The Prosperity Gospel promises that if you have enough faith, if you tithe and give enough, if you have positive vibes, and if you plant your seed money, God will bless you with money, promotions, and a powerful position. Sounds good, but it's ruining people.
THE PROSPERITY GOSPEL MEETS HURRICANE HARVEY
The Prosperity Gospel met its match in Texas when Hurricane Harvey hit Houston. It was like Hulk Hogan in a cage match with The Little Sisters of the Poor. It was Godzilla vs. Bambi. The Creature from the Black Lagoon met Lassie. No contest.
The Prosperity preachers, holding the Bible aloft, speak to the gullible masses telling them that God wants them to have their best life now, their "best life" means lots of happy cabbage, periodic promotions, and homes a Saudi prince would envy. There's a cost to get your best life now: it's called "having enough faith," "tithing," and "seed money." Their sermons are infomercials for their books and tapes, that, upon purchase and practice will lead the listener to success or so they were told until Hurricane Harvey hit.
AN EDITED BIBLE
But they've edited the Bible they hold high and lifted up. They've removed Matthew 8:20 and Acts 3:6; they've blue-penciled Luke 13:1-5; they've excluded II Corinthians 11:23-28; they never let their congregations read John 16:33, Acts 14:22, Hebrews 11:37-38 and Revelation 2:9 et al.
Then here came Harvey crashing into all the Prosperity Promises the preachers proffered, and great should be the fall thereof. The Prosperity Promises didn't work in Houston and they don't work anywhere--try preaching it Albania where people work for pitancies per day. Try delivering a prosperity sermon to those washing their clothes on a rock in Guatemala the night before they go to church. Try waxing eloquent about "Your Best Life Now" to a group of believers huddled in a home meeting for fear of the authorities in North Korea.
Among Harvey's victims were the just and the unjust. The just and the unjust lost their lives or their homes. The just and the unjust had only the clothes on their backs as they surveyed their flattened homes no skilled craftsmen can fix. According to the Prosperity Preachers, Harvey wasn't supposed to happen, not to the just, anyway.
Hurricane Harvey should empty their churches, not because of any physical damage, but because of the damage it wreaked on their false teaching. No one should listen to the prosperity peddlers any longer. Harvey should dim their TV studios and wipe them off the radio dials.
HISTORY SAYS, "IT DOESN'T WORK"
Even among the best of believers that is, the Apostles, we don't find their living prosperous lives. Tradition tells us Paul was decapitated, Andrew and Peter were crucified, Thomas was run through by the spears of four soldiers, some say that Matthew was stabbed to death in Ethiopia, and James was both stoned and clubbed until he died. John isn't thought to have been killed, but he was exiled to Patmos. Then there's Stephen, the martyr and those unnamed ones of Hebrews 11 "of whom the world was not worthy" who suffered and suffered and suffered.
Their shows us something. The Apostles didn't invent or embellish the story of our Lord: people don't suffer and die for what they know to be a lie.
Harvey has shown us this: the theology of the the Prosperity Gospel is popcorn theology. It's all hat and no cattle.
No comments:
Post a Comment