ISYOURCHURCH DRIFTINGINTO CULT-LIKEBEHAVIOUR?

The leader is treated as "God's anointed and only voice," and to question them is treated as questioning God Himself. They rarely say it outright, but watch how they respond when challenged: honest questions get reframed as "demonic attacks," and those who raise them get quietly blacklisted. Where you are afraid to ask a sincere question, you are no longer sitting under humble shepherds but under men leaning on their own pride.

And notice this: the followers who preach love and grace the loudest are often the first to reach for gossip, slander and personal attacks the moment their leader is challenged. Even more dangerous is the collective groupthink that takes hold when leadership successfully conditions the entire congregation to defend the indefensible. At that point, the script flips: the real enemy isn't the corruption being brought to light, but the person brave enough to expose it. They will ignore the rot right in front of them and instead attack the messenger for daring to speak the truth. That contradiction tells you a lot.

Cult-like churches love the language of family. It might very well be their favorite word. You'll hear it constantly: we're a spiritual family, covenant brothers and sisters, bound together for life. Or my all-time favorite. “This is my spiritual son or daughter.” And while you agree and stay in step, that warmth feels real. But watch what happens the moment someone leaves or dares to disagree — the "family" turns their back like Pauly in Goodfellas. Calls stop. Friendships evaporate overnight. People who wept with you at the altar will now cross the street to avoid you.

That isn't how a real family behaves; it's how the mafia behaves. In a healthy family you can leave the room, hold a different opinion, even move away, and you're still family. In these churches, belonging is loyalty, and the moment your loyalty wavers, the love is revoked. And you don't belong.

This ties directly to their exclusivity. The "family" only counts if it's their family (or paid staff that NEEEEEED the job) — inside their walls, under their covering. They keep to themselves, discourage real fellowship with believers elsewhere, and quietly teach their people that other churches are "less than," lukewarm or deceived. I don't think I've ever heard a positive word said from my old church about any of the other local churches. Actually, whenever we hosted one as a guest speaker—which, let's be honest, was nothing more than a political stunt—our pastor would spend the entire staff meeting "briefing" us. He'd act like it was this massive, exhausting chore just to tolerate these people for a Sunday.

So the circle is drawn tight: you're family as long as you stay inside the circle and never question it — and the day you step out, you discover just how conditional that family always was.

Churches that blacklist and shun members for not being “all in” or as I call it compliant — or for missing meetings, for putting family before the mission, for simply disagreeing — are behaving the way cults do. Often the shunned person is publicly rebuked and branded "rebellious".

At my old church, they'd literally put a person on stage and talk about them as if they weren't there, like putting a dog's face in his own s***, humiliating them, kind of like how plantation owners did slaves that they wanted to break.

Cult-like churches preach in a way that leaves people afraid and guilty for things they were never meant to carry. They set unBiblical standards that are literally based on the senior pastor's preferences and childhood trauma, and they make leaving feel like abandoning God Himself.

They speak of joy and peace, yet their people live under a low, constant hum of "never enough" — always braced for judgement, generational curses, demonic oppression, the next deliverance. In the end, such churches place more faith in the harm that might come to you than in the goodness God has promised you. They trust the enemy's power to deceive more than God's power to redeem. That is a heavy, exhausting way to live, and it is not the gospel.

I remember just how afraid people were of the head pastors at my old church, it reminded me of the movie A Bug's Life. The pastors were the grasshoppers and the staff were the ants. The vast majority of the labor we produced was fueled by a constant presence of fear.

Tithing by itself says nothing — many godly churches teach generous giving. But cult-like churches lean on it, pressuring even members who are barely getting by. "You can't outgive God!" and "Your money is a seed!" get used to convince people that giving is a transaction that obligates God to pay them back with interest. Some even require a 10% tithe for membership.

Scripture calls us to cheerful, Spirit-led giving — not law-based tithing squeezed from the poor. A church that demands money from those it should be caring for has, whether it admits it or not, made peace with the love of money. And if that isn't crazy enough, these two stories will help.

Wise churches offer counsel and then trust you before God. Cult-like churches cross the line into control: dictating how you dress, who you may befriend, what you're allowed to believe. Of course our choices matter — but no healthy church tries to run your life. Some use "prophecy" to steer members to certain outcomes. I remember one time the so-called prophet at the church that I used to be at gave me a “word” during a staff meeting that damn near sounded like a job description. I was like, "God, that can't be you."

I remember when I got engaged to my wife right before entering the NFL, and the head pastor called me and said, "You didn't consult me at all in this, and I'm disappointed." I hung up the phone and told my dad. We couldn't believe he was serious. Especially because this same pastor was ridiculed for marrying a black woman in the 80s by his white counterparts who thought it wasn't a good look for him.

This one was actually the straw that broke the camel's back for me. In 2018, my wife was having problems in her pregnancy and had to have another C-section. It just so happened to be the week before a church conference that the head pastor wanted me to attend. I told him that my wife was in great pain and couldn't walk up stairs so I couldn't leave her at home alone. He gave me tongue lashing and told me he was disappointed. I think he considered it as a rebuke. That's when I knew I had to go. Family was boasted as a core value at this church but not at all a practice.

This is the thing that had me fired up about buddy that came over my house. For the 90 minutes he was with me, he never touched the topic of how his church has a mile long track record of oppressing and abusing believers. He saved the apologies for strategy.

Cult-like churches protect abusers and gaslight victims. Instead of openly confronting sin, they shield the powerful and quietly discredit the wounded. If a church knowingly harbours an abuser or predator — worse, lets them serve where vulnerable people gather — it is behaving exactly as a cult does. Allegations get ignored or downplayed until cover-up becomes the culture. If this is happening, the safety of real people is on the line, and it must be named plainly.

Cult-like churches welcome newcomers with overwhelming warmth — visits, help, meals, hugs, calls, DMs, financial aid. It feels like unconditional acceptance, and for a while it is genuinely lovely. But watch what happens once you become a regular: the warmth cools into "You'd better fall in line." That's the tragedy of it — the "unconditional" was always conditional. They use love to get you in, and fear, guilt and shame to keep you there. If the affection has an expiry date tied to your compliance, it was never really love.

I have never ever seen someone leave that church after a bad situation and maintain any form of relationship with their pastors after.

Hell, I was the successor of the head pastor and the second I left, all relationships ended. Eventually, I realized that my frustration shouldn't be aimed at the individuals who ghosted me, but at the toxic system they inhabit. They live in a constant state of fear, terrified that maintaining a bridge to me would invite a brutal rebuke from the very same leadership that discarded me in the first place.

When outsiders raise legitimate concerns, cult-like churches cry "We're being persecuted!" or “we are under attack” and insist the devil is working through the person asking hard questions. Honest correction gets reframed as a demonic attack, and members are conditioned to see every outside voice as a threat. This is how I became the crazy villain to their community in their eyes.

They talk far more about how the enemy is "attacking" them than about God's power to keep them. When everything is an attack and everyone is an enemy, fear has taken the wheel.

Some churches with genuinely excellent statements of faith still promote false prophets and teachers, and no evidence will move them. The moment you show — clearly and conclusively — that their so-called prophet is teaching serious error, you're labelled "deceived," an "accuser," someone "coming against God's anointed." These churches host and attend conferences headlining such teachers, and they chase manifestations that look far more like Eastern mysticism than anything in Scripture. Hungry for more than what God has already given in His Word, they end up championing men and movements that lead people astray — and they will not be told otherwise.

This is how a man I esteem highly named Christopher, who truly hears from The Most High, was ousted and degraded. They forced their newly hired “prophet” into a position that Chris had stewarded and served for years before him.

That “prophet” that they'd decide to follow and promote to senior executive pastor, did his damage, hurt many, lied on the mic frequently, and became one of the highest paid staff members in the history of the church and received one of the most generous retirement packages known to humanity.