Do Christians and Muslims worship the same God?

[MustafaMc]

So, if you had two people, one who looked a a flag, said it was one flag but made up of three fabrics with colors red, orange and green and another that said it was one flag and not to associate different fabrics with it, which person would you suspect is color blind and which one is not?

That is the opposite, but, equally valid, way of looking at it. The point is, however, that they are still not seeing exactly the same thing.

Even assuming normal vision, if one said that the flag is a 3'X5' sheet of fabric and another said no, the flag is a 3'x5' sheet of fabric, a 15' aluminum pole, and a rope on a pulley, which would be correctly describing the flag? Is the flag pole an essential part of a flag? What about a flag draped over a coffin, or hanging flat on the side of a building?

 

[Seeker of Peace]

I am a Christian and believe that there is only one god. I also believe God tries to communicate with people in many ways because people learn and pay attention in many ways.

Jewish people have Yahweh (God) plus they have prophets and the Torah.

Muslims have Allah and Allah’s prophet Mohamed. Islam also has the Koran, which was revealed to Mohamed by Allah (God).

Christians believe in one god and have the Bible that contains the old and new testaments. Christians believe in Jesus, who is part of God and called the Son of God.

Many people ask a valid question; How can a Christian who worships God believe in the Holy Spirit and believe in Jesus and still say they believe in one god?

Here is the answer; A man can be a father to his children, a husband to his wife, and a son to his father. A man can be a friend, a boss, and an employee. To different people a man can be different things, or one man can be many things to people he knows and communicate with them in different ways. God communicates to us in many ways too. God is all things and all powerful and placing human limits on God is not wise. I believe Jesus is part of God and my savior. All who say they are Christians, truly believe in Jesus and what he did for all of us are saved and will be with God.

Muslims, Christians, and Jews who truly pursue worship of God, seek a relationship with God, work for God and struggle against sin will be with God.

God pursues us with his books, which are the Torah, Bible, and the Koran. God weeps when his children make war on each other for human reasons. Fighting among God’s religions or sects within the individual religions distracts us away from God. Peace does not distract us from God and helps us to focus on serving God (Allah, Yahweh).

God bless all who hear and follow the one true God. Peace be with you.

 

[Grace Seeker]

That is the opposite, but, equally valid, way of looking at it. The point is, however, that they are still not seeing exactly the same thing.

No, they are not seeing exactly the same thing. But the question is not about whether they see exactly the same thing, but (1) if they are talking about exactly the same thing and (2) which one of them as closer to the truer perception of what they do see?

Even assuming normal vision, if one said that the flag is a 3'X5' sheet of fabric and another said no, the flag is a 3'x5' sheet of fabric, a 15' aluminum pole, and a rope on a pulley, which would be correctly describing the flag? Is the flag pole an essential part of a flag? What about a flag draped over a coffin, or hanging flat on the side of a building?

It sounds like they both correctly described the flag, but the second also described ancillary items associated with but not actually a part of the flag.

The first analogy seems to be to be the difference between Christianity and either Judaism or Islam. The second analogy seems to be what happens when people move from talking about God to talking about religion and the manner by which one must worship God (i.e. standing, sitting, bowing, kneeling, prostrating, in a temple, in a church, in a mosque, outside, facing east, facing an altar, facing the rising/setting sun, with trumpet and timbrel, with songs, without music, wearing a certain garmet, using special words or rubrics). Get focused on enough of this other stuff and one can begin to think they doing them right is the same thing as worshipping God. While those things might have some importance, one can still have all of that "right" and if one's heart is not centered on God, one has not truly worshipped God. And vice versa, one can do all of that "wrong" yet if one has one's heart truly focused on God, then one's worship of God is just as pure and righteous.

 

[MustafaMc]

I am reading a book where William Ellery Channing is quoted as saying, "We do, then with all earnestness, though without reproaching our brethern, protest against the irrational and unscriptural doctrine of the Trinity. 'To us,' as to the Apostle and the primitive Christians, 'there is One God, even the Father.' With Jesus, we worship the Father, as the only living and true God. We are astonished, that any man can read the New Testament, and avoid the conviction, that the Father alone is God."

How is this understanding by an American Unitarian minister (1780-1842) different from some of the posts on this thread?

 

[Grace Seeker]

I am reading a book where William Ellery Channing is quoted as saying, "We do, then with all earnestness, though without reproaching our brethern, protest against the irrational and unscriptural doctrine of the Trinity. 'To us,' as to the Apostle and the primitive Christians, 'there is One God, even the Father.' With Jesus, we worship the Father, as the only living and true God. We are astonished, that any man can read the New Testament, and avoid the conviction, that the Father alone is God."

How is this understanding by an American Unitarian minister (1780-1842) different from some of the posts on this thread?

It is not different than some of the posts in this thread. It is also not something that I would say is representative of the true Christian faith, but very much outside of it.