In spite of my religiousness, I felt that there was a great void within me filling me completely. I never knew what my fate was after death…. For I worshipped God on the outside only. But on the inside, I was a slave to many bad habits and lusts. I couldn’t break free from those habits by fasting, praying or trying to lead a spiritual life. What I truly needed was a heavenly force which would free me and break me loose from the bondage of sin.

Through reading the Quran I discovered the greatness and uniqueness of our Lord "Isa (Jesus)" the Christ. He was wonderful and magnificent… for he’s the Word of God… a Spirit of God… and our intercessor in this life and the life to come…. he is close to God… he is the pure sinless child… he came to this world miraculously, for he was born of a Blessed Virgin untouched by man. Add to all that the fact that he lived a life free of sin and lusts – for the Quran says that all Prophets have sinned and asks for forgiveness from God, that is except for our master "Isa (Jesus)" the Christ. The Quran also says that he performed great miracles unmatched by anyone else. All of that made me wonder…. Who is this "Isa (Jesus)? Is he a mere Prophet? Or is he something greater? Why has the Quran given him all these privileges?

With all the confusion I had I though I ought to search for the truth no matter what it would cost! So I endeavored on reading the Quran from beginning to end deeply. That was when I came upon a verse there, "If thou wert in doubt as to what We have revealed unto thee then ask those who have been reading the Book from before thee: the Truth hath indeed come to thee from thy Lord: so be in no wise of those in doubt. [Quran, Yunus 10:94, Yusuf Ali’s translation]".

This verse was the key of answering all my questions and removing all my doubts… so I wondered, who are those who were reading "the Book" before the Muslims?

The answer came to me from the Quran itself! Those are the Jews and Christians – for the Quran calls them "the People of the Book" because they have the Torah and the Injeel (Gospel), and the Quran orders every Muslim who doesn’t understand it to go back to the Torah and the Injeel (Gospel).

That very day, I hurriedly bought a copy of the Holy Bible. I started reading it… in it I felt that the words of our Lord "Isa (Jesus)" cannot be the words of men; for no man or prophet dare say that he is the Way, Truth and Life… "No one comes to the Father except through me [John 14:6]"… "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. [John 8:12]"… I decided that I should study the life of our Lord "Isa (Jesus)" the Christ in more depth, for I was overwhelmed by great passion to know more about his unique character.

I read in the Holy Bible that our Lord "Isa (Jesus)" the Christ came to the world to save man from sin, and to set him free from bondage to the Devil. I realized the truth of the Gospel in my personal life, and I found in the sinless person of our Lord "Isa (Jesus)" the Christ… well, I found in his sacrifice the solution to the problem of sin in my life. For in his crucifixion is the atonement for all my sins and iniquities. I decided to seek him and his precious blood for shelter because he is the one who died instead of me and shed his holy blood for me!

I couldn’t achieve salvation on my own, not by doing good words or my duties or anything else for that matter. So I decided to submit my life to him. On that very day, I bowed my head and asked the Lord to forgive me my transgressions. Finally, I accepted Jesus as my Savior.

Monthir

My name is Walid. I was born in Bethlehem, Israel. On the day that I was born it was one of the holiest days to Islam, the birthday of the Muslim prophet Mohammad (Al-Mauled Al-Nabawi). This was an honor to my father. For that, he named me Walid which relates to the Arabic word (Mauled) and in English (The Birth) to always remember the birthday of the Muslim prophet.

My father was a Palestinian Muslim who taught English and Islamic studies in the Holy Land. My mother was an American who married my father during his studies in the United States in the year of 1956.

Fearing the impact of the American way of life for their two children and while my mother was pregnant with me, my parents left to live in Israel in 1960 which was called Jordan at that time. When they arrived to Bethlehem I was born. As my father changed jobs, we moved to Saudi Arabia, then back to the Holy Land -- this time, to the lowest place on earth, Jericho.

I can not forget the first song I learned in school just before the Six Day War titled "Arabs Our Beloved and Jews Our Dogs." I used to wonder at that time who the Jews were but with the rest of the kids, I repeated the words without any knowledge of their meaning.

As I grew up in the Holy Land, I lived through several battles between the Arabs and the Jews. The first battle (while we lived in Jericho) was the Six Day War when the Jews captured old Jerusalem and the rest of Palestine. This was a great disappointment to Arabs and Muslims worldwide.

The American Council in Jerusalem came just before the war to evacuate all the Americans in the area. Since my mother was an American, they offered us assistance but my father refused and turned them down because he loved his country. I still remember many things during the war -- the noise of the bombing and shelling that went on day and night for six days, the looting of stores and houses by the Arabs in Jericho and people running to cross the Jordan River from fear of the Israelis.

The war was called the Six Day War because it was won in six days and on the seventh day a Rabbi by the name of Goren blew the ram's horn on the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem declaring the victory. Many Jews claim that this was a parallel to Joshua when he went around the walls of Jericho six times, then on the seventh day seven times, and on that day the priests blew the trumpets and everyone shouted with one voice and took the city. To my father in Jericho, it seemed that the walls had crumbled on him. During the war he was always listening to the Jordanian radio station. He used to say that the Arabs were winning the war, but he was listening to the wrong station. The Israeli station was announcing the truth of their soon coming victory. Instead my father chose to believe the Arabs who claimed that the Israelis were promoting propaganda.

Later on, we moved back to Bethlehem and my father enrolled us in an Anglican-Lutheran school as they had a better English course. My brother, sister and I were the only Muslims in the school. Being half Americans, teachers would beat us and students would laugh at us. When the Bible class started, I would leave the class and remained outside waiting. One day, I walked in the Bible class and the class 'bully' stood up to fight. He shouted, "We don't want this half American and Muslim to be here!" I refused to get out and the lady who was teaching the class asked me to sit down. Since then, I changed the school's policy and for the first time, the school allowed a Muslim to study the Bible. For the next three years, I studied it despite all the mocking.

Later, my father transferred me to the Government school where I grew in the faith of Islam. I was fed the idea that one day, a fulfillment of an ancient prophecy by the Muslim prophet Mohammed would come to pass. This prophecy foretold a battle in which the Holy Land would be recaptured and the elimination of the Jews would take place in a massive slaughter.

This prophecy in fact is documented in Mohammed's Book of Traditions which states the following:

"The day of judgment shall not come to pass until a tribe of Muslims defeat a tribe of Jews." (Narrated by Abu Hurairah, Sahih Muslim, Hadith #6985; Sahih al-Bukhari, Vol. 4, #177)

When Mohammed was asked of the place this would take place, he said:

"In Jerusalem and the surrounding nations."

During my youth, like my father, I was always tuned to Islam and what our Muslim teachers taught. Believing in Muhammad's prophecy, I offered my life to 'Jihad' or 'Holy War' as the only means to obtain either victory or martyrdom. In Islam martyrdom is the only way you can ensure salvation and enter into heaven -- especially since Allah and his prophet Mohammed promised it. As the Quran states it:

"Do not think of whom are killed for the cause of Allah (in a Holy War), to be dead but living with their Lord receiving his blessing". -- Sura: The Family of 'Imran ('Al-'Imran, verse 169)

During school riots against what we called the Israeli occupation, I would prepare speeches, slogans, and write anti-Israeli graffiti in an effort to provoke students to throw rocks at the armed Israeli soldiers. We shouted, "No peace or negotiations with the enemy! Our blood and our souls we sacrifice to Arafat! Our blood and our souls we sacrifice to Palestine!" and "Death to the Zionists!"

I vowed to fight my Jewish enemy believing that I was doing God's will on earth. I remained true to my word as I participated in many riots against the Israeli army, always trying to inflict harm to them by all means and methods I could devise. I would start and participate in any riot I could initiate: in schools, streets, and even on the holiest place (the Temple mount site) in Jerusalem called by Arabs (Al-Masjid Al-Aqsa). All through high school I would always be one of the first to provoke a riot.

Many others got involved in terror tactics against the Jews using bombs and armed assaults on Jews in an attempt to force them to leave Israel. But they never could pluck them out.

Nothing could change my heart, I could only die or a miracle needed to happen. The simplest way to describe myself is that I was one of those one would view on CNN throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails in the days of the Intifada or 'The Uprising'. I was one of these who Jews would call a terrorist. The interesting thing is that I was not only terrorizing but I was terrorized by my beliefs which required me to gain enough merit and good deeds to go to heaven. But I never was sure if my good deeds would outweigh my bad deeds in the scale when I would be judged by God. Of course to die fighting the Jews would ease Allah's anger towards my sin and I would then be secured a good spot in heaven with beautiful wide-eyed women to fulfill my most intimate desires. Either way, I won and terror was the only way.

I remember one time in Bethlehem all viewers clapped their hands with joy in a jam packed theater watching the movie, "21 Days in Munich". The moment we saw the Palestinians throwing grenades into the helicopter killing the Israeli athletes, hundreds of viewers yelled, "Allahu akbar!" (Allah is the greatest). This is the slogan of joy used by Muslims for victorious events.

"Forbidden to you also are married women, except those who are in your hand as slaves, this is the law of Allah for you." -- Sura: The Women (al-Nisa, http://www.quranbrowser.com/cgi/bin/get.cgi?version=all&searchstring=4:24 - verse 24 )

And in a different verse the Koran says:

"O prophet; we allowed thee thy wives to whom thou hast paid their dowries, and the slaves whom thy right hand possesseth out of the booty which Allah hath granted thee, and the daughters of thy uncle, and of thy maternal aunt, who fled with thee to Medina, and any believing woman who hath given herself up to the prophet, if the prophet desired to wed her, a privilege to thee above the rest of the faithful". -- Sura: Confederates (al-Ahzab, http://www.quranbrowser.com/cgi/bin/get.cgi?version=all&searchstring=33:50 - verse 50 )

We had no problem with Mohammed taking advantage of this privilege as he married 14 wives for himself and several slave girls from the booty he collected as a result of his victorious battles. We really never knew how many wives he had and that question was always a debatable issue to us. One of these wives was taken from his own adopted son Zaid, as Allah declared that she was given to the prophet while others were Jewish captives forced into slavery after Mohammed beheaded their husbands and families.

In an attempt to change the hearts of Palestinians, the Israeli TV station would show Holocaust documentaries. I would sit and watch cheering the Germans while I chewed on food. It was impossible for me to change my mind or heart concerning Jews, only a "heart transplant" would do that job.

They once took our school for a week to a Jewish camp on the coast of Eshdod to mingle us with other Jewish schools. That didn't work. On the contrary, every teacher who spoke to a Jew was mocked.

My mother on the other hand tried to teach me a different idea at home that she called God's plan. She spoke to me about Bible prophecy; she said that the return of the Jews was pre-planned by God and had been fulfilled. This, to her, was Gods miracle in our generation for the world to see that "His will shall be done."

She also told me about many future events to be fulfilled in our generation which is surfacing every day now. She told me of false Messiahs and counterfeits; but all that had little effect for my heart was set on fighting against the Jews.

My mother was influenced by an American Missionary couple who she asked secretly to baptize her. When she refused to be baptized in a pond full of green algae, the missionary priest had to plead to the YMCA in Jerusalem to clear the pool of men, and my mother was then baptized. No one from our family knew.

Many times my mother would take me on trips to several museums in Israel and I fell in love with archeology. I was fascinated with it. In my many arguments with her, I would bluntly tell her that the Jews and Christians had corrupted the Bible. She responded by taking me to the Scroll Museum in Jerusalem and showed me the scroll of Isaiah, still intact. There was no one taking pictures of any Biblical errors to prove of any corruption and I could not respond to my mother.

I remember when I still tormented my mother by calling her an "infidel" and a damned American Imperialist who claimed that Jesus was the Son of God. I'd show her the pictures in the newspaper of all the teenagers supposedly martyred as a result of violence demanding that she answer. I hated her and always asked my father to divorce her and remarry a good Muslim woman.

I would even pose with a grim and sad face for the school picture as if I knew that my turn to be in the paper as a martyr would be next. Many times I risked being killed during youth protests and clashes with the Israeli Army.

I lived in Israel during the Six Day War, the PLO resistance, the Jordanian Black September civil war, the bloody wars in Lebanon, and the war of Yom Kippur. With no hope to destroy Israel and all these losses, we still hoped for that one victory since that is all it would take to destroy them.

My parents worried a lot about me as I got thrown in prison by the Israeli Army. My mother went to the American Council in Jerusalem to try to get me out. She was so stressed her hair started to fall out. In jail, I learned more about the art of terrorism and when I got out, I was more fanatical than before.

When I graduated from high school, my parents sent me to the United States to seek a higher education. Of course I got involved with many anti-Israeli social and political events. I still remember my favorite sick joke I used to like to tell my friends, that I hated Hitler very much because he never got the job done, that is: he never finished the Jewish problem "once and for all".

With Hitler being my idol, and Mohammed my prophet, I went on with my life with little regard for Jews, Christians, or anyone who was not a Muslim. I believed that one day the whole world would submit to Islam and that the whole world owed the Palestinians for their losses in all the battles with Israel. I also believed that Jews were prophet-killers and that they had corrupted the Scriptures to serve their evil desires. This is what Muslims teach. They also teach that Mohammed is our only redeemer and God's favored prophet.

As I lived in America, I could not forget the hundreds of thousands of Muslims who died just in the last 20 years in Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Afghanistan and in every single Muslim nation. I had to get revenge for them and someone had to pay the price. Of course there was no question in my mind that the Jews had to pay the penalty, somehow we always managed to twist things together and make it their fault.

One day I fought with a man and struck his eye blind, I was so happy to learn that the man was a Jew.

I was fascinated with Islamic history and I learned that the Islamic prophet Mohammed extradited a Jewish tribe from Saudi Arabia and ordered the beheading of all the men from another tribe. The women were taken as concubines. I used to believe, as Islam taught, that only a Caliph (Islamic ruler) could rule the world. Islam is not a religion for one's personal and moral life, but a system of law and government to the whole world. If not achieved through peaceful means, it would have to wage war against all who did not submit to Islam. With one billion Muslims living today, I believed that it could happen.

I'll be honest, all my life, I was terrified every time I read the Koran, as, after every other verse, there was always threats of hell fire for this sin and that. All I wanted was to reach out to my Maker to say I am sorry, forgive me, give me another chance. But I failed to keep count of all my sins and my good deeds and I was sure that at the end, my sins would outweigh my good deeds. So, I lived my sinful life depending on the love and mercy of my Maker. I always wondered about my destiny. Lost in my fears and doubts, I really hated the idea of killing for my salvation and, in reality; I never had the heart to kill a rat! How then could I kill a Jew!

Sometime in 1992, I was fascinated when I read a book titled "Armageddon, Appointment with Destiny", by Grant Jeffrey. Some of the things explained in this book had many detailed prophecies about Jesus: his birth, life, death and resurrection and the re-creation of the state of Israel. Many of these prophecies came to pass just as God put them down in the Bible! What also amazed me was to find out that the chances for a man to predict hundreds of historic events written hundreds and thousands of years before their occurrences are one in zillions. What is more fascinating is that the margin of error had to be zero, especially when the fulfillment of many of these prophecies was happening in my generation. This kind of evidence had to come from a divine origin that origin had to be God Almighty.

The struggle began. I was puzzled. How could the Bible be a fake and corrupted by the Jews if the land I grew up in, spoke and cried out as thousands of pieces of archeological evidence surfaced from the land of Israel confirming the Bible? The book of Isaiah, discovered in the Qumran caves, was found by a Muslim from the town next to Bethlehem by the name of Muhammad Deib while looking for a lost sheep. From that discovery, they found the rest of the Old Testament which matched the Old Testament Bible in our hands today. It contained hundreds of verses predicting the coming of Jesus Christ.

I had to read the Bible to know who Jesus really was, to find out for myself. God finally led me to get to the bottom line as I started reading what Jesus said:

"I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, who was and is to come, the Almighty." Revelation 1:8

Christ also said to the Jews:

"Truly, truly I say to you; before Abraham was born I AM (God)." John 8:58

It amazed me to find similar claims between Jesus and Mohammed. These claims were serious, as Mohammed said:

"I am the beginning of all creation and the last prophet."

He also said:

"I was a prophet of Allah while Adam was still being molded in clay."

Moreover, he claimed to be the intercessor for Muslims in the Day of Judgment, by all of these, claiming to be the world's last and final prophet and savior.

These things always puzzled me. If Mohammed claimed all that he claimed, than who was Jesus who claimed to be our Redeemer and Savior? That question troubled me a great deal. One of the two claims had to be a lie, if there were two redeemers; this would be association with God since God is the only Redeemer.

Christ or Mohammed had to be the Redeemer and Intercessor for mankind. The Bible or the Koran had to be correct. One of them was pure gold and the other had to be a fake, but which one...?

Vowing to make a decision for "The Truth", I stayed up late many nights comparing many details between the Koran and the Bible. At some point during my study, I prayed saying: "GOD, you are the Creator of heaven and earth, the God of Abraham, Moses, and Jacob, you are the beginning and the end, you are 'The Truth', 'the only Truth', the Maker of the true Scripture, the one and only word of God. I suffer to find your truth, I want to do your will in my life, I long for your love and in the name of 'The Truth' I ask. AMEN!!!"

I wanted real gold and would not settle for an imitation. I had to scratch very hard to look beyond the surface of the world's plastic religions.

I believed in the Koran as the word of God because it had modern scientific laws and only a book with a divine origin could have scientific facts written a thousand years before their discovery. I spent a month using a computer program searching for scientific clues in the Bible. Every verse in the Koran that was a scientific miracle that led me and millions of Muslims to believe in the Koran was already in the Bible. Many stories in the Koran had serious errors and with my knowledge of history and archeology, I knew that the Koran had serious faults.

With many of these discoveries, my claim that the Koran was a miracle was in question. The Bible had all of its miracles hundreds and thousands of years before. My foundation shook and I felt the sinking sand under me. Even the nations mentioned by the prophet Ezekiel in chapter 38, whom God would destroy -- most of them were Muslim nations growing towards Islamic Fundamentalism today.

What also helped me was that God led me to discover, through my study of the Bible, hundreds of detailed and unique verses concerning prophecies fulfilled to the letter. No man has ever presented such detailed predictions of future events without having more errors than truth. God is the only one that holds the key to future events and only the Bible has the key, not the Koran which lacks those most important elements of "Salvation and Redemption". I knew at that moment I would have to be a fool knowing all of this and continuing worshipping a different God than the God of the Bible. I really thought with my prayer, that God will lead me to the Koran, but that was not the case with me. In fact it was the other way around, I had to give up my pride and be open-minded to truth.

God said in the Bible:

"For I am God, and there is no other; I am God and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things are not yet done, saying: My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure." Isaiah 46:9-10

God not only foretold future events, but declared them and brought them to pass, unlike the Koran which simply used terror tactics to conform Muslims to believe. Since I did not believe that the Bible was corrupted, I spent many days searching the Bible for Mohammad, as he claimed to be in it, but never found him. If the Bible had been corrupted it had to have happened after the prophet Mohammed since the Koran always addressed the Bible that was 'between his hands' at his time. From that time until now Muslims have failed to provide one single Bible from the face of the earth to prove the corruption, and not one historical or archeological evidence has been discovered to disprove the Bible.

Even the death of that Muslim prophet was different than the death of Jesus, as Mohammed died on the lap of his favorite wife, Aisha, while Jesus died on the cross in order to redeem man's sins.

I felt sad that hundreds of millions of Muslims today live without ever hearing or being challenged with this kind of evidence.

It was astonishing to me to find that Muslims and the rest of the world recognized three main religions that worship God even though God said that He is One and his Word is One.

I was blind, but with the Bible only, I began to see -- I mean really SEE!!! With so much Biblical prophecy fulfilled showing the return of Israel from the grave and the attitudes of Muslims and the world towards Jews, the end time is near.

Man has never changed. He still kills his brother as Cain killed his brother Abel. The only difference is that we don't behead and stab each other in battles as much as we used to. We simply wage chemical warfare to exterminate each other like bugs as human life is becoming less and less valuable. I began to see that sin was the source of all man's problems and that the Devil was man's worst enemy, not the Jews, of whom Hitler exterminated 6 million less than 50 years ago. Ironically today, there is tons of literature being sold denying the incident even occurred. I wondered what would happen if a Hitler or a Mehdi or an Islamic Khalifa (Caliph) came to power and has what we have today: all these nuclear bombs capable of destroying earth seven times over. God led me to look at the world that I live in and ask myself if the world today so foolishly denies the Jewish Holocaust despite all the evidence we have, why should I still wonder why most of the world today denies the Messianic claim of Christ and the accuracy of the Bible -- especially when the evidence is all around.

God opened my heart and mind and led me to see how people today deny all the proofs He has provided for us in His Word, adapting themselves to false forms of worship.

The Lord began to show me the satanic influences which affected my way of thinking. Regardless of my Islamic background, I used to think these influences were from God.

I was led to a new view of the world and the meaning of life and saw the need for salvation. Today, we all can see man's goal for a world government waiting for the Devil to be the king!

"Babylon" is being revived from the grave to unite the world one more time; we have only changed its name to "The New World Order" when it should be called "The New Babylon". I started reading the Bible and began to wonder why Zechariah prophesied:

"For I will gather all the nations to battle against Jerusalem, the city shall be rifled, and the women ravished." -- Zechariah 14:2

In Islam I was taught that the second coming of the Messiah was in Islamic prophecy. He was portrayed as the one to break the cross and kill the pig, another setup for Muslims to follow the "false" messiah, the Mehdi, the coming Antiochos Epiphinias.

Contrary to Mohammed's prophecy, the Bible prepares its readers that the outcome of the siege in the time of Jacob's trouble will not be the total annihilation of the Jews but that Christ himself will descend on the Mount of Olives for judgment as He fights the enemies of Israel. Unfortunately, it will be too late for repentance and redemption for non-believers.

The saddest part is that hatred towards Jews is not an old out-moded idea from the far past. Millions of Muslims today have the same sick idea that one day they will do the same to all Jews in the Holy Land as Mohammed did to the Jews in Saudi Arabia.

In fact, the permission to kill Jews and Christians and to take their wives as concubines was engraved in the Islamic "Holy Koran" and is the main cause for the hatred of Jews by Muslims to this very day.

The word "Truth" was stuck in my heart day and night, pounding on my soul as I continued to compare the two books and to finally conclude that the Bible could be proven beyond any shadow of a doubt to be true gold. Not only by hundreds of ancient prophecies that came to pass, but by one ancient word created by God from the time of Jacob until our generation. For all who doubt, that word was and still is 'Israel'.

Israel's existence today, and the re-gathering of the Jews from ALL parts of the world is an irrefutable proof that the Holy Bible is the true Word of God. God scattered them throughout the whole world and then re-gathered them again from ALL nations back to their original land in fulfillment of His promises in the far past, until our present, for He said:

"I will gather you from ALL the nations, and from all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be carried away captive." -- Jeremiah 29:14

The true God has never changed, He is still the same. I also learned that my enemy, the Jews, were chosen by God to write God's Word and God's plan for salvation through Jesus the Messiah, the only Messiah and Redeemer for man. I also learned that Jesus, the man from my hometown, was a Jew and that even my hometown was Jewish 'Beth-Lechem', which means 'Home of the Bread', as He said:

"I am the Bread of Life, he who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst." -- John 6:35.

Beth-Lechem was given its name before Jesus came to this world. Jesus was from the people of my enemy, the Jews. Yet, He died for my sin. I had never heard of an enemy who died for another enemy and loved him so much that he allowed Himself to be beaten, spat on, mocked and finally crucified. Would your enemy die for you? Yet He said:

"Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you." -- Matthew 5:44.

The Truth was in front of my very eyes, knocking constantly on my heart, and wanting to come in. I called on The Truth and He answered, I was blind and sought the truth, and now I see. He knocked on my door and I opened, and now had set me free! Christ said:

"I am The Way, The Truth and The Life, no one comes to the Father except through Me." -- John 14:6

My way of thinking, my feelings, and my goals in life began to change. I began to feel for the Jewish people. All the hatred left me. The desire to see them hurt was no more a thing in my life. Now, I hurt for them and pray peace for Jerusalem continually. Instead of laughing at images of the Holocaust on TV, I weep for them. I am even ready to give my own life for them, as did my Lord. I say it despite the outpouring of hate that could come from my own fellow Arabs and Muslims.

Yes, I say it to the whole world, I love Jews. I love them because of their Messiah. I love them because they brought Light to the world and through them came the Light and the Truth and for that I love Jews. I no longer despise them and I know from the Bible that the Jews are God's chosen people to give light to Arabs and to the whole world if we only allow them. For God made them a blessing to the world and we need to love and support them as God said to Abraham:

"I will bless those who bless you and I will curse him who curses you, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." -- Genesis 12:2

Knowing the truth transferred my way of thinking from believing in Hitler to believing in Christ, from believing lies to knowing the truth, from being spiritually sick to being healed, from living in darkness to seeing the light, from being damned to being saved, from doubt to faith, from hate to love, and from evil works to God's grace through Christ. This transformation taught me that without the (true) word of God, things could look good on the surface but in the core lies deception. I accepted Jesus the Messiah who died for all of our sins as my Lord and Savior; to Him I submit.

Jesus said:

"Come to me all you labor, and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." -- Matthew 11:28

Thank you, Lord Jesus, for fulfilling your promise.

If you would like to contact me, you can http://answering-islam.org.uk/Walid/contact.htm - send me an email .

http://answering-islam.org.uk/Walid/index.htm - Dear Muslim, let me tell you why I believed : A detailed account of Walid's research into Bible and Qur'an

http://answering-islam.org.uk/Testimonies/index.html - More Testimonies
http://answering-islam.org.uk/index.html - Answering Islam Home Page

http://www.arabicbible.com/testimonies/ziad_a.htm">

Ziad was born and raised in Damascus, finishing his schooling in this historic capital of Syria. Most of his life, Ziad had been a practicing Muslim like everyone else in his devout family. He would often accompany his father, his three brothers, and some neighbors to the mosque for Friday noon prayers and frequently for prayer on other days. The rest of the five daily prayer times he would observe at home or at work. Not once had he failed to observe the month of fasting since his boyhood.

After graduating from the state University, Ziad moved to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where he worked for several years as a civil engineer. While he was in Saudi Arabia, he continued to participate in all the Muslim religious duties, as well as to make the pilgrimage to Mecca. At times he wondered about the Injil and the Tawrat, but he would brush these thoughts aside for he believed that through his traditional religious training, he knew all he needed to know about the Holy Bible and about Jesus Christ. Yet, according to his testimony, "what I had heard from my Christian friends in Damascus and had seen in their lives, continued unanswered for many years."

In 1979, Ziad, along with his wife and young daughter, Ghada, went to Germany for one year of specialized training as provided by his employer. During the family's stay in Germany, Ghada became very ill and was admitted to a hospital. After receiving medical care for 4 days with no improvement, the doctors seemed resigned to her imminent death.

Feeling overwhelmed by the scene of his daughter's paling face, Ziad left her room with a heavy heart, and returned to the waiting room. There he sat motionless, yet agonizing, for a few moments, until he noticed a table in the middle of the room which contained books and magazines. He saw two recognizable books -- an English version of the Holy Bible and a German version of it. He got up and walked over to the table and picked up one.

As he returned to his seat, he held the book closed while his memory took him back to some sayings of Jesus Christ which he had heard from his former Christian friends in Damascus. Recalling one saying, he eagerly opened the Book that was in his hand and directed by the Holy Spirit, began searching for the passage. When he found it, he began reading it silently:

I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it (John 14:13,14).

Seeing the willingness of the Son as expressed in these verses gave Ziad an abundant hope. He lifted a warm prayer to the Almighty God in the name of Jesus. His only request -- that his "dying" daughter would be healed.

"Immediately I felt a profound tranquility and assurance," said Ziad. "I left the waiting room filled with unprecedented joy, seeing light surrounding me. As soon as I came into Ghada's room, I rushed to her bed and hugged her gently, saying, "Ghada my sweetheart, god will heal you."

The certainly with which Ziad made this statement even astonished him, but he knew deep in his heart that God had answered his prayer.

The tears which had dropped from his own eyes onto Ghada's cheek as he embraced here, Ziad wiped off. With tears of joy still clinging to his eyes, he turned to his wife and said, "I have asked God in the name of Jesus to heal Ghada. Never before have I prayed so fervently, nor so simply in such a special way. Somehow I am assured that God has answered this prayer."

Indeed, Ghada was healed. Two days later, the doctors released her from the hospital. They could find no reason to detain her.

Since this amazing answer to Ziad's prayer, both Ziad and his wife have experienced the transforming work of God in their lives. They know the truth about Jesus Christ and proclaim their faith in Him. Later, Ghada followed them on this path; she too now believes that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

http://answering-islam.org.uk/Testimonies/index.html - More Testimonies
http://answering-islam.org.uk/index.html - Answering Islam Home Page

It was February 10, 1990 on a Saturday when I sat at the airport at the age of 23. I thought about what happened in my past life, what is happening to me now, and what could happen to me in the future. My plane to Jordan would leave in an hour and my life would never be the same. I would marry a man whom my father chose for me and I would never return to the U.S. unless my husband decided to move here.

You see, I was born in Jordan to a Palestinian family. As the third and middle child, my grandmother decided I should be the first of my brothers and sisters to carry a Muslim name. She named me after one of the messenger Mohammed's daughters. When I was at the age of eight, my father decided to come to the U.S. to make some money and eventually go back to Jordan because he feared his daughters would grow up to become American women and possibly even marry American men. My father held very strongly to his Arab customs and wanted his children to follow the customs and Islam, especially his daughters. It is a disgrace to the family and forbidden in Islam for an Arab Muslim woman to marry a non-Muslim man. On the other hand my brothers were allowed to marry anyone they want as long as they are believers of the Books (Torah and Gospel) because Islam gave them that right. That is why my father sent me to Jordan to go to school.

I lived with my grandmother, my uncle and his family for a few years. My father was so pleased with me because I became a devout Muslim. He was relieved to know he didn't have to worry about my older sister because she was already married to an Arab Muslim, my younger sister was too young for him to worry about, and I was living the life that would please God and him. I traveled back and forth from Jordan to the US so I can be with my family while I was going to school in Jordan. As much as I loved seeing my family, I felt happy living in Jordan and following God's ways. I prayed five times a day, fasted the month of Ramadan, read the Qur'an daily, wore the veil (covering the entire body and showing only the hands, face and feet) and tried to imitate the prophet Mohammed in every way. No matter what I did for God, I felt I needed to do more to show him how obedient I am to Him. I would sit with my brothers and sisters and start quoting the prophet Mohammed and the Qur'an to them. My father was so proud of me.

The more I spent time in Islam, the further I drifted from God. The Muslims I knew didn't seem to truly love God. They worshipped Him to obtain heaven and feared His wrath and anger. I also began wonder about my motive in following Islam. "Was I following it for God or for the people around me?", I thought to myself. I'm not sure what my answer was, but I decided not to wear the veil anymore and act like a Muslim instead of looking like one. Worshipping God suddenly became an issue only between God and me.

At the age of twenty three, my father decided I should be married. In the Arab culture, the marriage process required a man asking for a woman's hand from her family. Dating is not allowed, but both have a chance to talk to each other in the presence of their families before they decide if they are right for each other. Several Arab Muslims came to ask for my hand, but I refused. I had a hard time marrying someone that I didn't know just to please my father. The culture and Islam allow marriages between first cousins. I refused to marry my cousin along with distant relatives and even strangers. "Why would my father want me to marry someone I didn't love or even know?", I felt. At the same time, my father didn't understand why I would refuse all these good men when he knew quite well that love comes after marriage and not before. When my dad realized that reasoning with me wouldn't work, he tried force. He decided I should go back to Jordan and stay there until I was married. My younger sister was sixteen at the time, so my dad felt she should come with me. That was a trying moment in my life.

Disgrace in the family brought by a daughter is the worst shame a family can go through. Many families have killed their daughters for what the culture considers disgrace. That was what I had to think about when I sat at the airport with my sister as we prepared to leave for Jordan. My dad flew to Jordan before us to prepare for my wedding and my brother made sure we would get to the airport without any problems. As I sat in the airport, I knew what I had to face; disgrace or misery: disgrace the family if I ran away or be miserable when married to one of my cousins for the rest of my life. At that point, I was so angry at my father and God: angry at my father for what he was doing and angry at God for allowing what was happening to me. I felt my heart screaming at God and saying, "Out of everyone in my family, it was ME who prayed to You, ME who fasted for You, ME who studied the Qur'an and this is what You allow to happen to me?! Why did You allow my family to send me to Jordan when I was still a teen-ager? Why did I have to live in an uncaring home? Why didn't You help me pursue my education when my dad refused to let me continue my education? Why did You allow my grandmother, my uncle and his family to treat me so harshly when I was with them? Why did You allow all these bad things to happen to me? Why God, WHY?!" I made a decision that day to stop praying to God and stop worshiping Him the way I did in the past.

February 10, 1990 was the day that completely changed my life. My younger sister and I took our luggage and we were on our way to the nearest hotel. The plane landed sixteen hours later as my father, along with other relatives, waited for us in the airport to greet us. When my father realized that we weren't on the plane, he went out of his mind! He called my brother and told him we weren't on the plane so my brother began to desperately search for us. My sister knew she had to go back home because the family would kill us both once they found us. There was a possibility they would claim I kidnapped my sister because she was under age. We both agreed she would tell them that I dragged her off the plane and forced her to come with me so they would not harm her. I promised her that if they try to force her to do anything she didn't want, I would come back and get her. We tearfully said good-bye to one another thinking that we would never see each other again.

God alone was the only One who could protect me, but I was so angry at Him that I didn't ask for His help. I didn't have much money and I couldn't work because they would find me under social security number. I didn't have many American friends because my father wouldn't allow me to be influenced by their "Satanic ways". And more importantly, I didn't know what to do in a society I hardly associated with. I needed courage, strength and wisdom.

I joined the U.S. Army National Guard so the government can protect me. Once I was done with my military, I went back to a suburb in the city where my family lived and lived there in hiding. During that time, I found a job and became very successful at work, I rented an apartment from the money I saved while I was on active duty in the military, and met many friends that would care for me as if I was a member of their family.

Four years later, I slowly began to contact my family. My father had moved to Jordan and married another woman there, my brothers were living on their own, and my mom and younger sister were living together. After five years, I made peace with my family and they accepted me living alone and running my own life. It amazed me to see how accepting my family was of that I began to see God's grace in my life. "He didn't neglect me after all", I thought, "I don't know what I would have done without His love and grace. He took me out of a bad situation to put me in a better one. He protected me and gave me the courage, wisdom and strength to survive on my own." I felt ashamed for being angry at Him and I needed to make peace with Him by going back to Islam. I didn't pray five times a day, but I thanked daily and did nice things that I thought would please Him.

February of 1998, I accepted a job for a company that would move me to another state to work as a salesperson. That same month a dear friend of mine died of a car accident leaving me in agony and distress. Because I had made peace with God, I was able to talk to Him and for the first time have conversations with Him. I didn't know why He did what He did, but I had to accept it because from my past experience, I knew He did things for a reason even though I don't understand. Nonetheless, I asked for His help, and actually asked Him to help everyone in the world who needs help.

The month of May had arrived and it was time for me to move. I arrived not knowing anyone or what to expect from this city. I was scared being in a new city, and sad that I left my family and friends, but excited about my new job. I wanted to be close to Mexico so I could learn more Spanish and travel there for my company. My plan was to be successful in international sales, but the Lord had other plans for me.

Under the strangest circumstances, I met a woman one evening that was walking her dog in front of my apartment. She and I became friends instantly so one day she invited me to go to her church. I didn't think there was any harm in me going to church, "After all", I thought, "God sent down Judaism and Christianity so He would not be upset if I went to church even though I'm a Muslim"

I really enjoyed the pastor's sermons and felt that he offered sound teachings. The only thing that didn't seem sound to me was when the pastor talked about Jesus being the Son of God. I felt, though, that God would forgive the pastor because he was misled by his family to believe that Jesus is the Son of God. Sometimes the pastor would say that Jesus is God in the flesh and sometimes he would say that Jesus is the Son of God. I knew for sure that the pastor was obviously confused because how can Jesus be God and then be God's Son? That just didn't make any sense to me. I continued to go to church until one day the pastor said that Muslims didn't know Jesus Christ. I was struck by that comment. Something inside of me said, "Of course Muslims know Jesus; the pastor is sadly mistaken and I need to set the record straight." After the service, I went to the pastor, introduced myself to him that I'm a Muslim and I DO know Jesus Christ. He apologized for making a blanket statement, and said, " I know that Muslims believe he is a prophet." I told him that I would like to meet with him to talk about his faith. Sooner or later, I would have approached the pastor, but that comment expedited the whole process for me to search for the truth. That was another turning point in my life.

My heart and soul were convinced that the prophet Mohammed was the last messenger and the Qur'an was the last book sent by God. The Qur'an clearly states that Jesus was a messenger that was born of a virgin mother, Mary. He had many miracles including bringing the dead to life, healing the sick, speaking when he was a baby, and creating a bird out of clay. The Lord loved him so much that when his enemies were preparing to crucify him, God sent someone to look Jesus and die on the cross instead of Jesus. Muslims believe that he never died, but was raised to heaven to be protected from his enemies. Jesus, in the Qur'an, claims he never told anyone to worship him but to worship the One true God. The Bible has been changed, according to Muslims, that Christians and Jews really don't have the true Books. When God gave Mohammed the message, God preserved the Qur'an and made sure no one would change it like the Torah and the Gospel.

I continued to go to Church and listen to the pastor's sermons, but I began to wonder why Christians had different beliefs than Muslims. As I listened and began to read different books on Christianity and Islam, I became very confused and didn't know what to believe anymore. I had to wrestle with many issues: Was Jesus crucified? Did Jesus die on the cross for man's sins? Is Jesus God or the Son of God? Is God a Triune God? Is the Bible really accurate and had the Bible been preserved after all these years? If the answer was yes to all my questions, that would mean then that Mohammed was a liar and the Qur'an was not from God. Work, family, friends, and everything else around me suddenly became meaningless. My days and evenings were consumed with tears and agony over God and the truth. How could I know what really happened 2,000 years ago? How could I betray my family or maybe even God if I believed in Jesus Christ? That was a decision I was not willing to make myself. Nonetheless, I continued to read and search for answers to all my questions.

My questions needed convincing answers and I didn't know who would help me until the pastor recommended a professor at a seminary. As I spoke with the professor and read many books, things started making sense. The Bible had to be accurate because of the Dead Sea Scrolls. One of the Dead Sea Scrolls was the book of Isaiah that dates back to 125 BC. Apart from the Dead Sea Scrolls there are also parts of very old manuscripts of the Gospel according to John and the Gospel according to Matthew that we currently have that are in museums around Europe and the Middle East. I began to read compare the prophesies that were in the Old Testament about the coming of the Messiah and how they were all fulfilled in the New Testament. The Old Testament talks about the Messiah's hands and feet being pierced for man's transgressions, he would be born of a virgin mother, he would be led like a lamb to the slaughter, he would be sold for 30 pieces, he would enter Jerusalem on a donkey, and he would be called the Almighty God and Prince of Peace. These prophesies in the Old Testament and how they were fulfilled in the New Testament lead me to believe in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. The only thing left for me to wrestle with was Jesus' deity as part of a Triune God. "I can not, under any circumstances, believe that Jesus is God; that would be pure blasphemy!", I thought to myself. I had to either end my search or challenge Jesus' deity because I knew I couldn't embrace Christianity if I knew I had to believe in Jesus' deity. I needed a miracle.

One day I said to Jesus, "O.K. Mr. Messiah, it's my way or the highway. If you are God, you would prove it to me by doing what I want you to do." Jesus didn't respond. I was beginning to believe that God didn't want me to trust in Jesus because I thought for He'd respond to my prayers. Then one Sunday, I went to church and the pastor was talking about prayer. He said, "When I pray for something, I usually say: God, if this is Your will, then open the door wide open or slam it shut, but please Lord, don't let me make this decision myself." I felt good about that prayer because I was afraid of making the wrong decision about God. As soon as I got home that day I prayed and said, "God, if you want me to follow Christianity, then open the doors wide open or slam it shut, but please Lord let me make this decision myself." For a whole week nothing happened.

Sunday morning August 2, 1998, I woke up feeling depressed as usual about my search. I decided not to go to church because I didn't want to hear people say that Jesus is God anymore. An Iranian Christian pastor called me and said he would like a Qur'an. That evening, I went to his church to give him a Qur'an because I thought it was nice thing to do. He knew I had been searching for a few months. When I arrived at church, he asked me where I was in my search. I told him that I believed in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, but I didn't believe in his deity. I also told the Iranian pastor that I've studied the life of Jesus, I would want a man like him to be my neighbor, my brother, my father, by boss, my judge in a court of law, my king in a country because no one in history compared to him. He said, "Well, if you think he is that wonderful and that he died on the cross for your sins, will you confess that before God?" I agreed so we prayed together and he told me he would like to be the first person to shake my hand and congratulate me for being one of God's children. He asked me to continue to pray, read the Bible daily, and tell everyone what I just did. I had no idea what he was talking about. The pastor and I said good-bye to one another and I headed for my car. I got in my car and it all hit me. I sat there in total shock and said out loud as if God was sitting right next me, "You really wanted me to do this all along didn't You? You really wanted me to take this step, didn't You? " I then began to cry because I realized what happened. God made the decision for me! I fought with Jesus and I lost! I wanted him to reveal himself to me on my terms, but he was willing to reveal himself to me on His terms. It was clear to me that Jesus wanted me to walk with him instead of challenge Him.

I am grateful that the Lord has been my shepherd throughout my life. He has been there for me when I needed Him and even when I thought I didn't need Him. He has taken me through roads and routes I never dreamed to take. Above all, I'm amazed and that He loved me so much, He sent Jesus do die on the cross for me! How humbling and precious that is to me! The Lord is my shepherd and He has been leading His sheep.

An Iranian woman lived with her husband and two children in America in the midst of the American hostage crisis in the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran. She was insulted by her American neighbors yet she couldn't go back to Iran. And, the U.S. Immigration was after her. Here is the true story of an Iranian Christian ...

Childhood

I was born in Iran into a very religious Muslim family. My family was very close knit and all of us loved and cared for each other. I never knew what it was to be in need. My parents were wonderful providers.

I learned about the Christian faith from school and my parents. They taught me that Jesus was the fourth major prophet, Muhammad being the fifth and the last. I remember clearly asking my mother why Jesus was crucified. She answered, "Jesus claimed to be God's Son. Yet God is one and He didn't marry or have a son." I understood that Christians believed in three gods: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. This was very confusing. I believed that Islam was better than other religions, because we had only one powerful God.

Transition Years

When I graduated from high-school my parents faced a decision. Should I continue my education in the U.S. or should they arrange a marriage for me? They decided that I should marry first and then go to the U.S.A. with my husband to continue my studies. Therefore, my family arranged my marriage.

In 1973 my husband came to America and soon I followed him. I left the country with financial support from both my parents and the Iranian government. My husband and I came to this country on student visas and planned to stay for four or five years, complete our education and return home.

The separation from my parents and the adjustment to a new country was very difficult. I lived on the hope that the moment I finished my studies here I would return to Iran. In those days the political relationship between Iran and the U.S. was great. There was no sign of any problem or conflict. The Shah's government in Iran seemed very secure.

Crisis

It was not long, however, that we began to here of internal problems in Iran. The Shah began to lose popularity with the masses. The Ayatollah Khomeini wanted to return home from exile but only after the Shah had left Iran. This was exactly what happened in early 1979. And, with his approval, Iranians attacked the American Embassy and took Americans hostage. With the takeover of the U.S. Embassy, Iranians in the U.S. began to face difficulties.

Soon my husband and I lost the financial support of our country as the U.S. froze all of the Iranian assets. Also at this time I received word that my father had passed away.

Now we were on our own. We had to support ourselves. With our student visas, we were not allowed to work. However, we had to work to survive. I stopped going to school to cut down on expenses and took a full time job. I thought about going back home, but the war between Iran and Iraq began and that was not wise. The attitude toward Iranians in the U.S. became so negative that we lived each day with fear. The immigration office was searching for Iranians who were in the US illegally. I would have been deported had they found out that I was working illegally. With two small children my income was not enough to support us, so my husband also started working. Needless to say, our lives were filled with stress, anxiety, and fear.

Throughout these difficult times, I continued to pray five times a day toward Mecca and I often fasted. Now that I needed him, my "god" seemed very far away. I sent both of my children to church preschool because I felt they would receive less harassment. During the Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons, I was invited to participate in and help with the festivities. But I never went. I always thought that these festivities were wrong. Instead, I invited them to my house with the intention of teaching them about my God. But, deep down inside I felt that my God was just too far away to hear me.

My life consisted of no more than work and the care of my children. I kept asking my God, What did I do to deserve this? Life became so hard that I began living on tranquilizers. My doctors told me that I was depressed and I needed to return to Iran. I wanted to but I couldn't.

The church were my children went to preschool, offered an aerobics class. Exercise was one of my doctor's prescriptions to deal with the anxiety attacks. The aerobics class started with devotions and ended with prayer requests and prayer.

Although I participated in the class, I avoided the prayer times because they conflicted with my own beliefs. In spite of this, the ladies in the class were very kind to me, and I realized that their concern was genuine. In the meantime, my husband and I saw many attorneys seeking work permits so we could work legally. Work permits would mean less anxiety and fear. All seemed hopeless until we found an attorney through a T.V. commercial. He represented a glimpse of hope for us. The attorney told us that the U.S. Department of Labor would grant him a permit if a company maintained that my husband's mechanical skills were essential for that company. Finally, my husband received an offer from a Cuban owned company. We immediately took all of the documents to our attorney who promised to send them to the Department of Labor.

During this time we did not hear from our families because of the political situation in Iran. When we did occasionally make contact by phone, my mothers words were always the same, It is not safe here. Stay in the States.

I was going through much disappointment, bad treatment and harassment from our neighbors. I was frustrated and angry. I did not come to this country to be told, Go home, you bad Iranian. I didn't come here to work the way I did - taking care of an Alzheimer's patient. And, most of all, I did not understand why my God did not answer me.

I held on to the hope that we would hear from the Department of Labor and my husband would be able to work legally. All our problems would be solved and I would no longer be dominated by fear and anxiety. One night our attorney called. He had heard from the Department of Labor. The request had been denied. We were devastated! All our hopes vanished. We faced a stone wall!

I told my husband that it might be for the better if we returned to Iran. I was tired of working illegally and the harassment. But at the same time I was concerned for the welfare of our children. Did we want to take them to a country that was being bombed every day? That night I reviewed my life. I thought about every thing that had happened to me since coming to America. I had tried everything to solve our problems. I had worked as a baby-sitter, a house-sitter, a housekeeper, a hostess in a restaurant, a helper in a laundry room, a nurse's aid, and a companion. I said to myself, My plans have hit rock bottom. This is not why I came to America. I fasted many times. I prayed and cried to my God but he never answered. I was tired of being a foreigner. I cried, If my father was alive I would go back home. I wouldn't put up with this life anymore! As I went to bed that night, one bright thought entered my mind, I was going to aerobics class the next morning.

The next morning, I arrived at the aerobics class early. I listened attentively to the devotions. I had never done this before. Throughout the entire class I kept thinking about my family's future. I stayed for the prayer time after class. When one of the ladies asked if there were any prayer request, I responded by pouring out all my problems. They listened. And then they prayed for me. They took me and all of my problems before their God. They called Him Jesus. and they called Him Father. One of women read from the Gospel of Matthew 18:20, For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them. They claimed this promise and ended the prayer with, We ask this in Jesus name. They also told me that they would continue to pray for me. The name of Jesus stayed with me as I left the class. On the way home as I talked to Jesus, I started to cry. I said to him, If you really are God, then all of this time I was wrong. I was talking to the wrong God. That evening at the dinner table I asked Him again, Jesus, if you are the true God let me know what I should do about my life's problems.

The Dream

That night I dreamed that I had prepared myself and my children to go to Jerusalem to see Jesus. I was going to visit Him to tell Him about my many problems. We started to walk on the road. It was very rough and seemed endless. Finally, very exhausted we arrived in Jerusalem. We stood in front of an old brick wall. But there was no door. I started to cry and said, Jesus, I came all this way to see you. Is this your home? There is no door. Is there no way of reaching you, either? I remembered the promise the ladies gave me when they prayed for me. Is this the end? Then I heard a voice, No, that's not it. At that moment, we began to ascend the door less brick wall higher and higher until we stopped in front of the Heavenly Gate. The gate opened and my children and I walked inside. It was beautiful! Immediately I noticed a person welcoming me with open arms. He held a candle in each hand and wore a white robe and sandals. I couldn't see His eyes because in their place was an intense radiance which gave light to the entire place. I knew immediately that I was face to face with Jesus!

I began to talk to Him, telling Him all my problems and difficulties. I told Him everything from my childhood up to that day. As I turned each problem over to Jesus, I began to feel lighter and lighter. The depression and anxiety gradually disappeared. I talked so fast that I was out of breath. When I was too tired to utter any more words, Jesus read the questions in my mind and continued to respond to me.

As I looked around, I saw many rooms, each opening onto a garden where people stood in white shiny robes. Jesus pointed out, These are the prophets from the past. Then I realized that I had never worshiped Jesus. I had always worshiped Allah, but he never responded. A group of angels appeared encircling Jesus with a crown and sang, This is the Lord. Praise his name. I joined their song, Praise the Lord. Praise his name.

Jesus gave me all the time I needed and answered all of my questions. Afterwards, nothing bothering me any more. I felt as light as a feather. Jesus gave me these promises: Things will be okay! Things will be taken care of; "I" will take care of everything! These promises were enough for me! I had found the true God! With that I woke up.

Freedom

The following day I felt magnificently. My feelings of depression and frustration were gone. That evening we received a phone call from our lawyer. This time he said, The Department of Labor has approved your husband's labor certificate. It will take some time to receive your permanent residence but here is your permanent residence card number. That's all you need at this time.

I asked Jesus for a "drink of water, and He gave me a full cup!" He has proven Himself to be my provider and my sufficiency. He has given me His strength so that I don't bend under the weight of worries and cares. He has given me joy in the midst of tears. He has promised me that He will never leave me not forsake me! I don't have just a God - I HAVE A HEAVENLY FATHER!

Halimeh

http://answering-islam.org.uk/Testimonies/index.html - More Testimonies
http://answering-islam.org.uk/index.html - Answering Islam Home Page

I grew up as a Muslim in a Muslim country, and my religion was very important to me. After my first degree, I came to the U.S. to go to graduate school. Beginning graduate students took many of the same courses together their first year. I befriended an American graduate student from my classes, and we got along well. I had a birthday early in the semester, and my friend found out about it and gave me a small New Testament as a present. At first, I was taken a back. I didn't pick up the book for a week. I was too afraid to touch it. But as I thought about it, I considered myself to be a strong enough Muslim to read the book.

I started with the Gospel of Mark. My friend had recommended it because it was the shortest one. As I read further, many things struck me about the life of Jesus, but the biggest thing that influenced me were the verses Jesus spoke in Matthew 23:25-26. "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean."

What surprised me was that these ideas had been taught to me by my parents while I was growing up. They had a strong dislike for hypocrisy in religion, for people whose religion was only external and for show, but inside they were selfish and proud. They taught me that real Islam was in the heart and not just a set of rituals on the outside. When I saw that Jesus said the same thing as my parents had taught me, I recognized his authority over my life and that what he said was true. About a month later, I prayed for salvation through Jesus.

My family was furious with me when I told them I had become a Christian, and their displeasure with me has been the most painful thing I have endured in my new faith. I had had a very close relationship with my family, especially my mother, and there have been days when I thought about leaving my Christian faith just to restore my relationship with her. But I have no doubts about Jesus and am thankful that I had the opportunity to learn the truth about him from the Bible.

mailto:to_aishah@yahoo.com - Aishah

Полицијата му упатувала закани на муслиманинот да се врати во христијанство?  полицајците наши ги мрзи да си ја вршат работата што им е обврска, а камо ли да се замараат со некој си ојле дојле што се прелажал во ислам

A Muslim Looks at
Muhammad and Jesus

The story of Abdul Saleeb and what he
discovered about Islam and Christianity

http://www.everystudent.com/sendtofriend.php?articleName=A+Muslim+Looks+at+Muhammad+and+Jesus - Email article to a friend

My name is "Abdul Saleeb." I was born and raised in a Muslim country in the Middle East. Even though I lived in a very conservative Muslim society, I grew up in a somewhat of a liberal Muslim family. Furthermore, my Muslim upbringing was unique due to my mother's serious involvement in Islamic sufism. So I can honestly confess that I have had first-hand experience of every aspect of contemporary Islamic movements. I personally did not consider myself very religious. At one point I even turned to Marxist ideologies thinking that they could provide real solutions to my country's social ills. However, throughout all this time I never doubted the fundamentals of my religious faith. I thought of Islam as a faith with such high ideals that I did not consider myself worthy of the name Muslim but I wholeheartedly believed that Islam was God's last and most perfect religion for all mankind, based on God's final revelation, the Qur'an, and the prophet Muhammad, God's seal of prophethood. My view of other religions (especially Judaism and Christianity) was that although they were fundamentally the same since they had all been revealed by one God, they were all inferior to Islam because all of them had to various degrees corrupted the original message of their founding prophets, something that we as Muslims have not done.

My religious views were radically challenged when I left my country because of its civil turmoil and went to Europe for the continuation of my studies. By the providence of God and because of various circumstances, I ended up enrolling in an International Christian School.

A question I once asked my teacher revolutionized my worldview. I asked, "How come your word of God says one thing and our word of God says something different?" My teacher, not knowing much about Islam at all, gently asked, "How do you know the Qur'an is the word of God?" I was taken aback by that response. I had lived in a world in which everyone simply presupposed that the Qur'an was dictated word for word by God to the Prophet Muhammad and no one ever questioned that assumption. That brief encounter forced me to start on a journey, engage my Christian friends in hours of cordial discussion and debate about the truthfulness of the Christian faith.

Christianity and Islam

Like almost any other Muslim, my original reaction to the claims of Christians about Jesus Christ was that of utter shock. These claims not only seemed like plain blasphemy but also quite nonsensical. How could any rational being believe such things about an honored prophet of God? Despite my fundamental theological differences with my friends, there was something about their life and faith that impressed me a great deal. There was a sincerity in their relationship with God and with other people that I had not encountered. So I would often tell them that I did not want to deny their faith but I just wanted to find a compromise so that I could hold to the truth of Islam and they could continue to hold to their faith.

However, I was in no doubt that their belief about Jesus was based on statements that the prophet Jesus had never actually claimed for himself. My difficulty in understanding Christian belief was very much along the lines that have historically separated Islam from Christianity.

I did not grant in any way that the Bible, especially the New Testament documents, were reliable when it came to reporting the words of Christ. Anything in the Bible that disagreed with the Qur'an was automatically rejected as being a corrupt teaching in the Bible.

My spiritual journey went on for months. Oftentimes I did find comfort in the Qur'an, but I was encountering more questions in that book than answers. For example, the violent tone of many of the Qur'anic passages (especially against the unbelievers but also against the Jewish and Christian people) began to bother me, when compared with the emphasis on love in the New Testament. One particular passage that troubled me, especially in light of my good friendship with many Christians, was in Sura 5:51.

"O ye who believe! Take not Jews and Christians for your friends and protectors; they are but friends and protectors to each other. And he amongst you that turns to them (for friendship) is of them. Verily God guideth not a people unjust."

However, the most troubling section of the Qur'an had to do with the character of the prophet Muhammad himself. According to Sura 33:37, God sanctions Muhammad's desire to marry the divorced wife of his own stepson, "in order that (in future) there may be no difficulty to the believers in (the matter of) marriage with the wives of their adopted sons, when the latter have dissolved with the necessary (formality) (their marriage) with them. And God's command must be fulfilled."

I vivdly remember the first time that I came across that verse in my study of the Qur'an. I began to sob with great sorrow and shame. All my life I had been told that Muhammad was the most perfect and ideal moral example for mankind and yet the Qur'an had a good number of examples of how the "revelations" could be so self-serving to the prophet himself!

Christianity or Islam

I immediately wrote a letter to my mother back home with some of these troubling questions that I was encountering. The response that I received to my letter from one of the most prominent religious leaders in my country was that I should just continue my secular studies and not focus too much on religion. On the other hand, as my understanding of the Bible was increasing many of my questions were beginning to get answered. Even as a Muslim I came to believe that the crucifixion of Christ was an undisputable historical fact that no honest person that deals with evidences of history could deny.

The character of Christ himself, as manifested for example in his beautiful Sermon on the Mount, was gradually making a great impression on me. But for me the most impressive factor about Christ was the multitude of Old Testament prophecies about the coming of the Messiah. Some of these prophecies were so specific and they were fulfilled in the life of Jesus to such a detail that it amazed me to see how God had taken hundreds of years of Jewish history to prepare the coming of the Messiah; prophecies ranging from Messiah's ancestery, his manner and place of birth, his life and ministry to the circumstances surrounding his death by crucifixion. I was very attracted to Christ and yet I could not deny my own tradition and past. Becoming Christian seemed a definite betrayal of my own family and Islamic heritage. The tension in my life was so strong that I felt torn asunder between these two faiths.

But I still could not bring myself to accept that Jesus was anything more than a human being. Since he had never explicitly said, "I am God and you must worship me," the Christian claim about Jesus was based on speculation and historically unreliable Gospels. Surely the incredible statements attributed to Jesus were invented by later Christians and put in the mouth of Jesus.

A Muslim Converts

In the midst of all this anxiety of thought, I woke up one morning and was suddenly struck by the meaning of a verse written by the prophet Isaiah in his ninth chapter. I had read this verse several weeks prior to that morning, but I had never understood its meaning. In Isaiah 7:14 we read,

"Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel."

Isaiah then goes on to write in chapter 9,

"[...] in the future he (God) will honor Galilee of the Gentiles, by the way of the sea, along the Jordan the people walking in darkness have seen a great light, on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned [...] For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne [...] from that time on and forever."

I could not believe it! The fact that the Messiah was not going to be just a prophet but Mighty God himself, was therefore a truth that had been prophesied seven hundred years before Christ in the Old Testament, and not something that had been made up by Christians many years or centuries after Christ! It was God's own promise that he will come in flesh (Immanuel = God with us) and will establish a kingdom that will last forever.

I came to trust in Christ, the next day on January 20, 1985. I cried uncontrollably as I was praying and turning to Christ in faith. I did not know why, and though I had never felt much burden of guilt, I was feeling a great sense of peace and relief from the burden of my sins. A greater satisfaction was the sense of rest in finally finding the truth about God and His revelation of love to mankind in Jesus Christ. A book that helped me (and several other Muslim friends of mine who became Christians around the same time that I did) tremendously in answering many of my questions about the deity of Christ and the reliability of the New Testament documents was Josh McDowell's "Evidence That Demands A Verdict." I highly recommend it.

Soon after my own conversion, I decided to dedicate my entire life to promoting the Good News of Christ among Muslims and especially the people of my own country. I later came to the United States and received my undergraduate and graduate degrees in Biblical and Theological Studies. I also co-authored a book called Answering Islam: The Crescent in the Light of the Cross.

Abdul Saleeb, Ramadan of 1996

When I was five years old my parents couldn't find a nanny to take care of me while they were at work. My mother, who was an elementary school teacher, started to take me to the school where she taught leaving me in one of the first grade classes. After this my days were pretty routine. I was in class during the day, and at home I played with my books. I didn't know how to read yet, but I would look at the letters and make up stories based on how they were shaped. One day when I was looking at my books, all of a sudden the letters made words rather than pictures, the words made sentences, and I no longer needed to make up stories - I could read them. My parents rejoiced when they discovered that I learned to read "all by myself".

Near the end of the school year my mom's school was going through the yearly teachers' evaluation. One day the principal of the school came to my class with an Evaluator. I was the only one in the class who could answer their questions. When my parents heard about this they were surprised and quite pleased with me. So, along with everything else I learned in first grade, I learned that the easiest way to earn my parents' "love" was to be successful at school.

This discovery changed my life dramatically. From that day I became very competitive, doing better was my only desire - better than my classmates, better than my siblings, and even better than myself. As a result, I became one of the best students in my school. My dad loved science and planted that love in me at a very early age. He seemed to accept me regardless of my performance, but I felt like my mom's love was dependent on my achievements. Thus, my father became a good friend but I isolated myself from my mother.

When I was getting ready for the college entrance exams, my big dream was to get into a biology department. I found I was fascinated with nature, and this, together with the love of science that I had learned from my father, fueled my desire to study biology. When the results of the exam were posted, I found out that I was qualified to be in the Biology department, my third choice. Upon my father's request my first two choices had been the top medical schools of Turkey. I was so excited and happy. I could hardly wait to give the good news to my parents.

However a big disappointment was in store for me. The idea of having a daughter in medical school was so appealing to them that the news that I had "only" qualified for biology was a letdown. Their disappointment showed me that I had failed, first in my studies, and then in not being able to earn their "love". I had worked so hard for such a bitter ending. So when I started college my heart felt sour within me.

But when I began college things within me started to change. I was spending the majority of my time immersed in my biology books, and was awed by the complexities and perfection of life on a biological scale. I realized that I loved learning purely for learning's sake and not in order to gain my parents' approval. I was growing up! So my bitter feelings shortly were crowded out by overwhelming enthusiasm.

Another change that started to occur in me was regarding religious belief. I had grown up in a secular household. Although my family was not religious, we observed all the usual traditions. However, we did not observe the prayer rituals, nor did we fast. During summer vacations my friends went to the mosque to learn Namaz, the Islamic prayer ritual, and to learn to recite the Qur'an. But in our home, we didn't even mention these things. Growing up, I had believed that the universe was formed as a result of the "Big-Bang" and that life was formed through a series of random events. What I believed about God was quite different from my friends' beliefs, too. For me God was created by men. Evolutionary speaking, in all primate societies there had been a need for a strong, unquestioned leader. However, as humans developed the abilities to live outside social groupings, the need for an unquestioned leader disappeared. Because the instinct to believe and obey something unquestionable is still strong, man created God. I was very content with this belief. In truth, I was even proud of my unusual beliefs.

However, my first year in college, I felt that everything I believed was disintegrating in my hands. When I started to take classes like Zoology, Botany, Molecular Biology, Chemistry, and Cytology, I started to realize that life was too perfect to be the product of random events. One day I remember looking through a microscope and watching this little cell with awe, thinking there must be a God, the Creator of this life!

I became very confused. I didn't know what to do. One day - a little embarrassed - I went to talk to my father and told him what I thought. He listened to me carefully, without interrupting, as was his habit, and then answered me with a smile; "I don't want you to be ashamed of your thoughts. If you believe there is a God, go search, and you shall find". Two years of studying and practicing Islam started at this time period.

My interest in Islam pleased my mother's mother the most. She immediately got a Qur'an and books on Islam for me. She brought some Zamzam water, had me drink it, repent of my sins, make a promise to stay away from sin, and recite the Shahada.

Initially, I didn't care much about what Islam and Qur'an was all about. All I wanted to know was God. I learned the basics: memorized suras, learned wudu and prayer, read the Qur'an every Thursday night, fasted during Ramadan.

I studied hard, practiced hard, but only thing that happened in my life was following a different set of rules now. I did not know God anymore than I did the day I told my dad I thought there was a God. I might have become a nicer person at the time, but it was all in my power and initiative. Deep inside me I knew I was no different. On the top of these what I learned from my Islamic books and mentors did not help either. At the end of two years I was quite disappointed - even hurt - by my findings and experiences. After days and nights of struggling with myself, and feeling ashamed that I was wrong, I went to my father and told him that I was not able to find my God. I was heart broken.

The summer of that year, I started to work as a reader at the School for the Blind. There, I met with a lady who was associated with a Hindu group. I was quite excited to hear about this group, and I started to go to their meetings with her. All summer long, I studied with them the essentials of Hinduism - as well as of Buddhism. Because Islam had failed me, I was a lot more reserved about taking a step of faith in either of these. One of the members of this group was also interested in the old Turkic religions, and he helped me to understand the basics of those religions. At the end of the summer, the conclusion of my search was quite clear. All these religions were created by men to bring regulation to society. There was no God. I was stuck with Atheism.

Then followed a time of confusion and bewilderment. All joy and peace left my heart. I had lost hope - hope for the future, hope for finding God, or that there was anything greater than human existence. So, I went back to doing what I knew best, being an excellent student. I thought that I could find satisfaction in myself.

But it didn't work. The inner restlessness that I had grew stronger every day, and I couldn't live with myself anymore. So, I tried other things. You know what a party animal is, right? Well, that was me. Drinking, smoking, rebelling - everything you can imagine! Yet, these things didn't satisfy me. More and more, I knew that I had no peace in my heart. I longed to change--but I didn't know how.

In this sorry state, I finished university. On graduation day, as I was walking downtown, I started to think about my future. I knew that I had a long life ahead of me, but I didn't know what I would do with it. Frustrated, I walked into a store and stood in front of a mirror. As I looked at myself, I realized that I didn't like what I saw. Tears welled up as I considered who I was. This was a turning point for me. I decided that I was going to change my life and be a different person - have a good job, a good career, a good family, and a good income. I looked around at all the ordinary people in the world, reflecting that their lives were no different than mine but that they seemed happy. I decided to try being an ordinary person. So, I quit smoking, drinking, and hanging around those of my "friends" who had that kind of lifestyle. I got my first job, a very good-paying job, in fact. At the same time, I went back to school and earned my Master's degree, and then started to work on my Ph.D. But even all these things didn't satisfy me. In my heart, I fought with myself day and night. In Jeremiah 2:13, God says, "My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water". My heart was a broken cistern, and I tried to fill it myself. As Islam had failed me, I was failing myself.

In September 1992, I was nearing the end of my Ph.D. program when one of my professors in the department told me about a scholarship to go overseas to study for a different Ph.D. First, I thought, "No, I'm about to finish one; why bother starting all over again?" But it took me only half an hour to decide, "Yes, I would like to try". I got the scholarship and quit my Ph.D. program. Leaving everything behind, I packed my whole life into two suitcases and came to the United States to start all over again. I had a feeling that it was going to be different there.

It was different in the U.S., and I didn't like it. Honestly, I hated it with a passion. I didn't know any English, I didn't know the culture, and I didn't know anybody there. Everything was so strange to me. I asked myself again and again, "I had everything I needed back home, so why did I come here?" Of course, I didn't know the answer, and I didn't even know if there was an answer. But I didn't go home. I studied English, tried to understand American culture, and made some friends in the dormitory. It so happens they were all born-again Christians who talked about their faith with me. They were all very nice, helpful, smart, religious ... and very brainwashed! I didn't believe that one could be smart and religious at the same time. Since they had helped me to adjust to my new life in the U.S., I decided I could help them to see that they were all deluded.

If you are going to fight against something, you need to know it well, so I asked them to give me a Bible. Knowing that I would find contradictions and inconsistencies, I started to read it. However - and there's really no other way to describe it - a miracle happened! Each day, the words brought more and more peace to my heart and hope for my life. Also, Christianity deeply impressed me because of its differences from the other religions that I had studied. It was unique in a lot of ways, but four of them were particularly important to me.

First, Jesus was the only one who claimed to be the only way to God. What confidence that gave me! This was no vague instruction on how to reach God. This was a certain path. Jesus says, "No one comes to the Father except through me".

Second, people's sins could be forgiven without the need for good deeds to cancel them out. In every other religion, one has to be punished for the sins one has committed, but in Christianity one's sins can be forgiven. Having lived in sin as long as I had, I knew that I could never finish paying the penalty for them. I needed forgiveness. Human beings, in their weakness, don't know the real meaning of forgiveness, I think. This generous forgiveness can only come from God.

Third, one doesn't have to work for one's salvation. Salvation is by the grace of God. My whole life, I had tried to earn the peace and hope that I longed for but saw that I didn't have. Therefore, it was very meaningful to see that God was reaching out to me instead of my trying to reach Him.

Fourth and last, God loved me as I was. I didn't have to do anything to earn His love. This was quite new to me. I discovered that I was important to God just because I existed. It seemed to me that this truth was different from other religions.

I became convinced that Christianity was not a man-made religion. So, I continued to study the Bible, more and more enthusiastically. On February 6, 1993 while I was reading my Bible, a verse greatly impressed me: You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit - fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name... " (John 15:16). Then, I realized that I found the answer to my question. I had come to the U.S. because God had chosen me and had brought me there so that I could come to know Him. That day, I prayed and accepted Jesus as my personal Savior.

That night, as I prayed and accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior, I was very restless. I tried to sleep, but questions kept bothering me all night long. "Was I being culturally assimilated?" "Was my conversion a result of cultural shock?" I got up in the morning and decided that I might be going crazy, but I couldn't do anything about it other than wait and see. A few months later, God answered my questions again. He showed me that even as long ago as when I was 12, He had chosen me and had been preparing me for His kingdom. At that time, I had a dream in which I was swimming. It was very dark, without any stars in the sky. After swimming for a while, I stopped and looked up at the sky. Suddenly, I saw a star shining. I closed my eyes and made a wish. I said, "Morning Star, teach me the secret of life". When I woke up, I was deeply affected by my dream. I told my family and my friends about it, but nobody seemed to care. Because I took the dream so seriously, I was even mocked about it. A few days later, however, I forgot about the dream.

But the dream did not forget me. About a month later, I had it again. Although I thought it was strange, I didn't really think about it much. But then, a few months later, the same dream came again. I kept having this dream for years almost every other month and this pattern continued until a few months after my conversion, when I read Rev. 22:16, which says, "I, Jesus, have sent my angel to give you this testimony for the churches. I am the Root and the offspring of David, and the bright Morning Star". After reading this verse, I realized that God had been working in my heart for years and that He is a living God. He had brought me to this point to teach me the secret of life - eternal life. That very day, I decided that I would dedicate my whole life to God and follow Him wherever He might lead me. Now, my deepest desire is to follow my Lord as long as I live. In case you're wondering. I've never had the dream again - when the sun rises, one blows the candle out.

After I became a believer in Jesus, my life changed significantly. In the beginning, my family rejected me, but over the years, they observed the positive changes that happened in my life. A couple of years after my conversion, my mother told me that when I first told her that I had decided to follow Jesus, she thought that she had lost her daughter, but now, she knows that she has received back a better one. She tells me now that she believes this has been the best thing that ever happened to me. For years, I didn't believe that my mother loved me, and I hadn't forgiven her for that. But with God, all things are possible. Now, my mom and I are best friends, and she has a desire to know more about God and Christianity.

And that wasn't all.

After my conversion, my family was greatly distressed. They thought that I had brought shame on our family. They thought that we were born as Muslims and destined to die as Muslims. Not only my family, but also many of my friends rejected me. Sometimes, the things I went through lay so heavily on me that many times a day when I thought about my situation, I felt weak and helpless, but I also felt that God was in control. Since the day of my conversion, I have learned what it means to trust God with my life. This takes a lot of faith, but I have learned to live on God's provision "day by day". Exodus 16 talks about how God provided for the Israelites day by day when they were in the desert. In the past, I used to think that the Israelites were being ungrateful for God's provision, but as I learned to live on God's provision day-by-day, I understood that, physically and emotionally, this is a difficult place to be. Yet, through it all, I have been thoroughly blessed spiritually.

A lot of people ask me if becoming a Christian has been worth it. I have asked myself the very same question many times. I love traveling, and I travel a lot. One day while driving alone to give an academic presentation at a national conference, I was trying to practice my talk. But my mind was focused on problems I was facing as a result of my conversion. Suddenly, my disappointments and my fatigue overwhelmed me. Then, I remembered a game (that helped me cope with difficulties) that I used to play a long time ago, a game based on 'dreaming'. When I was five, I was in my grandma's home for summer vacation. One morning, I woke up and found bubble gum all over my bed and on my face. I was pretty sure that my sister had done it. As a little girl, I used to think that my sister was responsible for all of the bad things in the entire universe. I called my aunt and started to complain about my sister. But she didn't listen to me. I think that she knew that my sister was not responsible for all of the bad things that happened in this universe, especially the ones related to me. She took me to the sink and started to clean me up. Angry with me, she spanked me a few times, saying that I wasn't supposed to go to bed with bubble gum. I kept telling her that I didn't chew gum, which was true. But she wasn't listening. It was obvious that we had a communication problem. Then, I stopped listening to her and started to try to make myself believe this was not real, that I was only dreaming. I wanted to wake up and find everything fine. But I didn't wake up. Years later, when my father died, I thought of this incident. As before, I tried to make myself believe that this was not real. In the morning, I was going to wake up, and Dad was going to be with us, and everything was going to be fine. But once again, I didn't wake up. So, that day when I was traveling to the academic conference, I thought, "Yep, this is a dream. I will wake up, the problems will be gone, and everything will be fine". Then, immediately, I realized that if I woke up, my faith would be gone too. I would lose my relationship with God. Suddenly I knew that it was worth going through all the problems I have. I would even be willing to endure a lot more in order to have my relationship with God through Christ.

My prayer for you is that you can experience the fullness of eternal life in Christ Jesus in your personal life.

mailto:khatija39@hotmail.com - via email .

Hatice (Хатиџе)

Dear Friends,

This is the story of how I came to find true peace. I was born in America to Pakistani parents. As children, we were taught that Islam was the only true religion and that we were blessed because we knew this truth. Jews and Christians had received only a partial truth, which was then corrupted. Hindus were deceived into worshipping idols of wood and stone. We were taught about the life of the Prophet Muhammad and about the Five Pillars of Islam. As a young girl, I was the most zealous of the children and actively read books about Muhammad and Islam. I shared and defended my faith among my grade-school classmates, often standing out as the only Muslim among Christians. I told my whole class about how Cassius Clay had converted to Islam and become Muhammad Ali. I carried my Koran and books on Muhammad when travelling with my parents. I tried to emulate Muhammad in every way, from his eating and drinking habits to his practice of always facing towards the Kaaba in prayer. I prayed and fasted from age 9, reading my Koran all the way through every Ramadan. I even debated a 3rd-grade Christian, asking her how she could possibly believe that God had a son, and how she could worship a man who was just a prophet? She told me, "well, I guess I won't see you in heaven then!" I answered, "I guess not."

Despite all these efforts, I was always depressed, always down and had low self-esteem. I thought myself to be very ugly and sinful. No matter what I tried to do, from good works to dressing nicely, I always felt lonely and like an outcast. Yes, I had friends; but inside was so much pain. I cried myself to sleep many a night, and pleaded with Allah on my knees, my Koran open, trying to find peace through the words. Instead, I saw a cold and distant Allah. Sometimes I fantasized about paradise as described in the Koran: reclining on couches of silk and wearing fine clothes and bangles; drinking pure water from fountains; being waited on by virgins ... well, that part never made much sense to me. I wondered if this Paradise could give me peace. In the middle of my dreaming, cold reality would hit me: I will never go there. I will never be good enough. I imagined Hell as described in the Koran, with its ceiling dripping with molten brass and boiling drinks.

Nevertheless, I continued reading the Koran, fasting, and praying. As I grew older, I began to understand the Koran a little better. One day, I was reading Sura 4, Women in my room. I was 14 years old at the time. I read about a wife's inheritance compared to her husband and children. I read about the permission God gave men to marry four wives. Nothing new, so far; I knew that this was written during times of war, when men would die and leave their wives and children as widows and orphans. But the following passage jumped out at me for the first time:

"As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them." (Sura 4:34, Dawood)

Stunned, I read and reread the passage. I ran downstairs to my father and showed him the passage, crying. "How could God say this?" I demanded. "How could he tell men to beat their wives?" My father couldn't believe what he read, but had no explanation. He chuckled uncomfortably. I went back upstairs, distraught. Somehow, I calmed myself and believed that God would show me the reason for this, some day.

As time progressed, I became more depressed and sometimes even suicidal. Sometimes, I couldn't find a reason to live. To relieve the pain, I involved myself in music, politics, and boys. (Of course, I hid the part about the boys from my parents.) I was successful in high school as a musician, but I would be tormented inside because I never felt that I could ever be good enough at it. I became very interested in the Middle East situation and even wrote an article that was published in a Muslim newspaper. I had numerous crushes on several young men, fantasizing about being loved and cherished as a young woman. However, none of the scenarios ever came into being. I dated one young man, a Christian, for 3 1/2 years towards the end of high school. I would actively assure him that I was a Muslim and could never become a Christian. He never argued with me, just cared for me. All these things failed to give me anything but temporary relief from my despair. When the time came for me to go to college, I was determined to "start over" and find the truth about God.

As I unpacked my belongings in my college dormitory room, I decided that I should take a class on Islam. I met a girl in my dorm who was a Muslim, and I told her about my concerns about Islam and women. She didn't have an answer either, and was quite puzzled by the passage I mentioned earlier. I told her about my plans to take the class. Sure enough, a class was being offered the very first semester! I was quite excited, confident that my worries would be put to rest soon. As the course began, I was happy to read excerpts from the Koran and the Hadiths, since this was all familiar territory. Even more exciting was to learn about the life of Mohammed and the history of Islam's beginnings. Some sources were written by British colonists, and were clearly biased. I decided to focus on the Hadiths and the history books written by Muslim scholars.

My excitement turned to dismay as the class progressed. I read about the offensive wars and the bloody conquests made to spread Islam. I turned page after page to read about Muslim attitudes towards "infidels," Christians and Jews who would not convert to Islam. The Massacre of the Qurayza Jews affected me the most. Dear reader, I urge you to read for yourself the account of this battle (Ibn Hisham: The Prophet's Biography; vol 2 pages 40-41). I wrestled inside, thinking, "but Islam means peace! How can this be?" Dismay turned to confusion, and confusion to betrayal as I read further, about the life of Muhammad. Although I knew men could have a maximum of four wives, I didn't realize that Muhammad had special privileges, including unlimited concubines. I read about Aisha, his nine-year-old bride. I learned about the "deficiency of a woman's mind" as narrated by Al-Bukhari. I also found out that the majority of people in Hell were women, according to the same source. Again, I wondered where was the Muhammad that I had been taught: the Holy Prophet, who dressed in white and reverenced his mother. One day, I could not read anymore, because I could not stop the tears from falling. I gathered my books, thinking that if this was who God was, I could not worship him. But it was a fleeting thought. I knew inside that God existed. This God was just not revealed through Muhammad. As I left the library that day, I sensed God looking down at me from above. I felt a strange peace as I forsook Islam that day ... as if God was waiting for me to find out who He was.

I decided to search for the truth in other religions. In a big university, there is no want for religious diversity. I spoke with Hindus, Jews, and Catholics alike, trying to understand their beliefs and searching for something that made sense to me. I even met a Buddhist girl who had converted to the Ba'hai faith. I was interested: what made her convert? She explained to me about the emptiness of Buddhism, and how Ba'hais believe that all religions at one point had been revealed by God but were corrupted by man. "This sounds good," I thought. I agreed to visit a Ba'hai temple with her and I started to read about the Ba'hai faith. Somehow, when I went to the temple service, I felt emptiness. Then I learned some parables about their prophet, Bahaullah that really disturbed me. I knew that the truth wasn't here, and I began to grow weary and frustrated with searching.

A Catholic friend had given me a Bible. I started reading it from Genesis but I was discouraged by its length. Christmas break was coming, so I decided to take it with me to read on vacation to Pakistan. (I had the Bible with me the entire time, but thankfully, no one found it. I had no idea at the time what the consequences might be for having a Bible there.) Our plane made a stop in Saudi Arabia. As we were pulling into the terminal, I caught a glimpse of the Saudi Air emblem: Two single-edged swords, and a shield. I remembered words of Muhammad that I had read in my class on Islam: "the power is with the sword." I watched as young soldiers searched our plane for liquor and narcotics. After reaching Pakistan, I was moved by the graffiti I saw on the city walls, reading, "Oh God show us your miracles," and "Inshallah we shall be saved." I was grieved by the street children, the beggars and the lepers, lining the sidewalks. I was also deeply touched by the love of my extended family towards me. I didn't know whether they knew the truth about Islam, and if so, how they could believe in it. My uncle tried to explain to me about the rights of women in Islam, but I remained unconvinced. Instead, I came back profoundly affected by the sadness and despair of my country. I returned the Bible to my friend.

Late one night, I told another friend about my depression and my inability to see meaning in life. He asked me if I believed in anything. I told him that I believed in God, the prophets, and that if I was good I would go to Heaven and bad I would go to Hell. He asked me, "well, do you basically think that you have been good all your life?" I answered that I hadn't killed anyone or committed adultery. He said, "so don't worry about it! You'll go to Heaven." Obviously, I was very confused. I asked him how that could be, how could I go to Heaven. He asked me if I had ever read the New Testment. I replied that I had not. He asked me if I wanted to read it, and I did. As we opened the Bible to the Gospel of Matthew, I felt an enormous peace come over me - the same peace that I had felt that day when I had left the library. I knew that the answers lay within. Today, I know that this peace was that which was spoken of in the Letter to the Philippians: "the peace of God, which transcends all understanding" (Philippians 4:7).

We read aloud the first twelve chapters of Matthew. I felt enormously secure, as if God Himself was in the room with me, holding me. The words of Christ filled my dry and parched soul like refreshing water. The way that He spoke was with such authority! One passage made a particular impression on me: when Christ was being tempted in the desert by Satan. Satan told Jesus to throw himself down from roof of the temple. Jesus answered, "Do not put the Lord your God to the test" (Matthew 4:5-7) It was at that moment that I understood: Jesus is the Lord your God! Suddenly, thoughts began to run through my mind such as, "God can do anything. If He wants to come to earth in the form of a man, He can!" Could this man be the same Messiah that was spoken of in the Koran, the babe who uttered, "I am the slave of Allah" (Sura 19:32)? I didn't think so.

From that night onwards, I had a hunger to read the Bible. I read the Bible all the time. Another close friend bought me my own Bible. I dissected every sentence, every word to try to find fault with it. I brought my questions to several classmates whom I knew to be Christians. They answered me as best as they could. More important than their answers, though, was the love that I saw expressed in them, towards me. One of my friends, Cathy, didn't even know that I wasn't a Christian. Because I had a Bible, she assumed that I was a Christian. One night, I was very worried about an exam we had the next day. I left a note on her door, asking her to stop by. When she came to my room, she approached me, knelt down beside my chair, and took my hand in hers. She said, "Don't worry ... He died for you." When she spoke those words, my heart cried out inside. I had never heard those words before in my life. Someone would die for me? That entire night, I thought about those words, which filled me with a love I had never known.

My Christian friends told me about an event which was coming up, where a man named Cliffe Knechtle was coming to speak on campus. They encouraged me to attend, since he specialized in answering questions about Christianity. After the meeting, one of my friends introduced me to Cliffe. I told him my story, about how I was searching for the truth and for answers. He sat down with me for an hour and a half, just listening to me and answering my questions. He was so kind and gentle and honest. I went home that night, knowing that I had all the answers that I needed. I needed only to make a decision, to believe, or not to believe.

I decided that I could ask anyone questions - but if Christianity was real, God Himself would have to show me. One night, alone in my dorm room, I decided to pray to Jesus for the very first time. I awkwardly said: "Jesus, I don't know who you are. I don't know if you're a prophet; I don't know if you are the Lord. I don't know if you're dead, or if you're alive. But if you are alive, and if you are Lord, then please show me."

God answers prayers, my friends! "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you" (Matthew 7:7). Two days later, I received a letter in my mailbox from an old high school friend - an athiest. In this letter, he told me that he had become a Christian! He wrote: "I don't know why I am writing you this. All I know is that I must tell you to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved!" I almost fell over, the words jumped out at me so strongly. Later, I found out that he had written that letter at the exact same time that I had prayed - that he had sense of urgency, to tell this to someone. It just happened to be me.

In April of 1989, I made the decision to believe and gave my life to the Lord Jesus Christ. The Word of God says, "small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life" (Matthew 7:14). Understanding the fullness of Christ's atoning death on the cross took many years for me, especially since I was raised believing in the Muslim concept of the "scales." The truth of the matter is that, as a Muslim, I knew that I wasn't going to Heaven. No one can enter Heaven without the atoning blood of Jesus Christ. "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 3:21).

My friends, if you want peace, ask for it. Jesus said, "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid" (John 14:27). He will never let you down.

I grew up as a Muslim in a Muslim country, and my religion was very important to me. After my first degree, I came to the U.S. to go to graduate school. Beginning graduate students took many of the same courses together their first year. I befriended an American graduate student from my classes, and we got along well. I had a birthday early in the semester, and my friend found out about it and gave me a small New Testament as a present. At first, I was taken a back. I didn't pick up the book for a week. I was too afraid to touch it. But as I thought about it, I considered myself to be a strong enough Muslim to read the book.

I started with the Gospel of Mark. My friend had recommended it because it was the shortest one. As I read further, many things struck me about the life of Jesus, but the biggest thing that influenced me were the verses Jesus spoke in Matthew 23:25-26. "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean."

What surprised me was that these ideas had been taught to me by my parents while I was growing up. They had a strong dislike for hypocrisy in religion, for people whose religion was only external and for show, but inside they were selfish and proud. They taught me that real Islam was in the heart and not just a set of rituals on the outside. When I saw that Jesus said the same thing as my parents had taught me, I recognized his authority over my life and that what he said was true. About a month later, I prayed for salvation through Jesus.

My family was furious with me when I told them I had become a Christian, and their displeasure with me has been the most painful thing I have endured in my new faith. I had had a very close relationship with my family, especially my mother, and there have been days when I thought about leaving my Christian faith just to restore my relationship with her. But I have no doubts about Jesus and am thankful that I had the opportunity to learn the truth about him from the Bible.

My name is Sharifah. I was born and raised in a fully Islamic way. When I became a teenager, I tried to learn more about Islam and instill the spirit of jihad in me. I tried to explain what Islam means to non- muslims, especially Christians and tried to attract their attention to Islam. To me, Islam is a religion that is perfect, complete and universal.

I then continued to study Islam so that I could convey the "beauty" of Islam to my Christian friends. But, instead, many questions arose and I was not satisfied with my questions as well as stumped by the answers they were giving to me. The logic in the answers they gave me caused me to have doubts about my own questions. From that point onwards, I began to search for the true answers to the questions in my heart. Who really is Isa Al-Masih that will judge us one day?

I tried to get the correct answers by asking learned and devout Muslims in Islam about Isa Al-Masih and the Christian teachings. But they discouraged me from learning much more about Christianity and asked me whether I was looking to be an apostate! Since I did not get the answers I was looking for, therefore I began to search by myself by researching about the Al-Quran and the Injil/Gospel. After making a comparison between the two, only then did I obtain some answers as to who Isa Al-Masih (Jesus Christ) actually is  in the Al-Quran and Injil.

In the Injil, John 14:6 Isa declared: "I am the way, and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." This verse was clear and it often came to my mind because in surah Al-Fatihah1:6 "Ihdinasyiraatall mustaqiim" which means `show me the straight path'. But John 14:6 explains that Isa Al-Masih is the straight path. Therefore I need not find a another path to know God intimately. From that moment my mind became confused. I was not sure of the things that I had done before this. I began to have doubts about my previous confidence.

I also found surah Al-Nisa' 171 which means Isa son of Maryam was sent by Allah and is His Word. When I saw the word 'kalimatullah' which means the Word of God, I believe that Isa Al-Masih is the Word of God. The characteristics of Allah is that He speaks. Who then is Isa Al-Masih if He is the Word of God? Is He God? Because for me, God's Word cannot be separated from God Himself. For confirmation, I read from surah Al-Imran 45 which means "And remember when the angels said: O Mary! Lo! Allah giveth thee glad tidings of a WORD from Him, whose name is the Messiah, Jesus Son of Mary, Illustrious in the World and the Hereafter, and one of those brought near unto God."

Therefore, it is true that Al-Masih is closest to Allah as He is the Word of God. I also read the scriptures that explain who Isa Al-Masih is, in John 1:1,14 :

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us."

Surah Az-zukhruff 61 which says ' Lo! Verily (with Jesus) there is knowledge of the Hour (of Judgement Day). So doubt ye not concerning it, but follow me, this is the right path.'

Surah Az-zukhruff 63 adds 'When Jesus came with clear proofs, he said: I have come to you with wisdom, and to make plain some of that concerning which ye differ. So keep your duty to God and obey me.'

This verse explains the coming of Isa Al-Masih-Jesus Christ. And, who is Jesus Christ who actually has the power over death? In John 5:24 we are told:

"I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life."

The above verses convinced me, and with a brave heart I took a decision to choose this Right Path and in my heart I was convinced that Isa Al-Masih ie.Jesus the Christ was the true path to heaven and to Allah. In 1 Corinthians 8:6 :

" Yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live."

After I believed in Isa Al-Masih I began to have real peace in life. When, before this my life was up-side down, filled with questions, now I am free from such feelings. I have found the true answer. The verses above convinced me that Isa Al-Masih is my Saviour and I continue to be a worshipper of God Almighty.

My prayer for all Muslims are that you will strengthen your hearts to ascertain truly who Isa Al-Masih really is. I am very sure at the conclusion of your search, you will find the truth, the answer and eternal life.

Assalamualaikum warahmatullahi wa barakatuh…

A native of Morocco, I was born into a very religious Muslim family. Since a very young age I was brought up in a purely traditional Islamic way. Since adolescence I had a burning desire to be a good Muslimah and an example in the eyes of Allah. I rejected anything and everything concerning the Jews and the Christians. The mere sight of a cross revolted me. At the age of 16 I met my husband at the French School (Lycee) who talked to me about Jesus and gave me a copy of the Bible of John to read. I was very defiant but I felt overwhelming feelings for this boy . I accepted the Bible and decided to read it secretly of course because if my parents would have found out they would have severely reprimanded me.

Reading the first chapter overwhelmed my heart to the extent that I knew it is the Book of God and Jesus is the truth. That was a complete awakening for me. It was completely against anything spiritual and opposite to what I learned in Islam. I understood very well and precisely that God loves every human being without exception. I continued my discovery when I read a religious calendar with verses from the Bible that said that we can talk to God as a father. I experimented with this dialogue with God. Every evening before sleep I talked to God and felt with certainty that a presence filled my heart not like before when I recited the prayers for Allah and felt a void. This is an experience that really affected me. Time passed and I developed this firm belief that Jesus Christ is the son of God, that the Bible is the truth. I was not yet aware of the sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross. I did not have the experience of repenting for my sins.

One evening when I returned home I found my mother in my room. She had found out through an anonymous phone call that I have been going out with a French boy and a non-Muslim. This was a real shock for her and also for me. I cried and suffered for some days and even thought to discontinue reading the Bible or talk to the Lord. For me everything was finished even the relationship with this boy. But I did not count on the will of the Lord to save me.

The following Monday his father called my parents and asked to meet them. During this meeting I prayed from the bottom of my heart. God blessed me when my mother came back from the meeting talking about marriage. I was very happy despite my young age of 18 years. Then we were married and that was really a miracle if you know the Muslim religion.

When the miracle was over our hearts were not with God anymore. We prayed that evening but we did not go to church and there was no real repentance from sin. The enemy has sown the trouble in our life and I contemplated divorce. But my husband and I knowing that the divorce will not please God we contacted the Evangelical Pentecostal Church. My husband started going to the meetings but I did not. One day God in his love sent me to this house of prayer. It was there that I really repented for my sins and that was the beginning of the relationship with the Lord Jesus. We have been baptized in 1996 and I am very happy to know the truth and to follow Jesus. In retrospect I realize how great our God is and how much he loves us and his will helped us to be saved. He never abandoned me.

Thank you Lord.

Assalam-mualaikum.

My name is Siti Zainab. I am a Malay Muslim woman from Southeast Asia. I was born into a Muslim family, very traditional in its ways and strong in their adherence to the religion of Islam. From the very beginning, I was given an Islamic education that was solid and deep, thus was my knowledge of Islam from a young age.

As part of my basic Primary School education, I was also made to attend Muslim madrasah (Islamic religious) schools, and started reading and reciting the Quran early, absorbing the key precepts & fundamentals of (Sunni) Islam, from qualified religious teachers (ustazahs) and various other qualified Islamic teachers. There I learnt to fear and obey Allah s.w.t. and also to follow the teachings and example of Prophet Muhammad (especially those found in the ‘Valid Hadiths’). I also could recite the QuranMuslimah  wholly, much to the delight of both my parents and both of them were quite pleased and happy with the formation of my Islamic devotion. In brief, I had experienced a solid foundation and deep religious formation as a devoted and committed

I never neglected my religious duties to do the Solat (or Namaz) obligatory prayers five times a day, and religiously fasted the required 30 days during the Ramadhan ‘holy month’ of the Muslim calendar. I practised the Islamic ‘pillars of faith’ dutifully, without being told and/or reminded by anybody, particularly by my Muslim parents! In short, nobody doubted or questioned my religious upbringing, commitment and experience as a devout and God-fearing Muslimah (female Muslim), whatsoever.  

Even so, as I continued to carry out the pillars of Islam fastidiously and faithfully. After years and years of fulfilling and carrying out the observances of Islam as a Muslim I had not questioned or doubted the significance or importance this ‘offering of worship’ ['ibadah'] was for me. Yet, as time went by, all these works proved increasingly to be ritualistic chores, meaningless going-through-the-motions that lost all meaning and attraction to me! Were these rituals and routines describing the best kind of relationship that God/Allah can establish with Mankind – that between a Master and a slave??  Also, rituals that are done just to collect more merit points/brownie points that would possibly increase my chances with Allah to get into Paradise??

I had many, many such questions and doubts like that I kept in my heart to myself but I did not raise them up because I did not want to hurt the feelings of my fellow-Muslim friends. I also remembered how harshly I was scolded, reprimanded and prevented from asking these sincere questions by my Islamic religious studies Teachers!

Nevertheless these Questions lingered on in my soul and my thoughts, and grew as I matured further in Age into my High School years! As I developed further into adulthood, the Islamic obligatory rituals increasingly became shallow, empty and even dead deeds. They were not the meritorious and deeds of blessings my ustazs and ustazahs (religious teachers) so vainly tried to teach us about.   

That did not mean that I had not tried hard enough! I actually attempted many times to focus my attention on what was ‘beautiful and pure’ behind each act of ibadah (worship), nevertheless the realisation of how shallow and empty these Islamic actions were could never be shaken off..! The questions still remained; Was this actually the right and best way for mankind to be related to GOD?

After completing High School, I gained admission into University and into a Course of my preference. Whilst in University, I also increased further the search for the answers to my questions of Life and the emptiness the Islamic Religion had offered me, mentioned above. I increased my readings and research until I discovered a Book entitled “Appointment in Jerusalem”. This Book was written by a Danish lady, and it describes her deep spiritual struggle and search for meaning and spiritual enlightenment and satisfaction in her religion. I was very drawn to its contents as it was very similar indeed to my own spiritual struggle and quest!

I was not a little surprised when I discovered that this Danish lady had obtained the realisation that her own relationship with GOD could be directly and spontaneous, without going through the motions of religious rituals and prescribed ritualistic formulations. I learnt that mankind could relate to God freely through even a personal and direct relationship with Him. That is, we could be related with the Creator-without all that religious ritualism, directly and personally, even as a Child relates to his/her own Father! This is a direct, personal and dynamic relationship. Therefore it means that mankind can now get to know God personally in the same sense as a Father and his Child.  

Could this be the kind of spiritual relationship that I was looking for all this while? In my University classes there were also other Christians, who were kind and helpful. Yet, I did not mix closely with them, and only observed them from afar. I was trying to figure out if their faith and relationship with God was in line with what my struggle was about. Or were these Christians also having a shallow and meaningless ‘experience’ or ‘knowledge’ of God like I was as a Muslimah!

Even though these Christians were strong in their faith, they did not try to evangelise me or preach to me Christianity. It was only after many months had passed, that I finally inquired about their religious and spiritual experiences. They were intrigued that I as a Muslim, wanted to discuss religion with them, Christians.  However, I really respect them for not trying to ‘sell their religion’ to me. On the other hand, we were able to sit down together and discuss about our religious and spiritual struggles openly, as equals and as mature adults.

It was through the interaction with these fellow university students, that I acquired a better understanding about what Christian teachings were all about, as well as a clearer understanding of the Book “Appointment in Jerusalem".  Nevertheless, for 2 whole years in the University, I did nothing about Christianity. I still wanted to search within my religion of Islam about the true relationship between God and Mankind, and to compare that with the teachings of the Gospel. During those 2 years, my Christian classmates were very patient with me and my questions, sometimes, my questions were silly and shallow, other times, they were complex! Nevertheless I was very impressed at the Christians’ courtesy, kindness and sincerity.

After the 2 years, and further into my quest, I finally decided to embrace and accept the authentic teachings and message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Since that time, my prayer life, worship, fasting and good deeds have all been greatly enriched and blessed by Almighty God many times over. I have since come to realise that  Man is not made just to function like a ‘Robot’, existing in a relationship with God/Allah merely like that between a Master and a Slave!!    

On the other hand, the message of the Holy Gospel of Christ states that –all peoples that receive the Way and the Truth of God, they shall be given a brand new relationship with God, and the right to be known as “Children of God”, as it is written in the Holy Scriptures and taught by Sayidina Isa A.M. himself:

“But to all who received Him, He gave them the right to become the Children of God, to those who believe in His Name, who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, not of the will of men, but of GOD.” 

                        John 1 : 12-13.

After being blest by the Lord, as His ‘child’, my life began to change – for the better. This caught the attention of my Family members. They finally came to know about my Christian faith and being a follower of Jesus Christ as taught in His Gospel. At that point, it was a little difficult for them to accept me as a follower of Jesus Christ — Islam is a grossly intolerant religion towards its followers that reject it, I remember undergoing a time of trial, tests and tough obstacles during that phase of my life.

In spite of all that, the Lord GOD provided me with the strength and patience that was sufficient to endure and undergo the bittersweet initial reaction of my family members. I had embraced fully the fact of Jesus Christ as my Redeemer, the Living Word (Logos in Greek, Kalimatullah in Arabic; cf. John 1:1-5, AQ Surah 3/45, 4/171) of GOD, into my life.

I reckon that they are truly ignorant about what becoming a follower of Jesus Christ actually is. The Quran does not have a full account of the life and ministry of Sayidina Isa Al-Masih – ie. Jesus the Messiah. However the Gospels in the New Testament has a complete and comprehensive account of everything significant that Sayidina Isa A.M. had ever said and did! 

Today, Praise God, Alhamdulillah, the situation in my family is very much improved. Most importantly, I now possess the assurance of a real and powerful relationship with a loving God, unlike before, when all my good deeds or amal saleh were inadequate to assure me of a good and acceptable relationship with Allah, even though I strove to be an excellent or even a good Muslimah. No Muslim ever knows or is assured about what or when is ever good enough with the God of Islam! Now, as a follower and believer in Jesus Christ and his Salvation, I have a relationship with God that is far more blessed and better than that of a Slave and her Overlord – as Islam teaches, because as a slave, we are never sure if ever our overlord is pleased with our service or submission! 

Today, as a child of God, I now possess the confidence and the eternal assurance regarding my relationship with God, that was based upon the loving gift of my Redeemer Sayidina Isa, who offered the perfect kiffaratboth His child AND His willing servant. [the atoning sacrifice] on my behalf. Now, the Spirit of God Himself has showered every good and wonderful spiritual blessing from His bounty into my life, as

I would like to invite you to be healed from your spiritual uncertainty, confusion and lack of eternal assurance regarding your life in the Hereafter (Akhirat), and to come and experience and to know for yourself the incomparable spiritual blessings that the living God would bestow you now. I myself have no regrets whatsoever about the decision I have made, to follow and remain faithful to God’s living powerful Word, SayidinaIsa, the Messiah, for today as well as for tomorrow.

Your Friend, Zainab

Abdullah was a faithful Muslim. He lived just an hour’s drive from Mecca, prayed in the mosque five times a day, practiced all the Muslim beliefs, and, of course, regularly visited Mecca. Like many Muslims, he was taught that Christians had evil spirits and that he must keep away from them.

One night Abdullah dreamed he was in hell, burning in a blazing fire. The next morning, very worried, he prayed to Allah, ‘I have done everything well; why would I go to hell?’ During the following days he grew increasingly troubled. One night he was sleepless because of fear, when at midnight a bright light lit his room and a voice said, ‘I am Jesus. Come to me. I am the way to heaven. Follow me and you shall be saved from hell.’ Abdullah fell on his face crying and said, ‘Please help me find you.’

Within days Abdullah found a Christian Bible and began reading it. He soon committed his life to Jesus. Filled with joy, he started sharing his new-found faith with his family and friends. By his country’s law, however, a Muslim who leaves his faith must be killed. Abdullah’s family turned him over to the authorities. He was jailed and tortured for months.

When Abdullah refused to deny Jesus, he was taken to the Sheria Court, where the most dangerous criminals are tried. The judge said to Abdullah, ‘Deny your new beliefs and you will walk out a free man; if you don’t, you will be beheaded.’

‘I will never deny Jesus,’ Abdullah replied, ‘If you kill me I will go to heaven, but my blood will be on your hands.’ Abdullah was sentenced to be beheaded the following Friday.

He was returned to jail and bound hands and feet. On the day of his execution, however, no one turned up. Next Monday morning the guards removed his chains saying, ‘Run you demon, we do not want to see you again.’ Unable to believe his ears, Abdullah asked for an explanation. The guards said that on the day Abdullah was to be executed the judge’s son had suddenly died. As a result the judge reversed his decision.

Like most Saudis, Abdullah was from a wealthy family and had everything he needed. Not only was he rejected by his family, he had no source of income, and could not get a job because he was considered a betrayer. All of his identification papers were taken from him and he could have been arrested again at any time. And yet despite this pressure Abdullah continued to live for several years in Saudi Arabia, actively telling others about Jesus.

I was born in Iraq - Baghdad in 1967 of an Assyrian Orthodox family. The Arabs call this year the year of disappointment because they lost the war against Israel. When I was only 40 days old my mother (an Orthodox Christian) took me to the church and had me baptized as a Christian-born boy and as she had done earlier with all my brothers and sisters! When I was two years old my Father decided to move our family to southern Iraq to the city of Basra. Due to some political reasons I cannot tell you why my father decided to embrace Islam and force it on the family. And he also changed our names and identification cards to Islamic status.

So I grew up being a Muslim. In the south where there are very few Christians. I was in love with the Qur'an throughout my childhood to the extent that I used to wait for the Qur'an Tartile on TV and started Tartile along with it! (Tartile is the way Muslims sing the Qur'an to make it more effective, and it was made mandatory by Mohammed on each Muslim). My mother used to watch me and just laugh looking at this seven year old sheik! We had quranic verses all over our house and also had drawings of Imam Ali and his son Abaas. I was fascinated with the character of Imam Ali and how wise and strong he used to be and believed so totally. That he could hear whomever prays to him and ask him for a miracle! Being a Shi'a Muslim it was my duty to follow in his steps and believe his teaching of Islam as well as trying my best to rebuke any one who thought less of him in any way.

At the age of eleven my father died unexpectedly. I was devastated. I could not understand why that happened. I kept asking Imam Ali why that happened. I needed an explanation, but there was no answer to my prayers. After six months my mother decided to move back to Baghdad. I did not want to, I could not possibly leave my cousins, my uncles and aunts, my friends and school and my cat, of course! To my shock, my mother told me that all these people that I held to be my family are definitely not my family, they are only superficial cousins, uncles, aunts, and even the two brothers and a sister that I had been told are my half-brothers and sister from another women that my father had been married to and who had passed away before he married my mother were phony! The only things that linked us were the legal ID papers and the many years of a huge deception. In Baghdad my mother hastened to introduce us to our new family. She learned that her father had passed away years ago. She was so sad because he had not approved of her departure to the south but she had to go on with it. Suddenly I started to see new cousins, aunts, all kind of relatives and friends. And I say "I" because I was the only one who was confused about that mess since I was the younger in my family and did not have any idea about what had happened in the past. My mother had me live with one of her sister's family for me to adjust myself to the new reality. I was in a state of resentment and anger since they wanted me to learn their language (Assyrian) which I refused for many years to come because I was in love with the Arabic language. And they tried to take me with them to their church and to their parties and events. Finally, after years, I accepted them as my relatives. But I decided to be separated from them and their beliefs which I considered heresy.

I continued going to school as a young Muslim man and was a straight A student in all materials related to Islam. I used to prepare my questions at home. And whenever I saw a Christian fellow I would attack him with it. I felt pretty good when I waited for an answer and get NOTHING but a red face and a sweaty hand shake of "Good bye!" Then I started to go to the churches and sit in the Bible study and ask these questions to the priests. And sure enough, I had the same impact over and over again. My faith in Islam was increasing and my hatred towards Christianity was increasing even more! Even to the point that one day I was coming home from long day: It was about 8:00 p.m. and my sisters and Mom had the Jesus film on video and they were watching. I looked as I am coming in and Peter was saying to Jesus "Lord" in Arabic "God". I heard that and I was so angry I started to yell at my mother and sisters and pulled the film out of the video, broke it in half and also broke all the pictures we had of Jesus or Mary and threw them away. My mother was crying so bad, and everybody was mad at me. It took me three days to be able to talk with my mother again!

The civil war was intensifying in Lebanon and the government wanted to send some Iraqi soldiers to help drive the Jews out of the South of Lebanon. Since I hated the Jews even more than the Christian, I went to the embassy of Lebanon in Baghdad and registered my name, and when they asked me to write a statement I wrote "I AM COMMITTED TO GO TO LEBANON TO KILL THE STINKING JEWS" but the security guard secretly called me out to the side and said "It is not about the Jews, you are going to fight the Syrians!" So when I learn that my journey is to kill other Muslims like me I changed my mind!

By then I got my first book published and was so happy about it! I became a rather popular among my friends in school and the radio asked me to write some things for them. When I expressed my desire to write for children the TV station send after me. Six months later I was granted a scholarship to join the Academy of Arts in Baghdad. That was a 180 degree change in my direction. Though I was a writer and a poet, I wanted to study what is called the science of Qur'an. The war against Iran was over after 8 long years and everybody was happy. We used to dance in the streets until sun rise celebrating the birth of peace in the land! Everything seemed good and settled. But I had a big void inside my soul. Two years went by and I was still looking for an answer to the many questions boiling in my head.

Now I was asking if there is really God why would he allow all that to happen to me to my family. What I am I? Am I a Muslim as I was told and as I grew up? Or Am I Christian as I was born and baptized? Am I an Arab or an Assyrian? Am I human or an animal to be treated and betrayed like this?! The country I once loved was no longer home to me. I wanted to find my own self since I lost it in Iraq.

In August 1, 1990 I left Iraq to Turkey with no other goal than looking for my own freedom and establish a new life. Seven hours later, Iraq invaded Kuwait. I was already in Istanbul and that was the first sign of salvation to me! All telephone lines where cut off to and from Iraq. I would go without contact with my family for the next year and a half. Bit by bit my money started to decrease. I began to move from one city to another trying to find a job to maintain a living. I slept under a tree in Ankara for three days after I had sold all my positions and had no more to sell. I became ill and thought I could die any time. Then I started to knock at the doors of various embassies. It does not matter where to go I thought, anywhere will be better than Iraq and Turkey! No one accepted me. Even the U.N. office rejected my application as a refugee! I was in big trouble. If the Turkish police were to catch me, they would return me to Iraq because my visa had expired long ago. And that would mean death! It seemed to me that there was no other choice but to go to Syria though the Syrian council advised me not to do so!

I took the bus to the city of Antakya and from there, I was hoping, to get to Halab. Through these two months in Turkey I started to be more open to listen to Christ's voice inside me though I have to admit that at one point I stopped at the mosque in Ankara and read the Qur'an. But suddenly that book lost its effect on me and did not attract in this time of trouble, nor ever since. In the bus to Antakya I met a Turkish young Muslim man who became a dear friend to me. He took me to the Catholic church in Antakya and there I met Fr. Francisco and a nun by the name of Barbara. They provided great help and comfort to me during the three month that I spent in Antakya. Barbara gave me the first Arabic Bible and asked to read it. I used to read the Bible every night before bed in Fr. Francisco house (he opened his house for me to the last day!). And the church used to pray for me every single night and ask God to open the doors for me to go to some country so I might find peace and freedom. I started to ask Jesus to bless me and I apologized to him for my foolishness in the past. And one day I was alone in the house and was very depressed because of the rejection from the U.N. regarding my case and I had been away from my family back home with no communication at all. I shut off all lights and went to sleep. I woke up and it was so dark to the point that I couldn't see my own hands! I was walking, trying to find my way, I opened the door and stepped down but I fell on my knees and hurt myself very painfully. In the midst of all that darkness and pain a strong hand grabbed me at my elbow and sure enough that was Fr. Francisco. He helped me stand up and put his hand over my shoulder and said "Don't you worry, I will take care of you. You will be fine!" I woke up being like crazy and was all sweaty. I rushed to Father Francisco bed room but he was still out. It took me a few seconds to realize that I had been dreaming! I went back to bed after a short prayer and saw a second dream. This time it was Jesus as I saw him in the Jesus film years ago and I had trashed his video. He was hanging on the cross, the nails were in his hands and feet, yet he was smiling at me and talking to me. Though he was dying he seemed so beautiful. The cross was huge and I seemed like a little boy. My neck was falling back trying to see the whole face of Jesus and suddenly a huge big circle of light came from above the cross and down upon me! I woke up again. It was sun rise. This time I was really sweaty!

In the morning I rushed to Barbara to let her know. But an old lady who used to like me and fix sandwiches every now and then called me and told me that she also saw a dream concerning me. She said that she saw me riding on a white horse and fly away to safety! One week later the American Embassy called me while I was working in the church construction and they approved my visa to the U.S.!! That by itself was a miracle because my visa in Turkey was expired long ago and I was staying illegal. Besids, the Iraqi Army was still in Kuwait and the problems were rising towards a certain war between Iraq and the U.S. Many people tried to get a visa to America but could not. God answered the prayers of the church and accepted me as one of his children. Since then I started to have a personal relationship with Christ and became new creation in him. I think it is important for any human to know his God and savior and have a true experience with him.

I was born in Baghdad in which Abu Jafar Al-Mansour built and commanded his engineers to pour oil in the foundation and set it on fire so he can see and enjoy his schematic in real life. I thought that was such a stupid idea and I think the Khalifa just announced the death of the city before its birth! But God took me away to Antakya a city where the people of God were FIRST CALLED CHRISTIANS. By that God took away my curse and gave me new life in him. My prayer is that he might increase and I might decrease so I can live for him fully to the end of my earthly life. "FOR YOU WERE AS SHEEP GOING ASTRAY, BUT ARE NOW RETURNED UNTO THE SHEPHERD AND BISHOP OF YOUR SOULS." 1 Peter 2:25 - Amen.

mailto:alashoery@hotmail.com - email . I think that it is important to hear from you all. Whether in blessing or cursing. I believe my testimony is going on as long as I live. I am having new experiences with Christ one year after another!

Abdullah Al-Ashoery

I was raised in a typical Muslim family, where we would go to the mosque on Fridays and on special occasions; fast for the month of Ramadan; and celebrate the typical festive holidays of Islam. When I was a teenager, I completed the recitation of the Quran; and that in essence was a confirmation of the duty of a Muslim youth. Later, in my teen years, I was not satisfied with just reciting the Quran in Arabic; a language I could only read, but not comprehend. So my father got me a Study Quran by Abdullah Yusuf Ali and also a copy of the Sahih Bukhari Hadith collection. I studied it for a short while during my late teen years.

After I finished my twelfth year of schooling, I started studying engineering at an Engineering College in Karachi, but desired to study in the United States. My desire was to go to one of the best engineering university in the US. I had aspirations to do wonderful things for my people and country. Unfortunately, I was not admitted to my first choice of engineering university. Then in August of 1973, I came to the US and started in a community college. I lived a typical life in the States; spending time in getting my education and holding onto part-time or full-time jobs so that I could afford to put myself through college. My parents who were still in Pakistan helped, but there was not enough money to support the family and my education here. After a short while, I got plugged back into the local Islamic community and was involved with other Muslims in the study of the Quran and Hadith and its applicability in the local culture. After getting my 2-year associates degree from a community college, God in his mercy and grace provided for me to get into my choice of engineering university as a transfer student with an academic scholarship. By the time I had completed my BS degree, I had veered away from the daily practice of my faith, and focused my life's interest in the academic and secular things in life. After working for a short while to gain experience and decide what I wanted to do for further studies; I chose to get my MS degree. Once in the work place, I started doing what most typical men do in the US culture - start planning and working my way to the top of the corporate and financial ladder. I married a woman who had grown up in the States, had children, and life was typical and stressful. My eyes were focused on making a name for myself and getting all I could out of life - my earlier aspirations to do wonderful things for my people and country disappeared.

Then in March of 1987, I was in a bad accident and was very badly burned, while some others were killed. I had to take time away from work to recover. During this time, I had to face my mortality and deal with my blind ambition. I started to consider what legacy I was going to leave behind, and where was I going to go when I die. I wondered if I was spared from death for a purpose? Being a Muslim I believed that I would end up in heaven; but because of my life being the way it was - not actively performing the duties of a Muslim, I feared that I may perhaps be penalized in hell for a while? I then started again looking into the Quran and Hadith and Islam to find answers. This times my zeal to know my faith was fueled with the knowledge that there had to be a purpose to life; I was spared and had been given a chance. I wanted to know this Quran - which I believed to be the revealed word of God for all eternity, and the Prophet of Islam - his life and teachings. By this time I was back on my feet, starting to go back to work, but now I decided to take a job in the company that required minimum travel, so I would be spending a lot more time closer to home and with my family. I adjusted my priorities, and side stepped onto the slower track, away from the fast lane of the corporate world. Later on during this time, I was challenged by my Christian friends that Jesus was the only way to Heaven and that the Bible was the revealed and uncorrupted word of God.

So this challenge ignited an even greater zeal to study the Quran, Hadith and the life of Mohammad to prove Islam to be the true way and Christianity to be a false hope and Jesus being merely a man and not God. My desire was also to teach my children about Islam and to raise them Muslim. I spent the next few months studying the Quran and comparing it to the Bible. I compared the lives of Jesus both in the Quran and the Bible. Also compared the life and teaching of Mohammad and that of Jesus. I checked into the early history of Islam and Christianity and the sad but unfortunate atrocities committed by both religions, and the reasons why. I also read articles by others who denied the existence of God.

I reached a point where I was not sure how to deal with some of the difficulties in the Bible that were very unclear such as:

1. Why four books to present the "gospel" and not one, as Quran teaches of one gospel.
2. The whole issue of Sin and the need for shedding of blood and a Savior.
3. Jesus being God and Man and the whole concept of the Trinity.
4. Did Jesus really die on the cross and was he resurrected or not?
5. How could followers of Jesus commit the atrocities that are part of the church history such as the crusades?

But also in my quest to use the Quran as my standard, and the teaching and life of Mohammad as a model for life, I had some significant difficulties, for example:

1. The whole concept of "abrogation". That God chose to reveal verses in the Quran that supercede earlier revelation in the same Quran. How an eternal revelation of God could have such time bound revelation seemed at odds with the nature of God.
2. The inconsistency of the messages, for example facing Jerusalem and then Mecca; or fornication being a sin, but one can have sex with many slave women that have no legal marriage status; tolerance and peace message of earlier revelation, but the command to fight all unbelievers in later revelation.
3. The need for revisions of the Quran to standardize it and ordering the burning of all the older copies. Why this need to leave no trace of what the edited version did not contain and why.
4. The unequal status of woman compared to men in area of marriage, rule of law, social etiquette, modesty, etc.
5. Treatment of non-Muslims in the community and the command to Jihad.

At this point, I reached a place in my study that I could no longer defend the faith of Islam as it was clearly at odds with issues of truth and character of God as depicted in both the Quran and the Bible. However, I just was not ready to walk away from Islam. Christianity had its own set of issues, most of which revolved around the person of Jesus. At this point, I recalled from my childhood knowing some of the tenets of the Indian religions such as Hinduism, Sikhism and Buddhism. In all of my study of life and the sciences, it had become clear to me that there was a great creator and designer who had formed the universe and us. So there was no point in venturing into the philosophy of the Indian religions. I found they provided no answers that were consistent internally within it own teaching and externally consistent with the world around us.

Even though I had issues with Islam, I believed that there was a Creator God that I could and should pray to for answers. For me this was the God of Abraham (Ibrahim). I felt "safe" to pray to the God of Abraham as Abraham is highly regarded as a patriarch of Muslim, Jewish and Christian faiths. So, I ventured, that just as God had revealed the truth to Abraham, I would pray to this God to understand what was true and direct me on the right path. As I continued to regularly pray and meditate, I studied the passages in the Quran and the Bible on Mohammad and Jesus and reviewed books and articles by Muslim and Christian apologists.

Some weeks went by, as I prayed and reflected on Mohammad and Jesus. Finally, the evening of Good Friday of 1989, I was jogging and reflecting on the importance of this evening for Christians. Did Jesus really get crucified as taught by the Bible and some secular historians or was it some big hoax as claimed by Islam? What was this Sin that required payment by blood? As I prayed I sensed a burden lifted of me. I looked up, as it felt like some heavy weight was gone. I then looked down, to see if I was still on the ground. There was no external evidence, but in my spirit there was a clear sense, and this particular phrase came to life "Jesus is Lord" and occupied all of my thoughts. I responded in my mind, but what about Sin and the Cross? Did Jesus die on the Cross? The response in my mind came back loud and clear - "Jesus is Lord". I asked again, but what about the Trinity and this concept of three persons and one God, and again, the response was "Jesus is Lord". At this point, all that I had read in the Gospel accounts of Jesus came together. It was as if a veil had been lifted. That is why the Jewish Council had condemned him to death, because he claimed to be God, - blasphemy; that is why this Jesus had authority to forgive sins; that is why he told the Pharisees, before Abraham was I am, etc. He truly is God. Now the same old words in the Gospel that seemed to be vague about his deity, were suddenly crystal clear. Jesus is God. His crucifixion and resurrection were the ultimate calling card of this God-Man. It all started making sense, and I was at total peace accepting Jesus as Lord. At this point, I also realized it did not matter that for so many years I had been a Muslim, that my brothers, sisters and some of my best friends were Muslim; I now believed - Jesus is Lord, and I would follow him. Soon thereafter I understood what had happened to me. Jesus talks about this topic as to his real identity and what people misbelieve about him in the Gospel of Matthew 16:13-17: ‘Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, He was asking His disciples, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" And they said, "Some say John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; but still others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." And Jesus said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven."’

That has been the start of a journey, of getting to know my Lord Jesus better, accepting him as my Savior and his full payment for my sins. My desire has been to live my life worthy of my Lord as he empowers me.. My Muslim family did not accept me at first. They tried to convince me that I was wrong; while I tried to challenge them with the Truth of the Gospel message. When they realized I was convinced of my faith in Jesus being God, I was considered an outcast. Some time elapsed after which my mom's desire to bring the family together was resolved by them respecting my faith. Over the years, the mutual respect has resulted in a closer bond between us, and they have also been kind, generous and supportive as a family. During these years I also developed some very close friendships with Christians who challenged me as well as met some new ones once I got involved with a local church fellowship. I was welcomed as a brother. Also in the process, my character has changed over time. Some of the traits that he has exposed and dealt with me include pride, arrogance, anger, selfishness, and control among other sinful traits. He continues to change me from inside out to be more loving and kind to all.

Today, over 15 years later, having further studied the Bible, the Quran and various books and articles on Christian and Muslim Apologetics; and having discussed with many Muslims and Christians alike, I am sure of my faith in the Lord Jesus and continue to follow him, even more than at that day he chose to reveal himself to me and called me to him.

Please feel free to contact me with questions, comments or any thoughts you have at mailto:Farooq_Ibrahim@hotmail.com - Farooq_Ibrahim@hotmail.com .

Овде приложувам еден исечок од интервјуто на Алпин во весникот Форум, поточно делот каде на Алпин му беше поставено прашањето:

Какви се вашите искуства со дрогата?

Почнав многу наивно, не бев многу информиран, но и од љубопитност. Неколку пати пушев марихуана, а потоа почнав да ја купувам. Еднаш отидовме кај дилерот, а тој немаше марихуана, па ни понуди хероин. Си рековме - зошто да не! Така влегов во сето тоа. Кога почнав да ги искусувам првите апстиненцијални кризи побарав помош од моите родители.

Bassam's Testimony

I live in the Middle East. I was born as a Muslim, and at the age of 18 I became a member of one of the Islamic groups, as I had a relative who was one of the leaders of this group. I thought I was doing everything I could for God as I knew him at this point.

After a short time I started to get some training in using guns and making explosives. I wasn't very comfortable with what I was doing - hurting people for God's sake. I thought that either I or the group had misunderstood the teachings of God. I started to study the Qur'an and the Hadith all over again, (with the help of one of the leaders of the group, without telling him my real reasons for studying) to see what I had missed. After a couple of years I was astonished at what I found. I found that Islam is not the peaceful path to God, as I used to believe; on the contrary, it's so violent. If *I* have to establish God's will by any means possible, even by killing people, I said it can't be the way to God.

I never considered myself leaving Islam for anything else, yet at this point I was sure that it wasn't leading me to God. I had a kind of breakdown for some time when I found that every thing I had believed in wasn't right; I started doing drugs, and not talking about God at all.

Then I met a Christian who didn't know much of the Christian theology but who was full of love to others, whatever and whoever they are. One of his friends (who was a member of the same group that I had been involved in) said about him that he must be killed because he was Christian and didn't pay "Jiziah" (tax levied on Christians and Jews in an Islamic state, according to the Qur'an), yet this didn't stop him loving this man or dealing with him professionally. Initially I didn't know he was Christian, and when I found out I was surprised; everything I had learnt all my life about Christians from my reading of Islamic writings and Muhammad's opinion about them put them down very much. I asked this friend if I could have a copy of the Bible.

After starting to read the Bible I found a very big difference between what is actually written in the Bible and what I had heard people (Muslims and even nominal Christians) say about it.

I was really struck by one thing in the Bible, namely the teaching that no one is righteous but Jesus; even those who were called God's people like David, Jacob and Abraham, the twelve apostles - everyone has done something wrong. The Bible is full of the sins and wrongdoing of all people, except Jesus. He himself said to his enemies "Which of you convicts me of sin?" (John 8:46a), and no-one responded. Even Judas Iscariot, who delivered him up to the authorities to be killed, said "I have sinned in betraying innocent blood." (Matthew 27:4) In addition, Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor who eventually did sentence him to death, said "Why, what evil has he done? I have found in him no crime deserving death." And then a centurion who witnessed Jesus's death said, "Certainly this man was innocent!" He struck me as the highest example of a human being, one who really deserved to be followed. It took me some time till I finished the whole Bible. After about one year of hard struggle with myself, I decided that I wanted to follow God as He shows himself in Christ, not as anyone else says He is.

I prayed to Him and He was here; for the first time in my life I felt that God was here, and to say it was a very strange feeling for me would be an understatement. I was so happy, so sad. Happy to know he is here and sad for what I had missed. It felt very peaceful and I wanted this feeling to last for good. I still remember this very first time I prayed; I ran out of the room because for the first time in my life I felt the Presence of God. I have been following Him since then. He changed all my life. I went off drugs; I became a whole new person to every one that I know, but as I said before I live in the Middle East where every one thinks that he IS RIGHT and every one else is wrong, so I had some trouble with my family and they kicked me out of the house. As Jesus says "Brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death" (Matthew 10:21) and that is what happed with me.

My father delivered me to the Security Forces and they arrested me and put me in prison for converting out of Islam. I had a very bad time there, as they tortured me to force me to return to Islam. They used electric shocks, beatings, and hanging me from my wrists all night. After few week of this I was put in solitary confinement for almost a year. But I couldn't deny the one that gave me life. Now I am out of jail and I have left my home country as I am still wanted there for apostasy from Islam. I am still walking with Jesus, and I love Him because He loved me first and put Himself on the cross for me. I knew from the very beginning that I was going to have some trouble; didn't He say about Paul "for I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name." (Acts 9:16)

Now I am free from everything. I have a lovely wife whom I met after getting out of prison, and who is supporting me in everything I do for God, but the most important thing for me is I have my eternal assurance that I am going to be with Him for ever, whatever might happen. And as a result I decided to spend my life telling people about his great love to us. As he ordered me "Do not be afraid, but speak and do not be silent; for I am with you, and no man shall attack you to harm you; for I have many people in this city." (Acts 18:9, 10)

Please feel free to mailto:b_k@answering-islam.de - write me if you want to know more.

Bassam

VATICAN CITY - Italy's most prominent Muslim commentator, a journalist with iconoclastic views such as support for Israel, converted to Roman Catholicism Saturday when the pope baptized him at an Easter service.

As a choir sang, Pope Benedict XVI poured holy water over Magdi Allam's head and said a brief prayer in Latin.

"We no longer stand alongside or in opposition to one another," Benedict said in a homily reflecting on the meaning of baptism. "Thus faith is a force for peace and reconciliation in the world: distances between people are overcome, in the Lord we have become close."

Vatican television zoomed in on Allam, who sat in the front row of the basilica along with six other candidates for baptism. Allam later received his first Communion.

Да преведам, Папата денес крстил некој угледен муслиман,многу угладен новинар која денес ја примил католичката-христијанската вера...

When I was eighteen years old, I entered a large public university. Soon, it became obvious to me that many students were there to obtain a degree, find a high-paying job, and get rich. Others were interested in amassing intellectual knowledge. And, many students desired to go out drinking and partying on the weekends while others were trying to find satisfaction through relationships with girlfriends.

None of these things were new to me, but for the first time in my life, I started to consider for what I was living and why I was alive. I saw in my own heart the same selfish motives that I saw in those around me. It became a period of thinking and searching - a crossroad in my life.

At that point, there seemed like so many directions in which to turn. I started to read different books on philosophy, meditation, religion and history. As a member of the university soccer team, I tried to improve my ability through constant practice, hoping that maybe I would find fulfillment in athletics. I even went one semester without eating meat!

On one occasion, I happened to acquire a Bible. Since I was reading many other books, I figured that it wouldn't hurt to read it, too. I began reading the story of how God created the heavens and the earth. But very little of the Bible made sense to me. Nevertheless, I read on into the New Testament (Injil) about the life of Jesus Christ. I was surprised that the life of such a famous prophet was contained in such a short book. You can imagine how much more surprised I was that the entire story of Jesus' life, ministry, crucifixion, and resurrection was completed in a few pages! The account was then retold by three more authors! Despite some confusion, I felt strangely drawn to this prophet, Jesus, who suffered at the hands of disbelievers.

Up until that point in my life, I had never been to a Christian church. My father was an immigrant from Iran and my American mother had converted to Islam. From the time we were little, my brother, sister and I would go to the mosque (Islamic Center) with my parents every week. There we learned about God, his prophets, his books, his angels, the day of judgement, and life after death. We also learned surahs (verses) and prayers from the Qur'an, the Muslim holy book. The teacher recorded how many of the thirty-five prayers we had completed during the week.

Like many teenagers, as I grew older, I began to lose interest in religion. I became more interested in playing sports, going to parties, and having fun. This continued through my high school years. By the time I was ready to go to college, most of these activities, too, had already begun to seem empty and meaningless to me. This brings me back to my first year at the university. The more I began to read about Jesus in the Holy Injil, the more I began to believe. A great struggle issued. Confused and desperate, I often cried out to God, "Was Christianity, Islam, or some other faith the true faith?"

I also began to wonder if I was going to heaven after I died. In Islam, as well as in many other religions, a person would go to heaven if his good deeds outweighed his bad deeds. Poor Fred! I had already realized that I was a selfish person. No amount of willpower could help me live up to the standards of Holy God.

Then, I read in the Holy Injil that Jesus said we must trust that He, Himself, would change our hearts: "Everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin ... If therefore the Son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed" (John 8:34,36). This was a different message! God knew that we are all sinful, but He is so merciful that He sent Jesus to set us free.

Little by little, I began to believe more strongly in Jesus as the Savior. Instead of trying to overcome my sinful ways solely by my own willpower, I now felt that I didn't want to live like I used to. Jesus had changed my heart! Before I realized it, I had stopped cursing and partying. More importantly, I felt my heart being changed from within as I turned away from selfishness toward Jesus.

As I returned to college for my sophomore year, I began to look for other people who had an experience similar to mine. Although the great majority of Americans profess to be Christians, I realized that only a small minority of them really know and love God.

Soon enough, I saw a sign about a Christian meeting on campus. I attended this meeting, although I felt somewhat awkward. I soon realized that God was as real and important to these people as he was to me. Eventually, I began going to the small church that organized these Christian meetings on campus.

As I expressed my heart to God in prayer and read more about Jesus in the Holy Injil, my faith began to grow. Sometimes I would go through times of doubting whether God was near tome, but he always proved Himself faithful.

Once, a Muslim scholar came to the university to give a lecture about "Muhammad in the Bible." He claimed that the Bible actually points to Muhammad as the prophet who was to come after Jesus. Again, I became confused. I delved into Bible study using the Muslim scholar's pamphlets and I found that his conclusions were either incorrect or taken out of context. Jesus had indeed been crucified for our sins once and for all. He is the "author and finisher" of truth and faith.

Since then, I have married my Christian wife. We have dedicated our lives to serving Christ and sharing His life and love with others.

Hussein