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How It All Began

A booklet of a former top ranking Iglesia ni Cristo (1914) official planted a seed in my heart about cult evangelism. Though I could not say this booklet deals with every major and minor teachings of the group it paved the way for I.N.C. (1914) advocates to see the inconsistencies of their founder's teachings. During my early Christian life, I used to read the free magazines and booklets published by Herbert W. Armstrong.  I thought I was reading the right stuff until my father in the faith told me that I was in fact, reading a cultic material. This made me cautious in reading these so-called "Christian" literatures. I also began to develop the desire of reading materials dealing with Christian apologetics. I began to be aware at how gullible many Filipinos can be in accepting any spiritual teachings post by self-appointed "messengers," and "apostles," in spite of their obvious opposition to the Bible's teachings. These blatant deceptions created a desire so strong for me to share the gospel with many cultist and skeptics alike. As I talked with them, I began to understand their dilemma regarding the Trinity, the deity of Christ, the personality of Holy Spirit, understanding salvation, among others. In fact, there are many things that a Filipino cultist do not know or understand about what his cultic group believes in. I believe this is due to lack of information coming from outside sources. One example would be the former belief of I.N.C. (1914) about Jesus deity, Jehovah's Witness worship of Jesus, Mormon's belief of the Adam-God doctrine and many others. However, several people trapped in the cults know that the Bible speaks of this one God existing in three Persons but since they cannot comprehend such revelation (which I fully believed no one could) they have decided to throw "the baby along with the bath water". Not because they cannot believe but they chose not to believe. The problem lies not in the difficult verses of the Bible but in the heart of the person who encounters such verses dealing with the major Christian teachings. His heart is not yet prepared to accept those truths. One helpful tip in witnessing to the cultist is to try understanding things in their own view. As you do this, you will develop ways in explaining the truth of God's word to them. Of course, every Christian must acknowledge that only the Holy Spirit does the final penetration.

The Lord placed in my heart the desire to train and help Christians about cult witnessing. During 1994, I met someone who also has the same desire as mine. We talked and shared what we can do to help equip believers in cult evangelism. This meeting prompted us to organize a spiritual discernment ministry called The Bereans: Apologetics Research Team, (now known as, The Bereans: Apologetics Research Ministry) last 1995 because we see ourselves as a team of Christian researchers dealing with exposing the errors of heretical cultic groups in the Philippines.