Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Televangelists

* In an effort to encourage my writing, I will be adding shorter posts from time to time. This is one of them.

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver recently did an episode on televangelists:

I'm certainly not denying scriptures like Luke 6:38, but those scriptures can be abused when taken out of context of the larger gospel. When you give only to get you will not reap -- that's greed, AKA the love of money (which is the root of all evil, 1 Timothy 6:10).

This is what I love about the Sacred Romance -- your *heart* in the matter makes the difference, not just what you *do* (Matthew 6:1-2,5, 15:8).

     Money is one of the places where Christianity shines, I think. The world says, "Chase money. Money is your security." God says, "Chase Me; I'm your security."
     The point, I think, is not to be obsessed about money. I don't really think about money that much. I think about being productive, being fruitful, being a man, working hard -- and trusting God to take care of us.
     I think this is what Jesus meant when he said, "Don't worry about money. Focus on God and His way of doing things, and He will take care of you." (Matthew 6:19-20, 24-34)
     How we look at that -- what we believe about that -- changes everything.
~ John Eldredge

Although I don't believe that God *wants* people to be poor ("you can't *help* the poor if you *are* the poor"), saying God wants you to be rich isn't exactly right, either

The difference?

Followers of God focus on others; the rich focus on themselves (by buying “parsonages” for $6,500,000).