{"id":22537,"date":"2022-07-13T23:30:51","date_gmt":"2022-07-14T06:30:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/gospel-express\/2022-14-copy\/"},"modified":"2022-07-13T23:43:04","modified_gmt":"2022-07-14T06:43:04","slug":"2022-notchristian","status":"publish","type":"portfolio","link":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/gospel-express\/2022-notchristian\/","title":{"rendered":"They weren\u2019t called Christians \uff1f"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"flex_column av_one_full  flex_column_div av-zero-column-padding first  avia-builder-el-0  avia-builder-el-no-sibling  \" style='border-radius:0px; '><section class=\"av_textblock_section \"  itemscope=\"itemscope\" itemtype=\"https:\/\/schema.org\/CreativeWork\" ><div class='avia_textblock  '   itemprop=\"text\" ><p style=\"text-align: right;\">Israel Institute of BS<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"background: white; margin: 0cm 0cm 7.5pt 0cm;\"><\/h3>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-22538 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/apostles-1-e1657780467263.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"267\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Christianity is by far the world\u2019s largest religion. Did you know that there are about 2.4 billion followers spread throughout 195 countries around the world? If you are proud to call yourself a member of the global Christian family, you might be surprised to learn that two thousand years ago, no one used the word \u201cChristian\u201d. Do you know what word they used?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Prepare the Way of the Lord<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>The apostle Paul<\/strong>\u00a0proudly proclaimed: \u201cI admit that I worship the God of our ancestors as a follower of the Way\u201d (Acts 24:14), in front of the Roman governor Felix during his trial in 57 AD. Instead of calling himself a Christian, he<strong>\u00a0said he belonged to \u201cThe Way.<\/strong>\u201d Throughout the New Testament, the first followers of Jesus used this cryptic name to refer to themselves.\u00a0<strong>But why?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-22539 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/091712_christtheway.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"545\" height=\"227\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/091712_christtheway.jpg 545w, https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/091712_christtheway-300x125.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 545px) 100vw, 545px\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Bring the Law to Fruition\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Jesus and all his first disciples were Jewish. They were devout Jews, and they all observed the laws found in the Torah.\u00a0<strong>Jesus had no intention of canceling the Law<\/strong>\u00a0despite criticism of the legalism pertaining to the Pharisees. He even said: \u201cDo not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets;\u00a0<strong>I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them<\/strong>\u201d (Matthew 5:17).<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-22540 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/jesus_fulfills_the_law-e1657780746957.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"338\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Study the original Biblical word<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The original Hebrew word Jesus spoke when he said \u2018Law\u2019 was \u05d4\u05dc\u05db\u05d4\u00a0<em>halakhah<\/em>\u00a0from the root HLK \u05d4.\u05dc.\u05da meaning \u2018to walk\u2019.\u00a0<strong>The Law<\/strong>\u00a0is not just a dry set of obscure rules. It\u00a0<strong>is \u2018the straight path that one is meant to walk on\u2019<\/strong>. This code of behavior governs every moment of one\u2019s life.\u00a0<strong>This is the reason that Jesus said: \u201cI am the way and the truth and the life\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0(John 14:6).<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-22541 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/apostles-4.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/apostles-4.jpg 600w, https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/apostles-4-300x150.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"featured_media":22541,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","tags":[],"portfolio_entries":[35],"class_list":["post-22537","portfolio","type-portfolio","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","portfolio_entries-english-writer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio\/22537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/portfolio"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22537"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio\/22537\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22542,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio\/22537\/revisions\/22542"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22541"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22537"},{"taxonomy":"portfolio_entries","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio_entries?post=22537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}