Theology Thursday: Do Christians, Jews, and Muslims worship the same God?

Welcome to Theology Thursday! Theology is the study of God, his relation to the world, and our relation to him. I hope these newsletters help enhance your faith and deepen your love for God and his people, the church.

Today's question:
Do Christians, Jews, and Muslims worship the same God?

Pastor Brady's thoughts:
On the surface, the answer seems simple. All three faiths trace their origins to Abraham. All affirm one Creator who is sovereign over heaven and earth. All reference many of the same historical figures. Because of these shared roots, it’s common for people to assume the answer must be, “Yes, of course - Christians, Jews, and Muslims worship the same God, they just do it differently.”

But when we move from origins to identity, and from general monotheism (belief in one, singular God) to the specific nature of God, the picture becomes more complex—especially from a Christian worldview.

The question is ultimately not, “Do these religions believe in one God?” but rather, “Is the god each tradition describes actually the same god in his nature, character, and revelation?” And here the divide(s) becomes unmistakable.

The Christian Distinctive
At the heart of the Christian faith is the confession that God is one in essence and three in person: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is not a theological add-on or a later doctrinal flourish. It is woven into the fabric of Christian Scripture and worship.

• The Father creates and sends.
• The Son—the eternal Word—becomes flesh, dies for sinners, rises from the dead, and reigns as Lord.
• The Spirit indwells, regenerates, and empowers God’s people.

The doctrine of the trinity is not an optional detail—it is the Christian understanding of who God is. A “god” who is not Father, Son, and Spirit is, according to Christianity, not the true God.

This means that from the Christian perspective, theological systems that explicitly reject the deity of Christ or the personhood of the Spirit are not simply “slightly different versions of the same God.” They are different understandings of God altogether.

Christianity and Judaism
Christians affirm that the God of the Old Testament is the same God Jesus called Father. Christianity does not introduce a new deity but reveals further clarity about the one true God through the Son’s incarnation and the ensuing testimony of the apostles.

Judaism, however, rejects the New Testament’s claim that the messiah has come and that he is divine. While Christians and Jews share the same scriptural foundation and the same God of Abraham, they differ sharply in whether Jesus is the fulfillment of those promises. Jews who deny the deity of Christ do not cease to worship the God of the Hebrew scriptures - but from a Christian perspective, they worship him without acknowledging his full revelation in Jesus.

So in the Christian view, Christianity and Judaism share the same foundational God, though one faith sees his revelation as complete and the other sees it as incomplete. And as Christians believe Jesus to be the true Son of God, come to fulfill the old covenant and institute a new one through his blood, and that faith and salvation are now placed and found in the very person of Jesus, this is no distinction without a difference. To deny Jesus is to deny God and the hope of restoration with him in eternity.

Christianity and Islam
Islam affirms that there is one God (Allah), that he created the world, and that he sent prophets - including Abraham, Moses, and Jesus. At this surface level, Muslims appear to be speaking about the same God.

But the Qur’an (Islam’s holy book) explicitly denies the trinity (Qur’an 4:171), denies that Jesus is God’s Son, and denies that he was crucified (Qur’an 4:157). In Islam, to call Jesus the Son of God is blasphemy. In Christianity, to refuse Christ’s deity is unbelief (John 8:24; 1 John 2:23).

This is as significant a theological disagreement as there is - it is a fundamentally different understanding of God’s identity.

• In Christianity: God is Father, Son, and Spirit—three persons, one being.
• In Islam: Allah is a single person, with no Son, no incarnation, and no triune fellowship.
• In Christianity, God enters human history through Jesus. In Islam, God cannot become human.

In Christianity, salvation is accomplished by the atoning death and resurrection of Jesus. In Islam, Jesus did not die, and salvation is primarily through human deeds and Allah’s mercy.
These differences are not reconcilable; both views cannot be correct. Both religions make exclusive truth claims - to believe one requires rejecting the other necessarily.
Therefore, from a Christian theological standpoint, Muslims do not worship the same God, because the God they describe explicitly excludes the central and defining truth of who God is: the triune God revealed in Jesus Christ.

Conclusion
Christians, Jews, and Muslims all stand in the long shadow of Abraham, but their understanding of God diverges sharply:

• Jews worship the God of the Hebrew Scriptures but reject the full revelation of his identity in Christ (and the subsequent theological developments presented in the New Testament).
• Muslims believe in one creator God but explicitly deny the trinity, the incarnation, and the crucifixion (and thus the resurrection), placing their view of God outside biblical revelation.
• Christians worship the Triune God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—who has made himself known uniquely and decisively in Jesus.
  
  

So do all three faiths worship the same God?  In origin, there is overlap; in identity, there is not.

For Christians, the decisive difference is - and always will be - Jesus.
 
TO KNOW GOD AND TO MAKE HIM KNOWN!
- Pastor Brady

Have a question for Theology Thursday? Send an email to office@minierchristian.org and we'll respond, or we'll include in a future Theology Thursday Buffet.