My favorite military series of all time, “Band of Brothers” is back. Well, at least I am watching it again. So here is today’s leadership lesson:

Lt. Winters: “Never put yourself in the position that you could steal from your men.”

Lt. Winters got a new commanding officer in his company. To get to know the men, the new officer was playing poker with them while still in England as they prepared for the invasion of Normandy. Lt Winters, a generally calm, quite leader did not hesitate to rebuke his commanding officer with the above words.

This quote is in contrast to the leadership example we saw in Captain Strobel who used his men, their success, and their hard work to lift himself up in the ranks and gain prestige. Mutiny ensued and Strobel was sent packing.

Your men can tell when you are using them or when you are sacrificing for them. I was convicted that I may be in the position to gain from the work of my brothers and take from them. May we always be givers as leaders. May our men be taller by stepping on our shoulders and in their strength may we find our greatest satisfaction.

My wife wants you to rejoice with her (as do I) over the spiritual birth of a young lady here in our city that we first began to witness to almost two years ago. Two of the summer interns had taught her and her sister in their class and had an opportunity to give them a Bible and share their testimonies.  We had also invited her and her sister to some of our fist Bible studies. They came, argued their memorized points of doctrine and never came back. This began to make an impact on her. Since then, God has caused a number of difficulties in her life to show her deep emptiness. Last month she returned to class and reconnected with my wife and this years summer interns. About three weeks ago she accepted Christ as her Savior a little after midnight on the beach with my wife and two of the summer interns. My wife was overwhelmed with joy when she busted through the door crying and hugging me. I was pretty happy, too. She is some of the first fruits of the ministry here and the first lady to accept Christ. 

I am always interested in knowing what goes on the heart and life of a person like her who comes to Christ. So here is my assessment after talking with her and my wife:

-She had been trained as a child to pray by threat of beatings. This, I learned yesterday, is the norm for kids growing up in a Muslim home. Pray or get beaten. This had led her to feel hurt and anger toward her dad. This has been the one common denominator in all believers in Christ from Muslim countries that I have met. 

-She had tried to satisfy herself with Islam. For a few years in her life she prayed 5 times/day, wore the head covering, read the Koran, and was the most religious of her family. She found after a time that it was empty and she felt very far from God. 

-She had moved to the other extreme when she first heard the Gospel. She hadn’t prayed for years and was going to the disco’s dancing and drinking. She felt great, unremovable guilt from that lifestyle. 

-She had a number of difficulties as a result of her religion that caused her to be open to hearing “alternate truth”: She had been married off to an older man who never loved her. She was expected to be a submissive women. She divorced him before a year was up. He sister was being  rejected by the family for marrying a Catholic. She loved her sister so this fact of her religion hurt her.

She saw a different spirit in the Christians that hang out with us. When she was taught about Christ she was ready to accept the Savior. Pray for God to work through all these situations in the lives of Muslims all around the world.

The following article was all over the news today:

NOUAKCHOTT, Mauritania, (AP) – “Al-Jazeera TV said Al-Qaeda’s North Africa branch claimed responsibility Thursday for the killing of an American aid worker who was shot dead this week in Mauritania’s capital.

The Arab satellite TV station said it had received an audio statement from al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb in which the group said 39-year-old Christopher Ervin Leggett was killed Tuesday for allegedly trying to convert Muslims to Christianity.

 

Al-Qaeda flag

“Two knights of the Islamic Maghreb succeeded Tuesday morning at 8 a.m. to kill the infidel American Christopher Leggett for his Christianizing activities,” the group said. 

The statement’s authenticity could not be independently verified.

Mauritania’s Interior Ministry said Thursday it was investigating the death and security forces were doing “all they can to catch the criminals.”

Extremist violence in Mauritania, a moderate Muslim nation, has increased in recent years. In 2007, a group of French picnickers was killed. The gunmen were believed to be linked to al-Qaeda’s north Africa branch and the incident prompted organizers of the famous Dakar Rally to cancel the trans-Sahara car race.

Leggett was shot several times by at least two unidentified gunmen who rushed up to him on a Nouakchott street, witnesses said. An AP correspondent at the scene saw officials from the U.S. Embassy arrive as the body lay on the pavement. U.S. officials have so far declined to comment.

Legget grew up in Cleveland, Tennessee, and taught at a center specializing in computer science and languages in El Kasr, a lower-class neighborhood in Nouakchott, according to his neighbors in the United States.

The Rev. Jim Gibson, co-pastor of First Baptist Church of Cleveland, said Leggett was a church member and attended on return trips, but worked independently in the African nation. Gibson said Leggett had lived for six years in Africa with his wife and four children.”

Our prayers go up and our hearts go out to the four children of this great man who sought to show Christ’s love the the Muslims of North Africa. May the church be encouraged and challenged to allow the extremists gunfire serve as a resounding call around the world to the born again believers in Jesus to run toward those who would like to be their enemies with the gospel’s message of love and forgiveness.

Recently an unnamed blog reader posted some objections to my post “After your because”. So I am posting his comment along with my response. The black bold are my thoughts:

These are some interesting thoughts. It sounds like this “worker” was a little paranoid. Nevertheless, I feel like you’re being a little too hard on him.

In reference to his second point, it sounds like you’re imply that the Bible commands us to call ourselves Christians. But obviously it doesn’t. So I don’t see anything wrong with that. The term translated “church” in the New Testament is “ekklesia” which is a kind of assembly, so I don’t see anything wrong with using the term “jamat,” either, from a Biblical perspective. The term, “church” both in its origins and modern usage implies a building, which is certainly different than an assembly. I don’t know what term you’re having MBBs use.

My objections to the this missionaries rejection of the word “church” (translated  Kenisa in Arabic) and “Christian” (Mesihi) has nothing to do with etymology. In truth, Jammiat means a gathering just like the original word “Ekklesia” but so does Kenisa. My objection with the renaming of Christians to Muslims (since Muslim means surrendered)  and Kenisa to Jamiat (which happens to be “Mosque” in Arabic) is that it is motivated by the pragmatic desire to see more people “saved” by taking away an persecution. That is antithetical to Christ’s teachings. It waters down the church until it is not even recognizable as a church. We do not change terms to avoid persecution. We accept it with joy as our Savior said. Personally l rarely call the followers of Jesus “Christians” in this context but I rather call the “believers”. Not to avoid persecution but because it better communicates what they are. In South America, where I previously served, we as well called born again people “believers” to distinguish between the Catholics who use the word “Christian”. So you’ll see that I do not have a doctrinal stance on the word Christian. I have a doctrinal stance on whatever term best communicates to culture that a person is now a born again believer in the risen Messiah. 

Regarding his second point, while it seems little extreme to say, never teach them theology, (As you point out, where can you even draw that line?) the principle of letting believers draw their theology directly from the Bible seems like a good idea. Certainly Jesus teaches that you should listen to what the Bible says over what men teach you anyway, so by teaching believers to study the Bible, you are laying a firm foundation.

I am definitely for encouraging new believers to study the Bible themselves and see what it says for themselves. The missionary we met with would not preach or teach (if he ever had a work with real people in it which he doesn’t) but only give them a Bible and tell them to figure it out. This method simply defies all Biblical examples including Paul, Peter, Jesus, Jonah, and innumerable commandments to the man of God to preach the word and disciple (teach) all men everywhere to obey ALL things that Christ taught us. 

I don’t understand his sixth point at all.

You said Jesus said, if we are ashamed of his name before men he will be ashamed of us before the Father. Which is true, but I don’t see anything about rejecting Islam in there. It seems to me like you’re stretching what Jesus taught, here, to mean more than it naturally means.

You seem to be a bit ignorant of Islam but since I don’t know what context you are coming from let me give you a few reasons that a new believer in Christ MUST reject Islam: The Koran teaches:

1. That Jesus was not the Son of God

2. That Jesus did not die for our sins nor did he rise again

3. That salvation is gained by a system of good works and a mixture of God’s random mercy

4. That one must believe Mohammed is the prophet of God to attain eternal life

5. Against the trinity

6. A morality in complete opposition to the teachings of Christ and the prophets especially the ten commandments

Read the Koran and you’ll see that it disagrees with the Bible in MANY facts of doctrine and history. God felt so strongly about changing His word that he said anyone who does it will have their part in the lake of fire. It seems obvious to anyone but the post-modern mind (who would like to believe in two contradictory thoughts at the same time) that to accept the truth about Christ is to reject lies about him.  

You make some good points. I think the thing that bothers me about your post is that some of your practices don’t seem to come from the Bible at all, yet you claim that “I’ll have to blame it all on the Book that I follow.”

I’d love to hear what practices of mine are unbiblical. I make a daily commitment to reject all traditions of men and adhere to the teachings of Christ. Any contradiction to that in my life and ministry that comes to my attention and I’ll promise to change it. I am sure I am not perfect so there will be something. Write on! 

While it is certainly an admirable goal to make sure everything we do is Biblical, we should also be careful not to fool ourselves. The Jews of Jesus’ day had taken Old Testament commands and changed their meaning. For example, they took the statement, “An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth,” which was a command about legal justice, and used it to justify personal vengefulness. We should be careful not to misuse Biblical passages in defense of our our behavior either.

This was a blessing to me this morning. 

Who’s job is it to keep me? : God’s. I trust in him. Vs 1

            How many times have I feared for my “work” or my “safety”? This is God’s work and I trust in 

The end of those who follow another God is sure vs 4

            God owns this land. He is the King. Those who do evil now will live for only a little time. Don’t talk about and focus your thoughts on their names. Their names are the powers of darkness and fear. But God’s name is to be on our lips and our hearts.

The Lord is my portion and cup vs 5

            Jealousy and a deep emptiness arises in us when we look at those who own homes and have a stable life. Those in our home country or working on other mission fields. They have the opportunity to be “legal” and think very long term. That is where we realize like the Levites that the LORD is our portion or that thing which we call our own. Instead of looking down and seeing our small plot of land we can look up and see the greatness of the creator as ours. He is our cup or our sustenance. God is that which makes us satisfied on the inside. This is a better inheritance as it says in verse 6.

Take your counsel from the Lord vs 7

            THE greatest problem in missions to Muslims today is that men start from logic and modern methods and not from the counsel of the Lord through his Word. To take counsel from the Lord is to bless him. To ignore his counsel is to curse your Lord. The wisdom of “persepectives” or any other books or advise from men is vain if it contradicts what we read in our Lord’s commands and the history of the church in Acts.

Put the Lord before you and you will not be moved vs 8

            Countless times I have had nightmares about a police crackdown.Not all of these nightmares were at night. These are a natural result of working as an illegal agent of the Kingdom of God. Satan wants to move us in our inward most parts. He wants us to be like a constant earthquake, never at peace. What can you do about this? Is the Lord your first thought in the morning? Is he your last prayer at night? When you hear threatening, do you immediately speak to him or worry inside yourself.

My flesh lives in hope vs 9

            Anyone who has ministered on the mission field, maybe especially the Muslim field, knows what it means to have despair effect the flesh. The book “Culture Shock” talks about how missionaries can experience real physical sicknesses and pains because of  the “stress” of ministering in a cross-cultural situation. Sometimes it displays itself as a nagging stomach pain (which I have had) or back pain (which my wife has had) or an exaggeration of other physical problems you face. If the cause is spiritual the cure is as well. To put the Lord before your eyes continually will give your flesh hope. Hope is the opposite of worry and despair. Do you live in hope? Are you trying to be a constant source of words of hope for your spouse and co-workers?

Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell vs 10

            This verse is a prophecy of the Christ but it also has implications for the Christians. This verse has been the hope of martyrs and prisoners for Christ since the first martyrs of the first church to Ignatius of Antioch who traveled the length of Asia minor on his way to death by lions in Rome. Our suffering is for the present time is not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. (Rom 8:18) In the midst of jail and torture we can hold to this promise. How much more if you are not in jail but only the prison of your fears?

Fullness of joy and life are in His presence vs 11

            How many times have you thought, “I have no joy because of this situation!” No! We have no joy because we walk not in the presence of God for in his presence is life and fullness of joy. If my joy rests in my security then I have made myself and my comfort ultimate. No matter the trial or country, I can always be at the right hand of God. 

Do we forget that preaching is meant to bring people from where they are (wrong) to faith? It is important to realize that preaching is not to the Lord it is to people. We won’t preach forever but only while there are people that don’t know the truth. In heaven, preaching is not necessary. So we must always be considering where people are coming from who are sitting in front of us. Let me explain:

A man who pastored for many years in Latin America preached to three Muslim friends who came to a Bible study about Christ. He used this illustration to prove God’s love:

“A man was in a retractable bridge. Boats would come and he’d push the button to cause the bridge to rise and allow the boats under. One day he brought his son to work and his son was climbing in the gears when a boat was coming by with many passengers. The man had to decide to sacrifice his son for the lives of those on the boat or those on the boat for this life of his son. He chose to kill his son to save many. That is how God did it with Jesus.”

That makes a lot of sense to a Catholic who takes for granted that God has a son. But for a Muslim that illustration makes no sense. Why? Here is the response of these Muslims:

“The child was stupid to be climbing in the gears and his dad was irresponsible. Is Jesus stupid and God irresponsible? I am glad that man chose to save all those people but that doesn’t answer “how”. How does God have a son? Are they two beings? This is not logical.”

It’s not logical for them because they, unlike the Catholic, need to be shown what it means for God to have a son which in no way was well represented by that illustration. Be careful using illustrations that cause more confusion than they do answer questions. When chosing illustrations make sure that you get into the mind of the audience and understand where they are coming FROM and where they need to ARRIVE. Are you answering the right question? Maybe they are asking “How?” instead of “What?” or “Why?” instead of “What?”

Please pray tomorrow for my wife as she explains to a national young lady how to be a Christian. This young lady was at our church service on Sunday and asked to meet with my wife again so that she could explain this to her. It seems that she is desiring to take this huge step. Please pray that God would work. To accept Christ is simultaneous with accepting much persecution here. She needs your prayers.

Saturday I packed the three guy interns in the car and we headed about an hour away to do some mountain climbing and feast on lamb. Lamb from the mountains is better than your mom’s Thanksgiving turkey and that’s saying something. While we were at it I called a missionary (worker as they call themselves) who had started a restaurant near where we were going. The guys are all contemplating being long term missionaries in North Africa and one of them wants to get an international business degree as a tool for this work. So we are trying to interview guys who are doing business here and see what we can learn about what to do and what NOT to do.

Turns out from this one we were about to learn quite a bit of the latter. Here in short were the main points he made:

1. NEVER, NEVER, NEVER (emphasis his) give a Muslim a Bible BECAUSE as soon as you hand him one they’ll kick you out of the country. The best way to do it, he says, is keep a Bible on your bookshelf and tell them they can go to your office and pick it up themselves. (I sat respectfully and listened knowing that we have passed out at least 1,000 pieces of literature since we arrived 2 and a half years ago.)

2. Don’t tell the new believer of Muslim origins to call himself a Christian BECAUSE this is offensive to other Muslims and can give them flashbacks of the crusades and thus put his life in danger. The new believer should continue to call himself a Muslim since that means “surrendered” to God. 

3. Don’t use the word “Kenisa” (the Arabic word for church) when speaking of a gathering of Messianic “Muslims” BECAUSE this will put their lives in sure danger. They should call their meetings “Jamat” (the same Arabic word as Mosque which means “gathering”) since that’s what it is: a gathering. (Again I say quietly not telling him that the believers we are discipling have told ALL their friends and family about their church and they’re still alive!)

4. Don’t teach the new believers theology! Check your theology at the border! They don’t need any of our Western ideas. They need to read the Bible for themselves and follow it in their “North African way” (as if there is a “Western” way and a “North African” way to understand the Bible). One student asked him if he heard in the “Jamat” that he started that they weren’t believing in the Trinity, what he would do? He stammered and then said he’d show them some things in the Bible about that. We were a bit confused about where he drew the line of non-theology and theology. 

5. Baptism is a good thing but not a necessary thing. Since it’s not necessary for salvation, it’s not necessary at all. We should only baptize them if they ask and NEVER teach them to be baptized BECAUSE it could get them killed. (Again, I didn’t mention the estimated 3,000 baptized believers in our country who were, in fact, still alive. Not a one of them has been murdered as far as we know.)

6. The way God is going to shine his light into the Muslim world is through businesses and not through His church BECAUSE this is the 21st century, of course. 

If you don’t believe me, I have 3 witnesses to this insanity that is called the Insider Movement. 

Maybe you noticed my emphasis of capital letters of the word BECAUSE. Did you notice that after each BECAUSE is some reference to those things that are observable here on earth (most of them imaginary, by the way). One reason I noticed to be missing conspicuously from this list of “strategies” for evangelizing the Muslims after the word BECAUSE was “BECAUSE THE BIBLE TEACHES THIS”. 

Let me help you out with a few examples:

1. We give Bibles to the lost Muslims BECAUSE we are commanded to.

2. We start CHURCHES BECAUSE the Bible says Jesus died for his church.

3. We teach the new believers to be baptized BECAUSE it is an integral part of the Great Commission given us by our Christ.

4. We teach the disciples of Jesus to claim the name of Jesus and reject Islam openly BECAUSE Jesus said if we are ashamed of his name before men he will be ashamed of us before the Father.

5. We teach the disciples to take a stand for Jesus no matter the cost BECAUSE Jesus told his disciples that they should rejoice and be exceedingly glad when they were persecuted for his name’s sake.

I could go on and on but I have noticed one thing to be more effective than my own ingenuity while building God’s kingdom: His instruction manual, the Bible. I guess if at the end of it all I would find that I wasn’t near as culturally relevant as my friend the restauranteur nor as sly and cunning I’ll have to blame it all on the Book that I follow.