Did Jesus actually teach that God wants you healthy and wealthy — or did we invent a gospel for the comfortable and call it faith?

• JS

  Jordan S.5d ago

  I grew up in a Word of Faith church. My mother had stage 3 cancer. The pastor told her she wasn't healed because her faith wasn't strong enough. She died. I watched her spend her last months blaming herself for her own death. If that's the gospel, I want nothing to do with it.

  187Reply
• R

  Riley3d ago

  I'm a pastor in a low income neighborhood. I have watched the prosperity gospel do more spiritual damage than almost anything else in my twenty years of ministry. People leave because when they don't get healed or out of debt they conclude either God doesn't exist or they're too broken to be loved. It breaks my heart every single time.

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• C

  Casey4d ago

  The Book of Job exists specifically to refute the prosperity gospel. Literally the whole book. Job is righteous. Job loses everything. His friends say it must be his fault. GOD REBUKES THEM. The prosperity gospel's theology is literally the theology God called wrong inside the Bible itself.

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• A

  Alex2d ago

  The cross is the center of the Christian story. Jesus died in poverty, in shame, abandoned by his friends, executed as a criminal. That is the climax of the biblical narrative. And somehow the takeaway is supposed to be that God wants you to drive a Range Rover? Something has gone profoundly wrong somewhere.

  159Reply
• I

  Iris5d ago

  Name one verse — just ONE — where Jesus promises his followers financial prosperity. I'll wait. Because I can name about forty where he promises suffering, rejection, and persecution.

  154Reply
• KL

  Kofi L.3d ago

  It creates a devastating double bind for the poor. You're poor so you need more faith. You sow more seed (money to the pastor). You're still poor. So you must not have enough faith. So you give more. It's not a gospel, it's an MLM with Bible verses.

  148Reply
• J

  Jamie2d ago

  At the end of the day the question is simple: who benefits? The sick woman giving her last hundred dollars to a televangelist's 'miracle offering' — or the televangelist? Follow the money and you'll find your theology.

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• T

  Theo4d ago

  The prosperity gospel is a uniquely American heresy that we then exported to the Global South where it does unspeakable damage. Watch any documentary on it in Nigeria or Brazil. It's not inspiring people — it's stripping the poor of what little they have and funneling it to pastors who live like pharaohs.

  141Reply
• AT

  Avery T.4d ago

  The apostles were beaten, imprisoned, and martyred. Paul described himself as hungry, cold, shipwrecked, and 'as the filth of the world.' If the prosperity gospel is true, the entire leadership of the early church was catastrophically failing at Christianity.

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• N

  Noah2d ago

  The prosperity gospel ultimately makes God a vending machine and faith a coin. Insert enough belief, pull the lever, receive blessing. That is not the God of Scripture. The God of Scripture is sovereign, mysterious, allows suffering for purposes we don't always understand, and promises presence — not prosperity.

  121Reply
• KB

  Kofi B.4d ago

  My honest question for prosperity gospel preachers: why do you personally need eight figures and a private jet to do ministry? Like explain that to me slowly using small words.

  119Reply
• R

  Riley4d ago

  Psalm 23 is about peace and provision, not about getting a Bentley because you sowed a thousand dollar seed. The eisegesis required to get wealth doctrine out of that psalm is frankly embarrassing for anyone who's spent ten minutes with a commentary.

  112Reply
• F

  Feli3d ago

  If you disagree with all of this, then explain why Jesus told the rich young ruler to sell everything he had and give it to the poor. Not tithe ten percent. Not 'manage your wealth wisely.' Everything. That command makes zero sense inside a prosperity framework.

  107Reply
• T2

  Taylor 214d ago

  Actually, if the prosperity gospel distorts the nature of God, the work of Christ, and what salvation is for, 'heresy' is exactly the right word. A wrong gospel is not just a theological disagreement — Paul called it accursed in Galatians 1:8-9. I'll take Paul's word for it.

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• MK

  Morgan K.4d ago

  lol the jet thing. 'I need a private jet because demons travel on commercial airlines.' that was actually said by an actual pastor. out loud. into a microphone.

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• C

  Casey3d ago

  Thank you for saying this. The most vulnerable people pay the highest price for bad theology. Always.

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• L

  Liam4d ago

  Because Jesus said it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. That's not a prosperity promise. That's a warning. And he said it to someone who kept all the commandments, not some pagan sinner.

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• O_

  Omar _x4d ago

  ^^^ This. Job is the prosperity gospel's worst nightmare and somehow they just... skip it.

  88Reply
• KL

  Kofi L.3d ago

  Deuteronomy 28 is a covenant document with national Israel under the Mosaic covenant. It is not a personal promise to individual Gentile Christians in 2025. Applying it that way without accounting for redemptive history and the New Covenant is hermeneutics malpractice.

  82Reply
• JB

  Jordan B.4d ago

  Nobody is telling you to feel guilty for being financially stable. The critique isn't 'wealthy Christians are bad.' The critique is teaching that God GUARANTEES wealth to the faithful — and by extension, that struggling believers are spiritually deficient. Do you see the difference?

  76Reply
• F

  Feli3d ago

  The 3 John 2 verse — 'I pray that you may prosper and be in good health, even as your soul prospers' — is cited constantly in prosperity circles. What those preachers never tell you is that it's a personal greeting in a private letter, the ancient equivalent of 'hope you're doing well.' It has zero doctrinal weight as a universal promise to all believers.

  74Reply
• A

  Avery3d ago

  MLM with Bible verses is painfully accurate and I'm using that forever

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• L

  Liam4d ago

  I don't fully agree with the prosperity gospel but I also think some of y'all act like poverty is a virtue. Jesus wasn't condemning wealth, he was condemning LOVE of wealth. Abraham was rich. Solomon was rich. Job got everything back double. Why does the American church only quote the suffering verses?

  67Reply
• ZT

  Zara T.3d ago

  Context matters so much and nobody in those churches ever opens a study Bible. 3 John 2 as a theological cornerstone is like building a house on a sticky note.

  63Reply
• MM

  Marco M.2d ago

  He had a treasurer because there was money to give to the poor. Judas was literally stealing from that fund. Jesus had nowhere to lay his head. I admire the effort but that reading is a stretch and you know it.

  61Reply
• L

  Liam3d ago

  Doing good works doesn't validate a false theology. Lots of cults feed people. The question is what gospel they're preaching while they do it.

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• R

  Riley2d ago

  There's a whole theological tradition called 'health and wealth' that predates the American version — you can trace elements of it through New Thought in the 19th century. It's not an innocent re-reading of Scripture, it has ideological parents that have nothing to do with Christianity.

  53Reply
• M

  Maya4d ago

  They don't skip it. They say Job's suffering was temporary and he got it all back, which proves God rewards faith with material blessing. I'm not saying I buy that reading but let's be honest about the argument.

  51Reply
• O

  Omar3d ago

  I actually converted TO Christianity partly because of a prosperity-style church. The joy, the energy, the sense that God actually cares about your daily life not just your eternal soul. I know theologically it's shaky ground. But I'm not sure I'd be a believer at all without that on-ramp.

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• D

  Diego3d ago

  The standard response is that Jesus was addressing that specific man's specific idol, not making a universal command. I think that's actually a fair point even though I reject the prosperity gospel overall.

  44Reply
• L2

  Liam 214d ago

  ok but nobody actually believes the cartoon version yall keep arguing against. the real teaching is that God WANTS good things for his kids, that abundance is a blessing not a sin. that's literally Psalm 23. green pastures. still waters. nobody complaining about that.

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• D

  Diego3d ago

  Genuine question for you: now that you're grounded in faith, are you comfortable staying in a community that may be preaching a gospel Paul said was accursed? Being an 'on-ramp' doesn't make something a safe destination.

  39Reply
• E

  Elena3d ago

  Deuteronomy 28 literally lists material blessings as consequences of obedience. Crops, cattle, enemies defeated, rain in season. If you're going to say the prosperity gospel has NO biblical basis you have to grapple with the actual text, not just dismiss the people who cite it.

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• D

  Diego4d ago

  I've been blessed financially and I am a Christian who tithes. Am I not allowed to enjoy that? Must I feel guilty for it? My prosperity isn't proof of a false gospel, it's proof that hard work and faithfulness have consequences.

  34Reply
• T

  Taylor4d ago

  heresy is a strong word. wrong? probably. heresy? that's reserved for denying the trinity or the resurrection. let's not throw that word around for every theological disagreement we have.

  29Reply
• P

  Priya4d ago

  Look, I think the lavish lifestyle stuff is indefensible. But there are prosperity-adjacent churches that do real community development, feed people, build schools in developing nations. Writing off the entire movement as a scam ignores a more complicated picture.

  22Reply
• R9

  Ravi 922d ago

  idk man Jesus turned water into wine at a party and fed 5000 people with fish and bread and walked around with a treasurer. doesnt exactly scream vow of poverty to me

  18Reply

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