What isn't in the New Testament, Gnostic Gospels then, false teachings today

About this Lesson

A primary criticism of the New Testament is that critics say that Christians intentionally left out and/or suppressed certain writings, primarily what we call the Gnostic Gospels, and that they should be part of our New Testament and aren’t.

We need to take their challenges seriously because our New Testament contains both how to be saved by faith in Jesus AND how to live our lives after we accept Him as Savior in ways that are pleasing to Him.

But there are always alternative voices, ways to be saved, and live a “spiritual” life.

The Gnostic Gospels are an ancient alternative that we are going to look at because it isn’t just scholars who are influenced by them. Here is a typical quote that could be said by many,

“It seems to me that the only true Christians were the Gnostics, who believed in self-knowledge, i.e. becoming Christ themselves, reaching the Christ within, the light is the truth. Turn on the light.”

John Lennon is the person who said it and you don’t have to listen to those famous, past or present, to hear the idea of God within you (without Jesus. This claim is very popular today in some of the philosophical heirs of it in various cults such as Scientology, modern church “progressive” movements, and the challenges of “deconstruction.”

In this lesson, we’ll start with what the Bible warned us about false teachers and then we’ll go into detail showing how these views are false. To do that we’ll read some of the source documents. People are sometimes afraid to read them but they shouldn’t be—don’t simply listen to what critics say about the Bible, check it out and you’ll see for yourself the truth of Biblical teaching. 

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