Jesus said to Thomas, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life" (John 14:6)... and Jesus also proclaimed that "...for this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me." (John 18:37)
When Christianity is compared to Islam for example, they are not just incompatible, but are also opposed with each other and set on a collision course with historical and global consequences.
The Koran and the Bible have opposing value systems:
- Chistianity offers grace and Islam offers legalism.
- Christianity offers a God of intimate relationship, while Islam offers distant demands.
- Christianity offers conversion through conviction, while Islam offers conversion through conquest and Jihad.
- Christianity offers intrinsic value to all human life, while Islam offers less value to a woman’s life when compared to a man’s sense of shame.
- Christianity offers peace love and joy, while Islam offers fear, terror tactics and honor killings.
A person can take on the label of Christian, but not have a biblical worldview or lifestyle based on the teachings of Jesus and the Gospels.
So a nominal or cultural Christian who commits a horrific crime would be entirely contradictory to a Christian worldview and his actions are completely unjustified and incompatible with the Bible.
Take Hitler for example. He had a distorted view of Christianity. He committed mass murder in the name of secular fanaticism, social-political Darwinism and world dominance. His views against Jews were not justified by biblical teaching but instead by a science-flavored myth of Darwinian logic to defend the Aryan race.
In contrast, a devout Muslim can commit a terrorist or violent act and have perfect justification in doing so from the Koran, Sharia law and in the name of Jihad.
In order to have peace, Muslims would have to be moderate (less devout) and go against their teachings.
Christians would have to be more fundamental to live-out their Christian worldview.
However, the Bible explains that God is not only a God of "love"... His attributes also include holiness, justice, jealousy, righteousness and perfect judgment. In other words, there will come a time when it is required to fight (i.e. 'war'- Joel 3:9).
When we attempt to understand the underlying meaning of the word of God, it should not depend on the "cleverness" of the interpreter, but instead we should rather focus on the evidence of history, biblical grammar, comparative linguistics, anthropology, and context; or else the interpretation becomes very subjective and fuzzy. This means we are required to thoroughly research the true meaning of the scriptures from the author’s perspective and not our own.
The Bible teaches that God loves all people, but hates sin. The Koran does not say this, but instead, it says that Allah only loves those who obey Muhammad and loves not the infidels or those who reject their faith.
If we look at it from a Bible vs. Koran perspective, in order to have a peaceful coexistence would be for Muslims to be more moderate and for Christians to be more radical. That means we must live for Christ alone.
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