The Position of the Bible on Freedom

Using freedom of choice in the Bible for selfish motives ends up in spiritual death (Genesis 2:17 and 3:3) and the loss of unity and peace. God showed Adam, the first man on the earth, what was good and what was evil. He pleaded with Adam to take His advice and use his freedom of choice in a way so as to not fall into evil temptation and lose his freedom as a result. Adam ignored God’s advice and was deceived by an alternative thought. We know the rest of the story of how Adam and his wife Eve were tempted by a new idea without evaluating its consequences and subsequently they lost their intimate fellowship with God and with one another.  The new idea should have helped them to enjoy a continuing healthy unity if it was right, but it wasn’t. 

The new idea came from Satan, anti-God or anti-Christ, according to the Christian doctrine. This anti-God is the god of disunity who injects lies into the human mind by tempting people to think that they are each eligible to do everything they desire without thinking about the rights of others. He twists the doctrine of pure freedom by adding to it some selfish or unknown things in order to make people self-centered and to create disunity among them all for his domination. The central mission of God is also to wake people up to the schemes of Satan and provide the way of salvation for them. Since God Himself is free by nature and respects freedom of choice, He therefore has no other way than to plead with people to enter a dialogue with Him, allow Him to reveal the truth to them and free them from the atrocities of self-centeredness.

We see that both God and anti-God speak about freedom. But their definitions of and approaches to freedom are different. It takes an heroic effort to distinguish the difference between these two tactics. Let me give you a few contemporary examples to see where God and Satan have been trying to take us.

The establishment of political atheism in the 20^th century shifted many people’s attention from Christianity to the formation of Communism, the arrangement of a social organization which was supposed to free people, mainly the working class, from any discrimination or exploitation so that they could have access to all things equally. Theoretically this looked convincing and attractive since it aimed to free people from bias and the misuse of power and to provide everything for everyone. However, soon after the institutionalization of Communism in some countries, everything, including freedom, took on a new definition and became subject to the power of the central government. As a result, people were only allowed to speak or act in accordance with whatever the dominant Communist government espoused. Therefore, the desire for equal social, political and economic justice ended up in another version of dictatorship which restricted freedom in numerous ways to house favoritism, mistreatment and misuse of power. Later on, millions of people were killed by Communist governments simply because they questioned the authenticity of Communism. 

Likewise, in the West, because of the influence of Post Modernism, many Western politicians have adopted a different kind of social construct which has fueled the growth of relativism and skepticism, especially towards Judeo-Christian beliefs and, in particular, the freedom that is central to the Gospel and the purpose of Jesus coming to earth. This trend has led Western societies to a place where they now put their hope in unsustainable notions like multiculturalism and/or pluralism. These ideas are full of fantasy. They are, in fact, an enemy to true unity that can only be found in the transformed life that Jesus opens up for us.

A third reason for the limitation on freedom is that the church in the West has not been discerning enough or courageously vocal enough in evaluating secular ideas about freedom and defending authentic, Biblical freedom. Negative views broadcast about Christianity have led many to reject the Bible without any personal knowledge about its true position of freedom. Now, there are many prominent leftist elites whose criticism about the Bible via YouTube are sadly indications of their illiteracy about the teachings of the Bible. Imagine the enormity of these scholars’ negative impact on people, especially on the young generation of our time who are not interested in personal investigation. The church is called to teach the manifold wisdom of God to the world (Ephesians 3:10), but most evangelical churches have fallen short in revealing the manifold wisdom of God to their own congregations. Churches mainly speak about a few parts of God’s wisdom such as prayer, unconditional love and salvation or spiritual freedom. Other significant parts of God’s wisdom are not taught so that people can learn to defend their true freedom in God with convincing reasons against the bogus freedom that has confused many in every way and created enemies of the church.

Biblical freedom does not only include the spiritual realm, but every aspect of life on earth. In its first pages, the Bible teaches us the significance of using our freedom of choice in a way to establish a unified society (the first family on earth).  Adam used his discerning power, named animals each according to their instinct and evaluated whether he would be able to establish a unified and free society with animals. He discovered that he wouldn’t be able to do so. Adam was convinced that none of the animals he named would become a suitable companion for him or have an intimate fellowship with him for a long-lasting unity. Animals have no creativity or organizational purpose. We can teach the cleverest among them to do only primitive things for entertainment, but they are unable to understand a plan, the ways for achieving it or the purposes behind it. They are therefore unable to enter a planned partnership with us. They are by nature subject to the law of wildlife and that law can in any moment escalate even among the most teachable of them to attack people. It is because that law of wildlife does not recognize any difference between good and bad. 

Isn’t it strange that we are asked by many of our contemporary, so-called intellectuals to pursue a kind of freedom or live a life that does not recognize any difference between good and evil and has no ethics? It is shocking that such irresponsible ideas stem from the minds of intellectuals who are employed using our tax-monies to teach discernment to our children. Instead they put pressure on students to leave their God-given freedom behind and follow this mindless alternative. Until our young are taught to correctly understand the teaching of the Bible on the issue of freedom, they will not be able to resist these silly ideas that aim to chain them with confusion. We are face-to-face with many silly ideas daily and we need to make our Biblical stand in God clearer and free people from misperception. 

The freedom in the Bible is a creative freedom which encourages people to use their minds, hearts and consciences to compare ideas and choose the one that establishes life with productivity, long-lasting unity and peace. The God of the Bible respects this creative freedom and calls upon people for reasoning and conscious decision making:

Come now, and let us reason together, says Jehovah; though your sins are as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be like wool. (Isaiah 1:18, MKJV)

I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore, choose life, so that both you and your seed may live. (Deuteronomy 30:19, MKJV)

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. (John 8:32, MKJV)

Because of our freedom of choice, everything is within our reach for a reason. We are capable of basing our lives on reason or rejecting reason. We have autonomy to evaluate and reject a false idea or blindly bow down to it. In a comparable way, we are also free to respect the rights of others and avoid ending up in jail or breach others’ rights and go to jail. We are free to accept life and live eternally or follow the path of death and end up in hell. It is all based on our own conscious decision-making. We are free to use our brains, become creative and be a blessing to many or to remain indifferent and fall into the miseries of a random life. The path that lacks a consistent position on freedom will lead progressively downwards to a place where people will be hurt immeasurably.

Not many people in the world are able to grasp that an unstable and man-made freedom is the gateway to a progressive failure. It is for this reason that the freedom of the Bible supersedes the unstable man-made freedom which is 1. not reciprocal, 2. limits people’s ability to speak their minds and hearts and 3. lacks sound principles. No one with such limitations or ambiguities will be able to face the reality of life, hear the truth and thereby act freely. We have every solid reason to stand for Biblical freedom.

Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage. (Galatians 5:1, MKJV)

'Reasoning through Dialogue' may Help our Generation

What is the best way to respond if someone or a community deceives, betrays, belittles you, or lies about you, or aims to destroy you and your interests? Would you want to search for any possible way to dialogue with them?

"Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD." (Isaiah 1:18, KJV)

It is amazing that the most powerful God who is superior in justice and everything else sees the solution in dialogue. This sentence from the Almighty God is full of grace,mercy and love. Otherwise, who will be able to reason with the holy and spotless God if God chooses to assess short-fallings with His absolute justice? This is because God’s judgement is His last option in His approach to those who betray Him or lie about Him. God puts His justice into practice only when people shut the door forever to their ability to reason. For this reason, He is commending and surrendering His whole being and the entirety of His Kingdom to dialogue before the Judgement Day arrives, so that people may be able to see that He is interested in reconciliation not condemnation.

This bilateral culture of reasoning from God started to manifest itself in remarkable wayssince the Protestant Movement in the West. It progressively flourished into every part of life and brought about astounding changes for good among western nations. This was the first broad welcome to God’s culture by many nations after over two thousand years from the time of the prophet Isaiah to the Protestant Reformation. Westerners started to discover that it would be their fundamental responsibility to give reason for what they had and also sought reason even from their top leaders since they were divinely ordained for two-sided reason. By pursuing this Judeo-Christian culture, western nations grew rapidly, qualified their family, community and organizational cultures and thereby became the most creative nations in the world. For this reason, the West became the most favorite place for many people to migrate to.

Now, there is little interest in Judeo-Christian culture in the West since authoritarian socialism started to make its roots stronger under the freedoms ushered in by postmodernism. Because of its centralized, evolutionary leadership, socialism intentionally targeted the hearts and minds of western politicians and academics with the intention of aligning their policies with the unfriendly approach to reasoning and freedom that is the true face of socialism.

In socialism only one group, the working class, is entitled to have a voice - not the business owners or the wardens of the free market economy. This is because socialism’s conviction is that a business owner shouldn’t be able to make more money than the salaries of his workers.  To do so would be evidence that he had abused the workesr. A worker in a free market economy is therefore seen as a victim and his voice must be assisted so that he may dominate the owners of business. But business owners on the other hand must be made voiceless until their wealth disappears and society has become totally egalitarian. This is the definition of freedom in socialism; it is a one-way freedom – the freedom of the ‘victims’. 

It is funny that the first socialists rose to find a better solution against the money cartel’s one-way freedom and exploitation in 19th and early 20th Century.  But it is interesting to note that, by the late 20^th century, they themselves had fallen into the same trap and ended up embracing the principles they once disliked. Interestingly though, Socialists of the 21st Century are still living with the 19th Century  mindset (even though it is out-of-date according to their own evolutionary philosophy). Ideologically speaking, they are immeasurably confused, perverted and thereby unable to think deeply.  They see that the conditions of workers in 20th and 21st Centuries changed for good. Western business owners solved their problems with workers by listening to their reasoning and ideas through Bench-Marking and Enterprise Agreements and other innovative initiatives. Workplaces became characterised by financial incentives for increased productivity. In many businesses workers were given representation on Boards and in management. To this day, the conditions of workers in western countries are way better than the conditions of workers in socialist countries. The old unjust ethics that had been evident in many organizations of the 19^th century  have given way to the work ethics that flow out of the the teachings of Jesus Christ. Industrial laws were no longer shaped by the principles of the bad old days of exploitation.

Sadly, it is now the socialists who aim to erase good functional western laws by spreading their socialist ideology and ethics. One is their primary tactics is the use of the “victimhood” ethos in order to claim for themselves the higher moral ground of being the superior thinkers. Socialists leaders like Lenin, Stalin,  Mao, Pol Pot, Fidel Castro and many others slaughtered millions of their fellow citizens (many of them downtrodden workers) under a justification of socialist ideology.  Yet they still claimed that the workers were ‘victims’ in order to emotionally justify their violence and secure their political dominance. They were always afraid to lose their moral high ground and therefore had no choice but to play the self-righteousness game using the ruse of victimhood. The truth is that this victimhood has always been accompanied  by bluff and deceit.   For both followers and defenders of socialism, the goal and effect of this strategy is the accumulation of more power and control.

So, the second powerful ethos in socialism is bluffing or lying. Almost a century of practice has made socialists expert in lying about their critics while cleverly attributing their own flaws and failures to others. 

A third deceptive ethic of socialism is its overt support for any group that has the potential to claim victimhood - even if they have little knowledge of or sympathy for socialism. According to socialism, victims should have more rights than others in everything, even to the point of destroying the rights and freedoms of others.

For this reason, socialists, and all their allied leftists love to create or champion victims in any way they can since ‘the End Justifies Means’. Victims must always remain victims so that socialism is able to survive in western democratic societies characterised by Judeo-Christian principles and values which have nurtured a culture where there is reasoning between both sides. Socialists know that, if they lose the leverage of ‘the victim mindset’, it will be the end of their ideology.   Even if they avail themselves of the countless opportunities for bilateral reasoning in conversation with non-socialists, they will lose their ascendency. This was what happened between Regan, a defender of the free market economy, and the socialist Gorbachev. Gorbachev’s openness to dialogue and reasoning brought socialism to an end in Russia. Genuine dialogue changes the landscape for socialists.

Most socialists of our time are slaves to their old ideological principles.   They therefore have zero tolerance for creative mutual conversation. By drawing the media into their service, they have had remarkable success in reshaping the minds of many westerners. They have skilfully used journalists to  spread the victim mindset and, in so doing, have largely silenced the Christian voice in community dialogue.

Socialists and all their quasi-socialist sympathizers know that ‘victim’ propaganda is a most effective tool in winning people’s minds and enlisting their advocacy for socialist causes. Socialist leaders rejoice in being ‘stage-managers’ rather than ‘lead players’  in the socialist march that is sweeping through western nations.  Interestingly, one of the victim groups that they champion is fundamentalist Islamic activists.

Actually, the union between the socialists and Islamists in the West is largely because of Islam’s identification with a victim mindset. Muslim communities all over the world have taken up the persona of being victims at the hands of non-Muslims. Their thinking is that this victimhood will not end until Muslims occupy the entire world and release the world from non-Islamic values. Victimhood is the life-long destiny of each Muslim shaped by Muhammad and it will never come to an end unless all other beliefs disappear. That’s why ISIS has risen. This victim mindset has always been there throughout the history of Islam. Muhammad rose because an angel forced him to follow Allah against other religions that were opposed to him (Ibn Hisham, Sirat Rasul Allah, P.106-107); Sunnis rose because Shiites were at odds with them over the right to the caliphate; Shiites rose because of Sunni oppression; The Sunni Muslim Brotherhood rose because of colonialist oppression: Shiite, Ayatollah Khomeini rose because of Israel’s and America’s oppression; Palestinian fundamentalism - Hezbollah, Hamas - rose because of the creation of Israel which is an offense to Islam; and our contemporary terrorists have risen because of Islam’s core excuse - they see themselves as victims.

We can see how the tyrannical gamesmanship of ‘victimhood’ dominated thinking in the West. It produces pressure to repeal existing legislation. It is used to shame and  humiliate anyone who dares to disagree with it. Socialists use the gamemanship of 'victimhood' as a principle to belittle their oppositions, discriminate against them, call them haters or cause them to lose their jobs once their opposition has crossed the line and revealed the evil plans of socialists.

Christians are now forced to leave their Christian beliefs in their homes or their churches and bow down to the leftist credo almost everywhere you go.   Wherever they go, they will find themselves face to face with a legion of victims who will target them with accusations of bullying, insult, victimization, humiliation or racism.

Isn’t it shocking and heart-breaking that leftists have become the dire enemies of Christianity which originally gave them space and respected their rights to express themselves freely!? Such a wicked pay back to our beautiful Christian values. 

How should we respond to such wickedness? How about the response of Jesus Christ: 

"Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do." (Luke 23:24, MKJV)

We forgive them because they do not know. However, this appeal put forward by Christ for forgiveness does not mean we should ignore those who seek to manipulate our society in this way. Indeed, if this were to be the outcome, His church wouldn’t be established and His manifold wisdom wouldn’t be revealed by His Church (Ephesians 3:10).

Secondly, our forgiveness becomes sweeter and more meaningful if we stand to enlighten the minds and hearts of those who belittle us or want to get rid of us. That’s why God is pleading with his enemies to give their reasons and to hear our reasons:

“Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.” (Isaiah 1:18, ESV)

Reasoning through dialogue helps.

Christ and the Relational Problems of our Generation (Part 2)

How can we manifest the truth about our faith in Christ to individuals in our contemporary generation who do not have the mind of Christ and are lost and incapacitated by the beliefs and ideologies they have adopted? Many are unable to or too busy to evaluate the values underpinning their own beliefs and ideas. Nor do they anticipate the outcomes of their actions which are shaped by those beliefs.  Only Christ can help them to pause and see what they have been missing and how they have been exposing their own lives and the lives of their communities to progressive moral bankruptcy. It is therefore urgent for us to reveal the mind and heart of Christ to them and become explicit in shining the Christ-light on all matters of life, but particularly the spiritual. 

Perhaps one of the most effective and legitimate tools in this light-shining endeavor is a creative conversation. Even though a person may be aware that Christ stands in opposition to many parts of their beliefs, they may not have experienced the challenge and stimulation of such a conversation. The revelation of Christ will fully engage a person’s mind, heart and conscience in such a conversation. The Holy Spirit often harnesses a person’s competence and capacity to discover the truth individually without the bias of pre-suppositions. Christ will help them to allow their consciences to become vocal about the truth since their freedom is closely linked to the awareness and declaration of their conscience about right and wrong. Christ wants them to experience a true testimony within themselves about the belief they hold which can give them peace. He knows that they will not be able to have a comfortable testimony in themselves unless they follow His model. 

This manner of creating awareness in people is inventive and productive because of the work of God in the Creation of humanity. The Gospel states that since God has created people in His own image, their conscience therefore bears witness to the principles which sprang from God’s image into their lives against their own conflicting thoughts, accusations or even excuses. 

14 for when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law, these, although not having the law, are a law to themselves, 15 who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them) (Romans 2: 14 – 15 NKJV) 

In other words, so long as we are prepared to introduce Christ to them and can get them into a dynamic conversation with us and help them to discover their own conflicting moral stands, they have inherent capacity to discover the Christ-light and be enlightened., Even a person’s own conflicting thoughts, when exposed by discussion and challenge can demonstrate the human capacity to differentiate between truth and falsehood. We can challenge a person, if we have confidence in Christ, to prove the authenticity of their belief to us if they desire us to follow their path. In being asked to verbally expound their beliefs, a person is forced to formulate and justify them which can expose the inadequacies and inconsistencies. Certainly, they will give their hearts to Christ if they continue to discuss with us.

How do we get people into a dialogue with us? What are the fundamental tools that bring a Christian and a non-Christian together for an open and creative dialogue? 

Each person in the world understandably desires to have the best of everything in life. For us Christians, this is a strong God-inspired tool that focuses our attention on the very nature of what is the best. Other people may not know what is truly the best. Nevertheless, their claim to have the best or their desire to search for the best is a powerful instinct to motivate them for a conversation. In my interactions with people over the years I have come face to face with individuals who claim their belief to be the best among all. My response to them has often been “I would love to have your belief if you can prove its greatness to me.” My rational appeal has encouraged some of them to evaluate their assertion and to prove the accuracy of their claims as we have exchanged emails in a logical dialogue. This has opened the space for us to discuss the approaches of our respective beliefs about life in comparison with the values of Christ. Praise God, this has resulted in some of them putting their trust in Christ. 

When it comes to us, as the followers of Christ, our tool is the identity we have in Christ. He calls us as His light for the world. His light in us has established us as His heavenly examples to shine among people, drawing their attention, edifying them and illuminating their hearts and minds for everything in life. The very reason for Christ shining through us is to make us wise, enabling us to share our wisdom with others, teaching and convincing them to allow Christ to shine through them too. The light and wisdom of Christ is closely linked to the teaching of the whole Bible. The prophet Daniel prophesied:

And those who are wise shall shine as the brightness of the sky; and those who turn many to righteousness shall shine as the stars forever and ever. (Daniel 12:3, MKJV)

This verse is a prophesy about Christ and His followers. The true followers of Christ are called wise and asked to make the manifold wisdom of God known to people. 

8 To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, 9 and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ; 10 to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, 11 according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord,    (Ephesians 3: 8-11 NKJV)

The manifold wisdom of God is about the entirety of life - spiritual, social, moral, political, economic. The light of Christ is to fashion our minds and hearts with the beauties of Christ’s mind and heart about every aspect and stage of life so that we can teach people and prepare and mature them to teach others in a similar way. That’s why His Gospel calls us His ambassadors (2 Corinthians 5:20). An ambassador knows his/her sender and can reveal and represent his values. For example, in a discussion about leadership we need to know why the leadership of Christ transcends the model of their leadership and how it unites people in family and society for a harmonious, creative and productive life. What principles are there in the leadership model of Christ which inspire people to understand and believe that their contribution for the success of others will result in their own success?

This is the kind of disciple Christ desires us to become, helping others to think deeply about life and grasp bigger pictures for enlightening others. He has commanded us to make disciples (Matthew 28:19) so that not only do they put into practice all that He taught but also teach others to do so. Therefore, as His ambassadors we are responsible to reveal His teaching about all things to individuals and nations on earth under His caring, loving and generous leadership: things about God, about His character, how relevant He is to the life of people, what kind of leadership model He has, how people deal with each other under His leadership, what life will look like without Him, what His concerns are about individuals and nations, what initiatives He has taken to draw people’s attention to reconciliation and a long-lasting peace and why people need to leave other models behind and follow His model.

Jesus not only revealed to us God and His plans with His manifold wisdom but also laid an unshakable foundation for teaching people to overcome all kinds of relational hindrances. This was to help people reach reconciliation and to live in peace. He taught us so that we could allow Him to use us as His examples to teach others. We need to honor Him by becoming His faithful disciples, His salt and light in a world that suffers from relational problems.

Christ and the Relational Problems of Our Generation

For over three decades I lived in two Islamic countries while I was a Muslim. I learned that practically speaking self-interest carried more weight than the family interest which carries a secondary weight and what is in the interests of the wider society comes last. Leaders, either amongst extended families or in other circles, speak to one another about their deeper desires and efforts for togetherness and the success of everybody, as if they are angels sent for establishing a harmonious life. But it is all to manipulate, overtake, leave others behind and gain more for themselves. Of course, there are a handful of people who want to have a simple life and stay away from these games as much as they can.

These relational and psychological problems are because the dominant belief has closed the door to humility, servanthood and self-sacrifice becoming the leading factors in leadership. It rather has opened the door wide for the accumulation of power in any possible way and through every means, as the saying goes, “The end justifies the means”. Under the authority of such belief you need to do everything it takes, ethical or unethical, to gain power at any cost and to establish yourself as the most authoritative figure. You need power to occupy the mind and heart of every person and thing, including media to become your political players for silencing others and to ensure the longevity of your rule. Then every truth-lover will be branded as betrayer or threat and all others will be called to rise, like a tribal movement, against the threat and destroy it at its conception. That’s why the Middle East has become the stronghold of bloodshed for centuries.

I also learned that leaders were always perfect and the most gracious ones. They do not need any opinion or advice to reform their leadership since they are faultless. Reformation falls only on the shoulders of followers in order to learn better ways to perform their duties that the new leaders expect from them. The leader is not accountable to anyone, but all are accountable to him. Nobody has the right to speak about the leader’s weaknesses or failure - everybody is obliged to present even the leader’s failures as his victories. The leader twists words and presents circumstances in such a way as to command praise from the people, such as presenting his leadership as extraordinarily good and that the country has never seen such a caring and gracious leader. Recently, I was listening to the comments of a self-established once-for-all-time president of a Muslim country on YouTube. This dictator was talking in a meeting, saying that his close companions were worrying that he had brought his country to a such a level of unimaginable overt freedom that it presented a risk of being confusing to the populace. Imagine that in a country where there is scarcely any freedom everyone is obliged to rejoice and say that they have abundant freedom.

Most contemporary Islamic countries’ laws speak in favour of freedom and equal opportunity, but they remain only inside the legal books just to give leaders a basis for lip service either nationally or internationally. Lip service has always been a practice in Islamic countries right from the establishment of Islam until now. It demonstrates how religious and ideological values and habits override laws in dictatorial ideologies, and how an authoritarian belief trains its adherents, directly or indirectly, to view laws and regulations as secondary to power.

Muslim leaders have always had two kinds of lifestyles, apparent and secret. The secret life is known to the immediate family members only and also to some extent to very close and trustable friends or companions. Whereas the apparent life is a show for demonstrating in a manipulative way that the leader is benevolent and ethical, all for him to pave the way for himself to penetrate and dominate endlessly. This dualistic lifestyle has become the cause of weighty psychological problems in all Islamic countries where people are forced to coat words with niceness and serve the interests of unjust people.

We see how Islam has affected the life of its followers negatively and endangered a harmonious life among its followers. It is impossible for Muslims to be cured of

these psychological and relational illnesses unless they leave Islam and come to faith in Christ.

Our jaws drop anytime we see similar kinds of psychological problems in the west, especially amongst many educated people who have turned their back on Judeo-Christian values. They too, like in Islamic countries, hide their real ideological colors behind talk superficially coated with democracy, freedom and equal rights. They do this in order to reach their goals in a hypocritical way as if it is too hard for them to invest their time, money and energy for the spread of their beliefs openly and with honesty. Not only this, they also react with coercion and intimidation, if a person standing true to his/her community exposes their insincerities.

Why do they do this? Because their ideas and beliefs, like Islam, cannot handle truth and reason. The followers are therefore unable to realize that in a democratic society actions and words need to be filtered for protecting the freedom and rights of all. Since these beliefs and ideas do not stand for the freedom and right of all, they push their followers to receive endorsement or allegiance via dishonesty and manipulation. We are all aware that dishonesty and deception are the two inseparable friends of discrimination, intimidation and war.

Anti-Judeo-Christian values in the west misled people with the notion of “all are true” in order to confuse people, create a cultural war between the national and minority cultures’ adherents for benefiting from these cultural clashes and thereby receive the support of people who fall into their traps. For them the power for domination comes from clashes among various people groups, like the “thesis and anti-thesis” of Socialism or “Muslims against non-Muslims” of Islam. This was the reason for the establishment of multiculturalism so that each cultural group could receive sovereignty for its culture and push its course until domination.

Unfortunately, their politics worked. Many surrendered to them blindly since they were unaware of their agendas and still are. As a result, they dominated and gave further legal power to minority groups to bully those who did not confirm their ways. Even many migrants, who have come to have a better life in the west, have learned from these narcissistic westerners that it is ok to disregard the fundamental values and constitutions in the west and stand for their own cultures, cultures that have failed in their own motherlands.

We can see how these beliefs and ideologies have incapacitated people and turned them to become the enemies of their own lives and the lives of people surrounding them. This is a spiritual war orchestrated by Satan. Otherwise, it wouldn’t encourage people to base their faith in deception, coercion and hostility. Satan has made these people sick from the top of their heads to their toes. They need proper treatment. They need the eye-opening words of Jesus Christ, His brain, reason, compassion, love and reconciliation in order to be able to know the truth and become free. For this reason, we, as the followers of Jesus Christ, need to look at them with the eyes of Christ and speak to them with the mind, heart and mouth of Jesus Christ. That’s why He told us:

You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. (Matthew 5:14-15, ESV)

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. (Matthew 28:19-20, ESV)

Light makes things visible, reveals their beauties for acceptance but their defects for rejection. We need to shine amongst deceived people so that they can discover the remedy for their lives. We are the adherents of the truthful belief. A truthful belief does not hide its own objects behind deceiving words. That’s why the Gospel of Jesus Christ says:

[We] have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. (2 Corinthians 4:2, KJV).

What Unites Us Is Different from What Unites the Rest

Adherents of almost all beliefs and religions speak about unity, but in practice that unity ends up either in disintegration, with destructive fall-out among its own members, or it ends up in a long-lasting and constructive relationship.

All those beliefs that promote the theory of evolution and also the religion of Islam speak about an ultimate global unity, but all believe that they cannot reach unity unless their group strive against other groups and prevails over them.

All other beliefs that see the solution in the power of man and crown him as a god believe that they will reach unity by empowering individualism and self-centeredness, whereas self-centeredness is the major obstacle to unity.

There can be no hope of unification among individuals, groups or people or nations for a long-lasting relationship unless they are under a head whose belief is designed to unite people together from the beginning to the end. He combats the threat of conflict among them but establishes them in a path where they are able to unite their hearts, minds, feelings, plans, purposes and acts in such a way as if they belong to one another as the members of a healthy body. He not only unites them in all conduct of life but strengthens their zeal to love one another as their own body and further become the voice of this unity to others. This amazing unity is taught in the Gospel of Jesus Christ only:

Complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 2:2-5, ESV)

People need to follow Jesus Christ who is able to take the human race as a whole, bring people together from various national backgrounds, renew their minds and hearts so that they can walk together delightfully in His Path. Life which ensues from the message of the gospel practically and consistently nurtures unity despite differences in cultures, habits and laws. Cultural and habitual differences naturally force people into alienation and dominance. However a true belief enlarges people’s understanding of and commitment to taking personal responsibility for establishing unity. It enriches cultures so that people can unite their whole strength, wills, practices, cares and judgments together for following the best role model and thereby protect themselves from the forces of alienation.

In a truly unified group, people do not reject each other, but have unceasing peace which enables advancement in every aspect of life. This is because in peace the advancement of one also represents the advancement and benefit of others. There is no sense of competitiveness or personal gain at the expense of others.

The greatness of Jesus Christ is seen in His ability to establish such a unity among people of all colors, races, nationalities and ranks. For this unique task He deserves to be the commander in all things and among all nations and generations. The Prophet Isaiah defines the role of Jesus Christ very well:

…. the government shall be on His shoulder; and His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. There is no end of the increase of His government and peace …. (Read Isaiah 9:6-7, MKJV)

Because He is the Prince of Peace, there is no end of His unity, and because He has the heart of an everlasting and loving Father, He does not allow war and hostility to run the lives of His followers. That’s why nothing is more important than the love and harmony in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The Gospel says:

Through Him having made peace through the blood of His cross, it pleased the Father to reconcile all things to Himself through Him, whether the things on earth or the things in Heaven. (Colossians 1:20, MKJV)

By virtue of the reconciliation through Jesus Christ, we are established for eternal unity and peace. Our friendship in Christ is not divided but perfect to the extent that not only do we share the joy of reconciliation here on earth but also hereafter.

We, as the followers of Christ, are called to be the messengers of this unity to the world. Let us exercise our role in this New Year faithfully, embrace His plan for unity with the full purpose of our hearts and thereby prove to others by our lives that He is the only One to unite people in eternal truth, love and peace. The practice of our unity on earth will make the unity plan of Jesus Christ relevant to all nations and will pave the way for us all for an amazing song of unity in the future (Revelation 7:9-12).

Jesus Came to Reconcile the World to God

Two persons or parties cannot truly unite with one another if they are not of the same mind and heart. Also a true unity does not take place unless priority is given to the values that guarantee a long-lasting relationship. Unity with God also is not exempt from this principle. It is impossible for a person who is spiritually chained to the kingdom of sin, to unite with God, who is absolutely against sin by nature, unless that person allows his/her spiritual citizenship to become godly. This is what the true meaning and mission of Christmas should be since it is predominantly regarded as a season of celebration for the Birth of Jesus Christ. The revelation of Jesus Christ is to release people from the kingdom of Satan and establish them in the Kingdom of God. When we understand the way this transition takes place and when we allow this Redeemer to unite us with God, then we are with God and part of His community and plan, as the Gospel says:

But as many as received Him, He gave to them authority to become the children of God, to those who believe on His name. (John 1:12, MKJV)

Those who receive Christ and allow Him to set their minds and hearts in heaven are enabled to grasp the true meaning of Christmas, the Birth of Christ. This is because they have accepted the revelation of God in Christ and are thereby honored by God who declares them members of His own kingdom and household; His co-workers and children. (Ephesians 2) They now carry the citizenship of God’s Kingdom with God’s extraordinary reverence and have the right to be the spokesmen and women of God. They are authorized to represent God as His ambassadors and reveal His Kingdom values to those who do not know Him and haven’t received Him yet.

Therefore, the object of Christmas, in its true meaning, is to reveal that God stepped into life on earth in order to carry out His plan for long-lasting reconciliation and unity. Man’s mind and heart function conditionally and as a result produce conditional and relative reconciliation which can be breached anytime conditions necessitate. But God’s mind and heart are based on unconditional love which makes the harmony enduring from the beginning to the end. 

The unconditional love of God is His greatest Christmas gift to humanity. It is the greatest because while people were in bondage to Satan, God’s enemy, and did not deserve His love and forgiveness, He took a sacrificial step, paid an astonishing price in order to redeem people from the bondage of Satan and reconcile them to Himself. As the Gospel says:

For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but so that the world might be saved through Him. (John 3:16-17)

With this sacrifice, God gives His eternal love and compassion as free gifts to His own enemies (Romans 5:8) in order to open their eyes to the truth, redeem them from spiritual death and hopelessness and establish them in eternal life, peace and joy. Through this sacrificial initiative, God also reveals the doctrinal differences between His concept and the worldly concepts so that people can understand the object of His revelation in Jesus Christ and avoid blind obedience. As the Gospel says:

And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. (John 8:32, MKJV)

No matter who started the Christmas celebration, whether or not they were authorized by God to start such a celebration for the Birth of Christ or whether the day of Christmas matches the actual Birthday of Jesus Christ or not, the majority have accepted that Christmas is about the Birth of Jesus Christ. If this is the case now, it then should be a time of receiving and representing Jesus Christ and a season of experiencing the eternal joy of reconciliation with God.

God is not against people’s gifts to one another and their generosity towards needy people at Christmas time. But more than anything else, He loves the true message of Christmas being revealed to people through our gifts and through every other thing we do. For this reason, we need to allow our presents and happiness to function inside the frame-work of God’s plan for the salvation of the world. 

God revealed Himself in Jesus Christ to change us so that we can adapt ourselves to His way of life in order to have enduring peace in ourselves, in our relationships with one another and with God. God did not give His only begotten Son for the sake of our worldly and short-lived pleasures. The world’s pleasure is a self or a group oriented pleasure which can become the cause of misery for many. Aren’t thousands of wandering refugees in the Middle East the result of a self-oriented pleasure and preference? God’s pleasure is different from this worldly pleasure. Worldly pleasure is without Christ, alienated from the heart of God and does not focus on the purposes of life. This is because it is not from God and therefore cannot be the object of true life. God’s pleasure instead is to save and shield people from extremists and to give purpose to their lives. God is like the shepherd who attends his flocks sacrificially and delights in them. God rejoices over preparing His followers to become like Him and be blessings to one another.

Let us therefore please the heart of our God and practically prove to people that Christmas is about the incarnation of God in Jesus Christ. He revealed Himself in Jesus to give us a heavenly identity so that we could put Jesus at the center of our lives and make His expectations our priorities. He expects us to be functional with our new heavenly identity on earth and proclaim to our children, grandchildren, surroundings and to the world that His Birth declares the everlasting love of the God of the universe to His creatures so that they can have long-lasting fellowship with God, rejoice in peace and unity with Him and one another eternally.

Freedom Necessitates Evaluation

Freedom cannot flourish in a society or survive without analyzing the merits of beliefs and values and without standing for the best out of all of them. Indeed, we can only demonstrate our freedom when our freedom of choice is esteemed in our societies and we are in no way under pressure to follow things blindly. In a free society, people have individual space to practice their autonomy and to put their analyzing power into practice. This helps them to make healthy decisions and to have meaningful lives based on good and rational reasons. 

Nothing should bother people's freedom of choice. This is essential if they are morally expected to be responsible for their attitudes and actions in a society. If regulations are made to limit the exercising of free will for evaluation or choice, then it rids people of any social responsibility. In other words, if the law limits me in my ability to think before I act, then I cannot be held responsible for my actions since I was forbidden to analyze and anticipate the consequences. 

So we see how vital it is for us to approach life with open minds and hearts, making a willful decision for whatever we want to choose or follow.  That’s why the Gospel of Christ asks Christians not to follow Christ blindly, but to be prepared and to give reasons for following Christ:

…. always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect. (1Peter 3.15, ESV)

Living in a society, either with diversity or uniformity, makes us responsible to give reasons for the values we follow. Every follower of Christ is asked to give reasons for the establishment of his/her hope in Christ. These reasons reveal the life quality of Christ in every aspect of life either philosophically, doctrinally, politically, socially, economically or ethically. Unlike  all other beliefs and philosophies, the life in Christ is not compatible with vagueness. It is based on the knowledge of the truth which allows the truth to flourish in every sphere of life, creating freedom. This freedom in turn becomes the motivating factor in our lives to protect freedom. We do this through the exercising of our minds, hearts and consciences in all circumstances, and also in our relationships with others, friends or strangers alike, in order to educate or strengthen them to do the same. This creates openness so that people become interested in reading the chapters’ of each other’s lives and in searching for the best together.

This dynamic culture of Christianity was amiably welcomed by many organizations in the West after the protestant movement, and it played a significant role in making western organizations creative, productive and successful. It brought all employees together, no matter what their ranks and backgrounds, so that they could share the result of their investigations, experiences and knowledge with each other. This helped them to discover the best means for better and higher quality performance. The Gospel of Christ states that the members of one body are all equally significant and function in harmony. Western organizations also applied this principle so that their ‘members’ function in harmony in every aspect. They established the Benchmark and brought all, from the lower level worker to the chief executive officers, together in order to erase barriers so as to operate as a unified organizational body.  

It is amazing that this Christian principle has now become an inevitable part of the organizational culture in most successful businesses in the West (and in the world). Many of our contemporary business leaders and managers reject Christianity on the surface. But underneath they have allowed Christian participative leadership, relational values and work ethics to become the pillars of their organizational cultures. This has made for substantial success despite the challenges of competition. Very few of these leaders and managers want to compromise this Culture of Success with political correctness, multiculturalism and relativism since the result of compromise will be huge losses for them. We saw how some financial institutions in the West were deceived by Islamists and opened their doors to the Islamic Sharia Finance, but soon some realized the stagnant nature of Islamic economic principles which focuses on the interests of its adherents only. Some of them abandoned the Sharia culture and went back to their already dynamic Christian practices and values. 

My aim in saying this is to say that most leaders of successful businesses act as hypocrites and contrary to the practices of Christian values and ethics when involved in educational institutions and governmental organizations. They turn their backs on the same values that are the fundamental factors for success in their own organizations. Because of political correctness, they are unable to or do not want to understand the fact that their countries will go bankrupt and fail immeasurably if they do not support the practice of the same Christian principles for their own countries too. They are not far-sighted enough to see that the the biblical culture is woven into their organizational cultures, and their organizational life is a part of their countries’ economic life too. If their countries fail, their businesses will fail too. If they support governments and educational centers who turn their back on Christian values, the anti-Christian government’s norms will also, sooner or later, affect their own organizations negatively. In the same way, the universities’ anti-Christian graduates will also, sooner or later, become their employees and become a threat to their successful organizational cultures. Then it will be too late and difficult for them to defend their rights and to fight against the established rules, regulations and individuals who are out to erase their means of progress.

We see how subtly dualism and short-sightedness have occupied the atmosphere of the West now and do not allow people to pursue a meaningful life. Communities are forced to leave investigation, evaluation, discussion and healthy decision-making behind, bowing down to a failing culture of ignorance and indifference which progressively narrows their freedom and enslaves them to a complete totalitarianism. People’s growing dependence on this worsening culture is stealing their respect of Christ’s beliefs and values, subtly leading them to a future which will be the end of their freedom and civilization. We have lost our freedom in universities, schools and governmental offices; we will do the same soon in our worship places and homes too.

Freedom cannot function if people’s minds, hearts and consciences are restricted by governmental and school regulations. Individual autonomy for investigation, comparison, debating, rejecting or accepting is the sacred right in each person’s life and the landmark for protecting freedom. Any invasion of this sacred autonomy is the failure of freedom. 

The doctrine of Christ has proven itself practically to be the only cause and power of freedom in the West.  People need to be encouraged to relentlessly investigate this and to see how powerful and effective the values of Christ are for the establishment of freedom.  It is a violation of human rights if people are limited in their ability to investigate and discover the means for their freedom. It is our urgent responsibility, therefore, to wake up people to realize that understanding is the key for having freedom:

You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. (John 8:32, ESV)

Subtly Confined and Consumed

I remember how we young Iranians based our allegiance blindly on Ayatollah Khomeini’s verbal claim that Islam would fill in all of the inconsistencies in our society and take us to democracy. His comment exploited a major blind spot of the younger generation at that time in Iran; we who yearned for democracy, yet did not know that the very heart of Islam is incompatible with democracy. Ayatollah Khomeini’s proclamation of democracy was indeed a seductive ploy for him and his committed mullahs to reach for power and in fact entirely block the road to democracy. As a result, we became our own enemies by surrendering ourselves and our country to Ayatollah Khomeini who later made our own motherland a prison for us. For those of us who were able to run away from Iran and take shelter in the West it is truly heartbreaking and worrying to see that aggressive ideologues of the West are deceiving people with similar forms of socio-political pretenses, aiming to blind our societies, grasp long awaited authoritarianism and destroy the freedom we have. We never imagined seeing this in the West before our migration. Through my doctoral study, I had already discovered the uniqueness of Christian values and how its dynamic, considerate and creative leadership style was able to equip Western citizens to manifest the most successful lifestyle on earth.  This gave us a vision for our migration to the West and a hope that the West would certainly have something strong to bind us new-comers to its existing citizens and them to us so that together we could value freedom, integrate and do whatever we could to protect our new country from potential threats. 

Instead, we are shocked to see how far astray the West has gone, undermining its golden values and welcoming the values of foreign models that have long gone bankrupt in their respective lands. In particular, multiculturalism has given rise to the paradoxical dilemma of constraining certain discussion and expression with the straight jacket of political correctness, while giving free expression and liberty to anti-Christian sentiments. To mock, despise and discredit the Judea-Christian foundation of Western culture and society has become the popular discourse while subtly and naively these anti-Christians display tolerance toward insolvent cultures which erode freedom and fairness. Now many westerners, particularly a large number of young people, have fallen into traps of aggression and thereby find themselves bullying Christianity without knowing that their actions have been selling out their own freedom to the home-spun presentations of the self-styled guardians in the West. Amazingly, these people call themselves the promoters of freedom without realizing that they have been seduced, exploited and consumed for the destruction of freedom. They are unaware that their minds have become restrained with beliefs and patterns which are not compatible with freedom. 

What will the future be for a society that is highly exposed to such unawareness and incomprehension? The old proverb says:

The man that wandereth out of the way of understanding shall remain in the congregation of the dead. (Proverb 21:16, KJV)

Lack of understanding confines people and makes them passive, unresponsive and irresponsible. That’s why the Bible equates the lack of understanding with death. Understanding is a gateway to freedom. Jesus said:

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. (John 8:32, MKJV)

Neglecting the significance of understanding, following leaders and beliefs blindly, walking in their ways irrationally and sightlessly are roadblocks to freedom. This is what is happening in our societies and many of our contemporaries are acting as barricades to freedom. They are wrapped in perplexity, made slaves to the indefinite calls of opportunists and thereby are unable to walk in the path of freedom and live victoriously. It is true when the Bible says:

If the trumpet gives an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself for the battle? (1 Corinthians 14:8)

Can uncertainty wake people, bind them together as a nation, give them a reasonable vision and authorize them with strength to win the battles that threaten their existence and freedom? No. Only clarity and understanding can build up souls in truth so that they can understand who they are, why they are on earth and in which direction they need to walk. 

There is no doubt that many of our people are deceived and abused. It is our responsibility to inform them in any way possible so that they can free themselves from following false examples. There have always been people throughout history who loved their own personal aspirations more than the interest of their nations. There have also been courageous people who tirelessly informed others and fought for the protection of their nations’ freedom. The liberty we have in the West has not come to us accidentally. Lives were burned by selfish leaders in the squares of the West for their courage in protecting their nations’ liberty. With their sacrifices, they taught their generations that leaders may ignore their own personal rights, but they may not turn their back on the rights of their nations. These children of freedom could not sit idle and allow egocentric leaders to sacrifice the rights of people to their own individual interests. We need to follow their examples. Ignoring the interests of our nation is like turning our back on our own families since our families make up our nations. 

We need to follow the standard of Jesus Christ. He knew that it was costly to love the world and engage people in avoiding blind obedience but recruiting them to discover the truth. Yet He paid the price and fulfilled His love for the world. This is what we need to do if we truly love people and long for them to become free. 

Disharmony Among Leaders' Beliefs, Plans and Actions

In recent decades we have witnessed frequently a high degree of disharmony in the plans of many leaders from civilised countries.  They have not only been contradicting each other, but some of their plans have been sharply resisting others' plans as well. Imagine the destiny of a community whose leaders are ill equipped, resisting their own leadership style with contradictory plans and approaches. What can then be expected to happen in the midst of their community? It is obvious that a spirit of conflict and rivalry will prevail. Harmony and peace will be dismissed and the means of discord and polarisation will dominate. 

We all know what happens in countries with dictatorships, how leaders put themselves at the center of everything and force people to take their side. Even leaders in some western countries have been imposing themselves on their citizens and coercing them to take a position without testing the validity or truth of that view. Leadership has become more like emotional or political propaganda that compels people to join a party or group without a clear picture of the end result of their case. Not many of our contemporary leaders are interested in facing the real issues of our time and investing in discovering real remedies for problems. Their plans are nothing but fantasies and their approaches nothing but punching air. They love to spend their time on superficial things just to keep people emotionally engaged. A classic example would be how much concern and discussion was aired by some US leaders over whether there should be free access to opposite gender toilets!

When a leader is ill-equipped or unable to address the real needs of his people the result is confusion and no solid majority standard. A leader without a sound and stable moral code is more difficult to hold accountable to their own integrity. Unfortunately, many leaders in the West have disassociated themselves from Christian morality. Instead, they operate according to a fluid, relativist morality and rule randomly, thereby justifying whatever the consequences of their leadership decisions may be.

Such an unpredictable leadership will be the cause of divisions, indifference, discord, disloyalties, ethnic rivalry, discrimination, hatred, violence and wickedness. These evils will penetrate every sphere of national culture, progressively turning it into a culture of death and, in this way, blocking the path to unity and peace. No society can become healthy with such an erratic leadership that paves the way for doing evil.

One confusion that seems to dominate among our contemporary leaders is around Globalization and Multiculturalism. These are two popular ideologies that are, in practice, in conflict with one another. On one hand, leaders claim to be committed to a ‘global’ doctrine for political and economic co-operation.  On the other hand, internally, they proclaim the sovereignty of the doctrine of ‘multiculturalism’, in which full freedom is given to each individual culture to run its own course. This is argued on the grounds of the belief that sectarianism must be avoided at all costs. 

Think about the war against Climate Change by Western leaders. They have been marching ahead to obligate all nations and people groups to follow their particular climate-friendly agenda. But at the same time the same leaders have not only been defending the establishment of Islam in the West, but also have allowed huge amounts of taxpayers’ dollars to be invested for the formation of this religion’s Sharia. Unfortunately Sharia does not want non-Muslims to breath fresh air, but wants them to be suffocated for simply not joining Islam!

How many millions of dollars have been invested in the last three decades by Western leaders to get their environmental agenda embraced worldwide? It’s huge! These so-called civilized Western leaders have been trying to influence the minds of the leaders of developing and underdeveloped countries to introduce greater openness and dynamism into their closed cultures by getting them to start protecting their domestic environment for the benefit of the entire world’s population. Their messages about Climate Change tell us, though only theoretically, that we are now living in a global village where the self-centeredness of a group or of developing nations will be a cost to others. On this basis they argue that these developing nations should not use technology in a selfish way and at the cost of others’ rights and well-being. But alas, we wish the leaders in the West would be just as candid about the importance of 'worldview' in their approach to the leaders of developing nations. This might help these leaders to better understand the significance of the relationship between cultural practices and environment.  Surely this might help the developing nations to take climate initiatives that would advance consistent targets at home and abroad. Alas, this is not what we have seen in the past decades.

The problem lies at the root of their beliefs and philosophies. Most Western leaders believe in evolution and random natural selection, meaning that everything happens by chance and there cannot be a reliable man-made plan, including a plan for Climate Change., After all, nature is in control and is the driving force in life. You see, these leaders do not believe in the capacity of humankind to write a deliverable plan. Neither do they believe in the existence of any pre-made or Divine plan. The bottom line is that they hold to a doctrine of ‘the inevitability of gradualism’ that will take its course.  Yet, they still try to impose plans and ask others to respect their plans. Isn’t this strange? A total contradiction between their philosophies, their plans and their actions.

This is why they struggle to bring their promises to reality and deliver their political pledges. Firstly, they do not have a sound belief system to underpin their plans. Secondly, they defeat their own (globalization) plans by asserting sovereign power to every cultural group at home, without asking them to be open to integration. A good example of this is the sovereign power that they have given to Islamists to hold onto their closed, intolerant and restrictive beliefs even though that is contradictory to the dynamic of globalization. They proclaim loudly that they are globally caring leaders, but miss the point that Islamists have historically not cared for harmony. Rather, they care for the establishment of an Islamic caliphate to force the world to bow down to their 7^th century AD nomadic culture of Mecca.

So you see that, on one hand, Western leaders have been aiming to assert their power and demand the right to pursue their agendas for the future of the planet - all in the name of global harmony - but on the other hand, they have been undermining themselves at home via multiculturalism which gives power to groups like the Islamists, not only to disregard the significance of environmental issues, but the future of the world for non-Muslim citizens. What a contradiction! That’s why Islamic terrorism has been advancing globally alongside the proclamation of  ‘globalization’ (worldwide-harmony). This contradiction has been palpable for  three decades now. Islamists realize that leaders in the West are no longer governing for the protection of their own communities. Rather they are distracted by myriad minority agendas and personal aspirations for power and reputation. Muslims know that the more the cloudy-minded leaders in the West are in power, the more Islamists will be able to spread their influence and penetrate and destabilize non-Islamic societies. 

What a leadership crisis the West is facing! The weakness in leadership has been ripping off western culture and undermining its openness, freedom and creativity.   Instead, Western societies have become increasingly divided, discordant and chaotic. Such a negative trend in a culture will inevitably prepare the society for the rule of a dictator. That’s why the totalitarian thinkers are happy for the changes that are dominating the West.  Some are even financing the fragmentation, the conflict and the madness so that the long-awaited dictatorship might take over.

What is the solution?

The solution is in Jesus Christ. The Gospel says that God is not the author of disorder and confusion but of unity and peace (1 Corinthians 14:33). For this reason, the leadership of Christ is the best model. He is the Prince of peace and unity. There is no trace of confusion in His leadership. Confusion drives peace and unity away. Western leaders therefore need to go back to their Judeo-Christian legacy if they want to leave a positive impact on their world and be a blessing to other nations. No leader who is under the inspiration of Jesus Christ and seeks His counsel continually will be exposed to confusion. The Spirit of Christ in him will guide him to avoid any contradiction between his plans, promises and actions. He will not allow the spirit of division and disharmony to prevail and ruin the peace of his people. His society will experience stability under his leadership. Let us pray for leaders to have a personal encounter with Jesus Christ and to allow Him to inspire them with His leadership values for the sake of their own personal need for peace, and for the peace of their societies and the world.