My Christian Journal

A lot of denominations have false doctrine that can easily be disproven yet members either don’t look into it, they believe their founder’s books more than the bible, or they’re just caught up in traditions and peer pressure. Some may also believe that doctrine doesn’t matter a whole lot, ‘as long as someone believes in Jesus’ or goes to church and does good things, but that is an unbiblical mindset. But Paul makes it clear that we are to seek good doctrine and correct each other (Titus 1:9). He even gives us a warning that “the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but having itching ears, they shall heap to themselves teachers in accordance with their own lusts. And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned toward fables”(2 Timothy 4:1-4). Let’s look at some easily correctable doctrines from various denominations: 

The Pentecostal church is obsessed with speaking in tongues, so much that they essentially believe that a person isn’t filled with the Holy Spirit unless they can exhibit that gift. They get this idea from the day of Pentecost when the disciples/apostles were filled and started speaking in tongues in Acts 2. However, we must note that the disciples spoke actual languages which intrigued the people of various backgrounds around them to hear and believe in Jesus. It’s not meant to be random gibberish, and it’s definitely not supposed to be spoken all at once, especially if there’s no interpreter present (1 Corinthians 14:26-33). The bible also says that we are different parts of Christ’s body, so we will get different gifts from the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 12). It’s unbiblical to assume or demand that everyone has the same gift like speaking in tongues, and it doesn’t benefit the audience for a pastor to speak in tongues without anyone understanding what he is saying. 

The Seventh-Day Adventist church which I grew up in made the same mistake with the Sabbath. While opinions differ within the church, many will say that keeping the Sabbath is mandatory to be saved as it is part of the 10 commandments (Exodus 20), or at least give the impression that it is vitally important. Even as a kid, I heard Sunday keepers say that the law was only given to the Israelites and that Jesus is our rest, but none of them were really able to defend that view with the bible, thus why I personally felt the SDAs were on the right track. But with a new heart and the scales removed from my eyes, even I can disprove the SDA doctrine. We’re told that being under the law is a curse and that no one was ever saved by keeping the law (Galatians 3:10-14). We’re also told that we are now under grace, led by the Spirit ( Galatians 5:16-18). 

The Sabbath is never commanded in the new testament, and there’s even verses telling us not to judge regarding food, new moons, and Sabbaths (Colossians 2:16).  Paul and Jesus gives a lot of commands to the Gentile Christians, but keeping the Sabbath is never one of them. Sadly, the Adventist church’s gospel is the ‘3 Angels Messages’, so regarding Revelation, they believe that the Sabbath is the seal of God, the Pope is the Anti-Christ, and Sunday worship is the mark of the beast…..which doesn’t even make sense. Not all religions worship on those days, some meet on Wednesday and Fridays. It also paints a picture of a very cruel god, because not everyone has the freedom or priviledge to keep the Sabbath. Some people are slaves, are trafficked, or are being persecuted. Their hypocrisy runs further since they don’t keep the jubilee (full year) Sabbaths nor other Jewish Feasts and Holy Days. The Bible says if you break one law you’re guilty of them all (James 2:10), so if you’re going to tie yourself to Sabbath keeping, you should keep all of God’s holy days. The church doesn’t even keep the one thing they push on every other denomination. 

Adventists never talk about or push the law of circumcision even though that was a more vital part of the covenant given to Abraham hundreds of years before the 10 commandments were introduced. They not only promote keeping the clean/unclean food laws in Leviticus, but real Adventist will take it a step further into vegetarianism as our founder, Ellen G White said we should be like Adam and Eve. The church bans alcohol and any stimulant like caffiene, but the bible only speaks against drunkeness and lack of self-control. Jesus himself turned water into wine and drank wine at the Passover, but they’ll claim it was grape juice. So I guess Noah in Genesis 9:20 got drunk off of grape juice lol It’s best to let the bible interpret itself instead of changing what it clearly says and implies when it says ‘wine’. 

Some churches like mine would say ‘no earrings or jewellery’ as well, even though there’s no verse condemning them, and countless characters wore them and received them as gifts as well, like Isaac to Rebecca in Genesis 24. Yes, we should dress modestly, yes our beauty should come from inside, but not once does the bible say ‘do not wear jewellery’ or ‘you cannot pierce your body’. In fact, in the book of the law, during the Sabbath Jubilee when all debts were cancelled and slaves were freed, if a slave loved their master and chose to say, the master will pierce their ear with an awl through the door and be a slave forever (Exodus 21:6, Deuteronomy 15:17). While we are to honour our bodies and shouldn’t get tattoos *for the dead* (Leviticus 19:28), the bible also clearly allows jewellery (are we not getting crowns one day?) and piercings. After all, who is the most famous character who got pierced but our own Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ?  As you can see, the Adventist will push certain laws and commands, even ones never directly preached in the bible or kept by the Israelites themselves, but they’ll also ignore scripture and other laws like how men should wear their hair (Leviticus 19:27, 1 Corinthians 11:14) or how we shouldn’t wear clothes containing different fabric (Leviticus 19:19, Deuteronomy 22:11). 

Worse than that, we continue to avoid certain foods because they’re ‘unclean’, but if we’re really going to pursue cleanliness, then we’re doing a really bad job because in Leviticus 15, the same book that talks about clean and unclean food, also says “When a woman has her regular flow of blood, the impurity of her monthly period will last seven days, and anyone who touches her will be unclean till evening. Anything she lies on during her period will be unclean, and anything she sits on will be unclean. Whether it is the bed or anything she was sitting on, when anyone touches it, they will be unclean till evening.” I’ve never seen women avoid church due to their periods, thus our benches and the whole church is unclean! If we’re going to ignore Paul’s note about ‘nothing is unclean in itself’ (Romans 14:14), we as Adventists should do anything and everything to avoid unclean items and practices, right?? RIGHT???? They’re trying to so hard to be special and different as the ‘one true church’, but it doesn’t even make sense! They’re literally modern day Pharisees, adding laws to make themselves appear more righteous. Outwardly, we are clean, but inwardly, we are full of dead man’s bones and all uncleanness (Matthew 23:27).  

Lastly, their whole Revelation interpretation is that Sabbath is the seal of God, and Sunday worship is the mark of the beast. So, as much as they may claim that they believe in Jesus’s sacrifice of faith alone, the logic of their doctrine clearly states differently since they believe in the Investigative Judgement, which started at the Great Disappointment in 1844 (a cover up when Jesus didn’t return as William Miller predicted). But the thing is, Ellen G White has made many false prophecies, like ‘Israel will never be restored as a nation’, which happened about 100 years after the SDA church was established.  Deuteronomy 18:22 makes it clear that ‘if a prophet makes even one false prophesy, they were not sent from God’, yet Ellen had quite a few, even prophesying that Jesus would come back in her lifetime. Ellen also believed in a different Jesus, one who was an angel, a brother of Lucifer, and that Satan was jealous when Jesus was elevated to be God. That’s what her most popular book, The Great Controversy, is all about. The SDA church is a cult built on lies, whether people want to believe it or not. I’m very thankful God opened my eyes and I have not returned since.

Online, I have seen an uptick in people becoming Catholics and claiming it is the one true church as it was the ‘first church’,  but that is a lie, and it is one of the most flawed, corrupted, and idolatrous churches around. Baptism was always a choice and it literally means ‘immersion’. Jesus was immersed and we are to follow his example…and yet they are sprinkling babies. Matthew 6:7 says “When ye pray, use not vain repetitions as the heathen do, for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking”, yet, isn’t that what rosary beads promote? Rosary beads aren’t mentioned at all in the bible btw. And why all the “Hail Marys?” Mary is dead and the bible never states she was anything more than a human. The bible also states that Jesus had other brothers (ie Matthew 12:46, Luke 8:19), so she didn’t remain a virgin. Only God is to be worshipped. People who even attempted to bow down to angels were told not to do so, like John in Revelation 22:8-9. 

So, where did these customs and traditions come from? The main reason is due to syncretism. I’m sure you heard about roman gods like Juno, Mars, Apollo, and the very popular one, Cupid. If you go to Rome, they have countless statues of their gods and goddesses, and would even worship leaders as gods. So when Constantine promoted syncretism, Christian beliefs were mixed with Roman traditions. The 2nd commandment in Exodus 20 clearly states “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them; for I, the Lord thy God, am a jealous God”, so if you’re wondering why Catholic churches has so many statues and artwork, it’s due to traditions. It’s also why and how Christmas and Easter which we’re told are Christian holidays, also promotes seemingly unrelated things like Christmas Trees and Egg laying Bunnies (More on that in Point #10). Colossians 2:8 gives us a serious warning on this very topic: “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” 

Now, back to the whole praying and worshipping Mary and Saints thing….we also should never be praying to the dead as that is a form of witchcraft and necromancy, which the bible also condemns countlessly (Leviticus 19:31, Deuteronomy 18:9-12, Isaiah 8:19, Revelation 21:8, etc). As a Christian, we have one intercessor, Jesus Christ (1 Timothy 2:5). We don’t need to seek dead saints, fathers, priests, or anyone else but Him, and we definitely should not be worshipping or praising anyone besides God. The Christian church believes that the Pope is like god and thus has the power to change the scripture, and it’s why Catholics focus more on their Catechism book and priests for instructions. But Galatians 1:8 warns “should we, or an angel from Heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached to you, let him be accursed!” The Pope is all for the interfaith/coexist universal religion, which is a big red warning flag in itself. “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6). 

I realized this year that there’s so many denominations not because we’re all so close to the ‘true religion’,  but because we’re straying farther. The catholic church is not the first church. It’s easy to believe that since Jesus was crucified by Romans, but the first apostles were not Catholic. Websites would have you believe Catholic was made in 30AD, but evidence says it may not have been established til about 590AD with Pope Gregory. From what I’ve studied, I would say Constantine was the main guy because around 300AD, he had a vision with the image of a cross and was told to conquer with it, and thus the idea of ‘church and state’ was established. But regardless, they were not first. The first churches weren’t even buildings as they had to meet secretly a lot of the time, but catholics were certainly the first building that spread, and other churches broke off from them when they realized they were wrong about something, thus ‘protest-ist’). Sadly, if the root is bad, the branches can only become so good due to their influence. Catholics believe in works to save you, and pretty much every denomination does too.  

Another common trope among denominations and cults is that ‘the bible is corrupted’, so when a supposed prophet comes around claiming they have the true word of God and it itches some ears, a new religion can get its start. This is what happened with SDAs, Mormons, and Jehovah Witnesses for example. That single person goes on to write a new book or various books and it is seen in a higher light than the word of God. Muslim’s Mohammed did the exact same thing as an ‘angel’ (demon) approached him and he eventually wrote the Quran. 

…..But isn’t God amazing? Look into the ‘Dead Sea Scrolls‘. In the 1900s, a bunch of original Jewish manuscripts were found in prestine condition. When these scripts were compared to the Hebrew and Greek scripts that our bibles are translated from, they were accurate about 99% of the time, thus, the bible is not corrupted as many love to claim so they can disprove it’s authority and validity. They also found additional books like Enoch and Jubilees which adds additional context to the scriptures when studied alongside them. And imma just say it, I’d rather a book with 35+ authors over time where everything is still cohesive, over a book with 1 author knowing that humans have flaws and are sinful by nature. 

Unfortunately, this is Satan’s world, so of course he’s going to confuse and deceive the church and make us doubt the bible. You never see this level of confusion and division in other religions, that’s for sure. But we’re in the information age now. You have access to so much resources and teachers for free! Don’t take it for granted! Question what you learned, read your bible and look things up. We have the original Hebrew transcript and dictionaries, we have old and new maps to reference, we have archeological evidence and artifacts to prove many biblical stories (I linked many at the top), we can type one word and get 50 verses that talk on that topic, so we really have no excuse to be ignorant or lost when all this information is in our pockets. 

I have given some grace to some church founders in the past as I’m aware that their information was limited. If you only had the bible, and no access to additional information and context like we do now, I can totally understand why people jumped the gun and came to certain conclusions and interpretations. I know many churches believe that the church replaced Israel, so anything about Israel’s prophesies were considered symbolic. How else could you interpret it? But Israel was reborn in 1948 so now prophesies can be taken literally. Jesus will literally land in mount Zion and rule from Jerusalem, and fulfill his promises to Abraham’s descendents, the Israelites. When the bible talks about ‘wisdom will increase’ and about ‘the mark of the beast’, they couldn’t possibly imagine the world we have now, with cars, planes, laptops and cellphones, credit cards and the ability to send money across the world in seconds! A ‘talking image’ seems clear as day now. 

So I urge you to not just assume that cause a denomination or preacher is older, that they would be more right than you or would have more wisdom than you have now. Some of the first churches may not have even had anything besides Paul’s letters . So just like with scientists, where one person’s discoveries, theories, or formulas start a chain reaction where the next person can build off of that and discover more and more, it only makes sense that those who come later will be more knowledgeable. We get to benefit off their hard work and can continue to dig deeper. Off topic, but I’ve had arguments with guitar players who’d rather do things like the greats did, listen to a radio and figure out how to play by themselves, and I’m like, why waste your priviledge like that? You can learn something in 5 minutes what took them 5 years to figure out….and then you can go on to create newere things! Sadly, they would rather re-discover something that already has detailed lessons online due to pride, and I see that with churches as well. Pride makes us hold on to these old false doctrines and prophet’s interpretations.   

Anyways, out of all the doctrines, the most important one that really determines where people’s heart is if they believe in the divinity of Jesus, and a triune God. I know many will argue that the word ‘the trinity’ isn’t in the bible, but ‘the Godhead’ is. Since creation, we see that God is plural when He said ‘Let US create man in OUR image’. Throughout the bible, we see God the Father, the ‘Angel of the Lord’ who is later incarnated as Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. Sometimes, we even see them all together like when Jesus was Baptized (Matthew 2:13-17). Jesus was able to receive worship and he also forgave sins, which is something only God can do. The bible also refers to the Holy Spirit as our Helper, Comforter, and Teacher (John 14:26, Nehemiah 9:20, Mark 13:11, etc), terms that describe a person. It can’t get more clearer than 1 John 5:7 which says “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one”. Definitely check out this video by Impact Video Ministries that has more verses and context about this doctrine. 

This doctrine is so vital because if Jesus isn’t God…we’re screwed. We were told that angels can sin, like lucifer and 1/3 of angels who rebelled against God. We also know that all humans are born into sin thanks to Adam’s disobedience. No one is good or perfect, but God (Psalm 14:3, Matthew 19:17, Romans 3:12). No one else can take our place as they would have to die for their own sins. God was willing to take our place, but as an eternal spirit, he had to take on a mortal form. He also had to keep humanity’s side of the contract perfectly if he were to die and atone for us…and thank God, He did! So now, similar to how we were all born into sin through Adam, we can all be reborn and made righteous through Jesus (Romans 5). He is our only hope of salvation! 

You ever wondered why Jesus asked his disciples “Who do people say that I am?” along with “Who do you say that I am?” (Matthew 16, Mark 8, Luke 9). It’s because many people claim to know or believe in Jesus, but they have differing opinions on who He is. Muslim’s believe he is just a prophet. Heck, even the demons know Jesus is God, but they clearly don’t care to obey him or submit to him as their God. A lot of religions, even those who came before Jesus, actually adopted him as an enlightened man who reached god status, and this is where the whole ‘Christ Consciousness’ belief comes from. How we see Jesus will affect everything in our world. If you don’t believe Jesus is God, then you’re not going to believe his sacrifice and blood is sufficient, and this is why so many churches fall to the man-made believe that we have to be good to earn our own place in heaven. Check out this video compiling various denominations which teach us to ‘repent from our sins’ (works salvation) and also adding other religions that essentially teach the same thing. 

Some Christians just want something easy, digestible and easy going, and some only want their ears tickled which is why many are attracted to the prosperity gospel. But as a real Christian, we need to seek the truth and stand up for it. The bible makes it clear “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:24). You have countless free resources, books, blogs, and videos, so don’t try to claim ignorance or blame others for your lack of knowledge. Take responsibility like your eternity depends on it, cause it does. And don’t be another false preacher or prophet leading others astray in this world. God will hold you accountable.