1 Timothy 6:6-10  "But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs."

How can this passage ever fit into the teachings of people like Kenneth Copeland, Benny Hinn and Bishop Eddie Long?

Take a minute and look at this quote from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

"We're not just a church, we're an international corporation, " Long said. "We're not just a bumbling bunch of preachers who can't talk and all we're doing is baptizing babies. I deal with the White House. I deal with Tony Blair. I deal with presidents around this world. I pastor a multimillion-dollar congregation.

"You've got to put me on a different scale than the little black preacher sitting over there that's supposed to be just getting by because the people are suffering."

Now read back over what Paul said to Timothy.  Do you see any qualifiers in there?  Does it say that if you are someone who deals with the White House you deserve to make more money than the preacher who is faithfully giving out God's word every day, going to the hospital to pray with the sick members of his congregation, rolling up his sleeves and working to clear debris, side by side with those who have lost everything in a tornado?

And in this one quote, you can already see that Long is not biblical in his beliefs (baptizing babies).  And when we compare his statements to the passage in 1 Timothy and look at the lifestyle this man is living, we can see that it doesn't line up to God's truth.

What ever happened to contentment?  To people being content with what they have and not constantly grabbing for more, more money, more things?

These preachers that are claiming that God wants everyone rich have obviously not read this passage.  Well, they probably have and have twisted it around in their own minds and the minds of their followers so it says what they want it to say instead of what it actually does.

Isn't it time to put aside this false teaching of the prosperity gospel and look at the truth of God's word?

Most people are familiar with Oprah Winfrey's book club.  If she selects their book, a relatively obscure author is suddenly thrust into the spot light and guaranteed sales beyond what they ever imagined.  January's selection brought to light a man that most Christians had never heard of, Eckhart Tolle.

Unless you are an Oprah fan, you might still not have heard of Eckhart Tolle or the philosophy he teaches, but if you are a Christian, you need to be aware of what it is all about because it is affecting those around you, how they think and how they define God.

Although Oprah claims it is a philosophy that is quite compatible with her own Christianity, it contradicts what the Bible teaches as Christianity.

On her site, Oprah has a video clip of her commenting on this quote (that she says she loves):  "Man mad God in his own image.  The eternal, the infinite and unnamable was reduced to a mental idol that you had to believe in and worship as my God or our God."

Here is the transcript of that clip:

"The reason this struck me so is because so many wars have been fought over arguments, created websites about my God versus our God verses the God verses the one and only God and what is so incredible to me about this, this statement, is that we have truly no concept because our human brain cannot even behold the magnificence of that which we try to formulate or, uh, reduce to one word, God.  There's no way that your mind can even conceive of the power and omniscience of that word.  That's why I love that statement so much."

This follows along with Oprah's beliefs that everyone's path to God is equally valid, that everyone's idea of God is just as right as everyone else's.

Then I read what Jesus Himself said in John 14:6, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

Do these two philosophies line up?  Not at all!  Whose word am I going to take about it, Oprah's or Jesus'?  Not even a question on it.  I'm going to believe what Jesus said is 100% true and if Oprah calls herself a Christian yet denies this basic, foundational belief of Christianity, then I refuse to believe her commitment is true.  It's like saying you are going to be married yet you still continue to go out and date as if you weren't.

Either Jesus is the only way to God or He isn't.  They both cannot be true.

For more on this topic, I suggest you visit Apologetics.com and listen to their podcast on the topic.  It's a real eye opener.