What denomination is the closest to early Christians? Is messianic Judaism the only way?

[amaryga]

I am christian born to a non practicing catholic family never fully embracing Catholicism or understanding it for that matter. As a child there was a heavy Jewish influence in my life because I attended before and after care in a Jewish center where I learned basic principles of Judaism. Anyway, today I find that even though I attend a non denominational Church with baptist roots, there is still an element of incompleteness. I love how we are a bible based church but hate how we do not have Sat services and in general, there is a disconnect with Jesus' roots. Is there a denomination out there that is close to early Christianity? Or is Messianic Judaism the purist form of early Christianity?

 

[visionary]

We are trying. Still learning. And I think it is pretty close.

 

[visionary]

We are trying. Still learning. And I think it is pretty close.

Perfect and pure... NOT... but heading in the right direction.

 

[Cappadocious]

I love how we are a bible based church but hate how we do not have Sat services

For us the Sabbath is still the Sabbath.

There is a principle that goes like this:

1. People in the western world approach other cultures as an exotic fetish to help build their personal brand and narrative to market to others.
2. Except for the person saying #1.

 

[Hoshiyya]

there is no sizable denomination close to the original teachings, but you have individs in the MJ movement whose doctrines may or may not approximate the early teachings.

connecting to Yeshua has nothing to do with membership in some organization.

 

[Hoshiyya]

For us the Sabbath is still the Sabbath.

There is a principle that goes like this:

1. People in the western world approach other cultures as an exotic fetish to help build their personal brand and narrative to market to others.
2. Except for the person saying #1.

Yeah it's not like people in the East don't do that.

 

[LoricaLady]

As far as a religion being closest to Messianic (I prefer the term Hebrew Roots personally) I would guess 7th Day Adventists. Some are like mainstream Sunday Church goers, except they go to Church on Saturday. They are pretty worldly. I have been surprised to see some, though, who are very serious about their faith and very serious in understanding that keeping the Sabbath requires more than just meeting in a Church once a week. With such folks, if I bring up the topic of high holy days and the food laws still being in effect, they will listen attentively as long as I provide the appropriate Bible verses. I suspect some will become Hebrew Roots.

 

[ripple the car]

It depends. Imho the closest one might see to Apostolic Christianity might look something like Oriental Orthodoxy, Eastern Orthodoxy, or the original praxis of the Mar Thoma Nasrani Christians of India (Google 'em!). Thing is, there are followers of Christ in most every sect, and cultural Christians in every sect, too. You can hunt and hunt and hunt for the most "original" Church, but at the end of the day, it's our connection to, love for, and obedience to Christ through faith, works, and prayer which really matters in the end. I've met saintly Catholics, Lutherans, Greek Orthodox, and Quakers who truly seemed to know, love, and follow Christ.

If you truly want to keep Sabbath, that's cool. But Apostolic Christianity would have been about more than that, and archeological evidence supports the original Jewish Christians (Nazarenes) having a fairly organized system of prayer, ritual, and belief which would have made them distinct from both Pharaseic Jews and Gentile Christians.

Whatever their culture was, there's no way to definitely reconstruct it now. Modern day Messianic Judaism seems to borrow more in some cases from later Talmudic Judaism, but it seems unlikely that the original Nazarenes would have had Talmudic or pre-Talmudic traditions and ideas.

 

[CherubRam]

Judaic type Christians are the closest to the first Christians. I should warn you, not everything we are told, or taught, is the truth. If you are truly searching for the truth, then be prepared to dig deep. You will find the truth on the bottom of the garbage can, covered over by lies.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Judaic type Christians are the closest to the first Christians. I should warn you, not everything were are told, or taught, is the truth. If you are truly searching for the truth, then be prepared to dig deep. You will find the truth on the bottom of the garbage can, covered over by lies.

If you seek the truth, IF you seek God's Kingdom, at all cost, to serve HIM forever without any reservation - no holding anything back; nothing for yourself.
Literally, putting your own life on the altar as finally and certainly as Jesus laid down His Life; ....


1 Corinthians 4:12 - Bible Gateway
We're treated like garbage, potato peelings from the culture's kitchen. And it's not getting any better. MEV.
CEB
We work hard with our own hands. (SIX DAYS A WEEK, sometimes with no or little pay) When we are insulted, we respond with a blessing; when we are harassed, we put up with it;
CJB
we exhaust ourselves working with our own hands for our living. When we are cursed, we keep on blessing; when we are persecuted, we go on putting up with it;

.... in general, there is a disconnect with Jesus' roots. Is there a denomination out there that is close to early Christianity? .....

no. no denom. only small assemblies around the world, no advertising. no outward connection to the others.
subject to arrest, torture, imprisonment, and death of self and of family and of friends or fellow believers DAILY.

 

[pat34lee]

I think that many of us are being called out of
large churches of any type to house based
groups of no more than 10-20 people. It seems
once you pass that number, you lose the oneness
of the group. Then, as people grow or move away,
they begin or join other groups and new people are
called to replace them.

 

[visionary]

Always Yeshua's way first, gatherings can be found through prayer and searching. If you let us know where you live, maybe we can help you find a Sabbath keeping group.

 

[LoricaLady]

It depends. Imho the closest one might see to Apostolic Christianity might look something like Oriental Orthodoxy, Eastern Orthodoxy, or the original praxis of the Mar Thoma Nasrani Christians of India (Google 'em!). Thing is, there are followers of Christ in most every sect, and cultural Christians in every sect, too. You can hunt and hunt and hunt for the most "original" Church, but at the end of the day, it's our connection to, love for, and obedience to Christ through faith, works, and prayer which really matters in the end. I've met saintly Catholics, Lutherans, Greek Orthodox, and Quakers who truly seemed to know, love, and follow Christ.

If you truly want to keep Sabbath, that's cool. But Apostolic Christianity would have been about more than that, and archeological evidence supports the original Jewish Christians (Nazarenes) having a fairly organized system of prayer, ritual, and belief which would have made them distinct from both Pharaseic Jews and Gentile Christians.

Whatever their culture was, there's no way to definitely reconstruct it now. Modern day Messianic Judaism seems to borrow more in some cases from later Talmudic Judaism, but it seems unlikely that the original Nazarenes would have had Talmudic or pre-Talmudic traditions and ideas.

If you study RCC, Protestant and first century historians they all agree that the 1st century believers kept the true Sabbath, the holy days, the food laws and even the new moons. They didn't think it was "cool" to keep the true Sabbath. They believed it was absolutely mandatory. Nothing in Scriptures says the Sabbath was changed to Sunday. You can thank creeping paganism and sun worshippers like Constantine for that.

When people want to say it is fine to call Sunday the Sabbath they generally say "Paul said...Paul said..." First and foremost he had no authority whatsoever to change a single thing ordained by YHWH, aka God. 2ndly, Paul kept the Law of Moses. See Acts 21 for one thing. His "Let no man judge you" speech certainly did not say the Sabbath was changed. Again, zip in the Bible says that.

His speech was aimed at new converts who were turning to their pagan ways. He wanted them to not let their pagan friends and relatives judge them in their observance not nonobservance of the holy days.

In speaking of the time after His ascension, when Jerusalem would fall, Messiah told His followers to pray that their flight would not be in winter or on the Sabbath. He didn't think it was just "cool" to keep the Sabbath. He thought it was mandatory.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Man ! dat 'ory is GREAT ! (and TRUE ! by GRACE AND TRUTH AND FAITH , TRUE FAITH, IN YESHUA MESSIAH !! )

 

[LoricaLady]

Man ! dat 'ory is GREAT ! (and TRUE ! by GRACE AND TRUTH AND FAITH , TRUE FAITH, IN YESHUA MESSIAH !! )

Lol! Thanks for the laugh.

 

[ripple the car]

Sabbath observation would have been only one piece of the mosaic that would have made up the prayer, ritual, liturgical, and theological lives of the earliest Jewish Christians, and of the later Nazarene Jews, described by Jerome and others.

We have no clue in any meaningful way how these Jewish Christians prayed, what kinds of traditions they held, or what their liturgies might have looked like. We can know with some degree of certainty that they continued the Jewish belief in One God, and held Jesus of Nazareth to have been His Son, Messiah, and Promised One. If Scriptural tradition continued among these Nazarene Jews, we can also perhaps assume that they would have prayed to and honored the Messiah as they would have prayed to the God of their Fathers.

What's more, later non-Messianic Jewish literature supports this idea. There's a really, really good resource out there called "What the Rabbonim Say About Moshiach", which can be downloaded on MoshiachOntheWeb.com It basically proves that a divine Messiah is an inherently Jewish idea, and indicates that in all likelihood the super early Jewish Christians would have prayed to Mashiakh as well as to God, the Father, and would have viewed Him as divine, semi-divine, or at least a Man uniquely reflecting and revealing the Almighty and worthy of worship.

My point is, it's not possible to reconstruct 1st Century Nazarene Judaism. I can verify that ethnic Jews who believe that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah tend to do a lot less debating and wrangling over Sabbath, the Talmud, and symbolism and just live out their faith as Jews. Some don't even keep kosher. Some even go to Gentile Churches. Some are Hebrew Catholics.

If you study RCC, Protestant and first century historians they all agree that the 1st century believers kept the true Sabbath, the holy days, the food laws and even the new moons. They didn't think it was "cool" to keep the true Sabbath. They believed it was absolutely mandatory. Nothing in Scriptures says the Sabbath was changed to Sunday. You can thank creeping paganism and sun worshippers like Constantine for that.

When people want to say it is fine to call Sunday the Sabbath they generally say "Paul said...Paul said..." First and foremost he had no authority whatsoever to change a single thing ordained by YHWH, aka God. 2ndly, Paul kept the Law of Moses. See Acts 21 for one thing. His "Let no man judge you" speech certainly did not say the Sabbath was changed. Again, zip in the Bible says that.

His speech was aimed at new converts who were turning to their pagan ways. He wanted them to not let their pagan friends and relatives judge them in their observance not nonobservance of the holy days.

In speaking of the time after His ascension, when Jerusalem would fall, Messiah told His followers to pray that their flight would not be in winter or on the Sabbath. He didn't think it was just "cool" to keep the Sabbath. He thought it was mandatory.

 

[Albion]

When people want to say it is fine to call Sunday the Sabbath they generally say "Paul said...Paul said..." First and foremost he had no authority whatsoever to change a single thing ordained by YHWH, aka God. 2ndly, Paul kept the Law of Moses. See Acts 21 for one thing. His "Let no man judge you" speech certainly did not say the Sabbath was changed. Again, zip in the Bible says that.

Most of the earlier part of your post is baloney, but it's this part that deserves a special mention IMO.

Yes, Paul's epistles are part of the Bible. If it is found convenient to discard some of the Bible's books because any of us disagrees with Paul or have some unflattering view of him or of his authority, we are necessarily discarding the authority of Holy Scripture.

If that is done, there is no credibility to this kind of argument at all, any and all details aside.

 

[LoricaLady]

Sorry. Technical glitch and accidental duplication of things said below.l

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Amein ! Absolutely True Testimony of Yhwh's Word YHWH'S LADY !
Yhwh has testified of the Faithfulness of His people all along,
and Yhwh has called and chosen a remnant for Himself all along, His Own Testimony.
Yhwh is Faithful TODAY as ALWAYS, and FOREVER ! AMEIN and HALLELUYAH !

I almost replied earlier to the obvious errors in post 16,
but thought you would likely do so, and you have done so very well.

 

[LoricaLady]

Most of the earlier part of your post is baloney, but it's this part that deserves a special mention IMO. Yes, Paul's epistles are part of the Bible. If it is convenient to discard some of the Bible's books because we disagree with Paul or have some other unattractive view of him or his authority, we are necessarily discarding the guidance of Holy Scripture. If that is done, there is no credibility to this kind of argument at all, regardless of any details.

I certainly never said that Paul's epistles should not be part of the Bible. I said He kept Torah, as is clearly seen in Acts 21 aand elsewhere in the Bible. I said he had no authority whatsoever to change anything ordained by the Almighty. Do you think he did? If so cite your Bible verses.

It is not Paul who claimed he had such authority, it is erring mainstream Christianity that too often acts like (1) he did and (2) he said things he never ever said. I gave the example that often we are told "Paul said...Paul said..." to justify a Sunday "Sabbath." There is zip, zero, nada anything in the Bible saying such a change was made. In fact we are told that the Sabbath is for all generations.

I quoted Messiah to show that He expected His believers to still be keeping the Sabbath commandment after He returned to Heaven. If you can't see how clear his words are, sorry I can't help you. And oh yeal, He did also say that the Law and the prophets would not pass away, not one little mark, until Heaven and earth pass away. But traditions of men ignore those simple instructions too, or try to spin them away.

Read the story in Acts were Saint Stephen is falsely accused before they stone him.. What was he falsely accused of? The Bible tells you plainly.

12 So they stirred up the people and the elders and the teachers of the law. They seized Stephen and brought him before the Sanhedrin. 13 They produced false witnesses who testified, “This fellow never stops speaking against this holy place and against the law. 14 For we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and change the customs Moses handed down to us.”

Now you are on ignore. It is bad manners and against forum rules to use the word "baloney" when referring to another's post.