We Believe…
Thought
- Jesus and the Bible–understood as well as can be reconstructed from the original Hebrew/Aramaic language and worldview
- Contradictions and difficult sayings in the Bible resolve when back in their Hebraic setting
- Our understanding of scripture must make good common sense before it makes anything else
- Jesus didn’t give us a theology—he taught a concrete Way of living life in God’s presence
- Kingdom is the misunderstood cornerstone of Jesus’ teaching—not heaven, a quality of life lived herenow in the awareness of love without degree
- Living in fear of punishment has no place in a spirituality built on degreeless love
Faith
- God can never be understood intellectually–knowing God is learning to love mystery
- Faith is not the opposite of doubt, thinking we are certain—but living as if what we believe is true, able to act in the presence of doubt
- Without living what we say we believe, what we say we believe is irrelevant
- Living Jesus’ Way is not legal, but relational, not conforming, but transforming–seeing life in a completely different way
Practice
- Church should provide the community, accountability, structure, discipline, and service each of us needs to experience real meaning, purpose, identity
- We can only tell others what we are convinced of, not what to believe—accepting their freedom to become convinced of what they are convinced of
- Debating religious concepts we can’t know with certainty has little value compared to what we do know with certainty—how to treat each other
- While “Christian” has conflicted meaning in our culture, we remain unabashed followers of Jesus
- Jesus’ Good News is…there is no bad news: we are as forgiven as we want to be
traditional within non-traditional
We believe viewing the traditional essentials of the Christian faith from a non-traditional, Hebrew worldview is essential in getting us closer to the original intent of Jesus’ message. Jesus wasn’t trying to create a new religion; he was trying to free the hearts of his followers within the context of the religion they already had. When we return Jesus’ message as recorded in the New Testament to its original language and culture, an amazing shift occurs.
Putting ourselves in the sandals of the first hearers of Jesus’ message, we have become convinced that if we can make the same radical shift in awareness that Jesus called being born again, we can begin a process that focuses not on heaven or hell, but on this moment right here and now. We can see ourselves as we are—in unity with each other and God’s presence.
This Way of living life, this quality of life lived in unity with God and each other is what Jesus called Kingdom. As Jesus said, “The waiting is over. The Kingdom is here.” (Mark 1:15) We have decided to stop waiting and to start living theeffect of God’s love right here and now in each relationship and each moment and person that crosses our paths.
For more of what we believe on specific subjects, see our Articles page: especially the “foundational” articles on love, talimidim, kingdom, law, and scripture, to see how Jesus’ Way plays out in central areas of our spiritual lives. And for a deeper look, there is The Fifth Way.