Messianic Faith-What it means and Why it is the Right thing.

In the modern world, and all kinds of religion and guiding philosophy people follow, it's hard to keep track or even care.

In the United States there are hundreds of religions and philosophies to follow. The two most common religions in America are Jewish and Christian. The Muslim faith has a recognizable existence with many believers in America. I don't want to appear trite to other religious beliefs to others follow, here, but I honestly don't know many of the others or what they believe.

My focus is on a religious faith called Messianic faith. This Messianic faith follows the two foundational tenets of belief that Jesus is the Messiah and they believe in keeping the Commandments as given to the Israelites by Moses. Messianics follow the Messiah and call him by his Hebrew name Yeshua, which means salvation or savior.

The Messianic faith orginaly began as a form of the Jewish religion in the first century AD*. Believers in the Messianic faith claim the original Jewish believers and followers of Jesus as Messiah were Messianic. It has been called the original Christian faith" This original group that began as followers stayed in tact as believers in Yeshua(or Jesus) during the time of Yeshua and after his death and resurrection, and for many years after. They were known by different terms over the years. The most common or most known term was Nazarenes. This term was given to them by others, primarily other Jews, as identifying term. The term Nazarens was reference to Yeshua being from Nazareth ( or Natzret in Hebrew). There is little historical information about this group of believers and continuation of the faith past the 100's AD After the time of the "Apostalic Age" or the time of the Messianic believers. We know from scant remnant writings that they followed Torah, the five books of Moses which are the first books in the Bible, and expressed their faith in Yhwh, God of their fathers, and faith in Yeshua as Messiah. They followed most the Hebrew customs in their observance. Through the years of Paul and after, the message of Yeshua and the Torah spread through Judea and to the Jews in other nations Jews and some non jews(called gentiles or goy) joined together in observing this faith.

In a different article I will discuss the progress division of faith and how the gentile believers progressively moved away from Torah

The religion we see today known as the "Messianic Movement" is a modern form of following the original faith. For several centuries there were two clearly separtae religions who both believed in the same God,the God of the Bible. There were the Jews and the Christians. Jews believed in God and gathered on Saturday for worship on Sabbath. They did not accept or believe in Jesus as Messiah. Christians believed in God, beleived in Jesus as savior, and Messiah. The Christians gathered on Sunday to worship on the Lord's Day. These two groups recognized each other and accepted the differences. There was much animosity between followers of the faiths, which still exists to this day.

The modern Messianic faith went through some changes over several decades before taking the identity we see today. During the beginning of the 20th century, there were few Jews who openly professed a belief in Jesus as Messiah. There were and still are varied views by Jews about him. There were however some who did believe in him. Most of them joined a local church to associate with believers. Jews became Christians in those days. In the 19-teens a Jewish-Christian organization was created called the Hebrew Christian Alliance. This group was established as a group of Jews who wanted to identify their ethnic,Hebrew, heritage, and their identity as believers in Jesus. They held to this dual identity with pride and feeling of connection. It was a way to tell the Jewish believer he has fellow Jews in the same standing.

Then in the 1970's a great religious revival came along known as "The Jesus Movement" or the "Jesus Freak Movement." This era in America led to many young Americans from late teens in to 20's and 30's get interested in Jesus and religion. This movement/revival drew much attention. Young Hebrew Christians were getting involved in the new movement which involved and new "hipper" way to express faith in Jesus and make Church popular for a new crowd of people. This led to a break off movement by the Hebrew Christians, called the "Messianic Movement ", where the Jews had begun following Jewish/Hebrew style of faith. They began meeting on Sabbath, they started eating kosher, observing Torah based holidays. They began being Jewish. In the late 1970's The Hebrew Christian Alliance changed their name to Messianic Jewish Alliance of America. These Hebrew Christians called themselves Messiainc Jews. They started meeting on Saturdays at the churches they were previously attending, then moved to home studies, then eventually began to have there own places of worship, their own Messianic Synogouges. This new group and this new faith embraced a mix of Jewish ways and church ways making a unified faith. They changed their mission purpose as well. They set about with a mission to worship the God of their fathers, declare Yeshua as messiah and win their fellow Jews to Messiah, in a Hebraic fashion.

This new form of faith was dubbed by many as "Jewish Christianity." For some this was meant as compliment. Others meant it as a derision. Regardless, many Christians were attracted to this new way of faith and embraced the Jewish origins of faith and joined in the Messianic services.

Messianic Faith is essentially belief in Yeshua(Jesus) as Messiah and following the Torah. This is the Message Yeshua taught. His message was the Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Heaven. He is the promised Messiah destined to come and be rejected, die, and rise from the dead. He is also the promised great King to return and establish his kingdom on earth. His teachings were about how to show proper expression of reverence to the Father in Heaven, Avenu b' Shmayim, and to love others. He taught the rules of conduct for each other and for the Kingdom.

Yeshua did not do away with Torah. He explained it and demonstrated how to follow.

* The letters AD are short for Annu Dominai which is Latin for Year of the Lord. It it an identifier of time to distinguish division in world history used to divide history between time before Jesus and the after. Jews often use the identifier CE meaning Common Era in place of AD.