We need to really think about how we spell ISLAM - we need to spell it: I Sincerely Love All Muslims.

Too often we treat Muslims as the enemy and want to keep them at shooting distance - we need to get in close and reveal the love of God
Too often we treat Muslims as the enemy and want to keep them at shooting distance - we need to get in close and reveal the love of God

This is the challenge put forward by Open Doors' founder, Brother Andrew. After the success of his book, God's Smuggler, he was unable to travel to the communist bloc countries without endangering local believers so he turned his attentions else where. He rightly foresaw the next great frontier for the Gospel to traverse was Islam.

The question is no longer, 'is there a god?' it has become far more challenging, it has become, 'WHO is your God?' Do we have a credible answer? Do our lives exhibit a credible answer?

The demand is not for a theology, but which theology is more real. Brother Andrew has travelled extensively and met with many Islamic fundamentalists, including the leaders of Hamas, and given them Bibles - he was even able to present Yasser Arafat with the Gospel. As a man, literally on the frontline, he gives this advice: 'when confronted by a man with a gun, walk towards them, don't run away because they can shoot you in the back, walk towards them, close the distance and when you get close enough, hug them - they can't shoot you then.'*

We must stop treating Muslims as our enemies, we must spell ISLAM, I Sincerely Love All Muslims, if we love them, they can't be our enemies, and as our friends we can have dialogue and they can see the life of Christ in action.

It is often too easy to see Islam as the enemy especially as much of the persecution occurring in the world is as a result of the confrontation between Islam and Christianity. But Christians facing their Muslim persecutors refuse to retaliate, preferring instead to pray for their persecutors.

This challenge to reach out with love is the gauntlet laid down for us Christians in the UK by those Christians who dare to do it on the frontlines of the faith. How do we respond?

*quote based on a Brother Andrew sermon at Spring Harvest 2005 CR

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