Sunday 8 June 2014

Forgiveness means removing the poison of bitterness from your heart

Forgiveness doesn't mean forgiving or forgetting one's sins and hurts upon us but removing the poison of bitterness that is being rooted on our heart. The poison of bitterness is a very bad thing, it takes away everything from us, sinks its roots deep with in us and tears us apart from with in.

Why this so called poison of bitterness should come in the way of your relationship with the Holy Father? Why you should stray away from the path of righteousness and from your God just because of other's sins? That doesn't mean we should forgive someone just for the sake of forgiving without being fully healed ourselves. At these times it is better to take your pain to Christ and let him heal your wounds and let him decide when is the right time to forgive someone so that you are fully healed and ready to forgive. When you forgive after you are finally healed your heart becomes lighter and you start gaining strength to take the path of righteousness again.

Most Christians believe in original sin and take for granted that it is in their nature to sin and they believe they are sinners by birth and believe that Christ died for their sins but they all have failed to understand the root cause of sin. While Christianity puts the fall of man with the sin of Adam, Gnosticism puts the origin of sin with the Fall of Sophia. This is where I, as a Valentinian depart from orthodox Christians. I as a Valentinian Christian, reject the original sin and reject the atonement of the sins by Jesus Christ.

People sin not because they are sinners by birth nor do they sin because they have inherited sin from their ancestors, people sin because they are ignorant of the Holy Father, this is the root cause of all sins. Isn't prevention better than cure? Isn't it better to not sin at all instead of sinning again and again and asking for forgiveness again and again? Just by fervently believing that Christ died for our sins will not lift the burden of guilt from our shoulders and will not make our souls free from sinning. Only acquaintance of the Father can really make us free from being sinners.

Gnosis (knowledge) of the Father removes the power of sin. Those who have gnosis (knowledge) are theoretically free of sin. The Gospel of Philip says "The one who has knowledge is a free person. But the free person does not sin, for the one who sins is a slave of sin " (Gospel of Philip 77:15-18 cf.. John 8:34). Spiritual people by definition do not sin. Through knowledge they die with regard to sin and are raised up again with Christ (Excepts of Theodotus 77:1). Gnosis (knowledge) eliminates their inner demons and gives them a "pure heart" which allows them to lead a sinless existence (Valentinus Fragment 2/H) 


This is why Valentinians claimed that spiritual people are "saved by nature" (Excerpts of Theodotus 55:3, cf.. Ep 7:8, Ireneus Against Heresies 1:6:4, Thessalonians 2:13), and that it is "impossible for them to fall prey to corruption" (Ireneus Against Heresies 1:6:2 cf.. 1 John 3:9). They were said to have the knowledge of God's will that allows them to lead a sinless existence (cf.. Gospel of Truth 22:9-11, Interpretation of Knowledge 9:31-33) and become "illuminators in the midst of mortal men" (Letter of Peter to Philip 137:6-9). 
The idea that the redeemed person is theoretically set free from the power of sin is derived from the New Testament, particularly the letters of Saint Paul. In the Epistle to the Romans he says, "Our old sinful self has been put to death with Christ on the cross, in order that the power of the sinful self might be destroyed" (Romans 5:6). Later in the same letter he says, "You have been set free from sin" (Romans 6:22). Similar ideas occur in the First Epistle of John, "Whoever is a child of God does not continue to sin, for God's very nature is in him" (1 John 3:9)
In contrast, spiritual Christians were redeemed through unmerited grace (cf. Gospel of Truth 35:25-28). The elect are "spiritual not by behavior but by nature" (Irenaeus Against Heresies 1:6:2) as a consequence of having God's spirit. As we have seen previously, the gnosis (knowledge) granted by the grace of God was expressed through complete abstinence from sin. Valentinians believed that ordinary Christians performed good deeds in order to be saved while they themselves performed good deeds as an expression of their salvation. 

In conclusion, Valentinians are closer to the mainstream of Christianity than is often assumed to be the case. The evidence supports the conclusion by Desjardins (1990, page 116) that the Valentinians were "Christians who took sacraments quite seriously, who took to heart Matthew's Sermon on the Mount, and were deeply concerned about not committing sins". It might further be added that there is certainly some truth to their own claims that their theology was derived from Saint Paul. 
  
Isn't the world will be a better place if everyone abstain from sinning but one cannot be free from sinning unless and until one knows the Father and Sophia is doing just that i.e. sowing the spiritual seed in all of us and turning our nature from hylics to psychics and finally to pneumatics. By blind faith or by doing good deeds one cannot receive the gnosis of the Father, it can only be received through grace and by predestination, this is the reason why we don't try to evangelize anyone by force, its a gift which you have to receive from the Holy Father and everyone will finally receive that gift from him.

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