Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus by Nabeel Qureshi was recommended to me by a good friend of mine, and it is one of those moments where I thanked God for having friends who also love books just as much as I do. Really.
Because the exciting things about borrowing a book from a friend, especially a book you wouldn’t normally think to take off the shelf, is when it exceeds your expectations and that’s what Qureshi’s heart wrenching testimony truly did for me. Going into it I felt a little sceptical. Questioning not only how someone can dramatically replace their faith, but also how could they deny their faith along with their entire strictly faith based upbringing. Going from being in a tight knit family where practicing Islam and worshiping Allah was of the upmost importance in their hearts, to calling Jesus Christ the son of God. Makes for a big transition.
I’ve heard of people being raised in a particular faith and abandoning it later in life because of their own bad experiences or even because they felt it just isn’t for them anymore. Because faith can be a forever changing and fluctuating variable in our lives especially for young adults, just like Qureshi was in the time of his spiritual transition. It fascinated me to think that the Christian faith rang so true for him near the end of his spiritual exploration, that he was willing to deny and renounce his own upbringing, incredibly rich in culture as redundant to his adult identity.
I mean I kind of did, by not growing up in a Christian household and then becoming a Christian when I was twenty. But I grew up in the stereotypical white gentile Australian household who was still all in for celebrating Christmas and Easter, even though those holidays never really held any sacred significance for our family. They were just times of being close with family eating good food and getting presents! So for me stepping into a faith where I finally understood the spiritual significance of those dates, it did make it more special to me, but my life was never dramatically transformed externally. All that changed on the outer was my habits in reading the bible, praying, going to church, and making a more Christian friends. Really the internal change in my psyche was the most substantial and influential change for myself personally. Whereas for Qureshi it was a complete upheaval of his internal belief system and external community, due to how impactful the decision was for his life onwards.
I really admired how historically factual is first steps of exploration were while uncovering Christianity for himself. Where he found evidence via the resource of religious scholars, on the proof of the existence, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This reminded me of my Alpha sessions when I was considering becoming a Christian, where I found out how historically significant the bible is, and was shown the proof of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Qureshi’s historical discoveries helped ignite my curiosity and fascination of Jesus once more.
The discovery of his own personal and spiritual relationship with God, when he was on the tipping point of becoming a Christian, was really interesting and touching to read. To hear of how attentive God was to his queries through the use of his dreams was really insightful. It reminded me how God is always eager to speak to us in ways he knows we will most likely pay attention. Even though Qureshi’s final step of his transition into Christianity was very difficult for him to accept, knowing what it meant for the state of his relationships within his Muslim community. I found it really admirable of him for questioning and exploring his spiritual upbringing and beliefs, to give himself the opportunity to form a sense of his own life, which in this case was by becoming a Christian.
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This is a well written book, very informative on both the Muslim faith and Christian faith! Recommend it to anyone who is interested in taking a peek on the lives of others.
I won’t be making a rating system for book reviews because I don’t think the typical numerical rating system is an adequate system when reviewing subjectively written experiences of others or fictional pieces of art.
Thanks for reading! 🙂
Hay's Corner 