VALLEY FORGE, PA (ABNS 8/4/06)-Dr. Martin Accad, the academic dean of the Arab Baptist Theological Seminary in Beirut, told hundreds gathered at the World Mission Conference of International Ministries (IM) the issues of the present war between Israel and Hezbollah are complex, but informed Christians can engage the region with hope.
"From a human perspective there is no hope, but this is the strength of what we can do in Christ," Accad said in an interview before his presentation Friday, Aug. 4. Accad said he desired to provide another perspective to the Western church and called for Baptists and the universal church to be engaged in the current conflict.
In a workshop presentation to this annual gathering of American Baptists, Accad highlighted five action points for Christians in America:
* In times of conflict such as this, we are able to demonstrate the love of Christ to conventional enemies. * The church in America can pray that this time of conflict could heal intercommunal strife in Lebanon, which resulted in 16 years of civil war, as Christian communities in particular are helping to meet the needs of hundreds of thousands of displaced Muslims. * While acknowledging political and theological differences, the universal church can stand in solidarity against the humanitarian disaster that is happening in Lebanon. * A call that churches and Christians everywhere would leave behind any kind of hatred, and acceptance of injustice, based on political biases. * The church can focus on an ethic of God's kingdom, centered on the concrete needs of human beings, as opposed to some eschatological view where the end justifies the means, and where suffering is therefore justified.
As a practical matter, he said American Christians should continue to pray, and that many of the emails he has received of just prayers are very encouraging. He also encouraged American Baptists to continue to support agencies like Arab Baptist Theological Seminary, which is housing nearly 1,000 displaced Lebanese, mainly Muslims, at the seminary and its partner, Beirut Baptist School. Accad noted almost all missionaries have left the region, and so the decision of IM's missionaries, Daniel and Sarah Chetti, to remain and minister has greatly encouraged the school, fellow Lebanese Baptists, and other Christians.
Rev. Reid Trulson, IM's Area Director for the Middle East and Europe, said he was greatly moved by Accad's comments that the followers of Jesus were not fully transformed until they saw a wounded, but Resurrected Lord. "It's not, we will help you when it's no cost to us, or from a position of power; rather it's experiencing the wounding, but in God's power still reaching out."
Trulson encouraged American Baptists to continue to support the Chettis, or provide relief donations through the upcoming World Mission Offering. He also challenged people to "write the White House, and call for our government to actively push for a cease fire, because it's only once there is a cease fire that conversation can begin."
Accad, who self-describes himself as a conservative Evangelical, and was raised in a Lebanese Church of God, Anderson (an American Wesleyan/holiness denomination), continued to criticize his American counterparts whose faith and politics, he says, leads to unilateral support of Israel and continued demonization of Arabs.
"Theologically and biblically, their unquestioning equation of the modern state of Israel with Biblical Israel is the starting point of an erroneous reading of the Bible," said Accad. Most important to Accad is that such readings of the Bible cause American Christians to see those on the bad side of these interpretations as less than human.
"It's very easy for North Americans who have not lived in a context of conflict to take very lightly the massacre of Palestinians for the sake of fulfillment of prophecy. If we see Middle East events as leading towards the second coming of Christ, then we can justify the massacre of people, we can justify injustice being repeatedly done to whole peoples." Accad said this perspective is challenged when conservative Christians come to do mission, as many where doing at ABTS, when the war broke out in Lebanon.
"Suddenly, we find ourselves stuck in conflict," said Accad about several short-term Baptist groups who were at the seminary when the conflict erupted. "We realize what it means to live in fear, to be under bombing by air, sea, and land." Accad said these conservative, Evangelical, American Christians had been involved in relief work among Muslim Shiites who have been displaced by the hundreds of thousands. "These American Christians have taken food and mattresses and covers, and have provided entertainment and times of worship and sharing with the very people their own government is calling terrorists, and that is what I mean by demonstrating love to conventional enemies. That is one of the most positive things that could happen."
Accad is hopeful that American Christians will continue to inform themselves and look at the root causes of the conflict, which he places not with terror, but the ongoing question of a Palestinian state, and the history of partition in the region. Accad issues these challenges as one who studied for his master's and Ph.D degrees at Oxford University, specializing in nearly 1,500 years of Muslim-Christian relations. He is currently finishing a book that seeks new ways to engage in Muslim-Christian relations.
Accad emphasizes a new approach to dialogue, which moves beyond exclusivism or relativism. "I do not do the sort of dialogue which claims we are each on different tracks leading to the same purpose. For me, what God has brought to us in Jesus is good news, and good news doesn't need an excuse to be good news," said Accad, adding, "I don't need to destroy the other to be good news." The problem to be confronted, according to Accad is "Some Evangelical Christians believe they must destroy Islam before they can preach."
Accad formed the Institute for Middle East Studies at ABTS, which has held several dialogues between Evangelical Christians and Muslims for three years. He said just three weeks before the war, ABTS had held its most recent dialogue, and he asked one of the seminary's leaders to call two Muslim Shiite clerics who participated, to see if they were safe, after bombing in their neighborhood. School officials were able to reach one of the clerics who admitted his surprise at the call. Accad said the cleric remarked, "You are different."
Andrew C. Jayne American Baptist Churches, USA Mission Resource Development http://www.abc-usa.org/