Word of Faith Overview

"Word of Faith" is the name of a brand of Christian doctrine also known as the "Prosperity Gospel" or the "Health and Wealth Gospel." As one who has sat under that teaching for a season in my life, I feel that I can accurately summarize what it teaches without misrepresenting it. I've provided a quick summary of the doctrine below.

At the outset I want to say that this is not a criticism of those who are Word of Faith Christians themselves. Many of our dear Christian friends are Word of Faith and we deeply love them. Nor am I saying that they are not Believers, and I am not calling Word of Faith a heresy. I simply wish to outline the doctrine and let you decide as to its orthodoxy.

The basic tenants of Word of Faith are as follows:

1. It is God's will (His desire) that mankind be free from the curses caused by sin, e.g. sickness, poverty, despair, and various ills, in this present life.


2. Jesus Christ's death on the cross and His resurrection (His atonement) purchased the victory over sin and thus with it the victory over the above mentioned ills, too.


3. Salvation from our sins comes by faith in Christ. Likewise, salvation from sickness, poverty, and demonic oppression in this life also results from our faith.


4. God wants to give us these good things (health, prosperity, deliverance), but will not do so if we are disobedient (in sin) and/or if we don't have enough faith for them to come to pass.


5. Therefore, if we have anything bad happen in our lives, it is because we either are in sin or we don't have enough faith for it to happen.


6. God is powerless to do anything in our lives until those two criteria are met. In the meantime, Satan runs roughshod over Christians trying to keep them from meeting these criteria.

I hope you have picked up on some of the errors in the points above. Each point has some truth and some error in it. It is not my intention to go into great detail about them this in this blog, since entire books have been devoted to this issue. Rather, I just want to point out the logical conclusion of this theology in #5. This leaves many Word of Faith Christians disillusioned when they're doing everything they possibly can to love and obey God, and yet suffering still comes upon them. There is a great deal of condemnation associated with this teaching for anybody that doesn't "have it together."

I invite any discussion from my Word of Faith friends on the points above. Perhaps at some point I will devote blogs to each point in an effort to shine the Light of the Word on them and to bring Biblical balance to them.

Until next time,

ChadDA