Prosperity Gospel – A False Gospel

“I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.”

Paul, Galatians 1:6-7

It is the age old question engraved onto the human soul. Are we meant to prosper? It is the default pursuit of all race of all times. Our striving has always been for a better life, and that, my friend, is not a sin. It is what sin has robbed us of. You see, when God created man, He did not create him and place him in a manger. He set him above all His other creations and gave him dominion over them. He created us in His own image. We were created prosperous. But before you say amen, what exactly was our prosperity? Health, wealth and success? Not health, since sickness and disease did not even exist for there to be a measure of prosperity in that regard. Not wealth, since Adam owned everything and no other man owned anything apart from him. You see, his prosperity was not in these things. His prosperity was his right standing before God, in blameless and holy fellowship with His Creator. His prosperity was his God. If, when you consider Adam’s abundance, you think that his prosperity was in any other substance, remind yourself that it was his very desire for such a thing that made him disobey God. In his sin, all of humanity was cut off and now we all mourn with groanings too deep for words, we and all creation with us to get back what we once lost, our true prosperity.

The health, wealth and prosperity gospel is not the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is a false gospel and many are quickly deserting Him for this lie. There is nothing remotely defensible about it. The Bible is so clear in so many places in so many ways. It is not in order to sound pious that Jesus asked us not to store up riches on earth but in heaven. Whatever the argument, we simply cannot elude the very real struggles that Paul, and the other apostles and disciples, both during Jesus’ time and down through the centuries, had to endure for the sake of the Gospel. Acts 5:41 tells us that the disciples walked away rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name, when they were beaten by the order of the Sanhedrin for preaching the Gospel. None of them, and especially not Jesus our Lord, lived on this earth in a manner that supports this false prosperity gospel. When a man told Jesus that he would follow Him anywhere, Jesus responded to him in Luke 9:58 saying, “The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.”

The proponents of this gospel would say that God is concerned with our whole being. I would agree with them. But the true wholeness of our being can never be on this earth. One day, He will come to take us home and there we will be whole again. So, does God want us to be unhealthy and poor? No, but that does not mean that His aim is that we be healthy and rich either. He wants to save us from our sin and sanctify us to be more like Christ. And if your health and riches are a means to that end, He will do accordingly. But if your sickness and poverty are a means to that end, well, He will do accordingly.

Check out this link to read one of our previous articles with a slightly more detailed take on the subject of health, wealth and prosperity from a Biblical point of view.