How Do Cults Twist Scriptures?

 As I've blogged before, there's a proper way to read the Bible. When we take culture, history, and genre of each book into account, we won't go wrong.

Unfortunately for many new Christians, they don't know the difference between studying the Bible and twisting it to fit one's own ideas. This is why cults seek out new believers since they're easy to fool.

Here's one of the most-often-twisted verses:

(Matthew 18:18 KJV)  Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

Charismatic preachers and deliverance ministries take this to mean that we have the power to bind and loose demons. That's completely wrong. Look at the context and you'll see that Jesus was speaking about disciplining errant believers. Nothing in that verse even hints at demons.

Some fools have even taken the following verse to mean that they should cut off limbs that "offend" them:

(Mat 5:30 KJV)  And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.

Christ used that as a graphic metaphor to say that whatever lures us into sin should be shunned. Sadly for some, they took the verse literally instead of literately.

I was one of those naive seekers who ended up in a cult. Nobody taught me how to read the Bible correctly. Check out my account of finding out the truth in How I Was Razed: A Journey from Cultism to Christianity. You'll easily see  that the false teacher taught me complete rubbish.

In my next blog post, I'll explain how cults get away with misleading people.