My latest issue of Christianity Today (May 20, 1996) includes an ad for a new book by Peter Kreeft entitled “Ecumenical Jihad.” One segment of the copy reads:
Peter Kreeft argues that we need to change our current alignments. We need to realize that we are at war and that the sides have changed radically: many of our former enemies (e.g. Muslims) are now our friends, and some of our former friends (e.g. humanists) are now our enemies. Documenting the spiritual and moral decay of modern society, Kreeft issues a wake-up call to all God-fearing Christians, Jews and Muslims to unite together in a “religious war” against the common enemy of godless secular humanism, materialism and immorality.
Aware of the deep theological differences between these monotheistic faiths, Kreeft calls for a moratorium on our polemics against each other so that we can form an alliance to fight together to save western civilization. God is calling for this unity, Kreeft says, and if we respond, God will do something wonderful.
Would you find it surprising if I told you that the three endorsers of this author (Richard Neuhaus, Chuck Colson, and J. I. Packer) were also instigators of the recent proposed alliance between Protestants and Catholics? This must be the next whistle-stop on the journey to that great world confederacy that will at last bring peace in the worldwide kingdom of religious tolerance and international brotherhood. Haven’t I read about that somewhere? Was it Revelation 17 or 2 Thessalonians 2?
In reading the advertising copy, some questions obviously come to mind. Have Muslims–part of the world of sinners which God loves and for whom Christ died–been our enemies? “We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Eph. 6:12).
And when were the humanists our “friends”? The Humanist Manifesto declares unabashedly its opposition to the God of the Bible and its devotion to the supremacy of man. If such have been the friends of the Church, they have proved to be Judases.
Have we been called to “save western civilization”? One is reminded of the wag who, when asked what he thought of western civilization, responded, “I think it would be a good idea.” Western civilization, such as it is (and always has been), lies in the lap of the Wicked One. God does not want it, saved or otherwise. It, along with the rest of Babylon, is destined for the flames. The Lord cannot find anything worth salvaging in it. He has sent us instead to call men and women out of this world system to find refuge in Christ.
Our Lord spoke of this world system and our relationship to it in His prayer in John 17: “I have manifested Thy name unto the men which Thou gavest Me out of the world…I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which Thou hast given Me; for they are Thine…I have given them Thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world” (Jn. 17:6, 9, 14).
What would it cost us to form such an alliance? It requires, says Kreeft, “a moratorium on our polemics against each other.” Read that: “an end to the proclamation of the gospel to all Muslims and Jews.”
Avram, father of the nation of Israel, and Ibrahim, Al Kuds, the friend of God and also father to the Ishmaelites, would have something to say about this. He rejoiced, said the Lord Jesus, “to see My day: and he saw it, and was glad” (Jn. 8:56). What was it he saw? He saw the Lamb that God would provide, Jehovah-jireh. He saw the Saviour that neither Islam nor Judaism will accept. Abraham’s two sons (Gal. 4:22) have not the faith of their father, by which he was justified (Rom. 4:3), as are we.