Category Archives: Cults and Heresies

Armstrongism

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Herbert W. Armstrong began his career as a traveling salesman.  While doing this work, he happened to come in contact with a splinter group of the Seventh-day Adventists.  For a while he spoke as an Adventist evangelist, and demonstrated great success.  However, he came to believe some things that caused him to split with the Adventists and form his own organization.

Armstrong saw himself as specifically called of God to restore the true church to the earth, which had been lost for 1900 years.  His background in sales served him well as a self-proclaimed prophet.  He began to broadcast his beliefs on radio, once again with great success.  He attracted thousands of followers in the western United States.  Working through his radio ministry, correspondence Bible courses, and a slick magazine called The Plain Truth, Armstrong’s movement grew.  He formed his own church, initially called the Radio Church of God.  Later this was changed to the Worldwide Church of God (WCOG). Continue reading →

Native American Religion

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Beginning in the 1960’s and 70’s, and continuing since then, there has been a growing interest in nature and the environment.  The concern with nature is not only ecological and scientific, but also spiritual.  A “return to nature” and a belief in an inherent spirituality in nature itself has become commonplace among many people.  Many new religions stress the importance of nature (and sometimes nature worship) in their belief systems.  These new religions often look back to more primitive, tribal religions for their inspiration.  The belief systems of the First Nations of the American continent are a primary source for this purpose.  As Jacob Needleman said many years ago in The New Religions:  “In all this the American Indian stands as a paradigm.  His way was a way in nature.”  Continue reading →

Iglesia ni Cristo

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It is the third largest religious group in the Philippines, after Roman Catholicism and Islam.  It is known for its impressive church architecture, with ornate decoration and soaring spires.  It is a growing church, and now has congregations in Southeast Asia, Central Asia, China, Latin America, Africa, England, Italy and the U.S.  It is called the Iglesia ni Cristo (INC), which in the Tagalog language means Church of Christ. Continue reading →

Islam and Mormonism

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Through the years quite a number of people writing about Mormonism have noted similarities between Islam and the LDS Church.  As early as 1831 critics of Joseph Smith compared him to Muhammad.  Smith himself was known to make the same comparison.  In the midst of the so-called “Mormon War” of 1838 Joseph defied his enemies by declaring:  “I will be to this generation a second Mohammed, whose motto in treating for peace was ‘the Alcoran [Koran] or the Sword.’  So shall it eventually be with us — ‘Joseph Smith or the Sword!’ ”

In light of this, we have prepared a chart listing some of the similarities between Islam and Mormonism.  We hope you will find this interesting and informative.  Just click here to view the chart of Similarities Between Islam and LDS.

Witnessing to the Witnesses

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What do you do when a Jehovah’s Witness shows up on your doorstep?  Do you turn the TV off, close the curtains and pretend that you are not home?  Instead of going into a “raise the drawbridge” mode, how about sharing your faith with the Witness knocking on your front door?  Here are some tips on how to do this effectively.

  1. Focus on essential doctrines: The Trinity, the nature of Christ (especially His deity), the bodily resurrection, and salvation by grace.

Continue reading →