A large part of my christian experience over the last thirty years has been with people caught up in with religious cults, sects and extremist groups, or who have dabbled in the occult.

Often these people are ‘refugees’ from the orthodox christian church, who have been ‘burned’ by false teaching. Disillusioned, they fall for the seeming certainty that cults offer in an uncertain world.

The consequences for themselves and family can be truly tragic. Shattered marriages, suicide, financial ruin, loss of faith, all these things can and do occur. Even to highly intelligent people in professional occupations who always thought they would be ‘too smart’ to be taken in.

Today’s communication tools enable false teachers and prophets to reach millions of people, and they take full advantage of the opportunity. Distance no longer separates them from those they wish to deceive, in order to gain wealth for themselves.

The very best thing you can do to protect yourself or family members from falling into the hands of a pseudo-christian or extremist religious group, is to know your bible.

These days, that doesn’t mean you need to know it off by heart. There are any number of bible tools, many free, that you can use to locate passages of scripture quickly and easily.

Its relatively easy to become a person who can say “I know its there, even if I don’t know where“ and then use these tools to check bible references, or to find something quickly when you need to.

Lets be honest here. How many of us, myself included, fail to spend the time in prayer and bible study that we know we should?. Its one of those things we all know we should do, but work and family requirements make it easy for us to keep putting it off.

Almost without exception, the many ‘ex-christians‘ I have met over the years who joined a cultic group or sect, (usually after leaving a mainstream denomination), had only limited bible knowledge of their own at the time they joined. They were relatively easy marks for a practised ‘recruiter’ who raised questions and doubts they had never even thought of, and then provided them with seemingly biblical answers.

This blog will help you identify whether a particular group is considered harmful or not. There are links to some of the many resources available on the internet to help you find out what you need to know

The best defense against untruth is knowing beforehand what the truth is. Otherwise you have nothing to compare untruth against.

God Bless

Des Scahill