David Arzouni starb im Januar 2022
Good news
The angels announced to the shepherds in Luke 2: 10-11: ” I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”
What’s the good news?
God loves (Hosea 14:4), seeks (Genesis 3:9 / Ezekiel 34:12) and visits us (Luke 1:68).
He does not impose himself on us, but he waits until we open the door for him (Revelation 3:20) or we turn to him (Isaiah 1:4).
Jesus died on the cross and rose again for our transgressions towards his life-enhancing instructions (John 3:16).
The Heavenly Father and Jesus come to us personally through the Holy Spirit (John 13:20). We are changed to the person God created us to be.
The key question is if we are open to God and if he knows us (Matthew 7:23). He knows us when we reveal ourselves to him.
Rejoice daughter of Zion
“Sing aloud, O daughter of Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem!” Zephaniah 3:14.
The prophet Zephaniah called on Jerusalem, like all Israel, to rejoice in the presence of the Lord: “The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save” (Zephaniah 3:17). Salvation is in Hebrew: Yeschuah / Jesus is Yeschua and means saviour.
This almighty God has forgiven his people the guilt: “The Lord has taken away the judgments against you … The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst” (Zephaniah 3:15). “Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross. It read, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews” (John 19:19).
The joy of this is shared. Not only of the people of Israel, but God himself shares the joy of his people: “The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing” (Zephaniah 3:17). ” And you shall again obey the voice of the Lord… For the Lord will again take delight in prospering you, as he took delight in your fathers” (Deuteronomy 30: 8-9).
The promises of the First Testament are fulfilled in the coming of Jesus into this world.
Paul writes that the reason for joy is the closeness of God revealed in Jesus. ” Rejoice in the Lord always … The Lord is at hand” (Philippians 4: 4-5). The closeness of God in Jesus is the cause of hope and joy. And we always need it.
The mysterious Aleph Tav
Edit William H. Sanford and Chuck Missler spread the idea that behind the Hebrew Aleph-Tav symbol there is a reference to Jesus. The combination Aleph-Tav includes Y’shua haMashiach (Jesus the Messiah). They come to this conclusion because Jesus says in Revelation 1: 8 that he is the alpha and the omega (the first and last letters in the Greek alphabet). In Revelation 21: 6 this is also combined with the statement that he is the beginning and the end. In the Hebrew alphabet, the aleph and the tav are the first and last letters.
Behind this interpretation stands a kabbalistic interpretation of the Bible. Kabbalah is searching for secret messages behind the written text. It is a search for something that the text does not say. But the focus should be on the content of the text.
The Paradox of the Pious
The Pharisee thanks God that he is not like the tax collector. He is religious. Even thank God. But he doesn’t need God. His prayer revolves around himself, and he can do without God. He evaluates and condemns other people.
The tax collector, on the other hand, Continue reading The Paradox of the Pious
Muslim paradise versus Christian heaven
In the Koran, Allah describes the Muslim paradise as follows: “They (those who are close to God) lie opposite one another on couches with a gold thread, while eternally young boys make the rounds among them with tankards and jugs (full of wine?) And a mug (full) of spring water (to be mixed in?), from which they neither get a headache nor get drunk and (with all kinds of) fruits, whatever (always) they want, and meat from poultry whatever they want. And wide-eyed Huris (they have them at their disposal) to compare (in their beauty) well-kept pearls”(Sura 56: 15-23). Sura 52.20 describes what is meant by Huris: “We give them wide-eyed Huris as wives”
The Muslim paradise seems to be a land of milk and honey, in which the man is served by boys and can take of several women.
According to tradition, Allah is in seventh heaven behind the lotus tree and not even the angel Gabriel is allowed to go to him. Allah lives for himself.
Christian heaven
Jesus, on the other hand, speaks of preparing homes for his followers (John 14: 2-3). One serves another in his kingdom (John 13: 14-15; 15: 12). Relationship with God is the focus (Revelation 21: 3). Earthly needs will no longer exist (for examples sexuality: Matthew 22:30). A newly shaped joy will fill people which we know little here, and which cannot be passed over into earthly life. Paul calls these “indescribable words” (2 Corinthians 12: 4). God himself will wipe away the tears of his children (Revelation 21: 4). Jesus taught that all who receive him into their lives (open the door for him, Revelation 3: 20) and walk with him, become children of God (John 1: 12) so that they may be where he is (John 14:3). Christian heaven is not about a place, it is about fellowship with God. Whoever accepts the offer of forgiveness from God through Jesus comes as a prerequisite, already here God’s presence through the Holy Spirit and he changes him. In order to reach heaven, we have to want God and Jesus and spend time with him already here. Christian longing is not a place, but a person: Jesus.
The main differences are: Christian heaven is about fellowship with God. In the Muslim paradise, Allah seems to be absent. In the Christian heaven one helps each other. In the Muslim paradise there are servants and masters. It seems that the women lie on the couches only when the man asks for them. It is also not clear who the young men and the wives are. Are these other Muslims?
When Muslims and Christians are saved on their own terms, they will not be in the same place.
The secret of Islam’s success
Mouhanad Khorchide* analyses in his book “God’s False Lawyers”:
“If you follow Muslim tradition, the Prophet Mohammed began preaching Islam in 610.” “The main medium was the poetic form. The suras were not read aloud, they were recited, their aesthetic sound was supposed to make the voice of God (which is the content of the Quran) an emotional event” (page 21).
“The poetic form of the lecture was supposed to exude a certain sublimity and authority, the instructions could not simply be read out, they had to be recited ceremonially. This form of communication served in the first place the fortress of unconditional obedience”.
“It was precisely the poetic form of communication that tried to get in the way of critical thinking. Because it aimed to move people’s emotions. There was no need to think about it, on the contrary. This allowed the creeping consolidation of authoritarian structures in society to proceed unhindered” (page 35).
Actually, it is a countermovement to what, according to Khorchide, the basic intention was to make independent subjects out of externally determined objects. Because obedience to the rulers was equated with obedience to God, as far as Khorchide. Continue reading The secret of Islam’s success
The great dilemma of Islam
Mouhanad Khorchide writes: “The great dilemma of Islam today is that its self-image as a religion of submission, which only sees people as objects of obedience and not subjects of love, has become a matter of course.” (p.10) Continue reading The great dilemma of Islam
Manipulated Islam
Mouhanad Khorchide, head of the Center for Islamic Theology at the University of Münster, writes:
Islam, as it is presented to most Muslims as well as non-Muslims today and as it is practiced by many believers, is a manipulated version of this religion. We are confronted with a manipulation that goes back to the Muslims themselves and whose roots go deep into the early history of Islam shortly after the death of Muhammad.
The main intention of Islam, however, was to free people from their status as externally determined objects and to offer them the way to self-determined subjects.
However, the political power struggles led to a reversal movement shortly after the death of Muhammad. Again man became the object of submission, again he was forced to unconditional obedience to despotic rulers. Continue reading Manipulated Islam
God loves me even when I’m not perfect
Roman wanted to prove his faith to Allah. He loved to disturb Christians with questions in order to unsettle them. He planned to disrupt a Baptist church service in Kazakhstan during Ramadan. For him, Christians with a Muslim background were “betrayers of the real faith”.
But things turned out differently. “For the first time I heard about a God who loved me,” he says. “I never knew the Almighty God loved me even though I am not perfect.”
“For the first time I heard of a God who loves me,” he says. “I hadn’t known an almighty God who loves me even though I’m not perfect.” “That thought [of being loved even though I’m not perfect] seriously never entered my mind. I always felt guilty. I felt that I had to earn His attention.”
And then something happened he never expected: tears, prayers to Jesus, repentance and joy. Sitting in that church service in a Baptist church, the man who had devoted his life to persecuting Christians became a follower of Jesus.
And today he says: “I never want to go back to the Muslim faith.”