Word: mohler
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Ethics and Public Policy Center and the Beliefnet website found that 89% of evangelical leaders thought it "very important" to "insist on the truth of the Gospel" to Muslims. These leaders sincerely want to emulate Jesus' love by acts of feeding and healing, says Southern Baptist official R. Albert Mohler Jr., but "aid alone is not sufficient to bring a person to a saving knowledge of Christ." They have grown increasingly eager to expose Islam's "unreached" millions to Jesus. Missionary numbers in Muslim lands are reported to have quadrupled over the past decade. Thus, while Evangelicals supported the Iraq...
...That's a false impression, says Albert Mohler. The missionaries, he says, whose aim is partly humanitarian, see themselves as part of a tradition dating back 2000 years, to the mission that brought Jesus to Jerusalem. It was a journey that provoked unrest, frightened authority and led Christ to the cross, but ultimately, Christians believe, delivered a life-saving message to the world...
...Much of the (real or potential) tension facing missionaries, he says, arises out secular thinkers' and Christians' opposing views on religious conversion. "The secular world tends to look at Islam as a function of ethnicity," says Mohler, "which means seeking to convert these people to Christianity is an insult to them. But Christianity is a trans-ethnic faith, which understands that Christianity is not particular to or captured by any ethnicity, but seeks to reach all persons...
...despite any controversy surrounding their work, says Mohler, what the missionaries are doing in Iraq is completely in line with the traditional role of Christian relief agencies. "Christian organizations have been involved in organized relief efforts throughout the history of the United States. You can look at almost every significant military endeavor and find precedence for Christians being actively involved in relief efforts," and often, he adds, actively invited to solicit. If you went to Afghanistan today you would note that (missionary group) Samaritan's Purse is largely responsible for setting up hospitals in the region, without a great deal...
...classic example would be the rebuilding of Europe and Japan after WWII," says Mohler, "situations analogous to Iraq in terms of regime change and a subsequent rebuilding effort." He finds the comparison to Japan particularly meaningful because Douglas MacArthur, as the de facto ruler of post-war Japan, introduced Western concepts of religious freedom and tolerance that were entirely new to the country. It's a model Mohler hopes will succeed in Iraq. While missionaries will evangelize, he says, victory will come not in the form of conversions, but in the introduction of religious freedom into what he calls...