Cults and World Religions

If we understand spiritual warfare, we are not just to put on the armor of God. We are also prescribed to know the tactics of the enemy and those ideologies that come up against the knowledge of God (2 Corinthians 10:3,4). The enemy of the Christian’s faith is Satan, and he uses his armies to disseminate false teachings and heresies that easily delude believers who are not strong in their faith and knowledge of the Word of God.

World Religions
Over twenty years ago, the towers in New York City by Islamic terrorists. This resurrected the need to understand the religion of Islam and what makes it different from biblical Christianity. Does Islam worship the same God as Jews and Christians? What makes Islam different from the other monotheistic religions? My Understanding Islam page will provide you with the information you need to know on these questions and more.

Cults and Aberrant Religions
Over the past few decades, the media has viewed such groups as the David Koresh’s Branch Davidians, Marshall Applewhite’s “Heaven’s Gate UFO group, Jim Jones’ People’s Temple and Rev. Moon’s Unification Church as cults, but they do not consider such groups such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the United Pentecostal Church, the International Church of Christ, the Worldwide Church of God (“Armstrongism”a.k.a. The Church of God) or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons).  

Psychologists define a cult as a group which deviates from cultural norms.   The dictionary defines a cult in several ways ranging from “a group of followers” (implying to the devotion of one central figure or a particular principle), “a system of religious worship”, or “a sect.”  Indeed all of these ideas are important when Christians use the word cult. 

For the Christian, the late Dr. Walter R. Martin (author of the classic work, The Kingdom of the Cults) defines a cult as follows, 

“A cult, then, is a group of people polarized around someone’s interpretation of the Bible and is characterized by major deviations from orthodox Christianity relative to the cardinal doctrines of the Christian faith,  particularly the fact that God became man in Jesus Christ.” (The Kingdom of the Cults, page 12).

So a cult is a group of people that are polarized or gathered around a major deviation or set of deviations from biblical Christianity.  How can we recognize those deviations? 

We have pages which will provide you with information that we and others have written over the years in the area of the cults and the new religious movements. The purpose of this page is to provide you with resources, links and videos that respond to the false ideologies and theologies presented by cult groups.

More to come. . . . .