Hard Prosperity

I've been hearing a lot of preachers recently who proclaim a certain type of "gospel." This gospel tells its followers that blessings from God come in monetary and tangible ways. It claims that if you follow an obscure prayer in the middle of a book of genealogies from the Old Testament that God will "expand your borders", and it also claims that if you are obedient, faithful in church then God will bless you exponentially by material means. Before I go on I want to add a couple qualifiers. First there is nothing wrong with having money, owning nice things, or anything like that, unless that comes before your relationship with God. Secondly I do think that God can bless in tangible ways and that he does.

However the problem with this type of teaching is that it engenders a mentality of God almost as an amazing credit card rewards program. If you spend enough time and money (tithing) at church then you'll get that back even more. The real issue here is that this flattens the way that God does interact with his creation. By saying that if you believe in God and do everything right he will bless you monetarily is excluding the majority of Christians worldwide who are desolate, poor, and weak. It's like saying that God is like that father who is never around, and tries to compensate this by showering his family with expensive gifts. I've known people who have had parents like this and all they wanted was for their dad to be around. In the same way if we truly worship this awesome, all powerful, and amazing God as is revealed in Scripture then if the only way he interacted with us was through tangible blessings then I would react just like the child of that father. By saying, "Dad I just want to be with you."

Thankfully we know from the Bible that God is a loving father who wants to see us grow to be more and more like Jesus Christ our Lord. Going back to prosperity gospel preaching, sometimes the most loving thing you can do for your child is to discipline them. We see this concept more throughout Scripture than the type of blessing this false gospel proclaims. In Hebrews 12 the Scriptures say, "It is for discipline that you must endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline then you are illegitimate children and not sons." This is just one biblical example of this poignant and true concept, that if you are loved by God then he will discipline you. I don't know how this will come to fruition in your life, but I know it will, and I write this in the hope that you guard yourself against this pop theology that is grossly misaligned with the Word of God.