A Twisted Crown of Thorns ®

It is said, Islam is the shortest and broadest road that leads to God. Islam has grown from being just a religion in the ranks of Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism or Judaism. It has evolved into a system. A gigantic system which governs and controls the lives of more than 1.2 Billion men and women around the globe. Islam has religious, legal, political, economic, social, and military components.

So when you hear the slogan that Africa is to be the first Islamic continent how deep and wide does such a sentiment ring? Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean region, the Middle East and the Islamic world. Egypt though a Muslim country is usually taken to be a liberal or could I say a secular country by its ardent neighbours. After all the recently embattled President Mubarak Mubarak came from a military background and neither he nor his wife wears Islamic clothes as stipulated by sharia. The sharia (the sacred law of Islam) is said to assert that, a Muslim head of state must rule by Islamic law and preserve Islam in its original form or he must be removed from office.

Sharia leaves no or little choice for any Muslim leader. Because of that law Muslim leaders must seemingly play a game of appearing Islamic and anti-West while trying to get along with the rest of the world but the most dangerous law in Sharia that stands in the way of democracy is ironically the one that states that “A Muslim head of State can hold office through seizure of power, meaning through force.” Could it also be that that law is the reason every Muslim leader must turn into a despotic tyrant to survive, literally?

On the other hand, when a moderate or secular leader is over thrown or protested against in favour of a more pious and Islam honouring one (read Sharia enforcing one), the choice some times appears not to linger between good and bad, it apparently tethers between bad and worse especially for the non Muslims. Egypt in particular has already had its fair share of Christian persecutions. What, with countless Christians being beaten, killed and their homes looted? It beggars belief that things may not even get any better for some people despite a social and civil reform. What then does Egypt need? Democracy or Sharia law or anarchy? I think they need something more than that. [pullquote]Egypt needs God.[/pullquote]

In the core of every man descended from Adam therein is a corrupt nature that separates man from God. We are totally depraved. What that means, is that, not every human being is as sinful as he could be or she could be, but that every human being is sinful to the point that they’re incapable of altering their condition or saving themselves from its consequences.

To my Muslim friends there is no lasting peace in democracy, social reform or civil justice. Yes it may for a season make things appear better and improve standards of living but man in himself cannot mend himself morally to attain the state of social and moral bliss and moral innocence that he lost in the garden of Eden.

The freedom and liberty we crave for only comes from knowing God. In that freedom from the burden of sin and debt to God we can sing the words of that good old hymn by Charles Wesley, And Can It Be?

Long my imprisoned spirit lay,

Fast bound in sin and nature’s night;

Thine eye diffused a quickening ray—

I woke, the dungeon flamed with light;

My chains fell off, my heart was free,

I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.

No condemnation now I dread;

Jesus, and all in Him, is mine;

Alive in Him, my living Head,

And clothed in righteousness divine,

Bold I approach th’eternal throne,

And claim the crown, through Christ my own.

~Charles Wesley (1738)

Nevertheless the allure of Sharia Law will always lurk in the corridors of power in any Islamic nation. Tonight please pray for the advancement of the Gospel in sharia governed nations.

Also remember our Christian brothers in persecution.