Peter
Harris
About
twelve months ago I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Fortunately by the
grace of God, I was mercifully delivered from such a shattering experience the
intervention of Jesus Christ in my life — praise His Glorious Name! The problem
was that like an ever increasing number of people today, I’d been enmeshed in
the clutches of a cult. A cult that in their own words claimed to be the last
bastion of the Christianity promulgated in the first century. One that stood
for 100% truth in its purity.
CHRISTADELPHIANISM
The cult I was involved with for about five years goes under the name of
Christadelphians — meaning “brethren in Christ”. It was formed in the 1840’s by
a Dr. John Thomas, an Englishman who emigrated to America. To the unwary and
spiritually undiscerning, Christadelphianism when first encountered appears to
be a solidly Bible-based religion. Its adherents major in prophecy and they put
forward many cogent, weighty and forceful arguments in the presentation of
their interpretation of Scripture. Moreover, they are extremely sincere in what
they believe and are some of the most devoted students of Holy Writ one could
ever wish to find.
CHURCHES AND CHAPELS
It was when I came to a true and plain examination of their teachings and their
attitude to other faiths, that I began to be aware of that peculiar, grotesque
and demonical ‘spirit of error’ so unique to cultism. In common with their
brethren in the Watchtower Society, (who insist that they too hold THE truth in
its purity — and none else), Christadelphianism has the general attitude that
the teachings of the church are ‘strong delusion’. That the religion of the
Churches and Chapels is a negation of Bible teachings on almost all points, and
affirm that there is no salvation within the pale of any of them.
TRINITY DENIED
In short, they deny the Trinity — it being a stultification — an impossibility.
They deny the eternity, incarnation and deity of Christ, and make a mockery of
His Blessed Atonement. According to them, “Christ has given no satisfaction,
paid no debt”. The Holy Spirit is not a person but the “effluence that fills
immensity”. He is impersonal and doesn’t operate today. Nobody ever goes to
heaven, “going to heaven is purely gratuitous speculation” they say, and “both
hell and eternal torments are a fiction”. They deny the existence of a personal
devil (naturally) and deny the validity of any baptism other than their own.
Evangelism is regarded with a jaundiced eye. Justification by faith alone is
thrown out of the window, and as far as salvation is concerned, then it depends
not on what Christ has done — but what I do. Let Robert Roberts (Thomas’s
successor) speak here: “Nothing will save a man in the end but an exact
knowledge of the will of God as contained in the Scriptures and faithful
carrying out of the same. No assurance of salvation is theirs. Roberts also
said, and mark it well, “To the charge of holding that the knowledge of the
Scriptures in the writings of Dr Thomas has reached a finality we plead
guilty”. Little wonder the movement has had so many divisions in its short
history.
DOCTRINAL SCRIPTURE TWISTING
Well reader, what the historian Tacitus spoke of crafty counsels, I may as
truly apply to crafty errors. “They are pleasant in their beginning, difficult
in their management and sad in their event and issue”. And so I left
Christadelphianism — the death watch beetle of icy intellectualism dining in
the rafters, and the dry rot of schism and contention gnawing in the cellar,
and in the living room itself, heaps of false doctrinal and Scripture-twisted
rubble. The corridors ever echoing with the hyena cries of one faction whining
after their Thomas, and the other warbling for their Roberts. Praise God that
He mercifully delivered me from a mere head religion — unto Christ Jesus — a
perfect Saviour.
Amen.
"AWARENESS", December 1982
