History of Islam: Part 1

Good day to each and every one of you.

I'm Brother James, and I greet you once again in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.

I welcome you once again to the preaching of the cross radio broadcast, and we may as well get right to the point.

No sense in waiting any longer.

Are you genuinely, are you truly born again?

Are you born again?

Jesus Christ did not say ye must be a Baptist.

He never said that.

Jesus Christ did not say ye must be a Catholic.

He did not say that.

Jesus Christ never said ye must be a Methodist, you must be a Presbyterian.

He never said you must be a Muslim.

Jesus never said you must be a Buddhist.

I couldn't care less how many churches you belong to.

I don't want to hear about your holy pilgrimage.

I don't want to hear about your sacraments.

I want to know have you been born again?

Jesus said, I didn't say it.

Jesus said, it's not my opinion.

Jesus said, ye must be born again.

The Bible says in the book of Psalms that the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament showeth his handiwork.

Young, the sayer, the soothsayer, said, By night an atheist half believes in God.

The Quran says, Do you then need a sign to believe in God the Eternal when all creation is filled with his signs?

It's not a hard thing to know that there's a God.

Everyone born into this world knows and believes in the depths of their heart that there is a God.

They may be educated out of that belief.

They may be deceived into abandoning that belief.

But everyone begins with a belief in and a faith in God.

Now, if they will allow that faith in God to carry them in their heart to the revelation of God in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, to God's manifestation of Himself in a body of flesh, then they can be, that man, that woman, that boy, that girl can be born again and receive everlasting life.

You see, it's not even enough to believe in God.

The devils believe in God.

Satan believes in God.

No, you must put your faith and your trust in God's own Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Bible says in John chapter 1, and verse number 1, in the beginning was the word, capital W, that's a person.

John 1 · chapter mention

And the Word, capital W, that's a person, was with God, and the Word, capital W, that's a person, was God.

The same was in the beginning with God.

All things were made by Him.

This person called the Word, He made all things, and without Him was not anything made that was made in Him was life.

So there's nothing that exists apart from this person called the Word, and there's no life apart from this person called the Word.

In him was life, and the life was the light of men.

And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not.

The Bible says in verse number six, there was a man sent from God whose name was John.

The same came for a witness to bear witness of the light, capital L.

That's a person, that all men through him might believe.

The same came for a witness to bear witness of the light, capital L, capital L.

He was not that light, capital L, but was sent to bear witness of that light, capital L, that was the true light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

Oh, he was in the world, the Bible says in verse 10, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.

He came unto his own, and his own received him not, but as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God.

There's a second birth, a new birth, even to them that believe on his name, which were born.

See, we gotta have a second birth, a new birth, not of blood, nor the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God.

And the word, capital W, was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld the glory, his glory, we beheld his glory.

The glory is of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

Verse 18, no man hath seen God at any time.

The only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.

Now, there's a great argument today.

Is Jesus Christ the way?

Or is he one way among many?

That's the great argument.

The holy Bible, the holy scriptures, God's word says.

I'm going to tell you what God's Word says.

Verse number nine.

Jesus Christ was the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

Every man in the Middle East, every man in the Far East, every man in the United States, every man in Saudi Arabia, every man in India, every man in Australia.

Jesus Christ is the one and only, the one and only true light, which lighteth every man, every man that cometh into the world.

Now, if you want light, if you want life, you are going to have to get that light and get that life from the Lord Jesus Christ.

He said in John 14 and verse 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no man cometh unto the Father but by me.

I understand that there are those who believe, in fact, millions who believe that after the Lord Jesus Christ another came along, who was a prophet every bit as grand, perhaps even greater, than Jesus Christ.

And these men and women, millions of them, have opted to follow this newcomer in place of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now Jesus said in his words that there would be some who would come in his name and would say that he was the Christ.

They would say, He said, but others come in his own name and say that I am Christ.

They don't deny that Jesus was Christ, the Messiah, the Savior, but they just ask you to abandon him and follow them as some uh some Johnny come lately new prophet.

And Jesus said, Don't go after them, don't follow them.

Stay with me.

I'm the way, I'm the truth, I am the life, and no man cometh unto the Father but by me.

Now I've got to ask you a question.

In in light of this truth, what then is Mohammedanism?

You don't hear that word too much anymore.

That's that's the former designation for the followers of Islam, the Islamic faith or religion.

They tried to move away from this notion that they're followers of Mohammed, because that doesn't set too well with people in the Western world who have so long held and understood that Jesus Christ was the way.

But what is the faith that has created the Muslim world with its millions of followers and adherents?

It's the opinion of historians that only for the check of Charles Martel, only his victory over Muslim armies in the Battle of Tours kept the Muhammadans from conquering the civilized world.

And had it not been for that battle, today we would all be among the countries that follow the faith of Islam, or who have died as martyrs for the cross of Jesus Christ.

The pages of human history run red with the blood of men, millions of men who have lost their lives in the age-old conflict between the Muslims and free people, the invasions of Spain and France, the crusades to recover the uh the holy land, the setting up of the capital of Islam at Constantinople, the recapture of Jerusalem from the Muslims in the First World War, and then the current day uh battles around the globe.

As the Muslims continue to wage war against the capitalists, and the capitalists continue to fight back in order to hold on to their uh imperial uh territories.

But we want to consider the tragic events so that we might come face to face with Muhammad himself, and to place before our listeners the tenants of this faith which declares all non-believers to be infidels and consigns all Christians to eternal damnation, and that uh quite honestly manifests a fanaticism hitherto unknown among any religious believers save those small handfuls of uh zealots that have risen up throughout the ages, but they've been very few in number.

So let's first of all consider this man Mohammed.

Fourteen hundred years ago, he stood in the turmoil of a chaotic world.

Barbarism was raging about him, savagery, murder, robbery, pestilence, idol worship, a camel driver on the edge of the desert, with no friends, no money, abandoned by his family, his life sought by enemies who had sworn to kill him.

There he stood alone, his fierce dark eyes, gazing far out across the burning sands and dreary wastes of the Arabian deserts.

All about him civilizations had risen in dazzling splendor, only to fall in ruin and decay.

Mighty Egypt with its thousand and one gods had come and gone.

Assyria with its nameless uh demonic idols had risen and fallen.

Persia the magnificent was magnificent no more.

The glory that was Greece and the grandeur that was Rome were now but memories.

Only Judaism, with its one God and Christianity, with its Jesus Christ, the Son of God, stood like gleaming torches in the desolation about him.

But even these were struggling for existence against the pagans.

Out of this welter of confusion rose the voice of the outcast, the camel driver who could neither read nor write, a voice upon which one of the world's mightiest empires was to rise, and a great religious faith was to be founded, which would enfold entire nations and peoples within its tremendous power.

Allah Akbar, God is great.

There is but one God, the only God, and I, Muhammad am his prophet, his last and final messenger to man.

That was the statement.

But could anyone be made to believe it?

Now just look for a moment, think for a moment, upon this strange figure, this camel driver, who claimed not to be divine, but a man among men directly inspired from Almighty God to convey to the world the last and final revelation of the will of God toward man.

A prophet, an apostle, who at the end of three years had found but thirteen followers, and at the end of thirteen years but three hundred followers, but who lived to wage war with fire and sword until he had conquered all enemies and was hailed ruler of his nation.

The people of whom for centuries to come were to wage their holy wars against the infidels until today the followers of Muhammad number in the millions.

Who is this guy?

Why, even the calendar of these peoples dates and calculates all time, from the year of this man's entrance as a sovereign into Medina.

Take a look at the man.

Washington Irving described him as a man of middle stature, square built and sinewy, with large hands and feet.

Muhammad, in his youth, was uncommonly strong and vigorous.

His head was capacious, well shaped, and well set on a neck which rose like a pillar from his ample chest.

His forehead was high, broad at the temples.

He had an oval face, marked in expressive features, an aquiline nose, black eyes, arched eyebrows, which nearly met, a mouth large and flexible, indicative of eloquence, very white teeth, somewhat parted and irregular, black hair which waved without a curl on his shoulders, and a long and very full beard.

Carlyle said he was a man of truth and fidelity, a solid, brotherly, genuine man, a serious, sincere character, yet admirable uh amiable, cordial, uh even known to have a good laugh at at times.

We hear of Muhammad's beauty, of his fine, honest face, his dark brown complexion, his beaming black eyes, and uh that's his looks.

He was a spontaneous man, a passionate man, yet yet just, a true meaning fellow.

He was full of uh wild fire and light.

He worked out his life task in the depths of the desert.

What's Muhammad's claim?

What is Mohammedism?

Well, this man claimed to be the last prophet.

He said he was in the direct line of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, and Jesus.

Something of a Joseph Smith character, just a few centuries earlier.

He did not claim himself to be God or to be divine, but only divinely inspired.

He insisted that his coming was foretold in the Gospel of John.

In chapter sixteen and verse seven, the Bible says, John sixteen and verse seven, nevertheless I tell you the truth, it is expedient for you that I go away, for if I go not away the comforter will not come unto you, but if I depart I will send him unto you.

Now the fact that this promise of Jesus Christ was fulfilled before his ascension into heaven forty days after his resurrection from the dead, and the fact that if Muhammad's bogus claim were true, that Jesus left his followers for centuries with no comforter ought to make it obvious to any right thinking individual that Muhammad could not at the same time claim to believe the Bible and yet so mishandle the simple words of Jesus Christ as to make himself the fulfillment of the promise of a comforter.

Now the Muslims believe that there have been from one hundred to two hundred and fifty thousand prophets since the time of Adam, though no one cares to name the two hundred and fifty thousand.

They believe all of these were sent by God to instruct and save mankind.

Of these, six are of the first rank.

These are top of the line prophets.

Those named above, Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and of course Muhammad.

There are three hundred and thirteen prophets of the next highest rank.

These are called apostles, who were sent on special missions to save man from various errors.

Islam differs from the Christian and the Jewish religions mainly in the claim that Muhammad is God's ambassador.

Although it admits both Jesus and Moses were earlier prophets, sent to warn their peoples, but that these are now irrelevant with the coming of Muhammad.

The fundamentals of Islam have been succinctly set forth by von Keller.

He summed them up quite well nearly one hundred years ago.

Islam signifying resignation or submission to the will of God is really one of the simplest religions in the world.

It can be encompassed in just a few paragraphs or a few main points.

Number one, there is but one God, and Muhammad is his ambassador and prophet.

So you've got to start there.

The fact that the Islamic religion believes in one God is a good thing, but that that is not a separate statement of faith in and of itself.

It is half of the foundational statement of the Islamic religion, and you cannot accept the one true God and reject that Muhammad is his prophet and be in agreement with the tenets and principles of the Islamic faith.

Number two, paradise is reserved for those who believe the aforementioned statement.

So you cannot enter paradise unless you believe that Muhammad is God's one true prophet or last and final prophet.

Number three, hell is for all those who refuse to believe it.

Now you've got to see that there cannot be a mutual agreement or common faith shared by Christians and Mohammedans.

One says that Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven, and that if you don't believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, you'll go to hell.

The other says that belief in Muhammad is the only way to paradise, and if you don't believe on Muhammad, then you will go to hell.

We've got two different saviors here.

These are the duties of the Muslim first.

First, number one, to acknowledge that there is but one God.

Allah Tahalla, God the Most High, and Muhammad his prophet.

Number two.

The prayer repeated five times daily with a face toward Mecca.

In Muslim cities the Muzim calls the prayer from the minarets of the mosques as follows.

God is great.

That's repeated four times.

I bear witness that there is no God but God.

That's repeated twice.

I bear witness that Muhammad is his prophet.

That's repeated twice.

Come hither to prayers twice.

Come hither to salvation twice.

God is great.

There is no other God but God.

There's no communion, there's no fellowship, there's no interrelationship.

There's no God dwelling with man and man dwelling with God.

There's no fellowship, no walking with God as Enoch did.

Just the vain repetition of this empty, meaningless prayer five times a day.

And number three, to fast every day in the month, Ramadan, from dawn to sunset.

In other words, skip lunch.

Every day for a month, once a year.

Number four, to give one fortieth of all possessions yearly to the poor.

Now that's not a dime on a dollar.

That'd be one tenth.

That's uh two and one half cents on a dollar.

So uh some of you Christians may or professing Christians aren't really born again.

You may want to switch to Islam right away since you uh don't like that tithing business.

Number five, to make at least one pilgrimage to Mecca, where one million or more people, two million, three million, five million people, gather in a city for a week with no restroom or plumbing facilities, and call that a holy gathering.

Just just trying to give you something to think about.

Now there's seven important dates in the life of Muhammad.

Number one, he was born in Mecca, June eighth, A.D.

570.

He announced himself as prophet in 612 AD.

No angelic announcement, no heavenly host, no spirit of God descending like a dove.

Muhammad just said, Here I am, believe me.

He fled from enemies to Medina, the uh Hegra, H E G I R A in 622.

He defeated his enemies at Koryish, 623 to 625.

He waged war against Christians and defeated them at Muta in 629.

He was acknowledged as sovereign in 630, and he died June 8, on his birthday, it's believed, in 632.

You're probably curious as to when he rose from the dead.

Well, he didn't.

You're probably curious as to when he walked out of the tomb.

He didn't.

You're probably curious as to how the stone was rolled away to reveal the empty tomb and how Muhammad appeared to his disciples and showed himself alive by many infallible proofs.

But he didn't.

What this uh Muslim religion teaches is in its book called the Quran.

But the Quran has been as widely and variously interpreted as has been the Bible.

How it developed into its tremendous proportions we're going to cover in in subsequent broadcasts.

We can't do it today.

But suffice it to say that Muhammad is a replacement for and a substitute for the Lord Jesus Christ.

And were that not enough, Muhammad's followers have waged war against and sought to kill those who claim to be followers of the Lord Jesus Christ.

I must remind you that the Bible says, Jesus Christ speaking, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no man cometh unto the Father but by me.

That's what he said.

Now, if in the line of Muslim prophets Noah followed Adam, you must find where Noah told his followers to reject and disbelieve what was given to them by Adam and he did not.

If Abraham followed Noah, you must find where Abraham told his followers to reject and disbelieve what was given them by Noah and he did not.

Moses followed Abraham.

He did not tell his followers to reject or disbelieve what was given them by Abraham.

Jesus followed Moses.

He did not tell his followers to reject or disbelieve what had been given them by Moses.

And yet here comes this fellow Muhammad, and he wants to claim to be next in line, and then call upon you to reject what was said and taught by Jesus Christ.

My friend, in that very act, Muhammad revealed himself to be of a very different line indeed.

There's only one way to heaven.

That way is Jesus Christ.

Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.

There's no other salvation, because there is no other Savior.

Well, we'll have to take up there next time.

On the next broadcast, God willing, we are going to consider how the world of Islam was created, and we'll consider the prophet of the sword.

That'll be next time.

If you can't be with us and you'd like a copy of this study on Cassette Recording, we'll be glad to send it to you.

Our mailing address is 872 Glenwood Road, Deland, Florida 32720.

All right, that's all the time we've got for today.

Until the next time, I'm Brother James.

May the Lord richly bless you, and good day.

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Until next time, and throughout eternity, may Jesus Christ be praised.