10 Crazy Times that Pastor Greg Locke Hit the Headlines

You can’t keep this guy away from the glare of publicity…

Gregory Locke, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

If American Christianity invented a “Most Likely to Start a Firestorm Before Breakfast” award, Greg Locke would probably need to build a second trophy cabinet.

This Tennessee-based preacher has spent the past few years bouncing from sermon clips to viral outrage faster than a shopping trolley with one dodgy wheel. Depending on who you ask, he’s either a fearless truth-teller battling darkness… or the human equivalent of typing in ALL CAPS for two straight hours.

Either way, the headlines keep coming.

Here are ten of the wildest moments when Pastor Greg Locke crashed into the news cycle like an evangelical revival tent in a tornado.

1. The Time He Declared War on Face Masks

Back during the height of the pandemic, when churches everywhere were debating distancing rules and hand sanitiser stations, Locke decided subtlety was overrated.

He made headlines after publicly blasting masks, restrictions, and COVID rules from the pulpit. At one point, he told attendees not to show up wearing masks because they weren’t welcome at his church.

Yes. Really.

While many pastors were carefully navigating Romans 13 alongside public health guidance, Locke was treating mask mandates as the fourth horseman of the apocalypse.

The result? National backlash, endless media coverage, and, eventually, a permanent Twitter suspension for repeated COVID misinformation before the account was later restored.

For supporters, it was courageous resistance.

For critics, it was the theological version of licking supermarket trolley handles during a plague.

2. The Time He Jumped into Election Conspiracies

The 2020 U.S. election turned plenty of pastors into accidental political commentators. Locke skipped “accidental” and cannonballed straight into the deep end.

He appeared at rallies connected to the “Stop the Steal” movement and aligned himself with claims that the election had been stolen. After the January 6 Capitol riot, Locke condemned the violence itself but promoted theories that antifa operatives were behind much of the chaos.

Which, unsurprisingly, didn’t exactly calm things down.

He also became closely tied to the ReAwaken America Tour — a travelling cocktail of charismatic Christianity, conservative politics, anti-vaccine activism, and conspiracy rhetoric.

Imagine if a prophecy conference, a political rally, and a Facebook comment section all got trapped together in a lift. That was roughly the vibe.

Photo by Sierra Koder on Unsplash

3. The Time He Said There Were Witches in His Church

This was the moment the internet collectively stopped chewing its sandwich and looked up.

In 2022, Locke announced during a sermon that there were actual witches inside his congregation. Not metaphorical witches. Not “people behaving badly.” Actual witches.

According to Locke, demons had revealed their identities to him. He warned them publicly. Leave the church, he said, or he’d expose them.

Social media exploded. Some Christians nodded along solemnly about spiritual warfare. Others reacted as if someone had accidentally rebooted Salem, Massachusetts.

You know a sermon has gone sideways when national newspapers start covering your church like it’s a deleted scene from The Crucible.

4. The Time He Hosted a Book Burning

If accusing church members of witchcraft wasn’t enough to trigger controversy, Locke followed it up with something that looked ripped from a dystopian film trailer.

A giant public bonfire.

Attendees tossed in:

• Harry Potter books
• Twilight novels
• Tarot cards
• Ouija boards
• Occult paraphernalia

Locke framed it as spiritual cleansing — a dramatic rejection of demonic influence.

Critics, meanwhile, pointed out that public book burnings have historically not been associated with calm, balanced societies enjoying healthy civic discourse.

Photo by Artem Maltsev on Unsplash

The Harry Potter angle especially sent the internet into orbit. Millions of people suddenly found themselves discussing whether a fictional schoolboy wizard posed a direct threat to civilisation.

Somewhere, J.K. Rowling probably sighed and made another cup of tea.

5. The Time He Suggested Demons Could Cause Autism and OCD

This controversy hit a much more serious nerve.

During deliverance-focused sermons, Locke made comments suggesting that conditions like autism and obsessive-compulsive disorder could involve demonic oppression.

The backlash was swift and fierce.

Mental health advocates, disability campaigners, pastors, and ordinary Christians condemned the remarks as deeply harmful. Many argued that vulnerable families were being burdened with guilt, fear, and spiritual stigma instead of compassion and support.

Even people who agreed with Locke politically started backing away from this one like a man discovering the “mild salsa” is mostly lava.

It became one of the clearest examples of how his style of ministry often crosses the line from provocative to genuinely alarming territory for critics.

6. The Time He Turned Deliverance Ministry into a Spectator Event

Locke increasingly leaned into “deliverance ministry” — essentially public exorcism-style services focused on casting out demons.

Now, belief in spiritual warfare isn’t exactly unusual in charismatic Christianity. But Locke’s approach turned it into something loud, dramatic, livestreamed, and highly theatrical.

Services featured screaming, shaking, declarations of demons leaving people, and warnings about hidden spiritual attacks.

Then came the documentary Come Out in Jesus' Name, in which Locke appeared alongside other deliverance ministers.

Supporters called it a desperately needed return to New Testament Christianity.

Critics said it resembled a reality TV version of exorcism culture, where emotional vulnerability and mental illness were being sensationalised for clicks, views, and applause.

Either way, Locke wasn’t just preaching sermons anymore. He was building a full-blown spiritual warfare cinematic universe.

7. The Time He Went Nuclear on LGBTQ Issues

Locke’s sermons on sexuality and gender identity have repeatedly sparked outrage.

He has preached against homosexuality and transgender identity in highly confrontational terms, at times describing them as spiritual deception or demonic influence.

That language drew heavy criticism from LGBTQ advocates, progressive Christians, and even many conservative believers who felt his rhetoric crossed the line from conviction into hostility.

One reason the backlash was so intense is that Locke doesn’t speak like a cautious theologian weighing every phrase.

He speaks like a man trying to win a cage fight with a megaphone. For supporters, that bluntness is exactly why they admire him.

For critics, it’s precisely why they fear the damage his words can cause.

8. The Time His Church Started Feuding with Local Authorities

Not all the drama stayed inside the sanctuary.

Locke’s church became embroiled in legal and zoning disputes involving local officials and neighbours. Complaints reportedly included issues related to construction, traffic, stormwater management, and code enforcement.

Which is a very unglamorous way of saying: the church and the county got into a giant argument over what was happening on the property.

Supporters saw government persecution. Critics saw a church acting as if rules were for other people.

Honestly, nothing says “small-town controversy” quite like a megachurch pastor fighting over drainage systems while simultaneously talking about demons.

YouTube screen grab

9. The Time Former Leaders Accused Him of Spiritual Abuse

One of the most damaging controversies came when former pastors and church leaders associated with Locke publicly resigned and accused him of authoritarian leadership and spiritual abuse.

The allegations included:

• Lack of accountability
• Controlling leadership culture
• Financial transparency concerns
• Fear-based leadership tactics

Locke denied the accusations and pushed back strongly. But the story hit hard because it tapped into a growing conversation happening across evangelical churches: what happens when charismatic leaders become too powerful to challenge?

Modern church culture has produced more than a few celebrity pastors surrounded by loyal inner circles and massive online followings. Critics argue that the same personality traits that make someone magnetic onstage can sometimes make them dangerous behind closed doors.

It’s the old warning about charisma without accountability — a combination that can go sideways frighteningly fast.

10. The Time Violence and Chaos Started Following the Story

The final category of controversy around Locke has involved genuinely disturbing incidents.

Over the past few years:

• Locke claimed his family received threats connected to people involved in witchcraft.
• A trailer filled with Bibles near his church was deliberately set on fire.
• His home was struck by gunfire during a dispute later linked by authorities to a personal conflict involving his stepson.

Even many of Locke’s fiercest critics agreed that those incidents crossed every line imaginable. And perhaps that’s the strange thing about the Greg Locke phenomenon.

Some of the outrage surrounding him is undeniably self-inflicted. He says provocative things loudly and often. But the hostility aimed back at him has sometimes become ugly, dangerous, and extreme in its own right.

Which leaves Locke occupying a bizarre space in modern Christianity:

• part revival preacher
• part internet outrage machine
• part culture-war gladiator
• part reality show controversy magnet

Love him or loathe him, Greg Locke has mastered one thing almost nobody else in modern church culture can manage:

Keeping himself in the headlines.

Constantly.