How Should Christians Love People Who Love a Different God?
How Should Christians Love People Who Love a Different God?
There once was a Christian missionary who moved to the Middle East with his family, where he hoped to build relationships with the locals—a predominantly Muslim community—and to have the opportunity to share the good news of Jesus with them.
He met and befriended a local man who was a devout Muslim, and he invited the man over to his house so that they could spend more time together.
Because this man was a devout Muslim, however, he was required to stop whatever he was doing at certain times throughout the day to say his prayers. So as the next time for prayer was approaching, he asked his new friend and host—the missionary—if it would be okay for him to stay there and pray in his home. Otherwise, their time of fellowship would be cut short.
Initially, the missionary said, “Sure, that’ll be fine,” but the more he thought about it, he started to feel uneasy about allowing someone to pray to a different god within the four walls of his home.
Ultimately, the missionary changed his mind and told his new friend that he wouldn’t be able to pray to his god inside his house. “I’m sorry, but if you’re going to pray to your god, you’ll have to do that somewhere else. See, I am a Christian, and my family are Christians as well. We believe there is only one true God—the God of the Bible; and ‘as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord’ (Joshua 24:15).”
The missionary wanted to be sure he was setting a clear example for his children of uncompromising faith, and he also wanted to protect them from any spiritual influence that prayers to a false deity might call into effect within the home.
He thought that, perhaps, his Muslim friend would be conflicted over having to choose between staying or praying. He hoped that the inconvenience alone might persuade the man to neglect his prayers just the once, and that he’d want to stay and hear more about this “one true God” instead.
But the man was a devout Muslim, who took his faith seriously as well; and so, not being allowed to pray inside the missionary’s home, he left to find a place where he could fulfill his religious duties and show his devotion to his god.
In another part of the world, there was a Christian pastor who learned that a mosque was being built across the street from his church.
At first, he felt uneasy about this development and was unsure how to respond. But as he prayed about it and considered the gospel accounts of the life and teachings of Jesus, he found peace and clarity.
He hung a sign out front of the church building, welcoming their soon-to-be new neighbors—a sentiment that would be put to the test.
The mosque was scheduled to be opened the week of a major Muslim religious holiday centering on communal prayer, but due to a construction delay, they likely would not be able to open until after the holiday had passed.
Remembering the sign out front of the neighboring church, the imam of that Muslim community reached out the pastor of that church, asking if his people—the Muslims—could meet and pray inside their church building.
The pastor was ecstatic that God had given them such a practical opportunity to love their neighbors by showing them hospitality. “Yes! Of course you may use our building!”
“We don’t want to be a burden. We will pray that our building will be finished in time, so that we won’t be an imposition to you or your people.”
“And I will pray to my God that your building won’t be finished in time, so that you have to pray here!” the pastor replied.
The date for the mosque’s scheduled completion came, and the building was not finished; so the Muslim community gathered inside the four walls of their neighboring church, and they prayed to their god.
Meanwhile, the pastor prayed to the God of the Bible for the neighbors he was hosting; and he encouraged his flock to make space both in their hearts and their church building for their Muslim neighbors—not as brothers and sisters in Christ, but as neighbors to be loved.
Both of these stories are true. They involve real people and real situations and real decisions that were made “in Jesus’ name.”
Two very real scenarios that may seem uncommon or unlikely to many of us, but that aren’t all that different from the kinds of scenarios and choices we do and will face in our day-to-day lives as we engage with the people around us.
We all have neighbors, after all—some who are Christians, and some who are not.
And we are all called to love our neighbors, Christians and non-Christians alike.
I’m going to be real with you. I heard both of these stories firsthand, a few years apart. And with the telling of each story, I found myself wrestling with my convictions as shaped by my upbringing and presumptions, as well as by my convictions as shaped by the gospel of Jesus Christ. Both stories forced me to ask the questions, “What would I have done in their shoes?,” and, “What would God have wanted me to do?”
But having heard both stories now, and laying them out side-by-side—quite the juxtaposition—I can’t help but picture Jesus standing before His Church today and beginning to teach us in the form of a parable:
“There once was a missionary…”
And then again, “In another part of the world, there was a pastor…”
And finally, wrapping things up with a question, I can hear Jesus asking us:
“Which man loved his neighbor? And which man loved God more?”
It’s interesting, usually when Jesus told a parable and asked a question like this, the “right” answer was the answer that made most of those listening and learning from Him uncomfortable—the answer that felt “wrong” to them, because of the things they’d been taught or presumed.
I’m uncomfortable right now, as I’m writing these things—but in a good kind of way. I’m uncomfortable, because I’m pretty sure the life and words of Jesus are continuing to prove that some of what still seems right to me isn’t, and that some of what seems wrong to me is actually right.
I’m uncomfortable, because I need to repent—to think differently—to let God change my mind, so that He can change my heart, and ultimately my behavior, so that I can look more like Him.
Maybe you are feeling uncomfortable in this way, too.
I’m not going to tell you which man loved his neighbor better in these stories, or which man loved God more.
But I invite you to wrestle through this and to let Jesus ask you those two questions. (And friend, ultimately, it’s not about the missionary or the pastor. It’s about you, and it’s about me.)
At the end of our wrestling, when you and I give our answer to Him, I believe Jesus will have one more thing to say to each of one us:
“Go and do the same.”
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