A Plea to Arabs and Muslims from an American Christian
(Arabic translation published in al-Quds al-Arabi (London) 25
October 2001)
I am an American Christian. Not many agree with me and my
friends about America’s new war, but even now there are a few of us –
and if the Arab and Muslim world handles this wisely, there could be
many more.
Six to nine months ago my friend’s wife recounted a dream she had
dreamed back in 1999. She was standing on a high mountain looking
east over the whole United States before her. As she watched, two
whirlwinds formed close together. Presently a missile, labeled
USA, emerged from each one, and she knew they carried nuclear
warheads. We prayed that God would show us if this dream was from
Him, and if so, what did it mean?
I think we now have our answer! The war the USA is now
undertaking will be more cruel than any other it has waged before, and
not against a nation of 35 million, but against a region of 700 million
or more which can return blows in the American heartland as the
Vietnamese were unable to do. It will progress to unrestrained
savagery abroad and a brutal popular tyranny at home, in which those of
us who hold to truth and refuse to join in American pride and
self-righteousness will be persecuted without mercy, along with the 7
million or more Muslims and Christian Arabs here. It is written
in Revelation 13:4 concerning the beast that the whole world will
worship the beast and say, “Who is like the beast, and who can wage war
with him?” George W. Bush, in promising that when he is done no
one will dare to wage war against the United States, commits himself to
bringing this prophecy to fulfillment. And yet - through prayer,
repentance, and intelligent action, might it yet be averted in our day?
Bush’s ultimatum to Afghanistan is just like the one Austria issued
against Serbia to start World War 1. Like that one, this
ultimatum is designed not to be accepted but to give the USA an excuse
to crush Afghanistan and radical Islam, just as Austria designed its
ultimatum as an excuse to crush Serbia and the bomb-throwers who took
refuge there. Austria didn’t realize where that would end, and
neither does the USA. As Jeremiah wrote, “They are mad (boastful
and arrogant) over fearsome idols” – the missiles, bombs, and other
means of death which they have fashioned, and in which they trust.
Our President has blasphemously promised to “rid the world of
evildoers,” which only God can do in His good time. And if Mr.
Bush could do this, would he include the evildoers who have crafted an
embargo to target children, human beings made in God’s image, whom this
embargo is killing like gnats?
As some Muslims fail to realize, the USA is in no way a Christian
country – and few American Christians fully dare to face this
fact. It is an aggressively idolatrous pagan empire that worships
itself, the descendant and reincarnation of Nineveh and Tyre, of
Babylon and pagan Rome, which includes Jesus as a lesser divinity in
its pantheon, but which in no way submits to His word. As Solomon
said, “The name of the Lord is a strong tower and the righteous runs
into it and is safe,” but in contrast, “The rich man’s wealth is his
strong city, and a high wall in his own imagination.” Where does
the USA run for refuge – to the God of truth, or to its limitless
wealth in money, in instruments of death, and in seductiveness?
What does the confidence of the USA have in common with the word of
Jesus of Nazareth? What fellowship do the people of God have with
idols, American or otherwise?
If victory is to military might, where are the South African apartheid
regime and the Soviet Union? Arabs, both Muslim and Christian,
and all other Muslims have a common interest with American Christians –
that we might turn back the bloody hands of the corrupt and violent
gods of the American Empire.
Just as Americans would do better by understanding Muslims, the targets
of American wrath must understand American culture in order to turn
back their adversary.
Christians in the USA do know the slaughter in its abortion clinics,
and it does bother them a little. Persistently reminding them of this
wanton bloodshed could lead them to truly realize that the USA is
indeed one nation under Molech, the god who drinks the blood of
children, and not under the true God, as it boasts in its
insolence. Early and often, Americans need to be reminded that
the tally on 11 September was less than the sum of their own children
fed by their own hands to their gods of convenience and financial gain
on that very day and the day before. The USA devours Iraqi
children because it first devours its own. Should Christians be
unequally yoked with a nation such as this?
The authors of the present American war madness know that they are
vulnerable at this point – see how they flew at the throats of Falwell
and Robertson for bringing it up. Falwell and Robertson were
mistaken in that they too walked in American self-righteousness as they
identified the sins of other people as the problem, rather than our own
sins as Christians. Do we not share in worshipping America,
in adoring American power and wealth, and in despising the
powerless? And yet they revealed this fissure in American unity,
which the wise may use to oppose this madness, as happened in the case
of Vietnam.
Do not target the whole of the USA. Target its gods, and drive a
wedge between them and those who profess to follow Jesus of
Nazareth. In so doing, you will do good not only to us but to
yourselves.
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