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Will the Iran war forge a “very different” Middle East? · The Daily Article

• 0:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Good day, it's Wednesday, March 4th, 2026, and we're glad you've joined us for Guinness and Forums daily article podcast.
• 0:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm Chris Elkins, near eating today's daily article, written by Cultural Theologian Dr. Jim Dineson.
• 0:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: Political headlines this morning are focusing on overnight results from Senate primaries in Texas and North Carolina, racist whose outcome could help determine control of the Senate in the fall.
• 0:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: However, a different political story is making fewer headlines, though its impact could affect the entire world.
• 0:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: As Iran has expanded the war by targeting U.S. allies in the Middle East, it is facing a consequence it apparently did not expect.
• 0:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: The Wall Street Journal reports that Gulf states rattled by valleys of Iranian drones and missiles targeting their hotels, ports, and airports are concluding the Iranian peril must be confronted.
• 0:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: This is of foundational significance, Arabs are not Persians.
• 1:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: and most Arab Muslims are Sunni, while most Iranian Muslims are Shiite.
• 1:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: If Arab states most notably Saudi Arabia, side with Israel and the West in responding to Iran, this geopolitical alliance will forge while one article calls a very different Middle East.
• 1:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: However, there is a consequence to the Arab states' involvement in the war that is not military or political but spiritual and eternal.
• 1:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: I've been responding this week to Operation Epic Fury by reminding Christians that our frontlines in this conflict are the prayers by which we wage spiritual war for the protection of the innocence and the conversion of multitudes.
• 1:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: Here's my point.
• 1:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: The more Muslims across the Arab world are endangered by this war, the more urgently we should pray for them to no Christ before it's too late.
• 1:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: Of course, secularists and even some Christians will respond by claiming that Muslims and Christians worship the same God and that my call to intercession for Muslim conversions to Christ is therefore unnecessary and oppressive.
• 2:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: Is this true?
• 2:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: You've perhaps heard the saying with regard to world religions, all roads lead up the same mountain.
• 2:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: But the reality is that Christianity and Islam are very different mountains.
• 2:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: And when two mountains exist, you can't climb them both at the same time.
• 2:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: As I noted in Monday's daily article, the Quran explicitly denies the divinity of Jesus, noting Surah 5 verse 75 and Surah 19 verse 36, while the New Testament explicitly states in many places that trust in Christ as Savior is the one essential path to salvation.
• 2:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: If Islam is right about Jesus, Christianity is wrong about him, and faith in the wrong road, no matter how sincerely it is held, still leads to the wrong outcome.
• 2:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: You may have heard about the runner who was leading the U.S. Half-Marathon Championships in Atlanta last weekend before she was led off course by a media vehicle.
• 3:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: By the time she got back onto the right path, her lead was gone, and she finished in ninth place.
• 3:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: She was sincere in running the wrong road, but she was sincerely wrong.
• 3:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: If Muslims do not need to hear the gospel and respond by turning to Christ, why is God calling so many Christians to share the good news with them?
• 3:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: You might say that these believers are wrong in thinking they are called to such a ministry, but what are the dreams and visions by which Jesus himself is appearing to Muslims?
• 3:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: Is Jesus wrong as well?
• 3:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: I have encountered liberal theologians over the years who claim the Bible commissions us to make disciples of all nations in Matthew 28 verse 19.
• 3:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: Not because the lost will spend eternity and hell apart from Christ, but so they can live better lives in this world.
• 3:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: But Jesus clearly stated in John 3, verse 38, who ever believes in the Son as he turned life.
• 4:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: Whoever does not obey the Son, she'll not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.
• 4:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: And it is not necessarily true that Muslim Converse to Jesus will live.
• 4:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: better lives in this world as a result.
• 4:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: Many face the loss of their jobs, homes, families, and even their lives.
• 4:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: The biblical bottom line is clear and non-negotiable.
• 4:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: Every person who does not know Jesus needs to know him personally.
• 4:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: And every person who does know Jesus needs to share him personally.
• 4:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: In Tim Keller's, the reason for God belief in an age of skepticism, he notes, quote, if you don't live for Jesus, you'll live for something else.
• 4:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: Why choose him?
• 4:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: As Keller reminds us, Jesus is the one Lord you can live for, who died for you, who breathes his last breath for you.
• 4:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: In quote, with all due respect,
• 4:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: Jewish rabbis do not atone for their fellow Jews by their deaths, but less for the rest of humanity.
• 5:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: But from Romans 5 verse 8, God chose his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.
• 5:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: Each of us, all of us.
• 5:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: Now we are to imitate our Lord by paying forward the grace we have received.
• 5:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: In his exposition on Galatians, St. Augustine wrote, the believer who imitates Christ becomes the same as Christ whom he imitates.
• 5:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: According to CS Lewis, such Christ likeness and nothing less,
• 5:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: is the purpose of the Christian faith.
• 5:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: In mere Christianity, Louis observed the whole offer which Christianity makes is this, that we can, if we let God have His way, come to share in the life of Christ, every Christian is to become a little Christ.
• 5:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: The whole purpose of becoming a Christian is simply nothing else, and, quote, to become like Jesus, we must embrace His mission as ours noted by Matthew 20 verse 28, the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve.
• 6:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: How will you serve those who do not know your Lord today?