This workshop explores Jesus through the lens of His original Jewish context, inviting participants to see Him more clearly as the Son of David and Israel’s promised Messiah. Reading through the glasses of our own tradition, culture, and history can blur our understanding of Jesus. Recovering the original Hebrew context, on the other hand, can offer a sharp, enriching, and deep biblical picture, with implications for faith, discipleship, and mission. The workshop presents the incarnate Jesus, fully God and fully human, as a Jewish man, rooted in the Hebrew Scriptures, and examines how the early Jewish disciples understood His life, teaching, death, and resurrection. It explores how the first-century Jewish world shaped Jesus’ methods of teaching, His approach to discipleship, and the formation of the early believing community. Particular attention is given to how non-Jewish people were brought into God’s redemptive plan, and how this was understood by the apostles in Acts and the New Testament. The workshop points toward the biblical vision of unity in Christ—Jew and Gentile together—and will offer practical missiological patterns, pathways for healthier community life, teaching, and witness in our communities.
