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Confesson of a Longtime Cultist
by Robert Schmid, July 1979

Ever since Jonestown the word Cult or Cultist has become a household word around the world. I too could not escape the impact and it caused me to look at myself and determine what I have or had in common with 900 Jonestown Cultists.

To begin with, I was indoctrinated and brainwashed from early childhood. It was never my choice, for during my childhood I followed and accepted that which my parents taught me by word and deed. Even during my teenage years and early adulthood, I never became suspicious because the people we associated with had all the same beliefs, and did, more or less, the same things.

Asking the question WHY, was paramount to challenging the authority and wisdom of parents and leaders. My wife was the product of the same environment and so we were married and raised our children perpetuating the same beliefs and traditions we inherited from our parents and society.

It was not until my middle thirties, after I satisfied the basic human requirements of a family, a home, a steady job and a little financial security, that I began seriously to ask: WHY? I soon found myself with more questions than answers and the search for truth was on.

Why did I believe what I believed? Why did I go to church on Sunday mornings? Why did I go to a particular church and not to another? (I found there were some 250 denominations to choose from). Why did I believe what one preacher said and disbelieved another? What is truth anyhow? Who determines what truth is?

Then one day I received the answer. God in His own way and time opened my mind giving me the answer to all my questions. GOD’S WORD IS TRUTH!
I accepted, and God began to remove the scales from my eyes and mind, showing me that:

• God is not a “Trinity” but a loving and expanding “Family;”
• that man does not have an “immortal soul,” but that man’s only hope is a “resurrection from the dead;”
• that the purpose of man is not to “go to heaven,” but to become a “son of God;”
• that the “SUN-DAY,” is not the “SON-DAY;”
• that “Easter” is not the “Passover,”
• that “death” does not mean “life” in heaven, hell or purgatory,
• that “three days and three nights” in the grave can not be from Friday afternoon to Sunday morning,
• that the Good News Jesus Christ came to proclaim is not only the “Gospel of Grace,” but was and is the “Gospel of the Kingdom of God,”

Yes, I was brainwashed, along with millions of others, into believing and following blindly, beliefs not to be found in the Word of God – the Bible.

But praise be to God, my cult-days are over. Today I live in freedom knowing and understanding why I believe what I believe. True to scripture, Satan has deceived the whole world, raising up his most successful cult under the label of “Christianity.”

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