Stewart Best: The Book of Zero Options 

New Age Descriptions For the Bible

Article #2: New Age Descriptions For the Bible

Stewart Best's article, "Book of Zero Options Part One" teaches that the Bible is either the True Reality as it claims, or it is a gigantic myth:

Stewart chose a popular New Age phrase in reference to the Holy Bible!

"The millennium is the dissolution of illusion in order to allow the manifestation of the true reality. The true reality is a spiritual reality." (bold emphasis mine) See: The Birthing of a New Age

The "true reality" according to New Agers is definitely not the reality found in God's Holy Word, but the use of New Age phrases has a purpose in so-called Christian teaching. It is a conditioning device to cause Christians to accept New Age phraseology when it is applied to Christianity. 

First, Stewart places his readers on alert that the Bible has an indictment against them so they will pay close attention to Stewart's remedy for such an indictment:

The vast majority of the human race (including most Christians), do not recognize that the Bible is written in such a manner that it forms an indictment against them.

Now that sentence is true in the Biblical sense that every human being is born a fallen creature, and that he must be reconciled to God while he is still living on earth or else he will suffer eternal torment in hell. This is a serious indictment, but this indictment is not without a loving remedy provided from the heart of a loving God, who is not slack concerning his promise but is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. (see 2 Pe. 3:9) 

But it is not true if read through Stewart's SG/NW lens, which would make everyone who disagrees with him (because they believe and act upon the Bible's straightforward, in-context teachings) a rebel toward the Bible's allegedly hidden and secret teachings that Stewart constantly pushes.  

The presentation of a mean God is a recurring theme in Stewart's writings. Satan is a mean, devilish god, but the Most High God, the true God, is not. He is holy and just and as such renders judgment, but He is also loving and forgiving and as such renders mercy to the repentant. Stewart largely presents a one-sided God in this essay. 

God Does Not Care About You?

Here Stewart explains that God does not care about many things about you:

God does not care what you think about it. He does not care what your religious beliefs are, or your bias. He does not care how smart or intelligent you think you are. He does not care about your opinion. Source of quote: Book of Zero Options Part Two

According to Stewart, all that God cares about is if you accept his claims and obey his commands (you must search for these for a long time because they are secret and only for the select few) and accept what God claims is the reality of existence. (Yes, "reality of existence" is another New Age phrase!) Stewart just gave you a concise statement of the only thing Satan cares about: himself at the expense of his followers. Satan does not care about you, period. He only uses his followers for as long as they are successful in their assignments. Then he rewards them by completely destroying them.

The real God, the God of the Holy Bible, cares deeply about your beliefs and who you are as a person. He insists that you cast away all your beliefs that are against his holy Word and submit them— and indeed all that you are— to his loving authority in faith, but he is not an uncaring God the way Stewart makes him out to be.

Yes, God is the final authority, yes, God is in charge, that is true.  But God truly loves every individual man, woman and child on this earth and is not willing that a single one perish in his sins. Stewart is not presenting God in a balanced way— taking into consideration all his marvelous attributes— but almost as a caricature of a God: a mean, bigoted, hateful God who cares nothing for man.

2/08/03 update 

Stewart Presents God as an Opinionated Bigot

Is that not the very definition of a bigot? Jesus had HIS OPINIONS AND HIS BELIEFS. If you were not with him, He considered you were AGAINST HIM. Now if we go back to Psalm Two, and the prophecy of the last day conspiracy of the Kings and the Rulers of the Earth who conspire to rid the Earth of any thought of Christ or God, what does God say about it? He shall speak to them in HIS WRATH, and the wrath of God is the total and complete destruction of those He considers to be the enemy. By any definition, then, God is a BIGOT, with A BELIEF, AN OPINION, A CREED and He will not consider ANY OTHER POINT OF VIEW VALID. He does not care if you hang multitudes of degrees after your name. He does not care what your office and station in life is. He does not care if you command the greatest military machine in the whole world. All of it is of no use, vain and remarkable stupid and foolish.

Bigot is a derogatory term that is only applicable to man. A bigot is a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices.

Stewart said that Jesus had his opinions and beliefs, and that if you were not with him, he considered you to be against him. Do you see how Stewart made Jesus into a relative "god"? God does not have opinions or beliefs like mere man. If you are not with God, you ARE against him, period. He does not merely consider you to be against him.

Stewart's wording subtly sends the message (even while he repeatedly stated the zero options concept) that God is a relative "god" rather than the God of the Holy Bible--the one who is absolute truth. Look at this sentence:

By any definition, then, God is a BIGOT, with A BELIEF, AN OPINION, A CREED and He will not consider ANY OTHER POINT OF VIEW VALID.

Stewart is sending two messages: one is forthright and one is a subliminal message.

Forthright message: Zero options--believe God or be damned. 

Subliminal message: God is relative. He has opinions, beliefs, points of view and prejudices (opinions are subject to change and therefore relative) and if you don't agree, he considers your viewpoint to be invalid. God has a viewpoint and man has a viewpoint. However, God's viewpoint is the only one that he considers valid. 

God IS absolute truth. He does not have viewpoints, opinions or prejudices. To teach that God has opinions is to teach a relative "god" rather than the God of absolutes who is the real God. 

The Bible and "True Reality"

Stewart claims that the Bible makes a New Age statement about itself: 

The Scripture either stands or falls upon its basic premise - and it claims that it is the TRUE REALITY behind the Universe. (bold emphasis mine)

The phrase, "true reality behind the universe," is similar to the Hindu phrase, "truth behind the universe," that Stewart Best chose to include in his personal testimony, altering it with only one word: 

Now I did not know any of this, but I did have an intense DESIRE TO FIND THE LORD. In fact, my desire to FIND THE TRUTH BEHIND THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE WAS SO STRONG THAT I DID NOT CARE WHAT HAPPENED TO ME DURING THIS "SEARCH" FOR "THE TRUTH". I did not care if I died in the process. (bold emphasis mine)

Why is the phrase, "Truth Behind the Universe" such a concern? An article called, "Hinduism Through Questions and Answers" contains this concluding statement: 

The Upanishads are philosophical works dealing with such topics as the Truth behind the universe, the true nature of human beings, the goal of life and the means of achieving it. (bold emphasis mine)

If the Upanishads deal with the topic of the Truth behind the universe, then what exactly is an Upanishad? Could this be the philosophy in which Stewart is gleaning some of his teachings?

The Upashinad: Secret Doctrine

Upanishad means the inner or mystic teaching. The term Upanishad is derived from upa (near), ni (down) and s(h)ad (to sit), i.e., sitting down near... Groups of pupils sit near the teacher to learn from him the secret doctrine. See: Upashinads

This particular mystical philosophy is of the persuasion that it "is by a strictly personal effort that one can reach the truth." 

Compare that philosophy of strictly personal effort to reach the truth to Stewart's own words about his search for the "truth behind the universe":

I did not care if my entire family rejected me. I did not care about anything at all except for one thing: I WAS GOING TO FIND OUT THE "TRUTH" behind all of LIFE, and ALL OF THE UNIVERSE, or I was going to DIE TRYING.

Trying, or personal effort, is the only way the Upanishad mystics believe truth can be reached and it is also the only way Stewart Best teaches truth that truth can be arrived at: by great striving and personal effort!

I was also rather startled to learn that Sanat Kumara, among others, was an important Upanishadic sage. Sanat is an anagram of Satan.

Stewart also referred to the Bible as the Book of Mystery and Enigma:

The question then becomes, what does the human race do with this Book of MYSTERY AND ENIGMA?

Throughout all of Stewart's doctrinal writings there is a common thread of the secret, the mystical, the unknown, the mysterious, the hidden (occult means hidden), the inner, etc. This all ties in with Stewart's secret  doctrines that he asserts that only a select few will find.

1/28/03

Stewart Best and The Book of Zero Options: Satan is God With a Capital G?

Stewart Best: The Book of Zero Options: IF the Bible is True, God Will VERIFY Himself in a Supernatural Way?

Also See: Debunking Dark Light