Author: Daniel Bourdanné

Date: 02.09.2010

Editor’s Note: This Cape Town 2010 Advance Paper has been written by Daniel Bourdanné as an overview of the topic to be discussed at the Multiplex session on “Poverty, Prosperity and the Gospel.” Responses to this paper through the Lausanne Global Conversation will be fed back to the author and others to help shape their final presentations at the Congress.(1)

The Gospel of prosperity and miraculous healing is doing well because it glitters. Right across the globe from the USA to Asia, from Latin America and Africa, promises of material wealth and health attract people. When facing the reality of a difficult existence, material poverty and hopelessness, who can remain indifferent to the attraction of prosperity, healing and personal well-being through faith? And indeed in some contexts, despairing people without hope have had their lives changed, because the Prosperity movement has given them practical reasons to see life differently by believing in themselves. This means that this “gospel” can produce positive results and should not be brushed off lightly.

However, the popular success of this theology should not make us forget that all that glitters is not gold. Because the end does not justify the means. Whatever the apparent success of this theology, we must examine it in the light of Scripture. We need to do this just like the Berean Christians did when “they studied the Scriptures to see if everything was correct” (Acts 17:11).

This is no easy task, because the Prosperity movement has no exact, systematic theological doctrine, and has no structured, logical system on which to build a chronological critique. This is popular, crowd theology that is taught in fiery sermons. Even the writings of those who teach it have this oral, emotional, crowd-pulling character. Internet also plays an important role in making it popular. However, I will attempt to examine some important theological points that emerge from the writings and preaching of some of the main protagonists of the Prosperity movement.

The view of human beings

According to Prosperity movement theology, humans have a spiritual nature that is like God’s. So they believe that Christians can order things to happen, just like God does. For them, “humans are spiritual beings that have a soul housed in a body.” What they mean by this is that “the real interior self” is divine. So according to this theology, the difference between humans and God is not one of kind but of degree, and we are in fact “little gods”. According to Hagin “… we live in a body, but we are spiritual beings”. Idahosa from Nigeria understands the image of God in humans as “the little life that is part of Life itself: God”. The notion of the image of God is interpreted not analogically, but as directly equivalent. The image of God in Adam is a part of God himself, the part of the substance of God implanted in Adam at the time of creation. It follows that when Adam fell, the supernatural part of him died. God’s solution for us as believers is that this “dead spirit” becomes a “living spirit” once again. If we are spiritual beings, according to Hagin, our spirit is either “God’s nature or Satan’s nature”. Hagin writes: “Adam gave Satan what God had given him; as a result Satan has legal dominion over humans and creation. Now, since the fall humanity has Satan’s nature of death.” It is obvious that this theology is a sort of pantheism.

In his book Connais ta position en Christ, (Know your position in Christ) published in 1998, George Amoako, pastor of a church in Abidjan in Côte d’Ivoire, writes this about God’s dialogue with Moses in Exodus 4: “The prophetic lesson that God wants to get across to Moses is that after the Fall, authority changed hands. The divine authority given to humanity at creation left their hands and arrived in the hands of the devil (the serpent), but in Jesus Christ, this authority has been restored to its rightful owner.”

So what is salvation, then? According to Hagin, God needed to make a deal with Satan to regain the world for himself. He had to pay the ransom through Christ. This is the means by which the Christian can take on God’s nature once again. So conversion restores the godly nature that humans lost. By sanctification we develop awareness of being a child of God, and know our position and our rights in Christ. Amoako writes: “This book has been written to bring revelation knowledge and prophetic knowledge to God’s children so that they can be aware of their true position and their rights in Christ.”

According to Hagin, “since receiving eternal life means having God’s nature in us”, so “spiritual death means having Satan’s nature.”

Is this approach Biblical?

According to Scripture, humans are not a divine spirit living in a physical body. Nowhere in the Bible are humans ever described in these terms. In the Bible, humans are an inseparable body-soul-spirit entity (1 Thes 5:23). There is no contradiction between body and spirit. The body made of dust is not the human being, and neither is the spirit breathed into that body. It is the combination of these things that makes a human “a living being” (Gen 2:7). Humans are dust and breath, body and spirit.

The idea that humans became creatures of Satan after the Fall is found nowhere in the Bible either. The biblical writers never attribute to Satan any power to create. God alone is Creator, and Satan has no power to create.

Was God’s image in humans destroyed at the Fall? No! It was distorted. Distortion is not destruction. A distorted thing is not nothingness. A thing that is distorted is more like a warped arrow that misses its target. And that is exactly what sinning means, missing the target. Even after the Fall, humans remain moral beings, unlike animals and demons. Fallen humans are not demons, even if they can be inhabited by demons. They still have the image of God within them. They remain images of God, even if they are imperfect, distorted images compared with what they should be. Created by God to love without self-interest, humans remain loving beings; but separation from God by sin makes them love out of self-interest. Created to glorify God through their lives, their capacity for glorification is channelled elsewhere: they glorify themselves. They miss the target.

Hagin and others develop a conception of humans that makes them little gods. And this raises important theological, philosophical and ethical questions. If humankind was divine before creation, how could the Fall have been possible? Perhaps because of the body, some may answer. But the body is not the only part that died after the Fall. Prosperity movement theorists themselves talk of “the death of the spirit”. But how can a divine spirit die? According to the Bible, spiritual death is an alienation of humans created in God’s image, although being in his image does not mean that humans are deified. Humans are created in God’s image, which means that their personality reflects God’s personality analogically and not in a directly equivalent way. Humans and God do not have the same nature ontologically speaking. Humans do not have the same attributes as God. Whereas God can create from nothing, humans cannot. God is infinite, humans are finite beings. It was because humans were already influenced by their emotions before the Fall that they gave way to their emotions and fell.

Humans are neither God nor Satan. They are humans, with either a “new nature” or the “old nature”. Even salvation in Jesus Christ does not deify them. They remain saved creatures. Special creatures, certainly, but not deified creatures.

Is Jesus a “righteous” sacrifice offered to Satan by God, as these people say? According to Hagin, Jesus needed to die “spiritually” and physically to save humans from their “Satanic nature” after the Fall. The “Satanic creation of Jesus” needed to go through torment in hell to pay a just ransom to Satan. It was in hell that “Jesus was born again”. It is because he was born again in hell that he triumphed over Satan. Christ identified with us “legally”, because his suffering in hell brought about God’s justice for Satan. In the same way, all believers must identify “vitally” with Christ by taking redemption on themselves through faith.

This non-Biblical theology introduces the need for a double death of Christ. It concludes logically that Christ’s physical death is not sufficient for salvation. According to them, Jesus suffered a double death, both physical and spiritual, on the cross. This theology justifies these doctrines based on an interpretation of a passage in Isaiah 53:8-10. After his physical death on the cross, the devil took him to hell. And there he suffered spiritual death.

The Bible nowhere supports or suggests the idea of a new birth for Jesus in hell. Jesus did not die spiritually in hell. Neither does he have a satanic nature, as their doctrine claims. Quite the contrary, Jesus suffered in his flesh (1 Peter 4:1). It is in his body that he bore our sins on the cross (1 Peter 2:24). The notion of blood can be found throughout the Bible. There are so many elements referring to physical sacrifice that are well established in the Scriptures: the blood on the doorposts, the blood of the lamb, the blood of purification, etc. The Epistle to the Hebrews declares outright: “Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.” (Heb 2:14-15)

So it was on the cross that Jesus defeated the devil, not when he descended into hell. It is his precious blood that saves us. The physical death of Jesus is completely sufficient to save humankind. The Bible nowhere states that Christ was sacrificed to pay a just debt of any kind to the devil. Jesus’ death is not the price to pay to Satan! In the Bible, Jesus’ death is a sacrifice to God. It is not a sacrifice in a legal sense, that is, a repayment or a ransom. In the Scriptures, it is a sacrifice of love to a righteous and holy God to “satisfy his righteousness and holiness”. Paul writes to the Ephesians: “Live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God” (Eph 5:2). Christ gave himself as a ransom to God, not to Satan (1 Tim 2:5-6). God would be unjust if he paid any dues to Satan. This is because although Satan dominates, his authority is usurped. That which is usurped is illegal. Therefore, it would be unjust to pay a ransom to recover an illegal authority. In the context of his superior power, Almighty God could never pay a ransom, because a ransom is paid to recover conquered land when the payer is in a position of weakness, or at best when the forces are equal. Therefore paying a ransom to Satan would mean recognising God’s weakness or that God and Satan were equally powerful. God owes absolutely nothing to Satan. There is no arrangement between God and Satan about the salvation of humans. The initiative for saving mankind is divine and not satanic. Salvation was brought about by substitution. This idea is found throughout Scripture. In the Old Testament, an animal is used for the substitution. The animal must be without fault (Lev 4:3, 23). John calls Jesus “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” By his sinless life, Jesus is like the lamb offered to God as a fragrant offering. And this sacrifice appeases God’s wrath.

Positive confession and faith

Is faith a formula that operates automatically when we use it? Hagin says it is. According to him and his followers, “the law of faith” is a universal principle that applies to everyone, believers and non-believers alike. It is an impersonal law like the law of gravity and other natural laws. Hagin writes: “Then the Lord Jesus Himself appeared to me [and said] … if anybody, anywhere will take these four steps or put these four principles into operation, he will always receive whatever he wants from Me or from God the Father.” No matter what your relationship is with Christ, apply the law of faith and you will have the results. It is a formula into which “everyone can put everything they want: health, a new job, a house, a car, everything you want”!

According to supporters of the Prosperity movement, faith is essential to God and his action. God is presented as a being of faith. “The word that brings forth and upholds creation is an act of faith.” When people discover the spiritual laws established by God that cause the universe to function, they can make them function for their own purposes.

Where do we place God’s sovereignty and his will in this approach? God is not an infinite spiritual force or an infinite cosmic force that governs the world. God is a personal God who rules by his presence, his power and his will. God does not need to be subject to the principles of laws. He is not impersonal. He is not a predetermined God, not even by his own nature.

The attitude of humans that consists of demanding their rights, giving orders to God, trying to domesticate him by so-called spiritual formulas and techniques is, in my opinion, contrary to Biblical thought.

The claims of the Prosperity movement fall subtly into the trap of deism. In Scripture, faith, before being an action, is above all a relationship of trust in a sovereign and personal God. This God is present and acts, which implies that a created being cannot manipulate him.

It is easy to see that the principle of Hagin and his followers is close to traditional African rites, which insist on the right formula or gesture. Anyone working with African churches in which the Prosperity Gospel is preached will note the importance of ritual in prayers. A handkerchief is given in order to pass on apostolic authority, and candles, salt and other objects are used. Certain prayers have special rituals attached, for example placing a hand on the part of the body that hurts, complying with certain prohibitions, fasting etc. The leaders of this movement prescribe things similar to animistic rites. For example, people asking for blessings for the New Year are told “Now place your hands on this page and on your neck and sing this hymn which says: “Jesus has conquered the world and has given us the victory, victory, victory, alleluia.” When you’ve finished singing the hymn, shout ‘Amen’ seven times to the glory of God who has lifted you up. Look at your right hand. Put it behind you. As you do it, say with me “Holy Spirit, I’ve received my miracle”. Now bring your hand back in front of you as if you’re ready to run forwards… I command God’s blessings on you in 1992 and after, in the name of Jesus. It is yours.” (The Christian Mirror, p. 53)

More…http://conversation.lausanne.org/en/conversations/detail/10832#article_page_4