18-5–75MO—DFO No.709

—By Father David

© June 1978 by the Family of Love‚ CP 748, 00100 Roma, Italia.

(A Class … while guests in [a Muslim country]!):

1. ISLAM IS ONE OF THE WORLD'S GREATEST RELIGIONS. It's the religion of hundreds of millions of Muslims from China to West Africa. Those are almost all Muslim nations, and Muslims around the world on every Continent in every nation are the same, even in the United States.

2. I NEVER REALISED UNTIL THE OTHER DAY HOW BIG AND HOW LONG THAT ARAB WALL WAS until when we were going over the Arab countries, the Muslim countries particularly. I called that the Arab Wall because to me it meant Arabs. (See "The Arab Wall," No.274.) But do you know that I can't honestly say that that's what God called it, because the only identification on that wall was what?—The star and crescent!

3. IT WAS THE MUSLIM WALL! It was the Wall of Islam, that's what it really was. The Muslim Wall from China to West Africa, except for Israel which seems like a dagger in the heart of the wall‚ the Muslim Wall. I was thinking of the Arabs you know.

4. YOU THINK OF THE MUSLIMS AS ARABS BUT THEY'RE NOT ALL ARABS—the Muslim Wall. Those countries extend from China to West Africa and they're not all Arabs. That continuous wall of countries who are predominantly if not entirely Muslim extends all that way, that's a big long wall! And in that dream it's beginning to move and it really is moving! I mean that's wonderful to me how the Lord can show us these things. Praise God!

5. SO IT'S ABOUT TIME WE KNEW SOMETHING ABOUT THEM and their religion and their Book‚ of which we are woefully ignorant. I am ashamed of myself that I don't know more about them. I've heard about them, studied a little bit about them, and read a little bit about them, but mostly Western … propaganda.

6. IT'S ABOUT TIME WE HEARD THE OTHER SIDE and really studied the book itself and not somebody's opinion of it, not even their own traditions of it. It's about time we got acquainted with them and learned something about them personally. Not just what people say about them or about the former atrocities of history. Let bygones be bygones. The atrocities were just as much on the part of the so-called Christians as anybody, in fact maybe more so.

7. THE MUSLIMS WERE MORE OR LESS DEFENDING THEMSELVES. What's the best defense?—An offense! When they found they had to attack the West in order to defend their homelands‚ that's what they did‚ and they won!

8. IT'S MY FIRM CONVICTION THAT MOHAMMED AND ISLAM WERE THE SCOURGE OF GOD UPON A WICKED CHRISTIAN WORLD, an idolatrous corrupt Christianity, the Roman type of Christianity, because it came when the Dark Ages were almost at their depths, the 600s to the 1100s or 1200s.

9. THEY WERE THE GREATEST EMPIRE ON THE EARTH AT THAT TIME, believe it or not, one of the few remaining world empires, Not as great, however‚ as the seven great empires, Rome and so on, but they were a world empire, but simply not ruling the whole world as Rome did.—But they sure ruled a big slice of it!

10. A PEOPLE WHO WERE THAT INTELLIGENT AND THAT POWERFUL, and as great in art, culture, language and literature, science and mathematics, warfare, politics and religion and everything else as they have been, it is amazing to me, I can't even understand how little we are taught about them in school!

11. WHAT LITTLE WE HAVE BEEN TOLD IS PURE ANTI-ARAB PROPAGANDA. Nothing good is ever said by the West about the Arabs, I never heard anything good in school about the Arabs. I think the only good thing I ever heard about the Arabs was that they said, "Well‚ we did get our numerical system from them."

12. THEY WERE PRETTY GOOD MATHEMATICIANS and we got our Arabic numerals from them."—That's about the only thing they ever gave thanks to the Arabs for. And how could they help it, I mean there it was, they couldn't deny it, "Behold the man!"—But that's all they ever gave them thanks for.

13. THEY NEVER GAVE THEM CREDIT FOR ALL THEIR INFLUENCE on literature, culture, architecture and a lot of other things. We have a whole book about the influence of Islam on the Western culture and literature and art and science and a lot of other things, even religion.

14. SO WE NEED TO AT LEAST KNOW SOMETHING ABOUT THEM AND APPRECIATE THEM AS ONE OF THE GREATEST PEOPLES ON EARTH and one of the greatest religions on Earth, and at this particular moment becoming one of the greatest powers on Earth, politically and economically, as there's this great shift in the balance of power. I believe this is the beginning of the shift of the balance of power from the Western world to the "Kings of the East" from whom I believe is going to rise that final king. … (Rev.16:12.)

15. IF THIS UPRISING OF THE ARABS IS THE BEGINNING OF THAT COMING WORLD POWER, from what God showed me 20 years ago about the Message of Jeremiah, we'd be pretty smart even for our own good to … show our sympathies. …

16. IF WE'RE GOING TO HELP THE PLAN OF GOD SPEED ALL THE FASTER‚ the quicker the Antichrist comes the quicker Christ's going to come. Besides that, the Scripture teaches that we are to obey the power that is, and if this is the power that's going to be, well‚ why not start cooperating with them now? I mean for God's sake, if we can manage to get along with the Arabs, as different as we are in our religions and whatnot now, that is a miracle!

17. MAYBE IT'S PREPARATION FOR GETTING ALONG WITH THE FINAL … GOVERNMENT, at least for a while for our own self-preservation. There is a possibility that God is doing this to shift us—we've already come from someplace but where are we going? We've got to go someplace if we're going into all the world.

18. WELL, IF THE WORLD'S GOING TO BE TAKEN OVER BY A WORLD POWER, WE HAD BETTER BE ON FAIRLY GOOD TERMS WITH THEM, God helping us, if we're going to exist and survive for a while under that world power. And the fact that we were sympathetic in the beginning, showed our sympathy, and helped [explain] their cause, certainly ought to help them to at least be a little lenient and tolerant toward us if nothing more, at least to show their gratitude.

19. I RECALL IN ONE OF THE PROPHECIES, I think "Old‚ Church‚ New Church," the new government says, "Leave them alone, they're like us, they're for us, they're not against us." So it's quite possible that God is doing this now to help us to get their favor.

20. IN OTHER WORDS I'M TRYING TO SHOW YOU THERE'S A POSSIBLE BENEFIT IN IT FOR US EVANGELISING THE WORLD, not just some kind of a vacation in warm Arab countries. It's not going to be any vacation, we have too much to do‚ and you're going to minister there. I trust you haven't been looking on it as a vacation. I don't know what all you've been doing, but I hope you've been ministering to them all you can and helping them.

21. BUT THAT'S A THOUGHT—IT COULD BE GOD IS GETTING US IN WITH THE RISING POWER that is to come, that's going to run the world. We have taught and preached for years that this was going to be necessary for us to survive‚ even as Jeremiah taught.

22. JEREMIAH SAID, "SUBMIT YOURSELVES TO THE KING IN POWER AND LIVE, BECAUSE BABYLON IS THE SWORD OF GOD, the scourge of God upon the wicked" and some of the rest of the world! In other words, it's of God. Babylon was of God to punish even His Own people, just as they're going to probably punish the former so-called people of God. (Jer.27:12-17.)

23. THE U.S.A. THOUGHT THEY WERE GOD'S GIFT TO MAN, BUT NOW THEY'RE GOING TO BE PUNISHED BY THE LORD by the very enemies they curse and whom they consider the enemies of God. Frankly, the way the Communists are behaving themselves, they are considered prudish and puritanical. They purge and purify every country they take over to get rid of all the gambling and the prostitution and the filth and the garbage and everything else and clean up the country.

24. THEIR ENEMIES ARE EVEN ACCUSING THE COMMUNISTS OF BEING TOO PURITANICAL, can you imagine that‚ like the Puritans! Ha! Righteous!—More righteous than the so-called Christian world. Well, if the righteousness of the heathen, as God's Word says, is greater than the righteousness of those who claim to be His people, even without the law, then God is going to bless them for it. (Romans 2:14.)

25. IF THE COMMUNISTS OR THE SOCIALISTS OR THE ARABS OR THE THIRD WORLD ARE GOING TO BE MORE RIGHTEOUS THAN THE WEST and the so-called Christians by having compassion upon the poor and feeding the hungry and sharing the wealth and cleaning up the filth and abolishing the corruption, then all power and more power to them right?

26. IF THE SO-CALLED "WRONG" PEOPLE ARE PREACHING THE RIGHT MESSAGE and using the right method and getting the right results, then something is horribly wrong with the so-called "right" people! Right?

27. THIS IS GOING TO BE THE LAST STRAW. Of course we've already shown our favouritism toward the Arabs and made a lot of enemies‚ both Christians and Jews. … Well for God's sake let's stay in good with the Arabs for at least a little while! After all, I don't know how many enemies we can survive! Ha! So praise the Lord! Thank You Jesus!

28. SO I THINK WE'RE HERE FOR A PURPOSE, and I think it behooves us to learn to know them and their religion and their history and about their leader and leadership and to understand them better. Sympathise with them, have compassion upon them and even help them to know their own religion and their own Book better and their own leader better.

29. MAYBE WE CAN EVEN BE BETTER MUSLIMS THAN THEY ARE! I used to tell the Jews, "Listen here, I'm a better Jew than you are because I'm obeying the Book more than you are!" Right? Well, why can't we even set them a good Muslim example of true Islam, "those that submit to the true faith‚" huh? Well, that I think is why we're here and so all that to say this‚

30. I THINK WE SHOULD HAVE A LITTLE KORAN STUDY. You know a lot about the Bible, you probably know more than most, but you'll never know too much. So considering how much we know about the Bible and how little we know about the Koran and Islam, I think it's about time we studied something about them.

31. SINCE WE'RE THEIR GUESTS AND HELPING TO [EXPLAIN] THEIR CAUSE, we need to know something about them whether good or evil. Let's find out as much good as possible so we can even work better with them.

32. IN FACT, AS I SAY, LET'S HELP THEM TO BE BETTER MUSLIMS and to understand their Islamic faith even more. I dare say it wouldn't take us too much study of this book to know more about it probably than a lot of Muslims do!

33. IT WOULDN'T TAKE YOU READING TOO MANY CHAPTERS in the Bible to be way ahead of most church Christians who go to church for a little hour on Sunday and hear a ten-minute preachment on the offering or something else and know little or nothing about the Bible. That's probably what most Muslims get too, I don't know how much they even read the Koran in the service.

34. I USED TO GET UP IN CHURCH AND CONTRADICT THE PREACHERS and wave my Bible and quote chapter and verse. I found out I knew more about the Bible than a lot of preachers. All they knew was what they had heard themselves and what they were taught by the preachers and the teachers in the Bible Schools, a lot of which was not Bible!

35. WHEN I BEGAN TO REALLY DIG IN THE BIBLE as a young pastor and as a young Christian I found a whole lot in there that I never heard before and the preachers hadn't told me, and a whole lot of it contradicted what the preachers had told me.

36. I'M SURE THERE ARE MANY TEACHERS WHO COULD LIKE TO GIVE US LESSONS in it, but I personally found out that I could get more from the Holy Spirit and from the Lord by studying the Word directly myself to see what God had to say. So I have a feeling we're going to get more between us and the Lord and the Koran in our private study together trusting God to show us what it means.

37. SO FAR WHAT WE'VE READ HAS BEEN PRETTY SIMPLE hasn't it? And the meaning has been pretty clear. Why should we have to have anybody interpret it for us and tell us it doesn't mean what it says like the preachers do, or that it means something else?

38. I HAVE A FEELING MOHAMMED PROBABLY MEANT WHAT HE SAID‚ and this is what he wanted to say and what he wanted you to hear, so why not hear it? Why take somebody else's word for what they think he meant, or what they think he wanted to say or was trying to say?

39. I HAVE A LOT OF PEOPLE WHO INTERPRET MO LETTERS THAT WAY. Some leaders get up and say, "Well, you know Dad, you know what he really meant to say was so-and-so. Now what he was really trying to say was this. Well, now you know he doesn't mean that, he means this!" God help us!

40. I MEAN EXACTLY WHAT I SAY!—Word for word!—That!—Not this!—But they interpret it to suit themselves. So every teacher and every leader has those who try to twist what he says to mean what they think it says or what they think he means.

41. I LIKE TO GET THE RAW PURE STUFF MYSELF WITHOUT COMMENT AND WITHOUT INTERPRETATION, without tradition and without the interference and influence of another which might be a foreign spirit. I think I can listen to the Lord better with us alone, in a sense, reading and hearing what God has to say about it‚ praise God?

42. YOU FOLKS ALSO NEED TO BE WARNED ABOUT GOING INTO SOME OF THESE MUSLIM COUNTRIES. Although Islam teaches tolerance of other faiths and your own faith and your own worship and permits freedom of faith and religious worship, almost all Islamic countries prohibit propagandising like litnessing or soul winning or the spreading of your faith or proselytising missionaries. So you have to be a sample and not just a sermon.

43. WATCH OUT ABOUT SOUNDING LIKE YOU'RE TRYING TO PREACH YOUR FAITH to others and trying to convert them, propagandising them. This is strictly forbidden by Muslim law in most Muslim countries and why some of our kids were foolishly in jail in Morocco for about a year, that's a hell of a long time!

44. SO REMEMBER IT IS AGAINST THE LAW IN MOST MUSLIM COUNTRIES FOR YOU TO PROPAGANDISE, proselytise, win converts, spread the Word, especially to distribute literature‚ you just cannot do it openly. You can only sing and FF.

45. IF WE'RE GOING INTO ARABIC COUNTRIES NOW TO MAKE FRIENDS‚ even if not to preach but at least to show them a sample, we certainly ought to have a few Letters for them, if they really want to know what we've go to say.

46. GIVE THEM OUR MESSAGE ABOUT THEM and about politics and economics and the world situation. As long as they're not real religious—I mean you could give "Rich Man‚ Poor Man" to almost any of them, they wouldn't consider that religious propaganda. But it must only be done very personally just to very good friends who are not going to turn you in!

47. USE WISDOM AND GREAT CAUTION! Do not litness nor witness openly! But it's perfectly legitimate to be a Christian and "Show your faith by your works," "Let your light so shine." (Ja.2:18; Mt.5:16.)

48. LET THEM SEE YOUR LOVE, JOY AND PEACE, a light in dark places to lighten their load and enlighten their way. Sing them happy songs, even about Jesus. They could hardly call that proselytising!

49. JUST BE A GOOD SAMPLE and they will get the point that you have something happy that they haven't and it's JESUS!—Amen? God bless you! I love you! Just love and FF them! Love never fails!