Adeboye: Why they don’t want us to preach prosperity gospel, be rich

By Kazeem Ugbodaga

The General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Pastor Enoch Adeboye, has said that poverty is not the divine plan for believers, stressing that God made a great sacrifice to ensure His children prosper.

Speaking during his sermon at the RCCG 73rd Annual Convention at the church’s camp ground in Shimawa, Ogun State, Pastor Adeboye dismissed criticism that he was promoting prosperity preaching, insisting he remained first and foremost “a holiness preacher.”

“I know there are some people who have been waiting for that so that they can have something to criticise,” he said.

He said: “That is alright. Everybody knows I am not a prosperity preacher; I am a holiness preacher. But do you know that the one who owns the earth and the fulness thereof, the one who says silver is mine, gold is mine, paid a terrible price so that we will not be poor?”

Quoting the Bible, he added: “Second Corinthians 8:9 says you will know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich.”

Adeboye accused the devil of being opposed to the prosperity of believers.

“The devil does not want you to prosper. They begin to talk about getting rich, they tell you that you are in Jesus because you want to make money. Do you wonder that when a sinner makes it big, nobody talks? The day they see you as a child of God prospering, all hell breaks loose. They don’t want you to be rich.”

According to him, the motive is clear: “They know that if you become rich, you will be able to do the work of God, and they don’t want that to be done.”

He pointed to the sheer scale of the annual RCCG convention as evidence that wealth can be a tool for God’s work.

“Just imagine, how can we have this kind of convention with all the millions of people around? I was among the children this morning- the little, little ones up to the teenagers, they outnumber us the adults. It is incredible. You wonder, how can we have this kind of gathering for a whole week and everybody is fed? Can a poor man do this kind of thing?”

Adeboye maintained that prosperity enables evangelism and missionary work.

“They don’t want you to be rich so that we cannot send missionaries to the whole world. They say you are supposed to be poor, you are a Christian. Is that so? They say you are a Christian, don’t talk about financial breakthrough. Tell me, in what nation do you go and get to the petrol station, and they fill your car, and you say, ‘I am a Christian, I don’t have to pay’?”