, these are demonic, ideological strongholds.

So, we have to take captive all of these thoughts and make them obedient to Christ. Because the truth is,

Christ is already King. Right. He reigns over all the earth, Psalm chapter 2. And when he was crucified, buried, and rose from the dead, he asked the

Father, and the Father made the nations his inheritance. Ask me, and I'll make the nations your inheritance.

Psalm chapter 2. And Matthew 28. Matthew 28, he claimed it. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

So, Christ is King. Christ is King. He's reigning. He's ruling now. That sounds a little post -milk, shall

I find out. Yeah, he is King. And Satan is the father of all lies. And if Jesus says,

I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through me, that means he is the only way to eternal life and having your sins forgiven and making it, you know, past the...

The only way out of here alive is through Jesus Christ. So, if someone else comes and contradicts that, then they're wrong.

So, when Jesus says that, he's saying that all the other religions are wrong because Jesus is the way or he isn't.

So, that's when you have to make a choice. Am I going to follow Jesus, or am I going to follow something different? And my

Bible, what I think is that Satan is behind all these other religions because he's the father of lies.

So, it's really a big lie. And don't the biggest liars try to see some truth into their lies?

Yes. A little bit, sure. They have Jesus' name. They say he's a prophet. Yeah, sure.

They try to fool you, but no, we have the truth. Doesn't it say that when

Satan tries to twist the truth, he only does it in little increments?

Yeah. Yeah. Suddenly. So, it's not surprising that you have a religion in Islam that claims to attach to Abraham, that claims some of the truths of Christians and Jews.

Yeah, they had some of the truth, but we've got the rest of the truth. And how many other false religions do the same thing?

We need to restore the truth. People want to find common ground and just try to get along and look for peace when people's souls are on the line.

And you have to, I think Jeff is right, you have to just reveal and be direct and say, no, this is a lie.

This is wrong. Because I think us being so soft is the reason why, you know, Christians are being called

Islamophobic and things like that. Yeah, I agree. And it's... What I've seen is that the

Lord uses that over time. Like, I tell the story about, he was a relative of ours. He was very opposed to the direct approach, right?

And I was sharing the Gospel with him, very opposed to it. It was at a wedding. And then, it was more like a...

What's the thing before a wedding? A reception kind of thing? Like, I don't know what it was. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But we were there talking about the

Lord and he was very argumentative. Did not like the direct approach.

About a year later, he's driving down the road in his car. He was actually driving a postal truck.

And pulls off to the side of the road and goes and kneels down in the ditch and bows the knee to the

Lordship of Jesus Christ. So he got saved, but it was only as that seed began to grow in him and then eventually overwhelmed his resistance.

But if you don't tell people the truth, they don't have that seed. Yeah, a little bit of resistance isn't bad.

Right. It's almost like they believe you're right and they're a little bit mad. Yep. I think when someone doesn't react at all and they think they can just keep living their life,

I think that's even more dangerous. Yeah. Because they're not thinking about deep things at all. Right. I think if it hurts you a little bit.

You shouldn't be afraid of that conflict. Yeah. You shouldn't be afraid of the conflict. Because the gospel is like that.

I mean, it's a little bit, how would you say? It's an offense. Offensive.

Yeah. The gospel is offensive. Yeah. And it offended all of us at some point. We all had, I mean, I really respect people that are doing the wrong thing and then they repent and do the right thing because that's what all of us

Christians had to do at some point. We were walking the wrong way. Maybe we weren't Muslims or maybe we weren't following a different religion.

But we were going our own way, which was the wrong way, which was going to lead to death. And then Jesus came and revealed his truth to us and called us to live a different way.

And now we're born again. We see the truth. Amen. And we're trying to get other people to see the truth as well.

So we all are going the wrong way. So it's not just like we just woke up one day and say, we're better than you.

We're right. You're wrong. It's like, no. We love Jesus so much and we were wrong too. But we found the truth out of his love and grace.

So can't we just say that this is your truth as a Christian and they have their truth as a

Muslim? Oh, sure. Why not? Yeah, that's no problem. Yeah. It doesn't matter if they conflict, right?

I mean, if they're just illogical. That's the point. Yeah. If you want to create a world where 2 plus 2 can equal 4 and then also say 2 plus 2 equals 5.

Right. And 2 plus 2 also equals 1 ,900. And that's a big point I want to drive at. Like, if Jesus says that he came to die for the sins of those who would believe in him and rise from the dead.

And Muhammad says, Jesus was not crucified. Surely they crucified him not.

And the Hadith actually say what happened was Judas replaced Jesus and Judas was the one who died on the cross.

I think most Christians... Even just by logic you can't have both. No, you can't. Easy logic. You know what

I've noticed? I'm sorry, Joe. What I've noticed is where there's sin, a lot of sin, there is no logic.

Yes. So important. And I think even with... you look at it like have you ever met someone where you can just explain it out to them and all they want to do is hate you and they're rageful and they're not logical?

I mean, that's how Satan is. You think like... You know, I mean, Satan has been around longer than us.

Right. And it's not like he's like, oh, I lose at the end and I'm going to just stop trying. No, he's still relentless trying to take as many people down with him.

Why is he like that? He's not logical. He's rageful. He's hateful. And that's how people are when there's a lot of sin.

Yes. Materialists don't like non -material laws of nature because it points to what?

A creator. Oh, wow. You know? Non -material laws of nature like logic. Well, who's creating that law?

It's not something I can feel, touch, or taste, so I can do with it whatever I want. I can mold it however I want.

That's such a good point. I can change it. And I think most Christians, most Christians, not people, but most

Christians would recognize the inconsistency is so important to the gospel, which is first and foremost all the time.

It's not just the gospel. It's how we live our lives after we've accepted the gospel.

And if you have those inconsistencies, we can't even live in peace. Right. We have to be able to live in peace and live under God's truth.

And that's a non -material law of nature as well. Amen. Yeah. So one of the things about James White I mentioned earlier that I love is he always brings it back to the point of consistency.

Truth is always consistent with itself and with other points that you've made. You cannot be a

Muslim and be consistent. No. At all. No. Just because you're claiming that Jesus is a prophet yet you're rejecting what the prophet himself says.

I heard that Muhammad was so arbitrary Yeah. that when he you know, you were talking about when he was beheading people

Yeah. he would have one prisoner of the same situation and say let

Allah be merciful. Yeah. And then the next guy cuts his head off. Yeah. No rhyme or reason just I'm going to cut some heads off I'm not going to That's not

God. Right. Nope. No. Because he didn't have he didn't read he didn't have the the word of God the law of Moses to teach what is right and what is wrong and he wasn't a logical person in general from general revelation.

Yeah. You know what I've heard though is the number one way Muslims are coming to faith is by dreams.

Have you guys heard that? Yes. They're having dreams about Jesus Yeah. and converting

Shame on us. Nabil Qureshi who came to faith through the teaching of David Wood said there's two things.

Number one they will have contact with an apologist either online Okay. or something like that where they're actually hearing the truth the content of the gospel and number two a dream or a vision some supernatural thing.

Nabil Qureshi's dream was of David Wood coming into the door and revealing to him the truth like in his dream the same both of those were together so David Wood and Nabil were best friends in college on the debate club and Nabil was a

Muslim and David was a born again Christian and so he was working on him but then it was through a dream that Nabil started to really believe and that's just that's the story of getting in.

I thought God was just sending out dreams because we're not out evangelizing in those countries No. I like that better.

Both in. Okay. That makes more sense. But it shows that it ultimately is it's up to God to open the heart of someone who doesn't believe but our part is to preach it.

We're coming towards the end here what are the last things that you want to talk about as far as Islam or any other thoughts that you think we

I would like to just summarize some of the things that I've already said that are on my heart is that number one

Israel is still the specially chosen people of God they are in rebellion as a nation by and large they are in rebellion against that God and yet God faithful to his own promise has brought them back into the land and this is a sign of the times that when you see

Iran trying to destroy this particular people it's not just some random geopolitical thing this is the

Israel of God as he has ethnically brought them together as a people and it shows that the time is near he brought them into the land there's coming a day when there will be 144 ,000 ethnic

Jews 12 ,000 from each tribe that are marked and sealed and kept and these will be witnesses to the other

Jews there will be a massive revival in Israel such that you could say all Israel will be saved

I don't think this is going to happen until the last seven years but I do think it's coming so God is not done with his people he's faithful to his promise now we have to understand that when you see geopolitically

Iran attacking and shooting missiles into Israel understand that like Tim said there are spiritual demonic forces behind this and so we need to pray

I don't know that we need to send money because I don't trust our military industrial complex look what they're doing in Ukraine horrible and not defending our own border right so that's not but we do need to pray absolutely we need to be praying for the peace of Israel and understand and you know what we need to do more than anything else take the signs of the times as an impetus to go evangelize go out there and preach to Jew and Gentile and that includes

Muslims with a heart that's passionate for people to know

Jesus Christ because the days are short and we need to hasten the day keep preaching the gospel that's what