Love God, Love Neigbors…including Muslim Neighbors!

I normally don’t embed videos on this blog, so for those of you who would rather read a sermon than listen to one (as I normally would), I apologize.  However this message by my friend Rod Cardoza is worth the half-hour it’ll take you to hear it:

Rod is the founder of The Abrahamic Alliance, a Silicon Valley-based ministry that seeks to build bridges between Christians, Muslims, and Jews.  When Rod speaks, as he does in this message, about Muslims who actually respect Christians who follow Jesus’ commands to love neighbors, he’s speaking from personal experience of having lived and worked among Muslims in several countries as well as here in the U.S.  I say this in response to the inevitable comments that Islam is necessarily a hateful religion that is bent on world domination through force…this is factually untrue of Muslims I have met, and many more Muslims Rod has met.

To be absolutely clear, I’m not a universalist who thinks everyone who’s faithful to their own religion is “just fine,” whatever that means.  I hope I’ve made it clear on this blog that I repudiate the usual Evangelical boundaries of “saved” and “unsaved,” but that does not mean I think it’s all good.  I firmly believe that we are called to introduce all people–including Muslims–to Jesus.  However, we first must learn both who Jesus is, and who Muslims are, and I’ll give you a hint:  what’s usually taught by American Christians is a pretty lousy representation of both.