It's a little hard to sleep after watching things like this...

Last night as I was getting ready for bed I turned on the television just in time to see one of America's favorite health, wealth and prosperity preachers. His gigantic church was full, every last seat, full of Americans being told that they were created to be happy, in the name of God. It absolutely broke my heart. And it made me really, really angry to the point that I wanted to throw the remote control through the television.

He said if there are people in our life who make things hard for us, we need to just let them go. He said we should be surrounding ourselves with people who only uplift and encourage us. He said God didn't want us to be depressed and that it was a waste of our life to be that way. He said we shouldn't be carrying around baggage and that at the end of each day it's as easy as saying, "God I release all of this to you. I don't need it in my life." Wow. If only he were right. If only it were just that easy. How do you look out at 10,000 people, all with their own stories of extreme hurt and pain and tell them that waking up with a smile on their face is as easy as saying, "God I release this to you." If that's what God wanted it would happen. But it's a lie. And it's not the Gospel. And I don't know how anyone walked out of that place encouraged rather than down on themselves because they can't live up to that.

I was sad when he was saying that you should have this kind of mentality and be happy. But I was angry when he started using the word joy. None of that is true joy. None of it. It's a lie being fed to thousands of people who were completely soaking it in, word by word. Satan has completely captivated America with comfort, with the idea that God created us to be happy, to avoid and run from anything that might knock us off our happy, plastic pedastal. If that's what we're all chasing and believing, God's work is never going to get accomplished. And person by person we're slipping away.

I'm probably more sensitive to it right now for a number of reasons. I can't really handle people preaching nonsense, but I really can't handle seeing how many people are buying it. Following Christ is not about a life of happiness. It's not about just being a good person and doing good things because they make you feel good about yourself. It's not about "making every moment count" by getting rid of everything hard in your life.

It's a life marked by suffering.

Anyway...just needed to get that off my heart and I figured this was a better outlet than writing a scathing letter to someone who would never read it anyway. John Piper does a much better job talking about it than I ever could and Matthias' Lot made a fabulous video to go with his sermon so I'll just leave you with that...