When Old Heresies Wear New Clothes
Every generation thinks it’s discovering something new about God. In reality, most of what parades as “fresh revelation” is recycled error in modern dress. The early church fought—and settled—these same distortions centuries ago. What we see now in groups like the LDS Church, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Christian Science, the Prosperity movement, and segments of progressive Christianity are not innovations. They are reruns.
The ancient heresies never disappeared; they just learned new vocabulary.
Mormonism (LDS): The Return of Polytheism
The idea that God was once a man who “became” divine isn’t restoration—it’s regression. This is the same logic that fueled ancient paganism and Arianism. When the Creator becomes a creature among other gods, transcendence dies. You’re left with a cosmos of competing divinities, not the uncreated, self-existent “I AM.”
Formal Heresy: Polytheism — the belief in multiple gods or divine beings, directly denying the monotheistic nature of God affirmed in Deuteronomy 6:4 and the Nicene Creed.
Jehovah’s Witnesses: Arianism Rebranded
Their claim that Jesus is “a god,” not the God, is Arius in a Watchtower. It’s the same denial of Christ’s eternal deity that the Council of Nicaea rejected in A.D. 325. The logic is simple: if Christ is not eternally God, He cannot eternally save. Only the infinite can bridge the infinite gap.
Formal Heresy: Arianism — the teaching that the Son was a created being and not co-eternal or consubstantial with the Father, condemned at Nicaea (325 A.D.).
Christian Science and New Thought: Gnosticism Resurrected
Matter as illusion, sin as ignorance, salvation as awakening—these were the slogans of Gnosticism long before Mary Baker Eddy gave them a 19th-century twist. The ancient Gnostics denied the incarnation because they denied the goodness of creation. Modern Gnostics deny sin because they deny moral reality. Both end in the same absurdity: a “spiritual” gospel with no cross and no blood.
Formal Heresy: Gnosticism — the belief that salvation comes through secret knowledge and that the material world is evil or illusory, denying the incarnation and bodily resurrection of Christ.
Oneness Pentecostalism: Modalism with a Microphone
One Person wearing three masks—Father, Son, and Spirit—as mere modes of expression. That was Sabellius in the third century. It failed then for the same reason it fails now: Scripture doesn’t present God as one Person acting in three roles, but as one Being existing eternally as three Persons in perfect communion.
Formal Heresy: Modalism (Sabellianism) — the denial of the Trinity by claiming God is one Person who appears in three sequential modes rather than three co-eternal Persons.
Progressive Christianity: Marcionism, Softened and Smiling
When the God of the Old Testament is dismissed as primitive, and Scripture is filtered through modern moral sentiment, you’re watching Marcion’s ghost. He tried to edit the Bible down to a God he liked better. Many are still trying. But when you edit God to fit culture, you lose both truth and authority.
Formal Heresy: Marcionism — the rejection of the Old Testament and its God as distinct from the “good” God of the New Testament, condemned by the early church in the 2nd century.
Universalism: Origen’s Old Dream
The claim that all will eventually be saved—regardless of repentance—isn’t compassion; it’s denial. It collapses justice into sentiment and empties the cross of meaning. If all paths end the same, Calvary was unnecessary.
Formal Heresy: Apokatastasis (Universalism) — the belief that all beings, including the unrepentant and demonic, will ultimately be saved; rejected at the Second Council of Constantinople (553 A.D.).
The Prosperity Gospel: Pelagianism in Designer Clothes
The Prosperity Gospel promises what Jesus never offered—earthly ease as proof of divine favor. It reframes faith as a transaction, turning God into a vending machine for wealth and wellness. The poor are blamed for “lack of faith,” the rich congratulated for “spiritual success.” It’s not Christianity; it’s baptized consumerism.
At its core, this teaching denies grace. It assumes humans can leverage divine law for personal gain—a modern echo of Pelagius, who taught that moral effort could earn God’s blessing. Prosperity theology does the same with faith: treat it as currency, and blessing as payment. But the gospel of Christ is not if you give, you’ll get—it’s you’ve received, now give.
When Scripture says, “take up your cross,” prosperity preaching substitutes, “pick up your check.” The apostles were martyred, not manicured; Paul wrote from prison, not a penthouse. True faith doesn’t manipulate God—it submits to Him.
Formal Heresy: Pelagianism — the belief that human effort or merit can earn divine favor or blessing, denying the necessity of grace. Condemned at the Councils of Carthage (418 A.D.) and Ephesus (431 A.D.).
The Common Thread
Every heresy begins with a diminished Christ. They all distort either His nature or His work. Some shrink His divinity; others soften His authority. But the motive never changes: autonomy disguised as enlightenment. Humanity wants to keep its independence while borrowing the language of faith.
That’s why heresy is never just a mistake—it’s a mirror. It shows the human impulse to redefine God in our own image.
And so the church’s task remains the same as it was in the first century: guard the truth, proclaim the gospel, and refuse to trade revelation for reinvention. Truth doesn’t evolve. It endures.
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” — Hebrews 13:8