The Purposes of Prosperity
Must money constantly corrupt the soul? Denying that this is the case, A.B. Simpson insisted, “Money cannot hurt you if you do not love it for its own sake. It is not your fortune that hurts you, but your clinging fondness for it.…” 1
If the attachment is too strong, it then becomes wrong.
The way money hooks the self-life is serious and sobering, a fact that is true even for those who don’t have money. According to George MacDonald:
… it is not the rich man only who is under the dominion of things. They, too, are slaves who, having no money, are unhappy from the lack of it … The money the one has, the money the other would have, is in each case the cause of an eternal stupidity. 2
The antidote to this problem is not casting doubt on the provisions the Lord wants to give, but focusing instead on the correct purpose for these provisions.
That God is a good God who wants to bless man is foundational to his promises of prosperity. But also foundational is the premise that God wants to bless man so man can bless man. Prosperity is given with purpose—and that purpose isn’t greed!
In his book, 31 Kings, A.B. Simpson identified God’s corrective to the problem of prosperity exciting greed by saying:
The true Christian conception of property is stewardship; the holding of the gifts of God for his service, and subject to his direction, and for his glory. This is the sovereign remedy for avarice and the grasping spirit of the world … we are never consecrated until all is laid, absolutely and forever, at his feet, and held there, subject constantly to his will. 3
In volume two in his Commentary on Christ, A.B. Simpson wrote, “Money will be a blessing if we hold it in trust; but it will sink us in the depths of ruin if we ever allow ourselves to own it or prize it.”4 In volume five from this commentary series Simpson then added these words:
The grace of Christ is able to sustain the heart in the highest as well as in the lowest place, to fill you with humble thankfulness for the prosperity that is but a trust for God, and to make you a faithful steward of the means and resources which he has bestowed upon you only that you might use them for him.5
The easily-gained lesson for us all is this: Those who steward prosperity in a godly way need not succumb to prosperity’s temptations, and should not be maligned for the prosperity desired and gained.6
Deuteronomy 8:18 says that the power to get wealth has been given to us in order to establish God’s covenant in the earth. Biblically understood, prosperity means money with a mission. Paymasters for the kingdom have to be raised up in your church and mine because the ministry that has God’s vision requires a lot of money.
This is why John Wesley wanted Christians to gain as much wealth as they could, and why even Tozer could sanction at least that idea.7 This motive is at the core of prosperity theology, and therefore shouldn’t be placed in the margins where it can be easily overlooked.
Andrew Murray said that money can be a great blessing for the spiritual life.
It may be an opportunity for showing that we can possess and lay it out for God, without withholding it or cleaving to it, and that by means of it we can manifest our generosity to the poor and our overflowing love for God’s cause. 8
Pascal said matter-of-factly, “I love riches because they afford me the means of helping the very poor.” So is there anything wrong about this sentiment? And if not, why do we attack prosperity with overkill aggression?
It may not be fair to say that those without money on their agenda don’t have ministry on their agenda. However, there is a line of logic not to be dismissed. Because if ministry is on our heart, then our interest in God’s promises about prosperity obviously makes sense.
Given the positive purposes of money, Gordon Fee’s assertion that “material possessions are irrelevant to the people of God”9 is impossible to defend. The financial provision needed to extend his kingdom is simply not a subject outside the purview of Scripture. Gaining insight from biblical economics is therefore a worthwhile undertaking.
Having a better vision for this, A.B. Simpson wrote:
What a sublime sight it will be for the Christian men whom God has so splendidly enriched to come to the leaders of our evangelistic movement and say, one by one, “I will give the gospel to Viet Nam,” “I will evangelize Cuba,” “I will send 100 missionaries to the Philippines,” until the whole world should be parceled out for God as the commercial and political ambitions of our age are parceling it out for their own selfish aggrandizement.10
Money for the nations, yes, but also money for our neighbors, particularly the poor among us.
The stress that comes to people who can’t pay their bills, who can’t provide for their children, who can’t give as the Lord wants them to give, hardly represents the abundant life Jesus came to give (John 10:10).
What such a predicament does illustrate is the proverb that says the destruction of the poor is in their poverty (Proverbs 10:15).
Having your utilities cut off because you can’t pay the bill, seeing your children hate school because of daily criticisms about their clothes, being forced out of your apartment because you’re behind on your rent, not knowing where to go as you round up your kids for another humiliating exit—all this brings heartaches too deep to describe and too painful to forget.
Such heartache robs people of their intended dignity and fiercely agitates against their peace. G.D. Watson, the nineteenth-century holiness preacher, said that “… debt weighs heavily on the mind of an honest person who intends to pay it. It saddens the heart, destroys cheerfulness, weakens courage, brings a certain sense of degradation.…”11
Quoting one of the preachers of his day to make this same point, A.B. Simpson wrote:
“What is heaven?” said one of our eccentric preachers. “I’ll tell you what heaven is. It’s out yonder in that little back street where a poor widow is weeping over her roofless children, and sitting on her boxes and furniture on the street. Go to her with a basket of groceries, a load of coal and a good-sized bank note for her unpaid rent and you will soon find out what heaven is.”12
At least, what a little bit of heaven is, just as that woman had already found out what a little bit of hell is.
One’s heart need not be that emotional, and one’s brain need not be that intellectual, to understand how cruel poverty can be. There is oppression in poverty! It is a curse!
Prosperity, rightly gained and rightly directed, helps alleviate that.
Notes:
1. A.B. Simpson, The Holy Spirit, Volume One, (Telfair, PA., Worthy Christian Library, chapter 3, paragraph 24.)
2. George MacDonald, The Best of George MacDonald, (Colorado Springs, Co., Cook Communication Ministries, 2006), p.47.
3. A.B. Simpson, 31 Kings, (Dixon, MO., Rare Books, n. d.), p.13.
4. A.B. Simpson, The Christ in the Bible Commentary, Volume Two (Camp Hill, PA., WingSpread Publishers, 2009), p.397.
5. A.B. Simpson, The Christ in the Bible Commentary, Volume Five (Camp Hill, PA., WingSpread Publishers, 2009), p.521.
6. Amy Carmichael, Learning of God, compiled by Stuart and Brenda Blanch, (Ft. Washington, PA., CLC Publications, 2000), p.96.
7. A.W. Tozer, Rut, Rot, or Revival, (Camp Hill, PA., Christian Publications, 1992), p.74.
8. Andrew Murray, An Exciting New Life, (Springdale, PA, Whitaker House, 1982), pp.232, 233.
9. Gordon D. Fee, The Disease of the Health and Wealth Gospels, (Vancouver, British Columbia, 2006), p.19.
10. A.B. Simpson, The Christ in the Bible Commentary, Volume Five, (Camp Hill, PA., WingSpread Publishers, 2009), p.337.
11. George. D. Watson, A Pot of Oil, (Hampton, TN., Harvey Christian Publishers, n. d.), p.2.
12. A.B. Simpson, Practical Christianity, (Camp Hill, PA., Christian Publications, 1996), p.40.
