Recently 138 leading Islamic scholars, clerics, and intellectuals around the world issued an open letter to Christianity, "A Common Word Between Us and You", calling for dialogue and change in relations between the two religions. The thrust of the letter is for an agreement between the two religions that will ultimately bring abour world peace. The Scripture is very clear in warning us about such compromise. To say that Christianity, and more specifically Christ, can be reconciled to any other belief system is not only false, it is infinitely dangerous. There is not comparison or equal to Christ, His Gospel, or His true church. The initial letter states that without dialogue, concessions toward one another over core doctrines that separate the two, and a melding of beliefs where there is perceived unity, the net result will be the end of the world as we know it. So, to that response Yale University has issued a response from the "Christian" side of the equation. Knowing that the letter is spearheaded by Yale ought to be enough to sour anyone on its content, even before reading it. However, as one peruses the letter, even in the most casual of ways, it becomes clear that this is no ordinary statement of political correctness or religious tolerance, indeed it is a line in the sand. This response from those claiming to represent Christ is a watershed event in which people will either stand openly and unashameddly on the side of Jesus Christ, or they will fall from Him and be against Him.
Over the next few post I would like to make commentary of several points of this response from an exclusively Biblical perspective. Before I do that however, the links to the two letters can be found below and I would like to ask that all of my readers read these. As you read these however, read what the Bible has to say about Jesus, His Gospel, and His followers from the following passages:
1) John 1
2) John 14
3) Colossians 1
4) Hebrews 1
Along with that consider also the following thoughts about the response letter from the "Christians":
1) He who defines the terms wins the debate. In this case the "Christians" who responded have allowed the Muslims to set both term, tone, and content. (FYI, "A Common Word Between Us and You" is a quote from the Quran in Aal 'Imran 3:64) The responders have allowed the Muslims to define what are the core differences and similarities. Since when did Satan/deception begin defining Truth?
2) Christ must be named, and named without ambiguity, for there to be true Christianity. In other words, asking for forgiveness from Allah (a.k.a. "The All-Merciful One) while equating Jesus words and Muhammad's words as essentially the same is to obscure the Truth about Jesus Christ. For starters those Truths are as follows:
a] God is a Trinity and is God alone. There are no other Gods before Him.
b] Jesus Christ is God's SOn, the second member of the Trinity, and therfore God of very God. c] To equate Him with any other, either by inference or direct statement, is blasphemy and idolatry.
In this response these "Christian" leaders have proclaimed an ushering in of peace while compromising and blaspheming the Prince of Peace. This is an absolute contradiction.
I hope that these thought will trigger your thinking and logic as you read these letters and compare them with Scripture.
By God's glorious grace, may He always find you faithful to His Son!
Letter offered by the 138:
http://www.acommonword.com/index.php?lang=en&page=option1The "Christian" Response
http://www.yale.edu/faith/abou-commonword.htm
My Personal Response (Rough Outline of Points of Disagreement)
