Monthly Archives: June 2026

This is something no one is talking about: The sinfulness of eating sushi. Hear me out:

Sushi takes relatively plain, massively plentiful ingredients like rice, seaweed and artificial crab meat and simply rolls it up. Then, serving it with chopsticks, a wisp of ginger and a dollop of wasabi, proprietors charge an exorbitant, some would contend obscene, amount for it. 

Further, many forms of sushi contain shrimp, real crab meat and eel. People who abide by the dietary guidelines of Kosher eating, Islamic jurisprudence, the Bible and common sense just don’t eat that stuff. 

Finally, there are so many normal, good kinds of food to eat. Why should we disregard them for an odd, foreign so called “delicacy?”

I didn’t get you, did I? Of course, sushi is cool. Even if there is a shred of truth in the previous three paragraphs (and there is a shred!), it’s still fine if you enjoy sushi. The fact that I don’t like sushi (I understand the joy of sushi is simply lost on me.) doesn’t mean you shouldn’t. 

I say all that to say this: If you like Muslims, good for you. Don’t let people who don’t get it get you down. Granted, sometimes Muslims feel “odd and foreign” and yeah, there are plenty of “good, normal” people to hang out with, eat with, pray and advocate for. 

If people, even Christians, give you grief, send you reels, make stinky comments, let ‘em. Smile, if you can, and go about doing your best to follow Jesus. I’m all for you and God is too, just a million times more. 

Summer is here! To encourage a more laid back season and to thank you for reading Muslim Connect, I’m writing a few shorter editions—possibly also a little lighter than last week’s musings on Muslims, Christians, and the question of suffering and evil! 

Proverbs 17:22a says, “A joyful heart is good medicine.” I love to tell and be told jokes. Because I also love Muslims, when Muslims tell me jokes, that’s the best! 

Here are two Muslim comedians I’ve been laughing with today. (Tastes vary considerably. These guys are mostly clean, but if you find offense, I apologize.)

Nabil Abdulrashid is a huge Nigerian Muslim with a huge heart. Here’s a funny sample and this is a serious one. Nabil’s married to a Pakistani British woman and explains how that shapes their entertainment choices. 

Ola Labib is a Muslim comic of Sudanese background who is also a pharmacist for the UK’s National Health Service. (I know, you’ve seen that combo dozens of times!) She riffs on some NHS challenges and compares Sudan and Portsmouth, UK!

If you have a Muslim comic to recommend, I’d love to hear it!

Muslim World Cup-date!
Thirteen Muslim majority nations are competing in the World Cup. As of this writing, none have won a match. Six have played to a draw, including Iran, which ended 2-2 against New Zealand.

The rest of the thirteen lost their first match. Bosnia Herzegovina and Qatar have now lost their second match! I would love to see Jordan win a match or two in their first-ever World Cup. Do you have a favorite?

You’ve heard the question right? You’ve probably wrestled with it deeply yourself: If God is all powerful and all good and loving, why does bad stuff happen?

Since Muslims and Christians have similar convictions regarding the first two propositions, you’d expect we’d find some commonality of response to the question. And you would be right. 

(Let me be plain here: Addressing this in 300 words is ridiculous! Please go here and here for a more thorough look at Islam and suffering.) 

Here are five ways theologians throughout history, both those academically trained and those simply mourning dry fields and rains that never came, have answered this question.

God is smarter than me.
He says as much himself in Isaiah 55:8-9. A drifting-from-faith friend once mockingly discounted, “My ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts,” but any reasonable understanding of God surely includes realization that we can’t completely understand God. 

God allows people to choose.
People have free will and will often exercise it selfishly and stupidly. Raise your hand if you’ve seen an example of this. How about if you have been an example of this?

God is testing me.
Muslims tend to carry this more than Christians, at least Christians in our current, Western generation. 

It gets better later.
Followers of both Islam and Christianity throughout history have held on through the most brutal and trying times by looking forward to life beyond this life. 

God is with me.
Christians can rejoice in this in ways Islam forbids Muslims to. In Christ, the transcendent God we both speak of stepped into human reality and suffered in ways both familiar to us and beyond our comprehension. 

As a pastor and mobilizer, that last one speaks to me today: It’s medicine I hope will comfort my parishioner I’ll visit in the hospital today, but one Muslims have left on the pharmacy shelf, forsaking Christ and the healing, help and life he has for them. 

We celebrate our church’s 20th Anniversary this weekend! There will be food, memories, video greetings from those who couldn’t attend and possibly some grateful tears. This time of gratitude and remembering has me in “looking back mode” in a lot of ways. 

I remember arriving at the airport in Istanbul with my summer team and what seemed like a million people returning from the Hajj, dressed in white abayas, looking like ghosts milling about, waiting for their luggage. 

I remember the pleasure with which a couple in California shared the sense of cleanness and forgiveness they experienced upon completing the pilgrimage. 

I imagine the couple million people now returning, or just returned, from the Hajj. They’ve completed the pinnacle of their religion’s requirements. They have done the things most likely to merit them forgiveness for their sins and shortcomings. What do they head home to?

Some certainly to husbands who still haven’t found a job. Some to weary wives and kids with colds. Many to friends and families who don’t find their Hajj stories as interesting as they’d hoped. 

I suppose many didn’t even make it off the plane before they sinned in a way they couldn’t deny: They lied, they stole, they coveted. Whatever. The aura, the illusion, of being clean vanished.

My heart goes out to them. What do you do when you’ve done the thing, but the effect didn’t last? Start booking next year’s Hajj? I don’t know. I do hope many will hear what Jesus wants to say to them. At least part of that is this, “You burdened? Carrying a heavy load? C’mere. I will give you rest. I’ve done all it for you.”