God is most glorified when we declare him sufficient in the midst of great loss; just as Job did. The prosperity gospel teaches that we live for God’s material blessings now. Job teaches that we live for God’s eternal glory. At the heart of the prosperity gospel is our value. At the heart of Job, and all of Scripture, is God’s value.
Satan is a proponent of the prosperity gospel, as he told God that Job’s faithfulness was predicated on God’s blessings. And if those blessings were taken away, Job would curse God to his face. Satan was implying that God was valuable only for what he gave Job. But God contends just the opposite. God asserts that Job loves him for who he is, not for what he offers him.
And when Job is able to say in Chapter 1:21, after losing everything, “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord”, he declares the surpassing worth of God. God himself, not his gifts, is Job’s true treasure. and such is the poverty of the prosperity gospel. As the psalmist declares: “Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.” (Psalm 73:25–26).
May we all, like Job, find our treasure in God, who is our portion forever. But, of course, there is a greater example of trading gold for God’s glory: Jesus, the Son of God, for whom and through whom all the world, the galaxies, the universe were created, gave up all the splendor of heaven, emptying himself to glorify his Father.
Born into poverty, he was a man who worked with his hands. He wandered from town to town without a place to lay his head. He laid down his very life on the cross in obedience to the Father. All to secure for his Father the incomparable treasure of a holy people—children of God from every tribe and tongue and nation; redeemed from their sin and eternally, testifying to the immeasurable grace and love of God Almighty.
Like Moses, we must choose. Will we set our hearts on the treasures of this world or the glory of eternity spent with Jesus Christ? There is certainly no comparison!
