Even As Your Soul Prospers 

--3 John. 1-4:  “The elder, to my dear friend Gaius, whom I love in the truth. 2 Dear friend, I pray that you may enjoy good health and that all may go well with you, even as your soul is getting along well. 3 It gave me great joy to have some brothers come and tell about your faithfulness to the truth and how you continue to walk in the truth. 4 I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.” (NIV)

--3 John 2: “Beloved, I pray that in all respects you may prosper and be in good health, just as your souls prospers.” (NAS) 

Before we proceed with this lesson, I want to offer a disclaimer. I do not believe that John is saying (as the Word of Faith people teach): “Beloved I WISH ABOVE ALL THINGS THAT YOU MAY PROSPER AND BE IN HEALTH.”  By taking the KJV rendering of this passage, and by erroneously emphasizing part of it, they make it seem that God’s top priorities are Health and Prosperity.  About this misinterpretation of Scripture I wish to say three things: 1) This is a greeting, like farewell (may you fare well), hello (health to you), Good Day (may you have a good day).. It is a kind of blessing and good wish from John to his friend Gaius. As such, it represents John’s wishes for Gaius, not God’s top priority for all Christians. 2) Later translations make the emphasis that these teachers give the passage impossible. “I pray that in all respects you may prosper.” “I pray that you may enjoy good health and that all may go well with you...” Of course God wants to bless us in every way, but our health and material prosperity are not His top priority. 3) It takes a very shallow, unspiritual mind to think that ABOVE ALL ELSE God wants us to “prosper” materially and to “be in health.” 

Having said that, I want to point out a feature of this verse which, I believe, does stand out: that is the relation between physical health and material prosperity and the PROSPERITY OF THE SOUL. “I pray that you may enjoy good health and that all may go well with you, even as your soul is getting along well.” Notice that the rest of the passage shows where John’s (and God’s) real emphasis lies:

It gave me great joy to have some brothers come and tell about your faithful-ness to the truth and how you continue to walk in the truth. 4 I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.” Better health and material prosperity may indeed sometimes be by-products of spiritual health and spiritual wealth; indeed, they nearly always are. But that is certainly not the first priority. 

John Wesley loved the poor and preferred lower and middle-class people to the rich. He spent his life ministering the Gospel of Truth to the poor. But he expressed a certain fear that, once the poor converts began to lead ordered, righteous lives, they would prosper materially and tend to forget God.  That is, in fact, precisely what happened. The movement that started in homes, barns, and open fields, and ‘across the tracks,’ as we say, at length moved uptown, built beautiful buildings, and became what it is today—a worldly, rich, uptown church, which pays lip service to John Wesley, but long ago forsook his teachings.

Concerning money Wesley told his converts to, “Earn all you can; save all you can; give all you can.”  He wrote: “The fault does not lie in money, but in them that use it. It may be used ill: and what may not? But it may likewise be used well...In the hands of His children, it is food for the hungry, drink for the thirsty, raiment for the naked: it gives to the traveler and the stranger where to lay his head. By it we...may be a defense for the oppressed...It is, therefore, of the highest concern, that all who fear God know how to employ this valuable talent: that they be instructed how it may answer these glorious ends, and in the highest degree." 

God may safely bless people with wealth who will use it for the Kingdom of God. With such teaching it’s no wonder that Methodists did not remain poor for long. 

The Bible states clearly how God thinks about poverty and riches. Poverty is considered a curse, a condition to be pitied and avoided. Repeatedly He warns against neglecting or exploiting the poor. Poverty is a wretched condition, not a blessing. But riches are always treated as a dangerous good, a blessing that can easily turn bitter. The ideal is to be content with what one has and not to “desire to be rich.” What Wesley desired for his converts was that they learn the principles of Wisdom in wealth. God knows we have need of money. But our attitude should be that of Agur in Proverbs chapter 30: 

--Prov. 30:8-9:  “...give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the LORD?’ Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God” 

 “Neither poverty nor riches,” but rather “give us this day our daily bread.”  As I said, poverty is a curse, and all should wish to avoid or escape from it. And our wish for our friends, like the Apostle John’s wish for his friend Gaius, is that they might prosper and be in health. But even more that they “are walking in the truth.” 

If our souls are prospering, if we are walking in Truth, money will play a very small part in our lives, and (with or without) money all of our needs will be supplied. 

--II Cor. 9:8:  “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.” That’s about as comprehensive a promise as anyone could wish for.

--1Tim. 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.” The main thing is always the prosperity of the soul.

--Prov. 28:6: “Better a poor man whose walk is blameless than a rich man whose ways are perverse.” 

It’s true that “The blessing of the LORD brings wealth, and he adds no trouble to it.” (Prov. 10:22).  God makes some righteous people rich because their wealth is no threat to their soul. But the Devil can make people rich also. And for the most part great wealth is a snare and a danger to the soul. As Jesus said, “With what difficulty will the rich man enter the Kingdom of Heaven!”  More often than not where spiritual things are concerned God  “...has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty” (Luke 1:53).   

However, God intends for us to pay our bills. We are not to be in debt: “Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another...” (Rom.  13:8) 

There are many reasons a person might be poor. Some are poor because of injustice, through no fault of their own (Prov. 10:23); some through unwise decisions have fallen into poverty (Prov. 11:29; 15:27); some a result of slothfulness and unwillingness to work (Prov. 20:13; 18:9); some may be poor because they have not shown pity on others in need (Prov. 21:13). Some are poor because of their own vices—drugs, alcohol, dishonesty (Prov. 20:1; 23:21). 

But I don’t believe anyone can stay in poverty—by which I mean lacking  necessities and being unable to pay bills—unless there is some condition of the soul that is not prospering. For the promise of God is that He will “supply all of our needs according to the riches of His glory” (Phil. 4:19). Someone may be under a curse of poverty through wrong thinking. I believe I once had a “spirit of poverty,” because of which I tended to glorify poverty as a spiritual asset. I think that same spirit is present in much Catholic ascetic teaching, and in many second-generation welfare families. Whatever the reason a Christian finds himself either temporarily or permanently in poverty, it’s good to look for a spiritual cause. The principle is material prosperity, as the soul prospers.