Now, am I saying that idols and the sacrifices offered to them have any value? Absolutely not! However, I am implying that when an unbeliever offers a sacrifice to an idol, it is not offered to the true God but to a demon. I don’t want you to be participants with demons! I Corinthians 10:19-20 (The Passion Translation, TPT)

In Pauls’ day the cities and places that he visited were filled with idol worship, with temples erected to false gods all over the place. And Paul makes it very clear what those false gods were; they were demons. Many people believed that the idols were harmless because they were just objects made by man. However, the worship of idols was very dangerous because those man-made objects were demonically-inspired and represented demonic entities. And participation in false religions is just as dangerous today as it was then.

Man was made to worship- there is a desire within every person to worship something or someone. And what we worship is what we submit to. Those of us who worship the One True God are submitting ourselves to Him and His Kingdom rule. Those who worship anything else are submitting themselves to the kingdom of darkness and its ruler, satan.

Many people think that all religions lead to heaven, but that is a lie of the devil. And to justify that thought, many will say, “How can a loving God send people to hell?” The answer is that He doesn’t- the choice to reject what He has offered sends people to hell. You see, the Lord really IS a loving God. That is why He sent Jesus to die in our place. He could have left us with no avenue to escape hell, but He didn’t. What has happened is that the enemy has sent demons to draw man’s worship away from God. His interjection of false gods was intended to confuse people. It is his desire to introduce so many false religions and gods into the picture that people have trouble identifying the One True God. But the truth is that it’s not difficult to identify the fakes.

With that in mind, I want you to understand that no one saying “Jesus is cursed” is operating under God’s Spirit, and no one confessing “Jesus is Lord” can do so without the Holy Spirit’s inspiration. I Corinthians 12:3 (The Voice, VOICE)

Idenitying false religions and fake deities really boils down to one thing- what they do with Jesus. Any religion that does not recognize Jesus as Lord- equal with God and a part of the Godhead- is a false one. If a religion denies the existence of Jesus or identifies Him as anyone other than God and the Son of God, it is a false religion, inspired and directed by satan and his demons. A religion that denies Jesus is one that is operating under the spirit of antichrist, which denies that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed Son of God.

A gemologist has no trouble picking out synthetic stones because he knows what the real gems look like. You see, it is easy to spot the false when you know the genuine. In the same way, when Jesus is your Lord, you have no trouble identifying the fakes.