The shadows cast within the lodge are not new; they are the elongated silhouettes of ancient abominations that have haunted the soul of man since the plains of Shinar. To look upon the modern craft is to see the “Great Mystery” of the ancients dressed in contemporary finery. It is the same “secret doctrine” that flowed through the veins of the Egyptian priesthood, the Greek mysteries, and the Roman collegia. The Scripture warns us in Colossians 2:8, “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” These rudiments are the same “hidden wisdom” that the sorcerers of Egypt utilized to mimic the miracles of God, a counterfeit authority that seeks to bypass the Cross.
In the temples of Egypt, the initiate sought “deification” through the myth of Osiris; in the groves of Greece, the Eleusinian mysteries promised a rebirth through ritualistic drama; in the Roman vaults, the cult of Mithras bound soldiers in blood-oaths of brotherhood. Each of these schools shared a common root: the lie of the serpent that “ye shall be as gods.” This is the lineage of the lodge. It is a revival of the Gnostic heresy that suggests salvation is found in “gnosis”—a secret knowledge reserved for the elite—rather than the finished work of Jesus Christ. As it is written in 1 Timothy 6:20, we must avoid “profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called.”
These ancient paths led only to the tomb, yet the craft claims to possess the “lost key” to these dead civilizations. They honor the “Great Architect” who is nothing more than the sum of these pagan parts, a composite deity that welcomes the sun-worshiper and the humanist alike. But the child of God knows that there is no secret higher than the Gospel, and no school more profound than the foot of the Cross. We do not look to the pyramids for light, nor to the philosophers of Athens for truth. We stand fast, for the King is at the door, and His glory shall extinguish every false flame that was ever lit in a darkened chamber.
When the secrets of all hearts are revealed, will you be found covered by the apron of man’s works, or the robe of the Savior’s righteousness?