We are launching this episode on Thanksgiving evening, so happy Thanksgiving. But you may be hearing this the day after Thanksgiving on Friday. In either case, we need to talk about giving gratitude to God for his abundant mercy to us in our lives and for his abundant promises to us.

And the next question on the docket comes from Michael in Massachusetts. "Dear Pastor John, you speak a lot against the prosperity gospel, which I appreciate. However, there are texts such as Psalm 3527 which state that the Lord has "pleasure in the prosperity of his servant." That's from the KJV.

When I try to encourage other believers, I will sometimes use verses like this one to show them that God has their best interest at heart, also like Romans 8 32 as well. Yet at times, I think they are hesitant to believe a verse like this because of our response to the heresy of the prosperity gospel.

How can we properly and faithfully to the truth of the gospel comfort other believers using prosperity texts like this one in Psalm 35 without then falling off the other side of the boat in light of a verse like Luke 12 15? What would you say, Pastor John, to Michael?" Well, I'm gonna get exactly at his question in Psalm 3527 in a minute, but let me start by saying in all my criticism of the so-called prosperity gospel, I don't wish for or pray for poverty on anyone.

I don't wish for or pray for sickness on anyone. I don't wish for or pray for persecution or calamity on anyone. No one, I think, should make it his aim to suffer from poverty or sickness or calamity or persecution. Those are not the goals of life, and we rejoice when people are delivered from them into Christ-exalting well-being or what the Bible calls shalom.

To be sure, we should be willing always to endure suffering or sickness or poverty for Christ. We should be ready to embrace it joyfully when God calls us to it as part of a larger vision. But Jesus makes it very clear, seek the kingdom of God first, the hallowing of God's name, the pursuit of God's saving rule, the doing of God's holy will, the pursuit of purity, the glorifying of God's name, the rescue of the perishing, and loving our neighbors ourselves.

These are the great, all-consuming goals of life. Whether we're rich or healthy or safe are secondary issues. Praying that God would give us our daily bread is subordinate, just our daily bread, let alone lots of bread, is subordinate to praying that his name would be hallowed and his kingdom would come.

And God may will that we hallow his name through poverty and sickness and persecution and death. He has done that often for his people. He'll decide that. We won't make that choice for ourselves. And our job is to trust him in all of his providences and rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.

So my issue with so-called prosperity gospel or teaching or churches is threefold, and I need to clarify this so that I can answer Michael's question about Psalm 35. One, the prosperity preaching tends to bring into this life greater expectation of prosperity than is intended for this life and only intended for the next life.

It means crystal clear that in the next life, in the age to come, there will be no sickness, no poverty, no persecution, no calamity, no evil, no discouragement of any kind. In other words, the gospel does include health, wealth, and prosperity. It's coming. Namely, in the age to come when we are so spiritually mature and perfected that we're suited to enjoy these things to the full with no hint of idolatry.

But prosperity preachers tend to bring this promise into the present in a way that is out of proportion with the way the New Testament describes the embattled position of the Christian in this fallen world. And it's it's not just prosperity preachers who make this mistake. I think it permeates most of the modern church.

As far as my limited eyes can see, most of us, us, love this world too much and live in a compromised situation that does not comport with the wartime situation in which we find ourselves with millions of people perishing eternally and millions suffering in this life. And most of us using our resources to make ourselves more comfortable rather than relieve temporal and eternal suffering.

So my first criticism of prosperity preaching cuts across most of Christianity, not just prosperity, preachers, and I don't elevate myself above that criticism. We all need great help and deliverance from the love of this world that John warns about in 1 John 2 15. My second problem with the prosperity churches is a lack of clear deep biblical teaching on the necessity of suffering in this life and the goodness of God in it and his control over it.

Not just Satan, God's control over it and the benefits that may come from it that God decides we don't. It's a missing note, it seems to me, that gives the legitimate promises of God's earthly help a superficial ring because through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom. That was Discipleship 101 in Acts 1422 as Paul taught the churches.

The New Testament is replete with the teaching that nothing can separate us from the love of Christ including tribulation, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, sword, even Paul says when we're being killed all day long in Romans 8 35. And right alongside those assurances that faithfulness will be accompanied by suffering are the promises of forgiveness and acceptance with God and peace and joy and hope that are worth 10,000 times more than physical prosperity and health and safety in this life, which leads me now to my third difficulty with prosperity teaching and my answer to Michael's question, finally, about Psalm 37.

All of this, everything I've said so far, I think tends to lead prosperity preachers to comfort people not with the presence of Christ in suffering and his rescue from suffering in the age to come but rather to comfort people with the assurance that they'll get out of suffering in this life if they follow the right prescription.

I was just in what I would call a Prosperity Light Church last Sunday in Florida and the first thing that happened in that service, and there were thousands of people in the room and it was the second service, and by the way, the sermon was good. I mean, I was helped by this sermon.

But the first thing that happened in that service was that the lead pastor stood up and made a case for tithing and that students shouldn't get into debt because then they can't tithe, and if they don't tithe, they're not going to experience God's blessing in their lives. And so the note struck from the beginning is that there's a strategy of getting God's material blessing in their lives, and that happens to be giving to this church enough to pay for this gigantic building, and I think that's really dangerous.

Now, I think God does very often regularly bless people who give sacrificially in ways they could never imagine because he delights in cheerful givers and he loves Christ-like generous hearts. But instead of attaching a sure material blessing to an act of tithing, I think we need to cultivate a love for Christ, for Christ, not his gifts, for Christ, that would tithe and double and triple and quadruple the tithe that God prospers even when the hoped-for physical blessing does not come, or even when there is no double and triple and quadruple tithes seemingly possible from a human standpoint.

Paul says because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ, he counts everything, everything as loss. So, this is what Paul praises, it seems to me, about the Macedonians, which are an unbelievably precious example of what I want to be, 2 Corinthians 8. In a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part.

This is the joy that we should emphasize, the joy that flows from saving grace in spite of affliction, in spite of poverty. So Michael asks, "How can we help people feel that God has their best interest at heart?" Or to use the words of Psalm 35, 27, "How can we help people believe and enjoy the truth?

Great is the Lord who delights in the welfare of his servant, all of his welfare." And surely the answer is—this is my answer, really, to Michael's question—surely the answer is walk with people through Romans chapter 8, memorizing it together because there is no greater chapter to prove that God is for us, 100% for us, not 99%, and not against us, and no greater chapter to show that when he gave Christ for us, it was not to remove suffering in this life, but to assure us with unshakable joy and hope that in all our pain and in all our sorrow and frustration and disappointment, nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ.

So my short answer to Michael is let Romans 8, perhaps the greatest chapter in the Bible, put Christian gladness and Christian groaning in their painful and precious relationship in this age. That's a wonderful perspective. Thank you, Pastor John, and thank you listeners for your attentiveness. We deeply appreciate your financial support and your prayers for us and for your questions that you send in to us and for the way you strategically use our episodes to share with friends and family, and we appreciate the fact that you listen every week.

There is so much for us, for Pastor John and I, to be thankful for in just how he has connected our lives through this little podcast. So thank you. I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving day, and we are gonna return on Monday. Until then, for more details or to catch up on old episodes or to subscribe to the audio feed and find new episodes as we release them, go to our online home at DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.

I am your host Tony Reinke, thanking you once again, and we will see you on Monday. *Music* *Music* *Music*