My second meeting with OldG proved to me that he is someone the Holy Spirit has been working on for a while now. We started by ordering dinner at a broasted chicken restaurant. Despite being unemployed, OldG insisted on buying as he said it is necessary for the host to buy for the guest. I told him really, I am the host because I invited him, but he replied that he was hosting me as a foreigner in his country, and therefore he should pay. After a couple rounds of this I could see he would not budge so I let him pay. One of the best parts of this Middle Eastern culture is their incredible generosity towards guests.
Strategizing for the Long-term
So, we started eating chicken, and started talking. As this was only my second interaction with OldG, I wasn’t planning on pushing the conversation towards the bible or towards spiritual things, but I was mainly focused on getting to know him more and figure out what he was struggling with in his life so I could pray for him until our next meeting and offer a bible study then if it seemed appropriate.
However, things kicked off straight away with serious and spiritual topics. We talked about his job search and how scarce good jobs are in his city. Through that I had the chance to share a little of how I have seen God provide for me in challenging situations, and how I wanted to use our work in tourism to bring more jobs to his city. This intrigued him, and I could tell he appreciated the fact that I wanted to bless the residents of his city this way.
Identify the Struggle
Surprisingly, he shared about his personal struggles with sin as we talked about social media. He said he had been talking to girls for years using Snapchat (Snapchat is extensively used here as a discrete hook-up and porn site, if a guy asks a girl here for her Snapchat, the girl understands he is asking for sexual interaction.) I could understand from his other descriptions of how he felt his phone leading him towards sin that he was also struggling with a porn addiction, something quite common here as well. He described the inner struggle against sin in Islamic terminology saying, “The inner Jihad is the most difficult and greatest form of Jihad.”
Inner Jihad; Struggle with Sin
Jihad is a word broadly meaning “struggle” but is mostly used among Muslims in a religious sense. There is heated debate between liberal and conservative Muslims about the meaning of this term. Liberals tend to focus on “the inner Jihad” or the “spiritual Jihad” rather than the physical kind (for obvious reasons, the physical kind is not popular).
Conservatives, who take their religious texts seriously, say all are equally important. It is undeniable that Mohammad, his “god”, and his closest followers clearly understood it in all its forms: physically against non-Muslims, which they expressed through war, and spiritually against sin and Satan, which they express in Islamic prayer and recitation of the Quran and rituals like Hajj. They all call it the chief end of a Muslim in this life.
Sin’s Tangible Affect
I was delighted to see OldG taking such a keen interest in the inner struggle against sin, and I could tell he could feel the hopelessness of it as well, as he lamented to me about his failure to make any headway against such temptation. He ended his lament by saying he was convinced that this sin in his life is the reason Allah is holding back the provision of a job for him. Muslims (much like the Jews in Jesus’ days on the earth) often think about sin this way, as having a very real and tangible effect on your life here and now and even on your descendants.
After this he asked me, with visible pain in his eyes, “Is there any way to win this spiritual Jihad?” Dumbfounded by the profundity of his question, I took a few moments to decide how to respond. I knew that what he was looking for was what every buyer of a self-help book is looking for, some religious gimmick, some method he could add to his life to get better. This is all Islam has to offer and Muslims believe this is the only possible solution. This is one reason self-help books are always found in book shops across the Muslim world.
How to Defeat Sin
Coming back to our conversation, I decided this was too good of an opportunity to leave for later, or to skirt around, so I went for broke, and I tore into him with the simple reply,
“No.” It was like I had shot him in the guts. I obviously had just confirmed his deepest darkest fear. He was shocked, horrified and started protesting.
“You, you, really think so?!” “You can’t mean that!” I smiled and shot him again, “No, definitely not on your own strength.” Then I paused so I could watch that bullet sink in… and hope starting to come back, then I clarified more, “You need the help of God’s Spirit, that’s the only way.” “God is the only one who can really change us. We have to ask God to change our hearts to hate what is evil and love what is good.” He sat back in his seat considering my words for a second. The color was coming back to his face. Then he smiled,
“I completely agree!”
Discovery Journey through Romans 7
After many failed attempts to meet with OldG for a third time, I really regret not inviting him on a journey of discovering how this could be so through a study of the Bible at once. Hindsight is 20/20. What I did was tell him that I would send him a chapter from the Injil (NT) about the inner Jihad (struggle against sin).
I sent him Romans chapter 7 and decided I had shared enough for this our second meeting and would share the rest later. Please pray that he will be willing to join me in a study of the Bible soon. Also pray that the Lord will continue convicting OldG of his need of a savior and draw him to read the Bible he has had on his phone since the first time I met him.
Romans 7
What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.
Pivot from Middle East Politics with Biblical Wisdom
After dinner he took me to a Cafe to meet some of his friends and his little brother. His little brother obviously had an axe to grind and really wanted to discuss politics. I dodged his trap by sharing Romans 13 and the instructions Paul gave there regarding submission to worldly authorities. They were all fascinated by this teaching, (it is antithetical to Islam completely) and OldG asked me to share more.
God is Wise
Again, this would have been a prime time to invite him into a study of the Bible, but I didn’t want to do that with his brother there across the table from us, so I picked some random Bible stories to share revolving around this theme including Daniel and his three friends peacefully resisting the order to worship the king of Babylon.
I concluded by saying that we as Christians are told to hold these teachings in balance. On the one hand, we are ordered to submit to worldly authorities, and on the other hand, our primary loyalty is always to God, so if the worldly authorities command us to sin against God, we cannot obey that order. They were again extremely impressed by these stories. OldG commented, “Wow God is so wise!” I completely agree.
Only 1% of all funds raised for missions goes to the most unreached places on earth.
THE MOST UNDERFUNDED POPULATION OF CHRISTIANS ON EARTH ARE THOSE THAT SACRIFICE EVERYTHING TO REACH THE UNREACHED.
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