If a person believes in God, He is believing in Jesus with or without knowing it. If he believes that Jesus isn't God with the Father and the Holy Spirit, he is believing in an idol as though it were God. No two ways about it.
Take your pick. Either a believer in God is a Christian and knows it, or he is a Christian and doesn't realize that he is, or he is an idol worshiper but not a God worshiper.
Take your pick. Either a believer in God is a Christian and knows it, or he is a Christian and doesn't realize that he is, or he is an idol worshiper but not a God worshiper.
So can someone believe in an idol as God, but not believe that idol is Jesus? Why not call that idol a God and just classify that person a a "God" worshiper?
One of the religious dichotomies that I've always questioned is how the monotheistic religions can reconcile many billions of believing in a different god than their own, and being as sure of that belief as themselves. I suppose with polytheism there's a bit more room for congruence than some other religions.
As a Christian, you would need to accept that the billions of Muslims are incorrect in their beliefs and worshipping a deity that's nonexistent, surely.
People can think that an idol is God, and they can believe it. But we all know that we have believed things that we were mistaken about... just as an idol believer is mistaken to think that the idol is God. Why call an idol God when it is a mistake?
Our believing of something isn't strong enough to make it real. Only reality is what is real. If our religion believes what is real, then it is religion that recognizes God and Who He is. If people are tolerant of other people who have different religions, there is reason for it. The Christian reason - although many Christians don't understand this - is so that there can be enough peace among people that as many as possible can come to the knowledge of the truth and be saved.
Are there billions of Muslims? Just as many so-called Christians don't believe in Jesus-salvation, even so most Muslims barely understand Islam enough to really know what they are part of. However, if they don't believe that Jesus is NOT God, but simply never had the question presented to them, and believe in God as God, their salvation is in the hands of the Holy Spirit. We can't judge the heart. They might be believing in Jesus as God without realizing it (big idea here, with lots of cross-thinking among scholars and Christian scholars).
It is better by far that people understand that Jesus is God - One God made up of 3 Persons Who are Each fully God, yet only One altogether. A close way to understanding this is to look a corporation that has board members. Each member is fully acting for and as the corporation when he does his assigned work in the corporation. He IS the corporation regarding what he does... provided he doesn't break the corporate rules.
