Church Unplugged: When God Delivers You from the Matrix

By Apostle D. Jerome Garrett

There comes a moment in every believer’s life where the sound of heaven disrupts the rhythm of tradition. Many years ago, God told me to walk away from a church I had been part of for over two decades. It was not a reckless departure. It was not rooted in offense or rebellion. It was painful, deeply emotional, and covered in tears. I cried for three years straight. Every time I sang the song God had given me—“I Need Your Help”—I felt the ache of obedience colliding with confusion. I didn’t understand what God was doing. After 20 faithful years in that church—and 21 more in my father's church before that—why now?

But hindsight brings clarity that the present often veils. I wasn’t just leaving a building. I was being delivered from a matrix. A system. The rhythm of religious addiction dressed in Sunday best. I was loyal. I was present. I was conditioned. And unknowingly, I was plugged into a performance-based, culture-crafted, religious cycle.

This wasn’t about abandoning the Church. Let me be clear: the Church is right. The Church is biblical. It is the body of Christ, birthed by His Spirit, designed for equipping, edifying, and empowering. I didn’t unplug from the Church. I unplugged from a church culture—a culture that at times confused movement with maturity and busyness with breakthrough.

What I experienced was what I now call "Church Unplug." It was God's way of detoxing my spirit from legalism, tradition, and religious obligation. God wasn’t calling me out of community. He was calling me to clarity. He was breaking me free from what was choking my worship, what was making my praise predictable, my prayers mechanically, and my devotion conditional.

As I began to reflect, I saw something disturbing: church services at times began to look like clubs, concerts, or even sports arenas. Lights, sounds, crowds, chants, and emotional highs. I saw sensationalism. I saw emotionalism. I saw mysticism. And I had to ask: What’s the difference?

When a football game can make someone leap higher than the presence of God, when a club anthem can stir more passion than a worship song, we have to ask hard questions. We have to confront uncomfortable truths. The problem isn’t excitement or emotion—it’s the absence of true encounter. We've substituted spiritual formation for emotional stimulation. We’ve traded altars for platforms and intimacy for performance.

Church Unplug is not an anti-church movement, it’s a prophetic awakening. It’s God's call to purify His Bride from the inside out. It’s a stripping of idolatry, not a rejection of the assembly. It's the reclaiming of true worship in Spirit and in truth. It’s what happens when God says, “Come out from among them—not because they’re wrong, but because I’m doing something right in you.”

And so, I unplugged.

I unplugged from needing applause to feel anointed. I unplugged from cycles that celebrated routine over revelation's unplugged from systems that silenced the Spirit for the sake of order. I unplugged from emotional dependency and tapped into spiritual maturity.

And now, I’m plugged into purpose. I'm plugged into prophetic clarity. I'm plugged into presence over performance. I'm plugged into Him.

So if you’re in a season where God is pulling you out of a place you’ve known, served, and loved—don’t resist. It may not be rejection. It may be realignment. It may be your moment of Church Unplug.

Not to forsake the Church. But to find Christ again. Not to criticize the Body. But to become the Bride. Not to leave the gathering. But to gather truth.

This isn’t the end of church. This is the beginning of reformation. And those with ears to hear… will unplug to plug into the divine.

Selah.