By: Derrick P. Rodgers
4/20/2016

Either Christian leaders will defend the biblical gospel, or they will find themselves defending and promoting another gospel. There is no spiritual bipartisanship when it comes to the defense of the gospel. The lack of courage to stand firm in the defense of the gospel has led many to support another gospel, which gives way to a plethora of strange fires.

Today’s popular “Gospel of Empowerment (selfish ambition)” and the prosperity movement have indeed established repugnant influence within the church. As a result of this influence, a bizarre increase and rise in the defense of false prophets, false doctrine and false patterns of ministry have surfaced among us. This is due in part to the virtual uncontested blatant falseness, exported from such movements.

The prosperity movement has literally altered a segment of the church consciousness causing many to become tone deaf to sound biblical doctrine, in particular, preachers. The messages and calculations of too many preachers are produced with the lingering thought of, “will my message produce finances or will my message have an adverse impact on finances.”

Nonetheless, it is the responsibility of the true and faithful servants to remain committed to the defense of the gospel and not be lured into following popular politically correct smokescreens that lead to outer darkness. My prayer is that we return to the authenticity of serving God out of pure HolySpirit conviction minus all the prosperity and empowerment trappings.
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Some indeed preach Christ from envy and rivalry, but others from good will. The latter do it out of love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel. The former proclaim Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely but thinking to afflict me in my imprisonment. [Philippians 1:15-17]