Brian Houston’s Bungles Bloopers and Blasphemy

Posted 31/03/2014

Brian’s Houston’s Offical Clarification on the Doctrine of God and Allah

The following is an interesting clarification by Brian Houston. It is in response to many who have taken issue with a statement he made in a Hillsong Conference sermon. This statement was picked up, including by the author of this blog.

See my earlier expose from a couple of days ago — https://coercioncode.com/2014/03/28/brian-houston-hillsongs-god-is-allah/

Please read his clarification carefully. Notice there is no outright denial of who Allah is or is not… just a clarification that there is only one way to God.

You may need to read the statement more than once, which is nothing new when it comes to Brian Houston, and his seeming innocent gaffs.

Here’s the whole sermon again in FULL.

http://www.god.tv/hillsong-church/video/brian-houston-hillsong-tv/living-for-the-masters-well-done

 

So lets give Brian the benefit of the doubt for a minute…….right?

Some points from the sermon (28mins)

• What does it mean to live your life with purpose?

• What drives you everyday?

• How do you allow your perception of God to  influence your life?

• Do you think God as a hard taskmaster, or do you think he wants to see you blest, and be all that you can be?

• Purpose…. Everything God does He does with Purpose

• God is intentional, God is purposeful

• Be successful on purpose…

• A divine sense of purpose

•  Its about being useful for the Master’s use

• Our view of God is so important

 Much could be said about Brian’s Universal message of purpose, but I will resist… So we are going along pretty well then at 11:57 mins it all goes down hill. 

“How do you view God? In a desert there’s two types of birds: there’s vultures and there’s hummingbirds. One lives off dead carcasses, rotting meat. The other lives off the beautiful, sweet nectar in a particular flower on a particular desert plant. In the same desert, they both find what they’re looking for.

Do you know – take it all the way back into the Old Testament and the Muslim and you, we actually serve the same God. Allah to a Muslim, to us Abba Father God. And of course through history, those views have changed greatly. But lets make sure that we view God through the eyes of Jesus, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the beauty of a Saviour, the loving open inclusive arms of a loving God. And that way we’ll lead out of that and you’ll be purposeful about your leadership and you’ll draw people just like the Lord Jesus always does through the power of the Holy Spirit.”

Just so we don’t miss what Brian Houston said a moment ago, here it is again…..

“We actually serve the same God. Allah to a Muslim, to us Abba Father God.”

 

The reason Brian Houston’s statement has so many concerned is it’s questionable entry into a topic on purpose in the first place, a statement that has nothing whatsoever to do with his sermon.

If the sermon is about being useful for the Master’s use why even mention Allah? In his statement above he explains, but that’s way too late. But to be clear, he didn’t make a comparision in the sermon, saying that if you are a Muslim your view of God will be different.

In Old Testament times, Nabonidus (555-539 BC), the last king of Babylon, built Tayma, Arabia as a center of Moon-god worship. Segall stated, “South Arabia’s stellar religion has always been dominated by the Moon-god in various variations.” Many scholars have also noticed that the Moon-god’s name “Sin” is a part of such Arabic words as “Sinai,” the “wilderness of Sin,” etc. When the popularity of the Moon-god waned elsewhere, the Arabs remained true to their conviction that the Moon-god was the greatest of all gods. While they worshipped 360 gods at the Kabah in Mecca, the Moon-god was the chief deity. Mecca was in fact built as a shrine for the Moon-god.

Islam is polytheistic in origin.

Muslims didn’t exist when any of the scriptures were written let alone “the Old Testament”.

Muslim’s claim that Allah is the God of the Bible and that Islam arose from the religion of the prophets and apostles. Islam is refuted by solid, overwhelming archeological evidence. Islam is nothing more than a revival of the ancient Moon-god cult. It has taken the symbols, the rites, the ceremonies, and even the name of its god from the ancient pagan religion of the Moon-god. As such, it is sheer idolatry and must be rejected by every born again Christian.

I’m sorry, this is not miscontruing his words to say something else. They are here in Black and White.

“He starts his clarification ( above) by saying there have been false claims on social media that I believe Muslims and Christians worship the same God. That is incorrect….”

Then he goes on to say it was taken out of the context of the whole message.

He seems to clarify it better in a tweet:

In answer to this tweet is the following;

 Mohammed,  expressed his ignorance about his ancestors prior to his 17^th ancestor.

Ibn Ishak was considered by the Muslim scholars of his time as being guilty of forgery and fabricating false genealogies.[1][i]

Long before Ibn Ishak, Muslims who lived in Mohammed’s own time also fabricated genealogies in an attempt to connect Mohammed to the descendants of Ishmael. Mohammed, himself, rejected all of these false genealogies, and he put limits regarding the genealogy of his ancestors. Regarding Mohammed’s own rejection of the false genealogies, Amru bin al-As wrote:

Mohammed genealogized himself regarding his ancestors until he reached al-Nather bin Kinaneh, then he said, “anyone who claimed otherwise or added further ancestors, has lied.”[2][ii]

By this, Mohammed confessed that neither he, nor anyone else, knew about his ancestors beyond al-Nather bin Kinaneh. Nather bin Kinaneh is the 17th ancestor in the genealogy which Mohammed recognized as true. Other narrations of the customs, or sayings, of Mohammed, called Hadiths, show Mohammed refused to be genealogized prior to Maad, معدwho some suggested, was the 4th ancestor prior to al-Nather bin Kinaneh.[3][iii]

When we look at the ancestors of Mohammed, it’s reasonable to estimate 30 years for each generation of the 17 ancestors of Mohammed. Therefore, we can conclude that Mohammed knew about the genealogy of his tribe as far back as about 510 years.

If we want to add the other four ancestors that Mohammed listed, we would go back 630 years. The truth is, nobody knew beyond such a date. How, then, could Ibn Ishak and his followers reliably document a genealogy back to Ishmael, who lived in 2050 B.C.? This gives approximately 2000 years between the 21st ancestor of Mohammed and Ishmael.

How could Ibn Ishak claim the Ishmaelites lived in Mecca during this period and give details about their history when Mohammed himself said that nobody knew about his relatives prior to his 17th or 21st ancestor?   Mecca was not even in existence during this period.

To read more go to – http://www.religionresearchinstitute.org/Mohammad/ishmael.htm

If it can be said that the phrase regarding Allah be  taken out of context, it is because it shouldn’t have been in his sermon in the first place.  And yet to say that he didn’t say it, that is a denial of what has been plainly recorded.

Yes…he needed to provide an explanation, give clarity, and perhaps give some kind of apology to anyone he may have offended.

But no…. all we get is Brian Houston’s uncommitted media statement to put everyone’s concerns to rest.

I feel so much better….

His clumsy reference to God, and Allah are just too coincidental. You don’t plan to say such things without giving it clear thought and intent. We would ask what is the purpose of mentioning Allah, except to bring a marrying of two religious views under the guise of orthodoxy?

Because as Brian Houston stated, it was just one statement. But because it was such a significant statement, he should have stopped and said, ‘What I mean by that is …….’ But he keeps right on going!

To other words, he didn’t pause, but instead plowed on, without  hesitation. Then he wonders why there is this furore.

In a real church he should have been booed off the stage, and security should have handcuffed him, and taken him away.

I’m sorry but this is just more of Brian’s Bunglings, Bloopers and Blasphemies!

I say, Brian Houston deserves another Brickbat!