Today we started a series on Islam by watching a video of Dr. Nabeel Qureshi’s testimony:
Here is the note-taking form I handed out before the video:
Dr. Nabeel Qureshi’s Journey to Christ
Nabeel was very hesitant to write down his story, but he realized it was not his story but G______ story.
Nabeel’s Childhood Story
- Nabeel’s sect of Islam (Ahmadi) was persecuted heavily in Pakistan
- The Pakistan immigrant community was very tight
- Nabeel came from a very d_____ Muslim family (missionaries). He did not grow up as a “passive Muslim”, but Islam was his very identity. He viewed himself as an ambassador for Islam.
- In Islam, there’s a tight adherence to t_________ and c_________ – this includes speaking Arabic, because Mohammed spoke Arabic.
- Nabeel’s mother taught him to recite many memorized Arabic prayers each day.
- There’s a lot of overlap between the stories in the Old Testament and the Qur’an
- Nabeel had memorized the final 7 chapters of the Qur’an by the age of 5, because those are part of the 5 daily prayers. By the age of 15, he had memorized the last 15 chapters of the Qur’an.
- Nabeel read entire Qur’an in Arabic by age of 5, but didn’t fully know how to read English yet.
- Nabeel had been trained from an early age how to respond to Christianity & d__________ Islam
- Girl Betsy asks Nabeel if he knows Jesus – he replies, “I do know Jesus”. According to the Qur’an:
- Jesus is v__________ b___________
- Did m____________ (heal the blind and cleanse the lepers and raise the dead)
- He is the M_______________ and will come back at the end of time
- But Jesus was not G__________
- The Bible is not trustworthy, it has been c________________
- Nabeel threw back some objections at Betsy.
- Where does Jesus say he’s God? (Betsy replies Jesus & the Father are one – John 10:30)
- Nabeel replies “One what?” – Jesus also prayed he and the disciples would be one too.
- When Jesus was in Galilee in Mark, he said that he could do no m____________.
- When Jesus says, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but G_________”
- When Jesus says in Mark chapter 13 that no one knows when the end of times is – not the angels, not the Son, but only the F____________. How could he be God if he doesn’t know something that only God knows?
- In John 14:28, Jesus says, “The Father is greater than I”.
- If I were you Betsy, I would believe Jesus –that the Father is g___________ than Jesus.
- The moment she shared the Gospel, my respect for her went up through the r_________. Here is someone who c__________ enough about her faith to share it with me.
- Other Christians never shared. I know what Christians believe, that if you don’t accept Jesus you’re going to go to hell. So, either they don’t b_______ it or they don’t c_____ if I go to hell.
- Nabeel asks students – “Do you know w_________ you believe w_________ you believe? Can you give a reason for your faith, that’s compelling?”
Nabeel’s Meets David Wood in College
- Nabeel met David Wood on the speech and debate team. They roomed together and he saw David reading his Bible and he was flabbergasted, because he thought all Christians knew that the Bible was c__________. He had never seen a Christian reading the Bible outside C________.
- Nabeel’s objection: Bible is in English, Jesus spoke Aramaic, early church spoke Hebrew, NT written in Greek, translated to Latin, then to German (translation of a translation…)
- Most people just replied they believe it by f______________ (synonym for ignorance)
- David was different. David pointed out that Nabeel is bilingual – what he hears in one language, he can repeat in another language without losing the m_________ and that’s what disciples did.
- We have in our possession _,____ manuscripts of the Greek NT – we know what it said.
- We have over __,_____ quotations of the NT from the early church fathers w/in 150 years of NT.
- Nabeel and David became friends – they did life together, Nabeel knew David c_____ about him.
- “Nobody cares what you know until they know that you care”. Friendship is that glue that you need to have in order to sh__________ your m____________ with people.
Investigating the Claims of Christianity
- After acknowledging that the Bible is reliable, Nabeel needed to find out where in there does it say that Jesus c__________ to be G________?
- “I want to believe what’s true in the world – I want to have reasons for it”
- It doesn’t matter if we have warm, fuzzy f__________ about Christianity – if that man Jesus did not rise from the dead, then Christianity is false and we are deluded.
- Good case to determine if Christianity is true:
- D___________ of Jesus –you’d have to throw out history not to believe this
- R____________ of Jesus – the best explanation by far of what happened to Jesus is that He rose from the dead (looking at the evidence as a historian would)
- D_____ – Nabeel took the verses out of context that seem to be saying Jesus is not God
- Nabeel considered the case for Christianity strong (80-85%), but considered Islam 100%!
- David encouraged Nabeel to apply the same level of c____________ to Islam.
Nabeel’s Worldview is Shaken and He is Converted
- Nabeel: “The evidence for Islam came nowhere near the evidence for Christianity”
- Nabeel: “You can’t just come out and tell your doubts to your parents.”
- Muslims often ask for God to give them visions and dreams. 50-70% of Muslim à Christian c______________ had a dream or vision.
- God gave Nabeel a vision and 3 dreams to guide him toward Christianity
- Nabeel needed time to mourn, since he knew what was going to happen to him and family
- Nabeel pulled out the Qur’an and the Bible, looking for comfort – couldn’t find any in Qur’an, only in the Bible. There is not a single verse in the Qur’an to comfort a h____________ person.
- God, why didn’t you kill me between the moment I believed and when my family found out?
- “It’s not about you” – When Nabeel walked out, the whole world changed, felt c____________.
Discussion Questions
- On page 1, point 13, Nabeel comments about so many Christians that never shared their faith with him, saying that either they don’t believe it or they don’t care if I go to hell? How did that make you feel? Is that a true assessment of people who don’t share their faith?
- In what ways was David Wood different than other Christians Nabeel had met in the past? What role did David play in Nabeel’s conversion?
- What are the “costs” for a Muslim (or someone of another religion) to convert to Christ?
- What were the 3 key facts about Christ that Nabeel focused on in evaluating Christianity?