Allah is a permanent reality that works in the lives of those who hear Hismessage. Not having a personal relationship with my Creator tugged at myheart and mind for nearly two decades. Then, I discovered Islam.
I wouldnot be considered in the West a stereotypical Muslim. I believe thepopular Western stereotype of a Muslim male is something like thefollowing: dark skin, dark hair, bearded, Middle-Eastern or Asian descent,dressed in modest clothing and possibly a head covering. No, I’m thecomplete opposite of this. I am in many ways the epitome of the “allAmerican boy”: blond-hair, blue-eyed, corn-fed Protestant/Christianbackground.
However, Islam and Muslims take on many faces, manybackgrounds, many cultures, many nationalities and many tongues. Ourfamily moved a few times in my youth, but my world was limited to theheart of the “Bible-belt” in Augusta, GA, and Spartanburg and Greenville,SC – all fairly large communities, but all offered little in religious diversity.
Ihad normal, loving, God-fearing parents – they are still happily marriedtoday after more than 30 years – and one younger brother.I grew up as a “PK” (for those of you outside of Protestant Christianity, Iwas a “preacher’s kid”). My father was a Southern Baptist minister formore than 25 years.
As you can imagine, for the first 18 years of my life, Iattended church every Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday nightand any number of other nights that the church lights were on. I grew upbelieving in God and Jesus, or, should I say, fearing God and Jesus. Likemost adolescents, I was afraid not to believe in the religion of my parents.
However, something was wrong. I can recall thinking, even at age 10, “thisJesus’ story just doesn’t make sense to me.” Even at this young age, Ididn’t accept the divinity of Jesus and the notion of Christian salvation (i.e.,Jesus dying for my sins). As all my church friends were getting saved,baptised and confirmed during their pre-teen and teenage years (this allseemed like more of a rite of passage than a sincere decision for most, orjust the popular thing to do), I quietly sat in the church pews questioningthe fundamentals of Christian theology. My parents, my church-friends andthe various churches my father pastored throughout my childhood allprayed for my salvation.
Then, one Sunday night, I sub-came to the pressure. I was 12 years oldand my family was at the First Baptist Church of North Spartanburg (inSpartanburg, South Carolina). After a fiery sermon, which obviouslymoved a lot of people, my father came to me and said, “Son, do you wantto ask Jesus into your heart? It’s about time you do so.” Tired of all thesolicitations, tired of all the “Scott, we’re praying for you,” tired of alwaysfeeling like the one who didn’t belong, I lied to my father and said, “YesPOPS.”
That night, I repeated after my father and supposedly acceptedJesus into my heart. I was presented to the church as a new Christian,baptised and immediately became part of the Christian community;although, I was very empty inside. For the next 5 years, I put on thecharade of a good preacher’s kid. I attended Bible studies, went onsummer mission trips and even had a couple “saves” (individualsbecoming Christian) contributed to me.
This was all under the veil of a biglie – that night when I was 12 years old, the night that I supposedly
became a Christian myself – I never asked Jesus in my heart. True, I wentthrough the motions, but it meant nothing to me.
When I graduated high school and it was time to go off to college, I onlythought of one thing: religious freedom. I viewed the opportunity as thechance to move away from my parents and explore the religions of theworld. I moved about 70 miles away from my parents to Rock Hill, SC,enrolled in Winthrop College and majored in religion. However, movingarefrom one part of the “Bible-belt” to another part of the “Bible-belt” didn’thelp my search.
Rock Hill was a smaller town than I grew up in and therewere even more churches per capita. Once again, the only religiousdiversity was in the form of what favour of Christianity you wanted for theweek. I did manage to run across a couple freethinking religion professorsthat mentored me in exploring religion. If anything, they pointed me tomany different sources to satisfy my quest. I rarely pushed the envelope ofmy comfort level and only ended up exploring different forms ofChristianity.
During the two years I spent in little Rock Hill, SC, I attendedRoman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Pentecostal and many non-affiliated/community churches. It would not be until another couple years
before I would experience non-Christian religious expression.
BEYOND THE “CHOSEN PEOPLE” VISION
Unsatisfied with the lack of religious diversity, I left Rock Hill, SC for theUniversity of South Carolina in the state’s capital of Columbia (metropopulation: half-million). I thought, “Surely, I can find other religions in citythis size.”
Once again, I majored in religion. While in Columbia for theremainder of my undergraduate degree, I became extremely interested inJudaism, but not on a spiritual level, but rather, on an academic level. I
was attracted to the Hebrew language. I took more than 4 years of acombined Bible and Modern Hebrew and excelled at reading the originalscriptures and reading Jewish prayers.
In fact, because one of myprofessors was a local rabbi, I even taught 6-grade Hebrew school for aterm (to this day, a decade later, I can still read the Hebrew texts). I wasvery involved with Judaism in Columbia, SC, but much like Christianity, itsfundamental beliefs seemed empty to me. Inside, I asked questions like, “Ifthe Jews are considered God’s ‘chosen people’ – where does that leaveme?
While at the University of South Carolina, I was exposed to a glimpseof Islam. I took a class entitled “Islamic Institutions and Traditions.” It wastaught by a non-Muslim who had taught university in Egypt, so he seemedto be an authority on Islam but the class did little for me other than providea good textbook background for me. Half the class consisted of Muslims,so I think the class’s integrity was kept in check.
Half way through the class,I did visit the local mosque and witnessed salah (prayer) for the first time.Although I didn’t understand – what seemed like an impersonal approachto prayer and worship – I was impressed by Islam’s simplicity and humbleness (e.g.: prostrating before Almighty Allah) in prayer and worship.My brief encounter with Islam, both in a college class and my visit to amosque, planted a seed that would grow for the next ten years.
After my undergraduate studies, I went out into the workforce. For the next5 years, I withdrew from religion and became what I considered to beagnostic. I knew there was oneGod, however, I didn’t know a lot aboutHim. For me, Christianity and Judaism did not address the issue of theproper worship of one God.
My professional positions took me all acrossthe United States where I finally settled in Fort Collins, Colorado. Afterwaking up day after day to the beautiful mountains, prairies and expansesof Colorado, I began to question the concept of “God” again. How couldthere be so much beauty and order in the world and God not intimatelyreveal Himself to mankind?
I began to recall the religious experience I’dhad over the past years. I looked at Christianity and said “No.” I still couldaccept the Jesus theology. I looked at Judaism. Again, “No.” I couldn’t livewith the Jewish customs and belief in a “chosen people.” Finally, I began tolook at Islam.
My impression of Islam was a combination of several things.It consisted of the one class I took in university, my one visit to the mosquein Columbia, SC, and then the media (I’ve now discovered that the U.S.media does not accurately display Islam). I began researching thefundamental beliefs of Islam.
WHAT ISLAM IS ALL ABOUT
I decided to strip away the stereotypes andexamine exactly what Islam is all about.
After some study, I found thefollowing:
- Islam has the strongest declaration of monotheistic faith of any religion (Isaid to myself, “check, I agree”);
- The belief that God has no partners (again, “big check”);
- The belief that God has revealed Himself many times through prophetsand messengers and His message has been confused and distorted byman (I always had a hard time believing parts of the Bible and itsinterpretation, so “check for now”);
- That Islam is not just a religion, but an entire way of life (very appealing,“check”).
After reading about Islam, I set out to inquire a little deeper. I set out to finda Muslim. At the time of my inquiry into Islam, I was working in a very largecompany with more than 1000 employees. I thought, “Surely there’s aMuslim or two that would be willing to answer my questions.”
My search did not take long. I met a kind, quiet Muslim man named “Hani.”I approached the man and told him that I wanted to learn more about hisreligion. The first thing Hani recommended was reading the Qur’ān, therevelation of Allah to His Prophet Muhammad ﷺ. Hani even gave me a Qur’ān (In fact, the small Arabic-English Qur’ān that Brother Hani gave meis still one of my prized possessions). Hani inscribed in it the followingwords that continue to touch my heart: “May Allah guide us to the rightpath.”
I began reading the Qur’ān and to my surprise, it made sense to me.Coming from a Christian background with a good understanding of Jewishhistory/theology, the Qur’ān connected all the dots for me. It confirmed somany doubts I had about Judaism and Christianity, and provided theroadmap that I was looking for. After reading only part of the Qur’ān, I saidto myself, “I believe in this. I should be a Muslim.”
But what would myfamily say? What would my friends say? What would my co-workers think?So, for months, I kept my feelings quiet and continued to study Islam silently. I began to read more books, subscribed to Muslim email lists,purchased Islamic videos and even began memorising the prayers.
Out ofall the aspects of Islam that I observed, the prayer impacted me the most.Like the worshippers I saw in the videos, I too wanted to bow down andprostrate myself before my Holy Creator. Finally, after more than eightmonths of inquiry with my friend Hani, he must have sensed I was ready totake the next step.
In early January 2001, he invited me to the Islamic Centre of Fort Collins(Colorado). It is where more than 1000 Muslims in Northern Colorado goto pray and worship. He invited me to the Fajr prayer (before sunrise). At thattime, it was around 6:15 a.m. You can imagine what I was thinking: “God,you want me to get up before 6:00 on a cold Colorado winter morning andgo worship you?” I recall not sleeping too well the night before. I felt like Iwas being called to do something. I made it down to Islamic Centre andmet up with Hani.
When I went in, I was instructed to take off my shoes inthe vestibule. I walked through a large communal area and Hani showedme the area that Muslims perform wudu, the washing and purifying ofone’s body before going before Allah. Hani and I then went into the prayerarea. The prayer area was a large, simple, quiet room. There were manybooks, mostly in Arabic, on several of the walls, and the room seemed topoint in one direction (the direction to the Ka`bah in Makkah, or the firsthouse of worship to Allah). When we walked in, there were 6-7 Muslim men praying.
For the second time, I saw again in-person what I had seenonly in videos – worshippers bowing before their Creator – but with anewunderstanding after all the careful reading I did. It sent chills down myspine.
I too wanted to worship as the men before me. The familiar call toprayer, the Adhan, was called and Hani asked me if I wanted to pray. Inervously said, “Yes!” Hani said, “Just do as the rest of us do.” And for thefirst time, I prayed and worshipped Allah as He commands. I didn’t know allthe words or their meanings, but it had a powerful impact.
After the prayer,Hani asked me if I would like to become a Muslim. Again, I said, “Yes!” Ihad already practised and said the Shahadah dozens of times, and on thatcold morning on January 3, 2001, at around 6:30 a.m., I said it in front ofthose Muslim men. Al-Hamdulillah (Glory be to Allah), I became a Muslim.
The moment I said “La ilaha illaAllah Muhammad Rasooul Allah” (There isno god but Allah, Muhammad is the Prophet of Allah) in front of those men,I felt a huge burden lifted from my heart. I felt liberated from my search.
For the first time in my life, I knew the Truth – the Truth of Allah. It’s nowbeen years since I became a Muslim. Has it been easy? Not always.Have I had struggles, setbacks and doubts? Absolutely, I’m human.
However, the past year has been the best of my life. Allah has blessed mebeyond belief. I’ve had a peace about me that is indescribable. Andalthough I can’t really describe how it feels, I know where it comes from – itcomes minute-after-minute, hour-after-hour, day-after-day, trying my bestto follow Allah’s true Deen (religion, way of life).
My peace is knowing thatAllah has revealed the Truth to me. To my Muslims brothers and sistersand all non-Muslims, may Allah guide us all to the right path.