The “Abrahamic Family House” is an interfaith project currently being built in the UAE. The complex will include three separate buildings, a mosque, a synagogue, and a church and is said to “innovatively recount the history and builds bridges between human civilizations and heavenly messages.”
The center’s buildings are currently over 20% complete and are set to be finished in 2022.
The project has received much praise, with the Vatican entirely on board, applauding its architecture and calling it a symbol of “Interfaith harmonious coexistence.”
This is not the only country working on such a project. For example, in Berlin, a new interfaith building is currently being constructed over the site of a torn-down German Church. The center is being built as a “place of worship” for Muslims, Jews, and Christians under the name: “The House Of One.”
These three religions are often referred to as the three Abrahamic religions, hence the name of the complex in Abu Dhabi, “Abrahamic Family House.”
The reason for the name “Abrahamic Religions” is due to the fact Muslims, Jews, and Christians all claim to root back to Abraham. However, the difference in genealogy is that many believe Arabs came through Abraham’s son Ishmael, this is also stated to be the case in the Koran. Why does this matter? Because in Genesis 17, we learn that God made his everlasting covenant with Abraham’s seed through Isaac, and specifically not Ishmael.
Genesis 17:7-8, 19 KJV – “And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee. And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God… And God said, Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son indeed; and thou shalt call his name Isaac: and I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him.”
God then reiterates that He will bless Ishmael, “make him fruitful,” and “multiply him exceedingly,” however it is with Isaac that His everlasting covenant will be made.
Furthermore, in Exodus 3:15, God tells Moses that His name “forever” is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob:
Exodus 3:15 KJV – “And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, the Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you: this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations.”
God changed the name of Isaac’s son Jacob to “Israel” (Genesis 35:10), and therefore, his descendants were “the children of Israel” (the Jewish people).
It was through the seed of Isaac that God promised the Jewish people a Messiah. God provided that Messiah to the Jewish people and ultimately the whole world by becoming a man through His Son Jesus Christ.
The Muslim religion makes mention of Jesus multiple times, referring to Him as a prophet, which is why many attempt to connect the religions together. However, the Koran states that “Allah” has no son.
Through God’s Word, the Bible, Christians also understand what is referred to as the Trinity.
As Billy Graham Evangelist Association explains, “Islam teaches that the doctrine of the Trinity is blasphemous. But the Christian faith is essentially and irreducibly Trinitarian. The Bible reveals that the Father is God, that the Son is God, and that the Holy Spirit is God. Jesus is not merely a prophet, as acknowledged by Muslims, He is God in human flesh. This is precisely what Islam rejects.”
If that is not enough, Jesus Himself finished the argument of a shared faith between Muslims, Jews, and Christians when he told the Jewish Pharisees, who rejected Him as the Son of God, that they did not truly know God.
John 8:18-19 KJV – “I am one that bear witness of myself, and the Father that sent me beareth witness of me. Then said they unto him, Where is thy Father? Jesus answered, Ye neither know me, nor my Father: if ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also.”
Jesus is explaining that a person cannot truly know God if they reject Him and that He and His Father “are One” (John 10:30).
Jewish people may believe in the same God as Christians, but they do not know Him or receive eternal life unless they accept Christ. As further explained in John 14:6, “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by Me.“
As Decision Magazine wrote on this topic, “Christians and Muslims do not worship the same God. Christians worship the triune God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—and no other god. We know the Father through the Son, and it is solely through Christ’s atonement for sin that salvation has come. Salvation comes to those who confess with their lips that Jesus Christ is Lord and believe in their hearts that God has raised Him from the dead (Romans 10:9). The New Testament leaves no margin for misunderstanding. To deny the Son is to deny the Father.”
It is also worth mentioning that the Koran states that “Allah” loves those who love him first and also espouses a works-based salvation. This, too, runs contrary to the Bible, which says that we love God “because He first loved us” (1 John 1:19) and that we receive eternal life by God’s Grace in accepting Jesus’ payment for our sins on the cross.
Ephesians 2:4-5 KJV – “But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved).”
(Also see – Romans 5:8, 6:23, 1 Peter 2:24, John 3:16, and the Old Testament prophecy regarding Jesus dying for our sin in Isaiah 53).
Although the world may praise the idea of creating an atmosphere of tolerance and harmony by pushing these three religions to unite, Christians must be vehemently opposed to such an idea.
Christians are called to speak the truth in love. In not telling Jews and Muslims that Christ is the only bridge to eternal life, we are complicit in their blindness, and ultimately, their separation from God.
The Bible also speaks of a time in which the world will attempt to merge all religions into a “one world religion.” As Jan Markell explains, “We know that the Bible in Revelation, particularly [chapter] 13, even in Daniel, we can see that there’s coming a global government with a single leader and a one-world religion as well.”
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