tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-61004726927775626262024-03-18T06:00:32.148-06:00Jay ForrestA Sketch of Gnostic ChristianityJay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-3157454562752194032024-03-18T06:00:00.001-06:002024-03-18T06:00:00.132-06:00Four Church Movements<p>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5u543rZfb6sbXLwRUxLXYraITSArcoyykB9bF89PC0SxSW1caDFkslMtSafFUfRnqgA8HgyAHpCtYfL56aEOznk3_mQPI4ctHllTGr6OuidkLnu5HOEXkk96tSe4Xk9ES3tGM5mglonvcrV2Dfydnd9djNlNUI99xf7Rz95n1iHuyOFVoxRUaYkGCrAM/s300/Jays-Cross-Logo.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Jay Forrest" border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5u543rZfb6sbXLwRUxLXYraITSArcoyykB9bF89PC0SxSW1caDFkslMtSafFUfRnqgA8HgyAHpCtYfL56aEOznk3_mQPI4ctHllTGr6OuidkLnu5HOEXkk96tSe4Xk9ES3tGM5mglonvcrV2Dfydnd9djNlNUI99xf7Rz95n1iHuyOFVoxRUaYkGCrAM/w200-h200/Jays-Cross-Logo.png" title="Gnostic Christianity" width="200" />
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</p>As scholars study Church history without bias, they discover a lot of variety in the early church. It is common now to discuss Christianities rather than Christianity. That diversity is still with us today.<br /><br />Let me paint a broad brush and divide Christianity into four general movements: Protestant, Catholic. Orthodox, and Gnostic. And then let me characterize each by their central distinctive and characteristic. This results in the following”<br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Protestants are Bible-Centered</li><li>Catholics are Church-Centered</li><li>Orthodox are Tradition-Centered</li><li>Gnostics are God-Centered</li></ul>Gnostic Christians are God-centered because the personal knowledge of God is central. Gnostic Christians are also God-centered because God is the authority for them. The God of gnostics still gives revelation, still guides, still inspires, and still guides his children. <br /><br />The Protestant God is confined to the Bible. God speaks only through the Scriptures. The Catholic God is confined to the Church, by which they mean the Pope and the organization called the Roman Catholic Church. The Orthodox God speaks in and through tradition, although they may be more open to new revelation.<br /><br />You might wonder about the Pentecostals and Charismatics. In so far as they admit that God still gives revelation, they are Gnostic in spirit if not in title. Numerous Baptist ministers will agree with that. But for them the gnostics are heretics, not heroes.<br />Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-63795764040519366142024-03-17T14:08:00.002-06:002024-03-17T14:08:47.965-06:00Perennial Wisdom<p>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5u543rZfb6sbXLwRUxLXYraITSArcoyykB9bF89PC0SxSW1caDFkslMtSafFUfRnqgA8HgyAHpCtYfL56aEOznk3_mQPI4ctHllTGr6OuidkLnu5HOEXkk96tSe4Xk9ES3tGM5mglonvcrV2Dfydnd9djNlNUI99xf7Rz95n1iHuyOFVoxRUaYkGCrAM/s300/Jays-Cross-Logo.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Jay Forrest" border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5u543rZfb6sbXLwRUxLXYraITSArcoyykB9bF89PC0SxSW1caDFkslMtSafFUfRnqgA8HgyAHpCtYfL56aEOznk3_mQPI4ctHllTGr6OuidkLnu5HOEXkk96tSe4Xk9ES3tGM5mglonvcrV2Dfydnd9djNlNUI99xf7Rz95n1iHuyOFVoxRUaYkGCrAM/w200-h200/Jays-Cross-Logo.png" title="Gnostic Christianity" width="200" />
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</p>The basic outline of the perennial wisdom is as follows:<br /><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>There is a Divine Ground.</li><li>We are sparks of that Divine Ground.</li><li>We are separated from the Divine Ground.</li><li>Selfishness is what separates us from the Divine Ground.</li><li>In order to reunite with the Divine Ground, self must die (individuality and separateness must be overcome)</li><li>Dying to self is the path to Salvation and Union with the Divine Ground.</li><li>Our one ultimate mission in life is to return to our Source and invite others to return as well.</li></ol>Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-76765678280769263822024-03-17T13:56:00.008-06:002024-03-17T13:59:41.872-06:00A Gnostic Christian Creed<p>
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</p><i>I created this off the top of my head. Imperfect, incomplete, and fallible as it may be, it does point to a better understanding of gnostic Christianity.</i><br /><br />I believe in one God, the transcendent Father, who is the eternal Ground of Being.<br /><br />I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the first emanation in the realm of becoming, through whom all things came into existence.<br /><br />I believe that the Logos, who is the Lord Jesus Christ, who became a human being, taught the truth and the way of Salvation in word and deed, was crucified, dead, and was buried, and resurrected on the third day in a glorified body. I believe he ascended into the higher dimensions. It is he who judges the living and the dead.<br /><br />I believe that the sparks of divinity are predestined to return to divinity through a process of reincarnation, transfiguration, and ultimately deification. All others are predestined to destruction.<br /><br />I believe in the Holy Spirit, the sacred energy of God manifested in the realm of becoming. It empowers believers with the spiritual gifts for the work of ministry.<br /><br />I believe in the sacred Congregation of God, which are those who know God truly and serve him fully, regardless of which organization they belong to. All believers are priests and ministers of God.Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-4394630168488151632024-03-17T06:00:00.001-06:002024-03-17T06:00:00.142-06:00Don’t Take Jesus Literally<p>
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</p><blockquote>“These things I have spoken to you in figurative language.” – Jesus Christ (John 16:25 NKJV)</blockquote>The Bible is not literally true. Rather it is a complex web of metaphor, symbolism, parable, and allegory. The Catholic Church recognizes that there are three spiritual senses of Scripture. The moral sense, the allegorical sense, and the anagogical sense.<br /><br />The moral sense is the easiest to understand. It is the meaning Scripture has that instructs us in how to live a holy life.<br /><br />The allegorical sense is harder to understand. Allegory uses symbolic fictional figures, fables, and parable to express a truth. When Jesus says he is the door or that we are vines, he is not speaking literally. But this figurativeness goes much deeper and applies much wider than most realize.<br /><br />The third is the anagogical sense. It is a kind of allegory, but more complex and subtle. It is a spiritual interpretation of ideas, statements, and events in the Bible. It seeks to explain the events in the Bible so that they relate to the spiritual life. It transcends the literal meaning of the text.Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-59739996903533805402024-03-11T07:00:00.011-06:002024-03-16T14:17:03.879-06:00The Lord's Prayer (Modern Verson)<p>
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</p>Our Father, who is transcendent,<br />honored be your name;<div><br />Your rulership come;<br />Your will be done;<br />on earth as it is in heaven.<br /><br />Give us each day the food we need.<br /><br />And forgive us our sins,<br />as we forgive those who sinned against us.<br /><br />And keep us from falling into temptation;<br />by delivering us from the evil one.<br /><br />For yours is the rulership,<br />the power and the glory,<br />for ever and ever.<br /><br />Amen.</div><div><br /></div><div>__________</div><div>A dynamic equivalent translation from the Textus Receptus Greek New Testament by Jay N. Forrest</div>Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-55257103064321623252024-02-22T18:00:00.011-07:002024-03-16T14:16:48.157-06:00The Word of God<p>
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</p><blockquote>“When you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God” (1 Thess. 2:13).<br /></blockquote><p>There are two extremes when it comes to the Bible. The first is that the Bible is the word of God. The second extreme is that the Bible is not the word of God. Is there a middle way between these extremes? Yes, it is that the Bible contains the word of God.</p>What does it mean to say that the Bible is the word of God? There are actually three ways to understand this. We will look at each.<div><br /><div>First, we can say that the Bible is the word of God. To understand this we must define two words. First, what does the word “word” mean? It can refer to either the actual words used, or it can refer to the message. That is, it can refer to the symbols use or the meaning conveyed by those symbols. The two are related, but they are not the same thing.<br /><br />The next word we must define is the word “of.” It can be used to indicate the source of something or the topic of discussion. So the word of God can mean either the word from God or the word about God. In the passage about the word of God means “the message about God” (HCSB).<br /><br />Now, clearly the Bible is “the message about God.” And this message was “given by inspiration of God” (2 Tim. 3:16 KJV). That means that the Bible is an accurate record of humanity's understanding of God. Furthermore, the Bible contains “all things necessary to salvation.”<br /><br />Second, the Bible is not the word of God in the sense that the Bible was dictated by God. The Bible is the “message about God” in the words of humans. That means that there are errors in the Bible. Human authors are limited and fallible, hence the Bible is limited and fallible and therefore contains scientific, factual, historical inaccuracies.<br /><br />Third, the Bible contains the word of God. Not only is the Bible the message about God, the Bible contains messages from God. Notice how the book of Jermehian begins, “The words of Jeremiah…. The word of the Lord came to him” (Jer. 1:1-2). The whole book contains the “words of Jeremiah” but in the book are contained the “word of the Lord.” <br /><br />In Genesis 3 we read “the serpent” speaking words “to the woman” (Gen 3:1-5). Are these the “word of God”? If the whole Bible is the word of God then these words are also “the word of God.” And if these words of the devil are not the word of God, then the Bible is not the word of God. Rather, the Bible includes the word of God.<br /><br />In conclusion, then, the Bible as a whole is the inspired message about God from Israel and the Christian Church. The Bible is not the word of God, but contains the word of God. That means that the message from God contained in the Bible “containeth all things necessary to salvation: so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation.”<br /><br /><h2 style="text-align: left;"><b>References</b></h2>The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion. Church of England, 1571.</div></div>Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-721791267775245262024-02-04T16:14:00.016-07:002024-03-16T14:16:33.971-06:00What is the Ecclesia?<p>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5u543rZfb6sbXLwRUxLXYraITSArcoyykB9bF89PC0SxSW1caDFkslMtSafFUfRnqgA8HgyAHpCtYfL56aEOznk3_mQPI4ctHllTGr6OuidkLnu5HOEXkk96tSe4Xk9ES3tGM5mglonvcrV2Dfydnd9djNlNUI99xf7Rz95n1iHuyOFVoxRUaYkGCrAM/s300/Jays-Cross-Logo.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Jay Forrest" border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5u543rZfb6sbXLwRUxLXYraITSArcoyykB9bF89PC0SxSW1caDFkslMtSafFUfRnqgA8HgyAHpCtYfL56aEOznk3_mQPI4ctHllTGr6OuidkLnu5HOEXkk96tSe4Xk9ES3tGM5mglonvcrV2Dfydnd9djNlNUI99xf7Rz95n1iHuyOFVoxRUaYkGCrAM/w200-h200/Jays-Cross-Logo.png" title="Gnostic Christianity" width="200" />
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</p><blockquote>"Since you are eager for gifts of the Spirit, try to excel in those that build up the church" (1 Corinthians 14:12).</blockquote><div><div>Most Christian don’t know their own identity. They don’t know what the Ecclesia is. <br /><br />What would you answer if I asked you, “Where do you go to church?” The question would not be strange at all. You would answer that you go to such and such church at a particular address. To most people, a church is a building that one goes to on Sundays. Or Saturdays if you are a Seventh-day Adventist. <br /><br />The Greek word for “church” is <i>ekklesia</i>, which is brought over into English as Ecclesia. And it does not mean a building. As the <i>Encyclopædia Britannica</i> explains, ecclesia means “gathering of those summoned.” <i>Vines Expository Dictionary</i> of New Testament Words says the word literally means “called out ones.” <br /><br />Ecclesia refers to an organism, not an organization. Ecclesia can refer to the local gathering of Christians or the whole body of Christians scattered throughout the earth. It sometimes includes, says <i>The NAS New Testament Greek Lexicon</i>, “the assembly of faithful Christians already dead and received into heaven.” <br /><br />For this reason, I prefer using the word “Ecclesia” instead of the word “Church” when referring to the children of God in Christ. When I confess that I believe in “the holy Ecclesia,” I am referring to the true Christian everywhere irrespective of their labels. The Ecclesia is the gathering of those summoned by God.<br /></div></div><div><br /></div><div>An in the passage above, the Apostle Paul says we should "seek that ye may excel to the edifying of the church." Clearly he is not talking about encouraging a building, but the people of God. We don't go to church, we are the church. We are the called-out ones summoned by God. </div>Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-18921194885783630822024-01-29T08:00:00.022-07:002024-03-16T14:16:18.918-06:00Looking Back<p>
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</p><blockquote>And Jesus said unto him, "No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:62).</blockquote><div>You have said "yes." You have accepted the job offer. Now is not the time to doubt. Now is not the time to be "looking back."<br /><br />No job is perfect, and no job is really secure. Security is found only in God. Stop looking for it in the outside world. <br /><br />Doubts after decisions are devils trying to sabotage your new job, your new adventure. Put both hands to the plow and don't look back. It is too late to question, too late to second guess. Plow forward. Move ahead. <br /><br />It is good, sometimes, to close the book on a past chapter of your life. Indeed, we should be "Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead" (Philippians 3:13).<br /><br /></div>Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-72728087972586506362024-01-26T15:42:00.015-07:002024-03-16T14:16:06.277-06:00Careful About One Thing Only<p>
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</p><blockquote>“Be careful about one thing only,” says the Lord - “your relationship with Me,” - Oswald Chambers (cf. Matthew 6:25)</blockquote><p></p>Stop getting distracted by a hundred and one nonessential things. Stay focused Jay. The only thing that really matters is your relationship with God. It doesn’t matter whether the Bible is inerrant, what matters is that God is inerrant. <br /><br />Stop buying books. Seriously, stop! The only thing you should be buying is a good Bible and books on prayer and solitude. And then read them. Pray them. Focus on living the Way instead of studying the Way. You learn in the doing.<br /><br />Again, all questions should come back to how this affects my relationship with God. If it interferes with my prayer time, my solitude, or my spirituality, it should be avoided. This includes family and friends. God must be first.<br /><br />But family is second. Their relationship with God should be the priority here. Sacrifice for their good. Spend quality time with them, but not at the expense of your prayer life.<br /><br />Remember, be careful about one thing only, your relationship with God.<br />Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6100472692777562626.post-55955659095234175162024-01-01T06:00:00.010-07:002024-03-16T14:15:50.775-06:002024 The Year of Prayer<p>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5u543rZfb6sbXLwRUxLXYraITSArcoyykB9bF89PC0SxSW1caDFkslMtSafFUfRnqgA8HgyAHpCtYfL56aEOznk3_mQPI4ctHllTGr6OuidkLnu5HOEXkk96tSe4Xk9ES3tGM5mglonvcrV2Dfydnd9djNlNUI99xf7Rz95n1iHuyOFVoxRUaYkGCrAM/s300/Jays-Cross-Logo.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Jay Forrest" border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5u543rZfb6sbXLwRUxLXYraITSArcoyykB9bF89PC0SxSW1caDFkslMtSafFUfRnqgA8HgyAHpCtYfL56aEOznk3_mQPI4ctHllTGr6OuidkLnu5HOEXkk96tSe4Xk9ES3tGM5mglonvcrV2Dfydnd9djNlNUI99xf7Rz95n1iHuyOFVoxRUaYkGCrAM/w200-h200/Jays-Cross-Logo.png" title="Gnostic Christianity" width="200" />
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</p><blockquote>"Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation" (Matthew 26:41).</blockquote>I declare to myself that this year, 2024, shall be the year of prayer. <br /><br />I have never been a prayer warrior. Yes, I have studied the Bible, theology, and church history. Likewise, I have worshiped and praised. But prayer has always been a weak point for me.<br /><br />It is time to make prayer a priority. It must become a daily habit. No, even deeper. I must learn to “pray continually” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).<br /><br />I will study and practice the Jesus Prayer with the Eastern Orthodox Tradition. Furthermore, I will practice the prayers in the Common Book of Prayer. I will pray the prayers in Luther’s Small Catechism. And I will practice the prayer in the Catholic prayer book of St, Benedict. In all cases, I will learn how to pray from those who have been praying for ages.<br /><br />I will, of course, pair this with Bible reading and meditation. And I will not neglect silence, solitude, and simplicity. My desire is to grow in my relationship with God.<br /><br />Pray every morning and prayer every evening. And pray throughout the day. Remember to remember. “Pray continually” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).<br /><br /><div>Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.<br /></div>Jay Forresthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09990741849237698289noreply@blogger.com