A Historic Evangelism Opportunity–and a Threat to that Opportunity

Last updated on: January 26, 2017 at 12:33 pm by Mark Shea

A Historic Evangelism Opportunity–and a Threat to that Opportunity 2017-01-26T12:33:37-07:00 Mark Shea

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Sherry Weddell, who has forgotten more information about Christian missions than most of us will ever know, writes:

Something surprising that I just realized based upon the only serious scholarly attempt to accurately count what are called Muslim background believers (MBB’s) or sometimes BMB’s (Believers from a Muslim background.

The best estimate is that we have about 3.3 million Muslims in the country at the moment and about a half million MBB’s because the US is a magnet for people searching for religious and spiritual freedom.
I did not know and was surprised to discover that as of 2010, 2/3 of people of Arab cultural background living in the US were Christians.
There is also a large population of Iranian MBB’s here.

MBB’s in the world have grown from (rough estimate) 60,000 in 1960 to over 10 million today so you grasp how fast this is growing. And most of the growth has occurred since 2000.

This is simply unpredecented in the whole history of Christian/Muslim relations. Up until the present moment, Islam has been an extremely tough nut for Christian evangelism to crack. But cracks are developing and no small part of the reason is the very tradition of religious liberty that the West has fostered. Muslims, it turns out, remarkably like human beings and given the choice between Christian charity and Radical Islamic violence, they often choose Christian charity. Bridges of trust are being built, personal relationships forming, and curiosity about the gospel and Jesus Christ is growing in many Muslim hearts. If Christians can get past their fear of the Other and realize it, we have a *massive* evangelistic opportunity at our very doorstep.

But, of course, there is also a huge threat to that in this hour. A Christian who voted for a man who promised to “make Christianity powerful again” has a special burden to resist that man if he undertakes to burn the first amendment for Muslims and start registering them or otherwise punishing them merely for being Muslim. If you remain silent or (same thing) actively support him in this act of persecution, you *will* be helping to drag the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ into disgrace and disrepute. Don’t tell me “But Hillary!” Forget the election. It’s over. She lost. Move on. Live in the present. Resist *now* if he does this grave evil.

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