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Apologetics: Answering Heresies & Exposing Cult Watch Groups

Apologetics is the study and practice of defending the Christian faith.

Many groups today claim to be apologists. They call themselves "cult watch" groups, and they have assigned themselves the task of defending the "historic Christian faith" from "cults" like the Mormons, the Jehovah's Witnesses, and the Way International.

Defending the Faith

Defending the faith is noble and commanded by Scripture …

One question, however, must be asked: What was the faith once for all delivered to the saints?

Apologetics and the Historic Christian Faith

There is an objective faith that is historical, was spoken of by Jude, and can be accurately known and described.

Unfortunately, most of those who claim to practice apologetics either don't know or don't care what it is.

I'll just be blunt with you. If you were part of a church that emphasized salvation by faith alone, a born again experience that is separate from baptism, and a baptism that is a symbolic public testimony, would you want to know that none of those doctrines are historic?

Most apologetics ("cult watch") groups are fundamentalist evangelicals. My experience with Christ—a very real and powerful experience—began in a fundamentalist evangelical church. As of Christmas 2023, I am part of an evangelical church. 

I hang out with evangelicals because I know what matters on the last day is that I lived my life for Christ, not that my theology was perfect ... or even good (e.g., Matt. 25:31-46). I have found it easier to find people who encourage each other to live holy among the evangelicals, but don't get me wrong. It is hard, among evangelicals, Catholics, or Orthodox believers, to find people who "exhort one another day by day ... lest any be hardened by the deceitfulness of sins" (Heb. 3:13). 

It is even harder to find a church that practices Hebrews 10:24-25, the members provoking "one another" to love and good works at their assemblies and encouraging one another. Evangelicals, Catholics, and Orthodox alike keep practicing there traditions on Sunday morning week after week, ignoring Hebrews 10:24-25 except to misquote the middle of a sentence, "not forsaking the assembling of yourselves together," as though the passage taught Christians to rush to a pew be quiet every Sunday.

With that complaint out of the way, while Roman Catholics and Orthodox have added all sorts of tradition to the faith once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 1:3), evangelicals have built most of their theology on unscriptural traditions. 

Salvation by faith alone, as taught by apologetics groups like the Christian Research Institute, is not true and is directly rejected by James, the Lord's brother, in the Bible (James 2:24). (In fact, at this point, Hank Hanegraaff, CRI's director, has rejected the doctrine and converted to Eastern Orthodoxy). I will add here that any self-proclaimed apologist who twists "You see then that by works, a man is justified, and not only by faith" into "We are saved by faith alone, but not by a faith that is alone" has no business pretending to be an apologist. Instead, such a person is simply practicing the craftiness and cunning of men described by Paul in Ephesians 4:13.

I can't be certain that you have heard that James really meant "we are saved by faith alone, but not by faith that is alone" when he wrote "not by faith only," but I have heard it repeatedly. It is the most common twisting of James 2:24 that I have heard, though I have heard several.

The worst thing of all, though, is trying to get an evangelical to repeat James 2:24 verbatim. I have asked supposed Bible believers to say, "We are justified by works and not by faith only," but I have never gotten an evangelical to be willing to do so.

For those wondering about passages like Romans 3:28; Ephesians 2:8-9; and Titus 3:5, see my explanation of the historic doctrine of salvation by faith.

The point here is, though, that most "cult watch" groups have no idea what the historic Christian faith is. Their apologetics are a defense of Protestant tradition, not research into the faith as it was once for all delivered to the saints.

There is not one Scripture suggesting baptism is symbolic, and almost every Scripture on baptism clearly states it is not just symbolic. The same is true of early church teaching on the subject. In fact, no one teaches a symbolic baptism or separates it from regeneration until at least the 17th century.

Baptism in water and the regeneration experience were clearly tied together in the eyes of all Christians until sometime after the Reformation. Before that, everyone believed that Jesus was talking about water baptism when he mentioned the new birth in John 3:3-5. Even Titus 3:5, which mentions "the washing of regeneration," was universally understood to refer to water baptism.

Scripture Interpretation and Historic Christianity

In Protestant churches it is common to appeal to the Scriptures apart from the historic witness of any church or any Christians as a source of authority. I do not want to argue that on this page.

On this page, I want to point out that apologetics groups claim to be teaching the historic Christian faith, not just what they believe the Scriptures to teach. They regularly refer to the great creeds and councils of Christianity as a standard of orthodoxy.

Those who are willing to be that confident (I hesitate to say arrogant, although I am certain that is how God sees it) of their Bible interpretation can take a stand against what the Christ's churches have historically believed. But you cannot set the historic Christian faith as a standard for Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, and other "cults," when you do not abide by it or believe it yourself!

Early Christian Apologetics

Justin Martyr

The mid to late 2nd century Christian writers are known as the apologists. All of them appealed to the historic Christian faith.

The earlier apologists, such as Justin, didn't need to bother with researching the historic faith. For him and others of his age, just 50 years after the last apostle died, the historic Christian faith was still just what "we have been taught."

• God, the Father … and the Son … and the prophetic Spirit, we worship and adore … declaring without grudging to every one who wishes to learn, as we have been taught. (First Apology 14)
• We have been taught that God did not make the world aimlessly, but for the sake of the human race. (Second Apology 4)
• I consider it reasonable to recur to our progenitors … who have taught us nothing from their own private fancy … but without wrangling and contention received from God the knowledge which also they taught to us. (Hortatory Address to the Greeks 8)

Later apologists, like Irenaeus and Tertullian, stated more precisely that they were leaning on a historic faith:

The apologists referred to this apostolic teaching as the rule of faith or the apostolic tradition.

Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons

It is not that tradition has more authority or equal authority with Scripture. It is that tradition—if it can be shown to have come from the apostles and been handed down by the Church—judges interpretation of the Scriptures. This is proper apologetics … 

Then, like now, heretics argued that it is the true church that corrupts the Scriptures and their interpretation, not themselves …

Proper apologetics, then, points to the historic Christian faith. What did the churches of the apostles believe?

That is not as easy to determine today as it was in Tertullian's day. Tertullian could go to a church formed by the apostles and ask what they had taught. He could compare it both with Scripture and the writings of those who had come before him, such as Clement, the Letter of Barnabas, and other writings.

Though it is more difficult today, it is not exceptionally difficult. We have those writings available ourselves. We have Tertullian's writings as well. Eusebius, in his Church History in A.D. 323, preserved many quotes from writings no longer available today.

Those writings are consistent, and they testify to one carefully defined and limited faith that is the faith for which Jude commanded us to earnestly contend.

Apologetics and Modern Heresies

A Jehovah's Witness Kingdom Hall in England

Apologetics is still needed. There are modern heresies.

At what point have groups like the Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons wandered from the faith? What about unusual groups that are not usually considered "cults," like the United Pentecostals or the Church of Christ, which divides from all other denominations?

These questions apologetics will answer only through a knowledge of the historic Christian faith as found in the rule of faith.