When the prosperity gospel meets purity culture

Last updated on: August 8, 2023 at 11:17 pm by Olapeju Simoyan, MD, MPH

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When the prosperity gospel meets purity culture 2023-08-08T23:17:19-04:00 Olapeju Simoyan, MD, MPH

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It’s been a long time since I attended churches where the prosperity gospel is preached, but I still hear about their messages and even occasionally see their videos.

Do the terms ‘seedtime’ and ‘harvest’ have anything to do with $1000 ‘seeds’?

Over the past few years, videos of a preacher sharing her message of prosperity have been circulating. (Yes, in this case it actually is a woman!) In one video, she tells listeners that she has been so blessed, and that if they want to be blessed like she is, they should give a “seed” of $1000. Like many other prosperity preachers, she warns people that they can’t be financially prosperous if they don’t give. She quotes Genesis 8:22 to support her claims. Let’s take a look at what that verse actually says.

“While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.”

Genesis 8: 22 (KJV)

Taking this passage in context, it has nothing to do with giving money in church. It is part of the conversation recorded between God and Noah after the flood, in which God promises never to destroy the world with a flood again. This is a classic example of taking Bible verses out of their proper context and applying meanings that were never intended. As problematic as this is, it gets worse. This preacher went on to say that people should give if they want to be blessed like she is. One of her stated blessings is that she has three grown children, and they (male and female) were all virgins when they got married. She went on to challenge her listeners to give $1000 if they wanted to ensure that their children didn’t lose their virginity before marriage. There are several other videos that show her asking people to give various amounts of money, but we’ll focus on this one.

First of all, there is no reason to think that because you gave an offering in church, you are guaranteed anything, much less the virginity of your adult children.

Secondly, her message implies that you can buy answers to prayers…. “Just give enough money and your prayers will get answered”. Once again, this is misleading.

Parents aren’t responsible for their adult children’s behavior

The other issue is that the preacher in question seemed confident in the claim that her children were virgins when they got married, which makes one wonder how she could be so sure. I am reminded of a conversation with my mother after we heard that one of my friends was pregnant. She hadn’t been married for that long and someone commented on how she got pregnant so soon after her wedding. My mother casually suggested that my friend may have been pregnant when she got married. I insisted that she wasn’t pregnant at her wedding, to which my mother responded, “You think everyone is like you?”

I also remember being told a story about a young lady that was so close to her father, that she told him everything, or so he thought. When she ended up getting pregnant before her wedding, her father’s response was something like: “When did that happen? How come you didn’t tell me?”

I share these stories to make the point that it is presumptuous to assume we know what people do when they are behind closed doors, and the same applies to the prosperity preacher who was asking for donations. However, the larger and more concerning issue is that she was giving the impression that people can literally buy answers to their prayers.

You can’t buy blessings from God

At the end of the day, so many people have been convinced that they can somehow buy blessings from God. What they don’t seem to realize is that they are not giving to God anyway. God doesn’t need money and he doesn’t make giving a condition for answered prayers. Despite what the prosperity preachers claim, this type of giving is not faith-based, it is transactional. Giving a large sum of money to a church or pastor does not guarantee you anything, but it just might make your pastor richer.

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About Olapeju Simoyan, MD, MPH

Dr. Olapeju Simoyan is a physician, board certified in family medicine and addiction medicine, with a special interest in the connections between faith and health. She strongly believes that faith and critical thinking are not mutually exclusive. As a female physician, Dr. Simoyan is also interested in women's issues and writes about religious abuse and trauma, with a focus on how misinterpretations of biblical texts have led to the perpetration of abuse within church settings. She has combined her writing and photography in several books, including Living Foolproof, a devotional based on reflections from the book of Proverbs. You can check out her author page on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Olapeju-Simoyan/author/B0BP7RSYBL You can read more about the author here.

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