There’s a really uncomfortable truth spreading across the continent right now, but you won’t hear it from the people on stage. Fear has become the most profitable product the modern church ever made. And business is good.
Indeed Fear is the most lucrative product the contemporary church has ever manufactured.
We have to be honest here. If you take away all the theatrics, the way many of our church institutions work is actually quite simple. They need people to stay terrified to stay relevant. So, a story is built—a story about constant threats and witches hiding in corners and demons coming for your future. We’ve basically turned the world into a giant haunted house and then started charging people for the way out. Maybe we forgot what the point was in the first place.
The sad part isn’t just that people are selling this fear; it’s that we’re buying it. It works because it targets what we don’t know. It pretends to be spiritual wisdom when it’s actually just a trap. We’ve stopped acting like people with authority and started acting like victims. Honestly, the pulpit has just become a different kind of consulting room. Instead of truth, we see a “man of God” acting like a native doctor, selling trinkets and shortcuts.
You see it everywhere. It’s all a transaction now. People are told they need a “key” for a breakthrough and special water for protection and a seed to get God to pay attention to them. They’re told to give offerings to bribe heaven and buy cement and even eat grass to get a miracle. It’s strange. This isn’t the grace of the cross; it’s just a spiritual catalog.
2 Timothy 1:7 (NIV) – “For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline.”
ThIs is the most direct theological counter to the “spirit of fear”, and it reframes the entire argument: the church should be giving people power, love, and a sound mind—not fear, torment, and slavery.
When fear is the currency, people don’t end up with faith. They end up paralyzed. It turns people into cowards who are scared of the very world they’re supposed to lead. We’ve become so used to it that we don’t see how ridiculous it looks. We stand in circles yelling at a “generator demon” to fix the power and we completely ignore the real problems like systemic failure and poor education and laziness.
This is a real crisis for the soul. We gave away our ability to think for ourselves and turned God into a delivery boy who only shows up if we pay a fee. It’s frustrating to watch.
It has to stop. We need to get back to a faith that doesn’t invent enemies just to sell a cure. Real faith shouldn’t make you scared of the dark; it should give you the light to walk through it. It is probably time we stopped paying for things that keep us small and actually started living like free people.
Thanks for reading : May God’s Wisdom lead you and His Peace remain steady within you. Amen. Shabbat Shalom.
