4 Jesus answered: “Watch out that no one deceives you. 5 For many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am the Messiah,’ and will deceive many. 6 You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 7 Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of birth pains.
9 “Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10 At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11 and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Matthew 24:4-11
15 “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. Matthew 7:15
4 For if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the Spirit you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough.
5 I do not think I am in the least inferior to those “super-apostles.”[a] 6 I may indeed be untrained as a speaker, but I do have knowledge. We have made this perfectly clear to you in every way. 7 Was it a sin for me to lower myself in order to elevate you by preaching the gospel of God to you free of charge? 8 I robbed other churches by receiving support from them so as to serve you.9 And when I was with you and needed something, I was not a burden to anyone, for the brothers who came from Macedonia supplied what I needed. I have kept myself from being a burden to you in any way, and will continue to do so. 10 As surely as the truth of Christ is in me, nobody in the regions of Achaia will stop this boasting of mine. 11 Why? Because I do not love you? God knows I do!
12 And I will keep on doing what I am doing in order to cut the ground from under those who want an opportunity to be considered equal with us in the things they boast about. 13 For such people are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ. 14 And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. 15 It is not surprising, then, if his servants also masquerade as servants of righteousness. Their end will be what their actions deserve. 2 Corinthians 11:4-15
These are only three of the many verses in the Bible that warn about false teachers and false prophets. There have always been false prophets throughout history but they will increase and become more bold in the period before the end times. If you look around at the preachers today you will see many that do not follow the Bible and teach what the people want to hear. Many are subtle and if you do not know the Bible you could easily be fooled. Others are obvious cults, any “religion” that is so secretive that you cannot know what they are doing unless you are at that level are cults. Any “religion” that charges you money to move higher up in their “church” is a cult.
Let’s talk about Scientology, when you hear the name you immediately think of Tom Cruise or John Travolta, they are the face of this “religion” and their job is to make it enticing to join. Scientology is a “religion” that was created by L. Ron Hubbard. Hubbard was a science fiction writer that expanded into the self-help genre with his book Dianetics. Using a self-help technique called “auditing” which helped the person to recall traumatic events from their past and help them to remove the “engrams” these events have left behind by “clearing”. Dianetics found many followers and become a best-selling book. Some of its followers tried to get the principles behind Dianetics accepted as a psychiatric community. The concepts were rejected as unscientific and not worth discussion. Hubbard was sued for teaching medicine without a license and became bankrupt. The followers of Dianetics started arguing about past lives and reincarnation, Hubbard took this seriously and came up with the existence of the “thetan”. He could also see that disagreements were causing his followers were starting to do individual Scientology where they did not need any others, Hubbard created the church of Scientology to control his followers under his authority. He started opening churches in other states and countries to expand his following. The church of Scientology has been sued or had lawsuits filed against it, it has even been banned in some countries. In the Operating thetan level 3, they are taught that Xenu was the leader of the galactic foundation 75 million years ago. There was massive overpopulation so Xenu captured billions and froze them to capture their souls. They were loaded onto spacecraft to be taken to earth or Teegeeack to be disposed of . When they reached earth, they were unloaded near volcanoes and hydrogen bombs were unloaded into the volcanoes and detonated. Most of the aliens died , their disembodied souls (thetans) were blown into the air and captured by Xenu using and electronic ribbon. They were taken to watch a motion picture for 36 days that implanted misleading data into them (God, the devil, space opera). Each lost its personal identity and merged into the aliens that survived the blast, now known as “body thetans”. Only Scientologists have been able to remove them. Xenu was overthrown and earth was left as a prison planet though it has had repeated alien incursions. Hubbard was drinking and taking stimulants and depressants at the time of this “discovery” as he wrote to his wife. What does Scientology believe? They believe that experiences in this and in previous lives are recorded in the brain as “engrams”. These are rekindled in similar situations and cause self-defeating behavior. The goal of Scientology is to clear these “engrams” and reach the person’s potential as a “thetan”. A “thetan” is similar to a spirit or soul but also includes the mind and body. What are the steps to becoming a “thetan”? The first step is the Introductory program, this is where you learn about Dianetics and you can listen to recorded lectures by L. Ron Hubbard or take a course, this can cost from $15 to several thousand dollars. The next level is Purification where the person undergoes detoxification for 5 hours a day for 2-4 weeks. This costs anywhere from $1500-$2500. The next step is training routines and objective processing where the person learns to communicate better and to concentrate on the present, no cost listed. The next level is counseling sessions to help remove the “engrams”, these sessions will go on until you reach “clear” level and the cost is $40,000-$60,000. The next level is the “clear” level when a person is freed from the “engrams”, the person is now ready for advanced courses and counseling to prepare for the OT level, the Operating Thetan. This leads to the upper levels of Scientology and the person must go through security checks to be sure they can be trusted to not reveal OT secrets to others. The cost of these preparations is around $20,000. The church offers 8 OT levels but has a list of 15. The first 6 levels cost around $60,000 to complete and the final two levels can cost tens of thousands more.
Now you may wonder how so many people follow this “religion”, many are pulled in at a vulnerable place in their lives where they are looking for answers. They are told that Scientology can give them answers and help them learn how to have the life that they want. I don’t know how they can keep the people once they start asking for such large sums of money. Maybe the first two levels are understandable, but after that the amounts of money are astronomical. If it was just the learning, I can see a person taking it to clear level but once you reach the OT levels why would you stay? If anyone told me the Xenu story as truth, I would walk out of the room immediately. How can they take it seriously, it really sounds like the plot of a science fiction book. Who would follow a science fiction author who made up a religion anyway, and whose teachings are found to contradict other teachings. ( one reason for their church non-profit status to have been taken away at one point) It should be obvious to anyone that has done their research that this is not a religion, it is a cult.
Bible Prophecy 