Should there even be such a religion?
All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts.
(Acts 1:44-46)
In the initial days after Jesus, his followers expressed their faith in a communal life tightly connected to their Jewish roots. Even much later, Jewish followers of the Messiah Jesus continued to express their faith through their own religion:
“You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law.”
(Acts 21:20)
As for the non-Jewish followers of Jesus, they formed into groups where the expression of their worship was very different from their Jewish counterparts. In addition, they came to acquire a distinct identity.
So for a whole year Barnabas and Saul met with the church and taught great numbers of people. The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch.
(Acts 11:26)
In each church they appointed elders, and with prayers and fasting they commended them to the Lord, in whom they had put their trust.
(Acts 14:23)
However those groups started out, it was inevitable that a religion would eventually form. People going in the same direction, various practices would become normalized and passed on which in turn would become traditions forming the religion. But was that the original intent? Or is that the only valid model? Do we see anywhere where Jesus is trying to start a new religion?
Consider the following where some Jews begged Jesus to go to the house of a benevolent Roman officer in order to heal one of his servants:
So Jesus went with them. He was not far from the house when the officer sent friends to tell him, “Sir, don’t trouble yourself. I do not deserve to have you come into my house, neither do I consider myself worthy to come to you in person. Just give the order, and my servant will get well. I, too, am a man placed under the authority of superior officers, and I have soldiers under me. I order this one, ‘Go!’ and he goes; I order that one, ‘Come!’ and he comes; and I order my slave, ‘Do this!’ and he does it.” Jesus was surprised when he heard this; he turned around and said to the crowd following him, “I tell you, I have never found faith like this, not even in Israel!” The messengers went back to the officer’s house and found his servant well.
(Luke 7:6-10)
Does that sound like anything Christian? Or Jewish? Or religious?
Jesus told them still another parable: “The Kingdom of heaven is like this. A woman takes some yeast and mixes it with a bushel of flour until the whole batch of dough rises.”
(Matthew 13:33)