Freemasonry goes by many names, including the Scottish Rite, Masonry, Blue Lodge, Eastern Star (for women), and Shriners. Historically, Masonry has had a strong unifying effect on the American black community.Many people who consider themselves Christians, both black and white, are Masons.
Most people, even many Masons,incorrectly believe that Masonry is merely a fraternal order, like the Lions Club, Elks Club, etc. Masonry expressly denies it is a religion.Nothing could be further from the truth. Freemasonry is a non-Christian occult religion that teaches a different way to salvation and considers Jesus, Buddha, Confucius, and all spiritual leaders to be only messengers of “The Grand Architect of the Universe”. The Grand Architect is not just another term for Jehovah. Freemasonry teaches that there are two basic Gods: Adonay, the god of the Christians, a god of evil and Lucifer, a separate god of good. Freemasonry considers the religious scriptures of all religions to be equally valid.
(The information below is summarized from numerous expert sources on cults and the occult)
The two words, “cult and occult,” sound similar. But while different, they both pose a similar spiritual threat to people by appearing to be something they are not. Both can cause its victims to miss God’s loving and free provision for their lives through Christ, and cause them to face a tragic, Christless eternity. There are many nice, friendly and caring people in the cults and the occult. God loves them, so much that Christ died for them. They are not our enemy. Our enemy is Satan and his deceiving spirits.
Cults
In popular usage, “cults” are religious groups predicted by the Bible (2 Peter 2:1) that deviate from the central, historic truths of biblical Christianity and God’s revelation in Christ. Some cults are offshoots of ancient pagan religions, have no similarity to Christianity, and are easy to identify. Others falsely try to imitate Christianity, often using the Bible and Christian terminology, and are more difficult to distinguish. These latter cults typically exhibit one or more of the following traits:
1. They may consider Jesus Christ as not equal to God the Father, but something less. But Jesus said, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (John 14:9), and Paul said that Christ is the “image of the invisible God” (Colossians 1:15) The Bible is repeatedly clear that Jesus is deity, and when on the earth, He was God in human form. We can be redeemed from our sins only because God’s own perfect blood (in Christ) was shed for our perfect cleansing.
2. They may typically reject the clear biblical revelation of a triune God, sometimes called the Trinity: God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit — one God, not three, but manifest in three Persons. The Bible refers to all three as Persons, yet One. A mystery, but truth.
3. They may have their own “sacred” book in addition to the Bible. And although they usually deny it, these books conflict with and are given precedence over the Bible.
4. They typically reject the wonderful biblical truth that salvation is a “free gift” from God by grace through faith alone (this truth glorifies God and not man). Instead, cults and all other “religions” falsely say that people must “earn” their salvation by certain works and deeds, often works that will perpetuate the cult (this glorifies man rather than God).
5. Cults are often exclusive, centering around a strong leader (or late founder) who has the only “true” interpretation of Scripture. Whereas Christ came to give us freedom, (Galatians 5:1), cult members are in bondage to that cult or leader, with the threat that leaving the cult will cause a loss of salvation.
Thousands of these cults exist, but here are some major ones listed in most cult reference books: Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Christian Science, The Unity School of Christianity, The Way International, The Children of God, Scientology, The Unification Church, Unitarianism and the New Age Movement (which is also occult).
If involved in any cult, run — don’t walk — to the nearest exit, and find a Christ-centered, Bible- believing church. Also, apply the four-step process below.
References. There are many excellent books available on cults. Four are: The Kingdom of the Cults, by Dr. Walter R. Martin; The Deceivers, by Josh McDowell and Don Stewart; Cult Watch, by Dr. John Ankerberg and John Weldon; and Larson’s New Book of Cults, by Bob Larson.
The Occult
The word “occult” refers to what is hidden, concealed, or secret. The occult involves the spirit world, but the spirit world of darkness. The occult is particularly deceptive because the spirit world is very real. Practitioners are dealing with reality — but dark, forbidden, and evil reality.
There are two kinds of spiritual reality. The first is God’s spiritual Kingdom of truth and light, where Christ is King, the nature of which is “righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Romans 14:17), and where God’s holy angels dwell, worship and serve Him. The second is the world of Satan (a fallen angel), a world of darkness and hopelessness, void of God, and where other fallen angels (called demons) who hate God work to advance this evil kingdom under their leader, Satan. This latter world of spiritual darkness is that which is experienced through the sinister practices of the occult.
The Bible does not reveal a “dualism,” or co-equal forces of good (represented by God) and evil (represented by Satan). Satan is totally subject to the sovereign, omnipotent Creator. But God has given Satan certain authority to operate in the earth as a result of man’s sinful fall. He operates through the minds and wills of fallen humanity, and he has constructed a complex web of many evil schemes, including occult practices, even religions, to deceive and snare people by appearing to offer them access to supernatural power and knowledge. The Bible says that such deception will increase in “the last days” before Christ returns (1 Timothy 4:1). But the Bible also says, “The Son of God appeared for this purpose, that He might destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Those who trust and obey Jesus Christ have protection and victory through Him.
Any degree of occult involvement can produce problems of oppression, depression, despair, hopelessness, and many physical problems, sometimes bringing death, even self-destruction. Demonic influence can produce obsessions, phobias, bizarre behavior, violence, homicide and sexual perversion in its victims. Worse, it can deceive a person into eternal darkness. The occult is a form of idolatry and a sin expressly forbidden by God (Deuteronomy 18:9-12). In the New Testament when the gospel was proclaimed and received, the liberated people gladly burned all their occult materials (see Acts 19:19).
Here are just a few of the many occult practices: astrology, various kinds of “fortune telling,” witchcraft, satanism, ESP, telepathy, clairvoyance, seances, spiritism meetings, use of mediums or “channeling,” automatic writing, ouija boards, hypnosis, parapsychology, psychic surgery, eastern religions, reincarnation, voodoo, magic charming, yoga; involvement with psychics such as Jeane Dixon, Edgar Cayce; the Rosicrucians, and the New Age Movement. The New Age Movement is a catchall term embracing many modern occult beliefs and practices. There is even compelling evidence that UFOs are real, but supernatural and often occult manifestations of fallen angels whose ultimate purpose is to deceive humanity into thinking super-intelligent extraterrestrials will help usher the earth into a golden “New Age” of happiness without God. But with God rejected and without His blessings, occult-practicing, lost and depraved humanity will soon bring upon itself the end-time global holocaust prophesied by the Bible.
If you are now or have ever been, anytime in your life, involved with any cult or occult practice, you can be set free of it and any symptoms it may have brought by doing the following: (1) Confess sincere faith in and commitment to Christ; (2) confess the cult and occult sins to God, naming and forsaking each one; (3) renounce Satan, in Jesus’ name, and commanding him and his demons to depart; and (4), receive and claim your liberation by faith, without doubting, trusting in the authority and total faithfulness of God and His Word. If you do this, Satan must obey and release you, by the authority of Jesus’ Name and God’s Word, and any symptoms that Satan put on you must disappear.
References. There are many books available in Christian bookstores on the occult and the New Age Movement, including The Coming Darkness, by John Ankerberg and John Weldon; Inside the New Age Nightmare, by Randall N. Baer; Understanding the Occult, by Josh McDowell and Don Stewart. For information on UFOs: The Omega Conspiracy, by Dr. I.D.E. Thomas; Planet Earth–2000 A.D., by Hal Lindsey; and the outstanding documentary video, UFOs: The Hidden Truth (the video is available by calling 1-800-475-1111).
In my first book En Route to Global Occupation I summarized the economic, political and spiritual aspects of the one-world/New Age movement, showing their interaction in the pursuit of a global civilization. My latest book The New World Religion picks up where En Route left off, bringing people up-to-date on the most recent developments while examining the one-world movement’s spiritual roots and religious goals.
In order to achieve their occult objective, New Agers had to deal with the “problem” of Christianity which had been the main obstacle to their success. Christians had to somehow be neutralized or, if possible, seduced to unwittingly support their agenda. The modern ecumenical movement, as I documented in my book, has played a key role in accomplishing this mission.
Most people do not realize that today’s ecumenical movement is an integral part of the broader one-world movement. The seeds for twentieth-century ecumenism were sown in the late 1800s. During that time there was a growing interest in achieving unity for the alleged purpose of building an earthly utopia. Masonically-inspired organizations, ranging from the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn to the Theosophical Society, were busy laying the groundwork for the next century, which they hoped might finally usher in their long-awaited new world order.
Against this backdrop, religious leaders from around the world gathered in Chicago for an unprecedented ecumenical event – the 1893 Parliament of the World’s Religions (also known as the Parliament of World Religions). The people who attended this international conference came from a variety of faiths. Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, Roman Catholics, Protestants, and a host of others prayed and dialogued together for seventeen days. This was the largest interfaith leadership conference of its kind up to that time.
In the following decades, two catastrophic world wars were fought, each adding to the one-world movement’s momentum. World War I resulted in the League of Nations and World War II led to the United Nations. Both were created in the name of world peace. These institutions would give the secret societies a focal point around which they could rally religious leaders. The public, worn down from years of war, was ready to accept a new approach to maintaining peace. The United Nations was presented as the only hope for peace between nations and unity among the world’s religions.
Riding this crest of postwar sentiment, global planners seized the moment, attempting to unite the Protestant denominations through one organization. Although the spirit of ecumenism had been alive for decades, the founding of the pro-U.N. World Council of Churches in 1948 marked the beginning of the modern ecumenical era.
Strongly influenced by the Masonic Lodge and with funding from major “old money” sources such as the Rockefeller Foundation, the World Council of Churches (WCC) embarked on its mission. From the time of its first meeting in Amsterdam its purpose was clear: to help create the religious atmosphere for achieving a new world order. In a report issued in 1994 at one of its meetings in Jerusalem, the WCC confirmed this intention, stating: “After the second world war, the establishment of the World Council of Churches in 1948 signalled the resolve of the ecumenical community both to work for the fuller unity of the church and to participate in the struggle for a new just world order.”
While the efforts of the World Council of Churches have been paramount in bringing some of the Protestant denominations together, no event would give greater momentum to the ecumenical movement than Vatican II. The Catholic Encyclopedia proudly boasts, “The greatest religious event of the twentieth century, whose teachings and clarifications have yet to reach their full impact, was the twenty-first Ecumenical Council, called Vatican II or the Second Vatican Council.”
Vatican II, which opened on October 11, 1962 at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, added fuel to the growing ecumenical movement and helped pave the way for the acceptance of interfaithism. Pope John XXIII resided over the Council’s proceedings. According to M. Basil Pennington, a prominent Catholic priest, the Council urged “all Christians…to act positively to preserve and even promote all that is good in other religions: Hinduism, Buddhism, and other world religions.” To carry out this interfaith directive, the Vatican Council established the Secretariat for Non-Christians, which would eventually be renamed the Secretariat for World Religions.
Years later, Pope John Paul II would take the Council’s initiatives a step further by holding an actual interfaith summit in Assisi, Italy (discussed in my book). This 1986 gathering, consisting of leaders from the world’s major religions, and initiated by the Pope himself, would represent a visible transition from “ecumenism” to “interfaithism.”
Although these terms are often used interchangeably today, historically the public has viewed ecumenism as an effort aimed at unifying Christian churches. Interfaithism, on the other hand, has been perceived as a broader attempt to unify the world’s religions. In spite of the public’s perception, beneath the surface, ecumenism and interfaithism have been intertwined. The fact is, ecumenism has been used by New Age religious planners as a springboard to interfaithism. Once most of Christendom had been brought together under a false unity, it was thought that Christianity might be prepared to go the next step by merging with the other religions.
Regarding the spiritual condition of the world in the latter days Jesus warned that “even the elect” would be deceived if that were possible (Matt 24:24). What better way to deceive believers than through a false unity which has the appearance of Christianity, but is actually rooted in pantheism and the occult?
During the next few months, as religious and political events unfold and the new millennium approaches, we will keep you abreast of ways in which the New Age/one-world movement is advancing its agenda – especially as it relates to Christians. It is my sincere hope and prayer that our articles will not only inform you but will encourage biblical discernment and obedience to God’s Word!
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“What,” says Satan, “do you hold to these denominational creeds? Sensible men are
getting more liberal, they are giving away what does not belong to them—God’s
truth; they are removing the old landmarks. Acts of uniformity are to be repealed,
articles and creeds are to be laid aside as useless lumber, not necessary for this very
enlightened age; fall in with this, and be an Anythingarian” - Charles Haddon Spurgeon
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