Biblical Responses to the New Age Movement

God is personal. If God were impersonal, then the following qualities could not be His. God speaks and has a self given name: "I AM" (Exodus 3:14). God is long suffering, (Psalm 86:15; 2 Peter 3:15). God is forgiving (Daniel 9:9; Ephesians 1:7; Psalm 86:5). God hates sin (Psalm 5:5-6; Habakkuk 1:13). Man is not divine, but a sinner (Romans 3:23). He is deceitful and desperately sick (Jer. 17:9). He is full of evil (Mark 7:21-23). He loves darkness rather than light (John 3:19). He is unrighteous, does not understand, does not seek for God (Rom. 3:10-12). He is helpless and ungodly (Rom. 5:6). He is dead in his trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1). He is by nature a child of wrath (Eph. 2:3). He cannot understand spiritual things (1 Cor. 2:14). Salvation is not correct thought, but deliverance from the consequence of our sin (Romans 6:23; Ephesians 2:8-9). Salvation is God's deliverance from damnation (Eph. 2:8-9; Rom. 1:18; 2:5; 5:9). This salvation is found in no one but Jesus alone (Acts 4:12). Miracles are from God not from the mind of man (Matthew 8:1-4; Mark 6:30-44; Luke 17:12-19; John 2:1-11). Miracles imply an action by someone that is greater than ourselves. If God is impersonal, miracles cannot occur. But they do occur today as well as in Bible times and are not simply proper thoughts or understanding. Christ means "anointed. Jesus was the Christ, the anointed one." It does not mean a consciousness or quality of people. Jesus was the Christ, the Messiah, the Deliverer from sin. Jesus is the Christ (Matt. 16:16,20; Luke 9:20). "Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into His glory" (Luke 24:26). "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and rise again from the dead the third day" (Luke 24:46 ). "...we have found the Messiah (which translated means Christ)" (John 1:41). "He [David] looked ahead and spoke of the resurrection of the Christ..." (Acts 2:31). "...God has made Him both Lord and Christ this Jesus whom you crucified" (Acts 2:36). "For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly" (Rom. 5:6). "Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life" (Rom. 6:4). Christ is crucified (1 Cor. 1:23). You sin against Christ (1 Cor. 8:12). The blood of Christ (1 Cor. 10:16). Only the Bible has the message of Grace. Grace is the unmerited favor of God upon His people. Grace is the undeserved kindness of God. Grace is getting the blessings we do not deserve. At the death of Christ we are blessed; we are given grace; we are given eternal life and forgiveness of sins. Only Christianity has the message of free forgiveness given. Every other religious system on earth has some form of salvation dependent totally or in part on what the adherents do. Not so with Christianity. Humanity is not unlimited, but just the opposite: it is under bondage (Romans 5:12). Sin is its master and a deadly and deceitful one at that. True morality is that which is revealed by God in the Bible (Exodus 20). Anything else is only an imitation, a set of ideas laid down by man that originate from the mind of sinful man. The Bible opposes almost all the tenets of the New Age Movement. As Christians, we should be watchful to recognize what is false and teach what is true. We should be wary because the Edenic lie still rings strong in the hearts of the deceived -- and they want us to believe as they.