Different wineskins

From the days of Jeshua (Christ Jesus) there were people who wanted to follow that master teacher, whilst others were interested in some points but did not like other points and as such preferred to keep to other teachings and traditions also.

Jeshua had asked those who he had chosen to become his disciples, what they would say he was. (Matthew 16:15)

Matthew 16:15-20 New American Standard Bible (NASB)

¹⁵He *said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” ¹⁶Simon Peter answered, “You are ^[a]the Christ, the Son of the living God.” ¹⁷And Jesus said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon ^[b]Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. ¹⁸I also say to you that you are ^[c]Peter, and upon this ^[d]rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. ¹⁹I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth ^[e]shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth ^[f]shall have been loosed in heaven.” ²⁰Then He ^[g]warned the disciples that they should tell no one that He was ^[h]the Christ.

The question is

How many would come to see that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the living God.

For many it was intolerable that Jeshua or Jesus called himself the “son of God“. For others it was not possible that Jesus would be a mere man. They could not believe that a man could do all such things like making blind people to see again or to make lepers healthy again. they forget that Jesus never claimed that it was he himself who did all those miracles. Jesus always said he could not do those things without his heavenly Father, the Only One True God. The apostles were some time with Jesus and got to know him properly. They also saw how Jesus worshipped the same God as they did, the God of Israel. For them it was clear that this God of Israel was the God of Abraham no man could see. They with Jesus also went to the synagogues and kept to the Mosaic Law. It was not in the intention of Christ to go against the Laws God had given. He also did not want to create a new religion. His teachings where in line with Judaic teaching. Though he wanted to show how certain Jewish teachers had narrowed the Law by their wrong interpretation. Jesus wanted people to follow the Law of God and to live according that Law and to do the works of the Law.

After Jesus died at the stake and was taken out of the dead, the apostles got to see this resurrected son of man, before he was taken up into the air to go to heaven where he came to sit at the Right Hand of God. After the Spirit of God came unto them the apostles dared to go out to preach the Good News. From then onwards several people started following the teachings of the apostles and wanted to belong to the groups that shared the same faith. Several small groups were formed, which they called an ekklesia or ecclesia. All over Israel could be found several ecclesiae where people came together to meet under the inspiration of Christ Jesus. When goyim or non-Jews were allowed to enter into the groups the Jews were not happy to let them enter the synagogues and therefore meeting places where created outside the synagogues. The followers of Jeshua got known as a Jewish sect, being called the Way. They were called like that because they spoke about different ways, the way of God, the way to God, the way of Christ, the way to life, love, peace and of life, the way to salvation, requiring the members to walk in the way Jesus had shown so that they could find and go on the way to the Kingdom of God.

The apostles asked pepole who wanted to follow them to follow Jesus. they asked them to leave the worldly and heathen or pagan traditions for what they were and not to partake of them any more. To leave behind many traditions seemed to be very difficult for many. As such they went following groups which did not mind to adhere to human and philosophical teachings. The apostle Paul warned for such false teachers and wrong groups but people were more interested for groups which allowed them to keep the worldly pleasures. This way more different groups could be found.

When Jesus was till alive he had told a fisherman that he was the rock on which Jesus would build his Church. (Matthew 16:18) You would think Jesus would have picked a theologian, Pharisee or some other religious expert but he chosen a simple, rough, zealous fisherman. After he had directed his words to Peter, Jeshua then ordered his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah or the Christ (Matthew 16:20). You could say it were simple souls which were chosen by Jesus. According to God’s Plan imperfect people were chosen to accomplish his purposes on the earth. The plan of God is the Ecclesia or Church and there is no alternative or other method for spreading his Good News.

In the early church mainly the Word of God was the thread followed. Though from the book the Acts of the apostles we do know that already soon some other words became favourite. Human doctrines crept into several communities.

In the Holy Scriptures, the fermentation (as a factor) is not isolated from what causes it. Consequently, the fermentation that is naturally caused in wine making is not classified as being the same as the fermentation that is promoted in flour dough by an additive, yeast, namely leaven or sour dough. In the bible we find there is been spoken about old and new wineskins. It was common knowledge that fermentation of new wine would likely burst the hardened leather of old wineskins. New skins, on the other hand, were more supple and could withstand the pressure caused by continued fermentation of new wine. For this reason, Jesus stated a fact that was common knowledge in his day. He spoke of what would happen if anyone does put new wine in old bottles:

“Then the new wine will burst the wineskins, and it will be spilled out and the wineskins will be ruined. But new wine must be put into new wineskins.” (Luke 5:37, 38).

This illustration was part of Jesus’ answer as to why his disciples did not conform to all the old customs and practices of the Pharisees. Jesus evidently implied that the truth of Christianity was too powerful and energetic to be retained by the old system of Judaism, which lacked vitality and elasticity and which was fast passing away. (Mt 9:14-16)

By time several leaders of gatherings wanted to be on the same line as the Romans and came to agree with their demand to accept their gods and to make the god of those followers equivalent to the Roman gods. In the fourth century such agreement was made with Constantine the great and a three-headed god was introduced in Christendom. though it would be wrong to think all followers of Jesus would fall for the Trinity ruling. Throughout history every time there were groups who gave preference to follow Jesus and the apostles teachings and to keep true to the Only One True God, Jehovah, Who is One eternal Spirit Being greater than all gods. The Christian religion spreading all over the world certain people, like white people wanted to have their god to be a white god with whom they could associate. As such we can find also a white Jesus worshipped in many churches. Those churches which really tried to follow Jesus were not liked and often were attacked by those of other churches which got influenced by Roman, Aztec and other rites.

Those who agreed to have their religion conform Roman and Greek traditions adapted their church-traditions to the places where they came. The Roman Catholic Church added in this way many Celtic and Germanic traditions in the church-life for West Europe. For Africa they added a lot of African rites into their service.
Those who would not comply to their rules and their views they called heretics and went so far to kill them.

Throughout history underground movements can be found where people tried to keep to the biblical Truth instead of joining the Roman Catholic Church.

The Church had to be the union of God loving people meeting corporately as brothers and sisters of Christ. Throughout history it has existed in various wineskins, every time when a group started to go away from the bible Truth or did not continue to go in the right direction, new groups saw the life. The belief that has become popular is the idea of restorationism where essentially right after the Apostles died the Church went fully apostate. Also described as Christian primitivism, several groups came into existence wanting to restore the church along the lines of what is known about the apostolic early church, which restorationists see as the search for a more pure and more ancient form of the religion. Fundamentally every time when something went wrong in the church or when some reaction against the main churches became stronger, new winskins where offered to mankind with a vision that sought to correct faults or deficiencies (in the church) by appealing to the primitive church as a normative model. Efforts to restore an earlier, purer form of Christianity are often a response to denominationalism. According to some such thinking has essentially been the seed bed of all cults that have started, where truth was gone and the prophet of the hour helped to restore it to the people of God.

As Rubel Shelly put it, the

“motive behind all restoration movements is to tear down the walls of separation by a return to the practice of the original, essential and universal features of the Christian religion.

From early times there had always pepole who believed in the baptism by insertion. From that idea came Anabaptists and Baptists, one of the longest existing non-trinitarian groups or communities. But near the end of the previous century the American trinitarian Baptist Church Unions won ground and got thousands of non-trinitarian Baptists going to look for new wineskins and transferring to other churches, like the Jehovah’s Witnesses, several non-trinitarian Church of God groups, the Church of Abrahamic Faith, the Restored Church of God, the Restoration Church, the Nazarene Friends and or to the Christadelphians or Brothers in Christ.

The Jews were facing similar old- and new- wineskin problems. First there was the Nazarene and Essene Jew Jeshua (Jesus Christ) who with his followers was considered a sect or cult. Their teachings were found not conform by many. The group of their followers was first called the Way. Later on, because goyim became accepted in the group, several Jews took distance and others did not want them to be called Jews any-more. The name Christian (or follower of Christ) was chosen. Throughout the years there were new converts from Judaism, who wanted to keep to the Mosaic Law but accepted Christ as their Messiah. They called themselves Messianic Jews or Messianics. At the end of previous century there was a big change by several Christian groups who also wanted to keep to the Mosaic Law and keeping Sabbath. several Sabbath Churches saw light and to distance themselves from other Christians they started calling themselves also Messianics. Again new wineskins were presented to the world. But again trinitarians infiltrated and mad the new wine sour. This made certain Jews looking for an other name, because they did not want to be associated with trinitarian Christians nor with trinitarian Messianics. Wanting to be associated with the chosen people of God but showing to the world that they were willing to accept Jeshua as the Christ or Messiah they looked for a new wineskin and choose to be called Jeshuaist.

For the main churches such new wineskin groups form a great difficulty and danger, them not wanting to loose any member to such a group. Therefore they do everything to blacken such groups and tell a lot of lies about them. Some groups also frighten people because they hear God’s Holy Name. For many that is like a red cloth for a bull.

Most people love to feel safe or recognisable ground and dare therefore not to investigate more about other cultures and visions. Most people also do not want to get rid of the many worldly traditions and feasts and therefore they feel those Bible believing and Word of God following groups a peril, endangering their way of life, having to give up all those nice things and feasts.

People have to see that there are many ways of life, but to be able to find a solution against the troubles of the world and to find a world without such problems, they shall have to find God and shall have to come to live according to His Will.

Today there are quite a few groups that want to show the way to God. Like us they want people come to see that:

People should come to believe in Jesus
Jesus is the way to God
Jesus is the sent one from God
Jesus is the son of man and son of God
Jesus is the way to life
Jesus offered the way for salvation by putting his own will aside
Jesus, by doing the Will of his heavenly Father, gave his life as a ransom for the sins of many
Jesus is the Kristos or Christ, the anointed of God
Those who believe in Jesus shall be able to find redemption
Jesus is the mediator between God and man
Jesus is the high-priest before God

and they shall have to accept that

There is only One True God
God is an eternal Spirit Being telling no lies
God is the divine Creator to Whom belongs all power and might
God gave authority to Jesus to act and judge in His name
God has a Plan with His creation and shall fulfil it.
God is a god of love and wants to give everybody the opportunity to come to Him and to have a good relationship with Him
Jesus prepared the way for all to greet Jesus his god also as their heavenly Father, like He is the heavenly Father of Christ Jesus

If you come to accept all those point you are on the good way to come closer to God. When you are willing to accept the Bible as God’s infallible Word, you shall be able to find further answers in it and find your way out of darkness.

Grapes need enough sunlight and the right soil to become good wine grapes. the bible and several of those small churches can let you taste some very good wine but also offer you the right ground and food to establish a worthy ‘Christian’ or better, Godly life.

In Christendom we can find lots of denominations. Many of them started off with good intentions. Perhaps they even started with the same premise. Sadly they preyed off believers who were disillusioned with the current state of the Main or Roman Catholic Church and especially those who saw the divisions in the Church and could not bear such confusion.

It might be surprising to modern believers to realize that the Church has been unified for most of history. Since the reformation period there have been many more schisms to where today we have over 30,000 distinct groupings. Perhaps some of this division was necessary but in the end the Church does constitute mostly of larger unified Church bodies around the world.

We should know that God is always furthering His Church in the world. Those who love God and who love His only begotten beloved son (Jeshua/Jésus/Jesus/Jezus/Chesu), as Disciples of the Nazarene master teacher Jeshua (Jesus) need to find their place where the traditions and the faith once delivered to the saints (Jude 1:3) is being passed on. Some bodies of the Church as wineskins lose its lampstand (Revelation 2:5). We cannot make it alone in this journey, we need each other in the body of Christ. God is still building His Church through imperfect people. Let us therefore help each other to build up each other and let us see the many parts of the Body of Christ, how they may be very different but also very necessary to the growth of the body.

Preceding

God’s Self-Revelation

The Greatness of the eternal God

The New Testament and Judgement

To be prepared for the Day of Judgment

A participation in the body of Christ

Do you believe what Christ’s Apostles taught?