David gives Qureshi the promised book (More than a Carpenter, by Josh McDowell) and indicates to Qureshi that the Bible does not align with Qureshi’s view of Jesus’s possible claim to divinity. Rather than a demigod, David argues that the Gospel of John shows Jesus to be the pre-existent agent of creation, co-eternal with God the Father.

Qureshi reads McDowell’s book, and while he does not find its conclusions decisive, he is intrigued by some of the references from the Gospel of John where Jesus appears to be making a claim to divinity. Qureshi decides to read John for himself, and is immediately struck by how different the Bible is from the Quran. Each biblical book represents a coherent narrative whole, rather than a pieced-together assemblage of dictated teachings like those in the Quran, many of which lack a robust contextual setting.

Qureshi is also struck by the strong claims to Jesus’s divinity that emerge from the first chapter of John, which set the guiding context for the whole book. The experience is so unsettling that Qureshi immediately turns to prayer, invoking the help of Allah for guidance.

Qureshi objects to David that the Gospel of John might not be a reliable source, and that he wants to see evidence for Jesus’s divinity based on other sources. David pushes back, making an argument for the reliability of John, but also loans Qureshi a book that will serve him better than the last: Josh McDowell’s The New Evidence That Demands a Verdict.

Qureshi is surprised to see that McDowell’s first argument for Jesus’s divinity is not from John, but from Mark, which is presumed to be the earliest Gospel. Jesus’s self-identification with the “Son of Man” title—a reference to the divine figure of Daniel 7—strikes Qureshi as compelling: “If these were divine claims, Jesus’ deity was laced throughout the Gospels and earliest church history” (184). While Qureshi finds himself struck by the argument, it manifests at first in a greater fervency for his Islamic faith, even as he ponders the implications.

David comes back around to Qureshi’s questions about the Gospel of John, arguing that most of the scholarly skepticism about its high Christology is based on arbitrary premises. To underscore the point that the earliest Christian sources all show a high Christology, he points to the letters of the apostle Paul.

Unbeknownst to David, though, this is a trigger for Qureshi—he, like many Muslims, has been taught to see Paul as the chief corrupter of Jesus’s message. When Qureshi reacts with off-putting defiance, David is mystified and defensive, to the point that they agree to shelve the issue for the sake of their friendship.

In addition to their differing interpretations of the apostle Paul’s role, David and Qureshi have other issues which sometimes bubble to the surface and add tension to their friendship. One of the chief areas of tension is the Christian doctrine of the Trinity. To the Muslim mind, trained in the core doctrine of Tauheed (the oneness of God), the claim that God is a Trinity is tantamount to blasphemy. It also seems to imply an obvious contradiction: How can God be one and three at the same time? Qureshi avoids talking about it with David, having already decided the issue is nonsense. He has often noted that even devout Christians struggle to come up with good answers to his straightforward questions about the Trinity, which tells him all he needs to know.

Both Qureshi and David face big life changes at this juncture. For Qureshi, the decision to graduate early and apply to medical college is all-consuming. In David’s case, a new relationship is changing his life. David met Marie while on a trip with the college forensics team, when she interjected a comment into the middle of one of his debates with Qureshi. She was an atheist, but within three days of talking with the two young men, she became a theist, and within two months, she and David were engaged. They were married shortly afterward and soon expecting their first child.

One day, David and Qureshi are sitting together in an organic chemistry class, anticipating a call that Marie is in labor. During that class, Qureshi runs into a realization that suddenly illuminates the idea of the Trinity. His professor notes that even though scientists study the resonance structures of molecules as distinct states, in actual fact the molecules always exist in all of the resonant states simultaneously. For Qureshi, this makes him reconsider the doctrine of the Trinity, finally coming to an understanding of the classic Christian division between being and person: God could be, without contradiction, one being in three persons.

Qureshi and David continue their debates about religion, even as their college years are drawing to a close. They draw in a fellow classmate, Zach, a Buddhist who is willing to play along as an affable third member in their conversations.

One day while sitting in a smoothie bar together, the three friends start debating the Christian doctrine of substitutionary atonement—the idea that Jesus took our place and died for our sins. Qureshi contends that the Islamic view makes more sense: That God simply judges each person based on what they have done, and if the good deeds outweigh the bad, then they will get to heaven. By contrast, the Christian view seems to present God as punishing an innocent man in order to let a guilty person get off completely free.

David objects that Qureshi is compartmentalizing Christian doctrines inappropriately. In this case, it is not just a random innocent person God is punishing, it is God himself, in the person of Jesus Christ, who willingly accepts that punishment. David also points out that sin is not some light thing that God can simply ignore, but that his righteousness and justice mean that the corrupting influence of sin must be dealt with, not as an expression of divine vengeance but of love. Qureshi, suddenly realizing the depth and power of the gospel message, asks why God would do such a thing for him, a sinner. David’s answer—the love of God—strikes deep in Qureshi’s heart: “Could God be that loving? Could He be that wonderful? […] This God, the God of the gospel, was beautiful. I was spellbound by this message” (202).

As the three friends drive away from the smoothie bar, their conversation continues. David asks Zach how he thinks the case for Christianity compares with Buddhism, and Zach answers that one doesn’t really argue a case for Buddhism in the same way as one would for Christianity or Islam.

David puts the same question to Qureshi, but this time assessing the cases of Christianity versus Islam. Qureshi gives Christianity a score of 80 to 85, but Islam a perfect 100. The others push back on this, encouraging Qureshi to try to build a case for Islam. He responds by agreeing to present just such a case, based on arguments centered on Muhammad and the Quran, at the next discussion meeting at their friend Mike’s house.