To Osama bin Laden and members of Al-Qaeda, as well as other Islamic groups:

   In the past couple years you have sent several video and audio tapes which have been granted airtime by international media outlets, and these messages deserve a response. I can see from these messages that you have a great zeal for those things which you believe are important to God. You are ready and willing to die in fighting against the unbelievers. But sadly I must tell you that your zeal is not based on a true knowledge of what is pleasing to God.
   Let me tell you about the most perfect jihad that has ever occured. The two enemies were God and mankind. God has always been the most perfect and righteous King. But ever since the beginning, since the time of Adam and Eve, man has made himself an enemy of God. We have rejected His righteous rule over us, and rebelled against Him in every way imaginable.
   Now whenever there is rebellion against the King, a just punishment is required. And when it is the glory of the Almighty God Most High which has been shamed, nothing less than death and the shedding of blood is adequate. And of course God can see even to the heart, so that means that every wicked or impure thought that you or I have ever had deserves nothing less than our own death and the spilling of our blood for having shamed the spotless glory of God.
   But we know that God is also most gracious and most merciful. So that presents a great mystery. How could God demand the punishment that His enemies deserve (and each of us are His enemies if we have ever sinned against Him), and be merciful at the same time? If God slaughters us and sends us to the fire of hell, He is justly doing what we deserve, but He is not showing mercy. If He forgives our sins, and welcomes us into heaven, He is being merciful but not just, because He has not punished the evil that deserves to be punished.
   How could God deal with rebellious mankind while upholding the nature of His own character to be both just and merciful? The only adequate answer in all of the world to that question is found in the Perfect Jihad of Jesus. This is what happened: we know that Jesus is the Word of God, and it is clear that the Word of God has been with God from all of eternity past. The first step of the Perfect Jihad was that the Word of God humbled Himself, left His dwelling in Paradise, and became a man - Jesus. The next stage of the Perfect Jihad was that this Jesus lived a perfect life, in complete obedience to God's Law, as no other human has ever done. Because of His perfect life, Jesus was full of the righteousness of God, and thus did not deserve to die. But He voluntarily went to the cross and gave away His life there in order to complete His Perfect Jihad. At the cross Jesus took on Himself the punishment that we deserve, and He shed His pure and clean blood for the washing and forgiveness of our sins. God showed that He accepted the Perfect Jihad of Jesus by raising Him from the dead, and promised likewise to save all of us who would trust in Him.
   See how Jesus made peace between the two enemies - man and God - and He did it through dying, but not by killing! Jesus showed the world the profound concept that we might call the Jihad of Love. He gave Himself to be sacrificed, but He didn't harm others. As the Bible says, "When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed." Likewise Jesus called His disciples to take up their crosses and suffer with Him in sacrificial love, giving of themselves to serve others, even shedding their own blood if necessary - in acts of love, not acts of hate.
   Jesus defeated His enemies through a Jihad of Love in this way. Many who were formerly His enemies received His love and became His friends. And as for those who rejected His love? He warned them that the Day of Judgment is approaching for those who scorn His gift of love. Then having warned them, He refused to lay a finger on them to harm them, but let them await their fate on that Final Day.

   The message of Jesus Christ is the same for Osama bin Laden, George Bush, Ariel Sharon, the people of America, Palestine, Israel, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Turn away from the life based on anger, hatred, fear, and self-centeredness; look to Jesus who completed the Perfect Jihad of Love on our behalf, receive the forgiveness and cleansing by HIS shed blood, and you will be set free to go live out your own Jihad of Love for this world in the pattern of the Lord Jesus.