- I remember the first time I took an imam deer hunting in East Texas. That's right, you heard it right. I took an imam deer hunting in East Texas. He had visited my church because we were having a special event. He heard me talking to one of my leaders how that I was gonna go
deer hunting with him. And he said, "Bob, I've
never been deer hunting. "Would you be willing to take me?" And I looked at him and
I thought for a minute. I said, "Zia, I would. "But if you go dressed like
that running through the woods with a 12 gauge in your hands
yelling, "Allahu akbar." We're all gonna die. (gun clicking) If you're willing to put on a T-shirt, slick your hair back, speak with a Mexican
accent, I'll take you. So I took him and we had a blast. My life has been changed radically by all the friendships that I have with Muslims and imams and Jews and Buddhists and other people. But it happened because I
learned to be friends with them. I'm Bob Roberts, pastor
of NorthWood Church, right outside Dallas, Fort Worth, Texas, speaking for the Emir-Stein Center, answering the question, why do Evangelicals dislike Muslims? Now that may sound like a negative thing but I'm sorry to say it's true. As a matter of fact our own research says
that 57% of Evangelicals have a negative view of Muslims. The only group who has a worse view? Evangelical pastors. And what does that mean? It means Evangelical pastors from pulpits and how they come across, are the primary people who are spreading among
Evangelicals negativity. It has to stop. Why is it we Evangelicals
struggle with Muslims? Let me give you three reasons. Here's the first one. We don't know any. We simply don't know any Muslims. We do a thing at our
church every single year where hundreds of Muslims
come and Christians. And we have a table where you can sign up at
the end of the service and at the end of the eating time, and go to a Muslim's home or they can come to a Christian's home and we get to know one another. And it's amazing what
they wind up telling me. The Christians, after they've
been to the Muslims' homes and they've been with them. And they say, "You know, Bob, "We never realized that
they're just like us. "They're not extremists. "The views that we had, "the crazy things about Sharia "and all Muslims are
like Al-Qaeda and ISIS, "is just not true. "They're as afraid of them as we are. "And Bob. did you know "more Muslims are
persecuted by the extremists "than any other group?" And I sometimes grin from ear to ear because what's happened now, they're learning about who Muslims are not from a 30-second soundbite on the news but from a personal relationship
they have with someone. Here's a second reason, Christians struggle with Muslims is sometimes we have crazy eschatology or what we believe about the end times and how Jesus comes back. We Christians have a
thousand different views about how he's coming back. And here's the reality, we actually don't know
exactly how it's gonna happen. Even people who agree with one another will argue aggressively
about how it's gonna happen. Here's the only thing we know for sure, Jesus is coming back to set things in order, to bring peace, and to put the world at ease. That's all we know. But some of us have these crazy ideas that the Scriptures
don't necessarily teach, like the Jews have to go back and the temple has to be rebuilt. And so bad speculative theology, things that we don't even know cause us to look at one group of people, and we've gotta watch out for them but we've gotta be against
these other people. There are 1.7 billion
Muslims in the world. I don't want speculative theology, things I don't know for sure, to get in the way of me having
a relationship with them and being able to live the life of Jesus and share the good news of Jesus because I look at just
one group of people. Do we love the Jews? Sure we love the Jews. But we equally love the
Muslims and the Arabs and the Palestinians and everyone else. Crazy theology makes us do crazy things. Here's the third reason I would say that Christians
don't like Muslims. This is gonna be tough but it's true. It's because we've rejected
the Gospel of Jesus. Bob, what do you mean we've
rejected the Gospel of Jesus? We're Christians, we believe in the
authority of the Scriptures and what Jesus did. That may be true. But the reality is, when we don't do what Jesus says, we've rejected the gospel. And what is the essence
of the Kingdom of God? It's love. So what does Jesus say? Love God, love one another, love your neighbor, love your family. Jesus even says love your enemies. In other words, no one's left out. We should never dislike someone. We should never hate anyone. We've been commanded by Jesus to do only one thing, love. Jesus said this, "Greater love has no man than this, "than to lay down his
life for his friends." I remember one time going to Afghanistan to visit a friend of mine. And that friend's dad was killed by some people in the country. I wanted to go and honor him. So I go and I don't tell him I'm coming so that he won't know because I didn't want
him to come pick me up because being identified with
me could cost him his life. I get off the plane, who's there to pick me
up but my friend Umar. "Umar, why are you here?" "I'm here, Bob, because
you are honoring me "and I wanna honor you." "But Umar, I'm not even a
Muslim and you could die." He said, "It doesn't matter, Bob, "if you're a Muslim or a Christian, "you're my friend." Jesus said it another way. "If any man will come after me, "let him deny himself daily, "take up his cross and follow me." That's the way that we
have to love others. To take up our cross, to put our lives on the line for others. Jesus also said, "Greater love has no man than this, "than to lay down his
life for his friends." That is exactly what Umar was doing. If we Evangelicals are
going to love Muslims, then the most critical
thing that we have to do is to love like Jesus to the degree that we're willing
to put our life on the line for somebody's religious freedom even if it means that we totally disagree
with their theology. I want you Muslims to know, there are many of us as Evangelicals, you matter to us. We love you. (reflective music)
Ducking knew this would make me cry