Prosperity Preaching Is Not Christian (Osteen)

DFW Catholic ^ | 11.5.2014 | Vincent Ryan Ruggiero

[daniel1212]

Kind of a sweeping generalization for the vast majority of Christians over the past 2,000 years, isn't it?

As was

Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: (Matthew 7:13)

"Many" sadly includes vast majority of RCs (and plenty of so-called Prots), from popes to the latest proabortion, prosodomote promuslim RC pols whom she also treats as members in life and in death.

[cva66snipe]

All Christ Disciples whom He choose at the beginning of his ministry are believed to have died a violent death except for John who was exiled. Paul as well paid with his life. Adversity we will have and endure because it is the Masters tempering tool the fire to harden steel to temper and to form and shape us to His will and glory if we allow Him to do so.

Will The Lord abandon us? No, He is there with us. Different persons have different purposes in GOD's plan for man. One may seem to have an untouched life as far as misfortunes go and be evil or good, another may try their utmost to walk in GOD's Word and endure hardships for reasons we likely are not to know or understand in this lifetime. To borrow a phrase from a songwriter Joe South "I beg your pardon I never promised you a Rose Garden." Christ told His followers they would be mocked, rebuked, stoned, cursed, shunned, and killed in some cases even by persons thinking they were doing GOD's Will.

Do miracles happen? Yes, I strongly believe they do. Some will & some won't. Does that mean because they don't GOD loves someone less? No, The Bible doesn't say that. Paul asked for a healing {either spiritual or physical} that was denied him. He was told "My Grace is sufficient for today".

Adversity has created some very successful Ministries such as Joni Tada who was injured in a swimming accident at about age 16. Today she is 64 years old IIRC and overcame a second serious health challenge recently with advanced Breast Cancer. Would he ministry to the severely disabled have been formed had she not been injured? She is a full quadriplegic. Likely not. In our weaknesses God's Grace and Strength works the strongest.

The typical generic response to the prosperity preachers when riches or healing doesn't come it is the believers fault due to lack of faith. That is very wrong. It's no ones fault. It can be events occurring in the normal course of life but GOD can work through us in our adversity and weaknesses if we submit. It may still be a rough row to hoe so to speak but just as The Lord was in the fiery furnace, if we call on Him and allow Him he is with us right beside us in our trials and tribulations we may not understand the whys or how comes of.

The prosperity teachings promote greed. It's taken down many a preacher as well that teach it because they end up living beyond their ministries means. It doesn't have to be a televangelist. I know a man who had a local church it happened to. It was to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars taken and his lifestyle was one of riches. He was a blue collar worker and a preacher. The money taken was not a contracted agreement reached with deacons or elders either.

[metmom]

Or, perhaps Joel is intentionally or accidentally in error, through deception or semantics, when he claims “you have power in you greater than any power that can come against you”, for this is not inanimate power, rather, it is the Spirit of Christ, who is the way, the truth and the life! Amen!

Problem is that Osteen doesn't specify and so although Christians know and understand what he is talking about, non-Christians don't and are led astray.

While he's not outright lying, he's not telling the full truth and that IS deception, therefore from the enemy.

[metmom]

The bible doesn't mention biblical inerrancy either.

The Bible tells us that all Scripture is God breathed, inspired as the Holy Spirit led men to write.

It's a given that it's inerrant and infallible.

Unless you need something besides God's word on it.

However, Jesus tells us that God's word is truth. That in itself says it's inerrant.

[BykrBayb]

You are certainly violating prosperity theology?

[metmom]

Then the new Protestant religions break up into hundreds of other Protestant religions until most are so watered down as to become mere shadows of the one true Christian religion (Catholicism) that they all cloned off of. And of course one man’s sola scriptura (interpretation of God’s word in the bible) is different from the next sect’s interpretation of the bible, until you have thousands of interpretations of a bible that wasn’t even initially (for 1500 years) yours.

Where is the Roman Catholic commentary on the Bible that gives a verse by verse interpretation of the entire Bible so that there's unity in what Catholics believe?

You are aware, aren't you, that the EO don't acknowledge the authority of the pope among other things?

And that there are many Catholic rites. Lots of different interpretations of something.......

[metmom]

The religion I follow isn’t a clone of Catholicism. It’s based on the Bible (with a capital B).

The church I attend isn't like Catholicism either. It's no clone of it.

I follow a Savior, not a church or religion.

Interesting isn't it, how many Catholics type the word Bible with a small *b*?

Very telling about their attitude towards the word of God itself and especially considering they claim the RCC wrote the Bible.

[metmom]

AMEN.

Money doesn’t and can’t buy what I need from Him the most and it isn’t just health issues.

[BykrBayb]

Also telling, is when people who refuse to capitalize Bible, will actually capitalize the titles of lesser books.

[Elsie]

not many. I have theses stored.

[Elsie]

Yet
Another
Catholic
Versus
Protestant
Thread

[Elsie]

Refuse?

Bible is merely the word BOOK in Greek.

[Poison Pill]

it's inerrant and infallible.

God's word is truth. That in itself says it's inerrant.

How did Judas Iscariot die?

[Mrs. Don-o]

"After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands..."
Revelation 7:9

Based on Biblical history and a Biblical insight into the divine nature and character, I find it's dubious to assume that the Our Lord would let nigh unto 100% of His Church go disastrously astray for, say, 1500-2000 years.

Not if the Church is the Body of Christ and we are His members.

Not if Our Lord is the Good Shepherd who would leave 99 sheep on the hillside in order to seek and search for even one which was lost.

Thank you, Lord, for that Church of yours revealed in Revelation, a great multitude of every race, tongue and nation, so great that no man could number it.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Actually, it's in there. Quoting from the relevant Free Republic page:

"Other Christian: 7th Day Adventist, Churches of God, Messianic Christians, Unitarian, LDS, etc."

I guess we did skip Hazel Motes' Holy Church of Christ Without Christ, "where the blind don't see and the lame don't walk and what's dead stays that way". Apologies all around! :o)

[Mrs. Don-o]

"After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands..."

Based on Biblical history and a Biblical insight into the divine nature and character, I find it's dubious to assume that the Our Lord would let 100% of His Church go disastrously astray for, say, 1500-2000 years.

Not if the Church is the Body of Christ and we are His members.

Not if Our Lord is the Good Shepherd who would leave 99 sheep on the hillside in order to seek and search for even one which was lost.

Thank you, Lord, for that Church of yours revealed in Revelation, a great multitude of every race, tongue and nation, so great that no man could number it.

[daniel1212]

Based on Biblical history and a Biblical insight into the divine nature and character, I find it's dubious to assume that the Our Lord would let 100% of His Church go disastrously astray for, say, 1500-2000 years.

Which recourse to a straw man is typical, but i never said that 100% of His Church went disastrously astray for 1500-2000 years, as in fact that would be impossible in the light of what i said.

Not if the Church is the Body of Christ and we are His members.

Indeed, and as said, it is " the body of Christ which overcomes and continues, by God's grace and to His glory. Amen.

But that the leadership of the visible church can come to the point where there is almost an entire abandonment of equity in ecclesiastical judgments; of discipline in morals, of reverence in divine things, and thus true religion was almost extinct, leading multitudes astray, and that the true Church had to be sought outside the then-visible institution, which required reformation, cannot be denied.

Even if some RCs imagine otherwise, as they do that a perpetual assuredly infallible magisterium is essential for discernment and establishment of Truth, and of what is of God, and that common people cannot be correct in disagreeing with the historical stewards of Scripture. .

[Springfield Reformer]

Presumably, since you appear to be mounting an attack on Biblical inerrancy, you suppose there is a contradiction between these two accounts:

Matthew 27:4-5  Saying, I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said, What is that to us? see thou to that.  (5)  And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself.

Versus:

Acts 1:16-19  Men and brethren, this scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which was guide to them that took Jesus.  (17)  For he was numbered with us, and had obtained part of this ministry.  (18)  Now this man purchased a field with the reward of iniquity; and falling headlong, he burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out.  (19)  And it was known unto all the dwellers at Jerusalem; insomuch as that field is called in their proper tongue, Aceldama, that is to say, The field of blood.

Your problem is that these two passages are rather easily reconciled, and not only so, but there are a number of theories by which to do it.  The most typical is that Matthew describes the proximate cause of the death.  But for the fact of hanging himself, he would not have died at that time.  Whereas Peter in Acts is describing the same event in it's more notorious aftermath.  The scenario would have played out like this:  Judas finds a tree near a cliff, throws a rope over a branch, secures it, then ties the other end around his neck, and jumps off.  This is an amateur job, and so any number of outcomes are possible.  Did the rope hold? Maybe the knot slipped and he fell onto some sharp rocks below.  Or possibly the rope and the knot held, and he hanged there dead for days, dangling in the sun, during which time his body would have swollen, his skin integrity lessened until he finally came apart and hit the ground, bursting open like an easily ruptured water balloon.  

As an attorney, I have to take and assimilate testimony that sometimes seems to contradict, but is actually just the natural byproduct of the different perspectives and histories of the witnesses. Indeed, what actually makes an attorney wonder whether he's being lied to is when the stories line up too perfectly.  That just doesn't happen with what I call natural truth.  Everybody leaves their own personal fingerprint on the stories they tell, no matter how objectively true they are.

BTW, another interesting theory is linguistic, that the Greek behind the expression "hanged himself" can, albeit rarely, be a reference to extreme grief, a sorrow so deep it leaves one "choked up," as it were.  If this were true, then we could even say Matthew does not describe Judas' death at all, but his emotional reaction to his own sense of guilt.

But whichever theory seems best, the posit of an unequivocal contradiction is destroyed, as there are multiple possible ways to reconcile the data in a manner consistent with the premise that any God-breathed writing is assuredly accurate, else we accuse God of being unable to deliver His own perfect word through imperfect people, thus undermining any confidence we might have in His message to His people.  But we need not listen to the serpent asking "hath God said," but may with confidence proclaim His word as "thus saith the Lord."

Peace,

SR

[Poison Pill]

there are multiple possible ways to reconcile the data in a manner consistent with the premise that any God-breathed writing is assuredly accurate, else we accuse God of being unable to deliver His own perfect word through imperfect people

Multiple versions. I see. But Judas did die right? That part isn't in error, is it?

[LearsFool]

Based on Biblical history and a Biblical insight into the divine nature and character, I find it's dubious to assume that the Our Lord would let nigh unto 100% of His Church go disastrously astray for, say, 1500-2000 years.

Oh, nobody would disagree with you there. As has already been pointed out to you, you've erected a straw man to do battle against.

No, Jesus has always preserved His church - and always will - even against the powerful assaults of Catholicism. There have no doubt always been disciples faithful to Him, despite being outnumbered.

"If ye abide in my word, then are ye truly my disciples" - John 8:31