Christianity has its fair share of peculiarities, and more often than not, you can find movements among professing Christians that are baptized in Bible-speak and labeled “Christian” when, in fact, they are not. One of those movements is the “Christian leadership” movement. In fact, it has become so prevalent within Christendom that it is almost cult-like.

The “Christian leadership” cult is attempting to create the appearance that leadership in and of itself–apart from biblical fidelity–is one of the end goals of Christianity.

At the top of the leadership cult pyramid sits well-known names like Andy Stanley and Craig Groeschel and manifests itself in annual conferences such as Drive and Catalyst. The idea is that despite the fact that the “leadership” of these conferences amount to nothing more than the blind leading the blind–and in all different directions–they all have on goal: self-exaltation.

Name you typically expect to find among the ranks of these movements are Hillsong cultists like Brian Houston, who authored the book Live Love Lead, Andy Stanley, Craig Groeschel, Joel Osteen, Steven Furtick, and various other top-level popular-among-millennials prosperity gospel preachers. But it’s difficult when we find Southern Baptist and other Evangelical leaders–who are supposed to be shepherding their flocks away from people like this–instead, marching their congregations right into the midst of these wolf packs.

That would be Matt Chandler.

Matt Chandler is partaking in one of these cult-like leadership conferences and he’s joining well-known prosperity charlatan, Christine Caine as well as some of the other names previously mentioned. It goes without saying that wherever there’s heresy, you’ll find Ed Stetzer (and wherever there’s discernment, you’ll find him there opposing it).

Here’s part of the line-up for the First Impressions Conference.

Also on the list are various other heretics, including Sam Collier, a Word of Faith heretic from Hillsong, Atlanta. Now, everyone knows that Christine Caine is among the worst of the Word of Faith charlatans–her entire movement revolves around the prosperity gospel. And besides the fact that she’s a female “pastor” who regularly preaches to men, she also partakes and occult-like practices, new-age nonsense, and has been exposed as a serial plagiarist. More on her at this link.

Other “leaders” at this conference include a woman “lead pastor” named Andi Andrew of Liberty Church, Keri Ladouceur “pastor” of Community Christian Church, Alex Seeley, lead (woman) “pastor” of The Belonging Co., and “pastors” of “online churches” which aren’t churches at all, but distractions from church.

This type of “leadership” isn’t about biblical leadership; as you can see from the description of the vast majority of speakers, it’s about advancing the cause of social justice. This is precisely the opposite of biblical leadership and those who partake in these movements should be discounted as biblically qualified leaders.