Imperishable Inheritance

I use the word “new” lightly. I’m not claim­ing it to be entirely new, but to me it has been an earth-shattering rev­e­la­tion. We, as Chris­tians, tend to put major reli­gions and what we define as “Chris­t­ian cults” in largely mutu­ally exclu­sive groups. But can not a “major reli­gion” be viewed pri­mar­ily as a Chris­t­ian cult? We do this for LDS, JW’s, Chris­t­ian Sci­ence, etc.; but maybe we need to reflect on Islam in a sim­i­lar light. Here are some char­ac­ter­is­tics of Chris­t­ian cults I found (only one of many lists):

New Truth

Many cults pro­mote the false idea that God has revealed some­thing spe­cial to them. This is usu­ally truth that has never before been reveal­ed and super­sedes and con­tra­dicts all pre­vi­ous rev­e­la­tions. Some cults make no claim to new truth or extraâ??biblical rev­e­la­tion, but believe they alone have the key to inter­pret­ing the mys­ter­ies in the Bible.

A Nonâ??biblical Source of Authority

Some cults have sacred writ­ings or a source of author­ity that super­sedes the Bible.

Another Jesus

One char­ac­ter­is­tic that is found in all cults is false teach­ing about the per­son of Jesus Christ in the light of his­tor­i­cal bib­li­cal Chris­tian­ity. The Apos­tle Paul warned about fol­low­ing after “another Jesus” (2 Corinthi­ans 11:4) who is not the same Jesus who is revealed in Scrip­ture. The “Jesus” of the cults is always some­one less than the Bible’s eter­nal God who became flesh, lived here on earth, and died for our sins.

Rejec­tion of Ortho­dox Christianity

Char­ac­ter­is­tic of many cul­tic groups is a frontal attack on ortho­dox Chris­tian­ity. They argue that the church has departed from the true faith.

Doubleâ??Talk

A fea­ture of some cul­tic groups is that they say one thing pub­licly but inter­nally believe some­thing totally different.

Nonâ??biblical Teach­ing on the Nature of God (Trinity)

Another char­ac­ter­is­tic of all nonâ??Christian cults is either an inad­e­quate view or out­right denial of the Holy Trin­ity. The bib­li­cal doc­trine of the Trin­ity, one God in three Per­sons, is usu­ally attacked as being pagan or satanic in origin.

Chang­ing Theology

Cult doc­trines are con­tin­u­ally in a state of flux and have no sure foun­dation on which to anchor their hope.

Strong Lead­er­ship

Cults are usu­ally char­ac­ter­ized by cen­tral leader fig­ures who con­sider them­selves mes­sen­gers of God with unique access to the Almighty. Since the leader has such a spe­cial rela­tion­ship with God, he can dic­tate the the­ol­ogy and behav­ior of the cult.

Sal­va­tion by Works

One teach­ing that is totally absent from all the cults is the gospel of the grace of God. No one is taught in the cults that he can be saved from eter­nal damna­tion by sim­ply plac­ing his faith in Jesus Christ. It is always belief in Jesus Christ and “do this” or “fol­low that.” All cults attach some­thing to the doc­trine of sal­va­tion by grace through faith.

False Prophecy

Another fea­ture of the cults is they often pro­mul­gate false prophecy. Cult lead­ers, who believe they have been divinely called by God, have made bold pre­dic­tions of future events, sup­pos­edly revealed by the inspi­ra­tion of God.

And by “chang­ing the­ol­ogy” I’m refer­ring to the Hadith and it’s con­tin­ual re-canonical process (which was actu­ally explained to me by a Islamic the­olo­gian). I also found another list that also shows the cul­tic nature of Islam. I’m not going to go into how Islam actu­ally vio­lates all these prin­ci­ples here (although if any­one has a ques­tion let me know). I just want to throw out the thought.

It seems that I have per­ceived Islam in a light that must be re-evaluated. This new way of approach­ing this cult has made much light of how to approach study­ing and apol­o­gis­ing for their the­o­log­i­cal argu­ments. I will finally get to visit a mosque for the first time on Fri­day, and I’m look­ing for­ward to the worldview-expanding experience.