Inside the Revolution

by Joel C. Rosenberg

  [Jesus said,] “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” —John 10:10

  “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” —Romans 8:28

  “God . . . desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” —1 Timothy 2:3-4

  “We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.” —Ephesians 2:10

  Such truths astounded Shakir as he began reading the Bible, first as a Radical Muslim and even after his conversion and decision to follow Jesus Christ. He had never seen God as someone who loved him. He had never thought of God as having a positive plan and purpose for his life. He certainly never imagined that God wanted to count him as a friend and even as a member of His own family.

  Core Conviction No. 2: All Mankind Is Sinful and Thus Separated from God

  Another truth that floored Shakir as he read the New Testament and when he was in the presence of Jesus in his dream was the realization that he—Shakir—was a sinner, that he had been on a terribly wrong path, that not only had he disobeyed God but he was making God grieve because of his sins. This is why Shakir awoke from his dream to find his pillow and sheets drenched in his tears. They were tears of shame and remorse that were triggered as soon as he realized just how sinful he really was.

  Most of us are not terrorists, of course. Most of us have not been trained to kill “infidels” and recruit others to do the same. Nevertheless, the Bible teaches that every man, woman, and child has sinned against God. We have either generally disregarded Him—paying Him and His Word scant interest or attention—or we have actively disobeyed Him. Either way, this is sin.

  Some of us may have committed more sins than others, but none of us is innocent before God. According to the Scriptures, every single one of us has broken God’s laws. We have lied, or stolen, or cheated, or been guilty of lust, or coveted something of our neighbor’s. We have tried to live our own lives in our own way, not following God’s ways, and this is further evidence of what the Bible calls sin.

  The problem, the Bible makes clear, is that our sins separate us from a close, loving, personal relationship with God. Our sins also condemn us to eternal death where we will be separated from God in hell forever and ever and ever. Why? Because God is holy and we are not. God cannot allow a person with even one sin into heaven; if He did, that person would taint and thus destroy the holiness of God and His Kingdom. As a result of our sinful nature, then, the Bible teaches that we cannot know and experience God’s love and plan for our lives.

  Consider the following verses:

  “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” —Romans 3:23

  “The LORD has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. [But] they have all turned aside, together they have become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one.” —Psalm 14:2-3

  “The wages of sin is death.” —Romans 6:23

  [Jesus said,] “If your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame, than, having your two feet, to be cast into hell, where . . . the fire is not quenched.” —Mark 9:45-46

  [Jesus said,] “I say to you, My friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that have no more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear the One who, after He has killed, has authority to cast into hell; yes, I tell you, fear Him!” —Luke 12:4-5

  Jesus said, “But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before Him; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats; and He will put the sheep [His true followers] on His right and the goats [those who refused to follow and obey Him] on the left. Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. . . .’ Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels. . . . These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” —Matthew 25:31-34, 41, 46

  Core Conviction No. 3: Jesus Christ Is Mankind’s Only Hope of Salvation

  The fact that we are all sinners separated from God now and for eternity is terrible, depressing, devastating news, of course. Fortunately, however, the Bible teaches that God in His unending love and kindness made a way for us to be forgiven and to be saved from going to hell. He made a way for us to enter an intimate and personal relationship with Him.

  As one reads the New Testament, the Revivalists note, one learns that God sent Jesus to die on a Roman cross to pay the penalty for our sins. He died in our place, to rescue us from hell and restore us to a right relationship with God. He not only died on the cross, the Bible teaches, but He rose from the dead, thus proving that He is the only way to God.

  Consider the following verses:

  “While we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.” —Romans 5:6

  “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” —Romans 5:8

  “The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” —Romans 6:23

  “Christ died for our sins . . . He was buried . . . He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures . . . He appeared to [Peter], then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than five hundred.” —1 Corinthians 15:3-6

  It is no wonder Shakir was so confused when he first began reading the Bible. On the one hand, he was learning that God loved him deeply and wanted to be his friend, something he had never heard before and was not learning from reading or teaching the Qur’an. On the other hand, he was coming to realize that he was a sinner and was therefore eternally separated from this kind and loving God.

  The questions that Shakir had to wrestle through at that point came down to this: What was the right way to proceed? What was the right way to be forgiven of his sins—by his own death as a martyr in pursuit of jihad, or by accepting Jesus’ death on the cross as the payment for his sins? What was the right way to be saved from going to hell—by killing innocent people in the name of God, or by accepting the fact that God allowed His own innocent Son, Jesus, to be killed to pay the penalty for Shakir’s sins and the sins of all mankind?

  The answer to all these questions, Shakir knew, had to be found in determining which book was true, the Qur’an or the Bible. If the Qur’an was right, then Islam was indeed the answer, and jihad was indeed the way to God and eternal salvation. But if the Bible was right, then Jesus was speaking the truth when He said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me” (John 14:6).

  How, then, can one know which book is right? By doing exactly what Shakir did, say fellow Revivalists, many of whom have had similar experiences. Study the New Testament, and then earnestly ask God to make it clear what the truth is.

  Not everyone who asks God for wisdom will receive a dream or a vision. While millions of Muslims are having such dreams and visions convincing them that the Bible is the true book of God, there are many other ways that God can and has convinced people as well. The point is not how God explains Himself. The point is honestly and sincerely pleading with God to make Himself and His will clear. He will most certainly answer such sincere requests. Why would He not?

  Consider the following promises found in the Bible:

  “‘You will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you,’ declares the LORD.” —Jeremiah 29:12-14

  “Call to Me and I will answer you,” [says the Lord,] “and I will tell you great and
mighty things, which you do not know.” —Jeremiah 33:3

  [Jesus said,] “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.” —Matthew 7:7-8

  [Jesus said,] “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” —Matthew 11:28-30

  [Jesus said,] “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. . . . I am the living bread that came down out of heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever.” —John 6:47-48, 51

  I believe it is important to note here what a beautiful portrait of God’s love we see in Jesus’ appearing to Shakir. Think about it for a moment. Shakir honestly wanted to know God, serve God, please God. In his ignorance and sin, Shakir did not realize that as a Sunni terrorist he was on the wrong path. But because Jesus loved Shakir so much, He sent someone to give him a Bible to read. Because Jesus loved Shakir so much, when Shakir was troubled, Jesus came directly to him to answer his fervent, heartfelt prayer and make it clear that He really was the One True Way.

  Shakir asked, and he received. Shakir sought, and he found. He knocked, and the door was opened, just as Jesus promised.

  Core Conviction No. 4: A Person Must Individually Choose to Follow Jesus Christ as Personal Savior and Lord

  It was not enough for Shakir simply to realize that God loved him, that he was a sinner, that the Bible was the only true book of life, and that Jesus was the only true path to salvation. Shakir had to do more than just come to the intellectual realization of these truths.

  Shakir had to individually receive Jesus Christ as his own personal Savior and Lord. He had to believe in his heart that Jesus died on the cross to pay for his sins. He had to believe that Jesus rose again from the dead, thus proving Himself to be the Messiah. He had to choose by faith to become a Christ-follower and accept God’s free gift of salvation, acknowledging the fact that he could not pay for his salvation or earn it by doing enough good works to outweigh the bad.

  He also had to be willing to declare out loud his allegiance to Jesus Christ and to tell others that Jesus is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. Only then, the Bible teaches, could Shakir—or anyone else—truly know and experience God’s love and plan for his life.

  That, of course, is exactly what Shakir did, and it changed his life forever.

  Consider the following verses:

  “But as many as received Him [Jesus Christ], to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name.” —John 1:12

  “If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. . . . Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved. . . . Faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.” —Romans 10:9-10, 13, 17

  “For by grace [unmerited favor] you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.” —Ephesians 2:8-9

  “Behold, I [Jesus] stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.” —Revelation 3:20

  To his eternal joy, Shakir heard Jesus knocking at the door of his heart. He opened that door and asked Christ to come into his heart and adopt him into God’s family, and Jesus answered that prayer and transformed Shakir from a preacher of hatred and violence to a preacher of love and forgiveness.

  Would you like to make the same decision? If you are willing to repent—turn away from your own sins and from living your life as you see fit—and turn around to actually follow the God of the Bible, you can receive Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord right now, just as Shakir did. Here is a suggested prayer that has been helpful to many Muslims, Jews, and others—including my parents and me—in becoming followers of Christ. The key is not so much the precise words as the attitude of your heart.

  Lord Jesus, thank You for loving me. Thank You for having a wonderful plan and purpose for my life. I need You today—I know I need You to forgive me for all of my sins. Thank You for dying on the cross to pay the penalty for my sins. Thank You for rising again from the dead to prove that You are the Way, the Truth, and the Life and the only way to get to heaven. Jesus, I confess right now with my mouth that You are the King of kings and the Lord of lords. And I believe in my heart that God raised You from the dead. And now I open the door of my heart and my life right now. I receive You as my Savior and Lord. Thank You for forgiving my sins and giving me eternal life. Please change my life. Please fill me with your Holy Spirit. Please take control of my life and make me the kind of person that You want me to be, so that I can serve You and please You forever. Thank You so much. I love You, and I want to follow You. Amen.

  If you just prayed that prayer with sincere faith in Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection, then congratulations and welcome to the family of God. The Bible teaches that several wonderful things have just happened:

  1. You have a new spiritual life. According to the words of Jesus in John chapter 3, you have been spiritually “born again” and have been adopted into the family of God. Your physical body has not changed, of course. But inside, your soul and spirit (the part of you that really is you—your thoughts, your beliefs, your feelings) have been supernaturally regenerated. What was spiritually dead inside of you because of sin has been made alive because of the resurrection power of Jesus Christ.

  The apostle Paul put it this way in 2 Corinthians 5:17: “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.” In Romans 6:11 we are told, “Consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.” In Ephesians 2:4-6 we are told, “God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” And, as we read earlier from John 1:12, “But as many as received Him [Jesus Christ], to them He gave the right to become children of God.”

  2. You have made everyone in heaven happy. According to the words of Jesus in Luke 15:10, there is great rejoicing in heaven because you have become a follower of the living God. “I tell you,” Jesus said, “there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

  3. You are going to heaven when you die. According to the words of Jesus in John 3:16, you now have eternal life. You will not go to hell and perish eternally when you die physically. Rather, you will go to heaven and live forever with God and all those who have been adopted into His family by faith in Jesus Christ.

  In fact, the New Testament was written precisely to show people how to find eternal life through faith in Jesus Christ and to give true followers of Jesus solid assurance of their salvation. As we see in 1 John 5:13, “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.” God wants you to know—beyond the shadow of a doubt—that you are now forever safe in His family. Take confidence in His promises.

  4. You have the Holy Spirit living within you. According to the words of the apostle Paul in Ephesians 1:13-14, your salvation has been sealed and secured forever by God’s Holy Spirit now living within you. “In Him [Jesus Christ], you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory.”

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sp; 5. You have access to a supernatural sense of peace. According to Philippians 4:7, you now have access to a supernatural peace with God and internal peace of mind, regardless of whatever external circumstances come your way. “The peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” This does not mean you won’t face times of stress, anxiety, panic, or fear. Indeed, you may actually experience persecution and other severe challenges now that you are willing to follow Jesus with all your heart. But as a child of the living God and a follower of Jesus Christ, whom the Bible calls the “Prince of Peace” (Isaiah 9:6), you can now pray and ask your Father in heaven to give you the “peace which surpasses all comprehension”—an overwhelming sense of calm that may not even make sense to you—and He promises to give you such peace.

  6. You have access to a supernatural sense of hope. According to the words of Hebrews 6:18-19, all followers of Jesus Christ are encouraged to “take hold of the hope set before us” and to view “this hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast.” We no longer need to be discouraged, depressed, or despairing. Regardless of how poor we might be, or how endangered, or how persecuted, or how sick, God is ready and willing to give us a supernatural sense of hope and optimism about the future. And the more we study the Bible and understand how much God loves us and wants to care for us—and that He promises never to leave or forsake us—the more hopeful we will become.

  7. You also have access to God’s supernatural wisdom. According to James 1:5, “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him.” Whenever we face situations or decisions that confuse or perplex us, we can turn to our Father in heaven and ask for help. When we do, He promises to provide us with supernatural guidance and direction.