Don't Fall Victim to a Cult-Like Business Disguised as a Church
Probably by far the biggest mistake that new Christians make after placing their faith (trust) in Christ is to immediately seek out a modern institutional church to join, and so what almost always happens is they quickly end up entrenched in what amounts to nothing more than a cult-like commercial business disguised as a church of Jesus Christ. Of course not all churches are bad, but the good ones, the real ones, can be very few and far between these days and therefore can be quite hard to come by. So great caution is warranted.
Obviously the enemy would not be too threatened by anyone becoming a Christian if that person can be immediately immobilized (by being tempted to join a false church) where their life and resources will be tapped and where they will be ineffective in expanding God's Kingdom. False churches are generally run by heavy shepherds who control "the sheep" with a tyrannical heavy handed rule. True churches (assemblies) are guided (not controlled) by loving men who do not take advantage of God's children. These are true shepherds not "leaders" from a commercial or corporate / business perspective. A heavy shepherd is no shepherd at all, but nevertheless with that term being a common designation for them, we'll go ahead and stay with it. Today churches may be heavy shepherd run, commercial in nature or both, with both being the most common type.
When Christians join a heavy shepherd commercial based church (which tends to be most churches today), in such cases these Christians are actually in many ways working for and supporting the kingdom of darkness, not the kingdom of light. But of course they generally have no clue of what is really going on.
Commercial, heavy shepherd run businesses disguised as churches are everywhere today. And by spiritualizing their business and control practices as being “ordained by God Himself”, they form what essentially amounts to an abusive cult. They have no biblical basis whatsoever for their existence. In fact, there is not a single account in all of Scripture of Christ or His Apostles ever acting in any way that even remotely hints at the despicable, abusive, money-scamming ways of these more dangerous types of modern institutional churches. And worse, the vast majority of these so-called "churches" preach a false works-based Gospel, not the true free grace Gospel message of faith (trust) alone in Christ alone, which is the clear salvation message that we see in the Bible.
And by preaching this mess, these churches are usually able to manipulate and control their congregations by instilling tremendous amounts of fear in them, namely fear of loss of salvation due to non-compliance with the church's various man made rules. These type of churches typically also instill fear of loss of church privileges, fear of loss of membership, fear of peer disapproval, etc., not for any biblical reasons of course, but simply to threaten and enforce their legalistic regime of power and control. Many other unbiblical practices (as well as a myriad of false doctrines) are usually rampant among such "churches".
The good news in all this is you absolutely do not have to join one of these churches (cults) or any cult in order to become or remain a Christian. God requires no such thing of you. In fact, the Bible contains many clear warnings to avoid such people and to avoid their unbiblical doctrines and practices. It can actually be quite a dangerous thing to even visit one of these churches. The reason being is they often have many clever mechanisms in place to appear loving, caring, relevant and useful and thereby are able to attract many unwary people to join. And once someone joins and forms social ties, it is often very difficult for them to get free.
The truth is you can simply meet at home, read the Bible, sing praise and worship songs, pray, have communion and fellowship - all in peace and joy without any of the nasty entanglements awaiting the unwary. It's dangerous out there so you need to be very careful. Read the New Testament, especially the many letters (or Epistles as they are also called) in order to see the real picture of what the real loving and compassionate church of Jesus Christ actually looks like BEFORE daring to get involved with any modern church professing to be Christian. Otherwise you could end up becoming the next victim.
ChristiansFree.com
Probably by far the biggest mistake that new Christians make after placing their faith (trust) in Christ is to immediately seek out a modern institutional church to join, and so what almost always happens is they quickly end up entrenched in what amounts to nothing more than a cult-like commercial business disguised as a church of Jesus Christ. Of course not all churches are bad, but the good ones, the real ones, can be very few and far between these days and therefore can be quite hard to come by. So great caution is warranted.
Obviously the enemy would not be too threatened by anyone becoming a Christian if that person can be immediately immobilized (by being tempted to join a false church) where their life and resources will be tapped and where they will be ineffective in expanding God's Kingdom. False churches are generally run by heavy shepherds who control "the sheep" with a tyrannical heavy handed rule. True churches (assemblies) are guided (not controlled) by loving men who do not take advantage of God's children. These are true shepherds not "leaders" from a commercial or corporate / business perspective. A heavy shepherd is no shepherd at all, but nevertheless with that term being a common designation for them, we'll go ahead and stay with it. Today churches may be heavy shepherd run, commercial in nature or both, with both being the most common type.
When Christians join a heavy shepherd commercial based church (which tends to be most churches today), in such cases these Christians are actually in many ways working for and supporting the kingdom of darkness, not the kingdom of light. But of course they generally have no clue of what is really going on.
Commercial, heavy shepherd run businesses disguised as churches are everywhere today. And by spiritualizing their business and control practices as being “ordained by God Himself”, they form what essentially amounts to an abusive cult. They have no biblical basis whatsoever for their existence. In fact, there is not a single account in all of Scripture of Christ or His Apostles ever acting in any way that even remotely hints at the despicable, abusive, money-scamming ways of these more dangerous types of modern institutional churches. And worse, the vast majority of these so-called "churches" preach a false works-based Gospel, not the true free grace Gospel message of faith (trust) alone in Christ alone, which is the clear salvation message that we see in the Bible.
And by preaching this mess, these churches are usually able to manipulate and control their congregations by instilling tremendous amounts of fear in them, namely fear of loss of salvation due to non-compliance with the church's various man made rules. These type of churches typically also instill fear of loss of church privileges, fear of loss of membership, fear of peer disapproval, etc., not for any biblical reasons of course, but simply to threaten and enforce their legalistic regime of power and control. Many other unbiblical practices (as well as a myriad of false doctrines) are usually rampant among such "churches".
The good news in all this is you absolutely do not have to join one of these churches (cults) or any cult in order to become or remain a Christian. God requires no such thing of you. In fact, the Bible contains many clear warnings to avoid such people and to avoid their unbiblical doctrines and practices. It can actually be quite a dangerous thing to even visit one of these churches. The reason being is they often have many clever mechanisms in place to appear loving, caring, relevant and useful and thereby are able to attract many unwary people to join. And once someone joins and forms social ties, it is often very difficult for them to get free.
The truth is you can simply meet at home, read the Bible, sing praise and worship songs, pray, have communion and fellowship - all in peace and joy without any of the nasty entanglements awaiting the unwary. It's dangerous out there so you need to be very careful. Read the New Testament, especially the many letters (or Epistles as they are also called) in order to see the real picture of what the real loving and compassionate church of Jesus Christ actually looks like BEFORE daring to get involved with any modern church professing to be Christian. Otherwise you could end up becoming the next victim.
ChristiansFree.com