Scriptural References:
John 14:6

Galatians 1:6-10

1 John 2:19

Matthew 13:5-6

Reflection: Recently someone at the church I attend told me how her nephew had converted to Islam so he could marry his girlfriend, who is a Muslim. She seemed pleasantly happy with the event and didn't seem to see any problem with her nephew's conversion.

After over a week of consideration on this individuals conversion I cam to a single one line response.

"He traded his Salvation for Wife"
MJ Flack

To break this down into terms Christians should be able to understand: He has exchanged his eternal place in Heaven for a temporary condition here on earth. Galations 1:6-10 tells explains how the people living in Galatia and attending the early church there had deserted the gospel of Christ. Turning to a different teaching. One that made them feel at ease in the world without any challenges to change their ways our continue to affirm their faith in Jesus the Christ alone.

While 1 John 2:19 tells us of those who have left us (the family of Christ) as never truly belonging to us. Such as the nephew who has left his Christian faith to follow another for for a convenience that only matters here on earth. In both cases we are to consider never truly lost as they were never truly found. They can be deemed the same as the seed mentioned in Matthew 13:5-6. Where the word of Christ (referred to as the seed sown by a farmer) landed on rocky soil. For a short time it grew and sprang up quickly. But when tested it dried up and withered. When the world of physical challenges tests their faith the too wither and die. Never fully maturing in the faith.

God loves the world so much that He gave His only Son to die in our place (John 3:16). As a perfect redemption for our sins. By the death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ we have been made acceptable to stand in the very presence of God our Father and Creator. We are blessed to be able to enter heaven and live a perfectly blessed life with our saviour. A condition that is set aside for all who profess the very name of Jesus the Christ and claim their salvation. This is an eternal gift. One that will never perish or decay. But will last forever.

The alternative to this eternal blessing is an eternal curse. One that those who either refuse the gift of grace, or those who have fallen away, will receive eternal judgement and torment in hell. Where they will suffer for all eternity. As mentioned in Matthew 25:41. God will separate those who are not of His flock. Sending them into the "eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels". A place of eternal judgement and pain.

What this individual has done is to throw away the blessings that he once proclaimed to have in the very name of Jesus the Christ. He has decided that Islam is better then Jesus and so has left his first love. Which makes me feel deeply sad for him. Especially as I know the way Muslim's will treat him if he ever leaves Islam and returns to his Christian faith. In Islam this Apostasy s deemed unacceptable.

In the Quran, the very book this young man has now freely chosen to follow, it is written in Surah An-Nisa 4:89 that anyone who accepts the Islamic faith and later denies and turns away from it should be than proper Muslim's are called to "seize them and kill them wherever [they] find them". It is a tragic fact that Islam rules anyone who leaves the faith should be deemed an apostate and murdered in the name of Allah. This alone should make people aware of the stark and brutal difference between God and Allah

It reminds me of the differences between the three faiths. Such as Judaism Islam and Christianity.

In orthodox Judaism if a Jewish person leave the faith for any other faith they may ritually hold a funeral. They may bury an empty coffin thus expressing how dead that individual is to them.

In Islam if someone leaves the Islamic faith they will seek an appropriate time and ritually kill the individual. Usually by stoning them to death.

In Christianity if someone leave the Christian faith they will usually pray for that person and keep and open invitation for them to return to the fold.

As we can see there is a vast difference between pretending someone is dead, praying for that person as a lost but saveable soul. And openly killing that person to stroke fear into anyone who may consider leave Islam for another belief. Don't be fooled by Islamic lies, Which are deemed taqiyyah or sanctioned lies to fool those who are not Muslim's. The poor lost soul that has traded away his very salvation for a temporal thing is made all the more tragic. As he is now living with a death sentence. If he stays with Islam he will miss out on a heavenly reward and enter hell and eternal judgement. While if he returns to Christian faith he will be killed as an apostate of Islam. Or any other belief for that matter.

It is prayerfully hoped that if he does return to the Christian faith he will do so in all earnest faith so as when Muslim's murder him he will be safe in the grace of our Lord and Saviour Jesus the Christ.