I Accidentally Joined a Cult
… and it only took me 15 years to realize it.
For fifteen years, I was an active participant in a cult I thought was a church. From the outside, it looked like a regular church. There were no animal sacrifices or midnight rituals or anything else you imagine when you think of the word “cult.” It felt like a regular church. If you visited on an average Sunday, you would probably think it was a regular church too.
You parked in a normal church parking lot, walked into a nice, normal-looking church building, and were greeted by nice, cheerful volunteers at the door. You walked into a normal-looking sanctuary where normal-sounding worship music was playing.
You might be taken aback by the enthusiasm of the churchgoers as they sang: grown men and women jumping up and down and waving their arms around like tropical birds taking flight. You might be surprised by this display, or you might admire their devotion and assume they must really be excited about what they are singing.
You would then hear some normal church announcements, watch as children were released to go to Sunday school, and then hear a normal-sounding, “biblical” sermon.
Intensely earnest worship music played immediately after the sermon, designed to really drive home the message and manufacture an emotional connection to the sermon. You might find yourself in tears, feeling confident that God was speaking just to you.
You probably followed up the church service chatting with nice, normal people who invited you to “care group” later that week or maybe to go out to lunch after church. You probably walked out the door, awash in serotonin, feeling welcomed into this community of friendly people.
None of this seemed cult-like. This is why it took me fifteen years to finally realize that my “normal church” was, in fact, a cult with a definitive hierarchy, with men who believed they spoke for God, so their orders must be followed. Anyone who questioned their authority must be silenced, punished, and shunned. There was a strange and specific culture in this church-cult, where coded language kept everyone in line. We were told “be suspicious of your own hearts” but to “assume the best” of others who told us what to do or think or feel. We were taught to always believe and accept criticism, especially from the leaders or their inner circle. We were told to ignore our gut instincts, and any red flags that arose in our minds since our “hearts are deceitful” but to trust and submit to the authority God placed over us (the cult leaders, aka, pastors).
Like all cults, outsiders were treated with suspicion but were very welcome to attend, as long as they were potential converts. My cult was hiding a 40-year-long history of systematically covering up domestic and child abuse while simultaneously driving a staggering amount of members to suicidal ideation, promoting abusive marriages, indoctrinating church members with oppressive patriarchy (they call it “complementarianism”), discouraging the mentally ill from receiving life-giving treatments (they call it “biblical counseling”), and systematically silencing victims and critics.
Cults don’t always look like people drinking literal Kool-Aid or playing tambourines in airports. Sometimes they look like friendly, normal people who meet in normal church buildings on Sunday mornings. You might even admire their tight-knit community and how much they love and support each other. However, underneath the surface, there can lie a dark reality that must be hidden at all costs.
My cult was called Sovereign Grace Churches (SGC), formerly Sovereign Grace Ministries (SGM), formerly People of Destiny International (PDI), and formerly Take and Give (TAG). They’ve rebranded themselves more times than most Fortune 500 companies. Their latest rebrand from Sovereign Grace Ministries to Sovereign Grace Churches was a transparent attempt at avoiding the scandal they brought on themselves after they were faced with a civil lawsuit for conspiracy to cover up child sex abuse. This name change occurred immediately after the lawsuit was dismissed due to the statute of limitations (not because the claims were found to be false). Apparently, someone on the Sovereign Grace leadership team said, “Drop the ‘Ministries’ and add ‘Churches.’ No one will ever know it’s us.”
So how do you know if your church is actually a cult? This is an important question that I will discuss further in future articles. In a sense, Sovereign Grace is the perfect case study of cults that disguise themselves as churches. Thankfully, there is a difference between churches and cults, but on the outside they can look very similar.
To be continued…
(This is part 1 of a 6-part series. Please also read part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5 and part 6).
