*THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS NO HATE TO PEOPLE WHO IDENTIFY AS MUSLIM, BUT ONLY COMPARES |
If you aren't sure about what the Christian faith is exactly, I want to give a brief summary. Christians believe in God the father, God the son (Jesus), and God the Holy Spirit. God is one being, but he is split into three parts of himself: the father, the son, and the Holy Spirit. Christians believe that God came down in the form of a man named Jesus. While on earth, He never sinned, taught in God's name, and was crucified. It is this crucifixion that acted similarly to Old Testament sacrifices to atone for sins. He conquered death and rose from the grave, appeared to tons of people, and then ascended into Heaven. Christians are people who have accepted Jesus' |
WHAT TO MUSLIMS BELIEVE?
The faith is championed by Muhammad who is a prophet of Allah (God). Out of respect for the beliefs that some Muslims hold, I will not insert a photo depiction of Muhammad.
Muslims also believe that there is no guarantee of Heaven. You must live right, pray a certain number of times a day, give alms to the poor, take a trip to Mecca, and more.
So why do I believe in the trinity? Why am I a Christian? Here are things I believe show me that Christianity is the right way to go. As always, be sure to learn all of this for yourself. I want to make clear that I will be using sources from Muslim holy books and trusted sources.
GOD'S WARNING FULFILLED
To begin, here is God's warning:
"And if he [Muhammad] had made up about Us some [false] sayings, We would have seized him by the right hand; Then We would have cut form him the Aorta"
Quran, Surah 69:44-46
Quick biology lesson, your aorta, as you can see in the depiction to the right, is the main roadway to the heart. Severing it would result in death, a painful one at that. OK, so there was the warning, plain as day. This is obviously a pretty terrible way to dye, and a really painful one at that. So where is this fulfilled? |
Muhammad died from poison. A Jewish woman made him a meal and poisoned it. She did this after her family was killed by Muhammad and his men. She thought that it would be a sign that he was the true prophet of God if he lived. If he died, however, she thought it would be a clear sign that he was not.
But it is what he says after being poisoned that drove this home to me:
"The Prophet in his ailment in which he died, used to say, "O Aishah! I still feel the pain caused by the food I ate at Khaibar, and at this time, I feel as if my aorta is being cut from that poison." - Sahih al-Bukhari 4428
"Umm Bishar said to the Prophet during the sickness of which he died: What do you think about your illness, Apostle of Allah? I do not think about the illness of my son except the poisoned sheep of which he had eaten with you at Khaibar. The Prophet said: And I do not think about my illness except that. This is the time when it cut of my aorta." -Sunan Abu Dawud 4449
"The Messenger of God said during the illness from which he died - the mother of Bishr b. al-Bara had come in to visit him - "Umm Bishr, at this very moment I feel my aorta being severed because of the food I ate with your son at Khaybar." - At-Tabari p. 124
MUHAMMAD VS. JESUS
To begin, Jesus lived a sinless life. He abhorred violence.
"Then said Jesus unto him, Put up again thy sword into his place: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword." - Matthew 26:52
Next, Jesus claimed to be God in humans form and performed miracles as such. Muhammad claimed to be a messenger that had God's revelation revealed to him in private.
Another stark difference is the treatment of women. It is said that Muhammad's wife Aisha was only 6 years old when he married her. But she wasn't the only one. He had three wives. Jesus, who upheld Jewish beliefs, believed in marrying one wife and loving her alone.
CONCLUSION
I think I will make this a series that highlights some of the major religions. Let me know what you think. I am open to discussion. I hope that I approached this delicately enough to be respectful while presenting the facts.
I'd like to credit Acts17Apologetics on YouTube who dug up most of this. Feel free to look up "Who Killed Muhammad?" on YouTube.
In the United States at least, a lot of emphasis is put on merit. If you do well in class, you get into a good college. If you donate a bunch of money, you can get a building named after you. If you’re really smart or do enough good, you might even be rewarded with a Nobel Peace Prize.
But scrap all of that and keep reading. I want to tell you about something that is really difficult to understand. It’s the problem of sin.
WHAT IS SIN, EXACTLY?
Some of the old hymns that we sing in church may make it out like Christians and sinners aren’t the same thing. I’m sure that the writers were more trying to communicate that we sin less when we become Christians, but that might not be true wither.
The truth is that Christians and non-Christians alike sin every day. The difference is our response to sin. As a Christian, I can tell you that I recognize my sin much more than I did when I was not a Christian or when I had drifted away from God.
For example, if I say something bad about someone, or even think something bad about someone, I feel as though I did wrong. Sometimes it takes me a while, sometimes I feel this immediately. When I wasn’t a Christian or when I drifted away from God, I said awful things about people all the time and didn’t really care.
I didn’t realize that I was effectively disrespecting God’s creation: another human.
The beauty of being a Christian is that, if you are sincere, God forgives your sins. By that I mean that you can’t just go around each and every day pushing over old ladies knowing that God “will” forgive you. In essence, you can’t take advantage of God’s forgiveness because that inherently shows that you don’t respect his authority and forgiving nature anyway.
CHRISTIANS AND SIN
When talking to a friend about Christianity, it is likely that the atrocities associated with the Crusades will come up. If you don’t know much about the Crusades, the important things you should know for this blog is that the Crusades were, according to History.com, a “series of religious wars between Christians and Muslims started primarily to secure control of holy sites considered sacred by both groups.” The other important thing you should know is that the Crusades were very bloody and resulted in the horrific deaths of many innocent men, women, and children. |
As humans, we are all exposed to sin, even Christians. With God on our side and Jesus in our hearts, we are able to feed the good which in turn hopefully will outweigh the sin and badness of life. But we still mess up.
THE HARD PILL TO SWALLOW
The hard pill to swallow is that sin is sin. It’s all sin and it is all bad in God’s eyes. When you see a criminal holed up in a jail cell for assault, you may look at him and say “I am better than he is.” While you are better in merit (i.e. your naughty list is a lot shorter than his), you are still a sinner.
Until you become a Christian, you look the same to God. Even as a Christian, you still look like a sinner to God. It is because Jesus bled and died for you that you are even worthy of God’s love and forgiveness. That’s why Jesus is the key.
In the old days, sacrifices were made to God to atone for sins. The sacrifice would be something like a lamb or sometimes it would be things like fruit. Of course, faith in God was also very important. You have people like Job and Sarah who both lived on faith that God would protect them or fulfil his promise to them. They let God take the wheel in their life.
But God did something amazing. He decided that, rather than have animals be sacrificed to him, he would come down in human form as his son, Jesus, to live a sinless life, preach about God’s love and forgiveness, clarify some of the miscommunications in the church, die on a cross without having done any wrong, and rise from the dead three days later.
This sacrifice is effectively God shedding his own blood to cover the sins of everyone, should they believe on him and Jesus, who gave the sacrifice.
WHAT I WANT TO SAY TO NON-CHRISTIANS
I want to tell you that you and I, we are physically and mentally the same. We are both tempted to sin, we both commit sin, we both can feel guilty of our sin. Nowhere in the Bible does it say I am better than you. On the contrary, I am just a beggar who has found bread. Now I want to share it with you.
Apart from Christ, we are the same. But the good news is, if anything I said in the previous paragraph gives you longing, Christ wants to be with you, not apart from you. God is not willing that any should perish. But when we choose to live outside of His will and His guidance, He isn’t going to force us to spend an eternity with Him. He respects our free will too much to force anything like that on anyone. He even partially limited his will and power to give us the power to choose Him. That’s because love isn’t love if it is programmed into us like software. Love has to be a free decision.
He made that decision for us at creation and on the cross, will you make the decision to love Him?
- Admit to God that you are a sinner
(Romans 3:23; Romans 6:23). - Repent, turning away from your sin
(Acts 3:19; 1 John 1:9). - Believe that Jesus is God's Son and accept God's gift of forgiveness from sin
(Romans 5:8; Acts 4:12; John 3:16; John 14:6; Ephesians 2:8-9; John 1:11-13). - Confess your faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord
(Romans 10:9-10,13).
HOW TO GET TO HEAVEN
God is a perfect being who designed each and every one of us. He is sinless, good, and perfect. However, after Eve ate that apple, sin was released into the world and, as a result, everyone was born into sin and everyone does wrong. Only those without sin can enter into Heaven. But don't worry, Jesus came down to Earth and paid your sin debt do you could go to Heaven. Jesus is our salvation and offers us a way to Heaven. A way to live with Him forever. Here is what you have to do:
A—ADMIT
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