Seven Characteristics of a Cult
1. Opposing critical thinking versus letting people think for themselves
Their members must accept what the cult believes without challenging their doctrines. They do not want their members to think critically for themselves.
2. Isolating members and penalizing them for leaving versus helping them do God?s will.
They isolate their people and then reject any who leave. People will be judged by God or will lose God?s best if they leave. Rejection, shunning, and warnings of judgment are given. People are taught to make lifelong commitments to the group and/or to seek permission to join another ministry. The foundational value is that God owns the people, not the leader or the group in which they serve.
3. Emphasizing special doctrines outside Scripture versus loyalty to Scripture.
Cults brainwash their people and emphasize the special revelations of their ?anointed? leader who presents himself as having unique insights that no one else has. They claim to be the only way of salvation and that all refusing to join them will be lost.
Christians must emphasize the supremacy and infallibility of Scripture as the final authority of truth. We must emphasize the main and plain themes of Scripture: the love of Jesus, the Sermon on the Mount lifestyle, prayer, reading the word, winning the lost, healing the sick, serving others, etc.
4. Seeking inappropriate loyalty to their leaders versus connecting people to Jesus
Cults require loyalty and devotion to the leaders instead of to Jesus. Faithfulness is defined as supporting the leader, rather than obeying Jesus. This loyalty is achieved by forbidding them to correct or question the leader
5. Dishonoring the family unit versus insisting on the biblical priority of the family unit.
Children are taught to be more loyal to the leaders than to their parents. Women are taught to be more loyal to the leaders than to their husbands, and husbands are taught to accept this as normal behavior. The cult leader seeks to take the place of fathers, mothers, or a pastor or authority figure. The members act as dependent children seeking to win the approval of the leaders. Leaders go beyond their God-given authority and manipulate their members. The members are required to cut ties with their family and friends who do not join the group. They are required to socialize only with other group members.
6. Crossing biblical boundaries of personal ownership.
Cults emphasize special revelations that allow their leaders to cross biblical boundaries in the areas of immorality and finances. They usually insist on owning the money and property of members who ?join the community.? Peter taught that false teachers are most easily detected by covetousness and immorality.
They promote unethical ways of gaining gain money (for example, lying about collecting money for charities that do not exist). Some insist on high moral standards for the group, except for the leaders who are called to have ?spiritual partners? for the benefit of the movement.
7. Separation from the Church versus a culture of honor towards the whole Church
Cults criticize and exclude the larger Body of Christ and claim to be the only ones truly saved. They separate from the wider Church with an elite spirit, believing that they alone have a special calling and status with God. They have a polarized mentality of ?us versus them? that causes them to separate from others in the Church and society at large. They mock and ridicule all beliefs that differ from their own. They dishonor the Body of Christ, viewing all other denominations and ministries as being in error.
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