Exposing The False Gospel Of Physical Well-being

• Defining The Issues:

          -Prosperity gospel preachers are known for making fraudulent promises of recovery, financial blessings, and freedom from demonic influences to those who voluntarily donate large sums of money. It is claimed that God gives people who have enough faith a hundredfold in terms of wealth and health in addition to the forgiveness provided by the Cross. Professing Christians who give money to prosperity gospel ministries are wrongly assured that God will materially reward them as a result of their contributions.

• The Origin Of The Prosperity Gospel As Recounted By This Source:

          -"Its roots, though, don’t just lie in explicitly Christian tradition. In fact, it’s possible to trace the origins of the American prosperity gospel to the tradition of New Thought, a nineteenth-century spiritual movement popular with decidedly unorthodox thinkers like Ralph Waldo Emerson and William James. Practitioners of New Thought, not all of whom identified as Christian, generally held the divinity of the individual human being and the priority of mind over matter. In other words, if you could correctly channel your mental energy, you could harness its material results. New Thought, also known as the “mind cure,” took many forms: from interest in the occult to splinter-Christian denominations like Christian Science to the development of the “talking cure” at the root of psychotherapy."

• The Book Of Proverbs Expressly Speaks Of Having A Moderate Income:

          -"Two things I ask of you, Lord; do not refuse me before I die: Keep falsehood and lies far from me; give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’ Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God." (Proverbs 30:7-9)

• Jesus Christ Warned Against Being Greedy:

          -"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness! “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money." (Matthew 6:19-24)

• The Apostle Paul Stated That The Love Of Money Is A Root Of Evil:

          -"Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs." (1 Timothy 6:9-10)

• The Word Of Faith Movement Takes On The Ideology Of The Montanist Heresy:

          -"The Montanists believed that true Christianity depended on a mystical experience with the Spirit, and they taught a two-tiered division of believers, distinguishing between ordinary believers and the pneumatakoi, or “spirit-filled” Christians. The pneumatakoi were the “more advanced” group that received a special indwelling (a “baptism”) of the Holy Spirit after conversion. According to the Montanists, a life of true holiness or godliness was not possible if you were not numbered among the pneumatakoi." (https://www.ligonier.org/learn/devotionals/montanism/)
          -People involved in the Word of Faith Movement have been guilty of abuses of spiritual gifts when it is claimed that there are Christians not filled with the Holy Spirit. They do this when it is claimed that a lack of healthiness and wealth is due to a lack of trust in God.