Evangelist Benny Hinn during a live broadcast posted to his Facebook page on Monday admitted that the “prosperity gospel” is an offence to the Holy Spirit and it “hurts the Gospel”. He said, “I’m done with it…and I don’t care what people think about me anymore…the Gospel is not for sale”.
The preacher was at the forefront of the proponents of the theology that says that health, wealth and blessings are the rights of every Christian on this earth and can be claimed and activated through giving. This giving is explained in several dimensions depending on what the preacher wants to emphasize upon. The strange ‘prosperity gospel’ has done a lot of damage to the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and the faith of many faithful servants of God. John Piper called it hateful and horrible here and The Gospel Coalition condemns it here. Joyce Meyer sometime ago confessed that she got it all ‘out of balance’.
My prayer is that the Nigerian Church will learn from the emptiness this strange gospel brings at the end of life and start preaching the correct Gospel. I once attended a meeting where a Pastor coerced the church leadership to start giving him tithe of tithe (10% of all the church’s tithes) even though his salaries and all his allowances are paid to him. Sitting around while the argument lasted, all I could hear is something like, “Our prosperity is tied to our giving to the man of God. We may suffer and attract God’s punishment if we do not abide by this ‘scriptural’ injunction.” He got what he wanted but that is because of the prevalence of this strange ‘prosperity gospel’. May God save us by bringing us to repentance before it is too late. God bless.
