Deep in the heart of every person is the intuitive feeling that there must be "a way", a way which is of God and leads to God. This feeling is very strong in children and remains strong until the individual either becomes hardened in gross sin or by the wisdom of this world. But every honest person will admit that at one time in his life he felt an earnest desire to know God and to walk in His way. But as the lusts of the mind or flesh are given in to, there is a dark mist that settles down on the heart which quenches any true breathings after Him. Sometimes, after this darkness has settled on the heart and if the individual is religiously inclined, he may become active in one or other of the ways around us, but his religion is never the religion of Jesus and has its roots in the region of the damned. For the religion of Jesus was to do the will of the Father, but this man's religion is to do his own will in the name of the Father. And these two ways are as opposite as light and darkness.
So we see the foundation of the many ways in the world, each claiming to be of God and in the divine order. They all originate in the fallen and corrupt nature of man which is alienated from God. It is for this reason that they are filled up with hypocrisy and deceit. For it is impossible for fallen man to meddle with the things of God without creating an institution which is only superficially similar to the church of Jesus Christ, but within is filled with wickedness and every evil way. This is the spiritual Mystery, Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth, which is spoken of in Revelation 17:5.
Now the false ways are multitudinous. As there are no bounds to the wicked imaginations of man, so there are no bounds to the number of ways he may invent. For just as a man may be inspired by the Holy Spirit, he may also be inspired by the evil spirit, the arch-enemy of man's soul. And Satan knows that God's holy way is hateful to the sinful mind. So if he can invent many false ways which appeal to the lusts of the flesh, he knows that the deceitfulness of man's heart will do the rest.