Prosperity Gospel

A few months ago, I published a critique of Joel Osteen's teaching. Here's another piece I wrote about the prosperity gospel preachers.

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Their followers call them ministers. Their critics call them frauds. The media calls them televangelists. Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa calls them “Nonprofit Media-Based Ministries,” and he wants to know the real financial landscape of ministers Paula White, Joyce Meyer, Creflo Dollar, Eddie Long, Kenneth Copeland and Benny Hinn. In early November of 2007, stories broke about the Senator’s demand for financial statements from the ministries within a month’s time.

The preachers, all of whom preach a “prosperity gospel”—the idea that Jesus wants his followers to flourish materially —responded in various ways. St. Louis-based minister Joyce Meyer, who had already been criticized in a St. Louis Post-Dispatch feature series in 2003, pointed to audited financial statements that were available on her website for the last 3 years. Creflo Dollar and Eddie Long refused to provide documents. Kenneth Copeland, Paula White, and Benny Hinn provided answers that Sen. Grassley found to be insufficient.

Some ministries have questioned Grassley’s authority to conduct such an investigation, arguing that the IRS, not Congress, is the proper umbrella for such projects. Others suggest that Grassley’s attention to these ministries might be borne of a common distaste for their theology. Texas-based televangelist Kenneth Copeland even launched a website to fight Grassley’s probe.

Grassley dismissed these claims, insisting that the purpose of the investigation is to probe whether these organizations are using their tax-exempt status according to law. As of late May 2008, Kenneth Copeland and Creflo Dollar continue to resist the probe. At the time of this writing, Grassley has also refrained from subpoenaing the documents, but has pointed out that all other organizations he has approached in the past have surrendered documents voluntarily.

The theological movement we call prosperity gospel represents a marginal theology that has gradually moved into the mainstream. The seeds of prosperity gospel, also known as the “word-of-faith” movement, were sown in the late 1960’s with a small group of ministers led by Kenneth Hagin Sr., and it apparently began to take root in the mid 1980’s with ministers such as Hagin, Kenneth and Gloria Copeland (currently under investigation), and John Osteen (father of Joel Osteen). In fact, the six ministries Grassley targeted are not the only ones considered to be prosperity gospel ministries. Other popular media pastors exhibiting traits of prosperity theology include Joel Osteen, Fred Price, T.D. Jakes, and Randy White (husband of Paula White).

While the three major strands of Christianity—Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, and Protestant—have separate traditions regarding the use of wealth, it is not surprising that the Protestant ethos is the most prevalent in the US. The traditional Protestant understanding of money and wealth is at loggerheads with the new prosperity understanding. Shayne Lee quotes theologian James Cone as saying:

My job as a theologian is to tell Fred Price and T.D. Jakes that they cannot really be true to the gospel of Jesus if they preach a message of prosperity that contradicts it. I would say what they are preaching is very interesting and meaningful to people at some other level, but it is not meaningful at the true gospel level.

Ironically, Cone is an advocate of liberation theology, another marginal theology that has interesting parallels with prosperity gospel.

Even so, the movement is multimodal and difficult to define. Prosperity theologians and pastors often draw from self-help psychology, marketing, and coaching techniques to augment a biblical message of health and happiness. Indeed, their appeal of some is so wide that it transcends the church. Boxer Mike Tyson stated, “I am a Muslim, I pray five times a day and even I love T.D. Jakes” . In a recent article about Joel Osteen in Good magazine, a Jewish atheist was quoted as saying, “I look at him like a motivational speaker. I don’t think people get that until they see him [on television]. Yes, he’s a pastor and does it in a church, but the underlying [message] is just to live a good life, love yourself, and be happy. He pretty much doesn’t preach religion.”

What, then, do these pastors preach? Ken Sarles writes:

Perhaps the major emphases of this movement can best be summarized by rewording the old adage about being healthy wealthy, and wise. In this case the good news of the prosperity gospel is how to be healthy, wealthy, and demon-free.

While all of its figureheads promise “blessing,” some are more coy than others about what that means. Joel Osteen for example, in books such as “Your Best Life Now” and “Become a Better You,” urges followers not only to grasp their full financial potential, but to embrace physical healing through faith . Benny Hinn’s ministry emphasizes deliverance from demons, and even markets demonology materials on its website (www.bennyhinn.org).

However, the emphasis is often on the second member of the trio: wealth. As noted before, prosperity theology asserts God’s desire to materially bless His worshippers in this age. Shayne Lee unpacks the deeper implications of the theology:
"Word-of-faith teaching asserts that Christians have the power to control their physical well-being and financial fortunes through their faith. The underlying assumption is that the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ provided Christians with the ability to live in total victory, financial prosperity, and perfect health. However, God's "hands are tied" from blessing many Christians who lack faith and misappropriate biblical principles, thus explaining why all Christians are not experiencing prosperous and healthy lives. Word-of-faith preachers argue that once believers strengthen their faith by memorizing and confessing scriptures, they are able to live in total victory and control their physical and financial fate. The prosperity gospel is a central part of word-of-faith teachings and suggests that God wants all believers to prosper financially and will bless them according to their faith ."

At its core, it is fair to say that prosperity theology is a restless mix of biblical teaching and good, old-fashioned, American entrepreneurship. To a person, prosperity gospel preachers are charismatic and compelling, from the simple folksy styles of Joel Osteen and Joyce Meyer to the theatrics of Benny Hinn. They have their own television shows. The books they author often feature full-color photos of the preachers on the front covers, leading us to the unsurprising realization that the consumer buys the messenger as much as the message.

Yet Baptist Christian ethics professor David Jones finds fault with the theology, arguing that it incorrectly applies Old Testament scriptures like the Abrahamic Covenant, when God promises to bless Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3. He critiques the theology on several fronts, including prosperity theology’s inadequate understanding of biblical giving and wealth. Indeed, for Jones, the theology misses the teachings of Christ entirely. He writes:

A second error of prosperity theology…is the misinterpretation of 2 Cor. 8:9. Without exception, this is the verse to which prosperity teachers appeal in order to support their view of the Atonement [Christ’s sacrificial work]. The verse reads, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich.” This problem with this interpretation is, of course, that in this verse Paul was in no way teaching that Christ died on the cross for the purpose of increasing anyone’s net worth materially. In fact, Paul was actually teaching the exact opposite principle (brackets mine).

Evangelical author Randy Alcorn is even more incisive:

Are material wealth, achievement, fame, victory, or success reliable indicators of God’s reward or approval? If so, then he is an evil God, for history is full of successful madmen and prosperous despots. Was God on the side of Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and other prosperous butchers of history during their rise to power and at the apex of their regimes when they were surrounded by material wealth?...If wealth is a dependable sign of God’s approval and lack of wealth shows his disapproval, then Jesus and Paul were on God’s blacklist, and drug dealers and embezzlers are the apple of his eye (76).

Even so, not everyone believes that material prosperity and Christian devotion are poor bedfellows, and no one can ignore the simple fact that God is big business. Media convergence and messages of hope and healing have brought millions into the coffers of prosperity gospel ministries. Eager to invest in the invisible kingdom of God and reap the benefits in the here and now, virtual and actual parishioners write checks and wait for promised blessings. Meanwhile, television personalities build multimillion-dollar homes and zip around in private jets. Unlikely salaries and excessive lifestyles, it seems, are not limited to Fortune 500 CEO’s.

The fact that Jesus himself owned practically nothing rarely enters the discourse.

Comments

[Quentin Schultze]

Hey, David, drop me a quick email with your working email. Let me know if you received the copy of the book, too. Hope to hear from you soon. --Q

[Deborah Allinder Lee]

I think Joel Osteen is the most frightening of all the prosperity preachers. One reason is that he gives more clear reasons why people aren't finding proseperity "yet". He tells them to press on and persevere until it happens in a way that keeps them believing.

I've been thinking about the prosperity movement more lately because of I am coming across the "Law of Attraction" and "Manifestation" ideas with non Christians in the internet marketing groups I'm in.

They believe that the law of attraction is a natural law based on a an energy in the universe.

They teach that you place your order just like a catalog. If you direct your thoughts in the right direction and believe it will happen then universe is required to give it to you.

It seems to have some roots in metaphysics. They quote a lot of physics laws in their writings.

The movie "The Secret" gave these ideas a lot press, but a lot of the people I am hearing say The Secret missed the mark and didn't tell the whole story.

The Word Faith/Prosperity movement seems to be the Christian version of this.

I'm guessing it is probably tied to an ancient heresay, but I'm up on those right now.

There have been a lot of books from 1900s to the 1920s that have become extremely popular lately with internet marketers and other business people like "Think and Grow Rich". Actually, Donald Trump reads that book at least once a year.

My challenge is to find a Christian response to this within some of the groups I'm in. There is truth in the fact that if you have a lot of negative thoughts and attitudes, you will probably not have success. It will color your actions and decisions, concious and subconcious.

There are people who say the law of attraction is Biblical.

There's one book out there that gives case studies of wealthy people and includes Jesus on the list. I haven't read it, so I'm not sure where they are going with that.

If you look at Paul's thorn in the flesh and minor profits like Jeremiah, Hosea, and most others, it is obvious that the Word Faith/Law of Attraction ideas don't hold water.

It really all boils down to idolatry. If we have the power to place orders and God or the universe are obligated to fill them then we are really more powerful than God/the universe and control our own destinies.