Latest / The Immutable Word / EP003 Cults Part 1 - Are We a Cult? Defining Cults and Spotting the Red Flags (Relaunch)

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EP003 Cults Part 1 - Are We a Cult? Defining Cults and Spotting the Red Flags (Relaunch) · The Immutable Word

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They'll point to a Baptist church and go, oh, you guys are a cult because you
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beat your kids, you beat your wives, you do this, right?
0:09
They'll come up whatever list of egregious things that we commit,
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allegedly, right? But here's the thing.
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You look at Marxism, when you look at Black Lives Matter, you look at some of these political,
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cultural Marxists, they're just as much a cult as, say, the Jehovah's Witnesses
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or the Moonies or some other, you know, there's a South Korean cult,
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the Heavenly Mother cult out of South Korea.
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You can be just as much part of a cult as part of the political left wing or
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even the political right wing.
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And I would dare say, even in our circles, independent Baptists,
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you can have certain churches that imbue a lot of cult-like tendencies.
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Hey, welcome to the Immutable Word Podcast. This is Robert and Alan.
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Thank you for joining the show. Today, we're going to talk a little bit about
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a very interesting, I think, topic and defining a cult.
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Often, as Bible believers, we're accused of being part of a cult or being in
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a church that has cult-like tendencies and things like that.
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And I think sometimes there's some legitimacy to that. So, we're going to,
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define what a cult is, and then we'll probably do in a future episode is talk
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about how do we respond to cults or people that we know are in cults whenever
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they're interested in the truth.
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So, Alan, any insights, any thoughts before we get started?
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Yeah, I mean, when you're talking about cults, the first thing you usually want
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to do is you want to define exactly and specifically what that is.
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Because you hear the term cult thrown around all the time.
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You get accused of that if you go to church or if you're a Baptist,
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if you believe the Bible and you have standards, well, guess what?
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You're thrown into this bucket. Well, you're just a cult.
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And it's just most people don't
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understand what that actually really means because there is a difference.
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Yep, absolutely. And some of the material that I'm going to pull from today
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is from a book that I started reading.
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I haven't finished it, but it's called Combating Cult Mind Control by Dr.
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Steve Hassan. And he was part of a cult growing up.
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And he kind of talks about his personal experience, you know,
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being recruited into a cult, how he escaped it.
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And then he talks about how cults manipulate members using psychological tactics.
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You know, he categorizes cults into, you have religious cults,
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political cults, therapy-based cults, commercial group type cults.
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And then he talks about the warning signs, the red flags that indicate how a
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group may be using undue influence, provide strategies for individuals to break
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free from cultic control, kind of regaining their autonomy.
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The role of social media, how
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modern cults can use online platforms for recruitment and manipulation.
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And then critical thinking resistance. He encourages skepticism,
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self-awareness, informed decision-making.
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And there's one verse I think of that pops out in my mind is Acts 17,
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11, where the Bible says these were more noble than those in Thessalonica and
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that they searched the scriptures daily to see whether those things were so
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they they tested it also the bible talks about in first thessalonians 5 is that
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we're supposed to prove all things so.
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And one of the Baptistic characteristics, distinctives that we believe in,
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and the reason why I am a Baptist by conviction, is that what we call the priesthood of the believer.
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And that actually represents the autonomy of the believer, that we have a mind.
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God gave us, you know, a sound mind, right?
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And it's not fear, but love and a sound mind, which means we should be able
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to think for ourselves. We're critical.
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You see that all throughout the scriptures.
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Paul proved the resurrection by the scriptures. He argued and reasoned from the scriptures.
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He opened and alleged the facts about Christ.
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He talked like a lawyer. If these things weren't so, therefore this.
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You know what I mean? Just the way that he argued.
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So he encouraged critical thinking. There's nothing wrong with that.
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He even says in one of his Corinthian letters, he says to examine ourselves,
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whether we be in the faith so i think it's
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fair to say look i'm going to
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listen to somebody if they think i'm in a cult if they're open to it i should
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be able to explain why i'm not in a cult but i think in order to do that we
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have to properly define it so one of the things and and i'll get your insight
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here just a second alan because i know that you've got some personal history around this.
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But one of the things I wanted to say, you know, kind of talk about and we'll
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kind of focus on when we go through this call or this call, this podcast,
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is, you know, Stephen Hassan, he developed what he called the BITE model,
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B-I-T-E. It's an acronym.
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And he says that if it's a true cult, these are the characteristics,
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these are the tactics that you'll see employed by a cult.
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B means behavior control. And we'll talk through some examples of this and,
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you know, probably our own experience.
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Experiences, obviously me dealing with cults on the street and witnessing to
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them and things like that.
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And you likewise, because I know they've come to our doors, right? And talk to us.
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But yeah, behavior control, I is for information control, T is for thought control,
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and E is for emotional control, emotional control.
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So go ahead, Al. I know you have some, a little bit of personal insight into
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this too. Yeah. Yeah. I'd be happy to share a little bit more about that.
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I was it's a rather recent word.
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So that's what I came to the conclusion. I was like, it probably hasn't been around for too long.
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But looking at Wikipedia, it says that it's term often applied to new religious
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movements and other social groups, which have unusual and often extreme religious,
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spiritual, or philosophical beliefs and rituals.
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I won't read the entire thing, but that's Wikipedia for you. Yeah.
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And then trying to find like a more legitimate definition outside of Wikipedia.
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Well, you know, the root word it's drawn from is culture is drawn from cult.
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And that's where you develop or fabricate a culture.
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It could be a cult of personality around a person.
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It could be a cult, a culture of beliefs that control.
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But I believe what constitutes a cult is what this bite model indicates is that
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if it controls your behavior, if it controls your information that you received,
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ingress and egress information,
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thought control, how you should think, what you should think,
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when you should think, and then emotional control, right? That they...
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Like, one of the things I would think of when I think of emotional control is
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using guilt and fear to control you.
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Right? Right. Oh, you didn't come to our gathering tonight.
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You really missed out. You know, we're the only ones that really care about
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you. So they manipulate a person's emotions.
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They make them feel guilty for not being part of their group and so forth and so on, right? Yep.
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So. And, yeah, I found a better, I think, definition that defines it.
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But that's very interesting. Yeah, makes sense.
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Cult, culture, something to have the effect. But it says here religion or religious
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sect generally considered to be extremist or false with its followers often
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living in an unconventional manner under the guidance of an authoritarian,
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charismatic leader, which I think fits.
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I think it's interesting that they narrow it down to just religious.
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Because Dr. Steve Vassan, he talks about cults can be religious,
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political, therapy-based, or commercial-based.
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Right yeah like being part
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of a very overpowering company that
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sells products and goods right they can control
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your your behavior the people occult following occult
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following right and so that's the idea is that again the
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filter is this byte model that's why i love using this byte model because it's
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it's it's really a true reflection of what it really is you can't really trust
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today's culture because it's going to define it with bias and it's always going
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to be tied to some religious affiliation.
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Here's a perfect example. Here's a perfect example.
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Somebody that they'll be, they'll point to a Baptist church and go,
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oh, you guys are a cult because you beat your kids, you beat your wives, you do this, right?
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They'll come up whatever, whatever list of, you know, egregious things that
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we commit allegedly, right?
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But here's the thing, when you look at Marxism, when you look at Black Lives
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Matter, you look at some of these political,
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cultural Marxists, they're just as much a cult as, say, the Jehovah's Witnesses
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or the Moonies or some other, you know, there's a South Korean cult,
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the Heavenly Mother cult out of South Korea, who's an offshoot of Seventh-day Adventism.
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You know, so there's obviously, you can be just as much a cult,
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part of a cult, as part of the political left wing or even the political right
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wing can be very cult-like in their behavior, right?
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And I would dare say, even in our circles, independent Baptists,
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you can have certain churches that imbue a lot of cult-like tendencies.
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Yeah, I'm drawing some parallels here because what you see, whether it's political,
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whether it's religious, whether it's something cultural, there's a degree of
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authoritarianism in each one.
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You've got somebody that's an extreme authority who's reverenced,
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who tells you what you can and can't do, and that's where the behavioral control
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comes in, that's where the information control comes in, thought control, emotional control.
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I mean, we talk about that with communism, Nazism.
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Those seem like obvious examples, right? Yeah. They're not religious.
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They're not religious, but that's an extreme example.
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Yeah. Those are perfect examples. So here's my, this is, when I think about
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people or groups or even a church that engages in cult-like behavior,
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I think part of the root cause of that is this.
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Yeah, it could be a very charismatic leader. It could be somebody that has a
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lot of influence and control over a group of people,
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and maybe they've groomed that group of people to look at them as the ultimate
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standard or authority, okay?
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And I believe that the reason why a church or a group will resort to cult-like
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tendencies, I think it boils down to one thing, because they cannot adequately bring logical,
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philosophical arguments that line up with Scripture and prove why something is true.
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If you can't prove it, what is the best way to convince somebody?
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It's through force, power, influence, manipulation, right?
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Guilt. That's where cult-like tendencies grow. That's where they flourish.
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In those types of environments. You'll have a pastor.
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Look, they want to call Bible-believing Baptists cults. I think there are some
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Bible-believing Baptists that are very cult-like.
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I think what stops them from being a 100% full-blown cult is that you can get
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up and leave that church at any time.
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But that might come with a price. You could be ridiculed. You could be mocked, right?
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There'll be emotional control or emotional manipulation that's utilized to guilt
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trip you, make you feel ashamed because you left the group or the family, right?
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And so here's the thing. If you
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cannot convince somebody, the Bible talks about it in the book of Titus.
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In Titus chapter one, matter of fact, Paul tells, you know, he kind of ordains
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Titus to go to Crete to start a bunch of churches, right?
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And he says that he's supposed to use sound doctrine to convince the gainsayers.
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Not control, not money, not manipulation, sound doctrine.
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So if a preacher can't get behind a pulpit and influence you through sound doctrine,
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he's going to use some kind of cult-like tactic.
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He's either going to use behavior modification
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He's going to control the information that you have access to.
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He's going to control the way that you think about things. You're going to have
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to adopt his perspective, right?
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Or he's going to try to, he's going to guilt trip you through emotional control.
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So, a Baptist church can be guilty of being cult-like, but the only reason is
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because they're using these tactics, these cult-like tactics,
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as a proxy for doctrine. Yeah.
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Right? I mean, if you know your Bible well enough, you cannot be controlled mentally. Period.
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You gotta explain to me what this love bombing is.
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So, love bombing, the way that Hassan talks about it— And this is under the emotional control.
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Right. Under emotional control, he says, manipulating emotions through guilt,
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fear, dependency, often using techniques like love bombing.
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Imagine this. I'll give you a scenario. Let's just say that you join or you
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start going to a church that you don't realize is a cult or has very strong cult-like tendencies.
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All of a sudden, members of the church start showing up and bringing you gifts,
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inviting you over, having fellowships, showing you all kinds of appreciation and acceptance.
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Because look, the world doesn't accept you, but we accept you.
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We love you like our brother or sister.
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We're going to take care of your needs. We're going to take care of your medical bills for you.
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I'm not saying those things are bad in and of themselves, But if they're using
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it to manipulate you and control you, it's a cult.
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So love bombing is overwhelming you with love and acceptance that the world isn't providing you.
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So people feel they feel accepted.
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That's one of the biggest problems people have is they always want some kind of acceptance.
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They want to be accepted for who they are. So if you have a church that overwhelmingly
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displays and exhibits this kind of love and emotion and you're part of the brotherhood
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now and you know what I mean?
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And then you start hanging out with them and now you feel connected and you're
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plugged in, quote unquote, into their group.
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Well, guess what's going to happen? You're going to feel guilty whenever they're
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out doing something and you're not part of it.
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You're going to feel guilty when they have an all night, you know,
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church service and you're not there to fellowship with them.
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Love bombing is where they're the only source of love and acceptance as far
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as part of your life is concerned that you can find.
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And so that's what love bombing is. Yeah, it's really interesting.
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Yeah. That's where they get their hooks in you. And this is where on the other
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extreme is guilt or fear.
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If you find that you want to leave, well, guess what? You're going to be labeled.
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Right. You're not going to have this support. You're the black sheep. You're the black sheep.
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You're not going to have this support group anymore. You're not going to have
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the same level of engagement and love and fellowship that you had before.
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And so there's the guilt aspect of it. And I've heard that too.
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It's like, hey, you're, when you leave, I don't care.
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What is it? What's that group that Tom Cruise is part of?
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Science. It's not Christian scientists. It's a. Oh, it's Christian scientists.
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It's something else, whatever.
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It's flipping my mind. But anyway, that group, that's a perfect example where
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they control you, right?
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Mormons, there was people that we knew at a company you and I worked at.
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They weren't saved, they weren't Christians, but they grew up in a Mormon household.
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And he was from New York. He was a bus driver.
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The Mormon church helped him get the mortgage on his house.
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The Mormon church helped him get the car note, his car that he had.
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The Mormon church helped establish his bank account.
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And both of their families were deeply rooted in Mormon beliefs.
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And when they wanted to try to get away from
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that they were threatened they were he was threatened with
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his job he was threatened with his finances because
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they controlled his bank accounts that's the kind
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that's the extent that a cult will go through why because they can't convince
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you through sound logical reasoning arguments right they can't do that so anyway
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did you find the group yeah church of scientology scientology there it is so
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scientology is just as much of a cult as Mormonism is.
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It's just as much of a cult as some Baptist churches that we know of.
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So here's the problem with Baptist churches, especially independent Baptist churches.
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They, and look, just for clarification, you know, maybe we have some new listeners
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here, we are independent Baptists.
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We are Baptists by conviction because we believe that the Baptist denomination
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is the closest thing to the Pauline New Testament church model in this age, as far as I'm concerned.
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We agree with the Baptist distinctives, and maybe one episode we'll go through
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those Baptist distinctives.
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And we use the acronym Baptist, B-A-P-T-I-S-T, you know, that the Bible is our final authority.
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We believe in autonomy of the church, the priesthood of the believer,
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two ordinances, individual soul liberty, things like that, right?
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I'm a Baptist, but you have some Baptist preachers who do not know how to properly
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exegete and exposit the word of God.
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So in order to control their congregation, they will fear monger them.
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They will preach and scream behind a pulpit. They will guilt trip their people.
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They will control them. They'll control the information.
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Don't listen to this preacher. Don't listen to that group.
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Don't read this book. Listen, if you have the truth, the truth can withstand scrutiny.
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If I believe the King James Bible is the Word of God, I can listen to a Bible
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critic and his reasons why he doesn't believe the King James Bible is the Word of God.
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If I believe that God exists because of the revelation through God's Word,
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I can listen to an atheist and him give me his best arguments why he doesn't
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believe God exists. Period.
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It's that simple. okay i i you
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know i hold you know certain things in scripture that i've
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been challenged by people that hold other beliefs but i will listen to them
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and i've actually grown in my own faith as a result of it if if if i can be
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convinced through sound doctrine then i know it's the holy spirit teaching me
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and not a man so what happens about baptist churches is they become a cult of personality.
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You have the pastor who is a very controlling, influential person.
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My pastor can do no wrong. I love my pastor and my pastor is on a pedestal.
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My pastor is the greatest preacher on the planet, right? You'll hear statements like that.
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Now, listen, I'm not saying that a pastor doesn't deserve double honor.
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I'm not saying that a pastor doesn't deserve, you know, our loyalty and friendship and support, right?
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I'm not saying any of that. What I'm saying is, is when you use,
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you will let that pastor tell you anything behind that pulpit and you will never
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open up the Bible and check them against it.
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That becomes a cult of personality. And if you facilitate that kind of thinking.
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So if a pastor has to borrow from the cult toolbox in order to achieve whatever
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goal or whatever objective of that they need to achieve. There's something wrong there. Absolutely.
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When you have to facilitate that type of culture in the church,
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you don't have to read that, you don't have to listen to that person,
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just do what the standard that I'm setting to do.
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And it's not a cult per se, but there are cultic tools that are being borrowed
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from When you start hearing phrases like, well, did you check with the pastor
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before you bought that car? Yeah.
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Hey, did you talk to the pastor before you thought that maybe you should marry that person?
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Or, hey, you know, what would the pastor think of that? What does the pastor believe?
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You see what I mean? Once you start talking like that, you start putting the
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pastor in a different classification of Christianity than he should be.
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And I'm not even talking about just Baptist church. I'm talking about any church.
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You could be in a Mormon church. You're going to be a Jehovah's Witness church.
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As soon as you start seeing the leadership use one of these characteristics, right?
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The behavior control information thought and emotional control if
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you are not being if you're not cognizant and
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aware that these tactics exist you
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will easily get sucked into the fray and you will
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think that you're part of this loving church and the problem is is once they
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get their hooks into you a lot of times it's too late and and trying to get
21:14
out of it can create i mean it'll cause so much emotional and psychological
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and even sometimes physical damage you know what i mean And that's why we as believers,
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and this is what I just emphasize more than anything as a Bible believer,
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ought to be the most independent.
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You know, critical, self-thinking person on the planet is a Bible believer.
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Because at the end of the day, if you don't want people to dominate your lives
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and manipulate and control you, then you need to learn how to think for yourself.
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And God says in Isaiah 40, and in several places actually, but he says in particular,
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he says that let the wicked man forsake his way and his thoughts.
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And he says, my thoughts are not your thoughts. My ways are not your ways.
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We have to learn how to think logically.
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We have to learn how to think critically because that is the mind God gave us, Jesus Christ.
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He answered this young man. He says, what's the greatest commandment?
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He says it's real simple.
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Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, thy soul, and thy mind.
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And there's a lot of our independent Baptist friends that don't understand the
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love the Lord with all thy mind part.
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They think, oh, I got to just drive pornography from my mind.
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That's not it. That's not it.
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There's other things that will combat and compete with the knowledge of God.
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And that is not understanding sound doctrine. Listen, if you're a Bible believer
22:42
here, or you claim to be an independent Baptist and you listen to this podcast,
22:47
I'll give you a real simple challenge.
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Give me in 30 seconds or less, defend and will define and defend the doctrine of the Trinity.
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If you can't do that in 30 seconds or less, if you can't give me three or four
23:01
or five verses defending that, then guess what? You don't love the Lord thy God with all your mind.
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Period. You could say you love them because you show up to church and you're
23:09
modest and you listen to the right music and you don't drink,
23:12
you don't smoke, and you try to be self-temperate and all these other great things.
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But if you can't define and defend biblical doctrine, especially from the gainsayers,
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especially, there's so much on top of my mind.
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But the point is, if you can't do that, then how do you exhibit that you love the Lord with your mind?
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Because that's intellectual. I know this is only the tip of the iceberg when
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we're talking about the heart, the mind, and the conscience.
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We can really go deep there.
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But just to really sum it up in a nutshell, like right now, just kind of pivoting a little bit.
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If you're wondering, okay, there are churches, there are preachers,
23:49
there are environments in independent Baptist circles that exhibit cult-like type behaviors.
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Doesn't make them a cult per se because they're just stealing some of the tools
24:01
for control because of their lack of knowledge.
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But I would say the main differentiation as a true Bible believer is that we have a free conscience.
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That's what you're alluding to. That's what your implication is,
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is that we have, God has given us a free conscience to decide for ourselves,
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to search for ourselves.
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And just going back to what you said, proving these things, Paul,
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I think it was in Corinthians, search the scriptures, prove what he's saying.
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And you'll see this throughout scripture. Decisions being made, it is a choice.
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And in cults, and in true cults, you don't have a choice.
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You don't have any choice. You don't have freedom of thought.
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And that's the premise of Dr.
24:41
San's book is, it's called Combating Cult Mind Control.
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So, how does a cult control your mind? by manipulating those tactics,
24:53
the behavior, the information, the thought, and the emotion.
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Then eventually, you know what it is. You're right.
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We're independent, autonomous creatures that have free wills.
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We can think freely for ourselves.
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So why do people fall into this trap where they're under mind control?
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Because they defer and submit themselves to this behavior.
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If you're part of a church Listen, maybe the baptist church isn't a cult But
25:22
they have some cult-like tendencies Let's just say,
25:26
okay, maybe they don't control your thought life But they control your behavior
25:31
What you should wear, what kind of clothing, what kind of music you should listen
25:36
to Who your friends should be, who your friends can't be, right?
25:39
If they control your behavior or manipulate it Maybe they're not a cult,
25:44
but they're exhibiting cult-like tendencies.
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And here's, and there's, to me, there's an easy remedy.
25:51
One of the, he talks about in the book, he encourages skepticism,
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self-awareness, and informed decision-making.
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Well, you know what informed decision-making is? That means knowing the truth
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about something. You have information. Having all the facts before you make a decision, right?
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So when somebody says, you know, well, we believe in the pre-tribulation rapture.
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Well, why? Just because. We always believed it. We're independent Baptists because
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we don't believe in false doctrine.
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Well, if you fail to properly define it and then properly prove it scripturally
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that it's true, then I don't need to believe you.
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But my responsibility as an individual believer is to search the scriptures
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to see what the Bible says, and then establish my belief system.
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Everything I believe should be derived from scripture, right?
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And if I can't back it up with scripture, guess what?
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I'm probably the subject of some kind of cult-like tendency or control that
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maybe I'm not aware of. Or culture that's been developed.
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But yeah, so I think we're coming up on time here, And I think this is easily
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turning into probably a part two.
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Yeah, one of the things we didn't touch on, but I thought, you know,
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because we're talking about backing up a scripture, there are examples of cult-like
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behavior in scripture, right?
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You know, just as, I'll give you one example, Judas's betrayal of Jesus Christ, okay?
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What was used to convince him to betray the man he spent three and a half years with? Money.
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That's financial control. but but he
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obviously they manipulated him emotionally because
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what did judas do after jesus christ was crucified guilt
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he had the overwhelming guilt he hung himself he committed suicide right so
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they can they manipulate him with the money they caused him to lie against somebody
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he knew was the son of god he knew it he was given all the same apostolic signs
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as the rest of the apostles.
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He saw all the miracles, everything. He knew it.
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So he was operating against his own conscience, but there was a certain amount
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of manipulation and control that the Pharisees had over.
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And the Pharisees in and of themselves and the Sadducees were very cult-like
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in a lot of their behaviors.
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So we see it's consistent with the Word of God, bottom line, right?
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If we talk about cults, I can identify cult-like behaviors in the Bible and
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attribute those to modern-day cults.
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And I'm just saying this to my Baptist brethren, my believers, man, don't be afraid.
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Here's the difference, and I've always said this, and Alan, you've heard me
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say this before many times, it's okay to be critical, right?
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But avoid having a critical spirit, right?
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Critical spirit is when you're bitter and angry and jealous and envious over
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somebody and it controls you and it controls your logical thinking pattern.
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But being critical means, hey, you know what? I'm going to be skeptical of the skeptics.
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Before I just wholly invest myself into that belief system, I'm going to take
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some time and I'm going to run it through the filter of scripture and I'm going
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to pray about this and And I'm going to make sure that I have some sound doctrine
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that backs up why I believe something.
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If I believe in a woman being modest or a man not having long hair,
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I better be able to dive into Scripture and prove it scripturally.
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Not just because I think it's a shame, right? I can't just sit there and go
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off my personal opinion.
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Because, again, then the problem is now I'm letting my conviction or preference
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or personal standard replace Scripture.
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So yeah it's good stuff alright Robert I guess we'll wrap it up there we'll
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go into this a little bit more in depth in the next session there's a lot more
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here that we can cover and it sounds like it might be a small,
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series so really appreciate everybody tuning in and listening to us and we'll see you on the next one.