Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:01 <inaudible> welcome
Speaker 1 00:00:07 To village church, sermon Q and a pastor Michael and pastor Alex here with you and yesterday on June 27th, right. Alex, we preach a sermon on a pure and simple gospel. We're in a series on practical evangelism. So one of the questions that came out of this, it's actually kind of fun, Alex. So how do I, how do you spot a prosperity preacher let's process this? Okay,
Speaker 2 00:00:33 So, uh, just talking about just the role of a pastor of a preacher, uh, first Timothy lays this out pretty clearly. He says to Paul gives a warning to Timothy and he says, you need to do two things. You need to keep a close watch on your doctrine and a close watch on your life. First Timothy four 16. And at the end of that, he says persist in this for, by so doing, you will save both yourself and your hearers. So it's really important that you would pay attention as a pastor, as a preacher, to these two things. And as we look at prosperity preachers, we can actually take those two categories of doctrine and life and actually objectively evaluate them. And whether or not they're leading people into life, into
Speaker 1 00:01:19 Salvage, salvation or damnation, because that prosperity gospel is no gospel. Correct. All right. So we broke up, we have 10 categories. That's our top 10, the first three are doctrine. The second last, et cetera. I think there's nine technically, but our top 10. So here's number one in doctrine. They teach that God's will is for everyone to be happy, healthy, and wealthy. So whenever I meet somebody, if I think they're a prosperity preacher, I'll just ask them, I'll be like, do you, do you believe that God wants everybody happy, healthy, and wealthy? And you know what? They're always like, yes.
Speaker 3 00:01:52 Like if you asked me, do you believe in Jesus? But like, yeah, like we love talking about what are you most excited about? They're pretty excited about this because when you are wealthy, I'm wealthy, right? That's right.
Speaker 2 00:02:04 So, uh, the second thing that they do with their doctrine, they often put blame on you for your lack of resources, for your, just what you have.
Speaker 1 00:02:17 You said, if I prayed, I'd be healed. Right.
Speaker 2 00:02:20 And that's just that, that, that has nothing to do with the gospel. Right? And so, uh, typically what they'll, they'll make you feel guilty. Um, they'll tell you all, you just have to believe more. You have to do better. You have to give more, right. And you'll get more back. That of
Speaker 1 00:02:37 He's become devastating when people have cancer. I mean, just absolutely devastating, which is why they are. What, what Paul, Peter, not Paul will call wolves. Yes. I remember three. They take old Testament principles for prosperity and they apply them to the church. And so here's a wonderful interpretive rule. A old Testament law is put away. We are not under old Testament law. We are under new Testament or new covenant law. So what they do is they take these old covenant principles. If you obey, I will bless you when you go into the land. Uh, which was, it was for
Speaker 2 00:03:10 A nation in a particular place. Absolutely. That a particular point in history.
Speaker 1 00:03:14 Sure. The reason God did that was to prepare a nation and a culture that would be able to birth the Messiah when the Messiah came and they should fulfill its ultimate purpose. Got put aside that law, there's a new law, but it's basic Bible 1 0 1. The problem is the masses, especially those who are largely uneducated in scripture, fall easily for this. In fact, you hear atheist say all the time, well, you guys are such hypocrites. You don't eat bacon. Um, you know, like old covenant, even the old covenant is designed with an, with an expiration date inside of it. It wasn't intended to be forever. All right, let's move to the lifestyle. This is the story.
Speaker 2 00:03:50 Yeah. This is, this is fun. Yeah. So they ask you for money, not just one time and a service, but multiple
Speaker 3 00:03:58 Times in a survey, does he offer here at the beginning? There's the offering in the middle of the offering for me,
Speaker 2 00:04:06 There are a series of offerings and they all have to do with you being able to get more money as the
Speaker 1 00:04:11 Yup. Yup. So be, be aware. All right. So this is, this is an interesting one. Um, the pastor's lifestyle is three to 10 X, 80% of their givers. Yeah. So like, um, people often have things. They say like the pastor needs to be in the middle of the, of the income, whatever, who knows what's really the best. But what you'll find is like above like 80%. Cause there's always the guy who's super, super rich. You know what I mean? Like they're not typically up there. Uh, but you're going to find they are way, way, but like three to 10 times, like, you're just going to notice such a discrepancy here that you can.
Speaker 2 00:04:45 Yes. Well, I mean, if your message is, believe this more in theory, the pastor is the one who believes it the most. Right? So believe this morning, you will get more blessed. You have to represent that
Speaker 1 00:04:57 This person on the Brits, right. Therefore he's going to be probably the most blessed. Okay. All right. What
Speaker 2 00:05:02 Is the next one? Okay. So they are often found, unfortunately in poorer communities and ironically, so are casinos, right? They take advantage of people who actually have tangible need. Right. And they come in and say, well, if you give me what you already don't have, then God will come around and he'll give you what you've been missing all of this time. And really it creates an idol out of more. It creates an idol out of having resources.
Speaker 1 00:05:29 Yeah. To leverage your spiritual authority in light of someone's desperation. Right. That's evil. All
Speaker 3 00:05:34 Right. This is my favorite one. We say this big Thrones in hair, if both be aware, you know, I got to say like my,
Speaker 1 00:05:42 Some of my good Presbyterian buddies, they've got some pretty cool Thrones, great Thrones on stage. Right. But like when we, when we see the not great here, not great
Speaker 3 00:05:49 Here gotta be bald and fat, but that's just <inaudible>. But,
Speaker 1 00:05:56 Uh, we, they might have a big thrown
Speaker 3 00:05:58 In big hair. Like if Craig Jarvis was a Presbyterian, Craig would have big hair would have big hair, but that's fine. So he'd be your exception if both are there.
Speaker 1 00:06:10 Right. Be just be aware.
Speaker 3 00:06:13 Yeah. Right. Why I don't know. It's cool to do in their culture, whatever.
Speaker 2 00:06:18 Yeah. So, uh, so, uh, luxury cars and watches, basically, whatever the pop industry says, this is a sign of wealth. They often you can just see their lives and tangled with those things. You know, uh, I, this is not directly related, but you know that Instagram page preachers and sneakers like the new watch, right. That's the new watch. That's the new nice car. Right. And so it's just something to be aware of. If there are these pop culture symbols and they are achieving all that. Yep. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:06:49 When you take out, um, women and drugs and you leave the rest of it, that's basically now what you're left with. And so whatever pop culture moves towards, it's not an accident that pop culture moved to sneakers and now prosperity preachers are moving to sneakers. That's just an interesting, all right. Last one. Uh, they use manipulation in order to motivate giving to like fear or blessings. They hold the carrot out in front of you, guilt. Uh it's for the kingdom. And of course, all of it goes right back into their pocket. Here's a basic rule for giving that. I think, um, most, most people could probably filter out the motivation of the person asking. Sure. If your child asked you for money, the way they do, would you have an issue? So like it's interesting in scripture when Moses is raising the offering for the temple, his, his method is pretty simple. It was here's the vision, here's the need, go pray about it and go do your thing, like give back. And, and the Lord by the spirit moved rather than by guilt.
Speaker 2 00:07:49 Right. And funded it. Right. Like he brought it along and it was not, you know, if you don't do this, then this will happen. Right, right. Right. The Lord funds his vision his way.
Speaker 1 00:07:58 But it's interesting, like as a pasture or especially for a prosperity preacher, we feel like we have to basically our vision isn't God's vision. So we don't really have the spirit of God to motivate people. Now we have to use fear or blessing manipulation or something of the sorts. Um, one of our, one of our pastors, he, um, I was talking to him years ago and I asked him a question, um, do, is there prosperity music? Like, are there songs that prosperity churches make? And he had an interesting observation. He said, you will find in almost every prosperity church, they sing gospel centered music, but preach prosperity sermons. They stay, sing the gospel, but they preach a false gospel. They will sing the blood of Christ, but they'll preach money. It's a really interesting thing. So, all right. Uh, those shirts, we have got more to come, um, moral questions to answer. So join us next time on sermon Q and a.
