The �Interfaith Alliance� and Islam, followup

CARM (Link) - Matt Slick (July 12, 2011)

An organization called �The Irnterfaith Alliance� promoted a �Faith Shared� project where churches across the U.S. would do things like have a Muslim Imam read the Quran at the Christian Pulpit.

The churches that participated were listed on the Faith Shared website. They consisted of United Methodist churches, some liberal Lutheran churches, a few that were Catholic, several that were United Churches of Christ, along with Episcopal, Presbyterian, and Unitarian universalist churches. There was a Baptist church and one church called �The Church of our Savior.� Undoubtedly, these �churches� are so liberal they probably aren�t Christian. After all, why would any Christian church want anti-Christian literature read from the pulpit, the place where the truth of God�s word is supposed to be preached?

Why? The answer is simple; they have ignored God�s word and trampled underfoot the gospel of Christ so they might follow the liberal call of political correctness and social tolerance. Fortunately, there were less than 75 churches that participated. But even one is too many.

The Faith Shared website has this to say.

• The �Faith Shared event as a way to engage faith leaders on the national and community levels in interfaith events intended to highlight respect among people of different faiths.� 1

• �this project will not only serve as a model for tolerance and cooperation and promote local faith leaders as champions of such, but it will also create a concrete opportunity to build and strengthen working ties between faith communities moving forward.� 2

• �Faith Shared asks houses of worship across the country to organize events involving clergy reading from each other�s sacred texts. An example would be a Christian Minister, Jewish Rabbi and Muslim Imam participating in a worship service or other event.� 3

As noble as Faith Shared�s intention is to promote tolerance, it is also extremely misguided and profoundly unbiblical.

The Christian church is not for reading anti-Christian material like the Quran which denies the Trinity, denies Christ�s deity, denies his atonement, and denies his resurrection. To promote such reading at a Christian pulpit is to violate God�s word.

�Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? 15 Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? 16 Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God said, �I will dwell in them and walk among them and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. 17 Therefore, come out from their midst and be separate,� says the Lord. �And do not touch what is unclean,�� (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).

The Christian church is for the edification of the body of Christ, for the presentation of God�s word, and the administering of baptism and communion. It is not supposed to be a place of liberal social activism practiced by those who deny God�s word, as is often the case of the churches listed above who routinely deny the essentials of the Christian faith.

Consider what God�s word says is the purpose of the pastors and teachers.

�And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ,� (Ephesians 4:11-12).

This is a high calling. In fact, God warns about doing what the �Faith Shared� project promotes. Consider what God says in Revelation 2:18-20.

�And to the angel of the church in Thyatira write: The Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and His feet are like burnished bronze, says this: 19 �I know your deeds, and your love and faith and service and perseverance, and that your deeds of late are greater than at first. 20 �But I have this against you, that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and she teaches and leads My bond-servants astray, so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols.��

God warns about a false teacher who leads God�s people astray. Is not Islam a false teaching when it denies the true God, the true Christ, and the true Gospel? When churches promote the reading of the Quran by Imam�s at Christian pulpits, is this not a toleration of false teaching and helping to lead astray God�s people? Yes it is!

Anyway, there were two churches in my area, Boise Idaho, that participated in what I�ll call �False Teaching Sunday.� I wanted to do something about it, so I wrote up a tract and went to one of two churches that were here in Boise, Idaho. I only did one church because I didn�t have enough people to do two churches. A friend named Shawn helped out for an hour, and later in the morning my wife and daughter showed up. We stood out in front of the church on the sidewalk and passed out the tracts to cars as they were entering and leaving the church. I�d say we handed out about 75 tracts.

Most people were not happy with what we were doing. I was verbally rebuked more than once. A woman said �shame on you.� A man told me to go away. Several people said that I was �wrong� for passing out literature. But, the majority of people seemed apathetic.

Okay, so what did the information we passed out say? If you want the full text go to http://carm.org/interfaith-alliance. But, let me just list some of the quotes I provided in the tract that, I hope, informed the readers of what Islam really teaches.

1. Battle for Allah

1. �Those who believe do battle for the cause of Allah; and those who disbelieve do battle for the cause of idols. So fight the minions of the devil. Lo! the devil�s strategy is ever weak� (Quran 4:76).

2. �O Prophet! urge the believers to war; if there are twenty patient ones of you they shall overcome two hundred, and if there are a hundred of you they shall overcome a thousand of those who disbelieve, because they are a people who do not understand� (Quran 8:65).

3. �O Prophet! strive hard against the unbelievers and the hypocrites and be unyielding to them; and their abode is hell, and evil is the destination� (Quran 9:73).

4. �O you who believe! fight those of the unbelievers who are near to you and let them find in you hardness; and know that Allah is with those who guard (against evil)� (Quran 9:123).

2. Don�t take Jews and Christians as friends:

1. �O you who believe! do not take the Jews and the Christians for friends; they are friends of each other; and whoever amongst you takes them for a friend, then surely he is one of them; surely Allah does not guide the unjust people� (Quran 5:51).

3. A Man�s Seed Comes From His Chest:

1. �Now let man but think from what he is created! He is created from a drop emitted-Proceeding from between the backbone and the ribs� (Quran 86:5-7).

4. Salvation by works:

1. �And He answers those who believe and do good deeds, and gives them more out of His grace; and (as for) the unbelievers, they shall have a severe punishment,� (Quran 42:26). Also, �Then those whose balance (of good deeds) is heavy, they will be successful. But those whose balance is light, will be those who have lost their souls; in hell will they abide,� (23:102-103).

5. Lying is okay when furthering Islam.

1. �Muhammad bin Maslama got up saying, �O Allah�s Apostle! Would you like that I kill him [Ka�b bin Al-Ashraf]?� The Prophet said, �Yes,� Muhammad bin Maslama said, �Then allow me to say a (false) thing (i.e. to deceive Kab).� The Prophet said, �You may say it�� (Hadith Vol. 5, Book 59, #369).

6. The Quran says it is okay to beat wives:

1. �As to those women on whose part ye fear disloyalty and ill-conduct, admonish them, refuse to share their beds, beat them...� (Quran 4:34).

7. Muhammad said that women are deficient in intelligence:

1. �O women! Give alms, as I have seen that the majority of the dwellers of Hell-fire were you (women).� They asked, �Why is it so, O Allah�s Apostle?� He replied, �You curse frequently and are ungrateful to your husbands. I have not seen anyone more deficient in intelligence and religion than you.� (Hadith Vol. 1, Book 6, #301).

Obviously, Islam teaches many things contradictory to the Bible. It�s a real travesty that those who are supposed to be following Christ would promote the reading of Antichrist material from the pulpit in an attempt to promote harmony and peace. This is nothing more than compromise and the promotion of teachings that contradict Scripture.

The Bible says,

�Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness?� (2 Corinthians 6:14).

God calls us to be separate from the deeds of darkness, and this includes separation from the teachings of Islam which should never be promoted from any Christian pulpit. �

See also Interfaith Alliance and Islam