There is a wide range of opinions and emotions within the Christian community when it comes to blessing, prosperity and poverty.
Interpretations of various verses in the Bible as well as analyzing the words of Jesus and how He lived His life has failed to bring about a consensus on how Christians should view money and wealth.
On a recent episode of Boardroom Chat, televangelist Jesse Duplantis, alongside his wife Cathy, addressed the issue of poverty and the absence of prosperity in one’s life, calling it a “curse” and the result of disobedience.
“Most people’s troubles come because people disobey. That is just simply the truth. Wars, rumors of wars, people always mad about somebody,” he said. “It’s usually someone who has enough power to change ‘people’s thinking,'” Duplantis claims.
“I call it, especially in the church, I call it ‘Christian propaganda.’ You know, that poverty is a ‘blessing.’ That’s a lie. Poverty is a curse,” he adds.
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He points to examples such as heaven and the life of Jesus, asking where one would find poverty in such places, and that such an endeavor would be fruitless.
“It’s [poverty] not in heaven. None whatsoever. ‘Jesus was poor.’ When was He poor? Did you ever hear Him say, ‘I can’t eat today cuz I don’t have anything. Uh-uh, no,” Duplantis says.
A lot has been said over the years about the wealth accumulated by Duplantis and his ministry, with a large focus on the $54 million dollar jet he bought in 2018 and his 40,000 sq. foot mansion.
And he doesn’t care what people have to say about it.
“Let me give you a prime example why I don’t care what people think about me. About what I have,” says Duplantis. “Now…I am a very blessed man. Me and Kathy are very blessed. I’m spiritually, physically and financially [blessed]. I’ve had more people criticize me over that jet, they still can’t get over it. Criticize me over my house. They didn’t pay for it, I paid for it.”
Duplantis then reads Psalm 49:16 (KJV) to prove his point: “Be not thou afraid when one is made rich, when the glory of his house is in increased.”
But when Cathy reads it from the Amplified version, at Jesse’s request, it gives a much different context than what was originally stated:
“Be not afraid when [an ungodly] man becomes rich, When the wealth and glory of his house are increased.”
The following verses actually detail how these ungodly men will not be able to take their wealth with them into the afterlife.
“See, God don’t care if someone’s ungodly to be rich or godly to be rich. It doesn’t make any difference whatsoever at all,” Duplantis replies.
Jesus, and the Bible as a whole, constantly states that what is most important is what is in a person’s heart, and to guard against the love of anything above one’s love of God.
Our Lord and Savior says it better than any of us can in Matthew 6:24: “No one can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.”
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James Lasher is Staff Writer for Charisma Media
