God Is Enough - John Piper on Prosperity Gospel

John Piper hates the health, wealth, and prosperity gospel because he says it is no gospel at all.

Now, let us go for the whole gospel without losing the essential gospel.

I love what John Piper is trying to say here, but I sometimes have a conflict.

God is enough.

I could not agree more.

He sustains and shapes us in loss.

Absolutely and completely

We distort the true gospel all over the world by proclaiming a false gospel that God will give us extravagant material blessings if we will believe strongly enough.

When we tell people they can avoid pain by trusting Jesus, we do them and the gospel a disservice.

What then is this health, wealth, and prosperity gospel?

Where is the conflict?

Maybe it is not a conflict as much as a distinction.

The health, wealth, and prosperity gospel is not Christianity. It is magic.

However, Christian and Hebrew scriptures have much to say about each of those three subjects. When the Bible addresses them, it is not magic, it is about principles. Principles work whether or not we believe in the Author of those principles. If we practice them in faith, directed toward Him, He often blesses them in ways that go beyond our imagination ... but we don't always get what we want.

Hard, conscientious work can produce positive results and those results can be described as prosperity, success, and sometimes, wealth.

Wealth, properly understood, managed, and shared with others can be a real blessing. It is also a great responsibility.

Giving benefits the giver but cannot be ones reason for giving.

Following sound biblical principles can lead to better health. In fact, it is possible to seek optimum health even while in the process of dying.

And none of these things are magic and not even miracles all the time.

At the same time, there are miracles and they are, by definition, variations from the norm.

Where I differ with health, wealth, and prosperity preachers is that I don't believe miracles are owed to us by God or guaranteed - at least not the kind they sometimes promise.

There are signs and wonders in the world today where God demonstrates His sovereign power and love  we are astounded. The greater miracles, which are far more prevalent than signs and wonders are those that shape us from within and prepare us to become more than we could be without them. The greatest miracle of all is the work of grace from Jesus Christ within us.

We do become healthier because we heal from the inside out.

We do become wealthier because we start to see the value in the gifts we have received.

We do prosper because we grow in every dimension of life and plug into principles that are enduring and relevant to those dimensions.

So, I always have to balance any criticism of the excesses of the health, wealth, and prosperity teachings with an understanding of the "holistc" nature of spiritual truth in the Bible.

Much of what they teach is true - not because God waves a magic wand, but because God shapes us from within and we start to achieve more than we could have achieved before we started applying these truths.

It is true, but it is not the essential gospel.

God is enough. We will suffer. We can overcome.

Unless we have that in place, we are on shaky ground when the real trials come.