A Leader Greater Than Abraham Will Aid Palestinians

The former rugged log splitter who became possibly the greatest President of the U.S. is the type of courageous man the Palestinians must discover. For they need this type of leader in order to achieve justice against heavily weaponized Israel. Making matters even more unjust, Israel is being backed in its immoral policies against the Palestinians by the U.S. to the tune of ten million dollars per day. This is in addition to the fact that the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives enthusiastically back the very effective multi-media propaganda machine. In fact, Israeli propaganda is so effective that a poll taken near the end of Israel's pre Obama massacre of the overwhelmed Gazans, 60% of the U.S. responders thought that Israel had acted appropriately in their massacre of the Gazans. This was the case even though at the time of the invasion only one Hamas rocket had killed an Israeli.

So I am being serious when I say that the Palestinians must find a leader that would deliver the moral clarity of a combination of an Emancipation Proclamation for the Palestinians and a Gettysburg/Gaza Address for the abused, exploited, grieving people.

So it is obvious that the desperate situation calls for the stature of an Abe Lincoln type to emancipate Palestinians from immoral Israeli oppression and to justly lead them.

Is current U.S. President Barrack Obama the man to accomplish this virtually mission impossible? No he is not. But is he is a just and fair leader who is currently creating a positive climate which has much less of a tilt in favor of Israel? Yes, he is.

President Obama may indeed become an Abraham Lincoln type figure for the U.S. But his hands will remain too full here to fulfill a similar role for the Palestinians.

Is George Mitchell, the very just, fair, and experienced, new Obama appointed envoy to the Mid East the right man to lead the Palestinians to justice. No! He like Obama will effectively set the stage for someone else. But there is far too much entrenched opposition to Senator Mitchell by right wing Israeli leaders for him to be successful. The Israeli leaders perceive him as so fair that they vigorously complain that his fairness is a major obstacle that would be unfair to Israel. Because Israel acknowledges that the U.S. has always been biased in favor of Israel so that reality would make it unfair to Israel for the U.S. evnoy Mitchell to begin to be fair.

If you think that I have personally invented this twisted logic, please listen to this direct quote from the 2/16/09 issue of The Nation in an article entitled "The Defamation League." The author, Eric Alterman, quotes Abe Foxman, the national director of the B'nai B'rith Anti-Defamation League.

He goes so far as to attack Barack Obama's choice of former George Mitchell as the U.S. envoy to the region because-get-this Mitchell is "fair" and "meticulously evenhanded," and Foxman says he is "not sure the situation requires that kind of approach."

In another Nation article entitled "The Mitchell Moment" by Roane Carey, the full Foxman quote is given.

"Mitchell is fair. He's been meticulously even-handed. But the fact is, American policy in the Middle East hasn't been even-handed. It has been supportive of Israel when it felt U.S. support was critical. So I'm concerned. I'm not sure the situation requires that kind of approach."

Is former President Jimmy Carter, the Abe Lincoln like leader the Palestinians need in order to help them find the justice that has eluded them for 50 years? It is the fair minded Carter who has just written his second book attempting to help Palestinians in their quest for the justice they deserve.

In Carter's latest book, "We Can Have Peace In the Mid East - A Plan That Will Work," he is exceptionally thorough in laying out all of the various nuts and bolts of an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan where he has worked hard to meet the legitimate needs of both Israelis and Palestinians. However, even if he has effectively covered all of the bases and has found every piece of the puzzle, there is one major ingredient that I doubt if he has allowed for.

We are uncomfortably reminded of that necessary ingredient by the wise and practical humorist who is known to millions as Mark Twain. And he coined the pragmatic truism of "A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still."

Though I have not personally read this most recent Carter book, I have listened to three relatively thorough interviews he has given and have read his previous book on the subject. So this is how I see the Mark Twain Truism applying to the Israelis rejection of the thorough, even handed, wise Carter proposal. I see most of the Palestinians as being desperate for a just solution and even Hamas is being much more open to a just resolution that most people give them credit. In contrast to the Palestinians openness, I see way too many Israeli leaders as being infected with what I will call the Netanyahu disease of assumed Jewish entitlement. That is, though the people of the Netanyahu mentality may say the right words about wanting to agree to reach an agreement, their stubborn will will reject it. They consider themselves as Jews to be so superior to Palestinians, that Palestinians would virtually have to be willing to sell their souls before the Likud-Netanyahu types would be satisfied with any agreement with the Palestinians.

It is not yet clear who will be able to form the right coalition to be the next Israeli Prime Minister. However, Mr. Netanyahu received enough votes that is strikes dread into your heart to think that a man with his callousness toward Palestinian human beings would have the kind of disregard for Gazan civilians that he has gone on record as having. He has even publicly stated that Israel should have remained in Gaza longer in order to bring even more destruction. According to the afore mentioned Nation article by Corey, the following is stated about the former Prime Minister who a significant percentage of Israelis continue to support:

"And by most forecasts, the upcoming Israeli elections will bring back to power Benjamin Netanyahu, who dedicated his first term as prime minister to destroying the Oslo peace process; he now calls for escalation of the war against Hamas and by extension all Palestinians, and refuses to consider any withdrawal from the illegally occupied territories."

As we consider these strong anti Palestinian quotations from just one issue of the Nation, though the Carter book is thorough, is it capable of changing the will of many Israelis? No! Because Mark Twain is right when he reminds us that their wills must be changed before their deeply held opinions will actually support an agreement that they are against.

The Quartet's Envoy - Tony Blair

Is Tony Blair the man that will show Abe Lincoln type leadership to help the Palestinians find justice? No! From the way he was led around by the nose by George Bush during the Iraq fiasco, I personally cannot understand what results Russia, the U.N., the U.S., and Great Britain hoped that this reed that is so easily shaken by the wind, would obtain. There is no chance his efforts will resolve the Palestinian-Israeli situation. I hope that I will not offend this recent changer of his religion by suggesting that no one will confuse the Tony Blair track record with that of the liberator of the American slaves, Abe Lincoln. Blair definitely is not a man whom the Palestinians will be able to depend on.

The Saudi King Abdullah

This Saudi King has demonstrated remarkable leadership skills and is possibly the most influential current Arab leader in the region. He also holds a tremendously difficult position of being at least the symbolic leader of the Muslim Ummah - the International Islamic Community. Significantly that leadership responsibility seems to go with the territory of having Holy Mecca within the boarders of Saudi Arabia.

There are a number of notable achievements for which the Saudi Monarch deserves credit in addition to putting forth the quite reasonable Saudi Peace Plan for Israeli- Palestinian peace which recalcitrant Israel did not take seriously. Also, the world economy could be in much worse condition than it is if it had not been for his wise leadership in OPEC in keeping the price of oil low enough to avoid an even earlier catastrophic world financial crisis.

Additionally, the progressive Saudi monarch has been able to balance the severe competing factions in Saudi Arabia so that he has actually appointed the first woman to a ministerial position.

Though King Abdullah has shown superior and courageous leadership qualities, he faces a similar dilemma as President Obama as far as being the major helper to the Palestinians. He is far too busy attempting to keep his own Kingdom in order to supply the help, leadership, and leverage the Palestinians so desperately require. (Please see early paper on this web site, in Arabic or English - "Will the Quran's Messiah be Allowed to Visit Mecca?")

Palestine's Own Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln is ranked by the major U.S. historians as the most influential of the 42 U.S. Presidents they evaluated. Though not an historian, I would also rank him number one because of the great courage and wisdom he showed in his conduct of the Civil War and in his bringing to an end the severe cancer of U.S. slavery.

But there is one phenomenon that I find puzzling. That phenomenon is the amazing stature assigned to the Bible once owned and read by President Lincoln which is now known as the Lincoln Bible. While I totally agree with the great honor it was for now President Barack Obama to place his right hand on Lincoln's Bible at his own swearing in as President. But what seems to get lost while we stand in awe of that Bible is this reality that is far, far beyond the magnificence of that particular grand Bible.

The Messiah who was sent into this world by the very Almighty GOD who is credited by the contents of that Bible as being the creator of the entire Universe, should be considered more important than what any particular copy of the Bible that tells about him. Because what he accomplished and his being raised by ALLAH from death is what makes the Bible so significant; not because there is a religious book called the Bible.

The New Testament is emphatic that this sent by GOD Messiah man is much greater than even the great Hebrew Prophet Abraham, the Prophet whom the eminent President Abraham Lincoln was named after. Also the Messiah is presented in the Bible as much greater than the highly esteemed Law Giver, Moses. In fact, Moses along with other Old Testament Prophets such as Isaiah and King David actually predict the coming of the Messiah who ALLAH raised from death in the city of Jerusalem. When the four initial books of the New Testament are read, toward the end of each of the four books, a dark valley is reached. In that valley the jealousy and envy of the ruling hierarchy of Israel reach their evil climax and agree to manipulate the Roman occupiers to hide behind the authority of the Roman Empire. Then under the cover of the Roman Empire, the Israeli leaders assassinate GOD's Messiah by an illegal public execution. (This is not too dissimilar from the way in which the current leaders of Israel manipulate the leaders of the mighty U.S. Empire to support the prosperous and highly militarized Israel with ten million dollars per day in their current illegal and immoral suppression of the Palestinians. In fact, on 2/16/09 Israel illegally confiscated 423 more acres (1292 dunams) of Palestinian land for the illegal expanding of Israeli settlements which is financed by the U.S. to help rob the Palestinian victims of their land. So the bottom line is the U.S. Empire supports Israeli suppression and the execution of Palestinian victims similar to how the mighty Roman Empire was manipulated by Israel to illegally assassinate GOD's Messiah.

But immediately after the four New Testament writers each portray the dark valley of wicked political assassination that occurred to the Messiah, the unexpected suddenly occurs. By the intervention of ALLAH, a wonderful crescendo of triumph is achieved. The illegally executed victim Messiah suddenly is transformed into the Victorious Living Messiah. Think of this. Before the arrival on the scene of the great liberator of the slaves, Abraham Lincoln - the slave victims were imprisoned each day under the blazing sun of the cotton fields, virtually without hope, picking their master's cotton. But who was the one man who these slaves were certain understood their brutal suffering? It was their now living Messiah. The answer was reflected in the words of their hymn that they sang over and over as they labored in the blazing sun.

"Nobody knows the trouble I've seen, Nobody knows the trouble I've seen, Nobody knows the trouble I've seen but Jesus. (And this Jesus who knew of the slave's troubles was none other than Isa, the Holy Quran's Risen Man from Bethlehem.)

And whose words inspired the man who became the beloved deliverer of those oppressed slaves? The Messiah Isa, the Quran's Word from ALLAH. And who first spoke the words -

"A house divided against itself cannot stand," which Lincoln read over and over in his own Bible, which inspired him to free the slaves? The now living Bethlehem Man. And who is it today who has maintained a proven track record of responding to the cries of desperate people. It is the Risen, now living man from West Bank Bethlehem! GOD's Risen Messiah - Isa - Jesus.

The vivid written accounts of the Messiah's victory over death are in every Bible used to swear in all U.S. leaders. These accounts are even written in the unread Bibles collecting dust on shelves. These words of eternal truth are a vivid example of all the evidence that has been documented of the Messiah's victory. Yet a virtually blind people read that evidence over and over but do not understand the powerful implications of the evidence. In a modern metaphor they are unable to connect the dots.

The New Testament and the Quran (An-Nîsa 4:158) both emphatically teach that ALLAH raised His Messiah up alive. But the dots which both Christians and Muslims refuse to connect or even to think about are the fact that he is now ALIVE.

Since the Messiah was raised up alive, he is still alive and is now living among us. Yet it is a Bible like the Lincoln Bible that has become important and not the triumph described in that Bible that is of prime importance. Since the very relevant resurrection is a reality, this exciting truth of the Messiah still being alive has strong implications for the healing of the desperation of the oppressed, exploited, and robbed Palestinians. But despite how relevant it is that our Messiah is still alive, even very few Christians take this amazing reality seriously. Instead this reality is treated as a sort of irrelevant historical doctrine rather than a relevant reality that has very strong implications for right now. Because he is now living, he obviously has strong opinions about what is now occurring in Palestine and Israel. Therefore, he undoubtedly is more aware about what has occurred, is now occurring, and what will occur in Palestine, than anyone else who is living in our world today.

The relevance that this now living man who has been given unique powers by GOD and who remains today in our midst, cannot be over estimated.

Since he was raised alive by GOD in the Palestine area, this fact also has obvious unique implications for both the Palestinians and for the Israelis. Even the inconvenient reality that he remains invisible does not alter the fact that after 2000 years he remains alive and is totally aware of the lack of justice that is occurring in Palestine. But his potential to aid the Muslim Palestinians is being seriously hindered by a false understanding of but one verse in the entire Quran.

There are those who will insist that his now being alive is irrelevant to anything practical. They say he may be alive in heaven but he is definitely not available here on earth. But those who would try to make him irrelevant by emphasizing that perspective reveal their gross ignorance of the emphatic teachings of the New Testament Scriptures. For even years after his resurrection occurred, there are several documented instances of his having personal conversations with those who served him or were soon to serve him. And there were also several circumstances written about in the Book of Acts where he personally intervened on behalf of those who served him.

The fact that these type of interventions and conversations have not been documented as occurring in recent years are seized upon by the skeptics. They wish to use this fact of his current apparent lack of observable and news worthy activity to support their allegation that his supposedly now being alive can have no impact on resolving the plight of the oppressed and exploited Palestinians.

Nevertheless, though it may be GOD's will for direct, current, interactions, communications, and interventions of His now living Messiah be much more infrequent and less concrete than they were in the First Century, that does not nullify the fact that such interactions can and do occur, albeit in a less dramatic fashion. And they are not ordinarily documented as they were in the First Century when they occurred in a much more limited area involving fewer people.

I hesitate to use my self as an example as being a living recipient of current communications and interventions because of my obvious weakness and tremendous unworthiness. Also, because such circumstances of being spoken to by the Risen Messiah and having him concretely intervene in an individual's life are infrequent that to publicly acknowledge such occasions immediately undermines a persons credibility.

However, I have had several such circumstances. Though each circumstance has usually been separated by months and even years, each of them has related to the current situation in the Middle East. Also, each time I have experienced personal supernatural communications from the now living Messiah, in some unique way each has related to one of four different areas.

1. Being called by the Risen Messiah to specifically go to the Middle East, especially to Saudi Arabia to serve him there.
2. Communication about being involved in attempting to help Muslims understand An- Nisa 4:157 and 158 differently than Muslims presently do, which would have a constructive impact on Islam that would help Muslims realize the living Risen Messiah resides in their midst.
3. Communication specifically relating to injustice and the massacre of innocent mostly Muslim Arabs in the sovereign nation of Iraq by both the father's Bush Administration and the son's Bush Administration which have resulted in the Iraqis being the main unjust victims in the two bloody and unnecessary Gulf Wars. (Please read the 3/09/09, The Nation,"Iraq's Invisible Refugees". Its horrible accounts about women are part of the reason the Risen Messiah communicated with me about Pres. Bush's personal responsibility for the Iraq massacre.)
4. Communication relating indirectly to the Nation of Israel's unjust treatment of the exploited and cheated Palestinians.

I do not list these four overlapping areas of communication with the now living Messiah to make myself out to be anyone special because I am quite ordinary. But I am making the point that the now living Messiah is even now exceedingly preoccupied with the predominantly Muslim Middle East so that He has done the following in far from the Mid East, Seattle Washington.

He has spanned this vast distance to specifically communicate with a high school counselor in 1969 while he was in a high school office with a concise question: "Do you want to serve me?"

The only particular quality that seemed to set me apart from others was my unceasing urge to pray for the Muslims of the Mid East that they would enter into a more meaningful relationship with God's Risen Messiah. My prayers were definitely not for Muslims to become Christians. Rather, my prayers were for all of Islam to honor GOD's Risen Messiah in a more definite way.

My own pre-occupation focused on the centrality of the Messiah's death and resurrection as the Book of Acts focuses on these two central events. I felt that such issues as trinity and son of God were not main issues which GOD Himself was concerned about for Muslims.

It was several months after I had said "yes" to the question spoken to me, "Do you want to serve me?" that I began to realize what I should have seen earlier. Because I was so serious about praying for Muslims, it was primarily for the purpose of communicating with the religion of Islam that the Risen Messiah had asked me to serve him. Then, as I continued to pray regularly and fervently, a strong, virtually unattainable goal began to grow in my mind and heart.

I had no idea how GOD would work out the complicated logistics but I become convinced that GOD wanted this 40 year old father of five young children to serve His Risen Messiah in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Therefore, He would work out virtually impossible circumstances for my lovely wife Jean and each of our five children regarding reaching Saudi Arabia.

We accepted a position as counselor in the American Community School in Beirut, Lebanon in September of 1973. When the Civil War broke out in 1975 our older children stayed with friends in Seattle while my wife and I became temporary refugees in Amman Jordan. Then in early 1976 the position of orientation coordinator opened up for me at the King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Center.

In my off hours I continued to pray fervently for the Messiah to reveal himself in Islam as well as seriously reading the Quran each day.

After two job changes I began working primarily with Saudis rather than westerners in a firm connected with Nestle of Switzerland. Our company was contracted to provide nourishing school lunches for the school boys of Saudi Arabia. It was called SAFE, standing for Saudi Arabian Food Establishment.

In our company I met a very gracious retired General who introduced me to several other generals who had a significant impact on my evolving understanding of the intended meaning of An Nisa 4:157 and 158.

Islam's Smoking Gun

Before going forward regarding these two strategic verses from the Quran, it is necessary to return to Abraham Lincoln and several other assassinated U.S. leaders.

The metaphor, "smoking gun" is often used in trials when attempting to prove someone to be guilty of a crime such as murder. If there is considerable incriminating evidence proving the person to be guilty, as if there were witnesses seeing the murderer when he is still holding the gun while it is still smoking after he has shot the victim. As much as I don't like to say it, this is the position that I sincerely believe that Muslim leaders have put themselves in as far as severely wounding Islam with their incorrect understanding of these two very important verses.

Please consider the wonderful contribution that Abraham Lincoln would have continued to make if John Wilkes Booth had not stolen 25 years from his life by using a gun to ruthlessly murder him. Please think of how much more the two Kennedy brothers, John and Bobby would have contributed to our world had not their wonderful lives been taken from them by the smoking guns wielded by brutal assassins. Also, please consider how much more the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. could have offered to the unjustly oppressed of the entire world if an assassin's evil bullet had not torn into his body.

Now oh Muslims, please consider how much more the noble religion of Islam has to offer the entire world if a virtual assassin's bullet of laziness, oversimplification, and wrong interpretation would not be allowed to seriously wound the true intent of two great verses in the Holy Quran, An Nisa 4:157 and 158.

These two verses in combination were never intended to teach that ALLAH did not defeat death by raising his Messiah up alive after evil Jewish assassins had symbolically gunned him down by an evil, unjust execution. Instead, the verses were intended to teach that in the deepest sense of what killed or crucified means, he was indeed neither killed nor crucified. Because when ALLAH raised him up alive, it was as though his killing and execution had never occurred. So it was only conjecture to insist that the Messiah was killed or executed.

Please consider this. Did John Wilkes Booth and his fellow Lincoln conspirators not work hard in order to convince themselves that they were doing a wonderful service for our nation by assassinating President Lincoln? Yes. In fact Booth was overwhelmed by surprise that the people of the South did not greet him as a hero for killing the person that he convinced himself that he was a wicked President. And so it is with every assassin of great leaders. The assassins have always worked out a rationale as to why they are serving the greater good by assassinating a leader they view as wicked. But the future always proves that they performed a great wrong by killing the leader.

And this is how it will be with Islam for using its own smoking gun to eliminate the spiritual life that the Living Messiah is now living that could be of great benefit to Islam. But after considerable superficial thinking like assassins do, Islam has wrongly decided that Muslims are much better off if they do not have a living triumphant Messiah living in their midst. But this rationale on their part is deeply flawed just as all assassins' rationale is flawed.

As for the way that the verb phrase shubbiiha lahum is used in 4:157, it was never intended to have the CIA/Karl Rove-type of distorted meaning that someone was executed who appeared to be Isa but was not him. Rather, its more logical intended meaning is that it appeared to them (the Jews) that they had killed him permanently. But they had truly neither killed nor crucified him. Because, as the next verse triumphantly teaches, after he had been temporarily killed, not permanently killed, ALLAH used His Might and Wisdom to raise him up from death alive.

And I am convinced that this is how the Prophet understood this verse's meaning. However, as I explain in other papers, for the needed temporary protection of the Ummah, the Prophet did not consider it was yet the appropriate time to explain the full intended meaning of this profound verse.

Therefore, if a few wise leader types in Islam are not found who will convince Muslims of their terrible mistake and deeply flawed rationale to reject their Messiah, they will later weep at their judgment when they will finally be set straight about what the Messiah of Islam has accomplished in behalf of Muslims.

A Leader Greater Than Lincoln for Palestine

Yes, Abraham Lincoln was the most farsighted President the U.S. ever had. He was indeed a liberator. But what was the inspiration for his Leadership? Who gave Lincoln the insight that enabled him to see that a "house divided against itself cannot stand"? That the U.S. could not exist both slave and free.

It was the Risen Man from Bethlehem who inspired Lincoln. So it took only these few words spoken by the Glorious Quran's still living Messiah to significantly influence America's greatest President. It was the Messiah's words of wisdom about a simple house which led Abraham Lincoln to to liberate ALLAH's precious African Americans from wealthy slave owners who claimed to be Christians. And this same Messiah, who even now remains alive, is very much present in the midst of today's occupied, enslaved Palestinians. In fact, he is now invisibly present in the midst of all Muslims. But the Muslim leaders would rather continue to struggle under the blazing sun of the figurative blazing hot Israeli cotton fields, rather than to seek the help and leadership of the one person who truly understands their suffering. And who else could so thoroughly understand their suffering like the man whom the Quran calls Messiah 11 times? He himself has endured the wicked Israeli whip. With His heart overflowing with compassion, and his arms outstretched, he is now awaiting Palestinians to embrace him so he can join them in their struggle. For there is no one who has so thoroughly tasted the bitterness of Israeli cruelty like ALLAH's now Risen Man from West Bank Bethlehem.

Fitnah

One of the main points which I have tried to make for the Mid East Muslim community is this: Since there is overwhelming evidence that God raised his Messiah up alive after three days of very real death and that he then appeared to many after he was raised from death, that leaves us with our very relevant fact. God's magnificent courageous wise Risen Messiah is still alive. Therefore he will make his leadership available to either those Muslims or to those Jews in the Middle East who will open their hearts to him.

But the Jews appear to still have very hardened hearts similar to how their hearts were 2000 years ago. At that time their administrative body, the Sanhedrin, callously decided that ALLAH's Messiah must be illegally executed. Then, just a few years later, the same Sanhedrin brutally stoned to death the Risen Messiah's faithful servant Stephen. And even today many Israeli leaders are quite willing to massacre over 350 Gazan civilians. Also, under the current brazen leadership of a ruthless Zionist with a visceral contempt for Arab Muslims (Benjamin Netanyahu), there exists in Israel a climate of entitlement and arrogance. Thus, the majority of Israelis have forsaken GOD, the spring of living water. So they have no use for GOD's living Messiah as he is de facto banned from Israel.

Therefore, it strongly appears that it is Palestinian Muslims and Arab Muslims who will have a much greater willingness to embrace ALLAH's Risen Messiah. This magnificent process will begin to occur as soon as they realize and admit that he is now risen and is alive and therefore is available to be embraced.

I have personally testified to the reality that the Risen Messiah has on several occasions in the last forty years personally but briefly communicated with me. But for the sake of brevity I have not detailed each circumstance in this paper. Nevertheless, for the sake of allowing my integrity, or lack of believability to be established, I would be happy to do the following. I will meet with interested Muslims in a location of their choice whether in Seattle, New York, Washington D.C., the U.A.E., Amman, Jordan, Cyprus, Cairo, Egypt, etc. I would welcome such an opportunity to have thorough, unrushed conversations about these matters regarding ALLAH's own Risen Messiah and my own relevant experiences. I make this proposal because I am thoroughly convinced that the status quo of Islam's total rejection of ALLAH's Risen Messiah has virtually ominous implications for not only the future of Islam but also for the region of the Middle East. But looking at the situation from the opposite perspective, I am convinced that the wholesome embracing of ALLAH's own Risen Bethlehem Man by even a few leader types could be the beginning of a new, more positive era for Islam, for the Iraqis, for the Palestinians, and for the entire Arab Middle East. Furthermore, it could ultimately lead to a positive breakthrough in Muslim-Jewish relations.

But I will also add that I am not interested in some type of publicity stunt that a media circus might engender. Therefore, I would agree that any Arab Muslims with whom I would meet would be the ones to control who had access to information about our meeting.

But at this time I consider it relevant to comment upon one more, what I consider to be, supernatural event that occurred to me on December 16, 2006. I believe this amazing event is an indication that it will not necessarily be a smooth, unchallenged process for Muslims to begin to embrace and communicate with GOD's Risen Messiah in a more decisive way.

After prayer in December of 2006, I had written a personal letter to President Ahmedinijad of Iran urging him to consider GOD's Risen Messiah, but had not yet mailed the letter. Then during the night of December 16, suddenly in what had been a vague dream, a short man, who could have been the Iranian President, began excitedly jumping up and down while waving his arms and shouting very clearly the word "Fitnah", Fitnah, Fitnah about 5 to 7 times.

This was several months before the word "fitna" was in the newspaper about the title of a film very critical of Islam. What was so unique about my hearing this word shouted so many times was that never before in my life had I ever had any encounter with the word "fitnah". Thus I don't think the word could have been in my subconscious. But I do know a very small amount of Arabic. So I thought the strange word could be Arabic.

I asked an Arab friend and he said the word was a strong sort of negative word in Arabic meaning to start a great disturbance. A few days later I was with an Iranian couple. They said the word was a borrowed word used in Farsi. And they gave me the same meaning as my Arab friend.

Then a few months later my biggest surprise came. An Arab Christian in Jordan told me that this word was used about three times in the Arabic translation of the Book of Acts. It was used to describe sort of riots that started either among Jews or Gentiles when the radical former rabbi from Tarsus was publically proclaiming the resurrection of the Messiah, a message that the particular Jews or Gentiles he was speaking to did not want to hear. Then months later when I was glancing at my small English version of the Quran, I received another great surprise. A statement in al-Baqarah 2 states that to start a fitnah was worse than killing someone.

So after all of these new enlightenments regarding the word "fitnah", I came to the following conclusion. GOD was letting me know well in advance that by my openly proclaiming the resurrected Messiah to Muslims, I would be viewed by some Muslims as starting disturbances in Islam for which I would deserve to die.

I actually took this warming as positive reassurance that my web site would finally get response even if it could lead to my death, as a great encouragement. Because I consider it so important for Islam to finally have some open debate about whether ALLAH's Messiah is indeed risen and is available to provide direction and for fellowship. And if my own persecution or even my own death would be the cost I would need to pay in this service to ALLAH and to my Messiah and to Islam, that would be my privilege. Because what I look forward to now is for the precious people of Islam, and especially the young people, to have a sustained eternal relationship with ALLAH's own Risen Man from Bethlehem. Indeed he will bring much more liberation to those who embrace him and trust him than even the wonderful Abraham Lincoln brought to those American slaves whom he courageously gave his own life to liberate.

Attention Muslim Women

Significantly, in the male dominated culture of the time, ALLAH did not choose any of His Messiah's male disciples to first discover and then to be the first to announce the glorious news that ALLAH had raised His Messiah from death. Rather, the Creator and Sustainer of the Universe chose several of the Messiah's dedicated women followers to enjoy this unique, historical privilege. (See Luke 24.)

Oh Muslim women, please violently shake the shoulders of the sleeping intellectuals of the Arab Muslim world. Wake them up to a harsh reality! By their building Islam on a false foundation where they have vehemently rejected a major truth which is GOD's cornerstone on which to build an ALLAH honoring society, they have chosen to fall far behind the majority of the world in key areas of human development. Wonderfully however, ALLAH's Risen Messiah will have a major impact on the following type of discouraging examples when he is finally welcomed into Islamic society.

According to a 2006 United Nations study by Arab intellectuals, the entire non-oil exports of the 300 million people of the entire Arab world is less than the exports of the 5 million people of sparsely inhabited Finland. Yet, the Arab's future economy and thus the welfare of today's children are dependent on exports.

The total number of books translated into Arabic for all of the 300 million Arabs is far less than 1/5 of the number of books translated into Greek for Greece's only 11 million people. Yet, a society's progress is slowed considerably when the minds of its people do not have access to sufficient external stimulation.

Oh Muslims of the Arab world! It is not only for the future benefit of the oppressed, exploited Muslims and Christians of Palestine and Gaza that you have a sacred responsibility to embrace ALLAH's now living man from Bethlehem. But for the future welfare of all Arab Muslim children, ALLAH's Risen Man's great contributive influence must no longer be mistakenly locked out of your hearts, your homes, your mosques, and your society. For it is only him who at this crucial time is able to lead you to a wonderful well containing springs of living water for which the entire Arab world is now thirsting.

But please put two and two together and realize that it is not U.S. democracy for which the Muslim world thirsts. For U.S. democracy brought Iraq the polluted water of Bush and Cheney. And there is no greater contrast to these two self-proclaimed spreaders of democracy than ALLAH's Messiah spoken of in An-Nisa 4:158. "But ALLAH raised him up unto Himself. ALLAH is ever Mighty, Wise."

So please, oh women of Islam. Please announce this vital message of the Risen Messiah's supremacy to democracy to Muslim men. For it was only a few women in Jerusalem who impacted the entire world when they convinced a few disbelieving men that their Messiah was, indeed, now alive.

Epilogue

Muslim teachers have historically made a costly mistake. They have consistently minimized verses and passages about the Holy Quran's Messiah so as to interpret each of them in a way that awards him the least stature possible. They insist on doing this even though the Quran itself repeatedly asserts that it confirms the earlier Scriptures which teach that ALLAH has awarded His Messiah considerable stature. In Yunus (Jonah 10:94) the Prophet himself was urged to go to the people of the earlier Scriptures to settle any questions about the meaning of the revelations he had received.

The most extreme example of the counter-productive minimizing campaign by Islam's leaders is ALLAH's glorious raising of His Messiah from death. This hurtful to Islam act of minimizing is accomplished by insisting that a unique combination of two verses must be interpreted in the most simplistic way possible; that the Messiah did not die but instead was mysteriously taken up alive while a look-a-like was executed. For if indeed he did not experience death, it was impossible that the Messiah was victoriously raised from death by ALLAH. But this shallow interpretation is insisted upon even though other verses such as 3:55 portray him as experiencing death and 4:158 can logically be understood as his being raised up from a temporary death by ALLAH. But there could be no triumph over death if no death occurred. For even the Wisdom and Might of ALLAH (4:158) could not raise the Messiah up from death if his death did not occur. However, as explained in this paper, his death did indeed occur. But ALLAH's Wisdom and Might victoriously defeated that death by raising him up alive after it occurred. (See An-Nisa 4:158)

A tragic but real consequence of Muslim's minimizing campaign is to deprive Arab Muslims of the exceptionally valuable resource of a now living, compassionate Messiah who sincerely yearns to be invited to aid the Palestinian human beings who are being cruelly imprisoned by Israel. Sadly, their situation is all too similar to what the African American slaves endured when the Risen Messiah's words inspired President Abraham Lincoln to emancipate them from their cruel slave masters. For if the courageous President, fitly named after the Prophet Abraham, had not been inspired by the Risen Messiah who is honored in both the Holy Quran and the previous Scriptures, there would have been disastrous consequences of historical proportions. Both the American slaves and the divided U.S. would have suffered terribly if Abraham Lincoln had not decisively responded to the Messiah's unchanged words from the Injeel that “A House divided against itself will not stand.”

However, rather than current Muslims deriving deserved pride from the decisive role that their Quran's own Messiah had in freeing the American slaves, they chose to rob themselves of this unique honor. In fact they use every imaginable ploy to disassociate themselves from the wonderful reality that the Quran's Risen Man from Bethlehem still remains alive. Instead, they de facto reject him as the Palestinians main potential ally to help liberate them from the illegal and immoral choke-hold of today's Zionist driven and U.S. enabled Israelis.

Eegretfully, their conduct is in contrast to how the sun-burned and bull-whipped African-American slaves relentlessly cried out to the Risen Messiah of the Quran and Injeel. Due to their persevering prayers and steadfast faith, justice and freedom finally triumphed through Abrahams Lincoln who boldly took hold of the powerful words of the now Risen and Living Man from West Bank Bethlehem.

Therefore, in light of this true historical example, it is now the unique time in history for an equally bold paradigm shift in Islam. Muslims, especially in the exploited Arab world, must adopt a new, refreshing realistic attitude toward their response to their own Quran's now Living Messiah, who ALLAH in His great Mercy has sent to Islam. Such a bold paradigm shift must occur not only to please ALLAH. But this reality based shift will also prevent an historic decline in the stature of Islam in this current highly globalized world. But though it is globalized, it is an out of control world that desperately needs the spiritual and moral leadership of a revitalized Islam.

The Unmatched Irony

There is one supreme irony in the almost 1400 years of Islamic history. Never in the history of the world has there been a more sudden dramatic shift for justice and freedom for the benefit of one large, terrorized people group who were being enslaved by a powerful and calloused people. Significantly, this great liberation in the U.S. occurred due to both the inspiration and sustaining power of the Messiah of both the Holy Quran and the Injeel.

But the giant irony is this. Muslim leaders steadfastly refuse to award the Risen Messiah of the Quran deserved credit for his being the source for the greatest sudden movement for freedom and justice for a large terrorized people group to ever occur in human history. So why do these leaders refuse to give the Quran's compassionate Messiah any credit for this great victory which occurred in the U.S.? Because they also steadfastly refuse to give the Wise and Mighty ALLAH of the Quran the credit due to Him for raising His Messiah from death to life. (An-Nisa 4:158).

But there is a compelling reason why this strange disobedience to ALLLAH regarding His Messiah's triumph over death will soon be a thing of the past. Why?

Because it is so obvious that our wounded world so urgently needs the aid of a resurgent Islam. So there is no way that rejectionist leaders will continue to be tolerated by wiser Muslims. They will no longer be allowed to prevent Islam from fulfilling its leadership role of being ALLAH's Chosen Vessel to bring spiritual healing to vast multitudes through ALLAH's own Risen Man from Bethlehem.

Yes! The fact that Islam's now living Messiah helped to free the American slaves is not considered by ALLAH to have been trivial. Therefore this relevant fact must NOT be considered as irrelevant by Muslims.