Chapter 6—Christianity Has Lost Its Jewish Roots
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Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God”; that is to say in the strongest possible terms that Yahweh alone is the one true God. This was epitomized in the Shema (Deut.6.4), which was central to their faith and could never be compromised. The New Jerusalem Bible rightly expresses the spirit of the Shema: “Listen, Israel: Yahweh our God is the one, the only Yahweh.” What, therefore, would the shock and horror of the Jerusalem mother church be if they could see the non-Jewish churches today? They would find some Christians praying to “God the Father”, who is not the only God because to them there are two other persons who are equally God besides him. They would find most Christians praying to and worshipping Jesus, who is one of the two persons besides “the Father”, and who himself is now “God the Son”. What has happened to the church? Or is this really the church? It now has nothing of spiritual substance in common with the Jerusalem church; almost everything has been changed or distorted. The early Jewish church certainly loved and honored Jesus as God’s servant (pais, Acts 3.13,26; 4.25,27,30), a title found primarily in the early chapters of Acts and therefore apparently their preferred way of referring to him. But it would have been inconceivable to them that Jesus would have been worshipped alongside Yahweh and on the same level with Him. They saw Jesus as their Savior and friend, whom they could approach as their great high priest who intercedes for them with Yahweh at “the throne of grace” (Heb.4.16). But the Jews did not pray to the high priest, but only to Yahweh, who was “enthroned above the cherubim”, or in the words of king Hezekiah’s prayer, “O LORD of hosts, God of Israel, who is enthroned above the cherubim, you are the God, you alone” (Isa.37.16; 2Ki.19.15; 1Chr.13.6; cf. Heb.9.5). We have a record of how the Jerusalem church prayed in a time of crisis: “they lifted their voices together to God and said, ‘Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them . . . ‘“, and it is in this prayer that Jesus is referred to twice as “your holy servant Jesus” (Ac.4.27,30). King David is referred to by the same word “servant” (pais, v.25). They honored Jesus as both “Lord and Christ” (Ac.2.36), but their prayers were not addressed to him; they prayed only to the God who alone is God. Please do not copy without permission, this book can be read at http://www.TheOnlyTrueGod.org