Discerning Spiritual Realities in Islamic Contexts: Missional Reflections of a Boring Charismatic | The Religious Other (Langham 2020)

In this post I would like to introduce a chapter of mine in the recent book published by Langham, The Religious Other: A Biblical Understanding of Islam, the Qur'an and Muhammad.

This chapter is titled, “Discerning Spiritual Realities in Islamic Contexts: Missional Reflections of a Boring Charismatic.” And yes, I did just start my own denomination. Let me know if you also want to join the Boring Charismatics.

From the introduction:

“Islam is not a religious system. It is an actual spiritual being that holds people in bondage. Pray with me to break the Spirit of Islam!” exclaimed the conference speaker to begin a time of corporate prayer. The clear implication of his statement was that Muslims everywhere are imprisoned by the same malevolent force and all suffer the identical demonic oppression. And yet, are there other ways to think of the spiritual conflict in ministry to Muslims? Merely asking such a mitigating question often leads to accusations of “minimizing truth” and failing to engage the “dark side of Islam.” So, how do we discern the spiritual realities in Islamic contexts?

Since 9/11, Islam has frequently been denounced by evangelicals as demonic and inherently violent. Within the evangelical community the opening quotation is neither an isolated incident nor even a particular rarity. Especially in the American context, demonization of Islam spans three centuries and finds deep roots in American history. This kind of spiritualizing of a religion’s adherents is often absent when considering Buddhists, Hindus or Mormons. There are historical and political reasons that explain these tendencies, but my purpose here is not to explore these.

Evangelicals who serve within a Muslim context frequently report confrontations with the occult and demonic oppression. Subsequently, there are many extraordinary stories of healing and miraculous divine intervention. Theological hermeneutics and denominational traditions play a large role in shaping practical responses to spiritual conflict, but again, a discussion of these issues goes beyond the scope of this chapter. It is all too easy to get caught in the philosophical/theological crossfire: colleagues of mine who minister in the “signs and wonders” camp claim I am not charismatic enough, while coworkers on the other side of the spectrum accuse me of being too supernaturally oriented. In finding my own place in these issues, I classify my personal theological stance on spiritual gifts and supernatural conflict in mission as that of a “boring charismatic.” I do believe in all the supernatural gifts (although I’m still waiting for mine!), but I’m adverse to the sensationalism that often follows contemporary charismatic movements.

So rather than discuss the practical implications of supernatural ministry among Muslims, my emphasis in this chapter is more fundamental and pertains to our biblical theology of Islam. I will focus on the nature of the spiritual conflict in Islamic contexts. Does the spiritual conflict stem from Islam itself – as an evil spiritual covenant or as an actual demonic entity masquerading as a religion? In what ways are the evil, supernatural powers in Islamic contexts essentially different when compared with other religious traditions? Are military metaphors appropriate for conceptualizing our ministry to Muslims? What exactly are the spiritual realities we face in the Christian-Muslim encounter?

In this chapter, I hope to demonstrate how a biblically-grounded approach to spiritual conflict (and to the “religious other”) can make us more discerning and, in turn, fruitful in our missiological encounter with Muslims.

I continue this with the following sections:

• Spiritual Profiling?
• Ordinary Muslim Piety
• Sources of Spiritual Conflict in Islamic Contexts
• Idolatrous Loyalty and Spiritual Oppression
• Beyond Military Metaphors for Mission

This is one of the most challenging pieces I have written on ministry to Muslims, but I believe it is one of the most important and unique contributions I have made. There is a lot in here I wish I would have known 20 years ago.

From the conclusion:

I identified as a “boring charismatic” in this chapter for two main reasons. First, my charismatic emphasis denies the rose-colored lens and affirms the reality of oppressive supernatural conflict among Muslims wherein special gifts and persons are sometimes required to deal with these realities. Secondly, I am “boring” because I avoided the gray lens and the sensationalistic claims that Islam is either some extreme case or a monolithic, evil conspiracy against Christianity.

Understanding the various spiritual realities in Islamic contexts is an exercise in biblical discernment. We seek to relate to Muslims, not under the triumphal metaphor of war and empire, but as people who are very similar to who we once were, including many of the same idolatry and spiritual issues. We must also become sensitive to the temptation of spiritually stereotyping all Muslims or of imagining the activity of Satan at greater or lesser degrees in Islamic contexts compared to all others.

Worship of God outside of Christ and an ultimate faith allegiance to anything other than Jesus opens everyone to spiritual oppression which is especially devastating for those who have not been given the Holy Spirit. In light of this, we proclaim the highest and only hope for Muslims: Jesus! Through faith in him alone we find the freedom we so desperately need. May God grant us the grace, wisdom and perseverance to minister with unwavering trust as we joyfully proclaim the liberating gift of the powerful gospel: “If the Son sets you free, you will be freed indeed” (John 8:36).

Buy the book and read the whole chapter here.

Introducing Hermeneutical Hinges: How Different Views of Religion and Culture Impact Interpretations of Islam | The Religious Other (Langham 2020)

I’m excited to let you know about our new book, The Religious Other: A Biblical Understanding of Islam, the Qur'an and Muhammad which released in December 2020. Here is the book description:

We live at a time when religious diversity has become a fact of life in our globalized societies. Yet Christian engagement with Muslims remains complex, complicated by fear, misunderstanding and a history fraught with political and cultural tensions. These essays, drawn from the 2018 and 2019 Middle East Consultations hosted by the Arab Baptist Theological Seminary's Institute of Middle East Studies, engage the need for a carefully developed theological understanding of Islam, its origins and its sacred text. Weaving together the work of Christian scholars of Islam, the Bible, theology and missiology, along with the insights of ministry practitioners, this book combines scholarly exploration with pertinent ministry practice, offering a rich framework for the church to continue its conversation about its engagement with Muslim communities and its proclamation of Christ worldwide.

I have contributed three chapters in the volume; two of them are new. In this post I would like to highlight my essay in section 5.3, “Hermeneutical Hinges: How Different Views of Religion and Culture Impact Interpretations of Islam.” Here is my introduction.

As Martin Accad has proposed, “Your view of Islam will affect your attitude to Muslims. Your attitude will, in turn, influence your approach to Christian-Muslim interaction, and that approach will affect the ultimate outcome of your presence as a witness among Muslims.” I would like to add a more foundational layer to this proposal, namely, that your understanding of religion and culture will affect your view of Islam. In other words, your view of Islam inevitably hinges upon your approach to religion and culture, and specifically, the relationship between the two.

In this article, I would like to show how these ideas play out in the missiological discourse of ministry to Muslims. In the interest of space, I will not focus on a theology of religion (although the discerning reader will see hints of it throughout). Instead, I will focus on the more basic concepts of religion and culture. As we will see, the contemporary debate concerning approaches of ministry to Muslims is complex, and different presuppositions about culture and religion can lead to drastically different understandings of Islam.

The chapter continues with the following sections:

• Culture: Secular, Evil or Theological?
• Religion: Western Invention, Belief System, or Subset of Culture?
• Epistemological Perspective: Top-Down or Bottom-Up?
• Form and Meaning: Equated, Separate, or Corresponding?
• Islam: Cultureligion or Religiolatry?

My approach in this essay offers examples from missiology where different answers to the above questions will take you in diverse directions as you interpret “Islam.”

Here is my final section, Concluding Reflections: Getting Comfortable with Ambiguity:

We are unlikely ever to reach a consensus on a proper biblical theology of religion and culture. With the publication of Christ and Culture in 1951, Niebuhr called this issue an “enduring problem” for the Church through the ages. While we can make some general clarifications, as I have done here, it seems to me that many of these issues can’t be solved at the abstract, theoretical level. There is simply too much knowledge rooted in experience and context making the issues extremely difficult to evaluate in a historically “Western” way, i.e. in the realm of ideas.

Interestingly, during the infamous Jerusalem Council in Acts 15, the assembled reflected on the experience of God’s work among them. A next step in this discussion would be to put approaches of ministry to Muslims in dialogue with the Muslim and MBB experience of Islam (religion? culture? both?), which, as we already know, varies. I am very sympathetic to the charge that this discussion has been dominated by Western voices. And yet I find that non-Westerners and MBBs have similar discussions and similar disagreements around these concepts as well.

Still, we may offer some concluding critiques of the discussion. Many of the approaches to contextualization surveyed here assume that Muslims are practicing, not nominal, Muslims. In my experience, however, many Muslims, if they are practicing at all, use Islamic piety to keep God at a distance, either because they are afraid of punishment or because he is seen as unknowable. A Muslim friend once told me he was looking forward to eternity in Paradise, because in heaven, there “was no more worship.” For him, heaven was a man-centered place of sensual indulgence; God was present only in theory.

Additionally, Muslims do not all share the same attachment to Islam. It should go without saying, that, depending on the context, sometimes you do not have to do anything according to the context! Many Muslims do not desire to follow Christ in ways that are culturally or religiously familiar to them, although some indeed do. And yet, the Gospel has all too often been presented in Western forms, causing it to be rejected as foreign. While this may partially explain some of the tension in our discourse, it does not explain all the historical reasons for the resistance to the gospel in Muslim lands. In some Muslim contexts, there is often a very strong connection between form and meaning. For many Muslims and MBBs, some of the forms are linked with meanings that are nearly impossible to modify.

On the other hand, the automatic equation of form and meaning practically villainizes particular Islamic cultures. For mission in a postcolonial world, we must ensure that our theology of Islam does not speak pejoratively of Muslims and Islamic cultures. Unfortunately, Evangelicals have a long history of failing to obey the Golden Rule of Ethics, “Do to others what you would have them do to you” (Matt 7:12). If we understand Christianity as a religious system, we can also demonstrate that “Christianity” has (at numerous times throughout history) done evil things seemingly rooted in the demonic. Does this also mean that “Christianity” has a demonic source? Furthermore, if God saves us from our culture (as some maintain), to what culture do we turn? What is “Christian” culture? Answers only add to the ambiguity.

So, how can we understand Islam? Islam is a process of “meaning-making,” undertaken by Muslims as they interact in their context with the revelation (according to their tradition) given to Muhammad. Islam includes diverse cultural traditions, access to social networks, a sense of belonging with others, and rituals and ceremonies. Phrases such as “leaving Islam” or “remaining in Islam” are often too vague to be meaningful and can actually be confusing in discipleship. For some, “leaving Islam” could mean that a Muslim who comes to Christ must also leave his culture and community, while for others, “remaining in Islam” could mean it is automatically permissible to participate in Islamic rituals. Issues of socioreligious identity are not always clear either. What does a “Muslim” or a “Christian” identity mean within a specific setting? Answers vary with contexts. When we look at Muslim contexts, Islam is not all we see; it is one strand in the braided rope of Muslim societies.

Finally, we haven’t discussed other important issues, such as the nature of the Kingdom of God, the Church, and the gospel. These are also disputed concepts in evangelical missiology. Although we might not agree, and although we need to become more comfortable with ambiguity and messiness, we should still strive for as much Christocentric clarity as possible as we witness to Muslims in diverse contexts. Let us not forget the command to love one another and to love the religious other as we make disciples of Jesus among all nations.

Buy the book and read the whole chapter here.