There is a chasm happening in our churches as we see in this thread. It is caused by the findings of archeology about the history and culture of when our bible was written. There is understanding of the roots of our bible that was lost in the thousands of years that separate us. We have a professor with a Hebrew and Greek language background in our town giving classes on Wednesday evening. Our very traditional Nazarene Church has a Sunday School class giving ancient bible history based on archeology.
Zone explains best where our churches have been. She even lies about me (you never mention Christ) in order to prove her point, but her point is really the same point that the people of Constantine's day had. It was that Christ created a new religion that cancelled out Judaism. The history of our church from after the first hundred years after Christ has pointed to this way of reading the New Testament. In order to read it this way, we have to say that many things in the OT was done away with. These people who have discovered the early culture and language meanings are reading scripture with the idea that God is eternal, the bible reflects that, every passage is truth. That changes some of the interpretation of Paul that has been held for centuries. Churches have taught that God changed His mind and principles through Christ.
It is found that Christ came to fulfill and complete what was with us from the beginning of time. That is a turning around of how we have seen it. Before the fulfilled meant it replaced and wiped out. The new way is to understand the sacrificial system as a shadow of Christ. A shadow is an outline, reflection, of something real. If you only saw the shadow of a house you would know something about the house, but when the house and the shadow came into view, you would still see the shadow. Christ in the flesh is like the actual house.
The new way to study bible is to start with Genesis, and read it from the way the Hebrews understood it. I said this once, and Zone is still having tantrums. Then take it to the New Testament, especially Revelations, and see how Christ built on these roots and how Christ changed things. The book of Hebrews does this, and if you read that book from the mind set of the Hebrew person, steeped in OT knowledge of God instead of as a 2013 person only steeped in Christ, it gives a different perspective on the book. It was how it was written, to show the growth in Christ. When we see the growth only and deny all God the Father brings to the table, we don't see the entire thing.
I am sure that God is overseeing this. For the world to accept Christ, the world couldn't be encumbered with how the Jews worshipped God. Christ isn't circumcision, Christ has to radiate from the heart. Gentiles could understand Christ, but not all about ways of both Christ and God the Father. God had to let people separate them and call it "those awful Jews" sort of thing. God let the Jews be blinded to Christ as He fulfilled to help us with that. God gave Paul words that they could misinterpret easily to back that up, and the world over had Christians. It is just now reversing to paganism.
Now, the gospel message has reached all God's people from Africa to Siberia. Now God is asking His family to listen, not only to His Son but to Him. Understand the NT, not as opposed to God the Father, but as how Christ took His principles that He taught and gave us material to grow on. We are to learn what God has for us in scripture. We have been saying the NT is not only growth, but a destroyer. That is not so. We are to grow and see that.