Why I believe the Prosperity Gospel is insidious. (This will cost me more friends than my feelings about the president.) The test of a new doctrines staying power is it must be believable, it must be innovative and it must appeal to a hearers self-interests. While you can prove about any philosophy by proof-texting the Bible, there are plenty of Scriptures one can turn into a believable premise about prosperity. But, Hermeneutically , we are expected to allow the whole of Scripture to interpret the small. But, it is the personal greed which really drives the Prosperity Gospel, the quest for personal gain. Believing in the blessings of God is important, but having the absence of trouble or the presence of wealth as a barometer of spirituality is oppressive, unBiblical and cruel. Upon our return from a weekend ministry trip, our Bible school secretary said God must be in our favor because the offerings to keep our school going were good over the weekend. Having just come from Italy where I toured some of the greatest cathedrals in the world, I thought, God must love those Catholics much more than we because they have all the gold covered huge cathedrals. The greatest wrong the doctrine does beyond incentivizing personal greed is it is an agent for filling hell. Jesus said, For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. He came to hunt the souls of men. He did not hang on a cruel cross so you can have your BMW. The distraction, the sinful distraction from the message of the Cross is repulsive to a God who became man that man might be saved! Patti Roberts asked a producer, How many times on the program have we presented the Plan of Salvation? He couldnt recall once. How many times have we presented Seed Faith? He said she knew the answer to that. Imagine, substituting the Blood of Jesus with a fundraising plan that later proved to be extremely excessively self-enriching to Richard Roberts! Ken Copeland has boasted of being a billionaire, while billions are living on a starvation diet with a monthly income of about $35. One genuine test of a doctrine is its universality. If it doesnt work in Bangladesh, it is not a true doctrine. Now to those who believe that their Cadillac is a result of God who owns the cattle on a thousand hills, if God wants you to have the best, why a Cadillac. Its nameplate has diminished through the years. Why not that $750,000 Ferrari I read about recently? Why a $200,000 house and not the $20 million mansion? As I take our foreign guest to our local Air Force Museum, the largest in the world, I say to them, In here you will see many billions of dollars worth of aircraft. God has blessed America fiscally and in power so that we would bless the world. And once we cease to be a blessing to the world, God will lift His hand from us. Everything I have I owe to God. I had an uncle who tithed 20%. He said God has blessed me so I can bless others. No, the Gospel is not about getting, it is all about giving. Tradition tells us that all, save one of the apostles, gave their lives for Jesus. And, none of this rubbish that Jesus was wealthy in this worlds goods. Jesus, Himself, was born in a borrowed stable, rode on a borrowed donkey, had to go to the mouth of a fish to pay His taxes and was buried in a borrowed tomb. What makes you think you are any better than Him?
Posted on: Sun, 17 Nov 2013 13:34:50 +0000
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