I’m always intrigued at how, when our attention is drawn to an issue, we start to see evidence and discussion of it all over the place. For instance, I’ve been thinking recently about how I disagree with the doctrine of cessastion as taught by most Baptists, but also disagree with the Charismatic church on the other side on how certain gifts are practiced today and the implications thereof. Then last week, I came across a blog post where someone mentioned John Piper’s position on cessationism and found this sermon by him, and the next day Tom (a pastor at my church mentioned in passing at a Bible study his disagreement with cessationism. I probably wouldn’t have noticed those comments had I not already been thinking about that subject.
That brings me to my current topic. Last week, I was involved in a discussion on this blog about the following excerpt from a recent speech given by Illinois Senator Barack Obama:
Moreover, given the increasing diversity of America’s population, the dangers of sectarianism have never been greater. Whatever we once were, we are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers.
And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson’s, or Al Sharpton’s? Which passages of Scripture should guide our public policy? Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is ok and that eating shellfish is abomination? How about Deuteronomy, which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith? Or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount – a passage that is so radical that it’s doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application? So before we get carried away, let’s read our bibles. Folks haven’t been reading their bibles.
In the comments section, I said “I do not want to live in a county ruled by Communistic law or by Sharia law, but neither do I want to live in a country ruled by James Dobson or Jerry Falwell’s versions of Christianity. Imagine the Arts in a world controlled by either of those two.”
The next day, I came across an essay by Philip Yancey entitled The Lure of Theocracy. He ends his essay with this statement:
The very things we resist in Islam, some Christians find tempting. We, too, seek political power and a legal code that reflects revealed morality. We, too, share a concern about raising our children in a climate of moral decadence. We, too, tend to see others (including Muslims) as a stereotyped community, rather than as individuals. Will we turn toward our own version of the harsh fundamentalism sweeping Islam today?
These are issues that we all should spend more time thinking about and discussing. Do you consider the possible end results of the positions you take? To what degree do you think your interpretation of scripture and current issues should be legislated?
A couple of months ago I was at lunch with some of my Adventist colleagues and our discussion drifted to events in the middle east and around the world. Now Adventist eschatology is not as extreme as many dispensationalist versions that have been drawing attention lately, but it’s still an very prominent and detailed part of our theology. So it’s natural that they would interpret these events within that framework. Cliché’s such as “it’s a sign of then end” were mentionend and I suppose it would have died off except that I interjected an assertion that at least some Muslim’s were saying similar sorts of things but in an obviously different eschatology. The comment was met with shock and disbelief.
Now I’m not a expert on Islam, let alone its widely varied versions of eschatology, as varied as Christianity’s, but I do know enough to know that they have them, and that they are every bit as detailed and applied to current events as Christianity’s, Hinduism’s and other world religions. I’ve had some experience with it through a ministry call AMR (Adventist Musilm Relations) so I have some first hand experience talking with American Musilms about the issues in addition to reading about it online. My poor colleagues however apparently had never even imagined that this might be the case. Even when the admitted that it made sense for Muslim’s to have one and to apply it to current events, they had quite a bit of trouble imagining that it could have similar predictions as ours such as the famous “war and rumors of wars” bit. It put an end to the conversation in a totally different manner.
We are quite a bit poorer as human’s when we lack the imagination or perception to see that our fellow human even of different faiths, or no faith at all, have the same needs, desires, that we do. Moreover, most of them have answers which satisfy them, at least to a certain level. These answers may be different than ours, and we may think them wrong, but it is rather myopic to think that they are so pitiful that they are not even worth considering.
Concerning Islamic End Times eschatology, the current President of Iran recently said: “From the beginning of time, humanity has longed for the day when justice, peace, equality and compassion envelop the world. All of us can contribute to the establishment of such a world. When that day comes, the ultimate promise of all Divine religions will be fulfilled with the emergence of a perfect human being [12th Imam] who is heir to all prophets and pious men. He will lead the world to justice and absolute peace. O mighty Lord, I pray to you to hasten the emergence of your last repository, the promised one, that perfect and pure human being, the one that will fill this world with justice and peace.”
“Our revolution’s main mission is to pave the way for the reappearance of the 12th Imam, the Mahd.”
Change the “12th Imam” for “Christ”, and it sounds pretty familiar.
And that’s only the Shi’a. They have just as many schisms and sects as Christianity does.