The Prosperity Gospel is not well masked; its greed, selfishness, and absurdity are plain to most, but the notion of God’s blessing coming as material wealth fits well with the American dream and slips neatly into otherwise Biblical worldviews. When health is failing, wealth is out of reach, and material prosperity seems little more than a fantasy, we can conclude that God’s favor has departed from us. Conversely, if we have health, money, and material possessions, we can glibly assume God’s favor is with us. Tying God’s love to what we get from Him is childish. “You must not love me because I do not have this!” “If you truly cared about me, I would have that! “Oh, how much like spoiled brats we sound. How ridiculous it is for us to address the Lord of all Creation in this way. He who laughs at the mustered force of the nations is not all threatened by the waving of our puny fists. Nowhere in Scripture is there any universal promise of material prosperity. There are few examples of prosperous Christ followers, and even those who are did not enjoy prosperity in all seasons of life. The old song says that, “into each life some rain must fall,” and that is surely the case here. God uses material suffering to produce spiritual prosperity.
Does God Promise Wealth?
If that seems little comfort to us as we stock shelves for minimum wage and ponder how we will pay the bills this month, well, that says more about limited vision than God’s unfailing love. The psychologist Abraham Maslow put together a hierarchy of needs; he theorized that we cannot pursue higher needs until our lower needs have been met.
Maslow is half-right; we do fixate on the immediate basic needs such as food and shelter to the exclusion of higher needs like meaning and purpose. But the man who satisfies his hunger has a matter of hours before he fills the need again. The man who satisfies his need of a purpose in life is set until that purpose is achieved. In his pursuit of the higher need, the lower need is put into perspective; it now serves a greater purpose.
When the lower needs are met apart from the higher needs, they are left unchecked. Your hunger is The Master. What Maslow got the order of reversed. God did not. God offers the greater treasures of the immaterial, knowing they are more valuable to us than any amount of wealth.
Paul tells the Romans that God has already given them the very best gift that could ever be given in Christ. This is true. So, when tempted to think that poverty signals that God is withholding or withdrawing love from you, answer, “but I have been given Christ.” Christ is given continually; see John 15:5: “I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.”
Therefore, God’s love remains with you.
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