Chad Vandiver

1. Chad Vandiver

2. Level 3 Transformation

3. 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.”

4. Introduction • Transforming Relationships • Strategic Bridges • Muslims Today

5. Transforming Relationships

6. Transforming Relationships • How do you plan to transform the ministry opportunities you have amongst your people group into healthy church planting movements ? • It is very important that you are not the only facilitator of the transition from ESL class, Bible study, sports ministry etc. to church.

7. Transforming Relationships • In order to make this transition possible you will need to harvest the relationships you have cultivated amongst your people group. • These relationships will be the models of what a healthy church plant looks like. • They will be the roots of the church plant.

8. Transforming Relationships • This why it is so important to begin sharing Christ as soon as possible with the friends you have made in your people group. • Do not be afraid to share but instead share your faith boldly and without hesitation. • You are sharing the precious gift of salvation.

9. Transforming Relationships • You may have already formed an oikos with some of your friends. • An oikos is the ancient Greek equivalent of a household or family. • This will be the foundation for planting a church in your people group’s community

10. Strategic Bridges

11. Strategic Bridges • Study of Evangelism Methods • How to Build Biblical Bridges • Practice Patient Peacemaking

12. Strategic Bridges Study of Evangelism Methods • In his book, Reaching Muslims for Christ, William J. Saal writes, “As you set out to communicate the gospel to your Muslim friend you immediately find the imposing edifice of Islamic teaching. You must decide what you are going to do about Islam. There are three basic options: knock the edifice down, build upon it, or walk around it.”

13. Strategic Bridges • According to Saal, the “knock it down” strategy entails providing a Muslim friend with facts that prove that Islam has a weak foundation and Christianity a strong one. • This approach involves further discussion with the Muslim in order to prove scholastically that Christianity is the only true religion.

14. Strategic Bridges • The problem with this strategy is that many Christians and Muslims have adopted the same style of trying to convert one another. • When I tried to apply this strategy as a teenager I found that it led to arguments between my Muslim friend and me. • We would waste a great deal of time attacking and counterattacking Christianity and Islam.

15. Strategic Bridges • The end result of this approach is most often broken friendship. • The outcome of this Muslim evangelism strategy is an unfavorable impression of Christianity and Christians. • The second approach to Muslim evangelism Saal writes about is the “build upon it” strategy.

16. Strategic Bridges • This method involves using the Qur’anic verses that support the Bible and trying to build on the good principles of Islam. • The idea is to move the Muslim friend from the Qur’an to the Bible. • The thought process behind this approach is that if you spend a little time with a Muslim comparing the Bible and the Qur’an then the Muslim will choose the Bible.

17. Strategic Bridges • The danger of trying to use this method to build a bridge between the Qur’an and the Bible is that the Muslim will infer that they do not need to convert to Christianity if there are good principles in Islam. • This approach is also weak because it neglects the fact that Islam is a works based belief system.

18. Strategic Bridges • When the Muslim does not find the works based formula for Salvation in the Bible, he or she will determine that the Bible will not help them enter into Heaven. • The final method Saal defines is the “walk around it” strategy.

19. Strategic Bridges • The title of this strategy is misleading. Saal is not encouraging Christians to be uneducated about Islam but on the contrary he writes about how important understanding Islam is if you want to faithfully share Christ with a Muslim friend. • The “walk around it” approach is simply presenting the Gospel directly and positively to the Muslim.

20. Strategic Bridges • This strategy is most effective when it is implemented during times of natural conversation with a Muslim friend. • This no gimmicks approach to evangelism is most effective with Muslims since they already are faced with many challenges in becoming a Christian.

21. Strategic Bridges • They have to overcome multiple misunderstandings about Christianity that are often poured into their minds at an early age while attending Qur’anic school. • Muslims must also contemplate how their families will react to their conversion to Christianity.

22. Strategic Bridges • They face the possibility that they may never be able to return to their home or country again without facing persecution and even mortal danger. • For this reason, I have discovered it is best to help my Muslim friends discover their Biblical heritage by pointing to the account of Ishmael and Hagar in Genesis.

23. Strategic Bridges • Next, I have found it very important to explain submission through grace by taking them to Job. • These passages in Genesis and Job allow me to build bridges of Biblical understanding in the hearts and minds of my dear Muslim friends.

24. Strategic Bridges How to Build Biblical Bridges • The caliph Umar the Great is quoted in Al-Muqaddima as saying to the Arabs in his Islamic empire, “Learn from your genealogies, and do not be like the local peasants who, when they are asked who they are, reply: ‘I am from such-and-such a place.’”

25. Strategic Bridges • This statement reveals the longing, that burns in the hearts of Arabic men and women, to know their heritage . • It is important for them to realize that they were a part of the Abrahamic Covenant through Ishmael. • They must discover God’s plan for Ishmael’s line.

26. Strategic Bridges • They need to know how Ishmael was rescued from a desert death. • Muslims should learn that they are loved unconditionally by God and that His plan for them is for good and not for evil.

27. Strategic Bridges • In order for a Muslim to realize all of this, we as Christians must faithfully and graciously explain the Biblical truth about Ishmael by committing to meet with the Muslim in a Bible study setting. • It is important to spend this time with a Muslim friend in order to answer questions they may have about the Bible’s perspective on Ishmael.

28. Strategic Bridges • These questions are essential to the Muslim’s discovery of who Christ is. • They will help lay the foundation to building the bridge that will eventually lead them to believing the Bible is true. • In order to set the tone for showing a Muslim friend how they as Arabs are spoken of positively in the Bible, the Christian must first put aside any pride.

29. Strategic Bridges • Bernard Lewis writes in The Crisis of Islam, “Christians and Muslims share a common triumphalism. In contrast to the other religions of humanity, including Judaism, they believe that they alone are the fortunate recipients and custodians of God’s final message to humanity, which it is their duty to bring to the rest of the world.”

30. Strategic Bridges • This naturally creates an atmosphere of competition around any discussion about faith between Muslims and Christians. • It is important to approach studying the story of Ishmael in the Bible with a Muslim as simply an opportunity to discover more about who Ishmael is. • Show them that you are a Christian by respecting them as Christ would.

31. Strategic Bridges • Ask the Muslim friend if they know that Ishmael and his descendants are spoken of favorably in the Bible. • Begin the first Bible study session by reading Genesis 25:12-18 with your Muslim friend in order to introduce them to the facts about Ishmael and his descendants.

32. Strategic Bridges • This approach allows the Muslim to begin their discovery of who Ishmael was in Biblical history. • It provides them with an introduction to the Bible from an Arabic perspective.

33. Strategic Bridges • Dr. Tony Maalouf writes, in Arabs in the Shadow of Israel: The Unfolding of God’s Prophetic Plan for Ishmael’s Line “The only place where Ishmael is mentioned by himself is in Sura 19:54-55 (Meccan), where he is described as ‘true to his promise,’, ‘a messenger’, ‘a prophet’, one who ‘enjoined upon his people the prayer and almsgiving,’

34. Strategic Bridges • and ‘was in his Lord’s eyes approved.’ Nowhere in the above-mentioned verses is Ishmael given a distinctive place.” • This provides an opportunity for the Christian to become an Ishmael expert in the mind of the Muslim since as Dr. Maalouf points out the Qur’an does not offer much detail on the life of Ishmael.

35. Strategic Bridges • The Bible will be exalted in the heart of the Muslim since it provides such a complete picture of who Ishmael was. • Genesis 16:1-16 provides the Christian with several bridges for sharing Christ with the Muslim friend during the second Bible study session.

36. Strategic Bridges • First, Hagar flees Sarah’s presence by running to the desert where she is found by the angel of the Lord. • This account provides an opportunity to share how God cares for our well being. • Next, the angel of the Lord gives Hagar, an Egyptian woman, a promise that her descendants will be multiplied many times.

37. Strategic Bridges • This indicates that she was a woman of God because throughout the Bible only Godly individuals are given a promise of multiplication. • Finally, the angel of the Lord prophesies about Ishmael which means “God hears”. • This offers a way to explain that God is not a militant dictator but “El Roi”, a God who sees and hears our every need.

38. Strategic Bridges • It is important to conclude the study by highlighting the promise given to Hagar by the angel of the Lord in Genesis 16:10. • The third Bible study meeting should be spent learning about the Abrahamic Covenant in Genesis 17:1-27 paying special attention to verses 18, 20 and 23.

39. Strategic Bridges • Focus on the continued promise of God’s blessing for Hagar through Ishmael that was first proclaimed to Hagar in the desert in Genesis 16:10. • These verses should continue to encourage the Muslim friend to read more about who Ishmael was in the Bible.

40. Strategic Bridges • This study session will allow the Christian an opportunity talk about what it means to be a child of God through circumcision of the heart by accepting Jesus Christ as their Savior verses circumcision of the flesh which is a work of man.

41. Strategic Bridges • It will provide a natural time of discussion about the difference between acts that are works based and those that are grace based. • This discussion might continue for sometime as the Muslim begins to realize that faith in Christ alone leads to assurance of salvation rather than works done by man leading to the possibility of salvation.

42. Strategic Bridges • The concept of submission through grace will need to be explained. • One way to accomplish this is by studying the Biblical account of Job, an Arabian prophet. • At first, Job believed God dealt with people based on their worth. • He thought that if he did good works then God would reward him.

43. Strategic Bridges • While this is a sound logical statement it is not a Godly principle, so God allowed Job to lose everything. • Job could no longer rely on his good works. • When he discussed his predicament with his Arabian friends they applied the principle of retribution concerning God.

44. Strategic Bridges • In the end, God taught Job that he had to trust Him. • He explained to Job that his friends had not spoken the truth about who He is. • God told Job that he had blamed Him because he did not understand who He is. • God revealed Himself to Job through nature.

45. Strategic Bridges • Then Job repented and God blessed him twice by grace despite the fact that Job had spoken ill of Him. • It is important for the Muslim friend to realize that God is not limited to the principle of retribution but is also a God of grace.

46. Strategic Bridges • Chawkat Moucarry writes, in The Prophet and the Messiah, “According to the Bible, a person’s salvation is tied to faith in God and in Jesus Christ. • This faith, if genuine, necessarily results in a change of life of which good works are the outward sign (cf. Eph. 2:10).

47. Strategic Bridges • These works are not merely an obligation and do not earn merit as in Islam. They are, as it were, an echo of God’s love in the Christian’s life: ‘We love because he first loved us’ (1 John 4:19).”

48. Strategic Bridges • The fourth Bible study session should be spent studying Genesis 21:9-21. • This passage offers several bridges for the Christian to use in sharing Christ with the Muslim. • First, Hagar’s story is a tragic one because she was cast out of fellowship due to Sarah’s pride.

49. Strategic Bridges • This presents an opportunity to explain sinful nature to the Muslim. • Second, she is left out in the desert alone and it is God who hears her cries for help. • Next, the coming of the angel of the Lord can be likened to the second coming of Christ.

50. Strategic Bridges • Finally, the fact that God would come down to sit and talk with Hagar at the well, allows the Christian to ask the Muslim if God would come, sit and speak to Hagar then isn’t it possible for Christ to do the same with us? • It allows the Muslim to begin to discover how God reveals Himself to us.