An atheist, agnostic, and a religious man...

Kind of sounds like I'm going to tell a joke, but it was the situation that I was in yesterday. I met up with two friends and they wanted me to come to their apartment to hang out. One of these young men is someone we have been working with for some time. A young lady was there at the apartment when we arrived and while visiting one of their friends stopped by. I believe we began talking about the orthodox churches in Mardin, an area in southeast Turkey. The next thing I know, the visiting friend and the young lady began asking me what I thought about Islam and Christianity. The other two guys had already heard what I was going to say, but since one was an atheist and the other not sure about what he believes they were in a way helping me. When given an opportunity like this I usually start out with the following....
"When I talk to you about what I believe, I'm not talking about religion like you know out. I'm talking about a way of salvation." This lead to the question, "What do you mean?" I then can explain the Gospel in a nutshell. In our conversation this led to questions on sin, the Bible being changed, the deity of Christ, fulfillment of prophecies, etc... One question which came up, which often does, was, "What do you think about Islam and Muhammad being the final religion and final prophet?" I don't know if I approached it correctly or not, but it seemed to make the young man think.

I said let's think of it like this: "God gave Moses the prophet the Law or I say the Shari'a. Jesus came and fulfilled the Law and lived a perfect life so that we didn't have to. He then gave us grace so we are not enslaved to the law. Now 500 and some years later Muhammad comes on the scene. He reveals that he is a prophet and gives us the Law again.  Did God change his mind? Was Jesus' life in vain?" This gave me the opportunity to explain what Jesus said about himself.

Sometimes God gives us very easy opportunities to share the Gospel and this was one of them. I'm thankful for the opportunity.

Miras (Inheritance Magazine)

In the picture above in the left-hand corner is the first Christian magazine that I know of to come out in Turkey. It is called Miras which means Inheritance. A good friend of mine had a lot to do with getting this magazine out. So I'm very excited for him, but I'm also excited about the possibilities that a magazine like this may offer. In this first issue there is an article written by Ravi Zacharias that has been translated into Turkish. The article deals with the question, "Is there a meaning to evil and suffering?" Very pertinent question for this country. There are also articles written about what the Gospel is and one in particular about Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the price he paid in following Christ. I'm excited to see how it will be received by those who do not follow Christ. A magazine at times can almost give people the impression that they are tolerant or cultured because they are reading it. We'll see....