A friend sent me this recent news brief from CNN’s website:

“Blessed are the rich? A booming movement that began with Evangelical Christians holds to the belief that a God who loves you does not want you to be broke. In a Time
poll, 17 percent of Christians surveyed said they considered themselves part
of such a movement, while a full 61 percent believed that God wants people
to be prosperous. The movement's renaissance has infuriated a number of
prominent pastors, theologians and commentators.”

This past Labor Day weekend, my pastor, Richard Jordan, devoted his Sunday sermon to the whole matter of wealth and the deception shoveled out by “name-it-and-claim-it prosperity preachers” who get on TV, write books, etc., advising Christians on how to bankroll their blessings God’s anxious to bestow upon them if only they’d pray and act in the appropriate manner.

“Back in the Old Testament under Moses, it was a good thing to be rich; it was a sign of God’s prosperity,” Jordan started by explaining. “There’ll be a time in the future when it is again a sign of God’s blessing, but in today’s Dispensation of Grace, it doesn’t make any difference one way or the other. And in the earthly ministry of Christ, it wasn’t such a good thing at all to be rich.

“I’ve often wondered why it is all the ‘name-it-and-claim-it’ preachers want to talk about having this blood-bought covenant with God to make you rich and prosperous, but they never discuss Jesus’ teachings about money. Didn’t He say, ‘It is easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God’?

In this same passage from Luke 18, Jesus urges, “Sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, follow me.”

We’re told in Matthew 19 that when the rich young ruler heard these things from Christ “he went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.”

Jordan reasons, “I would suggest that the ‘great possessions’ had the young man, too, because it says ‘he was very sorrowful’ (Luke 18:23). And when Jesus saw that he was very sorrowful, He said to His disciples, ‘How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God!’

“I have never yet heard one of the prosperity preachers—Jimmy Swaggart, Benny Hinn, I don’t care who it is—quote Luke 18. They’ll quote that verse from III John 1:2 (‘Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth’) and tell you God will give you wealth, and make you prosper in your finances just like your spirit prospers in Christ, but there’s none of them who quotes that passage from Luke 18.

“Now you tell me, from Luke 18, does it sound like a good thing or a bad thing to be rich? Sounds kind of tough to be rich, doesn’t it? ‘It’s easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye’? That’s an impossibility, isn’t it? That’s why all the new Bibles re-translate that to ‘the gate of the city’ and all that kind of stuff. . . so the guy can wiggle through. But, no, Christ is saying it’s impossible. It’s as impossible for a camel to go through a needle’s eye as it is for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of god.

“Well, if that’s true, and He said that to the Apostle John—John was one of the people who was standing there when Christ taught that—then do you think III John 1:2 is talking about money? Being rich in material things?”

For prosperity preachers, III John 1:2 is a favorite calling card, but the verse obviously doesn’t say what they try to make it say.

Explains Jordan, “The doctrine in the verse says that your soul would prosper in Christ, does it not? In Christ, all spiritual blessings are yours upfront, and John says, ‘I pray that you would prosper in the material realm and in health, just like your soul prospers spiritually.’

In I Cor. 16:2, Paul says the standard for a Believer’s giving is “as God hath prospered him,” meaning, “As God has given us material wealth, therefore we should give on that proportion; on that basis.”

The first thing a reader of III John must recognize is that it was the Apostle John who wrote it. In Gal. 2:9, we’re told that John, along with Peter and James, came to understand that Christ had given Paul a new and advanced revelation over what He’d given the apostles, and they, in turn, extended to Paul “the right hand of fellowship,” recognizing the further disclosures in God’s plans revealed through him.

“They recognized that Paul had been given a new ministry, with a new message to a new agency of people—the Body of Christ—and that it was different from their kingdom ministry to the nation Israel,” says Jordan. “John, as an apostle of the circumcision, committed the uncircumcised over to Paul. If John stood here today, on the basis of Galatians 2:9, he’d tell you III John was written to the circumcision about Israel’s program, and God’s plan and purpose for the nation Israel, and that you shouldn’t try to steal their mail.

“Every piece of mail that comes into the post office doesn’t belong to you; only what’s delivered to your box with your name on it. And when you come along and treat God’s Word as though you can just go in there and dip your hand in and pull out anything you want because it says something you like, that’s nothing but spiritual larceny!

“You wouldn’t go down to the bank and run in and try to grab money that wasn’t yours and go out with it thinking you could get away with it. Well, you’re not going to get away with it spiritually and it will break your spiritual neck! It will bring disaster to your Christian life if you treat God’s Word that way.”

In I Cor. 16:2, Paul is instructing the Corinthians about their giving to the “poor saints who were in Jerusalem” and he was telling them they were to give systematically—“as a man purposeth in his heart, let him give.”

Jordan explains, “They were to have understood what the (financial) need was and then systematically, on the first day of the week—not just when Paul came and found out what they had—but systematically each week, lay aside an amount so that when Paul came there wouldn’t be a panic to figure out how much they should give.

“They were to purpose in their heart what their giving was to be. It was not to be a lackadaisical thing. It was not supposed to be, ‘Well, let’s just see what kind of disposable income I have next month and how much of that I’m willing to give to the ministry.’

“It was to be a thoughtful, determined kind of a thing, systematically. They were to give sacrificially. But they were also to give proportionately as God hath prospered them. That is, according to their sense of God’s goodness toward them.”

While people usually think about the word “prosperity” in the sense of money, in the Bible it has more the context of being successful.

When Joshua’s taking the nation Israel into the Promised Land in Joshua 1:8, for example, the word “prosperous” is referring to a prosperous journey for the successful outcome of taking over the land. So in their case, prosperity, or success, was to go in and take the land of Canaan and live in it, dwell in it and possess it.

In Gen. 24:21 is another example of this same type of thing: “And the man wondering at her held his peace, to wit whether the LORD had made his journey prosperous or not.”

Jordan explains, “It’s a journey where he found the wife for the boy. It didn’t have anything to do with money. In fact, it’s going to cost him money. You know, it’s like Barney Google said, ‘When I was single my pockets did jingle.’ It wasn’t a matter of making money; it was a matter of fulfilling the job that he had.”

In the same context, the Apostle Paul talks about hoping for a prosperous journey in Romans 1:10.

“Now people say based upon that verse that when you’re traveling you should pray for traveling mercies,” says Jordan. “I had never heard that term until I moved to the Midwest.

“What did Paul think a prosperous journey was? Not getting run over by a bus or having the airplane fall out of the air? No, he thought a prosperous journey was to have some fruit among the people he’s ministering to. So, for Paul, to have a successful journey had nothing to do with getting there on schedule and not losing his baggage.”

Paul expands on the issue of giving in II Cor. 8:2, lecturing the wealthy Corinthians, “Notice these people from the churches in Macedonia are giving a large amount even though they’re in deep poverty? You guys are in financial abundance, so you ought to be able to out-give them because you’ve got more, and it will allow for more equality.”

Paul’s saying, “You know what, the circumstances could get reversed. There’s going to come a time when you won’t have so much and they’ve got a lot.” And notice he doesn’t say God’s going to change that?

In I Tim. 6:17, Paul writes, “Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not highminded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy.”

“When he says ‘charge them that are rich,’ that’s not talking about MasterCard, Visa, American Express or Discover,” says Jordan. “That’s, ‘Put them under orders. Those that are rich—those that abound, those that have financial prosperity and are rich in this world with physical things—that they be not high-minded,’ meaning they don’t look down at people who don’t have it nor trust in uncertain riches.

“Can I tell you, friends, riches don’t satisfy. That’s why he says in verse six that ‘godliness with contentment is great gain’. . . I don’t care how many material possessions you gather to yourself, contentment is a spiritual heart attitude, and if you don’t have it with a little you won’t have it with a lot, because riches don’t give you contentment. That only comes from ‘the peace of God which passeth all understanding.’

“Now what people tell you is God will give them to you for certain if you do certain things, don’t they? Paul thought that wasn’t true.

“You remember Deuteronomy 28 when God said, ‘I’m going to make you the head of the nations and not the tail. I’m going to make you prosper and everything you touch is going to turn to gold. You’re going to have the Midas touch and you’ll have more than you can spend.’

“God said, ‘I’m going to give you that money,’ and yet to the same people later on, in Jesus Christ’s ministry, He says, ‘It won’t be good for you to have any money because if you do, you’re going to miss the kingdom.’

“Do you understand why if you don’t ‘rightly divide the word of God’ you’re never going to get that straight? That’s God promise to Israel about the future abundance in her kingdom, but He said, ‘Right now, seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.’

“Israel had to find God’s righteousness before they were going to get the things God was going to give to them. You better be careful about quoting Matthew 6:33 yourself because, while it’s a good thing to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, you’ve got no guarantee that those things are going to be added unto you.

“In fact, the instructions to you (in this Dispensation of Grace) is, ‘Don’t expect them to be added—get a job!’ Go back to Matthew 6 and see that He told those people, ‘Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin.’

“There’s going to be a time in the future of the nation Israel, where in order to be a child of God you won’t take the ‘mark of the beast,’ and, as a result, you won’t be able to buy, sell, have a job, do anything.

“And God said, ‘When that time comes, Israel, I’ll take care of you; you don’t worry about it. You just trust me, and if you’ll seek me and my righteousness, you won’t need to worry; all that other stuff will be added to you.’

“But that’s not where we are in the program of God today, and if you don’t understand how to study the Bible dispensationally, you’re going to get those verses all screwed up in your mind and wind up in absolute confusion about what God is doing today with the Body of Christ.

“As far as God’s concerned, your financial situation today is not an issue in your spiritual life. It’s not a gauge whereby you gauge God’s love for you and God’s blessings in your life. The love of God is tied to one thing for you and that’s the Crosswork.

“It’s not tied to how much money you make or how much money you give. That proves something about you but nothing about God’s attitude. That demonstrates something about your attitude, not God’s.

“God’s attitude toward you is consistent, and it’s always one where His love is commended toward you. And if you need God to physically intervene in your life to demonstrate His grace and goodness and welfare, He already has! You don’t need to wait for Him to do it tomorrow; He already did it 2,000 years ago on a rugged cross when He stepped out of heaven’s glory, became a man, walked in our human flesh and went to Calvary and, in the body of flesh through death, reconciled you to God. You couldn’t ask for more of an intervention in your life in human history!

“Every time you look for something else to demonstrate God’s love and working in your life, you’re saying, ‘That’s not enough Lord; I want that plus something else.’ And you know what you do? You do what that verse in Galatians says—you frustrate the grace of God and make it as though Christ is dead in vain; that His Cross wasn’t enough.

“The answer’s in resting in the goodness of God’s grace to you in Christ and relaxing so you aren’t holding on to these material things in the world that you try to get your security from.

“Now, how does God prosper us? How does He make us successful in material ways? There’s two ways. One is what I call the natural things. We read in I Timothy that He’s ‘given us all things to richly enjoy.’ God gave you creation, folks, to make you rich so that you can richly enjoy the bounty of creation.

“God has fixed a creation out here that provides for your needs whether you’re a believer or an unbeliever. Jesus said in Matthew 5 that He ‘causes the rain to fall on the just and the unjust alike.’ That’s what Paul’s saying in Acts 14:15 when he says to the pagans in Lystra, ‘We also are men of like passions with you, and preach unto you that ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God, which made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are therein.’

“You know what, the planet works. The creation works and it provides for your necessities; it provides for what you need in life to live and be successful.”

In talking to the Greeks in Athens—the cultural elite of the world at that time—Paul informs them that neither is God “worshipped with men's hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things.”

Paul’s telling these “sophisticated” pagans, “Creation is dependant on God, and you know what, creation is providing for you. God’s given you creation to make you rich so you can richly enjoy the bounty of it.”