Annabaptists Meeting Muslims

Recently I had the absolute pleasure of sitting in a lecture by David Shenk who is an Annabaptist from Pennsylvania working for the Mennonite Central Committee in the muslim nations of the world. David has been a pioneer for the greater part of his life of the Christian faith into closed muslim countries. The only reason that he has been able to do this is because he is truly living out the love of Jesus Christ, even for Muslim people. In a day and age where 'Christians' are doing an excellent job of earning the hatred of Muslims the world over, David Shenk has been approaching any and every Muslim to dialogue about their faith and his. Here is one scenario from Shane Claiborne that will hopefully illustrate the how we're earning this hatred. Shane had flown to Baghdad from America to be there when the Americans bombed the city. He said that as he walked down the halls of an over-crowded hospital in the ensuing chaos he heard one little girl repeating over and over again as she lay on a hospital bed, "What did I do to America?" Unfortunately, in times like these, America still bears the title of a 'Christian' nation and now terrorists in the Middle East have been given excellent material for propaganda against, not only Americans but Christians.

The amount of misinformation in the Muslim world regarding what Christians stand for and believe is incredible says David. And I think that this misinformation goes the other way as well. When terrorists bombed the Twin Towers muslims became demonized and misunderstood in our society. We sit back and make assumptions about what Muslims do and don't believe never for a moment thinking to ask a muslim.

So David's ministry is talking theology with muslims in closed countries over tea. One of the major reasons that he is able to do this is because he comes from the Anabaptist tradition. David said that he loves to remind his Muslim counterparts that Anabaptists did not fight in the Crusades, and in fact they were burned at the stake for refusing. It seems that the non-violent, apolitical anabaptists are seen as weak and utterly unthreatening to Muslim people. In conjunction with this they are also very attractive solely because of Jesus' love manifest in their good deeds. David is using this reputation in the Muslim community to share the good news of the gospel even with the most militant of Muslim leaders, and they are listening! He told the story of how after a cease-fire had been reached in the Caucus region he asked a few of the church leaders from the church up on the hill where he might find the muslim leaders of the people that they had just been fighting with. They told him where the Muslims gathered to pray and worship and he invited them to come with him to talk with them. They laughed at him and refused so he started off alone across 'no-man's-land' and seeing his boldness they scurried after him. They went and talked with the Muslim teachers at the building for three hours over a lot of tea and a lot of cookies. By the end of a conversation that revolved around Jesus, they called each other friends and parted ways. He is a fearless, non-violent, lover of muslims and he is changing the face of Christianity in the muslim world.
David Shenk is proof that the MCC's activity in the world has opened doors in Muslim nations because of Love manifested in good deeds! One extraordinarily practical thing that David really challenged me with was to go out and make muslim friends. Learn from them, love them, talk to them and rest assured Jesus will end up being the topic of conversation.


PS. I also bought his book called 'Annabapitsts Meeting Muslims' which any of you can borrow from me if you're interested in what God is doing amongst Muslim peoples these days.