Speak slowly. Read your sources before your headlines. Distinguish Muslim friends from Muslim governments. Refuse to be a culture-war voice. Remember that almost every conversation about sharia is, in the end, a conversation about a person God loves. Talk to that person, not to your audience.
Why Christians regularly fail this test
Several pressures push Christians toward bad witness on this topic.
1. The news cycle. Coverage of Islam in Western media is heavily skewed toward conflict, terrorism, and political-religious crisis. A Christian whose information about Islam comes mainly from cable news and social media has been catechized into a particular emotional response — fear and anger — that is incompatible with witness.
2. The political moment. In some Western countries, opposition to immigration or to Islamic political movements has become a cultural marker on one side of a political divide. Christians who let political identity shape their witness conflate categories that the gospel does not allow them to conflate.
3. The internet incentive structure. Hot takes on Islam get more engagement than careful walks through classical fiqh. Christians who chase engagement degrade their witness.
4. The genuinely difficult parts. Apostasy law, the laws of war, and gender rulings are real, and serious Christians cannot pretend they are not. Speaking with care about real difficulties is different from outrage; the same Christian who can speak carefully gives a far better witness.
Five practical disciplines
1. Read sources before headlines. Before you say anything substantive about a sharia ruling, have at least one classical fiqh source in front of you, and one modern Muslim scholar's engagement with it. If you cannot do that, do not speak.
2. Distinguish friend from government. Your Muslim neighbour is not the government of Iran. Your Muslim friend is not the Taliban. Treating a person as if he or she carries the weight of every classical ruling and every contemporary regime is unfair. Notice the slip when you make it.
3. Lead with the gospel, not the political point. A Christian who is more eager to win an argument about sharia than to commend Christ is doing the wrong thing. The conversation can include sharia. It must not be reduced to it.
4. Refuse the audience-pleaser temptation. If your most popular content is your harshest content about Islam, your platform is shaping your speech. Step back. Pray. Read carefully. Speak less and better.
5. Repent of past words. Christians who have spoken poorly about Islam in past years should say so plainly when they meet Muslim friends. 'I have read more carefully now, and there are things I said that I would not say again' is a powerful sentence. It also models the gospel.
Some New Testament reminders
James 1:19: 'Be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger.' Slow on this subject especially.
Proverbs 18:13: 'If one gives an answer before he hears, it is his folly and shame.' Apply to talking about sharia in particular.
Colossians 4:5-6: 'Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.' Each person. Not a category. Not an audience. A person.
1 Peter 3:15: 'Always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect.' The two qualifiers — gentleness and respect — are not optional. They are part of the command.
A note for the Christian reader
If you are tempted to make a strong public statement about sharia, ask three questions first.
- Have I done the reading?
- Will any actual Muslim friend hear this?
- Does this commend Christ?
If the answer to any one is no, do not say it. There are more useful things to say to your Muslim neighbours, and the most useful are about Jesus.
What faithful witness looks like
Faithful witness on these subjects is often quiet. It is the Christian who has read Jonathan Brown's Misquoting Muhammad. It is the Christian who can talk about the apostasy debate inside Islam, not just the apostasy ḥadīth. It is the Christian whose Muslim friend says, 'You actually know what you're talking about.' It is the Christian who, when asked what he thinks about jihad, can answer with classical fiqh, modern reformist scholarship, and his own Bible's hard war texts in one breath.
It is, in the end, the Christian whose voice in his Muslim friend's ear sounds more like Christ than like cable news.
Sources to read
Click a source title to read it on an authoritative site (quran.com for the Qurʼān and tafsīr; sunnah.com for ḥadīth).
| Source | What it covers |
|---|---|
| 1 Peter 3:15 | Always be prepared to give an answer with gentleness and respect. |
| James 1:19 | Quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger. |
| Proverbs 18:13 | He who answers before listening — that is folly. |
| Colossians 4:5-6 | Walk in wisdom; let your speech be seasoned with salt. |
How to think about it
- Read sources before headlines. Classical fiqh and modern Muslim scholarship before opinions.
- Distinguish friend from government. The person in front of you is not the regime in the news.
- Lead with the gospel. The conversation includes sharia; it is not reduced to it.
- Refuse audience-pleasing rhetoric. If your hot takes pay better than your careful work, the platform is shaping you.
- Repent of past words plainly. It models the gospel.
Common objections
- Christians need to speak boldly against sharia.
Boldly, yes — and accurately, gently, with careful sources. Boldness without accuracy is foolishness (Proverbs 18:13). Boldness without gentleness violates 1 Peter 3:15. Christians have done both regularly. The result is a worse witness.
- Refusing to speak is appeasement.
Speaking carefully is not refusing to speak. The Christian who has done the work, knows the classical fiqh, and engages friends respectfully has a far stronger voice than the Christian who shouts about something he has not studied.
Related questions
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