“Some Shall Depart From the Faith”

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Recently, I heard a pastor talk about revival and how he felt it was coming. He gave a few details on the last revival and how the Spirit moved people and how it’s time for another revival. I heard a few “Amen”s throughout the congregation, and normally when I feel the Spirit and the words coming out of the mouth of the speaker are aligned, I will be one of the first that shouts an “Amen,” but this time I kept my mouth closed, and I began to ponder. Revival—is that what we need, or is it survival?

As I read the book of Revelation, Chapters 2 and 3, the Spirit gave me wisdom about what I was reading. A letter written to seven churches that had been lost to time; however, the principles and warnings to each church have survived over 2 millennia! I read the warning to the church of Laodicea, and what I read and what the Spirit showed me was in perfect alignment with the description of the church of Laodicea and the modern-day church! As the Spirit showed me these truths, I began to understand the command “He that hath ears, let him hear…” For days I pondered and turned this information over and over in my mind, pulling up verses of scripture to see how everything aligned. I asked God, “God, I need your wisdom here; I have none of my own, but show me what you are trying to tell me. Show me the message that you have given me to give to others that have the ears to hear!” He pointed to 2 Thessalonians 2:1-3.

“Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and by our gathering together unto him, that ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first and that the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.”

This moment is where you would hear me praise His Holy name! Oh people, ask, and you shall receive! Amen!? I love that God uses His word to answer the godly’s request for wisdom. Let him who lacks wisdom! Let him ask of GOD!

The last part of that passage really caught my attention: “except there come a falling away first”—Oh people, watch this… Paul is talking to the people at Thessalonica and addressing their concerns about supposed teachers of Christ telling them they had missed Jesus coming back to earth and that they were living in the days of tribulation and sorrow. Paul is saying, “I am here to tell you all to stop listening to those who are making this claim!” There has to be a falling away first, and then the man of sin will be revealed!

A falling away… “Some shall depart from the faith.” This verse serves as a warning about the apostasy that will occur. Now look at what Paul and Peter say about how teachers and pastors will depart from the faith. It is so ironic that while you have some pastors, leaders, and teachers—real God-fearing people who live to hear “Well done, my good and faithful servant”—most spend their lives justifying themselves. “Oh, this guy just hates rich people,” or “God pours out his blessings on the faithful,” or “I’m not corrupt; look at everyone else,” or “Judge not…” or “Pull the beam out of your own eye.”

Scripture provides explicit pastoral archetypes that define leaders operating in apostasy. In the King James Version, a modern pastor fitting the biblical criteria of an apostate exhibits one or more of the following five profiles:

1. The Commercial Shepherds (The Prosperity & Monetization Model)

  • Biblical Blueprint: 1 Timothy 6:5 (“supposing that gain is godliness”) and 2 Peter 2:3 (“Through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you”).
  • Modern-Day Application:
    • Transactional Seed-Faith Marketing: Promising financial windfalls, physical healings, or marital breakthroughs in direct exchange for monetary “seeds” or vows ($1,000 “breakthrough offerings”).
    • Monetized Anointing: Charging high-ticket registration fees for “prophetic impartation” workshops, selling “holy anointed water/oils,” or offering VIP access to pastoral staff.
    • The Corporate CEO Pastor: Measuring spiritual success purely by budget growth, real estate accumulation, and personal net worth—treating churchgoers as a consumer base to be monetized for private jets and luxury lifestyle branding.
  • Apostasy Proximity: Very High. This is no longer an underground scam; it is a multi-billion-dollar global broadcast industry that explicitly teaches the lie that financial wealth equals divine favor.

2. The “Itching Ears” Entertainers (The Seeker-Sensitive Consumer Church)

  • Biblical Blueprint: 2 Timothy 4:3–4 (“They will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables”).
  • Modern-Day Application:
    • Therapeutic Self-Help Preaching: Replacing expositional Bible teaching with light motivational talks, positive psychology, and self-actualization—completely omitting doctrines of sin, repentance, divine wrath, holiness, or the cross.
    • Market-Driven Sermon Planning: Using focus groups, trend metrics, and social media algorithms to curate messages that ensure no visitor feels uncomfortable, challenged, or convicted.
    • Production Over Presence: Prioritizing rock-concert lighting, smoke machines, comedic monologues, and pop-culture references.
  • Apostasy Proximity: Extreme. Large segments of the modern Western church have traded the proclamation of the Gospel for an entertainment spectacle designed to keep headcounts high and sermon content palatable.

3. The Powerless Ritualists (Institutional & Cultural Christianity)

  • Biblical Blueprint: 2 Timothy 3:5 (“Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof”) and Titus 1:16 (“They profess that they know God; but in works they deny him”).
  • Modern-Day Application:
    • Dead Formalism & Denominational Bureaucracy: Actively denying the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit, answered prayer, and spiritual transformation while maintaining centuries-old ecclesiastical titles, liturgies, and political committees.
    • Deconstructed/Academic Faith: Denominations that reduce Christianity to social activism, historical tradition, or literary mythology—rejecting the literal virgin birth, bodily resurrection, and divine inspiration of Holy Scripture.
    • Institutional Hypocrisy: Defending corporate brand identity and institutional heritage while privately tolerating moral corruption, financial opacity, and spiritual deadness in their leadership ranks.
  • Apostasy Proximity: High. This is prevalent in legacy denominations that retain impressive cathedrals and traditional structures but have formally voted to abandon foundational biblical doctrines.

4. The License-to-Sin Teachers (Hyper-Grace & Hyper-Inclusivity)

  • Biblical Blueprint: Jude 4 (“turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness [aselgeia—shameless, unbridled indulgence]”) and 2 Peter 2:19 (“While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption”).
  • Modern-Day Application:
    • Hyper-Grace Theology: Teaching that once a person is saved, unrepentant intentional sin carries zero spiritual consequence, making repentance, self-discipline, and moral accountability obsolete.
    • Cultural Conformity as “Love”: Re-engineering biblical ethics on marriage, human sexuality, and gender to conform to modern secular culture—labeling any call to traditional holiness or biblical boundaries as “legalistic,” “phobic,” or “hateful.”
    • Flaunted Worldliness (Aselgeia): Pastors who openly celebrate or advertise carnal, coarse, or immoral behavior as a badge of honor to prove they are “relatable” and “free from religious rules.”
  • Apostasy Proximity: Critical. This phenomenon is the fastest-spreading form of apostasy because it disguises moral surrender as Christian grace, “inclusivity,” and “love.”

5. Inward Ravening Wolves (Authoritarian & Abusive Pastoral Dictators)

  • Biblical Blueprint: Acts 20:29–30: “Grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them” (Matthew 7:15).
  • Modern-Day Application:
    • Cults of Personality: Pastors who demand absolute, unquestioning loyalty to themselves rather than to Christ, using non-disclosure agreements (NDAs), public shaming, and isolation tactics against anyone who questions their leadership.
    • Predatory Exploitation: Leaders who leverage their spiritual authority to groom, emotionally manipulate, or financially ruin vulnerable church members, leaving trails of spiritually traumatized ex-believers.
    • The “Touch Not Mine Anointed” Shield: Weaponizing scripture to build an unaccountable hierarchy where the leader operates as an untouchable ruler above elders, boards, or biblical standards.
  • Apostasy Proximity: Widespread. This pattern is regularly exposed across independent megachurches, network movements, and isolated local bodies that have discarded transparency and biblical governance.

How Close Is Your Church to Apostasy?

When you analyze these five archetypes together, a clear pattern emerges: modern apostasy is rarely an explicit, public announcement that “we reject Jesus.”

Instead, it is a systemic substitution:

  • Replacing the Gospel of Repentance with Therapeutic Self-Help (Point 2).
  • Replacing Holy Living with Lasciviousness / Hyper-Grace (Point 4).
  • Replacing Spiritual Power with Corporate Branding & Ritual (Point 3).
  • Replacing Servant Leadership with Commercialism & Authoritarian Control (Points 1 & 5).

Because all five of these archetypes now operate simultaneously as accepted normatives across vast sectors of global Christianity, the modern church landscape exhibits the exact structural markers of the predicted end-time falling away (apostasia), and actions of modern day churchs, which I list below.

“They profess that they know God, but in works they deny him, being abominable and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate.”

Here is the biblical evaluation of seven specific actions that occur in today’s churches, using the KJV framework:

1. A leader who makes sexual advances of any type on another person regardless of the marriage vows—This behavior is a direct marker of the false teachers identified by Peter.

  • 2 Peter 2:14 (KJV): “Having eyes full of adultery, and that cannot cease from sin; beguiling unstable souls: an heart they have exercised with covetous practices; cursed children:”

2. A church leader that does not correct the people who give him the title of “God’s Anointed”—accepting unchecked exaltation and fostering a cult of personality—demonstrates the pride that disqualifies biblical leadership.

  • 3 John 1:9 (KJV): “I wrote unto the church: but Diotrephes, who loveth to have the preeminence among them, receiveth us not.”

3. A church leader who knowingly evades taxes through fraud—A requirement for any church leader is that they are not greedy for dishonest gain, and they must obey the civil laws regarding taxation.

  • Romans 13:7 (KJV): “Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom…”
  • Titus 1:7 (KJV): “For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God; not selfwilled, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre; “

4. A church leader who attempts to use extortion to raise the rent on a signed lease. – Extortion is explicitly condemned as a sin that separates a person from God, revealing a fundamental lack of salvation.

  • 1 Corinthians 6:10 (KJV): “Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.”

5. A church leader that uses manipulative teachings (“Leave if you don’t like me… then giving verses”) Using scripture to construct “fair speeches” that manipulate a congregation into choosing between loyalty to the man or leaving the church is psychological manipulation.

  • Romans 16:18 (KJV): “For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.”

6. A church leader that bypasses the elders’ council for his own agenda—this behavior violates the biblical model of church governance, which requires plurality, accountability, and a leader who serves rather than dictates.

  • 1 Peter 5:3 (KJV): “Neither as being lords over God’s heritage, but being ensamples to the flock.”

7. A church leader who threatens suicide to evade jail, then twists the Bible to justify suicide—weaponizing scripture to justify sin or manipulate others emotionally is the ultimate marker of a dangerous false teacher.

  • 2 Peter 3:16 (KJV): “As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.”

Yes, I just called out a large group of church leaders.

We are far past revival. Revival comes from God, and yes, God can do anything, but this situation isn’t something that will just be corrected in a revival, and here is why. The mega-church franchises, the prosperity networks, and the hyper-inclusive legacy denominations are unlikely to be reformed from the inside because their business models rely on the apostasy remaining intact.

So what do you do? If you have identified any of these in your church, what do you do? Let him who lacks wisdom ask of God.

Proverbs 1:7 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise instruction. What are you?

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