by Elmi Habib—

Muslims and Christians both believe in the afterlife but their views are surprisingly different. This includes the respective compositions of heaven and hell and the criteria by which people get to one or the other (or both). In this article my young Muslim friend Elmi provides ample information on the Islamic view on this subject. Following one personal conversation we enjoyed I asked him to provide sources for his assertions, and here was the result. I thought it was so interesting that I asked him if I could post this in the blog, to which he agreed. Later we engaged in a few rounds of discussion on the article via Facebook messaging which I have copied and pasted into the comment section.  As a biblical Christian I disagree with Elmi, but I appreciate my discussions with him because we go deep into the given subject and we are willing to go beyond mere politeness without forsaking mutual respect. We realize that we can't both be right but we mutually accept those terms for the sake of their non-politically-correct honesty. Thanks for the great discussions, Elmi.

*Elmi is a student at the University of Michigan-Dearborn.

by Scott Cherry—

In the 1st century the Christian faith mushroomed throughout the Roman Empire despite waves of persecution against Christians. Unlike Islam, it spread without military force or any sort of violence perpetrated by Christians for three whole centuries. It was literally unstoppable, but why?! Because it was credible, and thousands of average people believed it even though they had nothing to gain and everything to lose during those three centuries. There is no other logical way to explain the growth of Christianity but that Jesus rose from the dead and appeared to the disciples and "more than 500 brethren at one time". (1 Cor. 15)