After serving for 20 years, did your leadership truly conspire against you? That was the question I posed to this servant of God. He was used and dumped. They went as far as publishing a disclaimer in a leading newspaper against someone who literally burnt up his life to serve in this big ministry. His reaction to me was not in mere words, it was a torrent of anger and yelling accompanied by an overwhelming body of evidence: text messages, photographs, and emails from the highest echelons of leadership within his prominent denomination.
He poured these documents into my phone with such intensity that doubting their authenticity was impossible. All doors were shut against him. Broken, battered, and spent, he vowed to fight them to a finish. In his words, “These people are not saved. They are devils.” This man had served his denomination faithfully for decades, yet he was treated like a disposable commodity by power-intoxicated, Machiavellian leaders in Pentecostal collars who perceived him as a threat to their influence and visibility.
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Machiavellianism in leadership is rooted in the belief that the end justifies the means, regardless of the ethical implications. Leaders with high Machiavellian traits are often skilled in manipulation, using charm and deceit to achieve their goals.
He had expected those who profess to be children of God, especially those occupying positions of spiritual authority, to act in accordance with divine principles. Tragically, he was wrong. My relationship with this man of God has been a journey marked by tears, pain, anger, regret, and sobering reflection. Today, he is but a shadow of his former self. His marriage lies in ruins, his children scattered, his ministry dismantled, and his values eroded. He now resides with a strange woman in a remote part of Nigeria, having lost everything to the toxic brew of church politics, Pentecostal power struggles, community witchcraft, and executive politicking within the sacred chambers of the Church of Christ.
Did not Jesus leave us with a clear mandate upon His departure?
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“By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:35)?
Yet the reality of today’s church paints a starkly different picture. The kingdom of darkness appears to be gaining ground, weaponising politics to infiltrate church leadership, particularly within Pentecostal circles, destroying dreams, dismantling ministries, burying divine graces, and, in some cases, sending gifted men to premature graves.
I have always been fascinated by intelligence-themed films — counter-terrorism thrillers, World War sagas, and narcotics investigations. Recently, I watched a Netflix series on Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán. According to Wikipedia, “El Chapo was a Mexican drug lord and former top leader of the Sinaloa Cartel. Guzmán is believed to be responsible for the deaths of over 34,000 people and was considered the most powerful drug trafficker in the world until his extradition to the United States and subsequent life sentence.”
In his heyday, El Chapo perfected the ruthless art of divide-and-rule, drawing heavily from the demonic principles enshrined in the infamous 48 Laws of Power. He fragmented rival cartels, waged war through financial inducements, and mastered the strategic deployment of informants deep within enemy lines. To cement loyalty, he exploited opportunities, providing jobs, funding infrastructure in hostile territories, and offering scholarships to the children of suspected adversaries.
El Chapo was a paradox: a benefactor to some, a butcher to others. While many revered him for his largesse, countless others mourned loved ones lost to his assassinations or narcotic activities. His tactics fractured his nation, making consensus impossible. Ultimately, he built a narcotic empire that remains a global menace.
Disturbingly, this mafia-style strategy has infiltrated church leadership, becoming an accepted norm for consolidating power and sustaining ministry loyalty, or eliminating dissenters. Sons and daughters in ministry are recruited not for kingdom service but for allegiance to influential individuals who wield immense financial and numerical clout. This power must be preserved at all costs, even if the methods employed flagrantly contradict biblical standards. It is no longer about Christ-centered principles but about safeguarding status, wealth, and empire. Church branches are established and staffed by loyalists, while those deemed disloyal are ostracised, blacklisted, vilified, and, in extreme cases, silenced permanently. Ministry has devolved into an instrument of oppression rather than a conduit for transformative salvation.
Hear what Jesus said in Matthew 20: 25-26,
“But Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers in this world lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant.”
Look at the words, “lord it” and “flaunt their authority?” These speak to control, manipulation, and oppression. Any leadership that lords it over people isn’t of Christ, but of the devil.
I speak from experience. On three separate occasions, I have fallen victim to this monstrous system. Numerous pastors with whom I share fellowship have confided their own harrowing encounters with this untouchable beast, a beast that thrives on the silence and ignorance of critics who have neither tasted its venom nor endured its sting. The division in the church has its root in this monster.
A father figure in the church recently alluded that the current division in the church is largely caused by church leaders. They create, sustain, and maintain the models and values that run their ministries to which all members and pastors subscribe. Therefore, if the church leaders become completely Christ-like, damning the impact on church finances and numbers, the members and serving pastors will follow suit.
In over forty years of active service within the church community, spanning eight ministries across Africa, Europe, and North America before answering the divine call to pioneer a new work, I have witnessed unspeakable atrocities.
Church politics, orchestrated by cabals and ecclesiastical mafias, has exacted a devastating toll. It has quenched the Spirit’s fire that once convicted sinners both within and beyond Zion. It has extinguished zeal for God’s service, reducing ministry work to a privilege reserved for those aligned with the right caucuses. This cancer has fueled sin, immorality, deceit, rivalry, and every conceivable work of the flesh. It has driven multitudes from the church, leaving them disillusioned and convinced that church leaders are hypocrites, exploiters, and deceivers to be shunned at all costs.
Shall we allow this travesty to persist simply because we fear offending elders?
Over the past three decades, particularly following the advent of the prosperity gospel in Africa, with Nigeria as its epicentre, a new breed of church leadership has emerged. This model bears no resemblance to the Christocentric virtues of love, humility, selflessness, faithfulness, and unity exemplified by Jesus and His apostles. Instead, it is rooted in an insatiable quest for dominance —financial, numerical, and territorial. To lead a ministry today, one must dominate, control, and ultimately build an empire. Empires, by nature, thrive on exploitation. As Dr. David Jeremiah observes in Agents of Babylon regarding Alexander the Great:
1. Alexander lived for himself
2. Alexander died on a throne
3. Alexander shed the world’s blood
4. Alexander conquered every throne
5. Alexander was man, but made himself God
6. Alexander made all men slaves
Similarly, Adolf Hitler envisioned a thousand-year Reich—a grotesque empire that plunged Europe into a bloodbath, claiming over fifty million lives before the Allied forces crushed it. Both empires shared a common DNA: they used men, exploited men, enslaved men, rewarded men, and divided men.
Tragically, this same pattern now permeates the church of our Lord Jesus Christ. Pentecostal cabals and mafias in collars have allied with the forces of darkness to deconstruct traditional Christo-centric ministry model, built on humility, simplicity, contentment, holiness, righteousness, and love. They now use, exploit, and discard men in their relentless pursuit of financial dominance, power supremacy, and numerical relevance. If we fail to confront this monster, the future of the church, and that of the next generation, stands imperiled. A generation will arise that will neither know the Lord nor His works, as Scripture warns:
“When all that generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation arose after them who did not know the Lord nor the work which He had done for Israel” (Judges 2:10).
I harbour no illusions that every mafia or politician in the church will repent; prophecy must run its course.
“Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition” (2 Thessalonians 2:3).
Yet, there still remains a remnant of God fearing church leaders, pastors, evangelists, prophets, teachers, and apostles, empowered by heaven with wisdom, courage, and grace, who will continue to challenge this abomination, uprooting it from their lives and ministries to restore authentic, kingdom-driven, love-centered practices within their own church structure.
Dear servant of the Lord, dear son and daughter of the Lord, I urge you by the mercies of the Lord to refrain from becoming an instrument of oppression or a pawn in church politics for financial or personal gain. These evil practices have ruined destinies and shattered glories. In fact, words fail me in recounting countless cases that have passed through my table. Remember the reality of eternity—the day will come when you leave this world and stand before your Creator to give an account. Repent and turn away from such practices. Make it your solemn vow and personal mandate: I will never be the reason anyone abandons their ministry or turns away from the Lord, regardless of the cost to me. Let integrity and the fear of God guide every decision you make. God bless the Body of Christ
Ayo Akerele is the senior pastor of Rhema Assembly and the founder of the Voice of the Watchmen Ministries in Ontario, Canada. He can be reached through [email protected]
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