Oral Roberts and God’s ‘Threat’

Oral Roberts’ latest scam to raise money is just the latest in a centuries-old tradition of trying to make money by preaching the Gospel.

What amazes me is that people still get away with it. When Simon the sorcerer tried it in Biblical times, the apostle cursed him by saying, “May your money perish with you.” Indeed, such activity sparked the Protestant Reformation when Johann Tetzel exceeded his papal commission by implying that people could buy forgiveness of sins.

I suppose the reason it still works today is that these so-called Christians invoke the name of God and imply that we’ll get in trouble if we don’t cough up the cash.

What they so conveniently forget is that Jesus never asked for so much as a denarius when he was here upon the earth. Although Paul the apostle defended the principle that preachers should get paid, he said he’d refuse everything if that ever got in the way of preaching the truth.

The excuse that these charlatans use is that they use the money for good purposes, especially for the proclamation of the Gospel. But with all the appeals for money, how much of the Gospel gets through? In fact, most of these “evangelists” are, as studies have shown, not reaching unbelievers, but rather people who are already members of churches.

The only way that these people will ever stop abusing the viewing public is when their viewers wake up and start sending their money to those who really do preach the Gospel, and don’t ask for money. Such programs do exist, for example the Lutheran Hour and the Back to God Hour, and they really do what the Bible told Christians to do--preach the Gospel without cost.

STEVE LARSON

Pastor

Beverly Orthodox

Presbyterian Church

Los Angeles