Is the Prosperity Gospel Leading Believers Astray?
What happens when faith is measured by financial success, health, and positive declarations?
In this episode of Honest Christian Conversations, I’m joined once again by Chad Wagner, pastor of Excelsior Springs Church, to examine the teachings commonly known as the prosperity gospel and their growing influence within modern Christianity.
Together, we explore how doctrines that promise wealth and health in exchange for faith often blur the line between biblical truth and self-empowerment ideology. This conversation challenges the idea that words carry creative power equal to God’s—and addresses how such teachings can leave believers feeling guilty, disillusioned, or spiritually bound when life doesn’t go as promised.
Rather than offering quick fixes or emotional hype, this episode calls listeners to step back and evaluate faith through an eternal lens. We talk about why genuine faith is not transactional, how Scripture portrays suffering and endurance, and why discernment is essential when teachings emphasize personal success over humility and dependence on God.
Throughout the episode, we wrestle with questions many believers are asking:
• Does faith guarantee material blessings and physical health?
• How do Word of Faith teachings differ from biblical Christianity?
• What happens when spiritual success is measured by outward prosperity?
This episode invites listeners to move beyond surface-level promises and rediscover a faith rooted in Scripture, humility, and a deeper relationship with Christ—one that remains steady even when circumstances are challenging.
🎧 Listen to the full episode to step into this critical conversation.
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Wife. Mother of five. Podcaster. Fiction Novelist
Ana is the host of the Honest Christian Conversations podcast and a prodigal saved by God’s unending grace.
She grew up in a legalistic Christian home where asking questions often felt wrong. In her early twenties, overwhelmed by confusion and hurt, she walked away from her faith. Yet even then, God’s love never stopped pursuing her. At thirty years old—and after a painful second divorce—He brought her back to himself, and she has never looked back.
As Ana returned to Christ, she began rebuilding her faith from the ground up and asked the questions she once feared to ask. Along that journey, she discovered inconsistencies, misplaced teachings, and even lies woven into the Christianity she grew up with. Instead of destroying her faith, this only deepened it. Out of that discovery, she founded Honest Christian Conversations. Ana's heart is to help others navigate the same tension she once lived with: wanting to know the real Jesus while sorting through the noise of deceptive teachings, spiritual manipulation, and “wolves in sheep’s clothing.”
Everything she creates flows from gratitude for the God who rescued her, restored her, and continues to shape her into who He intended her to be.
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