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I am on the receiving end of a lot of emails for assorted people and groups and this one came to me and thought I would share for historical interest if nothing else.
I am on the receiving end of a lot of emails for assorted people and groups and this one came to me and thought I would share for historical interest if nothing else.
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Like all of Yeshua's disciples, you are a part of The Way.
What Happened to The Way?
The Exhortation to the Apostles, by James Tissot
The early Jewish followers of Yeshua (Jesus) did not start a new religion called Christianity.
They were simply Jews who were following a rabbi named Yeshua. And as the number of followers grew, a new branch of Judaism formed, which they called The Way. (Acts 9:2, 19:9, 23)
Their faith in Yeshua as the Messiah was the ultimate fulfillment of their religious and spiritual expectation of Judaism.
They continued to worship in the Temple courtyard in Jerusalem, attend synagogue services wherever they lived, and observe the appointed times (Jewish festivals) commanded in the Torah. (Acts 20:16)
The disciples were Jews.
There was no such thing as Christianity or the Gentile church culture that we know today — whether we think of Catholicism, Orthodox, Evangelical, or any other form of Christianity — it simply did not yet exist!
During the time of Yeshua, Israel was ruled by the Romans, and they viewed The Way to be a sect of Judaism, no different than the Sadducees, Pharisees, Essenes, the Jewish community at Qumran, or the secular people — they were all Jews!
Nor did the Sanhedrin (the religious court in Jerusalem, which included the High Priest), think that Yeshua or His disciples were starting a new religion. They just viewed Yeshua as a lone-ranger rabbi (teacher) who blasphemed. (John 10:36)
Stephen, a disciple of Yeshua, gets stoned for his faith as Paul looks on, guarding the clothes of those stoning him in Acts 7:58, 22:20. (Illustration: The Stoning of Stephen, by Luigi Garzi, 1638–1721)
Sha’ul Persecutes The Way Before Joining The Way
The rabbi and Pharisee named Sha’ul (who was later known by His Greek name Paulos or Paul in English), eagerly watched Yeshua’s disciples being stoned to death and imprisoned.
The “Conversion” of Paul (1765), by Nicolas Bernard Lépicié, depicts Sha’ul being thrown of his horse as he encounters the blinding light of Yeshua. (Acts 22:6–21)
He obtained permission letters from the high priest Caiaphas to arrest members of The Way in the synagogues of Damascus, Syria.
“I persecuted some of The Way to the death, binding and putting both men and women into prisons,” he confessed. (Acts 22:4)
But God had other plans for this rabbi’s zeal.
On the way to Damascus with thoughts of murder on his mind, a brilliant light beamed down from heaven, flashing all around Sha’ul, blinding him! (Acts 9:1–9)
“He [Sha’ul] fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, ‘Sha’ul, Sha’ul, why are you persecuting Me?’ And he asked, ‘Who are You, Lord?’ And He said, ‘I am Yeshua whom you are persecuting, but get up and enter the city, and it will be told you what you must do.’” (Acts 9:4–6)
Sha’ul had studied the laws of the Torah under one of the best teachers of Judaism, such as Rabbi Gamaliel, who is still highly respected to this day.
In Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Scriptures, appearances of God are often said to be His Word (Memra in Aramaic), such as the cloud that remained over the Tent of Meeting: “. . . the glorious Cloud descended and stood at the door of the tabernacle; and the Word of the Lord spoke with Moshe.” (Deuteronomy 4:33, Targum Palestine)
But now he had to relearn what God had been saying throughout Scripture about His ways and His Messiah.
Sha’ul (Paul) had to understand who Yeshua was, the One who said,
“I am the way, the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.” (John 14:6)
The Apostle Paul (c. 1657), by Rembrandt
Paul also had to learn what the other Apostles who lived with Yeshua understood. For example, John taught that in the beginning was the Word of God, who was with God, and this Word became flesh. Yeshua and God were one. (John 1:1–14)
So, after personally encountering the divine brilliance of the Living Word, Sha’ul (Paul) did not immediately go to Jerusalem to begin ministering with the other apostles of The Way, whom Yeshua had appointed.
Instead, he spent three years in Arabia and Damascus. (Galatians 1:17)
What Is the Way?
The Hebrew word derek (דֶּרֶךְ) and the Greek word hodos (ὁδός) often translate into the English words: way, path, road, and journey.
In Scripture, these words sometimes literally describes a road or physical journey and sometimes they figuratively describe a person’s way of life.
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The Way to a Restored Relationship with God
After the sin of Adam and Eve’s disobedience in the Garden of Eden, they were punished and could no longer enjoy immortal life. Mankind was now doomed to physical and spiritual death.
However, God introduced another way to live forever with Him.
Right in the beginning of the Bible, He gave a promise that a descendant (the seed) of Eve would crush the head of the serpent — Satan. (Genesis 3:15)
And mankind sorely needed such a Messiah! It was only another three chapters later that sin had spread so far that murder and mayhem filled the land.
God planned to destroy the evil in the earth with a flood. He told Noah to build an ark, which would save him, his family, and a variety of living creatures to repopulate the earth.
Noah’s ark on the Mount Ararat (1570), by Simon de Myle
The Way of the Lord
“God looked on the earth, and behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted their way upon the earth.” (Genesis 6:12)
Because of this pervasive corruption, God repopulated the earth after sending a great flood to destroy all living creatures, except Noah and those on the ark he built. God then chose a people to specifically follow His way and no one else’s way.
