Can the devil and/or yourself lead you to a wrong form of Christianity?

score:3

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I totally agree with David Stratton and I want to add some more on Faith and Work.

Most of the religions in this world like Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism etc. teach that you have to work out your salvation. You have to do some good things for other fellows and for God. After you die, your good works and your piety will be measured, and your destiny will be decided based on the assessment. The destiny may be heaven or hell, end of rebirth cycle or continuation of unhappy rebirth etc.

Christianity is different. Your good works count nothing for the salvation of your soul. You cannot save yourself, you cannot achieve salvation yourself. You need some external miraculous power to save you. Jesus Christ came from heaven and entered this world to die for our sins so that we may be counted sinless through His sacrifice. Salvation can be achieved by confessing our sins to Jesus and believe in His sacrifice, the work Jesus accomplished for our salvation and live our life according to His words, which is the Bible.

John 3:16 (NIV) For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

You must do good works because you are saved, not because you want to be saved. Show your faith by your works. Our good works and obedience to God's laws should be inspired by our faith to God. Faith without action is useless and deeds without faith is also useless.

James 2:14-18 (NIV)

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds.

Upvote:5

Asuming that there is one objectively True form of Christianity, the mere existence of the wide array of beliefs, some exclusive and contradictory to others means that some forms of Christianity must be false. Simply logic tells us that two mutually exclusive things can't both be true.

Therefore, it follows that if some forms of Chrisianity must be false, then it must be possible for people to be led and allow themselves'to be led to follow a false form of Christianity.

Without even going into doctrine, the clear answer to your question is "yes, you can lead yourself to a false form of Christianity".

Delving into Scripture, we're warned of false prophets, false spirits, able to disguise themselves as spirits of light ( 2 Corinthians 11:12-15: ), leading us to believe in false doctrines... Doctrines of devils (1 Timothy 4:1), so both logically and Scripturally, it's entirely possible to believe in a false form of Christianity.

Of course, discussing which form of Christianity is the right one is not within site guidelines, but that there is a right form is a belief comonly shared across Christianity. And we all believe that we are practicing it.

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