look up your salvation draweth nigh
Come Lord Jesus.
OK. so some see these dreams and convert to Christianity. Then what? Muslims don’t seem to like it when other muslims leave the faith. Executions, torture. Yeah, great things are happening in the middle east. :-)
See the comments of Turkish pastor Fikret Bocek, here
Whenever I am in the US people in different churches tell me that thousands of Muslims are converting through dreams and visions. Some missionaries here are exaggerating the situation when they tell their tales in their own countries. Some missionaries even encourage each other to look look for those stories in Turkish villages where dreams are shared in public gatherings with some folk tales…etc. I have even seen some missionaries asking Muslim converts whether they remember seeing an old man in their dreams! And encouraging a form of deception. I don’t see people converting through dreams or visions here in Turkey. I have heard some people dreaming about an old man with white beard. Old man with white beard is common among the Muslim Arab, Iranians and Shamanistic Turkish cultures. When you encourage people to talk about their dreams they will tell you stories. But Christians should abandon this practice. How can Muslims repent without the preaching of the Word? How can a Muslim become a Christian after seeing an old man in his/her dream without knowing anything about Christ’s substitutionary atonement?
While you're there, listen to the interview with him here. It's very encouraging.
I’m hoping they’ll have visions of Jesus with a Ruger 44 in one hand and a Louisville Slugger in the other!
Bring it!
I bet those conversions are liberating experiences. Just the ignorance dropping off would be exhilarating. Thank you Jesus!
And occasionally via an apparition or two.
On an highly emotional spiritual level there has been a great common-ground meeting place between Rome and Mecca in the town of Fatima in Portugal. To quote a Catholic news organization, "Our Lady of Fatima is really Fatima, daughter of the Prophet Mohammed." On October 23, 1995, Iranian television began running stories that the apparitions in Fatima, Portugal in 1917 were religious phenomena of Muslim origin.” Islam teaches that men can achieve favor with God by what a person does. On the Fatima site in Portugal May 13th 2000, the Pope proclaimed a message that could be readily accepted by both Muslims and Catholics. “‘Pray, pray much and make sacrifices for sinners; many souls go to hell because they have no one to pray and make sacrifices for them’....”
-- From the thread The Papacy and Islam
Gotta watch chewing too much Kat, Achmed.
‘Sides, as a Muslim you should be dreamin’ about boys and goats, shouldn’t you?
Back in 1994, I traveled to Israel to teach a programming class at an Intel facility in Haifa. The day before the class, I was hosted by a Christian Arab leader (not a Muslim convert) by arrangement with a University in the US. Prior to this, I had received a number of fascinating letters from the Jesus Film Project about this very phenomenon of Muslims becoming Christians due to a vision of Jesus.
After driving me all over Galilee, up into the Golan Heights and beyond that into a Druze village overlooking Mt. Hermon in Syria, he took me back to my hotel. A few nights later I visited his home to help him set up email. On the way back to Haifa that night, he told me a story about a newspaper account in the Haifa (Jewish) paper of a Muslim woman who had been admitted to a Jewish hospital in Haifa with cancer. According to the paper she reported having a vision of Jesus, was healed by Him and became a Christian. Note: I was blown away by this because I had not previously told him about the Jesus Film Project letters I had received.
My problem was that no Christian had been involved and I thought that God always uses believers to spread the Gospel.
When I got back to the states, my pastor (at that time) had me recount this story in all of the services one Sunday. Between two of the services, a person who was a missionary to the Philippines told me that there was a group of Christians there who were specifically praying that God would reveal Himself to Muslims in dreams because Muslims consider dreams to be authoritative. They also believe that demons cannot masquerade as prophets (e.g. Jesus) in dreams.
This appears to have been going on now for decades. Yes, many of these people are connecting up with Christian ministries (e.g. the Jesus Film Project, radio stations, etc.)
“I met a man yesterday who said he saw a Jesus dream and he didn’t know what to do with it, so he got deeper into his Muslim faith,” Doyle said. “Then he went to Mecca on the hajj, and on the first time around the Kabah, he saw a vision of Jesus standing in front of him.”
Doyle said the man told him Jesus had a message: “You’re on the wrong path; you’re on the wrong road. Leave this place and come follow me.”
“This man is getting baptized in the next few weeks,” Doyle said.”
Amazing!
I have heard the same from other sources.
It’s especially true during Ramadan.
There have to be some misguided souls in that death cult who really don’t get it and are sincerely seeking God, the Creator.
He will draw them.
THAT is why we’re to pray for our enemies, because they’re not really our enemies as much as God’s enemies. And He would rather have us hot or cold. He can do something with that. Nobody can do something with someone who doesn’t care (lukewarm).