Islam Explained by a Former Muslim - John Ghanim

We are not sure if Muhammad will go to heaven or not. So who is going to judge the living and the dead? Jesus Christ is coming back to judge the living and the dead. I believe Jesus will judge Muhammad.

So Muslims, think carefully, choose carefully who you're going to follow. You're going to follow the one who was a sinner, or you're going to follow the one who was without sin, Jesus Christ, and he's God. He's going back, he's coming back to judge the living and the dead, and he's going to judge Muhammad.

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John, welcome to the podcast. You used to be a Muslim, and you have quite the story of how you came to Christ and all of those things. There'll be a separate episode. People can check that out on this podcast. But now you're full-time in ministry. You're a missionary now. And we want to talk about in this episode about Islam. Like, what is Islam? What do Muslims believe? How can we as Christians interact well with Muslims and hopefully bring them to Christ? It's something you talk about quite a lot.

So give us a little bit of background of your story. Again, we have a whole episode on your story, so you don't need to go into detail, but tell us a little bit about yourself as we get into the topic. So my name is John Ghannim. I was born and raised in Yemen into a devoted Muslim family. My family taught me Islam. I grew up like I saw everyone around me was a Muslim.

I was married when I was 2012, when I was 18 years old. I went to the uni. I started business administration. I started to doubt about Islam. I get the opportunity to go to Mecca, Saudi Arabia, the most holy place of Islam and the capital. They call it the capital of Islam. And there, while I was facing Mecca, which they call it the house of Allah, I gave up Islam in front of Kaaba, in front of Mecca. And from there, I was agnostic or in a gray area for three years. Then after that, I became Christian in Greece at the end of 2017. And as you said, now I devoted my life to be a full-time missionary, full-time speaker, media evangelist.

So when we think of Islam, it's the fastest-growing religion in the world. And there is a lot to Islam and what Muslims believe. But if you could get to the core, what is at the core of Islam? What are Muslims striving for? So basically, if you look back to Islam from the very beginning, how Islam started, started by the founder of Islam, Muhammad. They called him the Prophet Muhammad. And he was in Mecca for a few years. He started to spread Islam. Nobody accepted him. He went to Al-Madina Al-Munawwara. It's in Saudi Arabia.

And they accepted him. Then after that, after they accepted him, he started an army. When he started an army force, so he went back to Mecca, his city where he was born. And then after that, at that time, they used to worship idols, more than 300 idols. And he destroyed all the idols with his army. And they called him, okay, we need now to worship Allah, which is the God in Islam, and the house of Allah in Mecca, which they call it the center of Islam. And after that, he started to build his army. He started to send his army to Yemen, to other countries. So that's how Islam spread by war.

And basically now how Islam is spreading, Muslims, they are allowed to get four wives and a lot of kids. I think most, I would say Islam is growing by birth. Not as much by conversion then. Like people think. I don't think so by conversion. I think by birth.

So you mentioned Muhammad. Can you tell me more about him? I mean, that's the critical figure in Islam, if I understand correctly. But yeah, is there more you can tell us about Muhammad? So in Islam, Muhammad, they believe, Muslims, they believe he's the last messenger of Allah. He's the final messenger. And Allah spoke to him through Gabriel and revealed to him the Quran in Arabic. And he created this Quran, the Holy Quran, which in Islam, they consider the Quran is the only book, the only revealed from Allah in Arabic.

And Muslims, they consider this is the Holy Quran. Even they treat it, they treat the Quran in a holy way. So they need, most of Muslims, like in my country, if you are holy, you can touch the Quran, the book of Quran. They put it in a very high place.

When they touch it, they need to do the rituals, the rituals before they, you know, clean their body, their parts. Then after that, they need to be ready to physically touch it because they call it holy. But you said they would believe that Allah gave it to Muhammad, but in Arabic. Is there something critical about it being in Arabic? Yeah, they believe it's only in Arabic. It's revealed in Arabic language, which I believed if you go back to the, there is a lot of people, you know, dig about this and find there is a lot of copies, different copies and how Arabic developed. And if you want to discover more about this, there is someone whose name is Jay Smith or David Wood or Hatun Tash.

Actually, she's a Turkish ex-Muslim in the UK. She got to Speaker's Corner and she discovered more than 30 copies. And every copy has a difference. There are so many differences. But in their mind, they believe it's only revealed from Allah. It wasn't written by man. It was revealed directly from Allah through Gabriel. Okay, not written by, not man's words. I mean, this is direct word for word. Yeah, Allah's book through Gabriel to Muhammad. Muhammad said it, tell it to people and people, you know, they wrote it. Yeah. But yet, so the Quran is very much revered as their holy book. Like if you could compare it to the Bible, is there similarities? Is there differences?

Because, okay, so one of the things you will hear is, oh, Islam is not that different from Christianity. It's, you know, all religions believe in God. It's really not a big deal. We can all, they're basically the same. How would you respond to that? So basically, if you compare the Quran to the Bible, the Bible came after, the Bible came before Quran.

And the Bible, we have the Old Testament and the New Testament. And we know we have evidence how they put it all together. And we believe that Yahweh, you know, spoke through people and people, you know, wrote the Bible. We understand from Genesis to Revelation. It's very in order, you know, a love story for humankind, a love story. But when you go to the Quran, the Quran is, I think it's mixed.

It's an order. It's when you read, you start to read from Quran and you can see because you will find, you know, Ibrahim, Noah, like most of the people in the Old Testament, you will find them in Quran. But it's disorganized.

Interesting. So it's not like a story then? No, it's different. There are stories, but in a different way. Like for me, when I was a Muslim, I used to love the story of Joseph. That was my favorite story before I sleep. I listened to it every day. I listened to the story of Joseph. It's like similar to the biblical story. But most of the stories in the Quran are a bit different because they, I believe, like now I am ex-Muslim.

The Quran wasn't from God. It was only written by Muhammad and his friends behind the scene. How they can go and search in Hadith and in the Islamic history, how Waraka ibn Nawfal helped Muhammad behind the scene. Because Waraka ibn Nawfal, he was not Muslim, but he spoke Greek, Hebrew, and other languages. And he was a cousin to the wife, the first wife of Muhammad, Khadija.

Khadija, she was a businesswoman. And when Muhammad started to receive the revelation, which I believe it's not a revelation, he was maybe sick or something, and he used to go to his wife, Khadija. And Khadija, he used to like put his head on his foot.

And this revelation will disappear because he started to shake, you know. Maybe it's a demon possessed or something like that. So she advised him, go to Waraka ibn Nawfal and he will help you with this problem. So we believed he went to Waraka ibn Nawfal and Waraka ibn Nawfal, he saw, wow, we can use this because he will be a great leader.

He will be a great leader. And this is how I believe this is how Islam started. They will not say this. They believe that Allah said Allah through Gabriel. But this is, I think, the real story behind the scene.

But you saying those things, you know, for any Muslims listening, that would probably be really offensive. Of course, yeah. You know, to say that of the Quran, to say it's not actually from God, you know, or to say those things against the prophet. Do you want to say anything about that? Oh, I would say if you really want to really follow the God, the one God, we will go to the Torah.

We will go back to the Torah, which is before Islam, before Muhammad, before Quran, and start to read from there and start to understand who is God, who is Yahweh, and how he revealed himself to Moses and to all the people in the Old Testament, and how he came to us through the New Testament, the new covenant.

But yes, like Muslims, unfortunately, they are stuck in Islam. As I said before, they are victims of Islam. They are brainwashed. Brainwashed. Because even like sometimes I see other Muslims from different nations, they don't speak Arabic because you need to read Quran in Arabic.

Yeah, so how does that work? Because not that many people in the world speak Arabic. I mean, as far as like the global population, it's not that many. So I'm thinking there's many Muslims in India, say, like they don't speak Arabic. So how do they read the Quran? So this is a question to Muslims. Like how, if Allah only revealed the Quran in Arabic, how Chinese will understand Allah? How Persian? I saw many people from Iran. They came to Christ, by the way, or they left Islam. Not necessarily they became Christians, but they left Islam. Why did you leave Islam? Because they don't understand the Quran. Because the Quran came to Arabs, to Arabic people.

He came in, Allah revealed the Quran in Arabic. They will say he's racist.

Yeah, seriously. I saw many people. They say, we can't read. We can understand. How are we going to follow him? Okay. So yeah, I guess, see, that would be very different than how Christianity does the Bible. Because the Bible, we have translations of it and you can read it. Yes. That's no problem, you know. But if, wow, I'm just trying to think how that would even work. Like, but now for you, you're from Yemen. So you would have. I speak Arabic. You spoke Arabic. So you wouldn't have run it. You wouldn't have had this challenge. Yes. I mean, because I was Arabic, I read it in the school with my parents, in the mosque, and it's for Arabs.

But even though when you, because it's classic Arabic, sometimes it's not easy to understand. So classic Arabic versus like what you would speak in everyday Arabic, those are different? Of course, different. Yeah. And I remember this is how I describe the Quran. Quran, when you read it in Arabic, it's really confusion. You can't understand it. Interesting. You can't understand. Why is that? One, because as I told you, you will find a little bit, a little bit of the story of Ibrahim in the first chapter, the mid-chapter, the end of the chapter. It's not like in order.

So you can't get the full picture. It's, yeah, disordered. So at its core, so we've hit a couple of the core pieces, you know, the Quran, you know, Muhammad, these different things. What about the five pillars of Islam? Those would be the other core pieces, am I right? Yeah, Arkan al-Islam, Shihada. Muslims, they will say, they will say the testimony of Islam, you know. When you become Muslim, when you convert people to Islam, they will say there is no God but Allah and Muhammad, the messenger of Allah.

That's the testimony or the Shihada, they call it the Shihada. So that's the first pillar, right? The first pillar, yeah. The first pillar. The second pillar is the Salah, when you pray five times a day. And when you pray, you have to recite the Quran in your heart in Arabic. And that's hard for the English-speaking or for the Chinese or for the Indians.

And the third is the Sawm, you know, Sawm, you fast, fasting. And Zakah, you give a charity. Muslims, they believe in charity. Like, is that like a tithe or a... Yeah, a kind of charity. What I would say they give because they want to earn their salvation. The more they give, they feel Allah will write it as a good deed.

So it's a big thing in Islam, charity. And to visit the most holy place of Islam, which is Mecca, Saudi Arabia, where I give up Islam, which gives me a lot of problems. No, lots of Muslims and imams doing videos against me. And some of them, they will say, oh, he's not a Jawun imam. It's a Photoshop. Yeah, some people, they say it's Photoshop. That you never went on the pilgrimage, you're saying. Yes, I've been there, but now... But they think it's fake. It's a, yeah, fake, because it's a thread.

Because I'm going to share, you can share my picture as well. So, oh yeah, absolutely. Send me the picture. We'll put it in the video, right? But the, the, so that's the last pillar of Islam is the pilgrimage, yeah, to Mecca. Well, tell me a bit more about that. So you did the pilgrimage to Mecca and you were also in Medina, if I understand right. Yeah, Medina is the grave of Muhammad, where they buried Muhammad and, yeah, some of his companions. So tell me why Mecca and Medina are so important. And then also tell me a little more of what happened for you when you did that pilgrimage as well. So, yeah. So Mecca is, is the Muslims, they will consider Mecca is the center of the earth.

And they will call it the capital of Islam, which every Muslim, at least they dream to go at least once in their lifetime to visit the most holy place. They believed it was built by Ibrahim, but I think there is no historic evidence for that. This is a really deep subject. I would invite the audience to go to listen to Jay Smith. He did a lot of research on this. I was going to say, yeah, I know Jay and some of his work on the history of it is really fascinating. It's pretty deep, you know. But yeah, which we need to make sure and link that because I'm guessing people have a lot of questions about that and want to, okay, tell me more, you know.

Okay, so that's, that's Mecca. What about Medina then? Because you visited there as well. Yeah, Medina, where Muhammad was accepted when he, because he preached, I think 13 years, he preached Islam in Mecca, but nobody accepted him at the beginning. Really? Yeah, they called him crazy. They called him crazy. Nobody accepted him. Then he traveled all the way to Medina. I think there are five hours by car between Mecca and Medina.

And in Medina, he was accepted, started his army, went back to Mecca. And in Mecca, people surrendered to him. And because he came by force, by sword, Jesus Christ, he came by love. Muhammad came by love, by sword.

And so you said in Medina, you said that's where he's buried then. That's the grave. Yes, that's, you know, they collect, there is a mosque and many Muslims, when they visit Mecca, they need to go as well to visit the grave of Muhammad in Medina.

It's follow-up with that. So he traveled all the way. I think now they have trains, maybe. So he traveled all the way to Medina. He visited the grave of Muhammad in the mosque. And so they collect at Masjid an Nabawi. So you did the pilgrimage, which is, again, one of the five main pillars of Islam. So this is an important, this is a big deal, you know. And yet what happened to you on that pilgrimage? Because if I remember, you know, this is where you mentioned, I mean, you started having some doubts, right? So tell us about that. So I was really excited when I went to Mecca, but I was, you know, seeking answers.

I wanted to have a spiritual relation with the Creator, Allah. If Allah is the Creator, I wanted to have a relationship with Him. But nothing happened. So in front of the Kaaba, I gave up Islam. Boom. Wow. That was crazy. That's probably not what you expected when you did the pilgrimage. Of course. Yeah. It wasn't even in my mind. Wow.

So that was like an adventure. But I'm really pleased it happened because now I am free and I can share. I encourage people as well to dare as well to do that because everybody has the right to freedom and everybody has the right to believe as well.

In my country, there are no human rights. There are no religious rights. There is no freedom, like freedom of speech or women's rights. We don't have that in Yemen or most of the Arabic countries. But I would say, I would advise everybody, you can do more than what I did as well. You can doubt, of course, because I believe Islam is not from Allah, not from God, not from the true Creator.

Because I believe now the Creator is Yahweh, the God of the Bible. So I'm from America, right? But in the West, you know, or maybe in Europe, you know, America, whatever, sometimes people have these ideas. They think of Muslims as, oh, they're terrorists or they think of war. You know, there's just a lot of war among the Muslims in the Middle East. What do you think of that when people maybe from my country who don't know any Muslims would think of the places you're from in that way? What would you say? I would say Muslims, they are human beings.

They are like me and you. And they are created, God created them in His image and He loves them. But they are victims of Islam. They are victims of Islam. Yes, Islam is aggressive, I would say. They will say, oh, some people, they will say Islam is the religion of peace. It's not the religion of peace. It's not the religion of war.

This is how it started. This is what Islam said, not me. Tell me more on that. The religion of war, you're saying this is what Islam says or is that in the Quran? Well, this is how when they came to my country, Yemen wasn't a Muslim country. They came by the sword. They converted Yemenis by the sword.

Convert to Islam or we're going to kill you. So Yemenis, they surrender. They become Muslims. Actually, they become radical Muslims. So this is how it started. The campaigns of Islam, the war, they went to different countries and they converted many, many countries through the sword, through the war.

So this is how Islam started, basically. So yeah, when you look into Muslims or from Arabic Muslims, they are human beings. They are very nice. They are very kind. They are, but some of them, yes, they are extreme radicals because they've been brainwashed.

But is that going to stop me from telling them the truth? No. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's not going to prevent me from telling them about the, that will give me more, that will give me more encouragement to tell them about the real God, the God of love. Because in Islam, Allah has 99 names without love. He's the merciful, the gracious, this, this, but without love. So of all 99 names, love is not in the list. Not in the list, yeah. Interesting. I didn't know that. That's interesting. Yes. And that's kind of sad. And in our God, our Bible, our God is the God of love. Yeah. And they can take for themselves.

Oh, that's a pretty distinct difference. Very. Which kind of comes back to something I mentioned earlier where some people are just like, oh, it's not a big deal. Bible, Quran, Allah, Jesus, Muhammad, they all, all paths will get you to heaven. It's no big deal. They're all the same. But you're describing some pretty major differences between these two religions, between Christianity and Islam. You want to talk more about that? Yes, of course. You know, in Islam, you have to do, it's a religion. It's a religion force, I would say.

It's, you have to do the rituals, you know, the five pillars, you know. And you have to pray, you have to fast, you have to earn your salvation, you know, every day. I remember like when I used to miss one prayer, you know, in the morning, I will, you know, feel guilty, you know, live the whole day with guilt because I missed the prayer.

Like fearful, scared, Allah will punish me, you know, under fear. But now when I came to Christ, He gave me freedom. He's my Father, He's my Savior, He's my Redeemer. He is, He redeemed. He said, it's finished. On the cross, what He said, He said, it's finished.

So if I believe in Him and I follow His teaching, I follow the teaching of the Bible, the New Testament, and the whole, actually the whole Bible, to read the whole Bible from Genesis to Revelation, you will understand more about God, the love story of God for me and for everybody. But if you read the Quran, this is why I describe the Quran. I'm sorry, Muslims, but I describe the Quran as confusion.

It's confusion. Many people, they get confused by the Quran because they don't understand. If you ask many leaders, many imams in, or scholars in Islam, because you have to have interpretation to the Quran, interpretation to interpretation, like layer upon layer, layer upon layer. You can't get the real meat straight away. But when you read the Bible, it's boom, you understand. It's very easy. You understand, you know, how God created, you know, about Adam and Eve, about the creation, the fall, and how God provided, how they try, you know, the Old Testament to do sacrifice through the animals.

And how Jesus Christ came as the Lamb of God. And He was crucified for, it's very like in order. But you don't have that in Islam. Even in Islam, they will say, because Muslims, they don't believe in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. They will mention Christ, but when it comes to Christ, interesting, they will not mention the crucifixion, the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So that's a big difference as well because this is our, this is the essence of Christian faith is the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

But in Islam, I will put it like this. In Islam, if you believe that Jesus Christ is God and He was died and rose again, you will go to hell. In Christianity, if you believe that Jesus Christ was crucified and on the third day He rose again and He's God, you will go to heaven. That's like a basic.

Okay, so when people are like, these religions are all the same, it's not really a big deal. I mean, you just described the most opposite thing that I can imagine, actually, right? Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. In one religion, if you say this, you're condemned. In the other religion, if you say this, you're saved. Yes. Whoa. I mean, those are as different as you can get. Which, as a Muslim, did that shock you when you realized that and converted to Christianity? Of course. When that changed, must have been huge. Of course, of course. When I started to read about Jesus Christ and I heard that when they start to preach that, you know, from the Bible that He was died for my sins and He rose again, why is, I need to know more about Him.

I need to read more about this Jesus Christ, why He died for me. So then I start to read and I came to the conclusion that He's real and He appeared in flesh as the Messiah and He redeemed me and He saved me from my sin.

So now He died on the cross for me. Now I have to carry His name and share His name with everybody and live a holy life because He's the holy God. He's without sin. So I'm going to go back to something you said earlier when you were talking about Islam and how maybe some in the West think about Muslims and terrorism and things like that. But then there's the other side where you have really progressive Muslims and they say, well, Islam is just a religion of peace and and all of these things. And you were just describing how it spread through warfare.

How would you respond to that, to those more, I guess, yeah, progressive or whatever Muslims who would say, oh, this is just a religion of peace and that, you know, you're wrong is what they would say. The Muslims who think that Islam is the religion of peace, I would ask them why I receive death threats every day. Why don't you leave me alone to live a peaceful life?

Hmm. And yeah, okay. And I would say to these people, because these people, they want to fit in any community or in any, you know, any society. But the real Islam, if you go to the course of Islam, you need to do jihad, jihad and to do da'wa and to live as a real Muslim, to do all the rituals and to go to fight the infidels because they consider Christians and Jews infidels and the non-believers, you know, from the West. They consider it. Actually, let me give you a verse.

It's the last revelation to Muhammad. They believed in, this is in the Quran. It's called a tawbah. So what is a tawbah? So Allah said to Muhammad through Gabriel, as they believe, this is through the Quran, go and kill anybody who doesn't believe in Allah and His messenger and the last day.

This is the final revelation from Allah to Muhammad. Whoa. So what do those Muslims say in response to that passage in the Quran where they would say, well, this is a religion of peace? How do they think of that verse then? They don't want the world to criticize them. They want to fit in because if they are in the West, they are a minority. But when they become majority, they will say, yeah, we need to apply this because they believe the Quran is the final revelation of God. So it's for all time. So if it's the Quran for all time, they should exercise that verse, yes? Hmm. But for some interpretation, they say the one who wants to say Islam is the religion of peace, they will say, well, that's in that time.

Okay, that's good if it's for that time. So that's good. But no, the majority of Islam, they would say, no, we should apply this. But because in the West, they are a minority, I think when they are more than 30%, we will see these verses will be applied in the West. I think it's already happening because now in the UK, Muslims, they are crying, they want Sharia law, you know, Sharia law to apply the Islamic law in, in, in because I am based in Europe and I see this in front of my eyes. And people in the West, they will say, oh, well, Islam is the religion, they believe Islam is the religion of peace.

Political correctness. No, it's not the religion of peace. It's the religion of war. If it's the religion of peace, why they, why they send media threats every day? Why? Why they, they, anybody who leaves Islam, they consider him apostate. And there is a death penalty for apostate.

There is a hadith in Islam, it says, whoever leaves Islam should be brought to death. So you, like, they would put you to death then because you left. So many people killed. So many ex-Muslims killed because they gave up Islam. So if you were to go home to your home country, back to Yemen, that's probably what would happen to you. They're going to skin me. Really? They're going to crucify me in Yemen. Wow. They're going to crucify me in front of everybody, public, because they're going to send a message to everybody. If you dare to do what John did, this is the result. Because this is, this is, this is the Islamic teaching. They want to put, they want to make them terrified.

They want to stop them from doubting about Islam or leaving Islam. This is how it works.

So we already touched on this briefly earlier, but Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world. Why is it growing so fast and should that concern us? They, because now, like there are migrants, like let's say in the UK, Yemenis came to the UK in 1860. 1860 came to the UK, you know, through the British colony. That's a long time ago, yes.

And when they came to the UK, they, they married British people, converted them to Islam. They brought their families from back in Yemen and they started their own communities with other communities from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, other countries. They started their own community and they are growing as well, as I said before, by birth. And they do as well, uh, they call it da'wa, evangelism, because they take advantage of the freedom of speech or freedom of religion. And this is why they, they want to use Islam as the religion of peace. So they can evangelize. They can call people to Islam. They are very smart and they have many techniques. Like if someone is lonely, especially the girls, if they are lonely and, um, uh, and they, they've been introduced to a Muslim family, this Muslim family, they will look after these, these girls or, uh, and they will give them feast, you know, because they are, you know, Middle East, they are like Abraham, you know, they like food, they make feast.

Mm-hmm. So, and they welcome everybody to their houses then. They start to tell them about Islam. Mm-hmm. And they told, especially girls, you should not cover your head, especially if their son's in love with this girl. Or if you want to marry him, you should cover your, uh, head. Mm-hmm. You should, uh, wear, uh, cover your body. Mm-hmm. Which this is, this is good things, but this is how they get them into Islam. Mm-hmm. A technique, there is a technique.

Mm-hmm. A technique through, through the culture. Mm-hmm. So I'm thinking of the Muslims that are listening to this. I'm sure there will be some. What would you say to them? Like you've said some things that are very counter to what Muslims would be taught, what you had been taught.

What do you say to those people? And especially thinking of how they might be reacting to some of the things you've been saying. Well, read, if you want to, um, to investigate Islam, read, because, uh, like I was born a Muslim, but I am allowed to question my faith. I am allowed to question who I am, what I'm doing on earth, and I don't have to, to be like my, my, my, my family.

I have free will. God created me in His image. And He gave me, uh, the freedom to choose. And, uh, I would encourage you to choose carefully. Choose carefully. Because if you want to be saved, if you want to go to heaven, 100%, not unsure, because I know you are not, you are not sure that you are going to heaven because you have to do all the Islamic prayers, all the Islamic rituals.

And at the end of the day, you don't know, because even Muhammad, he said, I don't know if I will go to heaven or not. Is that in the Quran or where? Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. He said, I don't know if Allah will accept me or not. Hmm.

That must be a little scary if you're a Muslim and you don't actually know. This is why Allah, you know, uh, Muslims, um, they always say, uh, Allah and His angels, they pray for Allah because of His sins.

He's a sinner. Hmm. So he, I, we are not sure if Muhammad will go to heaven or not. Hmm. So who is going to judge the living and the dead? Jesus Christ is coming back to judge the living and the dead. I believe Jesus will judge Muhammad. Hmm. So Muslims, think carefully. Choose carefully who you're going to follow. Hmm.

You're going to follow the one who, uh, who was a sinner? Or you're going to follow the one who was without sin, Jesus Christ and His God, He's going back, He's coming back to judge the living and the dead.

And He's going to judge Muhammad. Hmm. Yeah, wow. That makes you think. I've never thought of it like that before. So I'm going to, I'm going to ask the same question, but I'm now going to spin it the other direction. To those listening that aren't Muslims and they have, they've met Muslims, say they're, you know, they're listening to this podcast, they're Christians, but they don't really know how to speak to Muslims. Maybe they're intimidated or they're scared or they don't, they just, they don't know what Muslims believe. What would you say to those people listening? What advice would you give them as they interact with Muslims and, and try to point Jesus out to these people?

What would you say? I would say if you are a Christian, uh, live a radical life for the Lord Jesus Christ, and they will watch your life and tell them about, about the God of love, Jesus Christ, in the Bible. And they will see your life. They will see how, how you are, how you live, uh, a life, uh, which is pleasing the Lord, Jesus Christ. Because Muslims, they wake up every day and they pray.

It's in their, in their blood. And Christians, we should be radicals more than them. Hmm. Because it's not about, you know, how smart you are or you want to convince them. This is not our job. Just love them, accept them as they are. As you asked before, you know, people, they think they are like, uh, you know, terrorists.

No, Muslims, there is, yes, some of them, but some of them, they are nice people like me and like you. But they are a victim of Islam. They maybe they never heard about Jesus Christ because they always heard, uh, from their childhood about the, the corrupted Christianity. So you need to correct them. This is a great opportunity if you actually have a, uh, friends from a Muslim, from Islamic background. Mm-hmm. It's a great opportunity to show them the kingdom of heaven and the king of heaven, Jesus Christ. It's a great opportunity. Don't be scared. They are human like you.

They are the same race. They are from, they are from earth. They are from, they are not from a different planet. They are from the same earth. Yeah. Yeah. So you, yeah, you're encouraging us to be bold and courageous about what we believe. Yeah. Just be bold for the Lord. Share your faith. Don't be scared because they, this is what we see in the West. They are Muslims. They, you can go now to the streets. They share, they hand over the Quran in the street. They want to convert. They do da'wa, evangelism, Islamic evangelism. They are not scared because here in the West, it's the freedom of religious.

So they use it for their own benefits. So as Christians from the US, from the UK, from Europe, no, we should be radicals more than them. If we are ashamed of Jesus Christ, shame on us. Shame on me if I don't show Jesus Christ. And our duty is to love them and to share, to, to, to present Jesus because we are ambassadors to our king on earth. We are ambassadors to the king Jesus Christ.

And I think that's the piece about your story that has stood out to me and encouraged me more than anything is, is your boldness. And people can go listen to that at another episode, but in your story, you know, when you come to Christ and when you're not ashamed of that and you publicly say it, the cost for you was very high, you know, and the threats against your life even, you know, are, are intense. There's the, the, these aren't just words for you to say. And I think that's really important for our listeners to hear that, you know, sometimes there's a cost, but we should still be bold for what Christ has called us to.

I think that's the, you know, we can talk about Islam all, all day and how to reach Muslims, but in the end, if we're not courageous about who Jesus is in our lives, does that matter? Like, are we courageous for God? I think is the piece I'm learning here. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's, it's not only in, in the head, uh, information in the head. No, no, no, no, no, no. It's a real belief, a radical faith. We need to ask for radical faith and radical encouragement from the Lord to our lives so we can be bold for His name, bold for His kingdom every day. That's how we're going to win people and we will be an open book to them.

They will see our life. It's not got what you say as like your action as well. How you live. How you live your life, yes. How you live your life. And, uh, yeah, and I believe people, they will see that and they will start to question.

They will see the real Christianity because now many people from the Middle East, they see Christianity is corrupted. They see what is, what is on TV, what is on, you know, this, uh, bad things, happening, you know, uh, that's not Christianity. No, Christianity is in the Bible, not is the one in the TV on the street or these clubs or no, no, no, no, no, no. It's read the Bible and you will understand who's Jesus Christ. Mm-hmm. And, uh, because this is, uh, in Arabic, we, we said Kitab al-Haya, the book of life.

Hmm. Yeah, the Bible. We call it Kitab al-Haya, the book of life. So this is for my life. Mm-hmm. Because Jesus Christ, He says, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Mm-hmm. So my life belongs to Jesus Christ. Mm-hmm. He's in me and I am in Him. Mm-hmm. So I should live a radical life, a holy life for Him. It's not easy, but it's worth it. Mm-hmm.

And, uh, for me, like, especially you mentioned about persecution. Persecution may make me more mature in my faith. Mm-hmm. You know, and this sounds crazy. I love persecution. Mm-hmm. I love persecution because persecution is from the Bible. Mm-hmm. It's not from John, Ghanin.

It's not from Mm-hmm. Christians. It's from the early church, from Jesus Christ. It came from what Jesus Christ bought to the on the cross and He was died. They persecuted Him. So persecution is for everybody. Mm-hmm. You've given us a lot to think about in this episode, John. Mm-hmm. Wow.

Mm-hmm. Be bold for Jesus, but also know that there, there may, you know, there will be a cost. Yeah, you're you might be, uh, killed for your faith. Yeah. Wow. And that in the West is not happening yet, but it's much, it's my, maybe it's coming. My question is to the churches, to the leaders, are you ready? Mm-hmm. Are you ready for persecution? Mm-hmm. This is my question for everybody. Mm-hmm. For me, Jesus commanded us in Matthew 28, if you die, uh, don't fear the one who killed the body, but fear the one who can destroy the body and the sword and both them and inhale fire. Mm-hmm. So are we ready for persecution or not?

Or we are living a comfortable life. We have everything. Mm-hmm. And we bought God second, third. Mm-hmm. No, God is everything. Jesus is everything in our life. Then the rest it's come after. Mm-hmm. John, thanks for sharing with us today and for your example of boldness in the face of adversity and those who would not want you to speak what Christ has done in your life. So, wow, given us a lot to think about. Thank you for sharing today. Of course. And pray for me that I will be, you know, I will live a holy life, uh, for Him, a living testimony every day. It's not just, you know, one event. No, it's every day.

Every day. If you found this interview with John interesting, check out the first one we did with him where he tells his whole story of how he left Yemen and eventually leaves Islam and finds Christianity. And you can find that linked in the description down below. You can find all our content on our website at anabaptistperspectives.org and make sure you're subscribed on your favorite podcast app. Thanks again for listening and we'll see you in the next episode.