I dreamed last night that a friend I have been praying for finally became interested in Christianity. He asked me, “What’s the best book I can read to understand Christianity?” I was puzzled. At first, I thought, Mere Christianity, only to realize that Mere Christianity is better suited for a new Christian or someone who needs to become more serious about their faith. Then I was troubled. I didn’t have an answer.

My friend had asked me the question because he had recently heard me pray. While I was praying, he realized how much Jesus means to me and desired to believe—but wasn’t convinced yet—that there could be more to life. I assumed, in my dream, that the prayer made him realize that I actually believed that I was having a conversation with God: not just that I was petitioning, but that someone on the other side heard me, listened, and spoke back.

Last year I took a group of high school students to UC Berkeley to interact with skeptics. After spending an evening with S.A.N.E (Students for a Non-religious Ethos), I found myself in a conversation with an undergraduate student about the existence of free will. She told me that she recently embraced determinism and rejected free will.

 

In response to my query about why she changed her mind, she appealed to genetics, background forces, and environmental factors. In other words, she believed there is no free will because external forces determine beliefs. What she didn’t realize was that the justification she offered for her belief in determinism undermined her deterministic beliefs. She believed that she had evaluated the evidence and embraced the position—determinism—that is most logical. And yet if determinism were true she would have been incapable of evaluating evidence and freely following the logic because all her choices were already set. Logically speaking, her position was self-refuting. In other words, she sawed off the branch she was sitting on.

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Last week seventeen high school students from my Christian school went on a mission trip sponsored by Stand to Reason to reach Muslims in L.A. This was the first trip of its kind, so these students were really trekking out on faith! We were able to join an Iranian Christian Bible study, visit an Islamic center, engage Muslims in personal conversations, hear testimonies from former Muslims, get training from missionaries to Islam, share a meal with Muslims, and visit a major mosque. The students did not go unprepared – they had spent the last seven months reading books and attending training sessions outside of regular school hours. My thanks in particular to Brett Kunkle, Alan Shlemon, and Dawnielle Hodgman for planning such a great trip. Here are some highlights and reflections.

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For the past few weeks I have been carefully reading through the entire Qur’an. One reason is because there are roughly 1.3 billion Muslims worldwide, including an estimated 3-7 million Muslims in America. Understanding the Qur’an will help me better relate to my Muslim neighbors and friends. Second, Muslims consider the Qur’an the greatest miracle and proof of Islam (Surah 10:37-38). It is considered the most beautiful, holy, and truthful book. I wanted to assess this claim for myself.

Following are some observations and criticisms of the Qur’an. Just one precursor: If the Qur’an were true, then I would believe it. I’m just not convinced it is. If someone begins with the conviction that the Qur’an is true, then certainly these critiques will have little effect. But if one begins with an honest attempt to evaluate the historical, theological, philosophical, and scientific evidence, I believe they would come to a very different conclusion.

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Mormonism is everywhere. A leading Republican candidate for president is a Mormon, there is a play on Broadway about The Book of Mormon, and the LDS Church has launched a multi-million dollar ad-campaign about Mormons called “I’m a Mormon.” Even though I have been teaching a class on comparative religion for years, taking students on trips to Salt Lake City, and interacting with my Mormon friends, I had never read Mormon scriptures in their entirety.

Recently I asked some Mormon missionaries to show me that their religion is true. They said if I read The Book of Mormon with an open heart then God would impress its truthfulness upon me (they quoted Moroni 10:4). So, I earnestly prayed that God would impress upon my heart the truthfulness of the Mormon scriptures, and then I determined to read as many of their books as I could, including The Book of Mormon, Doctrine & Covenants (D&C), and The Pearl of Great Price.

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Let me just put it out there and take the wacks for being intolerant; I would be very uneasy having a devout Mormon in the Oval office.

Watching the political wrangling of the pachyderm party and the various missteps of those hopefuls for nomination to lead the nation, it is quite obvious that the “religious affiliation” question is a minefield not to be crossed.

So let me attempt to bravely venture out where one is forbidden to go and explain my queasiness.

Some religions are nutty.

Scientology comes to mind as a loopy scam. 

Some religions are deceptive, cloaking their real ideas and agenda in the guise and language of an already accepted faith.

The Gnostics were pretty good at this as I recall. 

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Last Friday I invited a local Mormon leader to speak to my 11^th grade theology class. This is the first time I have ever done this. Typically I take my students on trips to visit other people, but some students don’t go on those trips so I wanted them all to hear from a Mormon firsthand. He was thoughtful, kind, prepared, and very articulate. In fact, I was very impressed by how well he knew his stuff and how confidently he portrayed it. He even quoted from C.S. Lewis, although he took him out of context. I wish more Christians had his poise and confidence.

I learned a couple things from this encounter that Christians may consider taking to heart.

First, the higher degree of education a Mormon receives the higher is his/her participation in the church. And yet the exact opposite is true for evangelicals. Even though the Mormon faith is essentially built on a subjective experience (see Moroni 10:4), Mormons have come to value the intellect and education. Mitt Romney and Glenn Beck are good examples of leading Mormon intellectuals who are having a positive impact on culture. Why is it that a faith built on subjective experience produces many leading thinkers?

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In one of the scenes of the Coffeehouse Chronicles, my new novella series, Nick a student who is questioning his own Christian faith, watches the popular Zeitgeist YouTube video.

The video tells a story about religious leaders throughout history who had similar characteristics to Jesus. The video implied that Christianity simply plagiarized from other religious stories that were circulating years before. Names like Attis of Greece, Krishna of India, Dionysus of Greece, and Mithra of Persia were included in the video. The narrator described how these religious leaders, based on astrology were born on December 25, born of virgin, discovered by a star in East, adorned by three kings, became a teacher at twelve, baptized and started ministry at thirty, had twelve disciples, and performed miracles, were known as the “Lamb of God,” “The Light,” crucified, buried for three days, and resurrected.

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One of Christianity’s most important claims is also one of its most controversial:  Jesus is the only way to God (Acts 4:11-12, John 8:24).  A common objection follows:  “It does not matter if you believe in Jesus, Buddha, or Mohammed, as long as your belief is sincere.  What more could God want than a sincere heart?”  Indeed, the annoyed objector may even point to the fact that adherents of other religions are oftentimes more sincere than the very Christians who criticize their sincerity. 

Of course, Christians ought not needlessly offend people, but we do need to ask if sincerity should be our most important concern when it comes to religious belief, as this objection assumes.  Two responses will help bring clarity to the issue. 

First, notice that no one accepts sincerity alone in any other area of life besides religion.  Why?  Because sincerity may be important but it is not enough.  For example, if you decide to go skydiving, are you more concerned about having sincere beliefs or true beliefs?  When you are coasting in a plane at 10,000 feet in the air, preparing to jump into the wild blue yonder and then plummet towards the earth at mind-numbing speeds, do you merely want a sincere belief there is actually a working parachute in your backpack?  Of course not.  You want a true belief that your parachute is in full working order.  If you sincerely believe that your parachute works but you are sincerely wrong, you’ll look quite different once you land.

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It's 9/11 and there is a lot of pain in the American soul. The pain is real and not unfounded. Living outside of the United States, I feel the world's focus on my home country, holding its breath to see if one man will spark violence in so many places if he goes ahead with his bonfire plans.  

It's 9/11 and my question, as I wake up this morning, is simply this: what would Jesus do?

I landed at London Heathrow yesterday in the remnant of darkness just before dawn. Our route had taken us up from Nairobi (Kenya, East Africa) and over a big hunk of Africa before crossing Europe. Just half an hour before our descent into London, we passed over Paris.  The City of Light looked dazzling from the air. From my vantage point, I wondered about the millions of Muslim people I had flown over in the hours since I'd lifted off.  Northern Africa is predominantly  Islamic, the home of the infamous Moors who held the Iberian peninsula for hundreds of years. And Islam is by no means restricted to Africa's north. Nor to that continent. The cities of Europe are filled with second and third generation followers. Look at Paris. Look at London.

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