How Ex-Preacher Came To Islam

Yusuf Estes

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Channel: Yusuf Estes

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Episode Notes

How Yusuf Estes Came to Islam, this story always touches your heart for good.

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Bismillah Alhamdulillah wa salatu salam ala rasulillah while and he was a big shed with a lot what electrical? Well, I shut him Mohammed and up your asuma back. So I'm gonna go

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My name is Yousef.

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He said Yusuf Musa use

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a very good, I wish to teach my wife, she keeps mispronouncing it, she calls me useless.

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On the left.

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Now, how many of you were in the program today was teaching us trying to teach about how to call people to Islam called Dada. I just use an example what I was telling you about.

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Number I was telling you, when you introduce yourself to somebody, you got to get friendly with them. So I just use an example right there. Because this will disarm the people. This disarm them and make them relax a little bit. Because they're coming to you with things like how come your moslems has to kill all the people?

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What kind of question is that?

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How come you have to beat your wives?

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Why does your book tell you that you're the only ones going to go to Paradise? So these kind of questions when they come to you? What are you going to do?

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So the first thing is we said, as we said in the program, and I hope, by the way, if you didn't join us today, join us tomorrow. But when we doing it, you look through the schedule, I'm not going to get into that, but just the schedule. And join us for this whenever we're talking about the dollar, because part of given doubt, is you. And if the people aren't buying it, they're not gonna listen to what you got to say. So you got to soften them up a little bit. Got me? Okay, where are we? The subject tonight is the subject of priests and preachers entering Islam.

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And often people ask me, we heard about you used to be a priest or something, and you came into Islam. So you know, tell us about it. We want to know, how does that happen? And it's not just Muslims who want to know, not Muslims, they'd like to know the story too, because they feel like you mean, you didn't understand? I mean, you were a priest, you didn't understand about Jesus? Come on, man. So it's a topic that I talk about a lot. The first thing I have to do is clarify a couple of points, I was not a priest. In the English, we use the word priest to mean somebody who is in the Catholic Church, if you're not from the Catholics, if you're from the Protestants, then you don't

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use that term, we usually use the term. For instance, Pastor, Minister, preacher, Reverend, and these are some of the titles we came up with an awful lot of them, because that's the way humans are right? give ourselves titles.

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So I was a preacher, and a minister of music. But it doesn't really matter. But just if you're talking to a Christian, and you say, a priest, is going to say, Oh, my God, how is that and when they find out, oh, you weren't a Catholic girl, that's a lie, then you weren't a priest. So I want to clarify that.

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As a matter of fact, I will tell you, in my own estimation, I'm probably the least the least of the factions within this equation.

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Because there were so many other people that came in through Islam the same time I did. That's why it takes a little bit of time to tell the story, but they asked me to tell it tonight. So we're going to do that. But I want you to listen carefully to realize what goes through the mind of a person that's not Muslim. Okay.

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And I usually start out by telling people that

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my father and I were both ministers, and both of us were also businessmen.

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And the reverse order, we were business first.

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And preacher second, got me. Because Well, you know, as they say, Business is business. And that's exactly how it works. We operated mostly in Texas, we had place in San Antonio Houston, and also in the Dallas area. And we were very concerned about Christian conditions. So my father started something called concerned Christian centers. And basically, if you look at it from a material point of view, it was a place to sell stuff. But what we would do is take consignment things, and people could bring things into us. And then we would sell it and keep part of the money, keep a lot of the money. But anyway, they would bring in what they make with their hands, arts and crafts, and a lot

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of old women, they like to sit around and make things then they give it to us. And this helps the church, which is called the church, and then it helps them as well. So it became like business and religion tied together. And that's very common in our country.

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At one point my father told me we're going to start doing business with a man from Egypt.

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Merci Bora this great international sounds good. We can put this in our business card. We're International. He said and this man is from Cairo, Egypt. And that's where, you know, they have the Nile River. They have those big pyramids. They have the Sphinx. Oh, boohoo you know, they got everything and we say no, this is good.

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He said and he's a moslem

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I'll never forget it. I've told the story many times but I just like it happened yesterday. I'm standing in between the kitchen or in the dining room in the living room area, you know, like this when we're talking and I just thought like this. Was it What? A Muslim? No way. No way. Do I want anything to do that? They dad come on, you should know better than anybody. Because we were linked in with other preachers. My father supported people like pat robertson. Ah, you know him, Pat Robertson.

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And oh, Roberts. He's not very popular anymore, but it used to be real strong. And his ministry up in Tucson up in Tulsa, Tulsa, Oklahoma. In addition to that, people like Benny Hill, and I don't know if you heard of Benny Hinn, he's coming over this way. So look out, and there's

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many of them, many of them. JOHN hagy, and the list goes on.

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Jerry Falwell, Jimmy Swaggart, some of the names maybe you heard those before. We know these people we know all about them all about. Okay.

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So at one point, here, I am standing there talking to my father about a Muslim, these are the enemies of God, this is what we've been taught these same people I just mentioned their names and their preaching on the television and so on. This is what they teach. Muslims are no good.

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Now, it just became Muslims are terrorists, but back then, you know, we we didn't reach that level yet. We were still just kidnappers, hijackers. You know.

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They said that Muslims don't believe in God, that they're worshipping a black box in the desert, and they kissed the ground five times a day.

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Well, that's what we know, man.

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So here's this moslem gonna do business with us as well, my dad, no, I'm not gonna do it. And he insisted, he said, I want you to meet this man. He's very nice. And I said, I don't want to meet him. I was, I never liked this, by the way. But on this case, I said, No, that's one thing I'm going to stand firm against. We're not going to do it. He said, I want you just to meet him. I said, Alright, I'll do it. For you. I'm gonna do it my way. I'm going to go to church.

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And it's going to be on Sunday, when I come out of the church, I'm going to have my Bible under my arm. I'm going to have the silly but you secure a big cross, I'm going to have my cross with me. And I'm going to have my hat that says Jesus is Lord. And I'm going to have my wife born again Christian with me. And we are going to get this demon, devil infidel moslem, and we're going to show him Jesus.

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This is a true story, by the way. So I got up that morning on Sunday, and I was thinking, Man, you know, we went to church. Strangely enough, that preacher was preaching out of the Old Testament about salvation, coming at the time of David, which, which really puzzled me because

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according to Christianity, it's coming through Jesus. And it really that opened the door for me, but that comes up later in the story. Why was he saying their salvation before Jesus? That's interesting. Now, when I get there to my father's store,

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I'm looking around you know,

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I'm looking for somebody wearing you know, a long white robe and some kind of black you know, thing over that with a long beard and

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I guess I was looking for me what I

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want to get in there.

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I don't see this guy. By the way, he mama sword. Everything. I have total Khomeini maybe zorra have pictured. So where is he? I'm ready. My facility. So we're here somewhere. So here

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was a normal guy. He was normal. He didn't. He didn't have a beard. He didn't have any hair at all.

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Do you do it in my name? He introduced himself. His name is Mohammed. How do you do?

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After the niceties of Hello, how are you? How's everything I said, Do you believe in God?

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He said yes. Oh, yeah. Sure.

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You said Yeah. Abraham. Yeah.

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What about David and Suleyman? He said, Yeah,

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So when I meet this man, I'm impressed that he's believing these things. But I thought maybe he's just saying.

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So I even asked him, What about Jesus? Because I thought maybe they're kind of First I thought Muslims were like Hindus. That was first. Now when he said he believed in some of the things that the Bible I said, Okay, maybe they're like Jews.

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So that's when I said, Yes, but what about Jesus? Do you believe in Jesus? And he said, Yes.

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I said, Okay, Okay, wait a minute.

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This is gonna be easy. I can convert this guy.

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So I agreed that we're going to do business with him. And in fact, I took him immediately out to have tea together, we sit together, drink tea, talk a little while, and I started tearing the picture. And right away, I'm in the Bible. I got it right there. Flip it open. Genesis, let's talk about Abraham. What do you know about Abraham? Abraham, he had two sons he see, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm doing all the preaching to him.

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Imagine this, and he sit there.

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He's a graduate of Allah, his heart. And

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like this, get me. You don't say?

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Well,

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it happened that during Ramadan,

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some of his friends that he was staying with, he had moved their apartment around or something. And he was going to go stay in the masjid for it to cash in Ramadan. Normal.

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We didn't understand. I thought he has nowhere to go. And I told my dad, this man has nowhere to go.

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And my dad said, No, he's got money. I said, No, No, he doesn't. Daddy, I'm telling you has no place to go. I heard him say he's gonna go live in the mosque. Do Christian if you're gonna live in a church? Oh, that's the worst.

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So I said, let me let me offer the can stay at our place. And my dad said, No, you

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don't do that. That's not right. I said, No, I'm going to offer. I went to him. And I said, how would you like to come stay at our place? He said, No, no, no, I want to go and stay there. I want to stay in the mosque. And it's something good. I said, Oh, man, look at this poor man. Oh, my God. He doesn't know. You know, he just, Oh, poor soul. Please come and stay in our house. And he said, No, I can't. I need to go stay with them. I said, Look, I'm scratching his dignity. Show. I told him this. No, no, no, no, I want you to come and you can pay, you can pay money and stay with us. He said How much? I said $15 a week,

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which in America is like nothing. $15 is nothing. I said, and then he kind of hesitated. I said, and we'll pay for all the food. Will you eat $15 worth of food and one day in America? He said, Okay. All right. And I told my dad later I said, See how I did that? Because now he'll stay with us. He knows he's getting a good deal on the food that I was making it all about money.

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Well, I didn't know he wanted to come and stay with us. He wanted to learn about how are Americans and how is the Dell we're going to be? Where do we believe especially people who are preaching.

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So he came and stayed in our house. I said, Well, that's good. I'll travel with him and go with him in places and he'll see and he'll learn about Christianity. As we were traveling and working together, we put up tables just like this and booths and things and set things out for people to come and look at them and sell things.

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And I caught him one time.

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He

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when somebody wants to take something from the front, he took it from the back and gave it to him. And I looked at him and the next time somebody started to take something he took from the back and gave it to him. I said, Hey, Muhammad,

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we take the stuff from the front, because that's the old stuff. The new stuff in the back this hold it back. You know what I'm saying? This is David material, get rid of the junk first. He said No, I can't. And my religion. We can't sell something unless we give the people the best.

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Awesome.

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Got me on that one. I'm supposed to be telling him about a better deal. I said, Okay, okay, whatever. Never gonna make any money though. But that's alright.

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Over a period of time, I came to learn a lot of things also about being humble a lot, because this man was obviously well educated, very articulate, could really talk about a lot of subjects. And in fact, I tried to debate with him about many things. But he was so wise and well educated, that he could see what I was doing and he would take it easy and let me win every debate.

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I could win any debate with him if if he wanted me to. But if he wanted me to lose, I was gonna lose. It was this was how well he can handle. Now what happened? One of the things

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teachers that are new, another preacher who used to carry a big cross and walk down the street. So people will stop and talk to him about religion. He had a heart attack, and he went to the hospital. So I went to the hospital to visit him. And when I was visiting him, I met another man in the hospital who is in a wheelchair. This gentleman had a problem. He didn't want to talk to anybody. And I told him, let me witness to you let me share the message of Jesus with you. So I took out my Bible, and again, I started telling him about a prophet prophet Eunice la Salaam, and I'm telling them look at Jonah. He's in the belly of the whale. He's in the sea. He's down there like this. And

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who knows how long and suffering like this, you don't have as big a problem as that. And God saved him so he can save you too.

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He said, huh?

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Gentlemen, talk to me. I asked him, what's your name? You don't tell me? Where are you from? He said, I'm from Venus. towards that.

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But we do have there is a Venus, Texas, by the way. But he said, you know, it's from another planet. So I kept Hmm, I would go I would talk to him witness to him. Finally, one day, he started crying. I was pushing his wheelchair around, I took him down on rolling around different places. He started crying one day. He said, I'm going to confess something to you, I need to confess something to you. Now to a Catholic confession means you're going to tell the priest all your sins,

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and then he's gonna forgive you. Well, I wasn't Catholic. And I told him, listen, I'm not Catholic. And I'm not a priest. I'm a preacher. He said, I know better than you do. I am a priest.

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I said, Oh, my God.

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This man is a priest.

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And he knows the Bible better than I do.

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He said, I just have had a hard time. I've been hearing having heart attacks. And I've been having problems in everything and trying to figure out a lot of things. He said, I'm sorry, I took it out on you. I really am. I apologize. And he started crying. And when he started crying, I felt sorry, you know, how do you mess it? It's okay.

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One day I went to the hospital,

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and my friend was gone.

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So I started visiting with the priest.

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And that happened one time I went to visit him at the hospital and he was gone. And I asked him, Where did he go? They said he went home. I said home.

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He's a missionary priest from South America. How did he go home? She said, I don't know. He's not here. I'm sure his family. I said he has no family. I know him personally. He has no family. Where did he go?

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She said, I don't know. We're not responsible for them. I said, Well, let me see where he went, you got it in your file. And she said, I can't do that. Those are locked up. Nobody can look in the file. And I got into the lady's face. And I said, Listen to me. This man could die in the street right now. And it's gonna be your fault. And you're gonna get sued because I'm gonna sue you for him.

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She said, okay, his folders over there, but I'm not gonna watch. I went over and I look forward to get the address where he went. Sure enough, he was in a place where they put people that have no place to go a shelter.

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So I went to the shelter, and I found him he was still on crutches. He saw me started crying again. He said, Please get me out of here. Get me out of here. I said, Okay. Come live at my house.

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Now, I told you the story so you can see something. Now look, I have two visitors in my house.

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One is a Catholic priest, the other is a Muslim. And I'm thinking I can get the Catholic priests and convert him to be a Protestant. At the same time, I'm going to catch the Muslim and bring him over to Christianity.

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high aspirations.

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But it didn't work. Some strange things began to happen. We would sit around the table at night to discuss what is the Bible? And what's the salvation. My father has a Bible. It's called King James Version of the Bible. Most of you probably heard about it, especially any students above the dead or zacher night you've heard about King James Version of the Bible.

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But I work out of a different one that I've had since 1953. It's called the Revised Standard Version. And it says in it, King James version has grave mistakes, grave errors, defects in it is what it says.

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So I begin to preach out of mine, which doesn't match. And my father said, No, it's this wise, no is this way.

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Now my wife comes up with her Bible from Jimmy Swaggart.

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It's called the good news for modern man.

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Right?

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totally different. It's written in modern vernacular, you can just, you know, say anything you want to with it. You don't even recognize the Bible anymore.

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The Catholic priest, he's got another Bible, an older Bible with 73 books. We're working out of 66 books.

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His is not even the same and the verses doesn't match up at all.

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And I never even knew about this subject until then. And he's saying this and I'm saying that my father's saying something else. My wife's on something else and all it done Mohammed the Muslim is sitting over there like this.

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So we asked him,

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I guess it was me. I asked him I said, Well, how many versions of your book your co ran do you have? He said, the urn has no versions. There's only one it's original. It's in the Arabic language.

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daleko pitiable rate the fee. This is the book that has no doubt Hudler, moodiness, guidance for those who have Taqwa for a lot. This shielded taco that you have to have between you and Allah subhanho wa Taala.

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And only certain people are going to get the Huda the Daya Deena from this Quran. These people that have the taqwa.

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So when he's telling us that the Quran is one, I'm going

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and it's in the original language, we still have it.

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You know what I was thinking he's lying. I was sure he was lying, because he could see the problem we were having. And he just sat back and made that up. But I don't know Arabic at that stage. So I don't know what to say, you know, maybe, I don't know.

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And he left it at that he didn't try to preach, but it brought a big doubt in my mind. Now about we got all these books. He's got one. And low, right, the fee, no doubt in it.

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So another time, we had another discussion that came up. Now this time, I went to the other preacher who had the cross.

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And I was asking him, I want to be able to explain the Trinity.

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The Trinity I see. Yeah, I know. I know. I know. And I know the council.

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But I want to know the way to explain it. So a human being can just understand it.

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said, okay, it's like apple, just take an apple. The Apple has a shell around the outside the skin inside is the meat inside of that is the seeds. Okay? three things. One, Apple. That's a way

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I start going back I'm going to tell this Muslim about the Trinity. But on the way I remember his arguing with me his way of debating with me. I said, No, he's gonna tear me apart. As soon as I say seeds. He's gonna say there's more than one. So it could be seven or eight, or nine or 10. Gods all rolled into one. No, no, no, it's gotta be special. It doesn't work like that. Let me go back and try again. So I went back to him. I said, What if he says there's more than one seed in there? He said, Okay. I said, and besides, it could have a worm running through it, then that would make it go up another notch. What can I do about that? He said, Okay, okay. Forget the apple. Okay? It's like

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the baby, the egg. Use the egg. The egg has the shell inside of the egg is the white instead of the white is the yellow, three, one egg. That's it. That's good to go. Now I start going home again, and it hit me Wait a minute, the egg good Abba, double yolk. God becomes forward just like that. Plus, he could be rocking.

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I'm not gonna ask him again. So at the market, one day, I saw a man and I was talking to him because I was listening to some things that Muhammad told us about the belief in Islam. Allah is one. And so I was telling this guy, you know, I got some doubts about the Trinity. He said, You are a preacher. You have doubts. I said, Yeah. It doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make any sense. How could three be one?

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He said, Okay. Okay. Look, you see me? I'm one man. See ya. See my wife? Yeah, it's one person. Yeah. See my son.

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311 family. It's the family of God us that said There you go. The family of God.

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You don't get very far on that one. You realize right away. They could have another kid just like that. But worse, they could get a divorce. You want a guy that can get a divorce.

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In Texas, if you get a divorce, your wife gets the car. Cars house. Your retirement check your 501 your Keogh plan is she's going to get your

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Computer and even your email, you got nothing left. And I don't want a God that could have a worm in it. I don't want a God that can be rotten. And I don't want a God that can get a divorce. I don't want to explain this Trinity the right way.

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Sure enough, the subject came up Trinity. There we are. Now here's the priest trying to talk about the Trinity is like an apple, I'm going to go there.

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Don't worry about it. The family of God, forget about it. I know what's going to happen. So we asked him and we say, Okay, what do you say about God? What do you think he said? How many shaytani r rajim Bismillahi Rahmani Raheem,

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who Allahu

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Allahu cemac. Lamb,

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lamb,

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lamb yaku for one, and he explained it something like this. say he is along the unique, not like anything else. He's eternally sought after by his whole creation, but, but he doesn't need the creation. He's not the father of anything. He's not the son of anything. He's not like anything, and he is unique.

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Boy, that's exactly what I already think. But I can't admit that. That sounds too easy.

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But plus in the Quran, Allah subhanho wa Taala tells us to tell the Christians don't say three.

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Here's a little point, I'm going to go out of the story for a minute to show you something.

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Nowhere in the Old Testament, the Torah, or the zipboard, the songs, or the NGO, which is the New Testament, nowhere in the Bible, do you find the word Trinity Not once. Not once is the word Trinity.

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But it's in the Koran.

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We have it in grant, it says, to tell them not to say Trinity.

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But they don't have it. And Allah said, Don't say it.

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Guess what else? The word Bible is not in the Bible.

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Bible is from Greek it means biblio or book.

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book. But it's in the Koran many times is it to gab book. I hope people have the book. So we found in the Bible, a shortage. They're talking about it with the Quran is explaining it. I found actually in the Quran, I can explain the Bible much better because it gives me the things I didn't know how to explain. So then, in my mind, look what I do. I started realizing what he was saying was true, but I never admitted it. Instead, I was taking this and mixing it and when I would go get my next talk, I would say so and so and so and I would use what I learned from the Quran to explain what's in the Bible.

00:28:00--> 00:28:14

Some of the people liked it, but some of them didn't. Because when I began to talk about salvation being based on what the bible tells you in there, there's no savior except God. It says real clear. Jesus is not your Savior. God is.

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When I found that I said, Okay, let me try another way to explain that. Each thing is I would learn it, I'm trying to change how I'm presenting the thing. It still doesn't dawn on me, I need to do something.

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But I can see for sure God is only one and that so I totally forget the Trinity thing. My dad never did believe it anyway, so he had no problem with it. Now we come to some new thing. The priest asks the Muslim Can I go to your church with you? The mosque? He said, Sure. Come on.

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Well, he went and they came back. So he took the priests decides give me give me, what did they do? What did they do? You know, tell us what did he do? Did they like kill some animals? or What did they do in there?

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He said, No, they just stand there like this. And they pray and they leave.

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said what?

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They pray and leave.

00:29:10--> 00:29:13

Yeah. Okay. What kind of music do they have?

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He said he didn't have any music, no music.

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How in the world you're gonna worship God without music man.

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So I asked him, Mommy, you guys don't have any music? He said, No.

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Now I'm in the piano and organ business. I said how many mosques are there in the world? He said millions and millions and millions of them. I said none of them have a piano. He said, No, no, I have an Oregon he said no.

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Oh, man, I can get rich.

00:29:52--> 00:29:59

just introduce some music to these guys. Put it in there. You know bounderby I said the Arabs have any music. He said Oh, Arabs have music.

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Said huh boy I gotta figure it out boy, I can see my next million dollars coming right straight up to me you know.

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So then the priest ask again another time you want to go back to the masjid again.

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He went this middle of July 1991 he went to the masjid with him again and by the way this Masjid Jake momager barely knows very well is on Medina drive in Arlington, Texas. And that's where they were going to because we were living in Midlothian, just south of Oak Cliff and south of Dallas. So

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they didn't come back.

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Oh night we're waiting. What happened very late. They came back. And when he came in, I looked, there's Muhammad I recognize him. Who is the guy with him though. He's wearing a white jelibean white dress like this as a white pillbox cap on his head. And I looked at him and I said he his name was father Peter Jacobs, but we're not, you know, Catholic, so I don't have to call him father. I said, did you become a Muslim?

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He said it showed with a ilaha illAllah Muhammad Rasul Allah.

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Oh my god. Now I used to have cameras like these cameras right here, because we had a television show called as this music January. So I got one of our cameras out, opened it up, set it all up on a tripod, and I was going to interview him and ask him, Well, you know what, you went through Islam, what happened? While I was talking to him, though, he fell asleep. So it was still in my mind. And I was thinking what I'm going to do, this is too amazing. Now here, I'm preaching to the people. And I'm trying to change what I'm saying. And here's a priest just became a Muslim. My father said, it's a good deal. It sounds alright to him. I don't know what to do.

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So I decided to talk making sure I talked to my wife.

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We have apartment upstairs. We were in our apartment up there. And I'm telling her all, you know, a priest became a Muslim today. What is that? And can you imagine what they were saying about the Quran and saying about this? And so and so. All of a sudden, she said, I want to get a divorce.

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Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, not the subject. But what happened? She said no, all this talking about religion and talking about Islam. And so I can see I said, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no problem here. No, no problem. I said, You thought Uh, no, no, I was just observing somebody else. No, not interested. Just me. I don't want to be with those Muslims. Last thing I want to do a bit with a Muslim. No way.

00:32:41--> 00:33:00

Just put your mind at ease. She said, I needed a divorce. I said, What are we going with this again? What's about Maria, what happened? She said, a Muslim can't be married to a Christian. I said, Well, no, wait a minute. Hold on. I don't look. Look at me. I'm telling you, I swear I don't want to be a Muslim. Okay.

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Then. And even if I did, don't you remember what he said? A Muslim man could be married to a Christian woman. It's not a problem. But I'm not saying I want to I'm just saying it's not a problem. She said that is the problem.

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A Muslim woman can't be married to a Christian man. I want to be a Muslim. So I need a divorce.

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I'll never forget, I was sitting right on the edge of the bed just sitting there. You know, and I almost fell over. I said it last I can tell the truth.

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I can say it. I didn't realize that she liked the idea. I was afraid. I said, Okay. The good news is I don't want to be a Muslim.

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No, she said, I don't believe you.

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I said no, no, really. I was just saying that because you know, but for sure. Just so you know, I want to be a Muslim. I've been thinking about it. I want to be a Muslim. We're both going to be Muslim is going to be great right? Now what she said,

00:33:59--> 00:34:10

I don't believe you, because you're either lying right now. Or you were lying five minutes ago and you said you didn't want to be a Muslim. And either way. I don't want to be married to a liar.

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So get out.

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So I started leaving and walking down the stairs, it boiled down to my father's. I said, Wait a minute, where am I gonna go? This is my father's house. I just got thrown off on my own property. What happened here? So I went to get to Mohammed and I woke him up. I said, you and me. We got to talk.

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Come with me. And we went outside the house and we walked those country roads in Midlothian, Texas until the time for the dawn,

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the sun to come up at dawn.

00:34:43--> 00:34:57

And all that time I talked to him about what's it like to be a Muslim? How do you have to believe what do you have to do? Let me hear all of it now and no more playing a game. I'm not debating. I just want to know just tell me. Just tell me what's Islam. I need to know what I need to do.

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And he told me everything and I really

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This is it. I got to make a decision. This is a big deal though. And he told me, okay, this is up to you. You have to go make a choice for yourself. I can't help you, sir. Oh my god.

00:35:12--> 00:35:52

So when he was praying for Israel, I decided, I've been watching this man, praying this direction, with his head on the ground is so beautiful to see a man humbled himself, put his head on the ground to the rub below me. And I said, oh my god. Let me try that. So I sneaked off somewhere where nobody could see me a little law. And then I found the place aboard there, you know, and I bowed down on the ground, and I put my head down on the ground on that board there. And I was and by the way, I'm pretty good at speaking, especially in prayers. I used to make so long a prayer. They wouldn't let me say the prayer at Thanksgiving because the food would be cold. Okay, so but I put my head on the

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ground and only these words came no more words just this. Oh, God.

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guide me.

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That's it. And I was thinking, well, I gotta say more than that. Nothing.

00:36:09--> 00:36:12

Oh, God, if you're there guide me.

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After a while I set up I looked around. There wasn't any fancy rainbow. It wasn't birds flying around. There was no big signs from above. There was no music, angels harps. Nothing like this

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is just a cloudy day in Texas. But inside I could realize I had to make some changes. To me. That's what I need to do.

00:36:40--> 00:36:42

There's the problem was inside of me.

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Within a few minutes, it became clear what I needed to do. And I had to develop an idea how to pull this off. I talked to my wife, talk to my father. I made a bath and at 10 o'clock that morning.

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In Midlothian, Texas, I went in front of this man named Muhammad. And this new man named yahia, who used to be the priest. And I said a shadow the ilaha illallah wa shadow Mohammed also.

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Immediately after that, my wife did her Shahada, Chateau La ilaha illa Allah. I said

00:37:22--> 00:37:27

a few months later, my father did his Shahada, Sherif, Allah, Allah, Allah Wa, shalom.

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Step by step by step we saw so many people enter into Islam.

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We wanted to tell the whole world what is Islam, we wanted everybody to know, the real Islam, I said, How could this escape our knowledge? How could we not know about this great and wonderful thing called Islam.

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And it looks like all we got to do is just tell the people, I went to the Imam of the masjid there, and I told him this, let's tell the people

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then I find out something else about us as Muslims.

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And that's why we've got this convention here right now. This is why we have the exhibition, to use this week, to learn how you can become inshallah the best Muslim you can be. And how you can show the real Islam to the people that are not Muslim. This is your duty.

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This is your duty.

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This is your language is your people, just as it's my duty, to give the message to my people and my language. And so the same way, it's your duty to give the message to your people. Allah will not ask you if they made Shahada. But he will ask you if you delivered the message

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Alhamdulillah today,

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I can tell you with no doubt in my mind, we have seen 1000s of people give Shahada

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several 100 at a time.

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And I don't do it through debates. I don't need to debate any Christian. I was a Christian, I am a Muslim. If you want, I can give you both sides. Easy. Okay, I'll play both parts. I'll be the Christian tell you this, that I'll be the Muslim and give the answer.

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And there won't be any argument. And we've done that so many times. And let me share one story with you before and I'm gonna leave now. Sure.

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I was telling the brothers today that I was asked to give a talk in a church in Hagerstown, Virginia, Hagerstown, Maryland, just outside of Virginia.

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This was in 1999. And I went there and I gave a talk in the church on Sunday. Because I know how to address the people how many years was a Christian 50 years. I know what they want to hear, get them ready, and they said, oh, wow, this is normal breaching. But then when I came to the park, let you know the law. I stayed on that, you know, in the law until they said yes, that makes sense. It makes sense. It was one old lady that she was saying yes. afterwards. She said yes, but I just

00:40:00--> 00:40:16

Don't want to do it the way you're telling me. Okay? But guess what else happened to people did Shahada, right? They're low in the church in front of their preacher. They said yes, we agree we like this one and no more. And we say there's only one God to worship

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in front of the preacher.

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And one of them was his daughter.

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I took them to the masjid. And they did Shahada in the masjid that afternoon and Sunday afternoon.

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And later, the boy he married the girl.

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There are Muslims living there now, no matter your question. If I would debate and argue with this preacher, and made him look stupid, would he ever bring me back again? No. One asked you a question. If you were at a place and you saw somebody changed their religion, to another religion in the temple of that religion, and the father was the priest there, what would you think?

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Is that man ever going to call me again? Do you think he'd called me again?

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Three months later, he called me again. Come back again. We really enjoyed it so much. How's your daughter doing? I want to remind him see what he's gonna say. So she's doing fine. She likes Islam. It's very nice and lovely. She treats us so good. You know, we're amazed at her personality. We love you guys. Can you please come back again?

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And I did. So I'm just showing you that it's not guidance from me. Not guidance from you, is guidance from Allah, Allah guides whom He wills, whom He wills. So we ask Allah to guide me, all of us and all the people, whoever he guides, they'll be fine. But whoever a lot doesn't guide, they got a problem, serious problem. Our job here

00:41:57--> 00:42:05

is to do one thing, communicate the true message. If the people don't want it, that's your choice. That's their choice. You don't have to take it.

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But it's our responsibility and putting this on all the scholars that are here. It's their responsibility to tell us what's the truth in Islam and let us see for ourselves. And that's what we're going to try to do for this week. So I need you guys to listen to me.

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You have to participate your side of it. Your side of it is to show up every day. And your side of it is to bring other people. Joseph monaka would somebody come up to Erica