I wouldn’t say that it’s a partnership, to be sure. At their core beliefs, if these groups (the groups like gay rights groups, black lives matter, etc. and hardline believers Islam) were to compare notes, the former groups would be killed by the latter group if the tables were turned and the same players were suddenly transported to pretty much any middle-eastern culture – Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, etc., etc..
WHAT IS THIS CURIOUS DANCE BETWEEN RIGHTS GROUPS AND ISLAM?
But for some reason, in the modern West, gay rights groups often seem to be willing to form emotional ties to those in the Muslim community, standing up for them as “oppressed minorities,” and seemingly simply because they seem to feel oppressed themselves; and in that frame of mind, perhaps they find a sensitivity and/or feel a need to identify with other groups who are “oppressed.” And it seems there is no end in some places (for some of the Muslim belief) of complaints about being spoken badly of and not able to practice their religion as freely as they would like, or to not be spoken badly about.
It seems to be an odd phenomenon that also occurs between blacks in the “black lives matter” groups and the black panthers. When the protests were going on in Baltimore, there were some strange alliances between the “black lives matter” protesters and black panther/Muslim groups.
There doesn’t seem to be any kinship between these different groups except that you have groups (blacks, gays) who feel oppressed and other groups (Muslims – not all of them, for sure, but some) who will will capitalize on that feeling, giving a false sense of “we identify with your struggle” in order to gain their trust and draw them in to strategic alliances of sorts – in protests, demanding of the silencing of the Judeo-Christian voice which still remains in the culture.
Special Interests, Gay Rights Groups And Islam
The frightening thing that most in the “black lives matter” and gay rights groups don’t see is how this is the type is that some (SOME – NOT all) in the Muslim way of thinking may well have intentions of allowing these gay rights groups and “black lives matter” types do their dirty work for them – by allowing these special-interest groups to do the marching, the protesting and the heavy lifting of getting laws entrenched to silence the Judeo-Christian conscience that remains in our society, so that once this is done, the laws can be changed to make speaking out against their beliefs “hate speech” and therefore doing so will be a hate crime. There is a house resolution before congress about this:
Muslims are 1% of the population and sharia is already being enforced on the American people. Speak out now and prepare to take action or, as history has proven, your children and theirs will be the victims of Islamic supremacy and they will have to fight the physical war to defeat Islam. It’s clear which side the current U.S. government is on, and it’s not yours. via The Rule of Reason :: Weblog of the Center for the Advancement of Capitalism
Stephen Coughlin alerted me to a House Resolution introduced on December 17th,H.Res.569, “Condemning violence, bigotry, and hateful rhetoric towards Muslims in the United States.114th Congress (2015-2016).” As of this writing, the country remains clueless about this development.
Brigette Gabriel, a Lebanese-born Christian speaks openly about this type of thing happening historically in her native Lebanon, though it was much more violent and insidious. She speaks of how Lebanon was a peaceful country and culture where the government was a secular one; and yet, certain radical-leaning Muslims worked their way into places of influence in civil and federal government until they hit a critical mass; and then, within weeks, they were coming down, hard and heavy on the general population – killing people in the streets, demanding they convert to Islam or die, slicing pregnant women’s bellies open in the streets and killing their babies in front of them, all supposedly “in the name of spreading Islam.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Mo7ZU_iZak
In her book, “Because They Hate,” she discusses some brutal methods used by the PLO to terrify and intimidate Christians to bring Islamic conversions:
They started massacring the Christians in city after city. The Western media seldom reported these horrific events. Most of the press was located in West Beirut, controlled by the PLO and Muslims. One of the most ghastly acts was the massacre in the Christian city of Damour, where thousands of Christians were slaughtered like sheep. The combined forces of the PLO and the Muslims would enter a bomb shelter and see a mother and a father hiding with a little baby. They would tie one leg of the baby to the mother and one leg to the father and pull the parents apart, splitting the child in half.
A close friend of mine became mentally disturbed after they made her slaughter her own son in a chair. They tied her to a chair, tied a knife to her hand, and, holding her hand, forced her to cut her own sixteen-year old son’s throat. After killing him they raped her two daughters in front of her. They would urinate and defecate on the altars of churches using the pages of the Bible as toilet paper before shooting and destroying the church. Americans just don’t realize the viciousness of the militant Islamic fundamentalist. They refuse to see it even when they look today at video footage of churches being burned in Iraq or different parts of the world or synagogues being destroyed in Gaza.
I DO NOT HATE MUSLIMS
I do not hate Muslims. And for the record, I will be among the first to say that I perceive the great majority of Muslims (I do believe, even in the Middle East) believe it is wrong to kill people simply because we have a different ideology. I think many people who embrace Islam do so with an ache in their hearts for how badly they believe that people with an ISIS mentality misunderstand and misapply the Quran to support what these more moderate Muslims believe to be pure evil. (And if you’re a moderate Muslim in a country that is infiltrated by a critical mass of people in ISIS, you’re going to keep your mouth shut just to survive. Who could blame any of them for that?)
Here in the west, especially, there seem to be a number – a large, significant number – of Muslims who see the need to not entrench sharia law in our legal repertoire. They are what I (and many who are students of Islam) believe to be what would be called the more “moderate” flavor of Islam. I believe these people are kind, compassionate, hospitable and are as interested as we are – we, meaning Evangelical Christians – in allowing people to live freely according to their own beliefs, without compulsion.
But if you look at Germany in the 1930’s, and what Hitler did there, you’ll see that it didn’t take much of a percentage of the population who was radical, combined with a critical mass of the population who stayed silent for mere self-preservation for that evil to thrive and flourish to the point where they were able to kill over 6 million Jews – not to mention all the persecution of gypsies, some Christian/Catholic people and others in the mix.
JESUS COMMANDS US TO LOVE EVEN OUR ENEMIES
For the record, I want to be clear that if Jesus commands us to love even our enemies, then how much more should we strive to love those who might oppose Him if it is only out of ignorance and because of what they have been wrongly taught.
There are two different incidents in the scriptures where Jesus spoke about a similar topic, and if you aren’t careful to understand the context, then from an outsider’s point of view, you might be inclined to see them almost as contradictory statements.
There was the time Jesus said, “he who is not for me is against me.” (Matt. 12:30)
There was also the time Jesus said, “he who is not against me is for me.” (Mark 9:40)
Perhaps some of the processing we need to do as the body of Christ regarding how we interact with our Muslim neighbors is in discerning the difference between “he who is not for me” and “he who is not against me.” Rick Warren has tried to bridge this gap in working toward common goals with Muslims who are trying to bring peace to rule, and he has been hammered mercilessly by some in the evangelical church. This is embarrassing. I’ve written about this elsewhere, and you need to be aware of what he did and didn’t say, in light of all his false accusers who make him out to be “the antichrist.”
We need to be wise as serpents and harmless as doves (Matt. 10:16). We also need to shine like lights in the midst of a wicked and perverse generation. And there may come a time where we shine the brightest even as we lay down our lives for the sake of the gospel.
If we do, we should always remember that Jesus, who died for us and rose again, who is seated at the right hand of the father, stood up in tribute to Stephen as he entered into glory to be with Jesus (Acts 7:56).
But our hearts should be right as we witness, whether in life or in death, always aware that even Saul killed some in ignorance, thinking he was serving God in the process. But eventually, after sewing the blood of the martyrs, which is the seed of the church, God converted him. He went on to plant churches, write two thirds of the new testament and eventually lay his own life down for the sake of the gospel.
Never forget that these people, who may well persecute you someday, might well be the very ones that God will want to use you to draw to the saviour.
Jesus loves these dear people – all of them – the gays, the “black lives matter” folks, the Muslims. We cannot afford to despise any of them, though we disagree with them about who our saviour is and about how they must live to please him.
So be sure always to be “on your knees in your heart,” knowing that it is being in that posture before God where you become the most effective in showing anyone who Jesus truly is.