Let us turn back to the Word of God, to Isaiah 53. We will read verse 3 again. Though there are a number of texts that would be relevant, Isaiah 53, verse 3, He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from him. He was despised and we esteemed not. I want to speak tonight on the subject, the Mohammed cartoons. What do they mean to us? You can't surely feel to have noticed all the talk that has gone on, vigorous if not sometimes violent protests that have been launched because of the appearance of these cartoons. And I think it is an issue that we need to examine It doesn't do any harm to have another look at Islam because it is the up-and-coming religion, spreading its tentacles right over into the Western society, in Europe in particular, and of course has as its intention a complete domination of all that there is on the earth. The Mohammed cartoon controversy started when Danish author Kjær Bløttjen complained that he couldn't find an artist brave enough to illustrate his upcoming book about Mohammed. The newspaper Gylens Posten pondered whether there were more cases of self-censorship regarding Islam in Denmark, and so they issued a call for submissions from any artists Who would be willing to take up the challenge and provide some cartoons? The same Danish newspaper published a set of twelve Mohammed cartoons on the 30th of September 2005. Carsten Just, the paper's editor, said the cartoons were a test of whether the threat of Islamic terrorism had limited the freedom of expression in his homeland of Denmark. Well, if that was a test, a bit of litmus paper put out there just to gauge what was happening in the country, it's safe to say that by now the test results are in. In the ensuing outbreak of all kinds of extreme reaction, the original book, the Qur'an and the Life of the Prophet Muhammad, has been almost forgotten. I could almost guarantee that you're not even aware of the name of that book. that sparked off the cartoons in the first place. It has now been released and it does feature page after page of Muhammad depicted. Of greater concern now are the facts that the Danish newspaper Gylens Posten is being protected by security guards. The cartoonists responsible for the Mohammed sketches have all gone into hiding because Muslim fundamentalists have threatened to bomb the paper's offices and kill the cartoonists involved. They want to test our feelings. Mollie Abdul-Kahar Ab-Asargam, a protester against the publication of these cartoons in Afghanistan, told the BBC, they want to know whether Muslims are extremists or not. Death to them and to their newspapers, he said. And of course, we are concerned as well today that people are needlessly dying during violent protests. I begin by referring to the controversy caused by these cartoons. The twelve Mohammed cartoons originally published by the Gylens Posten newspaper on the 30th of September 2005 have since been carried by other news outlets, including a Norwegian publication on the 10th of January of this year. Papers in France have carried them, in Germany, in Italy, in Spain, and they went out on the 1st of February of this year 2006 as well. The first official complaint against the cartoons was lodged by the ambassadors of 11 Muslim countries, including Indonesia, a number of Arab states, Pakistan, Iran, Bosnia, Herzegovina, and they were launched on the 3rd to the 20th of October 2005, and the complaint was in the form of a letter to the Prime Minister of Denmark, Rasmussen. They claimed that the publication of these cartoons was a provocation. and they demanded apologies from the newspaper. On the 26th of January 2006, Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador to Denmark. However, things really came to a visible head when on the 30th of January, Palestinian gunmen took over an EU office in Gaza City to protest the Khartoum. About five gunmen stormed the building, closed the office down, while ten other armed men stood watch outside. One of the militants announced that they were protesting the drawings of Islam's great prophet Muhammad. While this intrepid newspaper in Denmark has not apologised outrightly for publishing the cartoons, it has issued a statement acknowledging that the cartoons offended many Muslims, which we would like to apologise for. Paul Bellion of the Brussels Journal singles out the courage of Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, who has refused, he says, to capitulate to the bully. He is one of the very few European politicians with guts. If anyone deserves a prize for his valiant defense of freedom of speech and freedom of the press, it is certainly Mr. Rasmussen. He did not give in to pressure from Muslim fanatics, nor from the appeasers at the UN, the European Commission, and the Council of Europe. In the past weeks, Denmark has shown that all is not yet lost in Europe. If something is rotten now, it is not in Denmark. What is unquestionable is that many rotten things have happened since. On the 4th of February, for example, Syrians attacked the Danish and Norwegian embassies in Damascus. On the 5th of February, protesters torched the Danish embassy in Beirut in the Lebanon. On the 6th and the 7th of February, at least eight protesters, perhaps more, were killed in Afghanistan as security forces were trying to suppress the violent protests that had flared up in their country. News reports have talked about Danish flags being burned, Danish products boycotted, Denmark now faces an international boycott from the Muslim nations, Danish embassies torched, Danish people have been advised, for their own safety, you'd better come home. Around the world, in Palestine, for example, in Jenin, about 1500 people burned Danish milk and cheese. The Palestinian terror group, Recent victors, of course, in the Palestinian elections as well, Hamas, were reported as roaming from house to house searching for Danish hostages. Palestinian gunmen, as we have said, seized various quarters. They found a German, later released him, but they threw a hand grenade into the compound of the French cultural centre in the Gaza Strip. Tens of thousands of angry Muslims marched through the Palestinian cities, burned the Danish flag, called for vengeance against European countries. In the West Bank town of Ramallim, protesters called on Osama bin Laden to attack Denmark. An imam at the Omari Mosque in Gaza City told 9,000 worshippers that those behind the drawings should have their heads cut off. In Nablus, Where protesters again burned the Danish flag, Imam Hassan Sharif said in a sermon, if they want the war of religion, we are ready. About 10,000 demonstrators marched through Gaza City chanting, we are ready to redeem you with our souls and our blood, our beloved prophet. In Lebanon, A mob estimated at 20,000 people marched on and torched the Danish consulate in Beirut. At the entrance to that consulate, protesters put up a banner that said, We are ready to sacrifice our children for you, O Prophet Muhammad. The extremists there, waving green Islamic flags, chanting, God is greatest. also stoned the church's damaged buildings in the city's Christian district. And we could go on and talk about what was happening in Indonesia, another Muslim country, in India, in Thailand, and in Iraq, where a militant group in Ramadi in Iraq called for attacks on Danish and non-Muslim targets throughout Iraq. The militant Islamic army urged followers to kidnap deons and cut them into as many pieces as the numbers of newspapers that printed the cartoons. Let's come closer to home, in England, roaring hatred and contempt for free speech. 500 extremist Muslims marched through London on Friday the 3rd of February, and you can watch the video footage of that on the BBC website. Some chanted the name of Osama Bin Laden, others showered plots. on what they called the magnificent 19-dose hijackers who took the airliners and 9-11 in American. They also cried out in praise of the fantastic form who blew themselves up in London and they chanted, You must pay. 7-7 is on its way. Another crude reference to the London suicide bombings that claimed the lives of 52 people. Words such as butcher, slay, exterminate, behead, screamed out of their banners, written in thick black marker pen. The marchers even had messages for those who pointed out that you couldn't do this in many countries in the world, you wouldn't be allowed to stage a demonstration like this. Only in liberal Britain would your rights be so assiduously protected by the police. And they cried out, freedom, go to hell, down, down, UK, behead the one who insults the Prophet. Just to add insult to injury, one demonstrator was even dressed in the garb of a suicide bomber, pathetic imagery, insensitive, inciting in the extreme. The irony of the Islamist fanatics who marched through London with these provocative chants and banners wasn't lost on the families who suffered at the hands of the July suicide bombers. George Collius, whose 19-year-old daughter, Danielle, is still recovering from injuries suffered in the London bombing, said that he was appalled. It's disgusting behaviour. These people are preaching death and getting away with it. It seems there is one law for them and one law for everyone else. It is inciting racial hatred and they should be arrested. They might be offended by those cartoons, but they should stop and think about the distress they are causing to those who have lost relatives. I find it insulting and very hurtful. However, one of the march organizers, Ann Jem Chowdhury, said, 7-7 was brought upon the people of London and Britain by the foreign policy of Tony Blair. He violated the sanctity of Muslims, He violated the covenant of security. The police and security people in Britain say there will be another security attack. There is no reason why there will not be another suicide bombing with the government. Trying to outlaw the glorification of terrorism, while a more brazen example of that kind of glorification that they claim we are trying to outlaw, could scarcely be imagined than what was predated on that London street. In some ways, at least, a trio of the twelve cartoons that were published have become self-fulfilling prophecies. One of them portrays a cartoonist anxiously looking over his shoulder as he completes a drawing of Muhammad on his sketchboard. Another contains a message on a blackboard that is being taught to a class by Muhammad. The message says, Gylans, Boston's journalists are a bunch of reactionary provocateurs. A third cartoon shows Mohammed holding back a couple of arm-to-the-teeth incensed fanatics in saying, relax, folks, it's just a sketch made by a dean from the southwest, Denmark. Gylens Posten has also been included on an Al-Qaeda website listing possible terrorist targets. An organization which calls itself the Glorious Brigades in Northern Europe is circulating pictures on the internet which show bombs exploding over pictures of the newspaper and blood flowing over the national flag of Denmark. The Mujahideen have numerous targets in Denmark. Very soon you will all regret this, the website warns. Now when we come to the subject of religious freedom, Of course we believe in the right to religious expression. This is why we opposed recently Prime Minister Tony Blair's incitement to religious hatred laws. And ironically, he was trying to bring them in, put them through Parliament in order to defend the Muslims. But we opposed them because we knew they would have the net effect of clamping down on the ability of Christian pastors to expose false religions in the light of the Word of God. We believe in the right to protest when religion is unfairly, falsely, or blasphemously caricatured. We have done this ourselves. For example, Jesus Christ Superstar, we have protested against that. The Last Temptation of Christ raised a voice against that as well. Jerry Springer, the opera, again, we have raised a voice of protest there. We have a right. And under God we have a duty. to write to the press on these things, to release statements, to mount peaceful demonstrations against these vile and blasphemous productions that are injurious to the public morals and are responsible for unsubstantiated malicious attacks on our faith. But I do not have a right, and we collectively do not have the right, to riot, to tear down and torch buildings, to issue death threats against those who offend me, my principles or my religion. What Muslim extremists are doing, and I am glad to hear many moderate voices crying out and saying, stop, this is not the way you should be acting. What the Muslim extremists are doing is way beyond the bounds of acceptable, decent demonstration. But we have the controversy calls. by these cartoons. But why is the Muslim world so angry about what are, when you would see them, rather poorly drawn and pretty much unfunny cartoons? Why do they feel that puerile jokes against their prophet printed in some obscure Danish newspaper is evidence of a Western conspiracy against the whole of Islam, because that's how they view them? What are these cartoons that have generated this extreme reaction? We're talking about the reality reflected by these cartoons now, the reality reflected in these cartoons, their actual content. Any representation of the Prophet Muhammad is viewed as idolatrous in the Islamic world. They call them haram, forbidden, taboo. Truth is, though, there is no verse in the Quran itself which forbids any representation of anything that has a soul. This only occurs in the Hadith, a collection of sayings of the Prophet Muhammad compiled after his death, drawing on the memories of his close companions. The Prophet feared that if pictorial or sculptural representations of Allah and the Prophets, including Jesus, were allowed, it would encourage idolatry. the worship of graven images. I must admit I can see where the Muslims are coming from on this point. Not that I have any appreciation for their prophet Muhammad, because I view him as a false prophet, but on the basis of the second commandment, Exodus 20, verses 4 and 5, I too do not like to see depictions of my Lord. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth, thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them. For I, the Lord thy God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me." However, idolatrous or not, do these cartoons present an accurate message? Do they contain allusions to traits that either Muhammad or his followers sported or sport? In other words, can we move from these little cartoons right on to a bigger picture and see something much larger than a little collection of twelve cartoons? Consider the further three of them. The cartoon that has generated the most headlines features Muhammad with a fused bomb In his turban, a clear linkage between Islam and terrorism is being drawn there. Another showing Muhammad with his hand raised to stop the tide of suicide bombers surging towards paradise, explaining, hold on guys, stop right there. Paradise is running out of heavenly virgins for you. Another represents Muhammad With a curved sword in his hand, his eyes blacked out, but being flanked and guided by two Muslim women in full Islamic dress. A fundamental fact. History clearly shows that Islam has been spread primarily by conquest. Islam was founded in the early 7th century by Muhammad. A series of conquests began in January 613 when Muhammad laid a force of 10,000 men against Mecca, the economic and religious center of the Arabian Peninsula, and he conquered Mecca. Before his sudden death two years later in 632, he knew that he was well on the way to accomplishing his mission of unifying the Arab tribes under a theocracy governed by the will of the one and only God, as far as he was concerned, who is Allah. And he was right in his prediction. The religious-spoke political movement he founded rapidly spread throughout the Arab world and far beyond. Within 100 years of Muhammad's death, Islam had expanded well into Europe. In fact, it was only stopped In France, at the Battle of Tours in 732 AD, exactly a century after Muhammad's death, and in the centuries that followed, Islam penetrated deeper into Africa, into Asia, extending as far as the Philippines. Now many Arabic historical novels glorify these conquests. The presupposition of the authors is that the conquests were necessary. They were sanctioned by the will of God. In Arabic, they're called the fuyuhat, or the openings. Modern Arab-Muslim writers call them, rather euphemistically, liberations. So that fact to be kept in mind is that Islam, as a religion, was primarily spread by conquests. A second fundamental fact, the holy texts of Islam advocate the use of violence. The two authoritative Islamic holy texts are, first of all, the Quran, regarded by Muslims as the eternal and uncreated word of Allah, and then the Hadith, that's the traditions containing the sayings and the example of the Prophet Muhammad, both of these. provide the militant Muslim with sufficient license for his barbaric activities. Now I know there is an intense internal debate in the Muslim world over how Islam's enemies are to be conquered. Moderates on the one hand claim terrorism has no place in Islam and they point to a verse in the Quran that says there is no compulsion in religion but fundamentals. have no difficulty in pointing to a text here and there and again somewhere else and more numerous texts in the Quran where Muhammad as Allah's spokesperson the chief and the seal of the prophets commands his followers to fight and subdue all who resist Islam if necessary by killing them. Muhammad followed the Arab Bedouin tradition of raiding the non-Arabs in the Quran 840 It's written, know that whatever booty you take, the fifth of it is God's, and the messenger's, and the near kin's man's, and the orphan's, and for the needy, and the traveller. But that aggressive position evolved into the concept of the holy war that we know is called Jihad. And so in the Quran, again we read, when you meet the unbelievers, like their necks, Then when you have made wide slaughter among them, tie fast the bonds. Then set them free, either by grace or ransom, till the war lays down its loads. So it shall be. And if God had willed, He would have avenged Himself upon them, but that He may try some of you by means of others. Those who were slain in the way of God, He will not send their works astray. He will guide them. and dispose their minds aright, and he will admit them to paradise that he has made known to them. And we could quote other references in the Qur'an which justify jihad and say, well, you know, this is the most certain way to get to heaven, to die during a jihad. And that gives great impetus to the Muslim conquest, and it still fuels the atrocities of Islamic fundamentalists today. The Quran, 475. The Quran, 9. 110 would be other references to look up. But then the cartoons made reference to the virgins in paradise concept. Will we find that in the Quran as well? 4452. Surely the God-fearing shall be in a station secure among gardens and fountains, robed in silk and brocade, set face to face even so. And we shall espouse them to wide-eyed Horace, who I, as a black-eyed woman, want any of the beautiful nymphs of the Muslim paradise among the rewards of faithful Muslims, too, a seductively beautiful woman therein calling for every fruit secure. Now this is the kind of material Islamic militants thrive upon. And this is the source for some of these dearest cartoons that we have mentioned. But there's a key issue at stake here. In this controversy over the Muhammad cartoons, we're not really talking, although it's being pumped up like this, we're not really talking about just an intrusion into the freedom of speech. There is that element, but there's more. The key issue at stake in the battle over the twelve Danish cartoons about the Muslim prophet Muhammad is this. Will the West stand up for its customs, including freedom of speech? Or will Muslims impose their way of life on the West? It's not just about the freedom of the press, this issue. It's about the freedom of nations. The Danish editor who published the cartoons explained that if Muslims insist that I, as a non-Muslim, should submit to their taboos, they're asking for my submission. The word Islam, contrary to what many claim, does not mean peace. Actually, it's based on the Arabic term for submission. A true Muslim is one who has surrendered himself to the will of the one true God, Allah, as revealed in the sacred text. And this submission they want to extend to all non-Muslims. Current Muslim demands, as we are seeing flying through the air at the moment, demand supremacism. It's an attempt at subjugation. Robert Spencer called on the free world to stand resolutely with Denmark. The Brussels Journal asserted, we are all Danes now. Some governments have done. Norway, for example, we will not apologise, they say, because in a country like Norway, which guarantees freedom of expression, we cannot apologise for what the newspapers print. Germany has said basically the same, and France as well, but other governments have apologised. Poland, the United Kingdom, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, really grovelling in many of his statements, but one of them was this, the republication of these cartoons has been unnecessary, it has been insensitive, it has been disrespectful, and it has been wrong. What was more galling from Jack Straw was that he was saying whenever the Fundamentals went through London, with all of their messages of hate, oh, we have it under control. Don't worry about it. We're just letting it happen. freedom of expression. New Zealand has apologised. The United States, they have apologised. In fact, they've been endorsed in what they've said by the country's leading Islamist organisation, the Council of American Islamic Relations. But I came across a quotation which I thought deserved to be mentioned. Western governments should take a crash course on Islamic law. and the historically abiding Muslim imperative to subjugate non-Muslim peoples. They might start by reading the forthcoming book by Ephraim Karsh, Islamic Imperialism, A History. People who would stay free the argument go should stand unreservedly with Denmark. Another fact to ponder that's relevant to this current controversy over these cartoons is What is truly offensive in this world? The publication of a few cartoons? Or the beheading of a few people who have been taken and kidnapped? Because we've seen a lot of that, have we not? Al Jazeera TV has broadcast many a person slaughtered in cold blood. One Jordanian editor asked, and to me this was a completely reasonable question, what brings more prejudice against Islam These caricatures are pictures of a hostage-taker slashing the throat of his victim. And this Jordanian editor printed the anti-Mohammed cartoons to allow his readers to make up their own minds. And such was the uproar, he was immediately sacked. All who are tracking the cause of the persecuted Christians in the world today will know that Islamic countries are the most intolerant and vicious against the saints of the Lord. Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan being just a few examples that we can cite. And we are into Hebrews 11 territory there. However, I do discern in this cartoon controversy a warning about Muslims harrying against the decadence In the West, I agree with them. We witness our own government passing laws for the extended availability of alcohol, the provision of same-sex marriage in all but name, the legislation that brings in prostitution, and we cry a moral over all of these things loud and clear, and we know there is a price to pay for this. And the West will pay a price, a heavy price, In the past, as we read in the Word of God, God used the Chaldeans to chase in His people and cart the Jews off into captivity. Listen carefully to how the prophet Habakkuk describes those Chaldeans. Habakkuk 1, 6, 7, 9-11. And I feel it is an all too familiar description. A bitter and tasty nation which will march through the breadth of the land to possess the dwelling places that are not theirs. They are terrible and dreadful. Their judgment and their dignity shall proceed of themselves. They shall come all for violence. Their faces shall sup up as the east wind, and they shall gather the captivity as the sand. And they shall scoff at the kings, and the princes shall be a scorn unto them. They shall deride every stronghold, for they shall heap dust and take it. Then shall his mind change. And he shall pass over and offend, the enemy always oversteps himself, imputing this his power unto his God." Now, as a nation, we need to wake up out of our slumber. We need to shake ourselves free from the chains of apostasy. We need earnestly to seek God and implore Him, Lord, revive us. Our only hope is the one to which Habakkuk pointed the people in Habakkuk 1, 12 and 13. Art thou not from everlasting, O Lord my God, mine Holy One? We shall not die. O Lord, thou wast ordained them for judgment, and, O mighty God, thou wast established them for correction. Thou wert a purer eye. than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity. Wherefore lookest thou upon them that deal treacherously, and holdest thy tongue, when the wicked devoureth the man that is more righteous than he." Let me say this by way of contrast. Muhammad was the prophet of war. Our Lord Jesus is the Prince of Peace, Isaiah 9, 6 and 7. Muhammad promoted persecution against the infidels as he described them, Christ, forgive, Converted the chief persecutor, 1 Timothy 1, 13-15. Muhammad was the taker of life. Christ is the giver of life, John 10, 27-28. Muhammad cried to the masses, Convert or die. Christ says, Believe and live, John 6, 47, John 11, 25-26. Muhammad preached death unto these foreigners, infidels Christ bred. Father, forgive them. For they know not what they do." Luke 23, 34. Muhammad's method was bodily compulsion. Christ's aim is heart conversion. Acts 3, verse 19. Muhammad constrained people by conquest. Christ constrains people by love, 2 Corinthians 5 and 14. Muhammad, without doubt, conquered his enemies by the sword. Christ conquers His enemies with another kind of sword, the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, Hebrews 4 and 12, Acts 2 and 37. Muhammad called upon his followers to fight. Jesus said, My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants spite." John 18, verse 36. Muhammad was swift to shed blood. Romans 3, 15-17. Jesus shed his own blood for the salvation of many. Ephesians 1 and 7. Muhammad declared a holy war, a jihad, against the infidels. But our Lord Jesus Christ achieved a holy victory on Calvary's cross. Colossians 2, 14 and 15. And his followers today share in that victory. John 16, 33. Muhammad's disciples killed for their faith. Christ's disciples are killed for their faith. The controversy caused by these cartoons, the reality reflected in these cartoons, And then we turn the spotlight on to the hypocrisy highlighted through these cartoons. The hypocrisy highlighted through these cartoons. Islam, we have already said, decries any representation of their prophet. And yet there are many, many depictions of Muhammad in their own literature. While this debate rages about these cartoons, you shouldn't do this to our prophet Muhammad. He ought not to be pictured. An important point has been overlooked. Despite this supposed Islamic prohibition against showing Muhammad under any circumstances, hundreds of paintings, drawings, other images of Muhammad have been created over the centuries with not a word of complaint from the Muslim world. Many medieval manuscripts, particularly of Turkish and Persian origin, depict Muhammad. One beautiful manuscript, completed in 1324, shows the Prophet rededicating the black stone at the Ka'ba, the artist, a devout Muslim living in the holy city of Mecca itself. The recent cartoons in the Jailan's Pastan are nothing new. It's just that no other images of Mohammed have ever been so widely publicized. Also, and why is this for hypocrisy, the 12 Danish cartoons were actually printed in the Egyptian newspaper Al-Fagarm back in October 2005, attracting no protests. I repeat, 2005, October, during Ramadan, for all the Egyptian Muslim population to see, The Twelve were shown, and not a single squeak of outrage was present. And Al-Faigar is not a small newspaper either. It has respectable circulation in Egypt. It's steered by the journalist Adel Hamouda. Its offices are not under any threat of attack. But let me highlight the hypocrisy by going a stage further here, and let me talk about some fake cartoons. Just after the cartoons were published in September of 2005, a delegation of Danish Imams, Muslim leaders, went to the Middle East to discuss the cartoons with senior officials and prominent Islamic scholars. When they went there, the Danish Imams openly distributed a booklet that showed 15 images. Not only the original twelve cartoons, but three fake, again anti-Mohammed depictions that were much more offensive than the ones published in Denmark. It's now thought that these three bonus images are what ignited the outrage in the Muslim world. The newspaper, Extra Bladheim, obtained a copy of the booklet that the Danish Imams brought and presented the three offensive images on its website. The fake images all looked like low-quality photocopies. They show the first one, Mohammed with a pig snout, singing into a microphone. This is really just a bad photocopy of an Associated Press news photo from last year showing French comedian Jacques Barrault competing in a pig-squealing contest while wearing a rubber pig nose. But the Danish Imams passed it off as a blasphemous image of Mohammed for the stirring of resentment and anger. Second cartoon, the extra one was a dog and Muhammad engaged in a vile act with a caption on it saying, this is why Muslims pray. Third cartoon that they added, a sketch of Muhammad as a demonic paedophile. Now more importantly on this question of hypocrisy, what about the cartoons against Jews and Christians? that the Muslims routinely publish, that are far more offensive than the Danish ones. And Leslie, Daily Mail, 4th of February of this year, describes an Egyptian editor of a government-controlled newspaper that routinely publishes these anti-Jewish caricatures of, you know, the men with the crooked noses and the faggon-like faces, gloating as they take over the entire world, and they make it soak in noble Muslim blood. When Leslie complained mildly about these routine cartoons against the Jews and this racism that was in the Arab medium, a sophisticated Muslim friend of hers from Cairo said, well, I'm afraid it's just part of our culture. You shouldn't take it too seriously. The Daily Mail published five samples of these cartoons on Saturday the 4th of February. Nick Craven commented concerning them, Some of these cartoon portrayals of Jews in the Arab press could have come straight from Joseph Goebbels' propaganda machine in Nazi Germany, but they are not to be found on obscure websites run by fanatics, but in the mainstream newspapers of the Arab world. They're blunt, venomous messages. are all the more powerful in countries like Egypt where the literacy rate is only 56% and where media outlets are tightly controlled by the government. Take, for example, the Cairo newspaper Al-Rabbin, which illustrated its coverage of the Palestinian Intifadim with a grossly offensive cartoon of an Israeli soldier with a swastika for legs and running around with the head of a pig. They put that out in the year 2000. Now that was rather ironic, given the fact that Islamists have targeted Piglet in the past. As Michelle Malkin reported on the 2nd of October 2005, Winnie the Pooh's friend, Piglet, has been banned in a British government office. In the name of tolerance, the Sensitivity Police succeeded in ridding the workplace of pig-related items that might be offensive to Muslims. Or we've got the Al-Akbar newspaper, also from Egypt, which in the same month showed the then Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak dressed as Hitler with blood dripping from his hands and standing in the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem. Now what image would be most likely to offend Jews than this? Did the editors Of these publications span sleepless nights wondering whether or not to publish such offensive material? Not likely. And were the Egyptian embassies in Tel Aviv and Washington and London besieged by protesters as a result? Of course not. It didn't seem to trouble any of the Palestinian gunmen who surrounded the European Union offices in the Gaza Strip the other week that their own official newspaper carries blatantly anti-Semitic cartoons. One shows a Jewish devil haranguing the Pope. As the pontiff says, peace on earth, the Jew responds to one, colonies on earth. In the Arab An English-language newspaper in Saudi Arabia, which circulates around the Gulf, a cartoon shows Ariel Sharon wielding a swastika-shaped axe to chop up Palestinian children. Are the Arabs and Muslims entitled to dish it out while being insulated from similar indignities? Germany's Die Welt newspaper hinted at this issue in an editorial. They said the protests from Muslims would be taken more seriously. If they were less hypocritical, when Syrian television showed drama documentaries in prime time depicting rabbis as cannibals, the imams were quiet. Nor, by the way, have the imams got out there and started protesting by the stomping on the Christian cross. that is embedded in the Danish flag. No, they can stamp it into the gutter and they can burn as many copies as they please. So are we going to accede to a double standard by which Muslims are free to insult Judaism, Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, while Mohammed and Islam and Muslims enjoy immunity from insults? You may also have heard of an announcement last week from Iran's largest selling newspaper that is now holding a contest on cartoons of the Holocaust in response to the publishing in European papers of caricatures of their prophet Mohammed. It all rises up and says hypocrisy. The controversy caused by these cartoons, the reality reflected in these cartoons, the hypocrisy highlighted through these cartoons, You'll be glad to hear finally we're talking about the diversity defined by these cartoons. The reaction of Muslims to the Muhammad cartoons shows up a major contrast between Islam on the one side and true biblical Christianity on the other side. Now it's a contrast that has been referred to by John Piper in an excellent way in an article dated the 8th of February of this year, entitled, Being Mocked, The Essence of Christ's Work, Not Muhammad's. As we watch in these Muslim, militant Islamic demonstrations over these Danish cartoons, we find here again a depiction, a very clear depiction of the difference between Muhammad and Christ and what it means to follow each. Not all Muslims approve the violence. Sir Iqbal Saqrani, Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Britain, warned that while he was deeply concerned at the number of newspapers reprinting the cartoons, the crisis could be exploited. He said, we believe this is a mischievous agenda. We would caution all British Muslims not to allow themselves to be provoked. They should respond peacefully. and with dignity at all times. This is the real message of Islam that has to go out. And we are very glad to hear that and congratulate him on saying that. But a deep lesson remains. The work of Mohammed is based on being honoured. The work of Christ is based on being insulted. Now this produces two very different reactions to mockery. If Christ had not been insulted, there would be no salvation. Come down from the cross. Show yourself to be the Messiah, the Son of God that you claimed to be. Sparrow-pulled, hair-pulled from His face, beaten with the reed, dressed in the purple robe, humiliation, but it was a component part of His saving work to be insulted and die to rescue sinners from under the hand of the wrath of God. In the Psalms, the path of mockery for the Messiah was promised. Psalm 22 and 7, for example, all thee that see me, laugh, be the scorn, thee shoot out the lip, thee shake the head. And in the prophets' world we read tonight in Isaiah 53 and 3, He is despised and rejected of men. A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from him. He was despised. And we esteemed him not. And that is the psalmist and that is the prophet saying what is going to happen. And when it actually happened, it was a dreadful spectacle. They stripped him, Matthew 27, 28-30 records, and put on him a scarlet rope. When they had plaited a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right hand. And they bowed a knee before him, and mocked him, saying, Heal, King of the Jews! And they spit upon him, took the reed, and smote him on the head. Christ's response to all this was what? Patient endurance. This was the work He came to do. This was the path. appointed and approved by God in heaven for him. He is brought, Isaiah again says, chapter 53 and 7, he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep before her shearers is done. So he openeth not his mouth. This was not true of Muhammad. And Muslims do not believe it is true of Jesus. Most Muslims have been taught that Jesus was not crucified. One Sunni Muslim writes, Muslims believe that Allah saved the Messiah from the ignominy of crucifixion. And others add, we honour Jesus more than you Christians do. We refuse to believe that God would permit him to suffer death on the cross. A natural Muslim impulse is to avoid the shame of the cross. They stumble at the offence of Calvary at the curse for the one who dies upon the tree. This is the most basic difference between Christ and Mohammed and between a Muslim and a follower of Jesus. For Christ, enduring the mockery of the cross was central to His mission. And for a true follower of Jesus Christ, enduring suffering patiently for the glory of Christ and for the good of others is essential It is our path of obedience. Didn't our Lord teach us in Matthew 5 and 11, Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and say all manner of evil against you falsely. For my sake, during His life upon the earth, our Lord was branded an illegitimate, John 8 and 41, a drunkard, Matthew 11 and 19, a blasphemer, Matthew 26 and 65, a devil, Matthew 10, verse 25, And he promised his followers to see him, Matthew 10 and 25, again, if they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more shall they call, kneel, caricature, cartoonize them of his household. And this caricature and this mockery of Jesus has continued to this day. Malcolm Scorsese, portrayed Christ in the last temptation of Christ as wracked with doubt and beset with sexual lust. The Da Vinci Code portrays Jesus as a mere mortal. Married and father of children, we will say nothing about the violence of Jerry Springer, the opera. How should his people respond? On the one hand, we are grieved and angered. On the other hand, we identify with Christ. We embrace his suffering. We rejoice in our afflictions. We say with the Apostle Paul that vengeance will belong unto the Lord. We love our enemies and try to win them with the Gospel. If Christ did His work and the insults were flying in, we must do ours in the same way. When Muhammad was portrayed in these twelve cartoons, the uproar we have seen across the Muslim world was intense and often violent. What does this mean? It means that a religion with no insulted Savior will not endure insults to win the scoffers. It means that this religion is destined to bear the impossible load of upholding the honor of one who did not die and rise again to bring salvation to His people. It means that Jesus Christ, our Lord Jesus Christ, is still the only hope of peace with God and peace with man. As the commentator W.S. Plummer put it, our joy out of his sorrow, our life out of his death. It means as well his followers must be willing, as Paul teaches in Philippians 3 and 10, must be willing to join in the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable. unto His death. I am glad I serve and believe in and love a suffering Saviour, One who bore the burden of my sin, took the insults, carried the shield, sustained the agony to take my load, to lift me and bring me into His salvation.