In 1987, when Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker's empire was hitting the skids, the mother of my son's daycare provider emptied her family's savings and sent it all to help out the Bakkers. I think this is called a "seed."
Since all her husband's retirement money was included in the donation, you could say this created a little family strife.
Bakker later renounced his prosperity gospel teachings, and admitted he was in prison for his financial misdeeds before he'd read the Bible completely through:
The more I studied the Bible, however, I had to admit that the prosperity message did not line up with the tenor of Scripture. My heart was crushed to think that I led so many people astray. I was appalled that I could have been so wrong, and I was deeply grateful that God had not struck me dead as a false prophet!
I draw my own conclusions about why Bakker and his old prosperity gospel cohorts still walk the earth. But if you buy that smiting false prophets is part of God's job description, then you have to conclude He's a terrible shot.
He keeps hitting the people who follow those guys.
There's a new, very long comment on a recent post about the reptilian Kenneth Copeland. It comes from a woman whose family was featured in a news report about the Copeland ministry's promise of healing through faith. When I first saw that story last March, I thought of the family I knew 20 years ago. It appears both have been run through a financial wringer because of their faith.
They send in their money in hope of blessing and healing, while the real beneficiaries don't even bother to pray all the way to the bank.
But the anger some of these people feel is not related to money. It's over the abuse of their belief.
I've been in contact with a former employee of the Copeland organization who says the Copelands "have their own personal elevator which takes them from their personal garage up to their offices so they never have to been seen by their employees or the general public."
The disconnect between the evangelistic entrepreneur and the faithful also exists on a more profound level. On the one hand, the church doesn't have to provide workers comp for employees, and it preaches the healing power of prayer. Yet:
Healing and Prosperity wasn’t practiced or operating much among the employees. Four employees died within a year and three of them died of cancer. While there is “prayer” spoken for healing, I rarely saw that manifested. Ministry employees go to the doctor, have surgeries, and take medications (prescription and non prescription) just like people on the outside of the ministry.
As for employees walking in the Prosperity that the Copelands walk in….a good number of them either have second jobs or businesses on the side in order to make ends meet. KC always preaches that your job is your seed, not for paying bills and living on, but he doesn’t have to worry about paying bills because they are all paid for by someone else. It’s sobering in light of KC being a self-proclaimed Billionaire.
Millionaires strutting past minions who process appeals from people going down the tubes as they send in their last dollars. And we wonder why the country runs on charisma, godliness and bullshit.
