End of Gospel by Victor Porton - HTML preview

In this book, I affirm that the New Testament denies itself in the same way as it denies the Old Testament. The outcome of gospel is the end of gospel.

The meaning of gospel is sometimes the direct opposite of what we thought it means.

http://endofgospel.org

What I Do Not Say

I do not say that the gospel is wrong. It was and always will be right.

I do not say that I would cease to believe. I believe just as before.

I do not say that the gospel ceased to have importance for us. It always was and will be important.

Hard Questions

In this chapter, I raised several questions about Christian religion which are hard to answer.

Who Is Better?

“Make my joy full…in humility, each counting others better than himself” (Phil. 2:1–3).

So we should count others better than ourselves.

But how can we count above us those who don’t know the gospel? Are they better than us who know the gospel and live accordingly to it?

One Hundred Thousand Dollars
for Sex

Once I met with a rich woman. She asked me to have sex with her. I said, “Pay me one hundred thousand dollars if you want to have sex with me.”

A day later, she came with one hundred thousand dollars in a suitcase. Then I told her that I’m a Christian and would not have sex for money.

Why I refused? Because in 1 Corinthians 6:9–10, it says, “the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God. Don’t be deceived…nor male prostitutes…nor thieves…will inherit the kingdom of God.” A male prostitute is a man who indulges sex for money. So I decided to not be a prostitute because it contradicts to the New Testament.

But despite my refusal, I wondered why God forbids this. This way, I could escape from living in poverty and from many trials and temptations in life.

I also wondered why God strictly forbids thieving. Isn’t it that money is more useful in the hands of believers? Wouldn’t it be better if we would seize or thieve money in order to use it for the kingdom of God?

Broken Head

It is scientifically proven that people think and are ruled with brain. The proof is simple: If a man’s brain is damaged, then his thoughts and behavior change.

I was not believing this scientific fact, being sure (according to a widespread Christian doctrine) that the mind of a man belongs to the soul or spirit and not to the brain.

But there were a few occasions when my own head was broken. Particularly, my head was sometimes hit by a frying pan as a punishment for following the gospel. That was causing my misbehavior, proving that our thoughts and behavior indeed are dependent on the brain.

How can we get away with this contradiction of Christian doctrine and proven science?

The Outcome of the Contradictions

As such, I was living with contradictions:

I’m better than other people; I should count myself worse than other people.

I need money for good; I must not steal or do prostitution.

The conscience is located in soul; damaged brain damages proper conscience.

Thus I lived with contradictions in my mind. It was an unbreakable obstacle on my way. I was suffering an obstacle in every kind of situation, even when there were no real obstacles, because contradictions in my mind were obstacles.

So, I’ve formulated several questions hard for a Christian to answer. I indeed will answer these questions below.

On Losing Something

Jesus has said, “But I tell you, don’t resist him who is evil; but whoever strikes you on your right cheek, turn to him the other also” (Mt. 5:39). I wondered, isn’t proper functioning of our mouth important for our ability to preach the gospel? Shouldn’t we protect ourselves in order to be able to preach? “But having food and clothing, we will be content with that” (1 Tim. 6:8). But how could we contend if we had no Internet access in order to preach the gospel? “But I tell you who hear: love your enemies, do good to those who hate you” (Lk. 6:27). Okay, we should love our enemies. But should we love enemies of the gospel?

The Main Idea of This Book

The main ideas of this book are postulated as the following:

The gospel should be applied to itself.

The New Testament terminates itself in the same way as it terminates the Old Testament.

The meaning of the gospel is about the “end of gospel” (a situation where the gospel does not apply anymore).

Gospel comes to its end like the Old Testament has come to end.

I will give examples below of that novel interpretation of the New Testament.

Some Misses with Gospel

Misses with the Coming of Christ

Christ has come to us and was sacrificed for us by mistake

The statement is not my invention, it is written in the Bible, “For him who knew no sin he made to be sin on our behalf; so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21). Christ has never made any mistakes. But his coming was by mistake. The entire life of Jesus Christ was a big mistake.

The word sin means “a mistake,” or literally translated “to miss the mark,” or “to hit missing away the target.”

In simple words, Christ has come to a wrong planet (roughly saying). It was not his mistake as he never mistakes, but his driver—an angel—has mistaken and driven him to a wrong planet. The driver has missed the target of the travel. For us saved by Christ was good, but this was not good in general. The gospel plainly tells that we are saved by grace—that is, saved incidentally as a result of a mistake, which was a good for us. Christ had more important deals than to save us, but his driver has mistaken. We were reading in the New Testament that we are saved by grace that is incidentally not by us being worthy of salvation, but were not understanding this before.

However, not only the earthy life of Jesus Christ was a mistake. It is written, “Christ…him who knew no sin he made to be sin on our behalf” (2 Cor. 5:20–21). That is, Christ was made sin. This means that the entire life of Christ in this world (not only on the Earth) was a mistake—that is, all what has happened to him in the world was a mistake. We had just an incidental success (grace), but anybody else also had only the same incidental success. For anybody taken separately, salvation is just an incident (good for him) but missing for others.

Jesus Christ was speaking
not from himself

“The words that I tell you, I speak not from myself; but the Father who lives in me does his works…The word which you hear isn’t mine, but the Father’s who sent me” (Jn. 14:10, 24).

Jesus Christ was saying that he speaks not from himself. We were not realizing what this means despite that it is very simple, He was just saying not what he wanted to say. He was probably also bound by certain legal obligations and was not able to say what he wanted to say. All what he has said was a truth, but not that truth which it should be.

Here, it is also said that Christ is sent—that is, accomplishes a particular formal mission. He is not at a free walk where one would speak anything he wants to say.

A reader could respond, “Yes, he was speaking not from himself, but it is plainly told here that he was speaking from the Father, so his words were indeed the words of God to us.”

He indeed has said not in vain that he spoke not from himself. It meant something. He has emphasized that he speaks not from himself. And what does it mean? It means that he was speaking not free according to the situation, but by a prepared (by the Father) pattern. You would meet with a great teacher or a great speaker, but if he would just read a study book, he would be no different in anything when compared with a lesser teacher. It is exactly what I say that Christ teaches not from himself but by a study book, by a pattern. It was not an individual lesson specifically prepared for us, as we are not worthy of this, but just a standard lesson.

We have not yet really spoken with Christ! We have spoken with him as an official, not as a person. Essentially, we have spoken with a common official of the kingdom of Heaven, not reached the highest level. Just any official would say the same words, so this does not matter that it was Jesus Christ himself; it was just like a common official.

So we have overweighed the importance of the visit of Christ. A great teacher has come, but what all he did was that he just read us from a study book, just like as any other (lower rank) teacher would do. Nothing special has happened. We were simply overimpressed by the words that Christ has come.

Doing Away with the Letter of Gospel

Letter kills

Gospel says: “Who also made us sufficient as servants of a new covenant; not of the letter, but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2 Cor. 3:6).

But have you ever think that this produces a paradox: New Testament book itself is letter. So it should kill.

In other words, New Testament itself claims that we should not follow its letter, because it “kills”, but spirit. After all, we know that Bible is true, we cannot ignore its letter.

In the end of gospel theology, this verse should be understood as the letter of the gospel kills. Moreover, it should be understand as the letter of the gospel kills the gospel itself—that is, the New Testament terminates itself.

To say “we should not follow the letter of Gospel” is the same as to say “New Testament is terminated”, because we must follow the letter of a covenant we entered in, unless it is terminated. Termination means that we are no more following the letter. It does not mean that we stop to believe or stop to live accordingly the spirit of Gospel.

When we tried to follow the letter of Bible we were like Pharisees as in (Mat. 23:24) “You blind guides, who strain out a gnat, and swallow a camel!” That is when we followed some particular commandments, we just violated more important commandments.

Before, we did not know the exact way the gospel is terminated. In this book, I explained where exactly the gospel fails and why it needs to be terminated.

We are not under the gospel now

The story that was told by the gospel was that the ancient Jews were, in their time, under the law of God and the Old Covenant (Old Testament). But once the time of the law has passed—when Jesus Christ the Messiah has come and then the believers started to justify themselves independently of the law by faith, “We maintain therefore that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law” (Rom. 3:28). So, accordingly in the gospel, the law has become not needed and has become a history, just a teaching example for us now, not a law according to which we live. “For sin will not have dominion over you. For you are not under law, but under grace” (Rom. 6:14).

It is clear that this should somehow apply to any law and even to the gospel itself. (Well, the gospel is not a law, but our understanding of the gospel has made a law for us.) But before, it was not understood how it should be applied to the gospel. For example, personally, I before supposed that regarding the gospel itself, it means just raising from the gospel to a new level of the gospel itself. But now, I know how we should deal away with the gospel. Now this is clear.

What I say is, we are not under the gospel anymore, and what the gospel says is now not said to us—that is, God speaks in the gospel to others but not to us. “Now we know that whatever things the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law” (Rom. 3:19).

This is just like as that after the end of the Old  Testament; what God speaks in the book to the Jewish nation continues to be important, knowledgeable, insightful, etc., but it is not spoken to us; it was spoken to the old covenant Jews.

Death for gospel

By “death for Gospel” I mean that we stop following the commandments like a law. I do not mean neither that we stop believing nor that we deny the spirit of Gospel.

“Death for Gospel” sounds... wild, but it is just like to Paul preaching death for Torah. At some stage this should happen.

“For I, through the law, died to the law, that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I that live, but Christ living in me. That life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself up for me. I don’t make void the grace of God. For if righteousness is through the law, then Christ died for nothing!” (Gal. 2:19–21). For the past stage, “the law” has been meaning the gospel. That is, for us, it means that through the gospel, we died to the gospel. In the time when we lived accordingly in the gospel, we lived for ourselves not for God. We followed selfish desires to be unpunished. (However some followed it from the reasoning that God wants this.) Now being free of the gospel, we can live for God. Before, we counted that we live an eternal life according to the gospel. Now I do not count so anymore. “Christ is the end of the law,” (Rom. 10:4). We reach contact with Christ when we cease to live by a law. Now it means for us to cease to live by the gospel. Then we will reach revelation of Christ. “For if I build again the things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor. For I through the law am dead to the law, that I may live to God” (Gal. 2:18–19). Pertaining to our topic, it means that we should never again build our life accordingly following commandments of the gospel as a law. No return to the gospel as a law. Gospel itself locks the way back.

Resurrection for Gospel

After death for a commandment of New Testament we should experience resurrection for it. This means that we begin to live by spirit and fulfill a commandment naturally by our inner nature without trying to conform to a particular commandment.

For resurrection to happen, first death should happen. This means that first we should understand that we should not follow a particular commandment or doctrine as a law.

It is essential to know the doctrine of death for Gospel, because otherwise we cannot stop to live accordingly to a law.

I tried to live accordingly to spirit not accordingly commandments, but in the past this failed for me: Because our understanding of spirit of Gospel was constructed from individual commandments, I returned to follow commandments like a law. My attempt to live by spirit of Gospel failed with my understanding of spirit of Gospel crashing and breaking into individual commandments again. We need to understand that the entire Gospel dies and every commandment is canceled for us, in order to be able to live by spirit.

Now I do not live accordingly commandments and ordinances anymore, because I understand that every commandment is canceled for us, for us to live accordingly spirit.

Prosperity Gospel as an example

Some Christian denominations, primarily Charismatics and Pentecostals, believe in the Prosperity doctrine or Prosperity Gospel. Other denominations, both evangelical and liberal, such as Methodists or Baptists, reject this teaching and even say that it is a heresy.

For those who may be unaware of what this teaching is; the Prosperity Gospel is the belief that faith, when combined with following certain commandments, primarily those involving giving money to God’s work or those who need it, results in making the giver  prosperous, not only in heaven but also in this world. This prosperity takes the form or earthly wealth and influence.

Proponents of this doctrine point to Bible verses, such as the well-known “blessing of Abraham” (who was a rich man by the standards of his day). Likewise, opponents quote other Bible verses to support their case.

Provided our faith is correct, I do not doubt that with God's help we can obtain everything we request. “Or do you think that I couldn’t ask my Father, and he would even now send me more than twelve legions of angels?” (Mt. 26:53);  “… how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him” (Mt. 7:11); “All things, whatever you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.” (Mt. 21:22); “Therefore I tell you, all things whatever you pray and ask for, believe that you receive them, and you shall have them.” (Mrk. 11:24); “Whatever you will ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you will ask anything in my name, I will do it.” (Jn. 14:13); “If you remain in me, and my words remain in you, you will ask whatever you desire, and it will be done for you.” (Jn. 15:7); “… that whatever you will ask of the Father in my name, he may give it to you.” (Jn. 15:16); “… Most assuredly I tell you, whatever you may ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you.” (John 16:23)

During the first few years after my conversion to Christ I lived in extreme poverty. Things were so bad I was afraid I would die of hunger. Even later when I believed the Prosperity doctrine and was asking God to give me money, I wasn’t receiving the promised blessings. I was in conflict with everybody, because I was constantly quarreling about the Bible with anyone who would listen. The verses are plain in their promises, so if they were not evident in my life the problem is not the bible, rather my faith was wrong. (Or do you think having the right faith leads to a meaningless death by starvation?) I could be not a preacher, because if I preached in a church, all of my sermons would be “how to behave in such a way as to conflict with everyone and die of hunger.” I was living a life of following a self-contradictory doctrine. It was all about me: “For let that man not think that he will receive anything from the Lord. He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.” (James 1:7-8)

Now I have no doubt that if a person’s faith is correct and they pray for money then God will answer.

The question is should we ask God to give us large sums of money? Should we practice the commandments of prosperity for the sake of prosperity?

It looks like that Gospel indicates that the answer is a resounding no! “But having food and clothing, we will be content with that. But those who are determined to be rich fall into a temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful lusts, such as drown men in ruin and destruction.” (1Tim. 6:8-9)

This verse is the death of the Prosperity doctrine.

But remember, in the Gospel death is followed by a resurrection! “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various temptations, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. Let endurance have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” (Jam. 1:2-4) In this passage, “various” includes the temptation of richness. So when God gives us richness we should accept it with great joy. We should lack in nothing (be rich) according to the above Bible quote. Also, “Blessed is the man who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to those who love him.” (Jam. 1:12)

“But let the brother in humble circumstances glory in his high position; and the rich, in that he is made humble, because like the flower in the grass, he will pass away” (Jam. 1:9-10). This is the reverse of what we thought.

Those who have riches should understand that they are tempted more than those who have little or nothing. “Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming on you.” (Jam. 5:1)

Wisdom of Gospel

Let no one deceive himself. If anyone thinks that he is wise among you in this world, let him become a fool, that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, “He has taken the wise in their craftiness.” And again, “The Lord knows the reasoning of the wise, that it is worthless.” (1 Cor. 3:18–20)

According to my theological postulates, world should be interpreted as “followers of the gospel.” That is, wisdom of followers of the gospel is foolishness.

The more we were studying the gospel, the more we were tempted and confused.

When he [the spirit of truth] has come, he will convict the world about sin, about righteousness, and about judgment; about sin, because they don’t believe in me; about righteousness, because I am going to my Father, and you won’t see me any more; about judgment, because the prince of this world has been judged. I have yet many things to tell you, but you can’t bear them now. (Jn. 16:8–12)

That the prince of this world is condemned means that who will be condemned is our past life in ignorance when we attempted to live according to the gospel as a law. “About sin that do not believe me” means that we were ignoring the real personality of Christ completely, substituting it with the official representative described in the gospel. “About righteousness that I go to my Father” means that Christ has come to the earth by mistake, while he was traveling to another direction, to his Father what is the right direction and his remaining here would be wrong.

The essence of what I say is that—notwithstanding that there are no contradictions in the gospel—the gospel has come very near to contradiction.

Failures of Life in Accordance to the Gospel

Here is an example of a problem that appeared during life accordingly gospel. Being (in my own understanding) a great mathematician, I counted that people should kind of stay on their knees before me, serve me. So everybody whom I was met was made severely blamed for his actions, even a little bad to me or not doing good to me. But the gospel is the ministry of justification (not the “ministry of good” as was the Old Testament). So my life was contrary to the gospel as I was making everybody I met blamed, not justified. What I have reached is kind of absurd—the more good I do, the worse it is. Every time, when a bad man meets a good man, it is bad, because the bad man should serve the good man, but he does not. So we have concluded that to be a good man is bad because it causes others to be guilty.

That we have advocates is good. We cannot live without advocates. But when a good advocate saves a bad person from prison, it is not the best.

Why we Christians were tortured so much? Isn’t it for the good purpose to cause us to somehow deviate from the set way of faith and to guess that thing (which I guessed) and write here? What else can be done to teach somebody to which it is impossible to speak except to somehow torture him in the hope that incidentally he will deviate from his normal way and guess? “The god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving” (2 Cor. 4:4). “God of this world” means God limited to the means and rules of this world. Now we see exactly this that despite the gospel is true and right, we were blinded by that spirit (God of this world) which has set our minds that we should be limited by the gospel.

Now I deem that being justified, we indeed should behave as not justified, remembering however that we are justified to not fall into complete self-condemnation.

Probably St. Paul also knew the mystery. “For seeing that in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom didn’t know God, it was God’s good pleasure through the foolishness of the preaching to save those who believe” (1 Cor. 1:21). Here Paul says that our preaching was foolish. It was a foolish deal to preach. “For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are dying, but to us who are saved it is the power of God” (1 Cor. 1:18). Oh, who died on the cross? It was Christ. For him, what was considered by us as the power of God (the word of cross) was simply a stupidity. It was looking like wise only from our side.

Failure of Angels

The word gospel in Greek (evangelion) has a common root with the word angel. Based on this, gospel can be also translated like “being angel well,” “correct life of angels,” “correct rules of behavior for angels” or something like this. So the end of gospel means that the behavior of angels ceased to be well, that the angels started to misbehave.

Not only Christian people, but also angels attempted to live according to the gospel. As I have shown above, the attempt to be ministers of the gospel was silly. As a result, not only people but also angels lived in a silly way. As during that time, the church developed and become more advanced; actions of Christians became more silly. Obviously. angels advanced greater and more successfully than people, so the actions of angels became sillier faster than the actions of people. As a result in our time, angels have reached about the same degree of silliness as people. Now angels are essentially as silly as people.

(Before, I was unable to think this way—to accommodate this into my mental model—as I was considering people as inherently unequal with higher levels of angels.)

For me, it was a self-obvious thing that an angel surpasses a man so much that a man would have no hope to reach a level compared to that. But as angels have also become silly, now it has happened indeed that people are on a level of development which is near to the level of angels—that is, angels have now reached such a degree of silliness that take the decision to actually count themselves equal with people.

In the future world, angels will be below people. “For he didn’t subject the world to come, whereof we speak, to angels. But one has somewhere testified, saying, ‘What is man, that you think of him? Or the son of man, that you care for him?’” (Heb. 2:5–6).

Inherent Problems with Gospel

Here are also some examples of how attempting to minister the gospel leads to nonsense:

Bible teaches to be humble to be raised by God, but also that those who raise themselves are brought down by God. It has lead me to the nonsense that I am to be humble to be raised, but this would be raising myself and humility has lost its sense for me. (The resolution is not that the Bible would be not right, but that this should be eliminated by counting all being equal before a higher level. Being equal, it is impossible nor to be raised nor to fall, and this loses any sense.)

Jesus Christ has commanded to not judge, but in 1 Corinthians chapter 2 verse 15, it states, “But he who is spiritual discerns all things, and he himself is judged by no one.” (Now we do not count ourselves as spiritual but as fleshly.)

Gospel can be called a teaching about humility, and humility is an important thing. Because this is an important thing, we were proud that we are ministers of the gospel, instead of to be humble.

I continue to believe that all what was said in the Bible are historic facts. But now, for me, these have become namely historic facts. Great history with heavenly powers coming to the earth but just a history, the past.

Here I will demonstrate some silly, meaningless situations where I have fallen, attempting to live according to the gospel.

Silly Situations

When I was a teenager, the elders severely punished me for my faith of Christ and for my godly life (sexual abstinence, for example). The punishments included hitting my head and other kinds of tortures which were making me mad. Then, driven mad, would I not go to have sex with a dog? Wouldn’t it better to have sex with the girl with which they commanded me to have sex? Wouldn’t it better to deny Christ by words than being driven mad lose memory and really forget him or even to change to pray to the devil?

This is what was leading to my life according to the gospel. Now it is evident that it is useless and even harmful to attempt to live according to the gospel as a law.

The gospel as a law was inappropriate from the very beginning. Yet St. Paul was beaten and driven mad. But either, St. Paul did not understood that gospel has the end, according to the gospel itself, or rather he has kept this in secret (so it seems from the verse “mystery of the gospel” [Eph. 6:19]). But anyway, until now we were holding the gospel despite it was having no sense for us to attempt to hold it.

Now I have realized that the driver of Christ has missed the target, came to a wrong planet, and all this was a big mistake, after being for a long time greatly confused, attempting to find a sense in some of acts of Christ (who as I know never makes mistakes and his every act has a sense) which as I now understand were meaningless.

I was repeatedly put in silly situations like this. I was at the lowest rank in a church organization. They would not only allow me to preach, but they did not even speak to me. The pastor was despising me. So I found no chance of how I could call them (both the pastor and others) to the true faith and repentance and save them. And all what could be enough to change all this—to be respected by the pastor, allowed to preach, and take a high position—would be to have sex with the wife of the pastor (which has offered it to me). I was completely messed in mind, thinking about situations like this, supposing I would do this (I have not). But if I would, what would it be? A kind of prostitution. Then who would I be after this? I would be an apostle prostitute. (I was called to be a missionary in Africa as I will describe below, so I call myself an apostle.) Yes, there was a reason in not doing this. It is that I was simply not able to analyze this situation. I have been somehow able to analyz