This Christmas-season has been different. A few weeks ago I was sitting together with Muhammad, a fulani highly educated in Islam, in a small town in Mali. Muhammed has received the Bible as a gift, and he has read quite a lot in it. He is an intellectual and interested in religion, and he finds it interesting to compare what is written about Jesus in the Bible with what he knows from Islam. As we were sitting outside his simple house he talked about the things he found that were similar between the Christian faith and Islam. He talked about texts concerning the birth of Jesus, and how Mary is informed by the angel Gabriel that she shall become pregnant and give birth to the Messiah. After a while I asked him if he had noticed any differences between what he read in the Bible and what he knows from Islam. “Yes”, he responded quickly, “there are two differences: The first one is that in the Gospels God is called Father. In Islam God is not called Father. The second one is that Jesus is called Lord. In Islam only God is Lord.” This seemed to me to be a great starting point for further conversations. We agreed to meet again to talk more about similarities and differences between the Gospel and Islam. A few hours later two French citizens were kidnapped not very far from where Muhammad lives. During the next days the Norwegian missionaries were evacuated southwards in Mali. At the moment we don’t know when we will be able to return to our homes here. Please pray for the people of Mali in this situation of uncertainty:
- Pray for peace and reconciliation and a return to law and order in Norther Mali-
- Pray for all those who are starving in Mali this Christmas, after the crops largely failed this year.
- Pray for Muhammed and our other contacts that they must know God as their Father, and Jesus as their Lord.
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Det skjærer i meg å lese denne historien Frode! På den ene siden deler du jo en enorm oppmuntring, i at du har fått vært med å dele evangeliet med Muhammed. Det er jo enormt mye som peker på Jesus i Koranen, om en vet hvor og hvordan en skal lete!
Slik jeg har forstått situasjonen i Nord-Mali så er det blitt tilspisset i det siste. Å leve i usikkerheten om en kan reise tilbake eller ikke kan jo vi relatere mye til. Det er ikke noe særlig, for å si det forsiktig.
Håper du er ved godt mot, og så får vi være med på å huske på dere og de dere måtte reise fra i bønn.
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