“Good and upright is the Lord; therefore he instructs sinners in the way. He leads the humble in what is right, and teaches the humble his way. All the paths of the Lord are steadfast love and faithfulness, for those who keep his covenant and his decrees.” (Ps 25:8–10) So the psalmist sings, in the psalm that is set for the First Sunday in Lent.
Of course, this short phrase, “The Way”, has a significant place in Christian understanding. When he recounts a key incident in the second volume of his orderly account—namely, the conversion and call of Saul—Luke describes the followers of Jesus as being of “The Way” (9:2). This is a term which he likes; it recurs in four subsequent chapters of Luke’s narrative (18:25; 19:9,23; 22:4; 24:14,22).
Using this term to describe the followers of Jesus makes sense when we consider the thoroughly Jewish character of the early Jesus movement. Luke takes pains to document this thoroughly Jewish ethos, from the opening stories of pregnant women (Luke 1–2), told firmly in the style of Hebrew scripture narrative, through the various occasions where he notes that Jesus was in the synagogue on the sabbath (Luke 4:16; 6:6; 13:10), the many instances where he relates the story of Jesus to scripture passages (Luke 4:21; 7:27; 9:30; 12:52–53; 13:33–35; 19:37–38; 20:9–19; 21:20–24; 22:37) and the way that his second volume traces the way that the followers of Jesus take their message of good news “to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8, quoting Isa 42:6; 49:6).
I think that it is most likely that “The Way” as the name of the movement owes its origins to scriptural usage in association with God’s activity. “Lead me, O Lord, in your righteousness because of my enemies”, the psalmist prays; “make your way straight before me” (Ps 5:8). In a song praising God for delivering victory to the King, we read, “This God—his way is perfect; the promise of the Lord proves true; he is a shield for all who take refuge in him” (Ps 18:30). By extension, Luke sees that God is at work in the movement initiated by Jesus and his followers.
This scriptural usage is widespread. The Way figures in a number of psalms. “Good and upright is the Lord; therefore he instructs sinners in the way”, says the psalm proposed for this coming Sunday. “He leads the humble in what is right, and teaches the humble his way” (Ps 25:8–9). The psalmist goes on to explain, “all the paths of the Lord are steadfast love and faithfulness, for those who keep his covenant and his decrees” (Ps 25:8–10).
Other psalmists pray, “Teach me your way, O Lord, and lead me on a level path because of my enemies”(Ps 27:11), and sing, “Wait for the Lord, and keep to his way, and he will exalt you to inherit the land; you will look on the destruction of the wicked” (Ps 37:34). There are many other other psalms which invoke the image of the way of the Lord.
The term is also appropriated in the Dead Sea Scrolls as a means of defining the Qumran community (1QS 9.17-18,21; 10:21; CD 1:13; 2:6). This most likely reflects competing claims for being the authentic keepers of Torah amongst Jewish sects in the latter period of Second Temple Judaism. Members of the community who followed the instruction of The Teacher of Righteous believed that they were keeping faithfully to The Way of the Lord.
A particularly important passage to note is the declaration that opens the second main section of the book of Isaiah—the section which scholars call Deutero-Isaiah. In the opening verses of chapter 40, the prophet addresses the Israelites, in exile in Babylon. Life in the exile was not a happy time for many of the people of Israel. (Psalm 137 is the classic expression of this; note especially the anger expressed in verses 8–9.) The prophet offers them words of comfort and hope.
The people of Israel yearned to return home (Jer 29:10–14; 30:1–31:26). They looked back on the past with longing eyes. They remembered their years in the land which God had given to them. Now, they were living among Babylonians—foreigners, conquerors. Soon, the prophet declares, they would leave behind these memories, and grasp hold of the future that God has for them. In a later statement, he declares that God would “send to Babylon and break down all the bars” (Isa 43:14). God, the prophet declares, is doing a new thing! (43:19).
So in the opening chapter of this section of the book, the return from exile to the land of Israel is announced with a declaration of comfort. “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins” (Isa 40:1–2).
Immediately after this, the prophet declares, “A voice cries out: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.’” (Isa 40:3). The way of the Lord, granted to the people who have been faithful throughout the decades in exile, is that they will return to their homeland. The Lord makes a way in the wilderness (43:19), just as in the past God had “dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep; who made the depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to cross over” (51:10)— and so, “the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away” (51:11).
This is, indeed, a powerful promise declared by the prophet. The pathway of justice, the way of understanding (40:14) is not hidden (40:27); indeed, the one chosen to be the servant of the Lord will make known this way, by declaring justice, by persisting with his mission to declare this way, “until he has established justice in the earth” (42:1–4).
It is by speaking through this servant (48:15) that the Lord “teaches you for your own good … leads you in the way you should go” (48:17). The servant’s mission is “to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel”; as a result, God declares, “I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth” (49:6). This is the way of the Lord for those ancient Israelite people.
Indeed, through the person of the servant, all those who have “turned to [their] own way” will know that “the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (53:6); “the righteous one, my servant, shall make many righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities” (53:11).
This Way of the Lord, first declared in the late sixth century before the Common Era, is later proclaimed, in that same desert, by the wild desert prophet, John, as he invites people to “prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight” in anticipation of the imminent coming of the one chosen by God, Jesus of Nazareth (Mark 1:1–3; Matt 3:1–3; Luke 3:1–6). And the psalm we will hear this coming Sunday also offers a focus on this same Way: for God will teach “those who fear the Lord … the way that they should choose” (Ps 25:12).
An Informed Faith 