The Evangelical Alliance has encouraged Christians across the UK to engage more confidently with Islam, warning against both fear and indifference while highlighting growing opportunities to share the gospel with Muslim neighbours, colleagues and communities.
The call came during a webinar titled Islam: challenges, questions and gospel opportunities, the second part of a series examining the rise of Christian nationalism and Islam in British public discourse and politics.
Speakers included Dr Andy Bannister, director of Solas Centre for Public Christianity and author of Do Muslims and Christians Worship the Same God?, and John Ghanim, a Yemeni-born convert from Islam to Christianity.
Dr Bannister said Islam is becoming increasingly prominent in British public life because of demographic change, growing confidence within Muslim communities and the increasing visibility of Muslim voices in politics and culture.
With around four million Muslims currently living in the UK, a figure projected to rise significantly in coming decades, he argued that Christians cannot afford to ignore the subject.
“Islam is certainly more vocal…it’s more confident,” he said. “We’re going to see a lot more about Islam in the public square, in the media.”
He pointed to the emergence of high-profile Muslim public figures, including political leaders such as London Mayor Sadiq Khan, as evidence of Islam’s growing visibility.
At the same time, Dr Bannister suggested Britain may be moving beyond what he described as “peak secularism.”
He said many people, particularly younger generations, are increasingly open to spiritual questions, leading some to explore Islam alongside other faiths.
The webinar also explored why many Christians feel hesitant to discuss Islam.
Dr Bannister argued that Christians naturally want to welcome and love their neighbours but can feel uncertain when wider social and political questions become attached to those relationships.
“Islam is a very public faith and … they’re a faith that believe in communicating what they see to be the truth, but immediately then we [Christians] get a bit nervous,” he said.
“The Church has generally done, I think, with the greatest respect, a pretty bad job at equipping people to engage their Muslims friends and neighbours. By contrast … many mosques teach their people how to engage with Christians.”
Dr Bannister highlighted the importance of learning from former Muslims who have come to faith in Christ, describing Muslim-background believers as an often-overlooked resource for the Church.
The discussion explored major theological differences between Christianity and Islam.
Dr Bannister cautioned against assuming the two faiths are largely the same. “Islam and Christianity are radically different,” he emphasised.
While acknowledging that Islam incorporates figures and themes familiar from Judaism and Christianity, he argued that the Quran fundamentally reshapes those concepts into a very different worldview.
Drawing on four key questions addressed by every religion – who God is, who human beings are, what has gone wrong with the world and how it can be fixed – Dr Bannister contrasted Christianity’s message of redemption through Christ with Islam’s emphasis on submission and obedience.
He argued that Christianity presents a God who is relational, loving and knowable, while Islam offers a very different understanding of God and humanity.
He explained: “In Islam, you’re just slaves. The most you can say is God is the master, we are slaves. What’s gone wrong with the world? Christianity would say, ‘Actually, what has gone wrong is … our rebellion against God. It needed something more than just good advice.’ Islam says, ‘No, you’re just a bit forgetful. God wants you to keep some commandments, and you’re a bit forgetful. That’s the only problem.’
“What’s the solution? Islam says, ‘Have some more commandments. You failed to keep these ones. Have some more.’ Christianity says, ‘No, you need something far more different. We actually need a rescuer. We need a Saviour.’”
At the same time, Dr Bannister stressed that honest discussion of differences should not be confused with hostility.
“We don’t disrespect Islam by describing honestly what’s there,” he said. “Much better to go: This is different, let’s understand our Muslim friends, understand what they believe, and then share the uniqueness of Christ.”
The conversation addressed Islam’s place in modern politics, including debates around immigration, integration and religious freedom.
Dr Bannister urged Christians not to reduce complex issues to partisan politics, arguing that many of the challenges facing Western society run deeper than elections or government policies.
“The biggest problem in the West is that we’ve forgotten our story,” he said.
He suggested that modern society has exchanged deep roots in “people, place, prayer and the past” for what he described as the “four S’s – science, sex, self and the screen.”
While acknowledging legitimate political concerns, Dr Bannister repeatedly emphasised the need to distinguish between Islam as an ideology and Muslims as people.
“In the West, we need to get better at it, which is [to] separate the person from the ideology,” he said.
He continued: “There are some big political challenges, but whatever happens, we are called to love the person next to us. And even if [you think], ‘But hang on, they might be my enemy,’ do you know what? Jesus doesn’t let you get off the hook, because we’re told to love our enemy.”
He encouraged Christians to engage difficult issues honestly while continuing to demonstrate Christlike love.
“So, help your Muslim neighbour and then when they thank you, don’t just go all shy,” he said. “Just go, ‘You need to know, by the way, the reason I have done this is I’m a Christian and Jesus died for me and He died for you and I’m doing this to demonstrate the love of Christ.’”
A major focus of the webinar was what Dr Bannister described as the need for “radical Christianity.”
He argued that many Western Christians have become accustomed to a comfortable and culturally acceptable faith, while believers in other parts of the world often face significant costs for following Christ.
Drawing on the example of persecuted Christians, including many former Muslims, he challenged believers to embrace a more costly form of discipleship.
Quoting German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s warning against “cheap grace,” Dr Bannister said the Church needed to recover a deeper commitment to gospel witness.
“Let’s rewild Christianity,” he said. “It cost God something. And it’s costly for us too, because if we’re truly going to follow, it may not be comfortable.”
John Ghanim provided a powerful example of that challenge as he shared his own testimony.
Raised in a devout Muslim family in Yemen, Ghanim said he began questioning Islam after struggling with the absence of assurance about salvation.
During a pilgrimage to Mecca, Islam’s holiest site, he concluded that he no longer believed.
Several years later, while living in a refugee camp in Greece, he encountered Christians for the first time.
Through Bible studies and reading the New Testament, he became convinced that Jesus Christ was the Son of God and Saviour of the world. After placing his faith in Christ and being baptised, Ghanim said he experienced severe persecution. His family disowned him, he was forced into a divorce by the mosque, and he lost access to his daughters.
Yet he said the joy of knowing Christ outweighed the cost.
“It was so difficult, but … I was encouraged by the Lord Jesus Christ from Matthew 16, where it says, ‘What they benefit if man gain the whole world and lose his own soul?’” he shared. “I said, ‘Lord, I lost everything for you, but I know 100% that I have access to heaven. I belong to you.’”
Now based in the UK, Ghanim urged Christians to see Muslim communities not as a threat but as a mission field.
He encouraged Christians to focus on sharing the love of God rather than fear, emphasising that Muslims are people created in God’s image who need to hear the message of salvation.
He said: “Maybe God brought them to Europe to hear the Gospel,” he said. “We need to be bold for Christ. We have the good news … of Jesus Christ. Muslims, they are bold. We need to be bold more than them. We need to have a radical faith, a radical obedience. Share the love of Christ because our God is the God of love, the God of salvation. I believe this is a mission field and we need to treat to treat it as a mission field.”
Offering practical advice, Ghanim said Christians should be prepared to answer common questions about the Trinity, the divinity of Christ and salvation.
“You need to know your Bible well. You need to read your Bible. This is why Christians need to read our Bible and try to explain to them from the Old Testament and the New Testament,” he said. “The more we present the evidence from the Bible, the more they will understand more because so many Muslims have their own understanding about Christianity, which is the corrupted one.”
He added: “It’s not about knowledge, it’s about conviction. When you have conviction in your life, in your faith in Christ … they will see that and they will come to Christ.”
The webinar concluded with practical encouragement for Christians to pray, build friendships with Muslims, offer hospitality and become more confident in sharing their faith.
Dr Bannister urged believers to start with simple acts of relationship-building.
“If the Muslim in your community, like in my case, runs the local convenience store, don’t just buy your milk and run,” he said. “Take the opportunity to introduce yourself and say, ‘Hi.’”
He encouraged churches to make better use of resources on Islam and to learn from Muslim-background believers who can help Christians engage their communities more effectively.
“Pray, make connections, equip your people, and then see how God uses you,” he said.
