Gnostic AttitudeAlan - you had an experience that I haven't. I can accept your story as Gospel, because you tell me that it is what you experienced. I was not there. I did not have your experience. I can only accept what you say - or doubt what you say.
Your story does not sound like Gavril Barnutiu
Your story does not sound like Angelica Zambrano's
or Enoch
or Paul
or Edgar Casey (not even a theologian)
How can I say - Enoch is correct and you are not - or Paul was correct and Enoch not - I CANNOT!
What I can do is listen, read, absorb these stories and apply scripture - 1 Thes 5:21 - TEST EVERYTHING - and KEEP THE GOOD
Your story has similarities with Enoch, Paul, Edgar, Angelica, and Gavril - it is these similarities that speak to me.
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PerspectiveThe basic knowledge we posses is the framework by which our minds process new information. We know more about space today and the idea of the earth being flat is ridicules. Everyone understands this common knowledge today, but on a personal level, our basic knowledge is the end product of our life experience, effected by our cultural and educational biases. Combined that with the revelation that persist among people today is greater than ever before. No wonder twenty people can see an accident and swear to twenty different versions of the same incident.
Just imagine how a college science professor might report the incident. 'After breaking, the momentum of Vehicle A was too great and carried Vehicle into Vehicle B with tremendous energy.'
The extremely upset student that was just graded poorly by that same professor thought that: 'Vehicle A just came out of no where and blew Vehicle B away.'
Yet, the empathetic lady saw that, 'The driver of Vehicle A tried their best to avoid Vehicle B by swerving and weaving.'
However, the lady standing next to the empathetic lady had lost her husband to a drunk driver years earlier and interpreted the swerving and weaving much differently.
The religious zealot may swear that if it wasn't for the hand of God, some one may have gotten hurt.
However, the wino sleeping buy the dumpster will swear that a bolt of lightning struck the two cars and caused them to explode. Which sounds absolutely crazy and is so easily dismissed, because of the predigest toward the wino's life style and the potential supernatural context of his statement, until the drivers of both vehicles admit that the sun was shinning in their eyes and reflecting off their windshields.
Detectives are trained to take all twenty statements and evaluate them side by side to search for a central truth. In essence, they are trying to look at the reported event from as many different perspectives as possible. I adopt this strategy/methodology in the search for a more meaningful truth. I intend to examine the issue from as many different perspectives as possible. Giving each perspective weight, yet understanding that any one perspective never includes the entire story."[/i]
ponderingconfusion.com/papers.php?id=psychology
The other side of this Gnostic attitude - does God speak the same message to each of us?In the example of Moses and Pharaoh - God gave different instructions to each side of the conflict
Paul's calling was much different than Thomas's or Peter's - or even James
There are 4 Roman Gospels and about a dozen Gospels altogether - Mark does not sound like Luke and John is even more different
The question came to me a few years ago from a Muslim in Iran - which of the 4 Gospels is the true Gospel
The answer - The Gospel is a message - not a book
It seems to me that all of the heaven visitors mentioned here all speak the same message from different perspectives.
Why? - because we are cultural
Gavril spoke to you - touched something within you for you to receive value from it - you can relate to him - you are a grown man - but his message my say nothing to a teenager in Ecuador. Just as a teenagers message from Latin America didn't speak to you, who are of a different culture.
Have you ever noticed that 25 people can try to explain a difficult concept to you and you just don't get it - until someone different says the exact same thing, but suddenly you understand. WHY? This new person said the same thing as everyone else, but for some reason the way they phrased it for you made sense. This is why there are 4 Gospels and not 1. This is why there are 66 books total in the Roman Bible and 83 in the Coptic Broader Canon. One tunnel vision perspective does not speak to everyone.
