The Jesus of The Way International
James Walker
The Way, International headquartered in New Knoxville, Ohio, was founded by Victor Paul Wierwille, who was a devout anti-trinitarian. This organization teaches that Jesus Christ is not Eternal and did not exist before the creation of the world.
In His book, Jesus Christ Is Not God Wierwille teaches: "We, as well as Jesus Christ, were with God in His foreknowledge, but not in existence, before the world began. Neither did Jesus Christ" (pp. 31-32). Wierwille teaches that Jesus did not exist except in the mind of God before conception in Mary's womb, and was at that time "Jesus Christ the Son of God, was made by God" (Ibid, pp. 103-04).
The Jesus of the Way becomes nothing more than a miraculously conceived sinless man. He was not God in the flesh but only a very special man who became "God's Son" as a result of divine genetic engineering.
Wierwille explains, "There is no question that the Bible teaches divine conception. Jesus was born sinless, but he also maintained himself sinless as he grew older [Because] the genes with the dominant characteristics came to Jesus not through Mary. They came by way of the creation of a sperm by God and thus Jesus had sinless blood" (Ibid, pp. 72-73).
He goes on to teach that Christ was crucified along with four other men (not two thieves) on an upright pole or tree. Correcting traditional views, Wierwille wrote, "`two on this side and two on that side and Jesus in the midst.' What a great accuracy from God's Word then they must have bypassed Jesus and gone around His cross which was really a tree to the second miscalled thief" (Power For Abundant Living, p. 166).
While the name (Jesus Christ) is the same and some of the historical information is similar, by his won admission Victor Paul Wierwille and the Way, International teach a different Jesus than the one taught by historic, orthodox Christianity. The Jesus of the Way is not God manifest in the Flesh, the second Person of the Trinity, the Word who "was God" (John 1:1). Instead He is a created being, having been created by the Eternal God.
Is this the Jesus of the Bible?
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