I am tired of being told how to act. I am tired of being told who to love. I am tired of being told who to vote for.
And I’m tired of watching people claim Jesus as Lord and Savior, talk nonstop about the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit, and invite others to “let Jesus change your life,” while doing everything they can to control what that change is allowed to look like.
They proclaim transformation, then try to manage it. They preach freedom, then police outcomes. They say “Jesus is enough,” then act like Jesus needs their supervision.
At some point we have to name it.
Too often, what gets called discipleship is actually a behavior management program. It’s a man-made sanctification plan. It’s checklist discipleship that rewards performance and punishes honesty. It treats people like cogs in a discipleship assembly line, turning out predictable Christians instead of surrendered people.
They didn’t want me healed. They wanted me compliant.
The problem is not discipline. The problem is control.
Real discipleship is a good thing. Jesus actually calls us to obedience. He calls us to holiness. He calls us to love God with our whole selves, and to love our neighbors as ourselves. He calls us to deny ourselves and follow him.
So this is not an argument for doing whatever we want. This is an argument against replacing the Holy Spirit with an institution.
Because there’s a difference between spiritual formation and social conditioning. There’s a difference between being led by Jesus and being managed by religious fear. There’s a difference between a community that helps you follow Christ and a community that tries to become Christ in your life.
One is discipleship. The other is control-based spirituality. And the Bible has words for that.
“For freedom Christ has set us free”
Paul doesn’t write Galatians like someone who’s mildly annoyed. He writes it like someone watching the gospel get strangled in real time.
“For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.” (Galatians 5:1, NRSVue)
A “yoke” is something you put on an animal’s neck to direct it. It’s guidance, yes, but it’s also domination. Paul is saying: Christ freed you from slavery, so don’t crawl back into a system that puts a controlling harness on your life again.
That hits because spiritual control is often sold as safety.
It sounds like: “We just want to protect you.”
It feels like: “Stay close to us so you don’t get deceived.”
It ends like: “You are only faithful if you conform.”
Freedom in Christ is not permission to sin. It is liberation from sin, from fear, and from any system that claims it must dominate you in order to keep you “holy.”
When a church trains you to obey the church first, it is not training you to obey Jesus.
When rules look holy but have no power
Paul gets even more precise in Colossians. He calls out religious rule-making that appears wise, appears disciplined, appears holy, but actually fails to do what it promises.
“If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the universe, why do you live as if you still belonged to the world? Why do you submit to regulations, ‘Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch’?” (Colossians 2:20–21, NRSVue)
Then he says the “quiet part” out loud:
“These have indeed an appearance of wisdom… but they are of no value in checking self-indulgence.” (Colossians 2:23, NRSVue)
Read that again. Rules can look like wisdom. They can feel like holiness. They can be packaged as discipleship. But Paul says they can be spiritually useless, especially when they become substitutes for actual transformation.
This is where so many of us have lived.
We were handed a script for being “a good Christian,” and the script was treated like the gospel. The goal became avoiding disapproval, not becoming like Jesus. The fear of failing the community became stronger than the desire to follow Christ.
That is performance-based discipleship. And it produces either pride or despair, depending on whether you think you are succeeding.
The church cannot do the Holy Spirit’s job
Here’s the part that exposes the whole machine. Paul describes how real transformation actually happens:
“Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” (2 Corinthians 3:17, NRSVue)
Then he describes the direction of Christian formation:
“And all of us… seeing the glory of the Lord… are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” (2 Corinthians 3:18, NRSVue)
Notice what is not in that passage.
There’s no mention of a church-approved personality. There’s no mention of a conformity pipeline. There’s no mention of “behave correctly so God will love you.”
There is the Spirit. There is freedom. There is transformation into the image of Christ.
When a church treats the Holy Spirit like a slogan and replaces him with a system, it’s not just annoying. It’s blasphemous in practice. It’s the community saying, “God cannot be trusted with you, but we can.”
Jesus doesn’t need a chaperone.
Jesus condemned this kind of religion
Some people will read this and say, “You’re just bitter.” Or “You just want an excuse.” Or “You’re attacking the church.”
No. I’m describing a pattern Jesus attacked himself.
Jesus confronted religious leaders who loved control, loved appearances, and loved making people carry burdens.
“They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others.” (Matthew 23:4, NRSVue)
He warned about obsessing over outward righteousness while neglecting inward realities.
“You clean the outside of the cup… but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence.” (Matthew 23:25, NRSVue)
That is reputation-first religion. That is holiness theater. That is a spiritual conformity machine.
And Jesus called it what it was.
Not discipleship. Not faithfulness. Not leadership.
Hypocrisy.
The conservative church often wants a church-approved version of you
Here is what I have learned the hard way. Many conservative church spaces are not primarily concerned with your soul. They are primarily concerned with your conformity. They do not ask, “Is Christ being formed in you?” They ask, “Do you fit?”
Do you speak the right language? Do you vote the right way? Do you love the “right” people, or at least hide the “wrong” loves? Do you keep the peace? Do you protect the reputation? Do you make the system look good?
They want a church-approved version of you, not a Jesus-transformed version of you.
They treat you like a cog in a discipleship assembly line. If you run smoothly, you’re celebrated. If you start asking honest questions, you’re treated like a threat. If you refuse the script, you’re warned, corrected, sidelined, or shamed.
And then they call all of that “love.”
Let’s say it plainly
There is a kind of church culture that confuses sanctification with socialization.
Sanctification is the Spirit shaping you into the likeness of Christ.
Socialization is a community pressuring you into the likeness of itself.
One produces humility, love, courage, and freedom.
The other produces anxiety, performance, and fear of rejection.
One makes you more like Jesus.
The other makes you more manageable.
And I am done pretending those are the same thing.
What real discipleship looks like
Real discipleship does not have to be soft to be faithful. It can be challenging and still be free. It can call you to repentance without trying to control you. It can be serious about holiness without replacing the Holy Spirit.
Real discipleship sounds like:
Follow Jesus.
Listen to Scripture.
Repent when you sin.
Practice love that costs you something.
Tell the truth.
Walk in the light.
Submit your life to Christ, not to a reputation machine.
Real discipleship is not “do what we say so we feel safe.”
Real discipleship is “come follow Jesus, even if it costs us control.”
A final word, especially to the person like me
If you are gay and you grew up in a conservative church, you probably know this pressure in your bones. You know what it is to be treated like a project. You know what it is to be asked to shrink, to perform, to erase yourself, to “behave” your way into belonging.
And you know how easy it is to start believing that Jesus is mostly disappointed with you.
But the Spirit of the Lord does not produce bondage. He produces freedom. And freedom is not the enemy of holiness. Freedom is the ground where holiness actually grows.
So here is my refusal:
I will not submit my soul to a spiritual conformity machine.
I will not confuse control with discipleship.
I will not let a church-approved script replace the living Christ.
If Jesus Christ is my Savior, my King, my Father, and my Friend, then he gets to guide my steps. Not a crowd. Not a political machine. Not a reputation-first religion.
Let Jesus change my heart.
Let Jesus guide my ways.
Let Jesus conform me to his image.
Because Jesus is enough.
And he always has been.