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It
was a cold morning in Las Vegas, NV (yes, those exist). I was out with a group of Christians trying
to meet people from the neighborhood surrounding our building to teach them the
good news of Jesus Christ. If you have
had experience cold-knocking on doors of people’s homes for any reason, you
probably would agree that the experience has the propensity to be quite an
adventure. There are vicious pets,
slamming doors, skeptical looks and disparaging words in abundance. Sometimes you will come across an isolated
person who will not mind talking to you about what is on their mind for as long
as you will listen. Sometimes you will
wonder if you should have called the police about a shady-looking
residence. Sometimes you will wonder if
someone will call the police on you for disturbing people’s sensibilities. This is all ‘par for the course’ because, for
the Christian, the mission is to scatter the seed of the gospel and look for
the “good and honest heart” into which the seed of God’s word can be planted to
bring forth fruit (Lk. 8:5-15). One home
unto which I came that morning was of a low-income Hispanic family. A young man came to the door sheepishly. He could speak very little English, so
communication was strained. When I offered to get him connected with our
Hispanic ministry and give him some tracts with our information, he
recoiled. It was not because he did not
show interest; we had both been helping each other fight our way through a
communication obstacle course for some time.
Do you want to know why he backed off?
Simply put, it was because he thought I wanted his money. He thought I
was nothing more than a door-to-door panhandler in a ‘religious’ disguise. In his mind, there was a connection between
Christianity and greed. I reassured him I was not interested in his money, but
in simply teaching him God’s word. He
took our material and we ended our conversation. I do not know what happened to this young
man, but I fear that this story reveals something very hideous that lies
beneath the surface of much of what passes as ‘Christianity’ today.
There
has been a significant ‘religious’ movement in our country that teaches what
can be labeled “The Prosperity Gospel” (TPG).
TPG “is a…doctrine that [teaches] financial blessing is the will of God
for Christians, and that faith, positive speech, and donations to Christian
ministries will always increase one's material wealth” (Wikipedia). TPG treats God like a cosmic vending machine:
put your faith (and your money) in, and out will magically come a large house,
a luxury car, a beautiful spouse, plush vacations, and whatsoever your carnal
heart desires. Is it not odd, though, that usually it is only the TPG
‘preachers’ that receive these physical treasures through the money of their
parishioners? Is it not disturbing that
these preachers have no shame living in oceanfront mansions, flying in private
jets, wearing the best suits and driving the nicest cars on the backs of
thousands of unsuspecting followers?
TPG
infuriates me as a human on many levels.
The degree of hypocrisy, greed and deceit displayed in its leaders is
heinous. The injustice that takes place when
these deceivers take advantage of the marginalized and the ignorant is
contemptible. However, as a Christian,
my biggest problem is that this doctrine is completely without any biblical
support and yet it passes as “Christianity.”
Who do the major news outlets have on their prime-time shows to
represent the “Christian” perspective? Frequently, it seems that they select
individuals that promote the teaching I have described. This has a devastating effect on the public
perception of preachers, Christians, the gospel and God Himself. It causes people like the young man that I
encountered on that Las Vegas morning to be repelled by any mention of
Christ. TPG is a scandalous perversion
of the truth. Because of the
pervasiveness and destructiveness of this false teaching, I am dedicating two
articles to this subject. This week, my
goal was to identify the problem. Next
week, I will attempt to give biblical answers.
Torrey Clark is the preacher for the church of Christ
Northside (www.churchatlagrange.org) and host
of the weekly Christian worldview talk show, Culture Shock (www.thelightnetwork.tv/shows). Torrey can be
reached at clarktorrey@gmail.com
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