Thoughts•
on August 13th, 2009•
By Romeo Pelle
The “Gospel” of Prosperity
American Christianity is rapidly being infected by a spiritual gangrene, the so-called “Prosperity Gospel” – although it has very little of the character of Gospel in it. Prosperity gospel (also known as prosperity doctrine, health and wealth, prosperity theology) is a religious teaching that God desires material prosperity for those He favors. Material prosperity in this theology not only includes financial prosperity but success in relationships and good health as well. Some of its more brazen exponents will tell you: “Serve God and get rich!” The cover story of the September 18, 2006, issue of Time magazine made a lot of Christians cringe: “Does God Want You to Be Rich?” It was an embarrassment as it presented an image of the body of Christ with many members who are idolaters and greedy.
The theology of this new “gospel” seems far more to fit the American dream than it does the teaching of Him who had “nowhere to lay His head.” Its message is a dangerous twisting of God’s truth, a message which can appeal only to our human fallenness and not to our life in the Spirit of Christ. The basic problem with the “Gospel of Prosperity” lies at the point of the interpretation of Scripture. The practical implications of this gospel is that God wills the financial prosperity of every one of His children, and therefore, for a Christian to be in poverty is to be outside God’s intended will, it is to be living a Satan-defeated life. Because we are God’s children (the King’s kids, as some like to put it) we should always go first-class, we should have the biggest and best, a Cadillac instead of a Chevy, because this brings glory to God!
This is strange indeed, when thinking of the Son of God who we are called throughout the Scriptures to emulate: “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross!” (Philippians 2:5-8).
The fundamental errors of this theology are hermeneutical (= methods or principles of biblical interpretation). Good interpretation of the Bible must begin with the plain meaning of the text. The “plain meaning” has to do first of all to do with the author’s original intent, it has to do with what would have been plain to those to whom the words were originally addressed. It has NOT to do with how someone from a suburbanized white American culture of late 20th or early 21st century reads his or her own cultural setting back into the text!
- The most important Scripture text of this movement is 3 John 2 : “Beloved, I pray that in all respects you may prosper and be in good health, just as your soul prospers.” This verse is interpreted by prosperity teachers to mean that God wants all believers to “prosper in all things.” Furthermore, their interpretation of this verse makes clear their claim that material prosperity is inseparably linked to spiritual growth. Of this verse Kenneth Copeland says, “John writes that we should prosper and be in health” (The Laws of Prosperity, p.14). The Greek word ευοδουσθαι (euodusthai) translated “prosper” in KJV and NASB means “to go well with someone,” just as a friend might say to you in a letter, “I pray that this letter finds you all well.” This combination of wishing for “things to go well” and for the recipient’s “good health” was the standard form of greeting in a personal letter in antiquity. To expand and apply John’s wish for Gaius to refer to financial and material prosperity for all Christians of all times and throughout the world is totally foreign to this text! John did not intend to say that and Gaius surely did not understand that way, thus it cannot be the “plain meaning of the text.” We surely may learn from this text to pray for our brothers and sisters in Christ that “all will go well with them,” but to argue from this text that God wills our financial prosperity is to abuse the text!
- Another important text that is used by this movement to support their theology is John 10:10, where Jesus declares: “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” The “abundant life” has nothing to do with material abundance. The terms “life” or “eternal life” in the Gospel of John are the equivalent of the “Kingdom of God” in the Synoptic Gospels. It literally means the “life of the Age to Come.” It is the life that God has in and of Himself; it is the gift He gives through Christ to believers in this present age. The Greek word περισσον (perrison) translated “abundantly” in NASB and KJV simply means that believers are to enjoy the gift of life to the full (as translated in NIV). Material abundance is not implied either in the word “life” or “to the full.” Such an idea is totally foreign to the context of John 10, as well to the whole teaching of our Savior.
- One last text we analyze, also (ab)used by the prosperity theologians is Galatians 3:13-14: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.’ He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.” This passage is used to teach that Christians are Abraham’s spiritual children and heirs to the blessings of faith. This is true but in their interpretation this Abrahamic inheritance is unpacked primarily in terms of material entitlements. In other words, according to the prosperity gospel, the primary purpose of the Abrahamic covenant was for God to bless Abraham materially. Since believers are now “Abraham’s spiritual children,” they consequently have inherited these financial blessings of the covenant. Prosperity teacher Kenneth Copeland wrote, “Since God’s Covenant has been established and prosperity is a provision of this covenant, you need to realize that prosperity belongs to you now” (The Laws of Prosperity, 51). In their appeal to Gal. 3:14, prosperity teachers ignore the second half of the verse, which reads, “That we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.” In this verse Paul clearly was reminding the Galatians of the spiritual blessing of salvation, not the material blessing of wealth.
Not only does this false gospel miss the point of individual passages, it conflicts with the overall context of Scripture. Take the matter of riches. What value are wealth and property for God’s people? Zero is the answer provided in such Scriptures as Matthew 6:32-33 and Luke 12:15. Indeed, where there is wealth, there should be sharing (Acts 4:32-37, etc.). In the Old Testament possessions are occasionally linked with a life of obedience, but this is never the case in the New Testament. Even the Old Testament warns about the danger of trusting in what one owns rather than in God (Psalm 49:16-19).
The Gospel teaches a carefree attitude toward wealth and possessions. According to Jesus, the good news of the coming of the Kingdom frees us from all those pagan concerns (Matthew 6:32-33). God cares for our needs; the extras are unnecessary. The man who seeks more and more is a fool, because life doesn’t consist in having a surplus of possessions (Luke 12:15). We find the same carefree attitude toward wealth and possessions also in Apostle Paul’s writings. He is a free man in Christ, who knows contentment whatever the circumstances (Philippians 4:10-13). Thus he tells those who have nothing to be content with food and clothing. “People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap” (1 Timothy 6:6-10). Then, he addresses those who happen to be rich to treat their wealth with indifference and not to put any stock on it. Rather, they are to be “generous and willing to share,” for this is true wealth (6:17-19).
Things to ponder:
- The Gospel of Jesus Christ is a God-centered gospel. What about the prosperity gospel?
- God’s love and giving are presented in the Gospel as unconditional. Listen to Gloria Copeland: “Give $10 and receive $1,000; give $1,000 and receive $100,000; in short, Mark 10:30 is a very good deal.” (God’s Will Is Prosperity, 45). Does this sound unconditional?
- “Any ‘Gospel’ that will not ‘sell’ as well among believers in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso or Dacca, Bangladesh or Phnom Penh, Cambodia as in Orange County, California or Tulsa County, Oklahoma is not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Gordon Fee, The Disease of the Health and Wealth Gospels, p.17).
- “No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.” (Jesus Christ, Matthew 6:24). The prosperity gospel worships materialism, and the health gospel’s idol is the human body.
- Read and analyze Hebrews 10:34-36 & 11:32-40. Some of those in the “Hall of Faith” were destitute and impoverished as their properties were confiscated.
- “Theology is important, because correct doctrinal beliefs are essential to the relationship between the believer and God” (Theologian Millard J. Erickson). A corollary to this statement is that an incorrect theology will lead to incorrect beliefs about God, His Word, and His dealings with men.
References
Aland, Kurt, The Greek New Testament
Copeland, Gloria, God’s Will Is Prosperity
Copeland, Kenneth, The Laws of Prosperity
Erickson, Millard, Christian Theology
Fee, Gordon, The Disease of the Health and Wealth Gospels
Green, Jay, The Interlinear Bible: Hebrew-Greek-English
Jones, David, The Bankruptcy of the Prosperity Gospel: An Exercise in Biblical and Theological Ethics
Kittel, Gerhard, Theological Dictionary of the New Testament
Time, Does God Want You to Be Rich? September 18, 2006