(RNS) — A controversial Tennessee pastor has claimed federal officials broke down his door and raided his house after former members of his church accused him of financial impropriety.
The Rev. Greg Locke, pastor of Global Vision Bible Church in Lebanon, Tennessee, said he was lying in bed about three weeks ago and heard a knock on the door. Outside, he said, about 60 federal agents had surrounded his house for an early morning raid.
“By the time I got my robe on and got out of the bedroom, a team of federal agents had batter-rammed our front door,” Locke told church members during a service on Sunday (July 12). “In riot gear, they had me on the ground. I was screaming, ‘I’ve got kids in the house, don’t shoot, don’t shoot.”
Locke claimed federal agents told him they were there because of reports of “misappropriated funds” and said agents had search warrants for his home and a church building. Those agents, he alleged, took his cell phone and computers and bank records. It’s not clear which federal agency raided Locke’s home.
“I’m not even telling you what three-letter agency it was,” he told church members.
The Tennessean newspaper reported that the IRS, and not the FBI, was involved in the raid. It’s also not clear what day the raid took place — Locke claimed it happened three weeks into a six-week sabbatical he had taken following the death of his son in May.
A spokesman for the Wilson County Sheriff’s Office said it had no records on an investigation into Locke or Global Vision Bible Church.
Two former pastors at Global Vision resigned last year, alleging spiritual abuse and financial mismanagement at the church, according to The Roys Report, a Christian watchdog site. Locke said allegations on a webpage had led to the raid but did not give any details.
The subdued announcement was out of character for the firebrand pastor, who has used social media to build a national following, with posts on everything from witchcraft and stolen elections to Christian nationalism and bathroom policies at Target in the past. In recent years, he has pivoted from political MAGA sermons to what he has called “deliverance” ministry, which claims to cast out demons.
He also runs a media company and held a revival recently with Sean Feucht, an activist who runs patriotic worship protests, but Locke made no mention of the raid until this past weekend.
“I could have went live the first day it happened and caused riots in the streets with the size of our platform, but the Lord said, ‘No, no, no! I will vindicate you. You don’t have to fight them. Amen,’” he told church members, according to a recording of the service posted online.
Locke told members that the congregation’s bank accounts have been closed as well as his personal accounts. He also said the church’s online giving provider had no place to send donations because the accounts were closed.
“We’re praying that the Lord this week will do a Red Sea miracle and give us a bank so we can put the checks in,” he said.
Locke said he expects the church will be cleared of any wrongdoing.
“We have nothing to hide, and they’re figuring that out,” he said. “And I’m not fighting them.”
He also said the plan for now is to wait the investigation out. Locke, a fierce defender of Donald Trump, also said the church will return to its more confrontational strategy in the future.
“You’ll know when it’s time for us to fight the governments when the Antichrist shows up, and we’ll fight that Joker, and we’ll go down swinging, and we’ll use the platform God’s given us for it,” he said. “But now is not the time to fight. Now is the time to believe God for a water-walking miracle.”