An ongoing conversation about America, the Middle East, and Jesus

by: Bob Roberts, http://www.glocal.net/

Those I’ve feared the most, have become those I’ve loved the most.  First I was afraid of Vietnamese and communist – I began to work with them serving them in Vietnam, now they are my friends.  I may not agree with them on some things and they not with me – but we can respect one another and work together.  Once I got over my fear of communist – I thanked God he had me work with them, and not Muslims!  They really scared me – then I wound up doing some relief and development work with Muslims and found out they weren’t all radicals and terrorist like I had made them in my mind. 

How did I over come my fear?  What lessons have I learned about fearing any people?  I’m not saying I don’t fear, even as I write this I’m getting on a plane later today to a very sensitive part of the world.  There are no gurantees something bad won’t happen, be it a terrorist or failed engine – but we must move forward if we want a better future for our world.  I had to shift my thinking.  We have to shift our thinking if we are going to be fruitful. 

1. Stop looking at earthly kingdoms instead of an eternal kingdom in Jesus.  When I begin to define my world by the moment I am in, or even the powers that are in play from an earthly level I miss out on great things that God would want to do in and through me for the sake of others.  The Kingdom of God is eternal, it’s righteousness, its peace and this means doing the right thing is measured not by the moment but by eternity. 
2. Don’t be driven by stereo-types from the media versus who is really there and how do they think.  When media does a story, generally it’s because something is wrong with someone somewhere.  We cannot allow those brief stories to become our primary lens of what we see.  I wouldn’t want all pastors to be seen as crooks and immoral men – but generally if a preacher is on TV, that’s why!
3. Fear cannot our primary motivator instead it’s love.  “Perfect love casts out fear.”  When you love someone, you’ll give your life for them,  Jesus said, “Greater love has no man than to lay down his life for his friends.”   
4. Faith becomes weak.  When faith falters – fruit shrivels.  Faith is the soil in which courage sprouts.   
5. I had to become less tribal and more global.  Like it or not, our prejudices, culture, opinions all go into shaping our view of the world – especially those of our tribe.  Mass conversation promotes stereotypes.  Instead of asking the question how am I different, I began to ask, how am I similar to others – and use that to build a friendship on.  It certainly doesn’t mean I have to agree with someone on everything.   
6. I had to exchange my focus on speculative theology to the eternal Great Commission.  For a long time, I held to a theology that pretty much blessed the Jews and ignored everyone else in the middle-east.  How does that jive with the Great Commission where we’ve been told to love and share the love of Jesus with all peoples and all nations?  It doesn’t.   

My fourth book, Realtime Connections:  Linking your Job with God’s Global Work. Has just been released, it tells real live stories of  people becoming friends with people in other countries and other religions and how they get along.  Go out today and hug a muslim – just make sure they’re the same sex!  You can read more of stuff like this at glocal.net  – Bob Roberts