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Reply Flag 0 Thumbs Up Thumbs Down BrimstoneAGS (4)
United States

Idon’t see this as properity preaching at all but instead as a call to give from ourselves in faith that God might return to us what we need if we take care of the needs of others. Properity preachers and followers want affluence for themselves and so they try to manipulate thier own Lord into giving them wealth and instead do not notice the wealth that God gives in allowing us to give to others.

22.11.2011

Reply Flag 0 Thumbs Up Thumbs Down NathanHollenbeck (0)
United States
@ BrimstoneAGS:

So it partly depends on from whom it comes? In this case, Basil was certainly above reproach as someone who gave himself to a life of intentional poverty, (bequeathing Eastern Christian monasticism with its written discipline for all generations to come in the process) and then using all the wealth available to him to found a hospital and comprehensive social services center that probably didn’t have a true parallel until modern times. 

But what about Basil’s promise that God will give temporal returns on an act of giving in faith? My wife did casework visits at homeless shelters in Harlem and the Bronx, and there met people who gave their rent money at church because the preacher promised returns. They ended up destitute.

Is there a difference, there, too?

19.12.2011

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