Many people have questions about God and the Bible.

With so many different views about God and how to interpret the Bible, many people wonder where they can turn to get biblical answers.

Well, have no fear, turn to my friend Andrew Rapaport and his friends on Apologetics Live.

They can answer any question you have about God in the Bible.

Check them out Thursday nights, 8 to 10 o' clock p.m. new York time at apologetics live.com you can watch or join the discussion at apologetics live.com and challenge him with anything.

Please ask him your really hard questions and tell him Ben sent you.

This is Apologetics Live to answer your questions.

Your host from Striving for Eternity Ministries, Andrew Rapaport.

Well, we are live.

That we do.

Thank the AI version of Ben Shapiro for the intro, but we are live Apologetics Live.

We're here to answer your most challenging questions that you have about God and the Bible.

We every week that we can answer any question that you have about God in the Bible.

And if you doubt that, well just come to apologexlive.com join us in the discussion, ask a really tough question and remember, I don't know is a perfectly good answer.

But this is a ministry of striving for eternity.

We are here to not only practice apologetics, but to to teach it, to train you on how to do that.

Tonight's topic is going to be one on Islam.

The the question that often comes is, is the God of Islam the same as the God of the Bible?

Now it depends who you ask, right?

So many of those that are Muslims would say yes to that.

And so we're going to take a look at what the Quran teaches, what the Bible teaches about the nature of God, and, and examine this question and, and then hopefully we will be able to help you to know how to share the gospel with someone who is from a Muslim.

Now what I encourage you to do is share this online, especially if you know any Muslims.

We would love for them to come in, have a discussion.

That would be wonderful.

And so I'm going to cover some stuff that tonight that is from my book what do they Believe it is the chapter.

I think it's chapter three on Islam.

Yep, I'm pretty sure.

So most of what I'm going to cover, it won't be all of chapter three, but it will be out of there.

So if you do want to dig into more detail on this subject, if you feel that we're just touching the surface because that's really all we're going to do, then what you could do is get a copy of what do they Believe?

And you can get that at striving for eternity.org at the store that is there.

So that's where you can get it.

I hope that you will consider doing that.

All right, so we don't have any co hosts with me tonight.

I do want to announce though that someone sent me our guest from last week, Israel.

He was on and he had gotten an email from someone that the title of it was Debate Me.

You know that I enjoyed that subject.

So this is an individual that wants to debate the canon of Scripture, whether the Protestants I guess have it right about the apocrypha.

And so he's going to argue that, that the apocrypha, I think he's going to argue the apocrypha is the word of God.

He's got a book out.

I will read that book and we will hopefully have him in for a discussion or maybe even a formal debate.

And so that is something that I hope that we can be able to do.

I say hope because I know there's a lot of people that challenge me to debates and they never show.

I don't know, I'm not that scary.

I don't think maybe I am.

I mean I will admit that I get my heart started every morning by looking in the mirror.

And after I scream, I realize, oh wait, that's just me in the mirror.

So yeah, maybe I am that scary.

Let's see.

I, I'm not, I see a comment up.

Since I don't have co hosts, I have to just put this up myself to, to see it.

So Max Peck says, I had this conversation years ago with my brother in law and that's when I finally made it clear that we worship Jesus as God.

He finally came to agree that we do not worship the same God.

Well, Max, I, I, that's good to know.

I, I don't know though if you were, if you were or your brother is practicing in Islam.

So that, that would be helpful to know just as we have the discussion.

So let's start with the, the fact of, and, and really Max Peck there nailed it in what he had said because the issue is we worship Jesus as God and Islam doesn't.

So he jumped right to the, to the heart of the issue.

I was going to wait till we got there, but, but he got there quicker.

So we, we asked the question, do Muslims do, do Christians and Muslims worship the same God?

Okay.

I said in the, in the show notes, both faith, faiths come claim the belief in one Creator, but Allah in the Quran and Yahweh in the Bible, are they truly the same?

That's.

That's what we want to get to.

Oh, here we go.

So Max says, my brother was and still does practice Islam.

I was Christian at the time and still am.

Well, praise the Lord that you are a Christian.

That is very encouraging.

So let's go through some things that we would look at.

When we look at whether they're the same God, the first thing I want us to recognize is who is God?

Now I always think about if you guys ever saw the.

The film.

Oh, the Kendrick brothers put it together.

And I'm forgetting the name of was the one I think they did after Fireproof.

I'm bad with these things.

But there's a scene in that movie that I really like, because what you have is the main character, Courageous.

That's the movie.

It just took.

Takes me a while.

But in the movie Courageous, there's a scene where the.

This.

The main character, he's a police officer.

He takes a week off of work so he can work on the house.

And he's waiting for this guy.

I forget the name, but I think his name was Julio is the character's name.

I actually met the.

The real actor in that at an event, and it was kind of really, really nice.

Guy went to.

He.

He went to a.

A church, a near friend of mine.

So.

But he.

This character, I'm going to say Julio, I think I have it wrong, but supposedly in.

In the scene, you had a fellow police officer that tells this guy, hey, my friend Julio is going to come and help you with the house.

And so this police officer, the main character, is at the house and he sees a guy walking down the street.

Now, this other guy walking down the street, he showed up to his job site to do construction and found out they laid him off.

And he didn't know how he was going to pay his bills.

And he's walking the street, not sure how he's going to make it home.

Like, what's he going to say to his wife when he gets home?

And so as he's walking, he hears this guy calling out.

Well, he thinks to him saying, hey, Julio, Julio, come on over here.

He's looking at the guy, doesn't know what the guy's talking about.

He guy knows his name.

So he walks over, he says, well, come on, you're gonna get to work.

And.

And the Julio takes it as a sign from God that, hey, he's got.

He's got a job.

And he's thrilled.

And he's working with the police officer for several days, for a whole week, pretty much.

And.

And then at the end of the week, the police officer went to have lunch with his police officer buddies.

And the one police officer that.

Whose friend Julio was supposed to come over, he apologizes and said, hey, sorry, Julio couldn't make it.

He.

He's been in the hospital.

And the main character's like, what do you mean, Julio's been at my house?

He says he can't be.

He's in the hospital.

Well, what does your friend Julio look like?

Oh, he's like six, two, really thin.

He goes, no, he's not.

He's.

He's about five, eight, and kind of pudgy.

And all of a sudden, they realized it's a different Julio.

Okay, now I tell that story because that makes the point that we want to.

To make here.

Just because someone says this is God doesn't mean they have the same nature and they're the same person.

The name may be the same.

In this case, the name's not really the same because we have Allah and we have God or Yahweh or Jehovah, however you'd like to pronounce that.

So we see a difference.

But just as a difference in the name, does that make them completely different?

Well, one of the things that we're going to see is that both in the Quran and in the Bible, they would teach that there's one God.

Well, that's good.

That.

That's a good start.

However, we would see that though there's one God, there's three persons that make up that one God.

And that is going to make the difference, because the one God in the Quran doesn't come in three persons, but one person.

So one person, one God, goes by the name of Allah.

Now, just a little history for you so that you know.

And you'll see this if you get my book.

What.

What do they believe?

Actually, I don't know that I have this in the book.

So maybe this will be sun extra.

I took a course on Islamic history and a college course, and.

And it was quite interesting because in the course, they started off by admitting that Allah was one of the minor gods in the Arabic area.

And so many will try to say today, many Muslims today will say that Allah was the one God, the creator God, and the only one that was worshiped.

And so the idea that they have is that there were all these in the Arabic regions, there were practicing polytheism, worshiping lots of gods.

But when Muhammad came.

God revealed himself to Muhammad and that through there he realized it is Allah.

Now as we say that, we have to realize that Allah was one of the minor gods of that pantheon of gods that were being worshiped there.

And so he was, he was just a minor God that, that Muhammad, you know, had said was the God.

So is it the same God as the Bible though?

Well, the God of the Bible we would see as a trinity or tri.

Unity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Now why do we say that?

We say that.

And, and I have previous classes that go into this in more detail.

You can go to the Striving for Attorney Academy at our website@restrivingfraternity.org and on the theology classes we have a whole class on going through the Trinity gives you that in detail.

If you get my book, what do we Believe?

I have a whole chapter on that in there as well.

But we see that the Father, the Son and the Spirit all have titles of deity.

They all have, are called God.

They are all do things that have attributes that only God can have, such as omniscience.

They all do work that only God do, such as creation.

So when we look at these things that we see that God does that all three have attributes.

God do the works of God, things like this.

And yet we also recognize that when we look at this, we see that they're separate and distinct from one another.

And being separate and distinct from one another becomes very important because the idea there is that as they're separate, they're not one, you know, one God, one being.

There's, they're, they're.

Well, they are one being, they're one God, but they're, they're separate and distinct from one another.

So that, so somehow we have to recognize that there's a, there is a sense where there is God is, is separate and yet he's also the same.

How could that be?

That seems strange.

And this is why when we look at this we, we recognize that there's got to be a way of understanding how God can be separate and yet the same.

And this is where the doctrine of the Trinity is something that is a solution to a problem.

The problem that we have is that when we look at this we see that there's only one God and yet three separate individuals that are described as being God.

Okay, that is where the Trinity comes in.

Now some ideas that we have in scripture now the, in the Quran, it is going to be strictly monotheist.

One God, one person, Allah.

But we can see, let's just look at some passages in Isaiah.

In Isaiah 45 verse, verse 5, I am the Lord and there is no other beside me.

There is no God.

In verse six, he says, I am the Lord.

There is no other verse seven, I am the Lord who does all these things.

So what we end up seeing is in verse 8 it says, I am the Lord have created it.

So he's, he's the creator.

I bring that out to say that what we see is that God says the God of the Bible says he is God and there are no other gods.

Now I'm being very specific with that because what we see there is the fact that when we have this, this view, we see that God is one.

That's all the way back from Deuteronomy, hero, Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one.

So from the very early books of the Bible, one of the first five books, we see that it teaches that there is one God.

And so, but yet we see even in the book of Genesis the distinction between the Father and the Spirit.

Now when we focus on something like creation, we will see that both in the Quran and in the Bible, both will teach that the God is the creator.

Okay, now when we look at that, the Quran is going to teach very clearly.

I don't think this will, with what I said earlier, this will be a debate.

But the Quran will teach that Allah alone created because he by, is by himself, he is all there is as the persons.

Okay.

And, and so what the Bible says.

And let me bring in Dan Kraft, the seven foot apologist and one of the speakers at Striving fraternity has joined.

And so I always like when he joins because he, he, when we're both sitting on camera, he looks the same height as me.

Yes.

So actually Dan, I was with, I was with someone this past week, it was this weekend or weekend before, who is 68 or 6 9.

And everyone was commenting on his height.

You're muted.

And he and me want.

So he was, we were saying that as he was, as he.

Everyone was calling him tall.

I said, well, we, we have someone that would make you look short.

And, and he kind of laughed and goes, not many people make me look short.

Nope.

Make sure you got the mic set up on the software.

All right, I'm gonna keep going while.

And then Dan will keep talking and we'll finally hear him eventually.

If you see that puzzled look on his face, well, that's because he's trying to figure out the technology.

This is why I start half an hour before the show to make sure technology Works tonight.

It didn't, by the way.

My camera wasn't working, the microphone wasn't working.

Everything wasn't working.

So.

So here's what we see in, in Isaiah 44:24.

And this is also a great passage.

Oh, interesting.

So Jesse is saying they can hear you.

All right.

So I wonder if this is something with me.

Thank you, Jesse, for letting me know that.

There we go.

So it was on my end.

There we go.

Let's see.

Can I hear you now?

So what, it was your fault that you couldn't hear me?

It was my fault because the, the, I think because I had the issues with the tech, with the technology.

What happened was when I, when I lost my microphone, I had to reboot, and it, it didn't keep the settings.

So there you go.

And you made me switch browsers.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Oh, but I didn't.

Oh, there we go.

Now people can hear you.

See, only before.

Only I could hear you there.

I'm sorry, folks, this is one amateur.

Hour at Apologetics Live.

Yes, it's one of the things I don't like about this software is that it has a thing for listen off stage feed.

So when, before I bring you on stage, I can hear you.

And so, yeah, I got to get used to that.

So what we see, and this passage in Isaiah is important to have because this is one where you can use this very well with Jehovah Witnesses.

And it's Isaiah 44, 24.

It's one that if you can't commit it to memory, I encourage you to at least write it down, because with Jehovah Witnesses, you can read it in their new world translation.

And it is a fun one.

It says, it says, thus says the Lord or Jehovah, or, you know, if you're in Jehovah Witnesses book, the Jehovah, your Redeemer, the one who formed you from the womb.

I am.

Yahweh, am the maker of all things.

So Yahweh is the maker of all things.

And it says, stretching out the heavens by myself and spreading them out on the earth all alone.

And that's the important part, because he says he does it all alone, which is very interesting, because when you turn to Colossians 1:14 or 15, really, it says, he is the invisible image of God, the firstborn of all creation.

For by him all things were created, both in the heavens and the earth, visible and invisible.

Whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things have been created through Him.

And for him he is before all Things.

And in him, all things are held together.

Now, it's interesting because that passage in Colossians, Jehovah's Witnesses have to say all other things.

And so the thing there that you end up seeing is they have to add all other things because they think Jesus is a created being.

See, in Colossians, it clearly says they're.

Great at adding things to the text to change meanings.

Right.

John 1.

John 1.

One through what?

Four is another great example.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a God.

Correct.

So now at least there, I, I, There is some argument that could be made there for that.

But, but from, from the Greek, you could, you could.

They do make the argument that way.

But from this passage, what they do is they go, oh, well.

Well, we're doing that because we're not.

Some people are saying that your volume is low.

Let me see.

I might be able to change that setting.

So what we have is the.

There's some kind of weird feedback going on, I think, with your microphone as well.

Really, really weird artifacts.

Okay, let me check my settings.

This is, it might be something that occurred because of the reboot there.

I don't know.

All right, well, so what you have is that in this passage, the Jehovah Witnesses will say that they're adding the word other because of the fact that it's clearer to understand.

But it does change the meaning of whether Jesus created all things or whether he created everything but himself.

Himself.

That's.

That's a big difference.

And then when you look at Isaiah 44:24, you realize if God or Jehovah created alone, no other help, then that makes it clear that, you know that somehow Jesus is Jehovah.

Right?

So when we look at, when we look at the, the teaching of the Trinity within Islam, we're going to get a little bit of a different thing.

And I want to bring up Max Peck's comment here, because he says the problem is our limited, our limited finite comprehension.

Now, when it comes to the Trinity, he brings up a good point that I want you to always remember when you're talking to someone that is a Muslim, I want to encourage you and Dan, I'm just going to mute you until you're ready to talk.

How's that?

So just so we.

Because there was some humming.

I don't know what.

Because your settings are right.

But.

So when you started conversation with a Muslim, one of the things to do is to ask them up front a question, is God greater than your ability to Understand him.

Dan, I think you would agree that God is greater than our ability to understand, right?

He's nodding his head.

So with that, the reason I say to ask that up front is to Max Pex's point, when you start talking the Trinity and a Muslim will bring this up when, when they do, you start talking about who God is, that he's a Trinity.

And they're going to say, well how could God die?

It's their famous question.

And yet what we end up seeing is what they're arguing is they the, that the Trinity does not make sense to them.

That's the argument.

Now once they may.

So what you want to do is get them to commit to that.

That doesn't make sense.

That's not, you know, it doesn't make sense to me once they do that.

Now you go back to that earlier part of the conversation.

Go.

Remember when you said that the, the God that created everything is greater than our ability to understand?

Yes.

Well, that's the God that I'm presenting to you because you don't fully comprehend him.

Okay, so let's look at the nature of, of what first off, what the Quran refers to with our view of God.

Now I mentioned the fact that they, they believe that God is one, one being, one person.

But what might be interesting and let me just put up Max's comment.

He says I found that they usually aren't of the Trinity or basic Christian fundamentals.

It I, I have not found that to be the case.

Max, I'm not disputing you.

I'm just saying most of the Muslims I speak to are, they do understand the Trinity.

And I can usually with this one question, figure out if they are a Christian, they were raised in a Christian area like western area, or if they were raised in a Muslim area.

And the question I will ask is, can you define what the Christian Trinity is?

And the reason I ask that is because as I said, we would hold to the Father, the Son and the Spirit, but in the Quran it would teach that it is the Father, the Mother and the Son.

And I actually had a Muslim in New York City that he was a PhD professor, I forget what university.

And his whole family was there.

And he was arguing that he understood Christianity, but he was telling me that Christians believe in the Father, the Mother and the Son and so sounds like a Catholic thing.

Well, that's what a lot of people have, have that thought except the Catholics.

Adoration for Mary didn't exist until far after Islam was, after the Quran was written.

So now some Muslims will say that there was one group and I've, I have yet to find any evidence outside of Islamic sources that support this group that that worshiped Mary as God.

But the fact is that if there was such a group it was a very minor group.

They would, if they were in the area where Muhammad would have met them that would be because they would have been seen as heretics and thrown out of the kingdom.

And so that's not orthodox Christianity.

So if the writer of.

Basically what I'm saying is that the writer of the Quran did not know about.

Didn't know about Chris.

Orthodox Christian doctrine.

Okay, Max Peck and Max, you are welcome to come in by the way if you want and join the discussion.

Just go to apologexlive.com scroll down to the duck icon and click that.

But he says because the Quran describes Christians that lived in the Arab world in 600 A.D. and so that's the thing that the, the Christians that Muhammad came upon he was, he met Jewish people.

He met Christians that were thrown out of the Roman Empire and they would have been the heretics.

So let me read and, and, and one of the things I do in my book what do they believe?

Is I give you long citations so that you can read what the Quran teaches.

I don't want to give just a, a quick thing.

Okay.

Max.

Max Peck says if Muhammad had met a group of Mormons the Quran would describe Christians as Mormons.

Lol.

And that's he, he makes the point very well.

So this is what the Quran says.

Now the Quran isn't.

Doesn't go by books but it has we could think of a chapter and verses.

So in 4:171.

So that's think of it as chapter four verse 171 just for the Christians.

He says O people of the Book that that's people the Jewish and Christians commit no excesses in your religion nor say of Allah anything but the truth.

Christ Jesus the son of Mary was no more an apostle of Allah.

And up Dan left and his Word which he bestowed on Mary and the Spirit proceeding from him.

So believe in Allah and his apostles say not Trinity detest would be better for you.

For Allah is one Allah, glory be to him far exalted is he above having a son to him belong all things in the heavens and the earth.

And enough is Allah as disposer of affairs.

So what you see here is it's very clearly saying that there's one Allah, right?

Don't say Trinity, detest it.

But in, in Surah 5:1, 16.

One, yeah, 116.

And I think of it as Chapter 5, verse 116.

It says this and behold, Allah will say, o Jesus, the son of Mary.

This thou say unto men, worship me and my mother as gods.

In derision of Allah, he will say, glory to thee.

Never could I say that which I had no right to say.

Had I said such a thing, thou wouldst indeed have known it.

Thou knowest what is in my heart, thou I know not what is thine, for thou knowest in full all that is hidden.

So what you see there is in Surah 51 16.

It is the clear teaching that they think we believe that Jesus is God and Mary is God and there are two gods added to Allah.

That's not what we believe.

And that's why I will ask them what the definition of Trinity is.

Because when they say that Allah the.

The Trinity is the Father, the mother and the Son, or Allah, Jesus and the Son and the Mother, I know that they have not been around Christians because they only have an understanding of Trinity from the Quran.

Okay, so let me, let me welcome in a friend from the Philippines.

Hey guys, just tuned in from.

And I'm going to mispronounce the city, but Marquis city in the Philippines.

He, he, you just come on in and correct me.

He says, just woke up and saw this.

Good morning.

In the Philippines they deal with, they deal with Islam in the south, very much in the north, they deal with Catholicism.

And at some point I'll do a show on Catholicism or maybe a debate, as I said in the beginning of the show.

So what I want you to see here is it's very clear.

We believe in a trinity.

That's what the Bible would teach.

The Quran would teach there is only one God.

And that we would teach the Trinity is the Father, the Son and the Spirit.

The Quran would teach that the, that it's the father, the Mother and the Son.

So as you can see here, even if they say it's the same God, it's a different person, a different character.

You know, just like I said in that, from the scene from Courageous, right.

It could say they're the same, but the reality is it's a different.

In that case, Jorge or whatever his.

His name was Julio.

I forget the name of the, the character.

So, so right there, I, I think we have enough there to say we're not worshiping the same God.

Dan, anything that you want to add to that?

No, you're doing, you're doing a good job, man.

Keep it up.

All Right.

Well, you know, I'm just lucky if I can keep the right browser window open.

So.

Dan, and when you, when you're out, I mean, have you, do you get to speak to any Muslims when you're evangelizing?

I have not had very many run ins and now that I work from home, I don't get to, you know, I basically, I work in a very target rich environment, but my targets are all Mormons.

So I work half dozen Mormons in my company, but we're all distributed, so the only time that we meet is, you know, over, over video chats.

So, so yeah, I haven't had a whole lot of interactions with Muslims.

Believe it or not.

God usually seems to bring, you know, Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons and of course your garden variety atheists, you know, across my path.

Okay, yeah, but, but when you're dealing with either of those two groups, the Trinity is a central argument, is it not?

It does come up.

Yeah.

Especially when you're dealing with, you know, of course, when you're dealing with the, but the Jehovah's Witnesses who fundamentally deny, you know, they fundamentally deny the personhood of, of the, of the, of the, the Holy Spirit, they say he's God's impersonal active force, you know, kind of like God's tractor beam.

That's how he gets stuff done.

And then of course, you know, the Mormons believe in, you know, a plethora of gods, you know, a multitude of gods.

So they're, you know, they're polytheist or henotheist if you want to be really technical about it.

But, but yeah, it does come up.

And that's, that's why, you know, when I was teaching Sunday school, I actually have a chapter or two or three in my book, my second book about the, about the, the Trinity.

And I have a presentation called Misunderstanding the Trinity where I take all the, A lot of the common analogies used to understand the Trinity and I explain why they all fail miserably at what they're intending to do and then lay out the biblical doctrine for it.

Yeah.

Now, Fatima from the Philippines.

Good morning, Fatima.

She says, she's saying, asking the question, do ecumenicals believe Muslims and Christians, among others, ultimately worship the same God?

And yes, they generally would.

Yeah.

I mean, even when I was, you know, when I was a kid, of course, you know, I believed that I was a Christian simply by virtue of the fact that I was not a Jew.

Muslims hadn't been invented yet, as far as I was concerned, in the Cornfields of Illinois, right?

So you had Christians and shoes and that's all you knew about.

But yeah, there's, there's even this thing called Chrislam, right, where people are trying to blend Christianity and Islam.

And you know, I used to think, you know, when I finally, when I heard about Islam when I moved to Florida when I was in, you know, like middle school, elementary school age, I heard, you know, okay, Muslims believe in one God, we believe in one God.

They just call them all.

And I'm like, oh, okay, we must worship the same God.

And you know, just being a kid I didn't know, you know, my left hand from my right basically.

And so I think it's only natural if you're just ignorant.

You hear the, you hear some of the similarities and you think, oh yeah, it must be the same.

But you really have to, you don't have to dig very far, but you do have to pay attention to what's being said and, and just ask some, you know, some key questions about who these people are.

So you know, they essentially, they may wear the same name tag in a sense, but who.

The person behind those name tags is very, very different.

And that, and that's the point that we're trying to make here, right, is the fact that just because they, they both say God doesn't mean it's the same God.

Right?

It's like your, your, your analogy used from the Fireproof.

Was that the movie?

No, it's one after fire proof.

It was courageous.

Courageous, that's right.

Yeah.

That's a funny movie.

Yeah, it was.

Yeah, it was.

And so one of the things that we end up seeing though is this is, this is a good way of just, if you have someone who says we're believing in the same God to quickly identify the Trinity kind of separates us from everyone other than Roman Catholics.

Okay.

Now you can separate from Roman Catholics from, once you get to works based salvation.

But, but understanding the Trinity is helpful in saying do we worship the same God with any of these other religions?

Because they're all going to end up differing there, right?

So that becomes the thing when it comes to the nature of, of God.

You know, we, we do have to see that there is a difference in the nature of Allah and the nature of God.

And the reason I say that is because there is a, there is the idea within Christianity that God is not going to lead you astray.

This is in James 1.

If, if you, you know, you look there, it, it says there that God cannot tempt us to sin.

He, you know he can't or not that he's.

I'm trying to look for the verse to read it.

Chapter one 13.

Oh, I didn't go down far enough.

Thank you.

Let no one say when he is tempted.

I am being tempted by God for God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself does not tempt anyone.

Okay.

And someone already knows where I'm going.

Old school.

Congratulations.

I, I'm not going to put the comment up yet for those so that we can get to it but you know exactly where I'm going.

And so what we see is that in the Bible we have a God who cannot.

He's.

He is not tempting temptation happens but it's not by the hand of God.

Okay.

And so there's a difference within Islam because in Islam not only is Allah referred to as, as the best deceivers, the best of deceiver, he's he actually deceived his own followers.

You see the belief that they have in Islam is that Jesus did not die on the cross.

That was a look alike.

Allah deceived his own followers into believing that it was Jesus on the cross.

And a reason I say that why that's important to remember is if you, if you do bring up the passage that talks about God, Allah being the great deceiver, they will argue with you that that's not what it says in the Arabic.

Now I have spoken to people who are Arabic speakers and I have asked them whether that word in Arabic means deceiver.

And they have said yes, but some will say that it means planner.

Allah is the great planner.

And so there you have the issue where they're going to say it's he.

It doesn't mean he's a deceiver, it means he's a planner.

But what they then what you could do in that case is ask them again.

It's good to ask some questions up front so you could use them later.

Another question I usually ask up front is did Jesus die on the cross?

Was Jesus on the cross or was it a lookalike?

And if they say yes it was a look alike I'll ask who made you know, it look like Jesus.

Was that the, the person themselves?

When he went on the cross did he look like Jesus or was that Allah that did that?

And I've never had a Muslim not tell me that it wasn't Allah.

And so I tuck that away for later because then when I come to the passage where it says that Allah is the great deceiver, what ends up happening is where they're going to deny that and say, oh, no, it's, he's the Great Planner.

I said, but didn't he deceive his own followers to believe it was Jesus on the cross?

Now, they have already admitted to that.

Right.

That's why it's good to ask those questions up front and gather them for later.

All right.

It's, it's a, that's always a helpful tactic to have.

And you learn this, by the way, when you, when the more that you, that you talk to different people and see what they believe, you learn what kind of questions to ask.

And if, if you, you know, when you get more tactical with it, what you're doing is realizing this question of, of the Trinity always comes up.

This issue of, I'm always going to bring up, you know, that Allah is a deceiver because I'm going to argue that the author of the Quran is deceiving them.

And so, and Max Peck is saying, no, they would say Allah made whatever poor victim was on the cross look like Jesus.

And so that, that's the thing is they, you know, they would say that it was.

Now I have, some have said, some Muslims have told me that it was Judas that was on the cross.

And so what you see, though is if they want to say that Allah is the Great Planner instead of deceiver, then what did he do on the cross?

Right, because when he was on the cross, he had, he had said at that point that, oh, here's, here's someone that I'm going to make look like Jesus.

All right.

And so, yeah, I, I neglected to read the verse.

So thank you.

Dan is putting in the, in the notes in the, in the chat, he is saying that is Surf354 that.

I'm referring to all of the, all the translations I'm able to find, say either planner or schemer.

Schemer, yes.

Yeah.

And there are, I do have some translations, print translations that, here's, here's where.

I think it gets interesting, right?

Is there, what's the doctrine?

Is it, is it shirk or Sikh where they're actually allowed to lie to promote the cause of Islam?

That's right.

So, yeah, when you, when you have as part of your court one of your core doctrines that you are allowed to lie to for the furtherance of Islam, then it does not surprise me at all that, you know, an English translation might be watered down.

Yes.

Yeah.

So let me read that.

Let me read that verse.

So we have says, I'm going to start in 53.

Our Lord we Believe in the, in that which the Lord has revealed and follow him whom thou has sent.

Enroll us among those who witness to the truth.

And they, the disbelievers schemed and Allah schemed against them.

And Allah is the best of schemers.

And so the idea is that, you know, the, the unbelievers were scheming against God, but God schemed him back.

And, and the word is to deceiver.

But here's the thing with that.

If they want to say, well, that means schemer or planner, if they make that argument, the point there then becomes, well then why did Allah end up deceiving his own followers at the cross?

That, that's the thing that I, I, you know, I always come back to because you, you have to realize that if he's, if he's, you know, scheming them, how could, if he's gonna, if he is going to deceive his own followers, how could they trust him?

And, and I think that's a fair question to ask of a Muslim because, you know, they're, they're putting their trust in, in this Allah.

And if he's deceiving them, how could they, how could they trust him?

Does that make sense?

I hope so.

I'm trying to read some of the comments as well.

This is why I like the co hosts in here, so they could check.

Let me see.

I'm just gonna put this up here and I'll read it with you guys.

It says do not act like you do not know.

In almost every religion it says the God has plans, he planned ahead.

Yet some, somehow this changes when we speak about Islam.

Double standards.

And, and so the issue there is it's not a planning, it's a deception.

And it's not a deception to, as the Quran says, a deception to the disbelievers.

But if, if God made a look alike die on the cross, then what happened is you had someone who, a God who deceived his own followers, not the disbelievers, as the Quran would say.

And so that's something that you, you have to understand.

Okay, so, and this is from.

I don't, it's, I don't know what it'd be a cendris Ace Andreas.

So we'll roll with it until he or she joins the, joins the conversation.

We get to call him or her whatever we want.

Yeah, I'm good at messing up names, so.

But if you do want to join, go to apologexlive.com, scroll down to the duck icon and you you can join us.

And so the, the, the thing though is, is that that's why it's important to, to find out whether they believe that the God of the Quran, you know, put a lookalike up on the cross.

Because if, if he deceived, who was it he deceived?

He deceived his own followers.

That becomes the important thing.

Yeah.

And that gets to Fatima's question.

She says Surah 354 suggests that Allah is deceiving only the unbelievers.

Can you please show the text where Allah actually is deceiving his own followers?

Okay, I guess I could, I could try to dig up the verse where it says, you know, that Christ was not the one who was on the cross.

Yeah, yeah.

And I'll look through my book and see if I can find that quickly as well.

But, but yeah, ultimately it is in the fact that it, where I'm saying it, Fatima is, it's, it's going to be in the sense where you're seeing that Allah is put someone else up for, you know, to, to just, you know, basically to make it look like Christ.

Yeah, it's Surah 4 157.

Let's see, let me get back to the right Quran because I was, I was.

So I'm, I'm looking@quran.com and it says and for boasting, we killed the Messiah, Jesus, son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah.

But they neither killed nor crucified him.

It was only made to appear.

So even those who argue for this crucifixion are in doubt.

They have no knowledge whatsoever, only making assumptions.

They certainly did not kill him.

Yeah.

Yep.

I, I just found it in my book as you, as you read it.

So, so, and I will say to a Cendris, he's, he's making comments in the chat saying my comments are not meant for though for those two guys who are speaking, I'm responding to other comments.

So just.

Well, he did say two Christians talking about Islam and then he kind of poo pooed the idea.

So I mean he says we're two.

Christians talking about Islam and everybody else is typing.

So, so he says two, two Christians speaking about Islam.

This, this live becomes into pure gossip when they split lies and there is no one about their about to tell tell about their lies.

Well, you are welcome to come in.

That's the difference here.

I put a link there in the chat.

You're more than welcome to copy that link, paste it in your browser, join the chat and tell us about all of our Lies.

Yeah.

I mean look here, here's the thing.

In my book, what do they believe?

I read through the Quran?

I, I purposely, I should say this, I purposely did not.

I, I read through the hadiths but I purposely did not use the hadiths in systematizing Islam.

And the reason being is because there are differences between the hadith.

So if I'm saying this is what Islam believes, I don't want to say hey, this is what one group, right?

And then the other group.

No, that's not what we believe.

So I didn't want to be guilty of that.

So I stuck to the Quran and what I did was to go to, I actually went to three different imams after it was written and asked them whether anything that I wrote was inaccurate.

And I have, I've yet to be told anything in, in the book is inaccurate.

I'm willing to change it if there is.

But, but yeah, so you're more than welcome to come in and it won't be two Christians talking about Islam.

It would be two Christians having a discussion with a, what sounds like a Muslim.

And, and we could discuss it.

So, so what we see is there's a definitely we're not worshiping the same guy when we look at the, the Trinity versus the Bible's version with of a Trinity and the Quran's version of a non trinity.

In fact I, I probably could look it up here in my book but I believe that the Quran actually says that if you were to worship the Trinity like you could never be saved.

Let's see.

I will look for that as I, I'll try to look for that as we keep going so I may come back to that.

I want to talk about the, the person of Christ.

It's, I, I do find it interesting that in the Quran the Jesus Christ is in a sense greater than Muhammad.

And I say that because Jesus Christ was born of a virgin, he did miracles, he had a miraculous birth, a miraculous death because he, you know, in the sense that he didn't actually die on the cross, it was a look alike, you see him doing miracles but you don't have that with Muhammad.

And so now saying that if, if those who are watching saw Dan's face go what?

Because most Muslims will, will have that same exact reaction because in Islam Muhammad is, I'm not, I, I, some Christians have made the mistake of saying that Muhammad is worshiped.

Muhammad is, would not be worshiped.

I mean Muslims would not say that very much like modern day Catholics would not say they worship Mary.

They Venerate her.

They put, they give her attributes of deity, but they don't call her God.

Right.

So that's something to note.

Let's see.

I'm trying to see what Max is saying here.

And, and Max, you're more than welcome to come in here as well.

Oh, I think he's responding to someone.

So let's put these other comment, this other comment up from Houston.

Refer.

He says it, if you, if you want to read the Quran to be more, to be more understandable, read it in the claimed order of revelation, not the numerical order.

Now he says longer to short.

And so the Quran is where our Bible is done more chronologically.

The, the Quran is, is done more by size other than the first sura.

They're all done by size.

And that's why Max is then saying to Houston Nyler.

Absolutely.

When you read it in a chronological order and study the history, you can see how his views toward the people of the book sour over time.

This was actually something that I learned when I took that course that I mentioned, the, this, the college course on Islam is that it wasn't written chronologically.

And it was very interesting how over time, in the, in the early writings, he's saying to follow the people of the book.

He actually says you can trust the people of the Book.

He says in the early years that the, that the book is trustworthy, meaning the Bible.

But in the later years it was corrupted.

Now the interesting thing I find with that is because in 700 AD when Muhammad was writing the Quran, we have copies of the Bible that are from before 700 AD and we have copies of the Bible today.

And they weren't different.

So the fact is the, the very Bible that he said you could trust, that later he said was edited.

We have many manuscripts and realize that we still have the same Bible.

It wasn't edited and corrupted the way he would claim.

So just something in case that argument comes up for you to know.

So what you see is that Jesus in the Bible is incarnate God.

We, we saw that when we read Colossians chapter one, he is the creator.

And then in Isaiah 42.

40, 40, sorry, in Isaiah 40, 44, 24, you see there that it's God alone that created.

Well, how could God alone create and, but Jesus created all things, right?

So you're seeing that difference between who Christ is in, in Islam, Christ is only a prophet.

He is not God.

So this gets right back to the same issue that we mentioned earlier.

If you're looking at the, the wrong God So, so if you're looking at the wrong Jesus, the.

Between the Bible and the Quran, you don't have the same Jesus.

And so again, just like we saw with God, we would see a difference here.

Okay, so now what was Fatima's question that you were answering?

Is it.

You're.

You're muted, though I'm going to assume it was.

Is it this one here?

That one right there.

Okay, why don't you read that and then provide the answer?

She says, I am just trying to see how the Quran can deceive so many people.

I am now realizing that if you're the type that falls for hearsay and conspiracy theories, then you take the bait.

But this is.

I think it goes much deeper than that.

And I referenced 2 Corinthians, chapter 4, verses 1 through 4, which I'll read from the LSB.

It says, therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we do not lose heart, but we have renounced the hidden things of shame.

Not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word, word of God, but by the manifestation of truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.

And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the God of this age has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

The reason why men don't come to the truth is not just because they have.

They have a fundamental propensity towards the lie.

Right?

And man does not want to come to the.

Doesn't want to come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.

And because he loves, he agapes the darkness.

That's John 3:19.

So it's.

It's a very.

It's a spiritual problem.

It's not just, you know, a gullibility issue.

Right?

We want.

We want to believe that which is false.

Because when we believe that which is true, which the Bible declares, then we realize that God is sovereign.

And then we.

We owe everything to him and he is our.

Our rightful judge.

You know, one of the.

I don't know.

Is.

Is it bad to say funny verses in the Bible?

But one of the verses I find funny is when Jesus told the Jewish leaders that you do not believe me because I tell you the truth.

Right?

Like if I lied to you, you'd believe it, but you don't believe me because I tell you the truth.

Amen.

I just always find that one.

Interesting.

So Max Peck says we've invited him in.

He says I can't join streamyard.

By the way.

It says I need Chrome plus I don't have a mic.

But we're not using Stream Yard.

So now I'm confused.

We're using EV Mux.

And so I don't know if you tried to join, but you might be able to join with, with evmox on whichever browser you're on.

But a microphone might be hard.

If you have a laptop then you have a mic.

Just would it be a great one?

So I'm just trying to see.

Okay, okay.

He's saying, well, whatever the duck points to.

I don't remember.

Okay, yep.

Well it, then I guess I should try it.

You know, I'll be curious.

Max, just for technical thing, what, what are you using, you know, as a browser?

Fatima says to you, Dan, thank you very much, Dan.

Beautiful explanation of Second Corinthians.

When I see those false religions, the more I, I, the, the more I worship the one true God of the Bible.

And that's good.

So amen.

Amen.

You know, when we look at, when we look at the Islam, I, I, I should say that we have to recognize that the word, you know, Islam is, is to submit.

So a Muslim is one who submits.

And so submission is a very important thing in, in Islam, what they would believe is that, and I'm going to just tell you, you know, for Christians, you're going to go, wait, what?

But the idea that they have in Islam is that, that God had written through first through Moses and then men corrupted it, then through David, men corrupted it, then through Jesus.

And I know, we know that Jesus didn't write the New Testament, but, and then men corrupted it and then through the Prophet Muhammad and it hasn't been corrupted.

Now logically, if you think of it logically, if, if Moses wrote God's word and David wrote God's word and Jesus wrote God's word and every time men corrupted it, it, why would we think that it wouldn't be corrupted when Muhammad wrote it?

Furthermore, the, the Quran was not written down right away.

The Quran was written down.

By an edict of the third caliph Uthman, there was a war and many the people at the time had the Quran memorized.

And so they recite, recited it from memorization.

And after a battle they realized that the, basically that the, the, the, those that knew the Quran could die off and they, and Uthman realized we need to record this.

And so they started to write it down.

Now for the arg.

The reason I bring that up is because in, in history this isn't from the Quran.

This is from history, Islamic history.

You have Uthman collecting all of the writings from those soldiers, those warriors that had it memorized.

And as they wrote it down, Uthman put out an edict to burn the abhorrent texts right there.

That tells you that they, that when these men wrote it down they did not agree, they had differences.

And therefore the, the logical question would be how do you know that Uthman got it right?

Because God couldn't keep his word pure according to Islam after Moses, David or Jesus.

So how could you trust that Muhammad?

Well really Uthman got it right.

Maybe Uthman was the one that then corrupted it.

After all, the God of the Quran deceives his own followers.

Now I am glad that we can agree with one of the Muslims that are in, in watching on YouTube.

Greg says as a, as a Muslim we do not worship the same God.

Christians worship three gods.

And, and this is why it's so important because here you have someone who is not understanding Christianity from what.

And, and this is the proof if you want proof that the, the author of the Quran is not God.

It's the fact that they, that the Quran teaches that the Trinity is three gods just as as Greg says here.

And yet no Christian believes that the Trinity is three gods, not one.

Every as we said at the beginning and Greg may not have been here for this but I read the texts, you know, Deuteronomy 6:4 Hero, Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.

It was clear that there is one God.

I read through in Isaiah where over and over again it said there that God is one and there are no other gods.

I read that on purpose because if there is any Muslims that are in here, you have to realize that the author of, of the Quran did not understand the Bible because to argue is, I mean this is, this is what the Bible says.

I am the Lord.

There is no other besides me.

There is no God.

There is only one God.

There's not two gods.

There's not three gods according to the Bible but according to the Quran as we read in, in Surah 5:1 16, there's Allah, there's Jesus, there's Mary.

And again that's not the definition of the Trinity.

The definition of the Trinity is the Father, the Son and the Spirit.

But Greg, you are very welcome to join us.

We would be honored to have you come in and have the dialogue.

You just go to apologexlive.com and and scroll down to the duck icon.

Join us and, and just give permission to use your mic and cameras for the.

And if you don't want to be on camera, that's fine as well, but at least the mic.

So we could hear you.

But we could.

If you disagree, you're more than welcome to come in.

And so, but this is the thing, the Quran has a wrong definition of the Trinity.

And, and that is something that you can use when you speak to someone who is a Muslim to point out that the, the Trinity is first off, one God, three persons, not three gods as the Quran teaches.

And it's the Father, the Spirit, the Father, Son and the Spirit, not the Father, the Mother and the Son.

So it, that difference becomes major because it shows that the author of the Quran did not understand Christianity nor the Bible.

And so if the author of the Quran did not know Christianity or the Bible, he can't be God because God knows all things.

Okay?

And so that becomes a major thing.

So as we've gone through, I've tried to give you some ways as you have these discussions on how to witness to, to Muslims you want, there are some questions you want to get up front, right?

You want to know whether God is greater than our ability to understand him.

Because when it comes to Trinity, they're always going to rely on the fact that they don't, they can't comprehend a Trinity.

Now what I do because, well, you, you guys who are regular in the audience, you know me, I like to have fun.

So when, when a Muslim says, if I've gotten up front that the, them admitting that God is greater than our ability to understand him and we start talking about the triunity of God and they go, well, that doesn't make sense to me.

I say, thank you for admitting that I follow the right God.

To which they're like, what?

I didn't say that.

Well, no, because their God is one they can comprehend.

The one that I believe from the Bible is one I can't, I can't comprehend.

And we've both agreed that God's one that we can't comprehend.

So brother John, our Canadian fellow, we love him even though he's charismatic.

One day John's going to come in here, we're going to have, I know one day he's going to come in, we're going to have, we'll have a discussion.

But he, he's, he's a really great brother.

Great.

He does a lot of evangelism.

I love him.

We have had the opportunity to talk on the phone and.

And dialogue back and forth.

I love this guy.

He says Islam began with one man's claim of revelation in a cave.

Christianity began with hundreds of eyewitnesses to the risen savior.

One is built on private experience and the other on public resurrection.

That's a really good summarization of them.

And, and by the way, there's a.

For those that are more Mormon, there's a lot of similarities between the way Joseph Smith supposedly got the golden plates and the way Muhammad got the.

The Quran.

Okay.

Both in a.

In a cave, in a darkness.

Both did not think that they were really.

That it was from God.

So both of them had that.

That challenge with that.

And so it becomes really interesting.

One other thing.

I'll give you another thing you could do when.

When speaking to a Muslim.

You.

And this also, again, this will help you to know whether you're dealing with a westernized Muslim or an easternized one.

Okay?

But one question also I'll ask is, does a woman's opinion count equal to a man's?

And the reason I asked that question is Arabic.

Muslims will say no, that it's.

It's four men or four women's testimony counts for one man.

Now, a westernized Muslim will say yes to that.

They're equal.

Okay.

Just something I've have found.

And so what I will do is if.

If they're westernized and they say, well, they're equal, I will then ask the question, does the Prophet Muhammad's understanding count more than.

Than anyone else?

Okay.

Now, old school is saying two women equal one man.

I. I have not heard that one before.

It doesn't mean that you're wrong.

I'm just.

I've heard the testimony.

I think he's quoting an old Beach Boys song.

Two girls for every guy I have.

Well, then you know me being pop culture illiterates.

That's right.

I don't get it.

Andrew does not have his fingers on the pulse of popular culture, whether now or then.

Yeah, no, sorry.

So if that's what it was, I didn't get it.

Okay, well, here's someone.

Housen, saying it's two women witnesses equals one man's witness.

But the women are only permitted to testify in civil cases.

Women can't.

Can't be a witness in a divorce case.

And then he says the four witnesses comes in requiring four witnesses for adultery.

Who.

Who.

Who must be all four men.

So.

Hey, by the way, his name is Houston Euler, so he's.

He's.

He must be a math nerd.

Okay.

You want to explain why he's a math nerd?

Because Oiler, Oiler's number.

Euler was a mathematician, a famous mathematician.

But then there's the, there's the, the pun there, right?

The Houston Oilers, right?

It's a football team.

That's this game.

They play with this oblong shaped ball and they kick it through and they bounce a pair of upright steel things.

And they bounce it.

Or no, they kind of run around with.

It's a bunch of fat guys wearing leotards running around trying to take this ball across some stripes on the, on the, on, on some grass.

So it's a really strange game, but, you know.

Yeah, the Houston Oilers is one of the teams.

I'm surprised, you know, I thought you only knew that ball, that one where you bounce a ball and you stuff it through a hoop against, you know, guys named Shaq.

Yeah, well, you know, I do what I can.

I read a lot.

So Max Peck says.

Max Peck is also Houston NASA nerd reference, by the way.

All right, so, so, but the point, the reason I bring up the women is, is for this reason, even if they say that a man and a woman are equal, here's an interesting thing.

If they agree that the prophet's opinion counts more.

See, when Muhammad had gotten this revelation in the cave, he comes to his wife and he believed it was a demon that was messing with him, but it was his wife that convinced him that it was an angel from God.

So you see it, if we were to say Muhammad, if we're going to trust Muhammad, Muhammad thought that the Quran was given to him by a demon, but it was a woman that convinced him that it was, it was an angel of God and that he should obey it.

So Muhammad submitted to his wife, a woman.

Just a simple thing to think about.

So these are some things that, as we've gone through this, you know, and the more you speak to, to Muslims, the more you're going to pick up on different things that you need to address early on in the conversation.

Because the reason I, I say this is, as I mentioned, with the idea of the Quran or God's word being corrupted.

Even though there are passages in the Quran that says you can trust the book and the people of the book, what you see is that they, they will sit there and believe in an illogical way.

They will submit to the Quran being infallible.

The one that they have today in Arabic, which there's a guy that he used to be in preacher's corner in the uk he's now out by Philly area.

And I, I can't remember his name offhand.

I wanna, I, I want to say John street, but I think John Street's the counselor at Master's Seminary.

But there was a guy that used to, you know, he used to do in, in the UK was he would put out the different Qurans, Arabic Qurans from different areas, different regions and show the textual variances that they have in the Quran today.

And I say that because it, it, they claim there are no variances in the Arabic Quran and yet there are.

So, so that becomes important because you will see when you speak to some Muslims they will throw logic out the window and it can be very frustrating.

So just be aware of that.

Dan, anything that you want to add to anything that we've, that we've kind of mentioned so far.

I like how you asked me the question right as I commenced dying.

I know, I, I, I, as I asked it I realized, oh, he's coughing.

No, yeah, it's been, been a good discussion.

I have nothing to add.

Okay.

And I know you have to go.

Pick up my daughter from soccer practice now.

I'm glad old school got it right.

It's J J Smith, that's who it is.

Thank you for the name.

J. Smith.

And I think he's now in the Philadelphia area.

I've always been meaning to try to reach out to him when I did live in the Philadelphia area, so, but I'm not far, I, I should reach out to him, have him on the show, so.

Well Dan, thanks for coming in.

I'm going to, I'm going to try to wrap up with giving you the, the what the view is in Islam of, of sin and salvation so that you just have an understanding of that.

The idea that they would have of sin is, well they, they, Islam does not believe in a doctrine of original sin.

It's one of the things I find with all of the man made religions is they don't believe in original sin because original sin means that our will was affected by the fall of Adam and Eve.

And if the fall, if, if the fall of Adam brought in an original sin, then we in and of ourselves cannot do any good works or anything to earn salvation.

You see.

And that's why every man made system where they have human effort as the way to get right with God, they can't have original sin.

So that's one of the things you always see, they deny.

And so therefore salvation within Islam is doing good works.

Now they will say that all of your sins when you, when you make the confession of faith, you recite the Islamic creed.

And what that is is to say in front of, in front of witnesses.

You have to have two witnesses.

But you basically say in Arabic there is no, there is no true God but Allah.

And Muhammad is the messenger or prophet of Allah.

And you say that in Arabic and you recite it in front of two witnesses.

That is how you get converted to Islam.

And they believe that at that conversation version, all of your past sins have been forgiven at that moment, your future sins, you have to do good works.

One good deed counts for 10 bad.

And so it's not a one for one.

And therefore you try to do good things.

What are the things?

Well, you have the, the daily prayers, giving of alms, fasting, and making a pilgrimage to, to Mecca.

Now if you can't make that pilgrimage, you can someone in, send someone else in your place, by the way.

So that is an option.

Let me just give a shout out to Fatima who says, another great show today, Andrew and Dan, God bless you both.

Well, thank you, Fatima.

I know you're probably rushing off to Bible study there in the morning.

And so that is.

So when we look at the, the way of salvation, we recognize that this is different than Christianity where we would say that we are not saved by what we do, but we're saved by what God did.

And this brings up something that in my book, what do they Believe?

I added a part in the back where I talk about the uniqueness of Christianity because in Islam they would say every time you mention Muhammad, it's, it's, you know, or Allah, Allah most Merciful.

So they recognize the mercy of Allah, but how could he then be just?

And if you ask them whether Allah is just, they'll always say yes.

But if you ask them how someone can know if they're saved, they can't because it's just, it's a law that just chooses in a way we can't understand.

It's not based on anything.

And yet we do good works to sway him.

And so the reality is, is that justice and mercy are mutually exclusive.

This is what makes Christianity unique.

Because no religion can satisfy and rectify a God who is both just and merciful.

See, justice means the full weight must be paid.

Mercy means that the full weight's not paid.

So if you, if you break a law, justice is the full punishment is, is paid.

And mercy is that you're not paying it at all or you're not paying the full weight of it.

And so in, in Islam there is no Way to, to rationalize those two.

Because if, if Allah is letting criminals into his paradise on nothing, no, no merit that they do, right.

There's no claim that of anything you could do.

Well, there is some claim of dying in a, in a holy war, but the idea is that you're, you're not able to know how to have the forgiveness of sin.

Okay.

There's very little talk in the Quran about forgiveness actually.

And so this becomes the, the difference is that we would see that the full weight of sin was paid by God himself, Jesus Christ, when he became a man and died on the cross.

Being fully God, he could pay a punishment once in time and accounts for all eternity.

Because Jesus is eternal, be it being fully man, he can pay a fine for and be a substitute for other men as long as he's never broken God's law, which he didn't.

So this is what makes Christianity unique because Jesus dying on that cross paid the full punishment.

Justice was met by Christ, he paid that fine.

And now in turn he can offer full mercy because he already paid that fine.

That is why what, what makes Christianity unique is that justice and mercy can be reconciled.

The fact that you can have the, the Jesus is, it's the only religion based on a person, not a teaching.

It's the person of Christ being truly God and truly man.

And the other thing that makes it unique, it's because of what Christ did on the cross that it's not based on what we do, but what God did.

Every man made religion adds human effort to getting right with God in some way.

Christianity is the only religion that says God did it all at the cross.

We cannot do anything.

And that is something that makes Christianity unique.

So as you think about this and you think about what we've talked about with Islam, may it help you to find ways that you could share the gospel with Israel with Muslims.

Clearly, even as the one Muslim, Greg came in and said, we do not believe in the same God.

It's a very different understanding of who God is.

And so with that we, we point this out to say that as we look at this, we want to look at this to say what is it that Christ would have for us if he really is a prophet, if, if there's a Muslim listening and you believe Jesus really was a prophet, then read what he actually said about himself.

He claimed that he is the I am.

That's the name for God.

And the Jews picked up stones to stone him.

And he says, for what good works do you stone me?

And they say, you being a man, claim to be God.

They understood when he said I am.

When he said before Abraham was I am.

When he said that the Father and He are one, they understood what he was saying.

And so what we recognize there is that Jesus tells us that we have to believe in Him.

He is our salvation.

It's what he did on the cross that was the payment for what we have done against God.

And it is the it is what you do with Jesus Christ.

Jesus is not only going to be our judge when we die, but he is the very standard of justice of getting right with God.

It's what do you do with Jesus Christ?

And we have to do and what Jesus said is we have to repent.

We turn from trusting ourself as a good person and we trust in what Jesus Christ did on that cross as a payment of sin.

That's what we must do.

So I hope this episode has been helpful for you.

I hope that you've learned a lot about Islam.

I may encourage you to get a copy of my book what do they Believe?

It's available@restrivingforeternity.org while you're at it, you could pick up my copy of my book what do we Believe and understand the doctrine of the Trinity in there that we discussed.

Those two books will be a great resource for you.

In fact, Christmas is coming and they would make great resources, great gifts if you want for someone.

They're.

They're books that are not hard to read, hard to understand, but are written away with there.

They could be used as a quick reference.

So I hope those are would be helpful to you.

I hope this has been helpful to you.

We will see you next week.

And remember to strive to make today an eternal day for the glory of God.

We'll see you next week.

Bye now.