I’m really sorry to hear about your experience. I’m not surprised by the way you’ve been treated by churches and Christians because I think most churches and Christians would respond similarly – not just NCC. I’ve been a Christian long enough to know that we Christians all fall short – and especially big organizational churches. And thus I’ve learned not to expect much from organizations and churches and even Christian individuals, even though we should – Acts 2:44-45, Acts 4:32-35.

This is of course not the way Christianity should be, but I guess it’s a sad reality that it’s this way. It only goes to show that only God is good and we thank God for people like David Chen.

I’ll contact you as I want to help as much as I can. And if anyone reading this wants to help Joseph, drop me an email at idealist at stillhaventfound.org

I called and made appointments to see the pastor and he told me a lot of advise that were not what i needed from the church. and he asked me to lower my expectations with my thoughts on how the church can help me. i give tithes to this church and now when i need financial help from them they told me no and should go to CDC and ask them instead. what kind of a church helps thousands and thousands of charity groups when they don’t even want to help just one. Now i am penniless and don’t even have anything to eat and have been starving. and what did they tell me? we will stand in faith with your situation and pray…i have done all that!!!! don’t they think i have done all that? praying, reading the bible, believing? i have approached CDC and they rejected my application because last year i already applied for aid. and for 2 years i could not get a permanent job. and to think that i didn’t pray for a miracle? i prayed all day all night, and nothing seems to happened. i am alone and without family. they were divorced when i was 18 years ago and have been living alone ever since.

i am the only child and know no relatives. my friends have all left me and i have no one else to help me except Jesus and God. and is not the body of christ the church? for once i thought that even if the world rejected me and not helped me i could have at least have the church to help me, a place where i can depend on, and this is the first time i have approached the church for help and they turn me down. All the things mentioned in the bible of how the church represents in a christian’s life has suddenly turned 180 degrees on me when all they say was call the cdc to help you. they collected $21 million dollars from the last miracle seed sunday this year which i also gave with the last of my money and now not even a single cent trickle out of their pockets to help me…all i got after 8 years of tidings is $110, $100 for the first appointment and $10 yesterday. how much can this last me until? i have to work for a full month before i get paid than and nothing else was given to me. is this how a church helps its members? all i wanted to asked the pastor was to help me with my back rents amounting to $3700 so that i wont get evicted but it seems too much for them, though they are pouring millions and millions into a new building which means nothing to me now because that building is not going to feed me or help me with my rents. I have been tiding and I am not exaggerating but it is more than the amount I required to help me along. For 8 years every time I get paid, regardless of how much, I would tithe. Am I ashamed to be asking it back, honestly no one cares if I live or die, I am alone when it comes to my problems, so I really don’t care either. I used to but now with the church’s attitude towards me, I really don’t care anymore.

I don’t know why i am writing this email to you, or how it can help me but i guess i just want to know is it right for a church not to help its members? I am not like some other who owns condo, cars and fancy hand iphones and yet asked for financial aid. i have no phone because i sold it, no gold, no car, no home. I sold all I have that were sellable and gave a portion to new creation church as well and the pastor knows it and yet nothing came out except the reply was ” we will stand in faith with you in prayers” about your financial situation, but we cant help you with money. how can this be? how can a church that preaches grace, generosity and truth suddenly turn their back to me? i prayed to God to help me everyday and feed me. the last thing i wanted to do was to ask the church for help but after all that i can think of finally run out, i thought perhaps the church will help after all that is where i get my bread from. but not even crumbs did they give. what kind of church does pastor joseph prince runs? i was very hurt and sad by the way they treated me. and as i was waiting to see the pastor, the staff can even boast about taking long holidays while i was hungry and tired from walking all the way to church to seek help. the only kind person that gave me food was DAVID CHEN, who is not a pastor, he was the only one who bought me macdonald’s food, something i have not eaten for almost a year. but than he was not the decision maker, he told me all the decisions are done by the pastors. They said no. please explain to me the rational when it comes to tidings, its so fast for the churches to collect but it comes to giving and helping others they just say go to CDC or is it just me. what is the meaning of this. By the way I joined one of their care groups and to my surprise one of its members told me after hearing about my situation, ” I am glad you did not ask me for money, actually I am very relieved that you did not mentioned it.” At that point I just lost my appetite even though I was so hungry before and I just gave up attending.

One non believer who knows me even asked me, why is your church not helping you? you give so much to the church and now when your really in need they turn you down? do you know how shameful it feels like for me to hear that? and they ask me to join their religion instead. but i did not because deep down inside i know GOD is good and kind and merciful and generous but the church is making me hate how i feel right now towards God because the church is the body of christ and to see how cold and selfish new creation church has been to my situation has left me dry to the born towards God’s love for me. By the way I have gone to chinese temples and even they give me food and money to find work and travel. They did not say to me “call CDC” and I don’t even tithe to them.

I contacted SOS and even they asked me to approach my church for financial aid. And yet I still tithe to new creation church believing in the goodness of christ, but never did I know that at the last day of my greatest challenges, they would tell me call CDC and a lot of “should have done this and that and this and that” advices. like i quote pastor prince phrases” i don’t need an actor to act out my drowning when i KNOW i am drowning”, I need a helping hand. But it seems that in my case, Jesus has choose not to use the church as the channel to help me, according to the church that is.

By the way i don’t think new creation church knows how CDC processes each case files. It usually takes a month before you know if the request for financial aid is accepted or not and the maximum they will aid you with is $200 (for a one time only). I find it ridicules again because CDC is not the body of christ but the government. So why don’t they ask CDC to bless them when it comes to raising funds to help spread the gospel by building a new church at one north at the costs of $billion of dollars. Yes I love to see more and more people getting saved by Jesus but after getting saved who will helped them if they are in need? like myself? push everything to Jesus and the CDC, because this is what the church is for? Free advise and not a single cent to spare? Is this faith and grace? or just faith no grace, and a reason not to get involve into other people’s sad stories, again maybe it is just me they choose not to help. By the way new creation church could and probably will ban me from coming again but I have no intention to return.

I have not given up on Jesus or God but I have given up on the church and its people because all they can say is “you have to make appointment to see the pastor because he is very busy, to talk and advise you what to do, the rest is out of the question especially money but please ask CDC to help you with that”. God bless and Shalom. Whether you are hungry or penniless is not our problem but Jesus your savior’s problem and the CDC because we have the financial assistance policy. GOD knows what this policy is because I don’t.

I thought when I was young I had lost my only family, but when I found this church I was hopeful at least here I found brothers and sisters, but in the end I only found people who treated me as a stranger and a burden to their time tables except DAVID CHEN whom not knowing me is the only one in new creation church in all my 8 years, treated me like a human being who is hungry and bought me lunch.

Jared, yes, I think that’s one reason. I’m sure there are others but I have to reflect more and can’t put it into words yet. I think there could be a good argument that the material blessings promised in the OT to Abraham (and used often to support the case that God desires to prosper us) is presented differently in the NT – it seems the focus is less material and more spiritual. If that’s true (and I still have to reflect more on this), that doesn’t mean there aren’t Scriptures to support the fact that God does want New Covenant Christians to prosper. I think there are.

Stanley, thanks for Lip Kee’s post. I like what he wrote. However, I do also think that contentment is to be satisfied even though supply doesn’t and will not come. That seems to be what Paul talks about in Scripture. He faced many bad things and did not have all his needs/wants met. Yet he was contented and satisfied. So I think there’s a place for that.

Having said that, I do believe that our posture should be to expect good from God and not to just passively accept our lot without actively seeking God to supply us with His abundance. This is where I disagree with those Christians who are overly critical of the prosperity message. They are afraid to expect much from a good God and will just accept anything that comes their way without expecting anything of God. And if they don’t ask, they don’t get. We should always seek His Kingdom come on this earth and His Kingdom and reign is accompanied with wonderful blessings. But if we don’t get it, we ought to still be satisfied and contented.

I just read Lip Kee’s latest post and I think what he said about contentment best describes NCC’s prosperity preaching:

To be content is to know God has supplied, is supplying, and will continue to supply, so that one could:
- be generous (manifested through giving and sharing) rather than be covetous (expressed through accumulating and hoarding); and
- be diligent (and exercise good stewardship) rather than complacent (and display laziness).

A person covets because of a poverty mindset – thinking he does not have enough. A person becomes complacent when he lacks godly wisdom – not understanding the greater purpose of prosperity. A person is content when he believes he is blessed with prosperity for a purpose – i.e. he possesses an abundance mindset and godly wisdom.

Covetousness and complacency are the two extremes. Contentment is the middle path. A contented person is neither covetous nor complacent. He enjoys and employs what he receives from God. He is blessed. And he is a blessing.

“If your preaching focuses more on calling Christians to sacrifice and to help the poor and do missions, will it actually result in that happening?”

this really is the crux of the matter, isn’t it? and it isn’t just social justice, it’s the same with spiritual warfare/dealing with sin, with faith, with walking in the light of God’s word here and now. sometimes i feel that i’m hearing too many shoulds/shouldnots, and while they can be and often do challenge me, they do not empower in the same way experiencing grace daily does.

“I may not be entirely comfortable with New Creation’s teaching on prosperity,”

Is this because of what you wrote later on on prosperity with a purpose, etc?